The Great Egg Harbour Township Historical Society (GEHTHS) will be connecting local history to the spirit of Halloween.
On Saturday, Oct. 11, at 2 p.m., the Historical Society will host a guided tour of Zion United Methodist Church Cemetery in Egg Harbor Township. The event offers residents and visitors an opportunity to honor South Jersey’s earliest patriots who fought in the Revolutionary War while learning more about the township’s role in shaping the country.
The cemetery, located beside Zion Methodist Church, is the resting place of 11 soldiers who served during the American Revolution. Though many of these men were not from Egg Harbor Township as it’s known today, they moved and were buried there after the war.
At that time, the Greater Egg Harbor area included a majority of South Jersey, all the way toward Camden, Pamela Tyson, GEHTHS vice chair, said.
The event highlights the veterans’ stories, the hardships they faced and the contributions they made to protecting the South Jersey coastline during the war.
In the 1770s, families in the area often claimed their own burial plots, leading to the creation of small family cemeteries like Zion, Tyson said. Despite the dangers of the time, all of the Revolutionary soldiers buried there returned home from the war and many lived to reach their 70s and 80s.
The event will begin with a 20-minute presentation on the history of the Zion Methodist Church, followed by a living history portrayal of local Revolutionary War soldiers, including Zephaniah Steelman, whose family name remains part of the township’s geography today. Members of the Historical Society will also portray the wives of soldiers, sharing insights into the families’ lives and the challenges they faced during and after the war.
After the presentation, attendees will have the chance to explore the cemetery, where flags will mark the graves of Revolutionary soldiers. Volunteer docents will be stationed throughout the site to share stories and research about each soldier and their family. The event will conclude with refreshments provided in the church hall.
The event is free to attend, though donations to the Historical Society are encouraged to support its ongoing preservation work. Contributions help fund educational programs, maintain archives and protect historical artifacts stored at the Society’s museum on West Jersey Avenue.
This will be the first time the Historical Society has hosted a program of this kind. The inspiration came from a recent partnership with the Lafayette Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), whose members cleaned and marked the graves of the Revolutionary soldiers buried at the cemetery.
“It’s so wonderful for people to learn more about the impact that Egg Harbor Township had in our history. We learn a lot about the cities and what the cities all did, but you just don’t realize how important the rural areas were and some of these original families that they believed in making this country free, and their commitment to this country, the commitment to South Jersey, the commitment to the boating industry,” Tyson said.
