Hillside Cemetery in Boothbay, Maine

Boothbay’s permanent colonial resettlement began in 1730, when Colonel David Dunbar established a community called Townsend with Scots-Irish settlers from northern Ireland. The settlement was incorporated as Boothbay in 1764. Southport separated from Boothbay in 1842; that date does not mark Boothbay’s founding or renaming.

Hillside Cemetery preserves part of the town’s community history through its gravestones and memorials. Local historical collections include burial lists and a blueprint of the cemetery. Photographed in 2013, the cemetery contains upright headstones, family monuments, and military grave markers from different periods. One photograph records the marker of John H. Pinkham, identified as a Maine private in the Coast Artillery during World War I. Weathering, carved lettering, military emblems, and extensive lichen document changing forms of commemoration and the effects of time on the cemetery’s monuments.