Mount Hope Roman Catholic Cemetery, Kitchener CC#4517

Linwood Avenue, Kitchener, Ontario

The Roman Catholic Section of  Mount Hope Cemetery, Kitchener

The first Roman Catholic cemetery in Berlin (Kitchener) was located in the churchyard of St. Mary's Roman Catholic at the southeast corner of Weber and Young Streets. The land for the church was purchased on August 15, 1854 from David Weber, but it was not until 1856 that the first St. Mary's Church was completed on the site. The first internment in the graveyard behind the church was on October 1, 1859. Several years later, in 1866, new rules were drafted by the Berlin Board of Health that prohibited the location of burial grounds adjacent to town churches.

In compliance with these regulations, the Roman Catholic congregration purchased land in 1868 in what was then open countryside but is now part of Kitchener Mount Hope Cemetery. Burials began in the new Roman Catholic Cemetery in 1869; the bodies that had been interred in the graveyard behind the church were moved to the new burial ground in the same year. The public cemetery was located on land purchased in 1868 also, and was near that of the Roman Catholic Cemtery.

The Roman Catholic Cemetery was enlarged by purchses of additional land in 1876, 1886 and 1907. A new fence was built in 1900 around the cemtery, and a cedar hedge was planted along the line between the Catholic and Public cemeteries. It was not until 1911 that Catholic and Public cemetery boards reached an agreement to permit right fo way through each other's portions of the cemtery. The hedge remained in place until 1956 when the City of Kitchener Cemetery Board assumed responsibility for the operation of the Roman Catholic Cemetery as part of the Mount Hope Cemetery. A line of large trees now marks the boundary between the two cemeteries.

Various names have been associated with the Roman Catholic Cemetery. Because of the proximity of both the Public and Roman Catholic cemeteries to a settlement named Greenbush, the cemetery at one time may have been referred to as the Greenbush Cemetery. The name of the Public cemetery section was changed to Mount Hope Cemetery in 1872. At some time after Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church was built in 1916, members of that congregation took over the operation of the Roman Catholic Cemetery. The cemetery, although used by the congreations of both St. Mary's and Sacred Heart Churches, was on occasion referred to as Sacred Heart Cemtery.

Rosemary Ambrose, Waterloo Region Branch, OGS 1996

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