A special guest was ready to treat PHL17 hosts with 18th-century methods including leeches and bloodletting during a preview of the 90-minute Bloodletting & Burials walking tour. The tour departs from the Betsy Ross House every Saturday evening in October, leading guests through Old City's graveyards before ending with a seasonal drink at a reactivated colonial garden.
The tour features an interpreter playing Betsy Ross stitching a coffin lining before guiding guests on a walk through the neighborhood's historical burial grounds, according to Historic Philadelphia, Inc., which organizes the event. Departures are set for 5:30 p.m. and 6:45 p.m., with remaining dates this Saturday and next, October 24 and October 31, as reported by PHL17.com. PHL17 hosts Rachel Malak and Abby Urban previewed the experience alongside Betsy Ross House director Lisa Moulder.
A Candlelit House Tour Leads Into the Graveyards
The experience opens with a candlelit tour of the Betsy Ross House before moving on to stops at Betsy's grave and Christ Church, per the same PHL17 preview. The interpreter's coffin-sewing routine isn't just theatrical flourish — in colonial Philadelphia, upholsterers like Ross regularly took on tasks beyond furniture and flags, including stitching fabric coffin linings as part of the era's death and burial trade, the Old City District notes.
The tour's graveyard stop at Christ Church Burial Ground carries its own weight in the city's history. Established in 1719 at 5th and Arch Streets, the two-acre burial ground holds over 4,000 graves, including Benjamin Franklin and four other signers of the Declaration of Independence, according to Christ Church Philadelphia. Also buried there is Dr. Benjamin Rush, a fellow signer and physician who heavily advocated bloodletting and aggressive chemical purges during Philadelphia's 1793 yellow fever epidemic, operating under the era's humoral theory that draining large quantities of blood could restore the body's balance.
When Bloodletting Was Considered Cutting-Edge Medicine
Rush's methods, grim as they look now, were viewed as cutting-edge science at the time, and bloodletting remained standard medical practice across Europe and North America well into the early 19th century. The context matters because the 1793 epidemic killed at least 5,000 Philadelphia residents — roughly 10% of the city's 50,000 population — making it one of the deadliest public health disasters in early American history, per the Pennsylvania Center for the Book. Philadelphia was serving as the temporary U.S. capital at the time of the outbreak.
Betsy Ross's own resting place has a more recent backstory than the tour's colonial setting might suggest. Ross's remains were moved to the Betsy Ross House in 1975, following earlier burials at the Free Quaker Burial Ground and Mount Moriah Cemetery. Ross died in 1836 at age 84.
The Tour Ends With a Seasonal Toast in a Reactivated Colonial Garden
After the graveyard stops, the walk concludes at The Garden at City Tavern with a seasonal cocktail, per the PHL17 preview. Ticket holders can choose from a warm Widow's Tea or a Blood Moon cocktail, alongside local craft beer, wine and non-alcoholic mocktails, as part of the $40 advance ticket price, with tickets available at historicphiladelphia.org.
That final stop has a history of its own. The Garden at City Tavern launched in June as a seasonal outdoor pop-up by Historic Philadelphia, Inc., Independence National Historical Park and event firm Cescaphe, reactivating the historic grounds while the indoor restaurant building has sat closed since late 2020, Hoodline previously reported. City Tavern originally opened in 1773 and served as an unofficial gathering spot for the First Continental Congress.
Historic Philadelphia, Inc. was founded in 1994 under then-Mayor Edward G. Rendell as a non-profit charged with enlivening the city's historic district. Today, it organizes living-history offerings, including the Bloodletting & Burials tour. The organization kicked off its fall programming earlier this month with an outdoor courtyard screening of George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead, paired with pre-show candlelit tours.
