Tombstone Tuesday ~ Joseph and Anna Rolfe, Derry, New Hampshire

This tombstone was photographed at the Forest Hill Cemetery in Derry, New Hampshire.  In 1781 this was located in Londonderry, New Hampshire (before the schism between Londonderry (west) and Derry (east).)

In 

Memory of

JOSEPH ROLFE

Died July 1781,

AEt. 53

ANNA, his wife,

Died Aug. 23, 1826

AEt. 88

B. Day Lowell

I found the marriage of Joseph Rolfe and Ester Rolfe on 24 February 1763 in the Newbury, Massachusetts vital records.  According to the website Rolph Reunion Database at www.rolphreuniondatabase.com  Joseph Rolfe was born on 14 May 1730 in Newubry, son of Samuel Rolfe and Judith Toppan.  He married first to his cousin, Esther Rolfe, the daughter of Henry Rolfe and Elizabeth Toppan.  He married his second wife, Anna, in 1775.  He was a patriot serving in the Revolutionary War as a seaman on the sloop "Tyrranicide".  Around 1780 he came to Londonderry, where he was buried with his second wife.  The first wife, Esther Rolfe, is buried in Newbury, Massachusetts. 

Benjamin Day was a famous stone carver from Lowell, Massachusetts.  This stone is carved in the typical neo classical style famous after the Revolutionary War with a weeping willow and classic Greek columns.  This is quite different from the Scots Irish stones of the early settlers with their geometric designs, and the skulls and winged souls of the Puritan settlers. 

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Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Tombstone Tuesday ~ Joseph and Anna Rolfe, Derry, New Hampshire", Nutfield Genealogy, posted February 6, 2018, (  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2018/02/tombstone-tuesday-joseph-and-anna-rolfe.html: accessed [access date]).