Abandoned Cemetery: Butcher Hill in Yreka, Ca.

Butcher Hill Cemetery (aka Foothill Cemetery)is located just outside of Yreka, California at the foot of Butcher Hill in the northeast section near the city of Yreka. There is no sign but the cemetery is "sort of" enclosed by a very old chain link type fence.

This is an open field cemetery.The earliest marker found at Butcher Hill is Harvey Newton March 1855; the last marked is 1940. Many of these graves are pauper, therefore are not marked. This is pioneer land, and I assume a lot of the burials here are early miners and settlers.

If anyone has info I can add about the history or interns, please let me know!

Head(stone) Scratcher of the Month: Headstone Humor

Ok these are not real headstones but... they are funny and I want them.

Stonehenge Was Cemetery First and Foremost, Study Says

James Owen in London for National Geographic News

The site appears to have been intended as a cemetery from the very start, around 5,000 years ago—centuries before the giant sandstone blocks were erected—the new study says. New analysis of ancient human remains show that people were buried at the southern England site from about 3000 B.C. until after the first large stones were raised around 2500 B.C.

"This is really exciting, because it shows that Stonehenge, from its beginning to its zenith, is being used as a place to physically put the remains of the dead," said Mike Parker Pearson of England's University of Sheffield. "It's something that we just didn't appreciate until now."

The new finding supports the theory that Stonehenge represented the "domain of the dead" to ancestor-worshiping ancient Britons, Parker Pearson said. Previously it was believed that Stonehenge was a place of burial only between about 2700 and 2600 B.C., the new report says. But new radiocarbon dates spanning 500 years were obtained for three cremated humans unearthed in 1950s at Stonehenge and kept at the nearby Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum. The earliest cremation, a pile of burned bones and teeth, came from one of 56 pits called the Aubrey Holes Continue here

Chapel Hill cemetery home to unknown graves-PLEASE Donate!

Barbee-Hargrave Cemetery in Chapel Hill North Carolina, is a slave cemetery that was active from about 1790 until 1915. Little is known about the cemetery, but the Chapel Hill Cemeteries Advisory Board and the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill are working to bring attention to Barbee-Hargrave.

A small plaque identifies the cemetery, but there are no headstones to mark its graves. There is only one known interrment-George Hargrave. Hargrave was a black slave who once belonged to Margaret J. Hargrave, according to the Twelfth Census of the United States, conducted in 1900. At the time of the census, George Hargrave was 71 years old. Although it is known that Hargrave is buried in the cemetery, it is unknown where his body – or any other body – lies within the cemetery’s grounds. One goal of the Preservation Society and the Cemeteries Advisory Board is to figure out where these bodies are buried using ground penetrating radar (GPR).

GPR for Barbee-Hargrave will cost approximately $500 and should not take long to perform, Dollar said.

“If someone wanted to walk in and donate the money to have this done for the Barbee-Hargrave, it could be done very quickly,” Moore said. “And the information would be known publicly.” Moore and Dollar said they are hopeful that once the GPR project is finished, they will be able to find out more about the history of Barbee-Hargrave.
“There may be a direct family connection that may be unknown until this point,” Moore said.These connections could mean a lot to local African American community, Moore and Dollar said.“I feel like the families want to know where their loved ones are buried,” said Jim Merritt, the Chapel Hill Town Council Member who sits on the Cemeteries Advisory Board. Discoveries made at Barbee-Hargrave could provide important links between Chapel Hill, its African American population and their intertwined past, Moore said. “Projects like this are a good way to highlight that history,” Dollar said. “You cannot destroy it, but you can lose it. Barbee-Hargrave cemetery was lost.”

The Preservation Society and Cemeteries Advisory Board are looking to complete the GPR project by the end of 2009 or the beginning of 2010.

To donate to this cause or request general information about the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill, e-mail: chpreservation@mindspring.com or visit their website.

Save these Graves: Chanate Historic Cemetery

The Chanate Historic Cemetery is located on Chanate Road in Santa Rosa, California. The cemetery is on the south side of Chanate Road, immediately across the street from Sutter Medical Center. While Chanate Cemetery holds a portion with pretty commemorative plaques and states they have been under restoration since 2003, “not so” say many Californians attempting to find the location of their loved ones at Chanate.

Many people searching for their interned family have been faced with frustration and no mater what channels they appear to go through, get no where. It is my understanding people are being told the cemetery does not even exist. There are no existing markers. Most of those interned were Asian (placed there through prejudice of the time period, indigents, criminals, those who died at the county hospital, paupers, plague victims, and the insane. And sadly it is due to this sort of “paupers” internment that records were not properly kept by the officials who were in charge of doing so; inquiries to hospitals, county clerk and records have all lead nowhere for many families. The cemetery itself is riddled with weeds and poison oak and getting even that handled has been an impossible brick wall. No administrative or state office is claiming ownership, nor is the County or city.

I wonder if it possible, if enough people get involved if these records will show up. I wonder if a university would have any interest in being involved with acts of kindness in the form of ground radar. I do not have any answers, though I wish I did. I have been in similar predicament when it comes to old family plots in the south which were forgotten by those who have no ancestral interest in its preservation. Thus I would love to join/form a group of others seeking- maybe then someone with the power to get to the bottom of this will listen and act in kind.

Below I have transcribed a list forwarded to me of the names of many interned; unfortunately families who are already aware their ancestors are buried there are actually seeking to know WHERE the burial placement is- which seems to be the saddest part for those who wish to mark said graves.

Cemetery in Parking Lot?

I was forwarded information about a small cemetery in Hattiesburg Mississippi, which is located in the middle of a parking lot. As far as explained to me, its protected and taken care of yet the apartment builders were not given permission by the county to move the graves, so it was left as is. Now THAT’S interesting!

The cemetery originally belonged to the Bryant family and the last known burial was 1916.