Cataraqui Cemetery, Kingston, Ontario

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Cataraqui Cemetery is one of the best examples of a medium-sized rural or garden cemetery in Canada. It has a range of noteworthy monuments of historic and artistic merit, a Gothic Revival-style Lodge carefully designed to complement the naturalistic and picturesque values of the site, and a number of attractive painted iron and zinc sculptures from the second half of the 19th century. It is the final resting place of many noteworthy Canadians, including Canada’s first Prime Minister, Sir John A. Macdonald. 

The “rural cemetery” or garden-cemetery movement had its origins at the beginning of the 19th century in Paris, France, before its influence spread to England, the United States, and then to Canada during the period from the late 1840s to the 1870s. In Canada, moral, social and health considerations similar to those in France, England and the United States were at the origin of the establishment of rural cemeteries. Rural cemeteries often replaced smaller cemeteries within city limits, which had become overcrowded due to a lack of space to expand. 

Cataraqui Cemetery is among the first rural cemeteries established in Canada. Its design is associated with the movement for garden-cemeteries because of its uneven topography and naturalistic landscape with many varied perspectives laid out in the picturesque manner, its curvilinear roads and islets of irregular curved shapes and differing sizes as well as its ponds and its range of plantings. The cemetery is comprised of two main roads, called East and West avenues, which wind along the cemetery and are joined to each other by shorter curved roads. A multitude of funerary monuments of varying models, styles and materials are spread throughout the cemetery, and decorative features include flowers, fountains and female allegorical figures. 

The cemetery, which was developed after the original plan, has had few changes over the course of the 20th century and is in a good state of conservation. Today, it is the principal burying ground for the City of Kingston.

 

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Hon. Catherine McKenna Parks Canada Society and Culture