Birmingham
Lafayette
Cemetery

The Quakers enjoyed peace in their new building until events in early September 1777 would change their world as they once knew it. General George Washington led his Continental forces into defensive positions along the Brandywine Creek at Chads' Ford awaiting the British forces traveling down the Nottingham Road advancing towards Philadelphia. Expecting a conflict at the Brandywine, Washington ordered the Quakers out of their Meetinghouse so it could be prepared to be used as a field hospital for the sick and wounded in his army. The wooden benches were set outside under the trees to hold the mid-week Meeting.

On the morning of September 11, 1777 Generals Howe and Cornwallis led approximately 9,000 British forces on a flanking march around Washington’s defenses. In the afternoon the two armies would conflict just north of the Birmingham Meetinghouse at Street Road. The Continental forces took up defensive positions behind the stone boundary walls of the Friends cemetery. As the fighting passed through the property there were casualties on both sides. At the close of the day of fighting in what would become referred to as the Battle of Brandywine, the British would take control of the field hospital at the Meetinghouse. As typical with 18th century warfare, fallen soldiers were buried nearby where they fell. Some of the dead from both sides were buried in a mass grave within the walls of the burial ground nearby the Meetinghouse. This mass grave would be identified with a stone marker in 1920 by members of the Brandywine Valley Farmers Club. The original Friends burial ground would continue to be used into the 1840’s at which time an expansion would be necessary.

This mass grave would be identified with a stone marker in 1920 by members of the Brandywine Valley Farmers Club. The original Friends burial ground would continue to be used into the 1840’s at which time an expansion would be necessary.

By 1842 a new burial ground would be opened for Quaker burials. There would be an entrance along the public road (now closed) running along the front of the Meetinghouse, running east past the octagonal schoolhouse. A stone boundary wall was erected on the south side of the new burial ground.

By the time of the opening of the new section of the cemetery, the Quaker traditions had evolved to allow simple headstones marking grave sites. The new section of the cemetery was, for a time, used by the Quakers in both the Orthodox and Hicksite branches of the Meeting (the split started in 1828 and lasted into the 1920’s).

In 1874 a plot of land for use as a cemetery was purchased by the Orthodox Meeting about 1/8 mile south along Birmingham Road. The Hicksite branch of Birmingham Meeting continued using the now expanded stone Meetinghouse adjacent to the original cemetery. The cemetery board was very strict on abiding by the customs of the Religious Society of Friends where large, superfluous headstones or monuments were forbidden. This practice would create conflict in the years to come.By 1890 the board of directors of the Birmingham Cemetery had decided to require the lowering of the gravestones to aid in the mowing of the lawns. This new ruling led to much dispute within families of those already buried within the cemetery. John Gheen Taylor, who had a wife and daughter previously buried in the cemetery led the opposition.

Taylor drafted and published a public criticism and filed a suit against the cemetery which ultimately reversed the gravestone decision. Taylor who had been stopped from constructing a granite monument on his family plot had been quietly buying up financial interests in the cemetery and had amassed a majority of the shares. This now gave him power to start to influence others who were of the same thinking to run for positions in the cemetery governing organization.

After an election in 1891, Taylor and many of his supporters had won positions on the board of directors of the lot holders of the cemetery. The new board would officially change the name of the organization to the Birmingham Lafayette Cemetery Association. It was during this same time period that the once Quaker burial ground was opened up to the public as a non-denominational cemetery.

The original section of the Friends burial ground adjacent to the Meetinghouse was sub divided and continued to be maintained by Birmingham Meeting. In 1892 a new cemetery entrance off of Birmingham Road was added. During the next decades an allée of cedar tees was planted along a new lane within the burial ground. By the mid-20th century, specimen trees and shrubs were planted throughout the expanded burial grounds, and a grid work of lanes were planned for future expansion.

The unused land within the plot was used as farmland for many years until additional expansions necessitated conversion into new burial plots.

The original 19th century caretaker’s storage structure was an earthen roofed mound with serpentine stone end walls with a set of hinged wooden doors located in the section of the cemetery closest to the octagonal schoolhouse. Equipment for digging graves, mowing the lawns, planting trees and shrubs, and caring for the headstones was kept within the structure.

As the years went by and the maintenance work required more modern equipment a new larger storage building and office was constructed within the cemetery.

The Taylor Monuments Visitors to the cemetery will notice a series of granite monuments near the Birmingham Road entrance. These monuments were constructed between 1893 and 1913 by John Gheen Taylor, a retired banker and broker in West Chester, using primarily his own wealth. With no family left living nearby, Taylor, the cemetery president had planned to spend his entire fortune by the end of his life creating monuments to his family and to the heroes of the Battle of Brandywine.

In the late 19th century Taylor began his monument building projects on his family plot. A granite monument was constructed topped with a white marble kneeling statuary of his wife who had died over two decades earlier. In addition to his wife, Taylor had also lost his 16 month old daughter in 1865. He created marble statuary to be placed on the grave of his late daughter.

Originally at the base of the monument were located white marble statues of Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and of Lazarus. Within the family plot are the remains of Taylor’s parents, aunt and uncle, siblings, wife, daughter, and finally Taylor himself. Located nearby the Birmingham Road cemetery entrance, a monument was erected as a tribute to Joseph McClellan by his descendants.

Located nearby the Birmingham Road cemetery entrance, a monument was erected as a tribute to Joseph McClellan by his descendants. McClellan who had served in the 9th Pennsylvania regiment on Birmingham Hill. The monument was dedicated on September 11, 1895, the 118th anniversary of the Battle of Brandywine.

The next monument was built by John G. Taylor to honor his great grandfather, Colonel Isaac Taylor who served in the 7th Pennsylvania regiment which guarded Pyle’s Ford below Chads' Ford leading up to the battle and fell back to defend Chads' Ford as the British advanced. Completed in 1898, the 12’ granite base is topped by a large granite ball.

Completed in 1900, a 45’ tall granite monument sitting on a pyramidal base was dedicated to the memory of the Marquis de Lafayette and Casimir Pulaski who fought at the Battle of Brandywine.

The original plan was to adorn the top of the monument with a bronze statue of Lafayette but it never was completed. On the monument are the engraved names of two of the foreign officers who fought in the Battle of Brandywine, the Marquis de Lafayette and Casimir Count Pulaski, as well as 3 other French officers who made significant contributions with the Continental forces in the American Revolution; Gen. Rochambeau, Gen. St. Simons, and Admiral DeGrasse.

Located between the Taylor and Lafayette monuments, started in 1902, the next monument built was in honor of Casimir Pulaski, Daniel Wells, and Henry McComas who fought at the battle. The granite canopy was completed in preparation for the statuary carved in Carrara, Italy to be delivered. There are two marble tablets on the rear of the monument honoring the three men.