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The Story of the Spite Cemetery

 

The community cemetery in front of Bailey’s Mills, Vermont, is frequently referred to as the “Spite Cemetery,” based largely on the alleged feud between David Hapgood and his neighbor Levi Bailey, the builder of Bailey’s Mills. 

The story goes that David Hapgood owned a small strip of land in front of both their properties.  Bordered on one side by a road and the other by the mill creek, it was not large enough to serve as a common grazing area as was the custom of most New England towns.  So he donated it to the town for a burial grounds in 1805.

Newspaper and magazine writers decided that this would make a good story, since Bailey and Hapgood were not on very good terms and the cemetery was directly in front of the imposing Bailey residence.  So they named it the Spite Cemetery.  Hapgood’s gift to the town was to impose a view of the cemetery from the large Bailey residence for his arch rival, Levi Bailey, when he awoke each morning.  However they overlooked a couple of small details.

First, Hapgood, a much younger man than Bailey, died in 1829, five years before Bailey started construction of his building in 1834.

Secondly, the Bailey’s Mills building was not primarly a residence to house the family, but a commercial property with community store, office space on the second level, and two identical floor patterns in the residential section.  Levi Bailey had in mind recovering some of his investment in renting out space, a good Yankee tradition.  One writer even ventured to guess that this was the first apartment building in America.  That would be rather hard to believe.  The school teacher resided in the building, school classes were held here before the school was built, there was a law office on the third level as well as the community dance hall.

Thirdly the cemetery was well established having been given to the town in 1805 long before Levi decided to build his two story mansion.

It is also doubtful if Levi and his wife Hannah lived very long in this building, since they had a home further up the road which has now been restored by the Savages as the Shadow Rock Farm, a center for raising and training Morgan horses.

While Bailey’s Mills has the appearance of a Greek revival southern plantation it was strictly a commercial building.  Bailey was fully aware of the cemetery in front of the building when he built it, the cemetery was hardly a consideration.

In any case, both Levi Bailey and David Hapgood are now residing comfortably in the Hapgood or Spite Cemetery, along with many of their descendants.

                  --S. David Bailey, 1995

See also David Bailey's essay on "The Story of Bailey's Mills" and
his involvement in "200-Year-Old Feud Is Laid to Rest."