Toponymie | Canton de Potton | Place Names

The Chapel Hill Cemetery is also known as the Jersey Cemetery, since many Jersey family members are buried there.

The oldest marker for this family is in memory of Reverend Francis N. Jersey, from London, England, who was born in January 1797 and died March 13, 1860.  His wife Ruth Rishton (1806-1871) from Kendal, England, is also memorialized.  

Early in his life, Francis Jersey sailed to Quebec, finding it quite a different place from his native London.  He returned to England.  There, he married Ruth Rishton in June of 1823.  He was an itinerant Methodist preacher, as the birthplaces of nine children attest.  In 1842, Francis Jersey brought his wife and eight of their children to Canada.  They came first to Montreal, where the family lived a time “where he was found preaching to the soldiers and sometimes to the prisoners.^[1]” 

He came later to Stanbridge Ridge, Quebec, where he rented, then purchased, a small farm around 1844-45.  Ordained as a Baptist minister in 1843, he lived for 12-14 years in Stanbridge East.  Around 1856, he moved to Potton, where several of his children already lived.  Rev. Francis Jersey died here in 1860 and his wife, some 11 years later, in 1871.  Many descendants of Reverend Francis N. Jersey still live in Potton and several are buried near their ancestor in the Chapel Hill Cemetery. 

Plate # 53 in Potton d'antan, Yesterdays of Potton depicts William Jersey, second son of Elder Francis Jersey, born in 1826 in Lancashire, England, with his wife, Phylura Jenkins, who came to settle in these parts.  Robert E. Jersey, who built the Round Barn in Mansonville, was the son of William Jersey and Phylura Jenkins.

Read more about this historic cemetery and area under Chapel Hill and Meig's Corner in this document.