ference in their holdings will explain why their names are given in the deed in the order they are.
The four trustees lived at the most interesting period of the history of Western Pennsylvania, and their lives are a part of the history of the region. Colonel John Gibson, called "Horsehead" Gibson by the Indians, sometime commandant of Fort Pitt, is buried in Allegheny Cemetery, Pittsburgh. Dr. Bedford lies buried at the head of South Twelfth Street, on the south side of Pittsburgh, overlooking the former town of Birmingham, which he laid out.[1]
John Ormsby is the only one of the four trustees buried in Trinity Church-yard. It was Mr. Ormsby's wont to write on the fly-leaves of his books, inserting extra sheets for the purpose in some cases, and we find in these personal notes frequent evidence of his religious feeling and resignation under affliction.
Although the land conveyed by the Penns was not the site of the first church, it was from the beginning used as a burying-ground. Here are to be found the graves of British officers, Revolutionary heroes, early lawyers, doctors, and men of affairs; even an Indian chief has here found Christian burial, and, what is the more remarkable, his body reposed beneath the chancel of "Old Trinity Church," as the second edifice erected in 1825 is commonly called.[2]
The silent "God's acre" in the midst of the city's busy
- ↑ Dr. Bedford came to Pittsburgh shortly after 1770, and was the first practising physician in what is now Allegheny County. In 1786 there were two physicians here, and it has been a frequent matter of conjecture who the other was. In the Pittsburgh Gazette, under date of March 24, 1787, we find named among the trustees of the Pittsburgh Academy, afterwards merged into the Western University of Pennsylvania, then incorporated, "Doctors Nathaniel Bedford and Thomas Parker." Dr. George Stevenson, another early physician, came here from Carlisle in 1794, and was probably the third physician here.
- ↑ In the Pennsylvania Magazine, Vol. IV. p. 122 et seq., a letter from Bishop Upfold is printed, giving the epitaphs of the following from Trinity Church-yard, although not transcribed literally in all cases: Mio-qua-coo na-caw or Red Pole, Captain Richard Mather of the Royal Americans, Captain Samuel Dawson of the 8th Pennsylvania Foot, John and Jane (McAllister) Ormsby, and Major Abraham Kirkpatrick.
