Dust to dust: Phila. abolitionist reburied

Isaac Ohayon wasn't sure what he hit with the blade of his shovel.

While converting a vacant 160-year-old South Philadelphia church into a house in July, he struck something a few inches down in the yard. Brushing away the dirt, he found a slab of slate covering a brick vault.

What was this chamber? A capped well? It didn't appear on any survey.

Ohayon lifted the slate and peered into the dark space below, not knowing he had stumbled upon the grave of one of the great leaders of the nation's 19th-century abolitionist movement: the Rev. Stephen Gloucester.

A former slave and one of the first black ordained Presbyterian ministers in the United States, Gloucester helped organize the city's Underground Railroad, the Leavitt Anti-Slavery Society, and the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society.

When he died in 1850, he was buried in front of the church he built - Lombard Central Presbyterian in the 800 block of Lombard Street, two years after it opened. He was later joined in the vault by his wife, Ann, and church elder John Winrow.

"It's an amazing story," said Ohayon, who with his wife, Naomi Alter-Ohayon, has spent months transforming the dilapidated church into a luxury home.

Yesterday, after spending about $15,000 for legal and archaeological work and court filing fees to arrange reinterment, the Ohayons came to graveside ceremonies at the cemetery next to Old Pine Street Church at Fourth Street.

"It's often remarked that we stand on the shoulders of giants. . . . We stand on the shoulders of Stephen Gloucester," said the Rev. Randy Barge, pastor of Calvin Presbyterian Church in West Philadelphia.

Noting the timing of the ceremony - on the day that President-elect Barack Obama was meeting with governors blocks away - the pastor said: "It would have been hard to imagine [in Gloucester's day] that we would have elected a black man president of the United States.

". . . By faith, [Gloucester] worked tirelessly for a country that he could only see in the distance."

The Ohayons were joined by Presbyterian church officials and representatives of Lombard Central Presbyterian Church, whose congregation left the Lombard Street location nearly 70 years ago and now holds services in a former Quaker meeting hall in West Philadelphia.

"I never thought this would ever come about," said Jeremiah Cousins Sr., 82, of West Philadelphia, a member of Lombard Central Presbyterian since 1949.

Gloucester's burial site was originally marked by a white marble obelisk. But the marker disappeared over time - no one knows its whereabouts - and the memory of Gloucester's grave was lost with it, until the Ohayons began their rebuilding project.

The couple, who own Masada Custom Builders and live in the city's Society Hill section, purchased the deteriorated church over the summer and began slowly restoring it.

"It was in horrible shape," said Naomi Alter-Ohayon, 43, who purchased the building for $450,000. "But we did a lot of work on it, and it's a different story now. It's absolutely magnificent."

The outside finishing touches were held up in late July when Isaac Ohayon, 46, and some helpers hit the slate slab while preparing to landscape the site. Ohayon called the Philadelphia Historical Commission, which put the couple in touch with Douglas Mooney, senior archaeologist for URS Corp. in Burlington City.

"I confirmed that they had found a burial vault," said Mooney. "I also did research and came across an 1895 photograph of the church" showing the obelisk marker at the grave.

Mooney studied Gloucester's work as an abolitionist, his aggressive opposition to slavery and his advocacy for the black community. The pastor worked to promote black education through a lending library and was copublisher and coproprieter of the Colored American - one of the most important African American publications of its day.

Stunned by the violence of the 1842 race riots in Philadelphia, Stephen Gloucester took a less publicly strident antislavery stance and was castigated by other abolitionist leaders such as Frederick Douglass.

Mooney said Gloucester turned more to his church flock and raised funds, during trips to Scotland and England, to build Lombard Central Presbyterian.

The archaeologist learned more about Gloucester after calling in Tom Crist, senior forensic anthropologist with URS and an associate professor at Utica College in New York.

Comparing the historical record with the skeletal remains, the two not only confirmed the identity of those buried there but also found evidence of events affecting their lives.

Gloucester was seriously injured when he and a white abolitionist were ejected from a canal boat in New York. The pastor was known to walk with a cane, given to him by his congregation. The injury could be seen in his remains.

Ann Gloucester's skeleton also told a story. It showed signs of arthritis, aggravated probably by the repetitive motion of washing clothes on a board. She was known to take in wash to earn money.

The discovery of Gloucester so inspired Isaac Ohayon that he attended services at Lombard Central Presbyterian a month ago.

The pastor leading the service noticed him in the congregation. "She said, 'I feel something. There is something in the air.' She was looking at me," Ohayon said.

Yesterday, the remains of the Gloucesters and Winrow were placed in one simple white child-size wooden coffin donated by the Huff & Lakjer Funeral Home in Lansdale. Also inside were artifacts found at the grave site - buttons, shreds of cloth, and hardware from the original coffins.

The remains were lowered into the grave directly next to the foundation of Old Pine Street, a few feet from fragile headstones dating back to the 1700s and 1800s.

"Ashes to ashes and dust to dust," said Mooney. "That's the way it's supposed to be."