Charlotte Temple’s Grave

Around 1850, a steady stream of pilgrims could be seen visiting a grave at New York's Trinity Church inscribed with the name Charlotte Temple. These mourners were paying their respects to the fictional heroine of Susanna Rowson's popular 1791 melodramatic novel, Charlotte, a Tale of Truth. 

In the novel, the titular Charlotte, a naive 16-year-old British girl, is seduced by the villainous rake Lord Montraville, brought to America, and then abandoned as he goes off to marry another woman and fight in the Revolutionary War. She dies penniless in a cold New York winter after giving birth to his child, and is buried at Trinity after her father arrives too late to save her. 

The grave appeared some decades after the novel was published, but the book had remained a steady bestseller over the years, with frequent adaptations into stage plays only increasing its popularity. 

Visitors to Charlotte’s gravestone in the latter half of the 19th century — men, women, even newly married couples on their honeymoons — left flowers, cards, and their tears at the “shrine of the girl who died for love.” Many of the visitors believed she was a real person, a belief supported by churchyard caretakers who would answer in the affirmative if asked whether Charlotte was really buried there. The grave was so popular that gardeners marked it with flowers — the only location in the churchyard so decorated — so that they could easily point it out.

It was most likely a stonecutter involved with the 1840s rebuilding of the church (after structural problems had condemned the 1790 edifice) who laid and lettered the stone, ensuring her name would live on for generations. 

After over a century of curiosity, the Trinity archives team received the go-ahead to investigate the grave in 2008. This involved lifting the slab to check if there was a burial vault underneath it — there wasn’t — and then inserting a scope into the packed earth to see if any remains could be detected. None were found.