The Angel of Death Victorious, also known as the Haserot Angel, is the most famous angel statue at Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio. Earlier this year, on April 8, the day of the total eclipse of the sun in northeast Ohio, I was driving in the cemetery, a few hours before the eclipse, in search of photographic opportunities. As I drove down the hill past the Haserot Angel, I noticed three young white-tailed deer standing in front of the monument. When I slowed down to enjoy the scene, two of the deer scampered away, but the remaining deer froze and posed for a few seconds. I had my Nikon D850 with a 100-400mm lens attached resting on the passenger seat, and the deer allowed me to take several portraits before strolling away from the statue. I don’t think I could have improved the deer’s pose in the above photograph.
White-tailed deer have been in Ohio since the end of the last ice age, and today there are estimated to be more than 720,000 deer living in all 88 counties of the Buckeye State, where they can be seen in our forests, parks, nature preserves, backyards…and cemeteries! The plentiful supply of grass, twigs, shrubs, and other food sources in cemeteries, in which hunting is usually prohibited, makes many Ohio cemeteries – especially garden cemeteries with wooded areas – attractive sanctuaries for Bambi and his kin, and it’s a safe bet that tens of thousands of white-tailed deer make their home in many of Ohio’s 17,000+ cemeteries.
In the photograph above, three white-tailed deer fawns keep a watchful eye on the photographer, while the doe stares at two other fawns that are out of the picture. I made this image on September 13, 2022 at a suburban cemetery in Summit County, Ohio. Ohio fawns are born in mid-May through mid-July, so the triplets in the photo are 2-4 months old.
Fast forward a couple of years to September 6, 2024, when I was driving through another northeast Ohio cemetery early in the morning and noticed several fawns resting in the midst of a group of gravestones. I picked up my Nikon D850, with a Tamron 100-400mm lens attached, from the passenger seat and eased out of my Toyota RAV4 to record the scene. Cemetery deer are often quite tame, and the curious fawn allowed me to take several photos leaning on the hood of my vehicle. However, when I took a couple of steps toward the fawn in search of a different angle of view, the deer’s white tail flashed an alarm, indicating that I had approached too close and spooked the youngster.
I froze, and after a few seconds the fawn lowered its tail and strolled over to a doe standing nearby. Although the young deer was fully weaned and there was plenty of grass, twigs, and other vegetation for browsing nearby, the fawn decided that a liquid breakfast was preferable and began to suckle on the doe.
After a few seconds, one of the fawn’s siblings decided to join in the breakfast activities…
Not wishing to miss out on a free meal, two other fawns soon decided to expand the family group…
In the early afternoon on April 8, 2024 I joined several hundred visitors at Lake View Cemetery as we witnessed a once-in-a-lifetime total eclipse of the sun for several minutes. I viewed the eclipse from the bottom of Daffodil Hill, and as the moon’s shadow began to cover the sun a male wild turkey gobbled and pursued several female turkeys along the ridge at the top of Daffodil Hill. Perhaps the fading light had ignited his courting instincts.
An eerie silence gripped the cemetery during the four dark minutes in which the moon totally covered the surface of the solar disc, an event that will not be repeated in northeast Ohio for another 75 years. Yet this profound moment was eclipsed, for me, by the earlier juxstaposition of a famous statue, erected a century earlier, and a young white-tailed deer, in its Lake View Cemetery sanctuary. The Angel of Death Victorious, weeping black tears of grief, her hands extinguishing the torch of life, stared at a young white-tailed deer, the essence of rebirth, staring in turn at the photographer. A fanciful connection, perhaps, but one that I will treasure.