Subterranean Celebrity: William Leonard & Albus Rea Billings
The Eastern Cemetery in Portland, Maine holds the memories of around 7,000 persons. Some of them are known; some are not. As we uncover stories of their lives, we share them through our e-newsletter. Sometimes the tidbits are not of life, but only of the artifact that remains. These are our subterranean celebrities.
The Billings brothers' slate headstones, insdie the Dead House. Photos by Ron Romano
Nearly 200 years ago, 2 babies were buried at Eastern Cemetery. William Leonard Billings lived from June to August 1829 and his brother Albus Rea lived from November 1830 to March 1831.
Their parents, Leonard and Ann J. Knight, married in Portland in 1828. Leonard worked in the maritime industry and was associated with the Portland Steam-packet Company. They lived at Franklin Street and Cumberland Avenue and had two more boys who survived to adulthood: William Leonard (born 1832) and George W. (born 1836). The four of them are buried at Portland’s Evergreen Cemetery.
The question is: at some point, did Leonard and Ann disinter their infant sons and rebury them across town, leaving their markers behind? It’s possible that they’re still with us, their stones vandalized and forgotten.
William Leonard
son of
Leonard & Ann J.
Billings.
died Aug. 13, 1829
ALBUS REA,
son of
Leonard & Ann J.
Billings.
died Mar. 10, 1831.
aged 4 mos.
Their simple slate headstones, carved by Francis Ilsley and complete with an urn and willow design, were recently unearthed near the front gates. Neither child is listed in the Eastern Cemetery burial book. William Leonard is recorded with a birthdate of June 14, 1929 (which made him 2 months old at death), and Albus Rae on November 10, 1830.
We may never know if the infants were with us for a short time or still remain, but we have added them to our list of interred. And now we can protect their gravestones, ensuring they’re not lost from history again.
This information was first published in the July 2018 issue of Spirits Alive eNews with information from our own cemetery historian, Ron Romano. It will be updated here as more information is available, but my contain information that is not quite right or needs to be corrected. Text may have been edited to make sense for this page as opposed to the eNews issue it had been a part of.
Last update: September 2026