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Julia Knox, the daughter of General and Lucy Knox, is buried in the Dutch Reformed Church in Bedminster, New Jersey
Back in the Winter of 1778, General Knox, at the young age of 28, was knee deep in New Jersey's "cockpit of the Revolutionary War" in Pluckemin overlooking the Pluckemin Artillery cantonment and military academy. While the winter was certainly difficult, it wasn't until the following summer of 1779, when tragedy struck the Knox family in Pluckemin.
It was the winter of 1778 when the Jacobus Vanderveer home served as the headquarters for General Henry Knox when the American artillery was encamped on the hillside of the second Watchung mountain just north of the Pluckemin village during what was part of the General Washington's overall Second Middlebrook Encampment, Pluckemin was a breakout location to the north and west of the soldier encampment at Middlebrook (now Bound Brook, New Jersey).
Lucy Flucker Knox
Lucy Flucker Knox's loyalist family (her father was the Royal Secretary of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, and her brother served in the British army) rejected her when she chose to marry Henry Knox. He was a bookseller and Whig at the time of his courting of Lucy . Lucy's parents disapproved of the match as socially, economically, and politically imprudent. So when the British forces abandoned Boston in March 1776, the Flucker's fled, turning estrangement from Lucy into permanent separation. She would never see her family again.
This may explain why Lucy clinged all the more strongly to Henry and would frequently visit and stay while Henry was on his campaigns. She had no other close family besides Henry, and his brother William. Lucy
Knox attempted to help her brother-in-law William Knox run the bookseller business during the war, but the business failed. She also stayed with friends or in rented lodgings at times during the war, but she always preferred to be with her husband.
As a result of both need and determination, she managed numerous, lengthy visits to the various camps, where she started to raise her family and served as a prominent social hostess. Lucy was with her husband General Knox during the winter cantonment at Pluckemin alongside her first daughter Lucy. It was here, at what is known locally as the Vanderveer House where a their baby Julia was born, sometime in March 1779, and died in early July of the same year.
Julia Knox
 According to letters, Lucy was having a difficult time with her second pregnancy. Records conflict about whether she spent the early pregnancy in winter in Boston or Pluckemin. Lucy gave birth to her daughter in late March who only survived a few months in Pluckemin and is reported to have passed on July 2, 1779 while in Pluckemin.
Photo : Aerial view of the Bedminster Dutch Reformed Church Cemetery, which was once part of the Jacobus Vanderveer family farmstead. The Vanderveer Mill was just to the north, and the Vanderveer/Knox residence was just a few hundred yards to the south.
Embedded in the image is a view of a bicentennial plaque that's attached to the original gravestone in the cemetery(see below). The grave site lies just to the north of the Schump Memorial Chapel, that was erected in 1902.
Lucy decided to return to Boston soon after the tragic event. Henry wrote her a few days later, and George Washington wrote an note of condolence to Lucy and Henry:
"I wish you to make this an object of particular attention. I shall be glad to hear how Mrs. Knox is, to whom I beg my respectful compliments and best wishes for her health."
(General Washington to Henry Knox, GWP, July 12, 1779, Writing of George Washington, Fitzpatrick ed, Vol 15, pg 411)
Quoted History
Below are a number of researched extracts from historic journals and writings about Julia Knox.
"Already under pressure of servicing his four churches, Doninie Hardenburg was put under even greater strain by the Revolutionary War. Between Van Derveer's Mills and the site of the old church, the "Knox House" was occupied twice by General and Mrs. Henry Knox during the Revolutionary War. During their residence in July 1779, their infant daughter, Julia, died from some violent paroxysm. The Bedminster Church officers, fainthearted lest this be an evidence of "demon possession". still much believed in, and uncertain as to whether a Congregationalist should be buried in the churchyard, refused burial permission in the consecrated area."
"The host of the Knoxes, Jacob Van Derveer, had himself experienced the loss of a small daughter under similar circumstances and had buried the body in his own land adjacent to the cemetery. He offered his ground and it was accepted. Sometime afterwards the land was deeded to the church for burial purposes, and the fences were moved to include the two bodies."
Source: Pg. 9 HIstory of the Reformed Church, Bedminster, New Jersey, 1758- 1958
(Dill ion Library History Section)
Excerpt from the 1939 book New Jersey Present and Past.
The First Dutch Reformed Church, whose congregation the cemetery once accommodated, was built in 1759 on land granted by Jacob Vanderveer, a prominent banker. It no longer stands, but the graves of several early settlers are still visible. One of the reads: "Under this stone are deposited the remains of Julia Knox, an infant who died the 2nd day of July 1779. She was the daughter of Henry and Lucy Knox of Boston in New England." Henry Knox was General Knox of the Continental Army, then quartered at the Vanderveer house; and the simple inscription on the grave veils a story of rigid eighteenth century religiosity.
The story runs that Jacob Vanderveer had an insane daughter (name?) who was refused burial in the churchyard because she was "possessed of the devil." No man to flout his church elders, Vanderveer buried her in a little enclosure on his own land next to the churchyard. When Knox's baby daughter Julia died the performance was repeated; Julia was ruled ineligible for burial in the churchyard because her father was a Congregationalist. Mindful of his own experience, Vanderveer provided the Knoxes with a burial plot alongside his daughter's grave. Years later, the church accepted the land as part of its official graveyard. Till then, however, a narrow fence separate the graves of the two outcasts from the consecrated ground.'
Source:
New Jersey, a Guide to Its Present and Past By Federal Writers' Project, Federal Writers Project of the Works Progress Administration, Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration for the State of New Jersey Contributor Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration for the State of New Jersey Staff Published by US History Publishers, 2007 ISBN 1603540296, 9781603540292 (Search Julia Knox)
In 1889 another excerpt was written regarding Julia Knox:
"General and Mrs. Knox tasted sorrow as well as pleasure, while living in the Van der Veer house. About twenty five feet west of the Reformed Dutch church a tombstone is still to be seen, upon which is the following inscription. "Under this stone are deposited the remains of Julia Knox, an infant who died the 2nd day of July 1779. She was the daughter of Henry and Lucy Knox of Boston in New England." "Bedminster traditions preserve an unhappy story connected with the death of this Revolutionary babe. Notwithstanding that Knox was in the township defending the homes and liberties of the people, the consistory of the Reformed Dutch church refused to allow this little one to be buried in the churchyard. In their ignorance and superstition the Dutch fathers considered the fact of Knox being a member of the Congregational church of new England sufficient to warrant their refusing his child a sepulcher."
"The general's host, old Jacobus Van der Veer, himself one of the consistory, was very indignant at the stand taken by his co-trustees. He, poor man, had suffered from the same bigotry. A few years before, on the death of an insane daughter a burial place had been denied his child; this, too, in the face of the fact that the church-grounds had been a gift to the congregation from the man they were treating so harshly. The worth elders reasoned that the girl's infirmities would endanger her salvation in the next world, consequently her body in this one could not be permitted to crumble into dust among those of the elect. Van der Veer buried his daughter in a field just beyond the line of the "God's acre." He is said to have taken Knox by the hand, and leading him to the lonely grave outside the fence, with a choking voice, "Gen'ral, this is my ground, bury your child here." The prejudice of the church people seems to have lessened, as a few years later the fence was moved, so that the burial ground now includes the once excluded graves of the children of honest old Jacobus Van der Veer and the brave Revolutionary soldier. "
Source: The Story of an Old Farm, by Andrew d. Mellick - The Unionist Gazetter, Somerville, New Jersey 1889. page 470-471.
Lastly, here's a quote from Historic Houses of New Jersey in 1902:
"It was in Pluckamin Lucy Knox lost her young daughter, Julia,’ whom the elders of the Dutch Church refused a sepulture in their church-yard, considering the fact of the Knox's being members of the Congregational Church of New England sufficient to warrant their un-Christian-like action. "
Historic Houses of New Jersey by W. Jay Mills, 1902 - Source
At the time of Henry's death in 1806, Knox and his wife had buried ten of their thirteen children, who did not live to adulthood.
Additional Notes:
The Bedminster Reformed Church plays an important role to this story as well. The first Dutch Reformed Church had its roots founded with the Vanderveers. The church, and it's cemetery was once land part of the Jacobus Vanderveer homestead, which was a few hundred yards to the south.
Dominie Hardenbergh, who served as the first minister of the Bedminster Congregation who learned from Rev. John Frelinghuysen from the Raritan (now Somerville). The first church originally sat to the north of the current cemetery, and there have been three constructed versions. The second Church actually blew down when it was in the process of being moved to a new location. Hardenbergh left the church in 1784 to become the first installed President of Queen's College (Rutgers) of which he was the prime organizer.
Photo : View of the former Bedminster Dutch Reformed Church Cemetery, which was once land part of the Jacobus Vanderveer family's home, which was a few hundred yards to the South. Embedded in the image is a view of a bicentennial plaque that's attached to the original gravestone in the cemetery(below).
Julia Wadsworth Knox, 2nd daughter of 13 children to General Henry & Lucy Flucker Knox
- while Lucy was the first, born in______________________.
Julia Wadsworth Knox--b.1784 in Thomaston; d. 22 Jan 1798 (age 14) ?
Julia died after the insane Jacob Vanderveer daughter.
 Learn more about the Pluckemin Artillery Encampment and what it meant to the Revolutionary War...Click Here
Written by: Brooks Betz
Photos/Images by: Brooks Betz
Last Updated: April 2010
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