The New York Marble Cemetery of Manhattan's East Village is on the National Register of Historic Places and has been designated a New York City Landmark. At the time of its establishment in 1830 on Second Avenue above Second Street, it was the first non-sectarian burial place in NYC open to the public. Its design took the form of below-ground vaults of white Tuckahoe marble, intended to conform to city legislation barring earth graves which might leak infectious diseases. Take a look at its web-site at www.marblecemetery.org.

Recently, Anne Brown, a trustee of the Cemetery, sent along the following Teeple information: William Gaston, son of John Gaston and Naomi Teeple, was buried in Vault no. 76 of the Cemetery. The vault was owned by Thaddeus Phelps and Verdine Ellsworth. The above-ground tablet for Vault 76 may be seen on the web-site's Virtual Tour, about 3/4 down the page.

According to the Cemetery's annotated vault listing, William Gaston was born 26 Sep 1785 in Somerset Co NJ and he died 12 Sep 1837 (LDS. North America IGI 4.01; Ancestry World Tree h9590. Internet site, 1999). He was of Savannah. He died 12 Sep 1837 (NY Ev. Post, death notice, 12 Sep 1837). He was a Savannah merchant and agent for Savannah-Phila-Liverpool shipping line (Phillips, 27 Dec 2001). He was from the South; removed to his native place.

Anne added some notes of her own. "William Gaston, 1785-1837, died on 12 Sep 1837 in NYC and was buried the next day in the New York Marble Cemetery vault belonging to Verdine Elsworth and Thaddeus Phelps. He was later removed to Bonaventure Cemetery, Savannah, the setting for Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Phelps was in the Savannah shipping business, so this would be the connection."

Further detailed info on William Gaston may be seen on the web-site, Gaston Family Lines of Somerset., particularly on p. 125.

William's mother, Naomi Teeple, was one of three daughters of John Teeple and Margaret Castner. The most notable source of info on this family comes from the Genealogical Magazine of New Jersey, vol 31, 1956 in an article "The Families of the Name of Gaston ­ Bible Records." About John Teeple, it says, "John Teeple, son of George Teeple, married Margaret Castner, (daughter of Jeremiah & Naomi Castner) on the 10th January 1756. John Teeple, born October 29th 1728, died March 17th 1813 aged 85 years." About Margaret Castner, it says, "Margaret Teeple, born July 15th 1737, died March 17th 1813, aged 76 years. John and Margaret Teeple departed life on the same day, within 3 hours of each other, Margaret died first & John after."

Naomi had an older sister, Mary about whom the article says, "Mary Teeple, born December 21st, died October 21st 1816, aged 60 years . . . " and she had a younger sister, Ann, described as "Anne Teeple, born April 13th 1764, died June 9th 1805 aged 41 years."

About George Teeple, the article says, "George Teeple father to John Teeple, was born in Germany & emigrated from thence to the State of New Jersey about the year 1700," with the notation, "The following record was found among the effects of Russell B. Rankin, editor of the Magazine from 1925 until his death in 1949. It is written in brown ink on a sheet of parchment measuring 15 by 23 inches, apparently between 1837 and 1846. There are also later entries, in pencil or ink. It is not known how the record came into Mr. Rankin's possession . . . An account of the Gastons will be found in Somerset County Historical Quarterly 5:33."

Extracts from The Story of an Old Farm by Andrew D. Mellick Jr., (Unionist-Gazette, Somerville NJ, 1889), describe a likely fit for this Teeple family.

From p. 130, "This tract is designated as number 51, on the map accompanying schedule number IIIl, in the Elizabethtown Bill in Chancery. The land was conveyed by George Willocks to Daniel Axtell on the twenty-fourth of June, 1726, and soon after that time that portion of the land lying east of the north branch of the Raritan came into the possession of George Teeple, the founder of the Teeple family at Pluckamin."

From p. 146, "On the east side of the river, on the part of the tract (Winder) that George Willocks sold to Daniel Axtell, lived George Teeple and his sons, John and Christopher. He emigrated from Germany as early as 1700, and his grandson William was living recently in Pluckamin at an advanced age. The records show George Teeple to have been living in the township in 1745, and his name and that of his son John also appear, in 1756, as subscribers to the building of St. Paul's Lutheran church. From a gravestone in the churchyard we learn that John married Margaret Castner on the tenth of January, 1756, and after living together for fifty-seven years they died within three hours of each other on the seventeenth of March, 1813, and were buried in the same grave."