Tombstone Tuesday Ancestral Magnets?

This Christmas Santa brought me these unusual magnets made from tombstone art of a member of my family tree. Mary Munroe (daughter of John Ball and Elizabeth Pierce) was born about 1651 and died in August 1692 in Lexington, Massachusetts.  She was the second wife (of three!) of William Munroe, a Scots prisoner of war captured at the Battle of Worcester and sentenced to forced indentured servitude in Boston.  They had ten children together.  I descend from William's first wife, Martha George.   I also descend from Mary's brother, John Ball, who married Sarah Bullard.  See the link below for my blog post on the BALL family. 

These details are 3D prints of details taken from the tombstone of Mary Ball Munroe. 

HEART AND SOUL

This small hearn adorns the gravestone of Mary Munroo

symbolizing the heart as the seat of the soul. Her sould was

released for its flight to Heaven upon her death

August 12, 1692 at the age of 41.  she is buried in the

Old Burial Ground, Lexington, Massachusetts.

This piece of historic cemetery art is cast

directly from the face of an old New England gravestone.

It is completely handmade and finished. Item #0110

MUNROO '92

A windged skull adorns the gravestone of Mary Munroo

as symbol of her sould flying to Heaven; the goal for

Colonists of her era.  She served 41 years and hoped

for eternal life when she died August 12, 1692.  She is 

buried in the Old Burial Ground, Lexington, Massachusetts.

This piece of historic cemetery art is cast

directly from the face of an old New England gravestone.

It is comepletely handmade and finished. Item #0109

These magnets were created by "The Gravestone Girls" who I have met at many genealogy conferences, and heard their cemetery lectures at many historical societies and libraries.  I have several other art pieces from ancestor's graves made by the Gravestone Girls.  There is a link to their website below where you can find a schedule of their events, and shop for art objects made from copies of New England gravestones. 

For the truly curious:

The Gravestone Girls website:   https://www.gravestonegirls.com/#/  

My original 2011 "Tombstone Tuesday" blog post on the gravestones of Mary Munroo and her husband William in Lexington, Massachusetts:    https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2011/06/munroes-in-lexington-ma-tombstone.html  

My Surname Saturday blog post on the BALL family:   https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2012/11/surname-saturday-ball-of-watertown.html

My Surname Saturday blog post on the MUNROE family of Lexington, Massachusetts:   https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2012/06/surname-saturday-munroe-of-lexington.html  

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To cite/link to this blog post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Tombstone Tuesday Ancestral Magnets?", Nutfield Genealogy, posted December 30, 2025, (  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2025/12/tombstone-tuesday-ancestral-magnets.html: accessed [access date]). 

Surname Saturday ~ Bullard of Watertown, Massachusetts

BULLARD

George Bullard became a freeman in Watertown, Massachusetts on 13 May 1641.  His land was next door to a Robert Bullard, his brother. His mother was Grace Bignett who died about 1629 in England and names her children in her will.  The names of her four sons disappear from English records about the same time they appear in New England. George and Robert Bullard lived in Watertown, and William settled in Dedham, and John in Medfield, Massachusetts.  This is a case where the myth "four brothers came to America" really is true!

George’s first wife Margaret died in Watertown at the same time as the birth of a daughter named Mary.  He married second to “Beatrice Hall, now wife of one George Bullard of Watertown” who was dismissed from the church of Boston to Watertown on 17 November 1644.  He had four children with Beatrice.  He married third to the widow Mary Marplehead. 

My descent from the Bullards daughters out in the first generations, when Sarah Bullard (1645 – 1722) married John Ball of Watertown and they had nine children.

For more information on the Bullard’s of Watertown see the New England Historic Genealogical Society Register, Volume 154, page 172 – 188, “The English Bullard Family Revisited and their Bignett Connection” by Clifford Stott and Myrtle Steves Hyde.  There is a mention in Henry Bond’s Genealogies of Watertown, page 147.   There is also a book Bullard and Allied Families, by Edgar J. Bullard, 1930.

My Bullard Genealogy:

Generation 1:  George Bullard, son of William Bullard and Grace Bignett,  born about 1607 in Barnham, Suffolk, England, died 14 January 1699 in Watertown, Massachusetts; married first to Margaret, married second to Beatrice Hall about 1640; married third to Mary Marplehead on 30 April 1655 in Watertown.

Generation 2:  Sarah Bullard, born 1645, died 8 May 1722 in Watertown; married on 17 August 1665 to John Ball, son of John Ball and Elizabeth Peirce, born 1644 at Watertown, died 8 May 1722.  Nine children.

Generation 3: Daniel Ball m. Mary Earl

Generation 4: Mary Ball m. Joseph Mixer

Generation 5: Lucy Mixer m. Andrew Munroe

Generation 6: Andrew Munroe m. Ruth Simonds

Generation 7: Luther Simonds Munroe m. Olive Flint

Generation 8: Phebe Cross Munroe m. Robert Wilson Wilkinson

Generation 9: Albert Munroe Wilkinson m. Isabella Lyons Bill

Generation 10: Donald Munroe Wilkinson m. Bertha Louise Roberts (my grandparents)

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Copyright 2012, Heather Wilkinson Rojo