The picturesque pocket companion, and visitor's guide, through Mount Auburn

[6] our respected fellow-citizen, Dr. Jacob Bigelow, on which occasion were present with himself Messrs. John Lowell, George Bond, William Sturgis, Thomas W. Ward, Samuel P. Gardiner, John Tappan and Nathan Hale. The design of a Cemetery somewhere in the vicinity of the city met with unanimous approval, and Messrs. Bond and Tappan were appointed a Committee to make enquiries, and report a suitable piece of ground for the purpose. The Committee were unsuccessful in their enquiries, and never reported, nor was the subject ever actively revived in any way by these immediate parties.

The next movement was in 1830, when Dr. Bigelow, having obtained from George W. Brimmer, Esq., the offer of “Sweet Auburn,” for a Public Cemetery, at the price of six thousand dollars, communicated the fact to the officers of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, and engaged their co-operation as private individuals in a great effort to accomplish the object in view. A meeting of members of that Society was held on the twenty-third of November, by invitation of Messrs. Bigelow and John C. Gray, to discuss the plan of a Cemetery to be connected with an “Experimental Garden” of the Society. A Committee of the Society was now appointed, consisting of Messrs. H. A. S. Dearborn, Jacob Bigelow, Edward Everett, G. Bond, J. C. Gray, Abbott Lawrence, and George W. Brimmer. These gentlemen called a more general meeting on the eighth of June, 1831, “to consider the details of a plan now about to be carried into execution,” &c. On this occasion the attendance was large. Mr. Justice Story took the chair, and the Hon. E. Everett acted as Secretary.