It once lay broken and hidden under a green carpet of cemetery grass, but now the fully reconstituted tombstone of Lyme blacksmith Calvin Spencer lay at our feet on the basement floor.

“How are we ever going to get this guy out of here,” I wondered out-loud.

My associate and “partner in crime,” Rod McCauley, reassured me that we would find a way to finish this project that had begun many months earlier. Somehow, we would get this heavy tombstone up the steep and narrow cellar steps out into a waiting truck and returned to his Pestilence House Cemetery home.

Calvin was historically significant, and that made saving his tombstone well worth the effort.

Calvin Spencer did enjoy a certain “celebrity status,” but more in death than in life. Two noted diarists of the time had recorded their association with him in the late 1700s, early 1800s. Dr. Vine Utley was known for his scrupulous record keeping, and Spencer and his family were his patients. Calvin’s name also appeared in the journal of Moses Warren Jr., a neighbor, friend, and perhaps the most famous of the area’s native sons.

Moses Warren was a jack of all trades. Known for his surveying skills, he was also a mapmaker, district judge, mill owner and veteran of the Revolutionary War. His journal mentions helping Calvin Spencer build a blacksmith shop in the fall of 1789.

Moses would visit that shop many times to have his horse shod and his saws “breasted.”

Moses Warren records that he once loaned Calvin his horse so that he could make a journey to nearby New London to purchase church pews for the local Spencer, Warren and Lee families.

Warren also wrote in his journal that he saw fit to loan Mr. Spencer twenty pounds of iron and that the two of them once conspired to “blow a little rock” at an undisclosed location. (Gunpowder used here as dynamite was not invented until just after the Civil War.)

There is familiarity and mutuality disclosed in these records, but unfortunately the journal ends after only one year,so Calvin’s “down time,” that period that led to his unfortunate demise and landed him in the PestHouse Cemetery, is not chronicled.

But his personal physician would fill in those blanks, citing his patient’sincreasing problems with alcohol.

It was overindulgence in “distilled spirits” that brought Dr. Utley to the Spencer home on repeated occasions.

Utley was also present at Spencer’s death when he succumbed to “spotted fever,” one of the many epidemics that earlier ravaged our area.

Alcohol may have played a part in that as well, as Spencer’s poor judgment to retrieve the dead body of a neighborfrom a New London shipyard proved fatal.

Calvin Spencer’s good friend, Pardon Ryan, riding along in the wagon and assisting in the burial of the diseased corpse, also took ill and died a few days after the incident. (Many of Ryan’s family would follow him in death.)

Fast forwarding to the spring of 2021, there were so many questions and concerns with our place in the Calvin Spencer saga. Could his tombstone simply be picked up and carried up the cellar stairs? How heavy was the thing, anyway?

We remembered the stone to have been extremely difficult to move while doing repairs. A rough estimate of 300 pounds had earlier been suggested.

Later, using a specific formula, we were able to determine the stone’s cubic footage.(Brownstone, we found, has a weight of 142 pounds per cubic foot.)

Taking the necessary measurements, we calculated the actual weight of the entire stone to be just slightly less than the original estimate.

Perhaps a ramp might need to be constructed and, using a come-along, we could slowly winch him up the stairs. Maybe a plywood stretcher with rollers underneath would allow us to push or pull Calvin up into the light of day.

“What to do?” we wondered. It would take Melissa Victor to propose a workable solution.

Melissa Victor is a family friend, a long-time East Lyme resident and dedicated public servant. Serving many years in the Flanders Fire Department and working as an EMT, her background proved the difference maker.

“We’re a public service facility in town and assist the living as well as the dead. Of course,those are both people, not tombstones. But in any case, we do aim to serve,” she quipped recently when presented with our current predicament.

“We have carried heavier bodies out of homes and woods than what you have here with this stone,” she said after examining the gravestone for a short time. “We can definitely carry this out. Let me tell you how I think this can be done.”

“Over the years we have used hard and light plastic backboards to transport people in emergency situations. We can put one under the stone for support. I know your concerns about keeping the old stone rigid and secure so we will sandwich the tombstone between two of these backboards, strapping them tightly together. Now one problem we will then have is that we will be unable to use the handles on the boards because they are narrower than the tombstone. To solve that problem, we will use a portable transfer unit (nylon tarp) with multiple hand holds which can be slid under everything, allowing us to use enough people to make the weight light enough to carry. It is rated for a maximum load of 1,000 pounds so it will not rip. It’s light and has the advantage of allowing the carriers to get in close to better manage the weight. Also, that is the only way you are going to get through the narrow opening at the foot of those cellar stairs.

“Let me first check with Flanders Fire Chief Chris Taylor to see if we can supply this, and I’ll get back to you,” she concluded.

Needless to say, Rod and I were greatly encouraged by Melissa’s growing interest in the project and the expertise she brought to the table.

Fire Chief Taylor not only supplied the necessary equipment to make this plan possible, but he also sent out a notice to his firemen asking if any of them might be interested in volunteering their time and muscle.

In response, two burley East Lyme firemen, Ken Janus and Forrest Andrews, jumped on board the day of the move.

Fourteen people in all had become interested in the project and were willing to lend a hand. They were many different ages and from all walks of life, but all came together for a common goal, to see this important piece of history preserved.

Saturday, March 27, 2021, was the big day. Up at the Pest House Cemetery the hole had been predug and lined with stone the week before. The plastic backboards had also earlier been positioned front and back of the tombstone as Melissa Victor had suggested, strapped together and the portable transfer unit easily slid underneath.

All awaited the arrival of the “pallbearers.”

At ten o’clock in the morning, twelve eager hands grabbed hold of the nylon “blanket” and lifted Calvin easily off the basement floor. Up the stairs they went without a problem. No broken backs, no broken stone, no broken hearts over many imagined disasters.

We had planned a rest stop or two while carrying the heavy stone to the truck, but none was required. Up into the truck the tombstone went as our little funeral procession of fourteen people soon made ready for the short journey to the Upper Pattagansett Road burial lot.

Carried into the cemetery, the tombstone was laid flat on the ground in order to loosen the straps.

That was felt necessary as the backboards were longer than the tombstone at both ends and we wanted to prevent jarring when it was stood up on end and the stone released into the waiting hole.

The process resumed without incident. The headstone soon stood erect and was checked for plumb.

Sean McCauley and Tom Matlock began backfilling the hole with small stone and earth, tamping as they went. Upon completion Rod McCauley gave a liquid toast in remembrance of Calvin Spencer. Elizabeth Kuchta and Dawn Shea from the historical society placed flowers at the base of the tombstone.

Mr. Calvin Spencer of Lyme, Connecticut, had succumbed to the spotted fever epidemic of 1812-1813 that Dr. Utley reported was killing one out of every 50 local residents. Fourteen Covid-masked onlookers stood silently by his grave. The masks we wore were a reminder that the COVID-19 pandemic which currently swirled around us had killed over a half million Americans and many more worldwide.

All of us now had no trouble understanding Calvin’s plight despite a separation of over two hundred years.

No, Calvin Spencer was one of our own. We were connected by common experience. We had attempted to honor our fallen brother by repairing what remained of him … his fallen and broken tombstone. After many a high-five and fist bump, all assembled agreed that this had been one very special day.

Jim Littlefield is a retired history teacher in East Lyme who has written two local history books and two historical novels. His columns can also be found in the Post Road Review.