PROVIDENCE, PA.
DR. SILAS B.
ROBINSON
& WIFE, MARIA (SLOCUM) ROBINSON, REBURIED FROM TRIPP BURYING
GROUND
Article exactly as it appeared originally in the "Scranton Truth" newspaper, and was later published in the book, "The Historical Record", a quarterly publication of The Wilkes-Barre Record, 1899, edited by F.C. Johnson
Article exactly as it appeared originally in the "Scranton Truth" newspaper, and was later published in the book, "The Historical Record", a quarterly publication of The Wilkes-Barre Record, 1899, edited by F.C. Johnson
Doctor Robinson's Grave
One hundred years ago there was but a single burying place from the head of the Lackawanna to its mouth at Pittston. This was known as Tripp's graveyard, on the edge of Capouse, near the Mt. Pleasant Colliery. There were no public grounds, all were private. In Slocum Hollow the Slocum place was the second, while on the Hyde Park hillside was the third burial ground in the valley. In Dunmore the DePuy was next started. The Griffin, the Hermans, the McDaniels, the Lutz and the Mott grounds were private places for the dead, with no head-stones of marble, and few had common stones reared by tender hands.
Dr. Silas B. Robinson came into the valley in 1823. He was the second physician here. He settled in Providence, where he died in 1860. He was buried in the Tripp place. On the sunny side of the hill under the sighing of a small pine tree, he was buried by the Masons, of which he was a prominent member. His death was sudden. In the evening he visited a patient in the village, returning home he shelled a bushel of corn for his chickens, took a dose of medicine for a cold, went to bed and died within an hour. He was a good man. He never drank or smoked. He always visited his patients on foot, carried his own medicine, and never wrote a prescription in his life. Valerian, soda and herbs made up his "materia medica", and his patients generally recovered. He belonged to no church, but he knew the Bible by heart yet he was very profane. His profanity, however, like some men's prayers, never meant any harm. He never had a lawsuit in his life, and yet this excellent man has no monument or stone to mark the spot where he was laid. It is a shame that this is so. Hiram Lodge of Masons appointed a committee to erect a monument, but as his son Dr. Giles Robinson promised to do it, it was abandoned. Mr. Storrs, of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western RR., promised to remove the remains to Dunmore but thus far nothing has been done. His estate is estimated at $50,000, and it is a shame that so good a man should be covered up by culm, forgotten and unknown.
By the way, his son, Dr. Giles R., died recently and few knew the cause of his death. In the lower portion of Providence, opposite the blacksmith shop of Mr. Bright, stands a small building where W.W. Winton and the late W.W. Ketcham, D.R. Randall and others once kept school half a century ago. In the winter of 1839 Loran Dewy, an Abingtonian, kept school here and Giles, a lad of fourteen, went to him. Being a mischievous boy, the master jerked him off his seat one day with such violence as to fracture his hip. He never recovered from the fall. It led to necrosis, or death of the bone, and it discharged matter up to the day of his death. -- Dr. H. Hollister in "Scranton Truth"
The location of the Tripp Burying Ground was not next to the Tripp House as often stated in recent years, but was relatively close to it.
The late George Broadbent's grandmother, Katy Tripp was the last Tripp to live in the Tripp House. George knew that the Tripp Burial Ground was not next to the house as often suggested, but also did not know just exactly on the property where it was located.
An early illustration of a Tripp burial, showed the coach and horses departing from the front porch of the Tripp House after services, for the burial.
"Tripp Graveyard Most Likely First In Scranton"
Charles A. McCarthy's research, "Burying Grounds" in the region, revealed that Tripp's Graveyard, near the later site of the Mount Pleasant Colliery, probably was the first cemetery on the site of present day Scranton. [Also same site of Diamond Shaft in Providence.]
In the June, 1887 Wilkes Barre Record, Dr. H.H. Hollister wrote;
"As early as 1787 there was but a single burying place from the head of the Lackawanna River to it's mouth at Pittston. This was known as Tripp's Graveyard, on the edge of Capoose."
"Isaac Tripp, 'a man of five and 30," built a shelter among the pines in Capoose Meadow in 1771."
Dr Hollister recalled that Dr. Silas B. Robinson, who in 1823 came to Providence Township, "where he creditably practiced his profession nearly 40 years, " died in 1860 and was interred in the old Tripp "burying ground."
Dr. Hollister stated, "it was later covered by a culm bank."
Seventeen bodies of the Tripp's, two LaFrance's, and one Keen, had been removed to two Tripp plots in Forest Hill Cemetery in Dunmore, Pa. in early November, 1870 and November, 1872. where they are marked today with the original gravestones laid flat upon their graves. (Link: Forest Hill Cemetery Data Base)
Dr. Silas B. Robinson and wife Maria Slocum Robinson, were removed and reburied in 1878 in Dunmore Cemetery in Dunmore, Pa., and are so marked with a monument there today.
Information provided by Norma V Reese and Ralph W Robinson II
Copywrited By "Robbie" - Ralph W. Robinson,
II.
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W. Robinson
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