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 the Amoskeag manufacturing Company donated 20 acres of land to the city of Manchester for use as a burial ground. The Valley Cemetery was created as a "garden" cemetery, a popular design during that time. Not only did the site act as a final resting place for the city's deceased, but the walkways, carriage paths and bridges over the stream invited residents to stroll the grounds. Picnics under the trees were popular as were horse-drawn carriage rides.

The original thorn hedge which enclosed the cemetery was replaced with iron fencing made at Amoskeag's Machine Shop. Elaborate iron work bordered on Pine and Auburn Streets. Plain iron bars surrounded the remainder of the land, where paupers and the less fortunate were buried. The original gate facing Chestnut Street, designed by Moses W. Oliver, Esq. was replaced in 1907 by Hannah Currier, third wife of Gov. Moody Currier. The Pine Street gate was dedicated for builder Stephen D. Green in 1916.

During the city's cholera disease epidemics in the 1850's, trustees found it necessary to designate the northeast corner of the cemetery for victims of the decease. Burials were performed at night in a mass grave. There are a few headstones in the area. A paupers' site is located at the northwest corner of the cemetery.

By 1859 most of the plots in the Valley were sold. Pine Grove Cemetery was established because of Manchester's tremendous population increase. The City Tomb, constructed in 1888, housed the deceased during winter months when the ground was frozen. In 1932 the original wooden chapel was replaced with a stone building in the English gothic style.

Decoration Day, or Memorial Day as it is now known, was established in 1868 to remember the veterans of the Civil War. Solemn celebrations took place at the Valley Cemetery and most citizens participated in the procession or laying of flowers at graves. The Louis Bell Post of the Grand Army of the Republic fired a 21-gun salute, city bands played patriotic tunes and Manchester's school children decorated soldiers' graves with flowers and evergreens and presented songs and poems.

The burial grounds host some of the city's first politicians, ministers, engineers, musicians, mayors, two New Hampshire governors, approximately sixty Civil War soldiers, a few veterans of the Revolutionary War and at least one soldier from the French and Indian Wars. Members of Manchester's first families, including Starks, Straws, Blodgets, Beans, Buntons, and Harringtons reside in the Valley Cemetery.

Burials occur quite infrequently now, the flowing brook is culverted, and veterans no longer salute their fallen comrades. Ancient trees are falling and graffiti defiles Governor Smythe's tomb. Expensive family mausoleums require maintenance.

The goal of the Friends of the Valley Cemetery is to bring the Valley back to its grander day when it was considered Manchester's garden.