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Cemeteries - Ross Bay Cemetery - PartitionsHistory | Gallery | Partitions | Sections | Sea Wall | Changes | Markers | Tour Religious Partitions at Ross Bay CemeteryWhen the cemetery was originally planned, the Cemetery Trustees intended it to be open to all for burials without restrictions. However, strong pressure from the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches in town forced the trustees to reserve portions of the grounds for burials by specific denominations. Sections were reserved for the Church of England (Anglican), the Roman Catholic Church, the Presbyterian Church, the Wesleyan Methodist Church and later the Reformed Episcopal Church. This resulted in only 10% of the entire site being available for use by the general public. Several years later, public outcry over the lack of plots for the general public resulted in an investigation in 1876. It concluded that the government never intended Ross Bay Cemetery to be divided up between the churches. This led to the passing of a bylaw in 1879. The law required the churches who wished to control their parts of the cemetery to pay $300 per acre to the city within six months. This was the same amount that the city had originally paid for the land in 1872. Only the Church of England (Anglican), the Roman Catholic Church and the Presbyterian Church paid for their land, and so the rest was opened up for the public, to be administered by the Cemetery Board of the City of Victoria. Potter's Field
Non-ChristiansNon-Christians were buried in the southwestern corner of the cemetery. This land was so close to the ocean that winter storms sometimes washed away graves. Chinese and Japanese Buddhists and First Nations people who had not converted to Christianity were buried there.
Diversity at Ross Bay CemeteryPeople of many religions, countries and roles are buried at RBC. There are Roman Catholics and Protestants, Veterans, Asians, Blacks and First Nations peoples. Burials of Black people were not segregated to a particular area of RBC, but were integrated, usually according to religion. Two religious groups that have large populations in Victoria but no burials in Ross Bay Cemetery are Jews and Sikhs. In 1859, the Jewish Congregation Emmanu-El purchased its own burial ground, which is still in use (the longest continually used cemetery in BC). Sikhs traditionally have cremated their dead, first on open funeral pyres (some in RBC), but later in indoor crematoria. The ashes should be scattered on flowing water, not buried, so there are no Sikh graves at RBC. History | Gallery | Partitions | Sections | Sea Wall | Changes | Markers
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In Ross Bay Cemetery, the city had always used the lower part of Section F as a
Potter's Field, mostly for people who were destitute, people of unknown identity,
still-born babies and convicts.
A Potter's Field is a place in a cemetery (or even
a separate cemetery) where people are buried who have no one to take care of their
funeral or no money to do so themselves. They are usually buried in plain coffins
with no markers over their graves.
