Parish Graveyard
Buried Treasures
The graveyard of St. James Parish is a unique legacy - a tiny bit of colonial Wilmington and the only surviving part of the first St. James Church. The south door of the 1771 nave opened into the “burying ground.” The 153 graves represent 175 people, some Anglicans who owned pews, some who simply wanted a Christian burial.
They were mariners, merchants, innkeepers, builders, planters, patriots, Revolutionary War officers, a poet, a doctor of physic, a sea captain, little children, mothers young and old who died with their newborns.
They came from England, Scotland, Ireland, and France, from all along the eastern seaboard and the West Indies to start new lives, creating a new town and ultimately a new nation. Many are mentioned in the earliest town records.
