Smith Pond Cemetery

Added: Sep 5, 2008

From: maryann712

Duration: 1:9

Music by Kevin Macleod, http://www.incompetech.com The following text tells of a tragedy involving the Rice family, which occurred on Smith Pond, New Year's Day, 1866. It is an excerpt from the Smith Pond home page and can be found at http://www.smithpondny.com/history.htm (The Rice family grave is marked by a large white monument with the symbol of clasped hands carved near the top. In this video there is a spider resting on the monument.) "There have been two known drownings in Smith Pond. The first on record occurred on January 1, 1866, when William and Abby Rice were returning home from a New Years party at one of the Smith homes. Their neighbors, Hannah and Israel Baldwin, were traveling near them in their sleigh. When the Rices approached the school yard, William Rice drove his team and sleigh towards the pond and told the Baldwins that he and his wife were going home across the ice. Mr. Baldwin is quoted to have said, "The long way around may be the best way." Meanwhile, the Rice's young daughter had stayed at the Baldwin home while her folks were gone. When Mr. Baldwin arrived, he told the child that her parents would soon be home and that it would be alright for her to go. This, she did, and she waited quite a long time for her mother and father to return. When they didn't, she went back to the Baldwins and told them that something must be wrong. Israel Baldwin went in search of William and Abby and found a large hole in the ice where the horses and sleigh had broken through. William's hat lay on the ice. The horses' heads were up against the ice. The neighbors gathered at daybreak and, with grapnel hooks and ropes, managed to pull William, Abby, and the horses and sleigh out of the water. An account of this tragedy is in the weekly newspaper in the Bath library. William and Abby rice left two young daughters, Margery and Lydia Jane. They are buried in the Smith Pond Cemetery; a large monument markes their graves and the story is engraved on the stone. "Father & Mother" Family Burial Place of Wm. and Abby Rice William Rice ae 46 y's 11 mo. 9 d's Abby Rice ae 45 y's 11 mo. 10 d's They were drowned in Smith's Pond while driving across the ice about 8 o'clock in the evening of January 1, 1866 "Father, Mother: Ye Whose early guidance trained our minds Rest in the bosom of God till the kind sleep Of Death is over and a happier life Shall down to wake your insensible dust Gone off untimely, loved ones, rest in God."

Channel: Travel

Tags: cemetery  creepy  ghosts  ny  old  pond  scary  smith  spooky  yikes 

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