Eastern Methodist Cemetery, also known as Old Ebenezer Cemetery and Ebenezer Cemetery, was a

cemetery A cemetery, burial ground, gravesite, graveyard, or a green space called a memorial park or memorial garden, is a place where the remains of many death, dead people are burial, buried or otherwise entombed. The word ''cemetery'' (from Greek ...

located in the Barney Circle neighborhood of

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

, in the United States. It was founded in 1824 as a privately owned

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

cemetery open to the public. (The earliest interment at Eastern Methodist came before the cemetery was incorporated. That was Ely Drown, who was buried there on August 18, 1823.) Its owner was the Fourth Street Methodist Church at Ebenezer Station (hence the nickname "Ebenezer Cemetery"). The cemetery was located one a city block bounded by D, E, 17th, and 18th Streets NE. It was across the street from and north of

Congressional Cemetery The Congressional Cemetery, officially Washington Parish Burial Ground, is a historic and active cemetery located at 1801 E Street in Washington, D.C., in the Hill East neighborhood on the west bank of the Anacostia River. It is the only American ...

. The cemetery was designed to hold 1,830 burial plots. But because of the cemetery's popularity, there were multiple burials in each grave, and by the 1890s the cemetery held more than 3,000 bodies. During the roughly 70 years in which the cemetery was in operation, many of the leading citizens of the Barney Circle,

Capitol Hill Capitol Hill is a neighborhoods in Washington, D.C., neighborhood in Washington, D.C., located in both the Northeast, Washington, D.C., Northeast and Southeast, Washington, D.C., Southeast quadrants. It is bounded by 14th Street SE & NE, F S ...

Kingman Park Kingman Park is a residential neighborhood in the Northeast quadrant of Washington, D.C., the United States capital city. Kingman Park's boundaries are 15th Street NE to the west; C Street SE to the south; Benning Road to the north; and Anacostia ...

, and

Atlas District The Atlas District (also known as the Atlas or the H Street Corridor) is an arts and entertainment district located in the Near Northeast neighborhood of Washington, DC. It runs along the resurgent H Street from the outskirts of Union Station t ...

were buried at Eastern Methodist Cemetery. The cemetery was never in good financial condition, however. The price of burial plots was too low to permit the cemetery to establish a perpetual care fund. Eastern Methodist Cemetery was built on marshy ground, however, and it was not very suitable as a burial ground. About 1890, the cemetery's trustees proposed closing the cemetery. To finance the disinterment of remains, the cemetery would be subdivided and sold for building lots. Lotholders, however, rejected the proposal. The trustees then sought a legal solution. In 1891, Congress enacted legislation allowing Eastern Methodist Cemetery to remove all bodies in the cemetery and subdivide and sell the land to finance their reinterment elsewhere. Some remains were claimed by family members. The Fourth Street Methodist Church agreed to disinter and box these remains, and reinter them at church expense at whatever local cemetery the family chose. Remains which went unclaimed were interred in mass graves at Congressional Cemetery. Although there initially was opposition among lotholders against the cemetery's closure, no lawsuit emerged. Disinterments commenced at the cemetery on October 1, 1892. By October 4, about 50 bodies had been removed from Eastern Methodist Cemetery, and cemetery officials were predicting that the cemetery would be cleared by the end of the year. Cemetery officials said that they had located nearly every grave listed in the cemetery's lot book, and full clearance of bodies from the grounds was almost certain. As of November 3, about 1,000 bodies remained to be unearthed, but officials said they were sure to have the work finished within three more weeks.

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