Bridge Street Cemetery, Northampton, Massachusetts
Bridge Street Cemetery is located at 156 Bridge Street (Route 9) in Northampton next Lampron Park and the Bridge Street Elementary School.  Established in 1661, it is the oldest cemetery in Northampton.  The City of Northampton oversees the cemetery.

Bridge Street Cemetery attracts visitors from all over the country in search of gravestones of ancestors.  According to the cemetery division, the official burial records were lost to fire.  Over the centuries, local individuals have studied its history, compiled inscriptions, plotted gravesite locations and researched the names carved in stone as well as those who carved the stones.  Others have advocated for the preservation of deteriorating stones and some maintain the grounds and oversee day-to-day operations as part of the city's cemetery division.   Below are some of the sources compiled by local historians as well as the City of Northampton Master Preservation Plan (2016).
Resources on the Bridge Street Cemetery

Plan of a Part of the Bridge Street Cemetery, Northampton, Mass.
Survey and Plan by E.C. Davis, 1885
Original Map traced, with additions February 1918 by E.C. Davis, C.E.
The above map redrawn, May 1931 by Walter E. Corbin, Florence, Mass.
This plot map shows the location of family plots identified by surname (family last names).  The street names on the map are no longer marked inside the cemetery.
Inscriptions on the Grave Stones in the Grave Yards of Northampton
Transcribed by Thomas Bridgman

Inscriptions on the Grave Stones in the Grave Yards of Northampton, and of other towns in the Valley of the Connecticut, as Springfield, Amherst, Hadley, Hatfield, Deerfield, &c. with Brief Annals of Northampton.

Transcribed by Thomas Bridgman.

Northampton, MA: Hopkins, Bridgman & Co., 1850.

Click on this link to view a digital version of Bridgman's Epitaphs on the Internet Archive website.
City of Northampton Bridge Street Cemetery Preservation Master Plan
Funded by the Northampton Community Preservation Committee
This plan was compiled by Martha Lyon of Martha Lyon Landscape Architecture, LLC with input from city residents and gravestone preservation consultants.  In 2015, the Ward Three Neighborhood Association and the Department of Public Works secured a Northampton Community Preservation Committee grant to draft a long-term preservation plan for the Bridge Street Cemetery.  
Additional Resources
A virtual tour of selected gravestones compiled by students in a Teaching Local History course at Smith College in the late 1990s.
  • Find-A-Grave website
Visit the Find-A-Grave website to find gravestones in the Bridge Street Cemetery from local contributors, including P.K. Magruder.
  • Walter E. Corbin Collection, Hampshire Room for Local History, Forbes Library
Walter E. Corbin was a local historian, genealogist and photographer who indexed area cemeteries and photographed headstones.  Forbes Library, the public library for Northampton, houses the Walter E. Corbin Collection of photographs and research materials.  Please contact the Hampshire Room for Local History at Forbes Library for a research appointment.  Learn more on the library website.