Benjamin La Trobe, 1786, father of the Rev. C. J. La Trobe, a man of distinguished excellence as a preacher, the editor of several religious works, and for a long time superintendent of the congregation in England. He removed many “absurdities which prevailed in their religious proceedings, and which had subjected the whole community to unmerited scandal.”
Christian Renatus, Count of Zinzendorf, May 28, 1832. There is against the south wall of the chapel a tablet to his memory. He was the only son of the celebrated Count Zinzendorf.
Mary Theresa Stonehouse, daughter of Sir John Crisp, Bart., and wife of the Rev. George Stonehouse, 1751. This monument is on the right of the preceding.
In this cemetery also lies buried an Esquimaux Indian, called Nunak. As he had not been baptized, he was not permitted to lie in the same division with the community, but was placed outside the walk under an elm tree, having an inscription to his memory in the same style as the rest of the Brethren.
The burial service of the church is particularly impressive. The coffin being deposited in the middle of the chapel, a hymn is sung by the congregation, for they value and carefully cultivate music as a science, and the responses of their liturgies are attended with peculiar effect. The Minister then delivers a discourse, in which some account is given of the deceased, with suitable exhortations. The form of service contained in their Liturgy is next read, and the congregation then follow the corpse, the men walking together, and the women the same. A scriptural passage is read, commencing as follows. “Meanwhile none of us liveth to himself; for whether we live, we live unto the Lord, and whether we die, we die unto the Lord,” &c. The following is then sung by the congregation:—
“Now to the earth let these remains In hope committed be, Until the body, chang’d, obtains Blest immortality.”
While the above verse is being sung the body is let down into the grave. A prayer is then offered, and the whole is concluded by singing a verse of another hymn.
The chapel at the north side of the burial ground occupies the site of the old stables of Beaufort House. It is a plain building, displaying no architectural adornments, and it is now upwards of fifty years since Divine service was performed in it by the brethren. For a long time it has been occupied as a schoolroom for the boys belonging to Park Chapel National and Sunday Schools, and most of the annual meetings of the numerous societies, which are supported by the congregation of Park Chapel, are at present held in it.