Great Cove Massacre of Seventeen Fifty-Five

Among those buried in this graveyard are victims of the Great Cove Massacre, which took place on November first, seventeen fifty-five, at the settlement then known as present-day McConnellsburg. A raiding party of Delaware and Shawnee warriors led by Shingas, the Delaware leader known to colonists as the Delaware king, struck the frontier settlement without warning. Houses were burned, and roughly fifty settlers were killed or taken captive.

The news of the attack reached Philadelphia's Provincial Council four days later, on November fifth. Governor Robert Hunter Morris, confronted with the scale of the violence on Pennsylvania's exposed western frontier, used the report to press the colonial assembly for stronger military protection. The bodies of those killed were brought here for burial, making this graveyard a direct and lasting witness to the violence of the French and Indian War on Pennsylvania's frontier.