Early Years
The first recorded burial in what is now Saint Joseph Cemetery was that of Bartholomeu Quinn, who died July 2, 1848. Father William McDonald, Manchester’s first permanently assigned Catholic priest, acquired land on a hillside overlooking the city’s West Side, more than two miles (3 km) from downtown when Mr. Quinn’s death made the establishment of a Catholic cemetery a necessity.
For more than twenty years, Father McDonald administered the cemetery from his rectory office at Saint Anne’s Church. The only known references in print, however, refer to it simply as “the Catholic cemetery in ‘Squog.” “‘Squog” is the nickname given to a broad expanse of land on the banks of the Piscataquog River near its confluence with the Merrimack River, all on Manchester’s West Side.
By 1869, the Catholic population had grown too large for just one parish. Bishop James Augustine Healy of Portland, Maine, to whose diocese Manchester still belonged, sent Father John O’Brien to assist Father McDonald by establishing a new parish, this one dedicated to Saint Joseph. Father O’Brien was succeeded by Father Denis Mary Bradley, who would go on to become New Hampshire’s first Catholic bishop. Under his pastorate, control of the cemetery was ceded to Saint Joseph parish. The cemetery has borne Saint Joseph’s name ever since.
Read more about this topic: St. Joseph Cemetery (Manchester, New Hampshire)
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