1971 - My Friend Jeremiah

Well, this is it, I've just about run out of pre-written missives so postings are going to slooooow down a bit. There are several almost ready & a few titles with enough to remind me of what I'm doing, but I'm down to only a dozen or so of those. I still intend to post weekly if at all possible. Until then - this is Jeremiah...


1971 – My Friend Jeremiah

As we sat under the 1st Street bridge I absently mindedly chipped away at a piece of concrete that appeared to be buried in the hillside. Bob, Albert, Bill and I had been out exploring the neighborhood and had stopped for a shady rest and a cigarette. The canyons and hillsides in our neighborhood were a fascinating Exploratorium of wild areas and, like this one, piles of debris that was obviously bulldozed to the edge of the hill when clearing the land for the apartment building immediately above. As we casually discussed things that were important at the time I noticed the block of concrete I had been clearing of dirt and debris had lettering on its face. The writing was only a few inches above the broken section and was filled with dried mud and lawn clippings. Thinking I had discovered a buried cornerstone I enlisted Albert’s help and we quickly uncovered the entire script. We quickly discovered this was not a large block of “stone” buried in the hill but, indeed, this relic lay on the surface but was well-covered by dried mud and debris. As we revealed more and more of the piece it became increasingly clear that this was not a cornerstone or a piece of discarded building materials. We were in the process of uncovering a tombstone.

On the stone was carved:

Jeremiah Feeley
Died Oct 20, 1886
Age 42
Erected by the Plasterers Union

Feeling it wasn’t right to leave this representation of someone’s life buried in the rubble and discarded we hefted the stone up the hill, all 80 lbs worth, and to Bob & Albert’s apartment. We were 4 sailors living in apartments near downtown in between cruises to WestPac. For a year or so Bob kept Jeremiah until his girlfriend convinced him that having a tombstone against a living room wall wasn’t her idea of good interior decoration. Jeremiah immediately moved in with Bill & me until I was released from the service and returned home leaving Jeremiah with Bill. A year later when I returned Jeremiah still stood against a wall and was greeted like an old friend. The next couple of years were mobile ones for me as I moved from house to house, band to band or situation to situation but Jeremiah traveled with me to every new abode. In 1977 I moved to Southern Illinois for almost a year. Jeremiah spent that year in the garden of my ex-landlord and keyboard player Terry. Upon my re-settling back in San Diego I took possession of Jeremiah and he’s been my companion since.

He is, of course, the perfect friend: he never complains about my lifestyle, acquaintances or girlfriends, and eventually had the opportunity to offer feedback on my choice of bride and life-partner, Kathleen. His approval was implied by his silence. He never tells me to turn the heat up or to open a window. He never offers unwanted advice and doesn’t let slip any of my secrets. He doesn’t complain about his situation or his weight.

He has now been with me for over 35 years and over that time I managed to do very little of research on Jeremiah, but eventually came to invent his story for myself.

My (completely fictional) story of Jeremiah was:

Jeremiah was born in Massachusetts – this is where most of the Feeley’s loved during the time of his birth – and was raised on the family farm until as a young man he enlisted in the army to fight in the Civil War. A true patriot he served well in battle but was undistinguished from his companions. Following the war he took off to make his fortune in California. The California Gold Rush started the year before his birth so the legend of easy pickings was tempting. Although the rush officially, or historically, ended in 1855 Jeremiah was a young teenager before the excitement died down and the possibility of fortune was still a strong call to a young man without direction. In 1860 when the War-Between-the-States began Jeremiah was 17 and enlistment was a tempting way to get away from the farm life, the restrictions of family on a young man, and a way to adventure and the possibility of a career and certainly gaining the respect of his peers and elders. In 1865 the war ended and a 22-year old fully grown Jeremiah emerged intact from the battles and had grown into a self-sufficient, self-confident adult…ready and willing to take on the world. California still called. He left for California by enlisting on a merchant ship headed in the direction he wanted to go. The trip took the long trip through the Straits-Of-Magellan spending 1 week becalmed on the Equator and 2-days waiting for a break in the weather so they could more easily pass through the Straits. Close calls and a stomach that never settled enough for him to enjoy any part of the voyage, convinced him he wasn’t really meant to spend his life at sea. Arriving in San Diego, California he jumped ship to make his fortune on his own. Unfortunately California wasn’t everything he hoped it would be. Gold mining was hard work that was now becoming a corporate-held field of skill that hired thousands of uneducated fortune-seekers and sent them underground to do dangerous and unpleasant work for poverty wages. Jeremiah could immediately see this was not the path he was destined to take. Finding work as an honest laborer he eventually became a skilled plasterer who eventually joined the local church and practiced the quiet behavior of a good parishioner and solid citizen until his death after which, the Plasterer’s Union erected his tombstone as authorized by the union membership. He was buried in the church graveyard which fell into greater and greater disrepair over the years but where he resided until the graveyard was completely lost and built over by encroaching civilization which pushed his marker into the canyon.

Except for the part about the Feeleys mostly living in Massachusetts, that was my, completely, made-up story.

When the web started up I searched on occasion for Jeremiah’s name. Time after time I was unsuccessful. A couple of years ago I ran across a mention of a book about historic San Diego graveyards. Noticing the author, Professor Seth Mallios, was on staff at UCSD I looked at the school website and found the author still listed. I found this on the web at a UCSD website:

“Mallios and his team recorded more than 10,000 historic gravestone markers of various size and distinction. Between 1,650 and 3,400 individuals are buried in Calvary Cemetery in Mission Hills. Among those interred are some of San Diego's earliest pioneers.
As Mallios discovered, the cemetery was abandoned in 1968 and all of the gravestones were knocked down and unceremoniously dumped into a ravine at Mount Hope Cemetery.
"The only indication that Calvary Cemetery ever existed in Mission Hills is a memorial of about 140 gravestones at Pioneer Park," Mallios said. "People walking though there today probably don't realize they are walking on the graves of several thousand individuals."

I sent an e-mail with the information relating where and when Jeremiah was found. With very few e-mails Seth suggested I look in a closed cemetery in what is now Pioneer Park. I received this reply:

“Interesting question. Here's my best guess, considering the date of death, location of the gravestone, and the date you found it. Mr. Feeley was most likely buried in Mission Hills at the Cavalry Cemetery. That cemetery was heavily vandalized before the city decided to raze the remaining stones and dump them at the Mt. Hope Cemetery in the 1970s. Cavalry Cemetery is now Pioneer Park, but there is a memorial in the northeast corner. A number of plaques list the people known to have been buried there. (The bodies still lie under the grass.) You could look for Mr. Feeley name. Some of the original records were destroyed by fire, so it's not an exhaustive list. It would have been easy for vandals to pick up a 75 lb. stone for an interesting lawn decoration, or to throw off a bridge. Perhaps it was in someone's yard for a while, and the new owners decided to toss it in the closest ravine.
Cavalry Cemetery was a Catholic Cemetery, and Feeley was most likely Irish Catholic, so Plan B would be to check out the records at the Catholic Diocese. Let me know what you find out.”

After a short trip to Old Town and the surrounding area I found the park and, in a remote corner spotted some large graveyard monuments. Overlooking this little area was a large brass plate that listed all of the interred people. I found Jeremiah on this plaque.

Pulling a map out I realized that the path up 1st Avenue to Market Street and onto Mt. Hope would have to be the route taken to Mt. Hope as the cemetery closing was just a couple of years before I-805 was opened. During this research I also found out that Pioneer Park had been on the tour of “Haunted San Diego” and was known to the neighborhood as the nighttime location of strange occurrences including ghostly figures and sounds. It had been this way since the stones were moved. Upon investigation of these occurrences the investigator found out the stones had never arrived at Mt. Hope where they were to be stored in a dedicated area. Just a few years ago a groundskeeper had been cleaning some debris in a remote canyon area of Mt. Hope and found the stones thrown into a haphazard pile. They were soon recovered and placed in the designated area – although I know for a fact they were not ALL there as Jeremiah still resides with me. Soon after this recovery Pioneer Park was removed from the Haunted San Diego tour as the park no longer seemed so.

Now the remaining facts as I have found them in the last couple of years:

In 2006 a list of veterans of various wars were placed on a search file and free access was offered for a month. Looking there I found:

6-Weeks after his death his wife applied for Civil War Veterans benefits…in Massachusetts. Now I know part of my made-up story was correct but I now have a new mystery: Did it take her over a month to find out her husband was dead or did it take a month to travel from San Diego to Massachusetts. I’ve not found him on any family tree and cannot trace a descendant which I had hoped to contact to see if they wanted Jeremiah.

Failing that I imagine he will need to go to Mt. Hope to join his ghostly companions.