Hilltop Cemetry

Orland, Maine

 

Visitors to the state of Maine will find that the state in general is a quiet and peaceful place. Long meandering roads will lead you through sleepy villages and towns. Yet few people realize that Maine is a place of great history. Sometimes that history is local and other times it is of national significance. On a fall day, I set out to explore a peaceful little cemetery which I had often passed. Locals know it well, but to your average tourist, it is hidden away. The town of Orland, Maine sits off the beaten path, although most visitors heading to the tourist town of bar Harbor pass very near to it, and even through a small portion of it.  It is located in midcoast Maine and can be found just north of Bucksport. I have always know it to be a small community, with no great industries and several small farms.

 

 

The Hilltop Cemetery is located on the Castine Road. As you turn off of Route 1 onto the Castine Road, you enter the center of Orland. However, if you blink you could very well miss it. A short ways out of town on the right sits a quiet little cemetery surrounded by white fence. I have often passed by on my way to Castine and thought about exploring this little cemetery. It was almost as if the traditional white farm fence was beckoning me to enter. So on a rainy fall day I finally did. What I found was certainly interesting. The cemetery is the resting place of many of the towns founding families. Although little is known about many of them, this little cemetery also boasts of some wonderful examples of tombstone art. Orland, was settled in the 1700's a short time after Bucksport, so there are still several stones whose designs and dates date back to that era. As I have stated in posts before, this is not so common in this part of Maine. Most older cemeteries in Maine contain the white and granite stones so commonly associated with the 1800's. So any cemetery that offers up these gems here is refreshing.

 

The cemetery contains a few people/ families of interest. Several members of the Hancock family are buried here and from what I have been able to ascertain are relatives of the famous John Hancock, the well known signer of the Declaration of Independence. The other person of interest is a man by the name of Samuel Keyes. He was a Captain during the Revolutionary War and was in charge of a Company of Maine militia. I was able to find out very little about Keyes, except that he served under Colonel Jonathan Buck. If one remebers Buck is the namesake of the town of Bucksport, and whose memorial has created many legends. You can see my post on the Buck Cemetery for more details about this. With this in mind, it is very likely that Keyes, like Buck, played a role in the fatal Penobscot Expedition. He is also know as one of the founders of Orland and one record indicated he built the first ship in the area.

 

 

One final thing is worth noting. Near the back center of the cemetery sits the largest monument in the place. Most of the stones sit low to the ground and take the form of the traditional gravestone. However, this monumnet takes an obelisk form and seemingly towers over the rest. The thing that makes it interesting is that it is completely blank. What is or was the purpose of this monument is a mystery to me. Perhaps some reader of this blog would care to enlighten, should they know more. At first I thought maybe the inscription had simply worn away, but the facade of ths tone seem sto have never been touched. It is almost as though it was placed there to memorialize someone and never completed.

 

 

 

Should you desire to explore this little cemetery, you will not be dissapointed. I praticularly reccomend the fall for this. There are a few large trees in the cemetery and in the fall the leaves turn a very beautiful yellow. To get there follow Rt. 1 through Bucksport and turn right onto the Castine Road. You will find the cemetery on your right about two miles down the road.