Lebanon Cemetery was an

African-American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa. ...

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 ...

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

, established in 1849. It was one of only two private African-American cemeteries in Philadelphia at the time. Lebanon Cemetery was condemned in 1899. The bodies were reinterred in 1902 to Eden Cemetery in Collingdale, Pennsylvania, and the cemetery was closed in 1903. The former location of the cemetery is now the street corner of 19th Street and Snyder Avenue in

South Philadelphia South Philadelphia, nicknamed South Philly, is the section of Philadelphia bounded by South Street to the north, the Delaware River to the east and south, and the Schuylkill River to the west."." ''City of Philadelphia''. Retrieved November 8, ...

History

Lebanon Cemetery was chartered on January 24, 1849 by Jacob C. White on the Passyunk Road near present-day Nineteenth Street and Snyder Avenue in

. It was a

nonsectarian Nonsectarian institutions are secular institutions or other organizations not affiliated with or restricted to a particular religious group. Academic sphere Many North American universities identify themselves as being nonsectarian, such as B ...

cemetery designated for African Americans since they were excluded from most of the new

rural cemeteries A rural cemetery or garden cemetery is a style of cemetery that became popular in the United States and Europe in the mid-19th century due to the overcrowding and health concerns of urban cemeteries, which tended to be churchyards. Rural cemeter ...

. The cemetery was a part of the United States National Cemetery System during the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...

with a leased lot within the cemetery for soldiers that died in nearby hospitals. 339 African-American veterans of the U.S. Civil War were buried in a reserved section of Lebanon Cemetery and were reinterred to the

Philadelphia National Cemetery Philadelphia National Cemetery is a United States National Cemetery located in the West Oak Lane, Philadelphia, West Oak Lane neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1862 as nine leased lots in seven private cemeterie ...

in 1885. See p. 233. In the early 1870s, Henry Jones, an affluent African-American man who worked as a caterer, purchased a lot for burial in Mount Moriah Cemetery in Philadelphia. After his death in 1875, cemetery authorities refused to bury him based on his race. A lawsuit was filed against the Mount Moriah Cemetery Association and in 1876 the

Pennsylvania Supreme Court The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Unified Judicial System. It began in 1684 as the Provincial Court, and casual references to it as the "Supreme Court" of Pennsylvania were made offici ...

ruled that Jones had the right to be buried in the cemetery. During the court case, Jones' body was stored at a burial vault at Lebanon Cemetery. His family had planned to bury him at Lebanon Cemetery but he may have been buried at the Church of St. James the Less in Philadelphia instead. In 1882, a Philadelphia Press newspaper story sparked a sensational trial after a journalist caught body snatchers from the

Jefferson Medical College Thomas Jefferson University is a private research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Established in its earliest form in 1824, the university officially combined with Philadelphia University in 2017. The university is ...

stealing corpses for use as

cadavers A cadaver, often known as a corpse, is a dead human body. Cadavers are used by medical students, physicians and other scientists to study anatomy, identify disease sites, determine causes of death, and provide tissue to repair a defect in a liv ...

by medical students. Four grave robbers, including the cemetery supervisor, were arrested and sentenced to

Moyamensing Prison Moyamensing Prison was a prison in the South Philadelphia neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was designed by Thomas Ustick Walter. Its cornerstone was laid on April 2, 1832; it opened on October 19, 1835, was in use until 1963, and w ...

for stealing bodies and providing them to Jefferson Medical College at the rate of $15 a body. After the arrests, it was determined that the body snatching had been going on for nine years and several hundred corpses had been sold to Jefferson Medical College. The reports of bodysnatching caused an uproar in the African-American community in Philadelphia. The renowned surgeon and Jefferson Medical College anatomy professor,

William S. Forbes William Smith Forbes (10 February 1831 – 17 December 1905)Staff report (December 18, 1905) Dr. William Smith Forbes. (obituary) ''New York Times'' was an American physician who served as demonstrator of anatomy at Jefferson Medical College. H ...

, was arrested for his role in the grave robbery but was acquitted. Forbes helped write the 1867 Pennsylvania Law named the "Anatomy Act" which called for hospitals, prisons and mental health wards to provide the bodies of those that had no family or funds for burial to medical schools for anatomical research. Due in part to the Lebanon Cemetery grave robbery scandal, the Pennsylvania Anatomy Act of 1883 was passed which provided for legal means by which medical colleges could obtain cadavers without having to buy them from grave robbers. Eden Cemetery Entrance

By 1889, the cemetery was overcrowded and in disrepair. Expansion of the city began to erode the size of the cemetery. By 1900, Lebanon Cemetery had shrunk from the original 11 acres down to 6 with over 17,000 corpses. In 1899, the city condemned the cemetery and in 1902 relocated the bodies to Eden Cemetery in Collingdale, Pennsylvania. Lebanon Cemetery was closed in 1903.

Notable interments

* Aaron Anderson (1811-1886), Landsman USS Wyandank, US Civil War Congressional Medal of Honor recipient for heroic actions on Mattox Creek, VA, 17 MAR 1865. * John C. Bowers (1811–1873), entrepreneur, organist and abolitionist * Octavius Valentine Catto (1839–1871), civil rights leader and baseball pioneer * Rachel Cliff (1805–1885), delegate to the 1855 Colored Convention * Emilie Davis (1839–1889), writer * Nathaniel W. Depee (1812–1868), activist and abolitionist * Absalom Jones (1746–1818), abolitionist and clergyman, buried at the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Reinterred in 1887 to Lebanon Cemetery when the church was demolished. * Grace A. Mapps (c. 1835–1897), educator, administrator and poet

References

Citations Sources * {{cite book , last = Keels , first = Thomas H. , year = 2003 , title = Philadelphia Graveyards & Cemeteries , publisher = Arcadia Publishing , isbn = 0-7385-1229-X , url = https://books.google.com/books?id=rzNvCR4_-2YC&q=pauline+oberdorfer+minor

External links

The Library Company of Philadelphia – Chapel of the Lebanon Cemetery Lithograph by G. Dubois
1849 establishments in Pennsylvania African-American cemeteries in Pennsylvania African-American history in Philadelphia Body snatching Cemeteries established in the 1840s Cemeteries in Philadelphia Former cemeteries United States national cemeteries