Rockville Cemetery and Bristol and Mexico Monument is a historic

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 at Lynbrook in

Nassau County, New York Nassau County ( ) is a suburban County (United States), county located on Long Island, immediately to the east of New York City, bordering the Long Island Sound on the north and the open Atlantic Ocean to the south. As of the 2020 United St ...

. The cemetery started as a small local burial ground in 1799. It subsequently came to be the final resting place of many early Near Rockaway settlers. The cemetery features a monument to two nearby shipwrecks, the ''

Bristol Bristol () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, the most populous city in the region. Built around the River Avon, Bristol, River Avon, it is bordered by t ...

'' and the ''

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

'', in the winter of 1836–1837. The Bristol and Mexico Monument marks the mass grave of the 139 passengers, mostly Irish immigrants fleeing famine. The shipwrecks resulted in changes to

New York Harbor New York Harbor is a bay that covers all of the Upper Bay. It is at the mouth of the Hudson River near the East River tidal estuary on the East Coast of the United States. New York Harbor is generally synonymous with Upper New York Bay, ...

approach practices. ''Note:'' This includes an
''Accompanying photographs''
/ref> In 1953, a 20-year-old Ruth Bader wrote an article in ''New York Folklore Quarterly'' about the memorial. She described the poor condition of the memorial at the time, and the very negative opinion of the memorial from Nathaniel Prime, author of ''History of Long Island'', which was published five years after the memorial was completed. She also included a brief history of the ships' voyages from Liverpool in October 1836, and their losses off of Long Island in late November 1836 and early January 1837. The monument was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2015. Two notable persons are buried in Rockville. They are blues musician

Reverend Gary Davis Gary D. Davis (April 30, 1896 – May 5, 1972), known as Reverend Gary Davis and Blind Gary Davis, was a blues and gospel singer who was also proficient on the banjo, guitar and harmonica. Born in Laurens, South Carolina and blind since infanc ...

(1896–1972) and B&B/doo-wop musician James "Shep" Sheppard of

Shep and the Limelites Shep and the Limelites was an American doo-wop trio of the early 1960s, composed of James "Shep" Sheppard (September 24, 1935 – January 24, 1970), Clarence Bassett (March 13, 1936 – January 25, 2005) and Charles Baskerville (July 6, 1936 – ...

(1935–1970).

References

External links

* {{National Register of Historic Places in New York Cemeteries on the National Register of Historic Places in New York (state) 1799 establishments in New York (state) Buildings and structures in Nassau County, New York National Register of Historic Places in Nassau County, New York