I was out at an appointment today and took a back road toward home. In the corner of my eye I saw a tombstone. I had to find a place to turn around and encountered the saddest, most neglected place… A giant cemetery full of old grave markers and grass that was as high as my knees in some places. I’ve driven past this site a million times and never noticed it before. The genealogist (and history lover) in me finally made me take notice.
I took a video of the cemetery. It doesn’t look like much from the video, but deep in the grass are some small tombstones that have tipped over, and many low profile marks set low in the ground that you can’t see until you get close to them.
I walked through the high grass toward an obelisk style tombstone and found a couple that I could read.
- Headstone – James and Margaret Jones
This smaller headstone was near the obelisk. I was unable to read it, but perhaps blowing it up here may help:
Unreadable "Jones" headstone
This granite stone was in the same corner as the Jones stones – it is fairing better than the older stones. Notice also the tiny discolored stone behind and to the left of it.
This stone reads, "Hannah Hues, 1840-1915, Isaac A Hues 1833-1907"
And finally, this small stone was buried under live and dead, dried out weeds. I had to push the weeds aside to photograph it.
Headstone reads, "Charles H. Hert, Jr, 1880-1952"
It was sad to see the state that this cemetery was in. Perhaps a visit to the historical society is in order. Before you can even begin to clean up a cemetery you need to find out who owns the land (there is no church nearby and no church sign) and get permission to clean it up.
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