Setauket Presbyterian Church Cemetery in Setauket, New York

About

Get directions Setauket, New York, USA

Coordinates: 40.94556, -73.11042
Cemetery ID:

Members have Contributed

About these numbers These percentages indicate the number of Find a Grave memorials that have a grave photo or GPS coordinates. We don't know the total number of burials in a cemetery, so we cannot calculate a percentage of those with memorials, photos or GPS coordinates.

Remove Ads

Photos

41 photo requests.

The cemetery of the Setauket Presbyterian Church began over 350 years ago when it became the first burying ground in the Town of Brookhaven. In 1674, a meeting house was built facing the village green to serve for church meetings, a town hall and a school house. A proper Presbyterian Church was erected on the site in 1715 and the grave yard continued to expand. The early graves were very badly disturbed in 1776 when the British converted the sanctuary building into an armed fort, barracks and stable when they occupied Long Island during the American Revolution and dug up the cemetery to make an earthworks and stockade fence around the building. On August 22, 1777 the fortified church was attacked by a raiding party of colonials and the building suffered much damage during the skirmish. It should also be noted that the now famous spy ring organized by the Pastor's son, Maj. Benjamin Tallmadge Jr. was made up of fellow Presbyterians and operated very successfully throughout the revolution.

The sanctuary was completely rebuilt in 1812 to repair the ravages of the Battle of Setauket and a later lightning strike and fire that severely damaged the building. The cemetery contains a wealth of early American history, despite the British desecrations, and includes the first spy, Abraham Woodhull , and many other names from Setauket's and Brookhaven Town's early days. William Sidney Mount, a famous genre painter, has a prominent monument dated 1868.