Epitaphs

Actual epitaphs from gravestones. Or, if not, they ought to be.

On the grave of Ezekial Aikle in East Dalhousie Cemetery, Nova Scotia:
Here lies Ezekial Aikle Age 102 The Good Die Young.

In a London, England cemetery: Ann Mann
Here lies Ann Mann, Who lived an old maid But died an old Mann. Dec. 8, 1767

In a Ribbesford, England, cemetery: Anna Wallace
The children of Israel wanted bread And the Lord sent them manna,
Old clerk Wallace wanted a wife, And the Devil sent him Anna.

Playing with names in a Ruidoso, New Mexico, cemetery:
Here lies Johnny Yeast Pardon me For not rising.

Memory of an accident in a Uniontown, Pennsylvania cemetery:
Here lies the body of Jonathan Blake Stepped on the gas Instead of the brake.

In a Silver City, Nevada, cemetery:
Here lays Butch, We planted him raw. He was quick on the trigger, But slow on the draw.

A widow wrote this epitaph in a Vermont cemetery:
Sacred to the memory of my husband John Barnes who died January 3, 1803 His comely young widow, aged 23, has many qualifications of a good wife, and yearns to be comforted.

A lawyer's epitaph in England:
Sir John Strange Here lies an honest lawyer, And that is Strange.

Someone determined to be anonymous in Stowe, Vermont:
I was somebody.
Who, is no business
Of yours.

Lester Moore was a Wells, Fargo Co. station agent for Naco, Arizona in the cowboy days of the 1880's. He is buried in the Boot Hill Cemetry in Tombtone,[sic] Arizona:
Here lies Lester Moore Four slugs from a .44 No Les No More.

In a Georgia cemetery:
"I told you I was sick!"

John Penny's epitaph in the Wimborne, England, cemetery:
Reader if cash thou art In want of any Dig 4 feet deep And thou wilt find a Penny.

On Margaret Daniels grave at Hollywood Cemetery Richmond, Virginia:
She always said her feet were killing her but nobody believed her.

In a cemetery in Hartscombe, England:
On the 22nd of June - Jonathan Fiddle - Went out of tune.

Anna Hopewell's grave in Enosburg Falls, Vermont has an epitaph that sounds like something from a Three Stooges movie:
Here lies the body of our Anna
Done to death by a banana
It wasn't the fruit that laid her low
But the skin of the thing that made her go.

More fun with names with Owen Moore in Battersea, London, England:
Gone away Owin' more Than he could pay.

Someone in Winslow, Maine didn't like Mr. Wood:
In Memory of Beza Wood
Departed this life Nov. 2, 1837 Aged 45 yrs.
Here lies one Wood
Enclosed in wood One
Wood Within another.
The outer wood Is very good:
We cannot praise The other.

On a grave from the 1880's in Nantucket, Massachusetts:
Under the sod and under the trees
Lies the body of Jonathan Pease.
He is not here, there's only the pod:
Pease shelled out and went to God.

The grave of Ellen Shannon in Girard, Pennsylvania is almost a consumer tip:
Who was fatally burned March 21, 1870 by the explosion of a lamp filled with "R.E. Danforth's Non-Explosive Burning Fluid"

In a Thurmont, Maryland, cemetery:
Here lies an Atheist All dressed up And no place to go.

In a cemetery in England:
Remember man, as you walk by,
As you are now, so once was I,
As I am now, so shal you be,
Remember this and follow me.

To which someone replied by writing on the tombstone:
To follow you I'll not consent,
Until I know which way you went.