Oak Grove Cemetery, 1838, Brunswick

Oak Grove Chapel, or Wake House. Oak Grove Cemetery Society President Robert M. Gindhart III writes: For the record, recent research has revealed the true story of Oak Grove Chapel which was completed in April 1902 by the Ladies Oak Grove Cemetery Society. The chapel [originally thought built in the 1880s] was built in one year with donations of materials, cash, and labor.  The chapel had a 1902 value of $400. Three purposes for the chapel were to provide a place: for funerals in the cemetery; to hold Oak Grove Cemetery Society meetings and to store their garden tools.  That Society was founded on March 2,1901 and is not to be confused with today’s Oak Grove Cemetery Society founded on March 18, 2014.  In fact, when today’s Society chose the name, we knew nothing of the earlier group founded 113 years earlier.  Their work is today our work.  The ladies found Oak Grove in exactly the same condition as did today’s Society. 
The chapel was restored in 2017.

Oak Grove was established by the city of Brunswick in 1838 as its first public cemetery and was originally designed to encompass ten acres. I received a nice message from Oak Grove Cemetery Society President Robert M. Gindhart III and he updated some of the history of the site: The cemetery was finally reduced to the size we see today in 1901 to make way for the new Brunswick and Birmingham Railroad roadbed. This greatly altered the western boundary of Oak Grove, moving the fence 50 feet eastward. Fifty graves were exhumed and most of those were brought within the new cemetery boundary. Were all exhumed? Recently, OGCS, using Ground Penetrating Radar, identified hundreds of unknown graves.  We have added those to our electronic map found at: www.oakgrovetour.com identified by beginning with letter U and a blue dot.

Oak Grove contains a nice variety of Victorian funerary monuments and is one of Brunswick’s most fascinating public spaces. It shouldn’t be overlooked.

The memorials that follow were randomly selected and appear in no particular order

Eula L. Brown Dunwoody [1862-1890].

Nightingale Family Plot

Frances Nicolau Nightingale [1871-1948]. Founded in 1920, with Maya Stevens Bamford, Miss Nightingale’s School for Girls (Nightingale-Bramford School) in Manhattan. Graduates include Millicent Fenwick and Gloria Vanderbilt.

James D. Kenny [1828-1885]. Irish-born sailor.

Cornelia M. W. Boone [1847-1876]. Yellow fever victim.

Captain Douglas G. RIsley [1838-1882]. Captain Risley served the Union in the Civil War and founded the first public school for African-Americans in Brunswick in 1870.

Major Urbanus Dart, Sr. [1800-1883]. Upon his death in 1883, Major Dart was the oldest known citizen of Brunswick. He was associated with the first railroad chartered in Georgia and served in the state legislature.

William Harvey Anderson, Sr. [1837-1896] & Alethia I. Williams Anderson [1839-1904]. William Anderson, Sr., was a prominent contractor and builder in Brunswick and was responsible for the construction of Brunswick’s City Hall.

Anderson Mausoleum (Detail)

Anderson Mausoleum (Detail)

Anderson Mausoleum (Detail)

Hirsch & May Mausolea. Benjamin Moses Hirsch [1840-1927]. Bertha Elizabeth Hirshfield Hirsch [1842-1912]. Julius May [1863-1915]. Emma M. Hirsch May [1870-1946]. The Hirsch & May families were prominent Jewish merchants in Brunswick.

Samuel Bruce Moore [1835-1857].

Joseph Florence Lasserre [1844-1919] & Family. This monument was likely erected upon the death of Lasserre’s daughter, Ida, who died in 1898. Lasserre was a native of France and served as Captain in Harris’s Independent Co. Brunswick Riflemen, 26th Infantry Regiment of Georgia.

Satilla G. Brown [1857-1901]

Sir Rosendo Torras [1851-1929]. Rosendo Torras was a native of Spain who was knighted by King Gustaf of Sweden for service to the crown. He came to Brunswick in the 1890s as captain of a sailing ship. His son, Fernando J. Torras, was an engineer and the builder and namesake of the causeway to St. Simons Island.

Unidentified Brick Crypt

William Williams [1800-1885]. Demis Broad Williams [1814-1877].

O’Connor Family Plot

William Walter Watkins [1841-1885].

James Alexander Clubb, Jr. [1827-1889]. Clubb was the lighthouse keeper on Little Cumberland Island and was the pilot of the slave ship The Wanderer.

Townsend Plot Starburst Finial

Annie Louise Blain [1884-1891].

Annie Elizabeth Scranton Blain [1845-1880].

Oak Grove is open from dawn until dusk. Parking is free, on the street beside the cemetery.

National Register of Historic Places

Lorillard Fountain & Pool, Harris Neck

Fountain at Lorillard Estate

The following history of the site is taken from the interpretive panel at Harris Neck National Wildlife Refuge: Various plantations occupied this site from the 1740s through the 1870s. One of the earliest Harris Neck landowners was a man named Dickinson, and his property was known as Dickinson’s Neck. John Rutledge owned fifty acres on neighboring Bethany Plantation. He sold the tract to Ann Harris, who married Daniel Demetre in 1752. Her son, William Thomas Harris (Demetre’s stepson), acquired 350 acres on Dickinson’s Neck in 1758, and in 1759 he inherited an additional 750 acres on the “Neck” from his stepfather. Demetre’s will identified Williams’s residence as Bethany. This reference is the first documentation of a white landowner’s dwelling on the “Neck”.

Ruins of wading pool at Lorillard Estate

Early in the 1830s, another family gained prominence on Harris Neck. Jonathan Thomas acquired most of the Demetre-Harris holdings. Thomas’s 3000-acre Peru Plantation covered the eastern half of the present Harris Neck National Wildlife Refuge. The plantation produced sizeable cotton crops.

Ruins of wading pool at Lorillard Estate

The Civil War ended the plantation era on Harris Neck. The Thomas family subdivided Peru Plantation. Many small tracts were sold to former slaves or their descendants. From the 1870s through the 1930s, a community of primarily African-American developed on and near the current refuge land. By the 1940s, 171 tracts existed in the area now managed by the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Details of a painting of the Lorillard Lodge: Courtesy Leftwich D. Kimbrough

 

During the 1880s, several large tracts bordering the South Newport River (the site of one Peru Plantation home) were acquired by Pierre Lorillard, the tobacco magnate, Eleanor Van Brunt Clapp, and Lily Livingston. Lorillard’s estate featured a lavish lodge, an indoor swimming pool filled from an artesian well, and formal gardens with reflecting pools and fountains.

Fountain at Lorillard Estate

The lodge was used during World War II as the officers’ club for Harris Neck Army Airfield. The deteriorated building was sold at auction, when Harris Neck National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1962.

Harris Neck National Wildlife Refuge

Hampton Point Plantation Ruins, St. Simons Island

There is a small section of an original tabby wall on the right of the drive into the modern gated community at Hampton Point Plantation. Owners at some point incorporated tabby fencing (the lower section to the right).

On the left of the entrance to the gated community is a much larger section of tabby wall. (Detail below)

 

Pink Chapel, St. Simons Island

It’s been shrouded in mystery and rumor for much of its history and the Pink Chapel (modern name) was actually built as the result of a feud between two families. But it wasn’t pink from the bloodstains of slaves (the coloration was due to lichens that few on the tabby walls) and wasn’t a temple for satanic followers, as some urban legends have indicated.

The original chapel was erected in 1838 on the grounds of Colonel William Wigg Hazzard’s West Point Plantation as a place of private worship. Col. Hazzard’s brother, Dr. Thomas Fuller Hazzard, who owned Pike’s Bluff, had a feud with John Wylly, owner of nearby Village Plantation, over land lines. A duel was called for but never commenced. However, when the two met by chance at the Oglethorpe Hotel in Brunswick, on 3 December 1838, Dr. Hazzard fired at Wylly and Wylly died instantly. Since both the Hazzard and Wylly families worshiped at Christ Church, the Hazzard family did not feel safe attending services there.

The present chapel is a reconstruction of the original, incorporating some of the original material. I have yet to track down the date of the reconstruction. [I’m including it only as an historical reference point, and to clarify to those wondering that it is a replica].

The Pink Chapel is not open to the public and can only be seen from a road and the edge of a driveway.

 

 

St. Andrew’s Cemetery, 1810s, Darien

In the tradition of other historic cemeteries of Coastal Georgia, St. Andrew’s in Darien is worthy of note as an important public green space. An impressive collection of Victorian monuments share space with exceedingly rare tabby tombs.

Thomas Spalding (1774-1851), owner of Sapelo Island and one of the most influential men of early Georgia, established his family cemetery here in the early 1800s, adjacent to his mainland home, Ashantilly. A man of his time, Spalding’s wealth was entirely dependent on slave labor. His last official act was leading the Milledgeville Convention which officially declared that Georgia would use force to resist any efforts of abolition by the federal government. He fell ill on his way home and died at the home of his son Charles, in Darien.

The tombs of Spalding and wife Sarah Leake (1778-1843) are at the center of the original cemetery.

Hester Margery Spalding Cooke (1801-30 November 1824), daughter of Thomas & Sarah Spalding; wife of William Cooke (d. 1861).

Tombs of Spalding children, including, at center, Thomas Spalding (1813-1819). These tabby forms are among the rarest forms of grave markers in Georgia.

Even rarer is this tomb, featuring what appears to be the original lime sealing over the tabby.

The original section of the cemetery contains many tombs, including tabby, brick, and marble examples.

Some are in poor condition, with a few slabs unreadable and perhaps even on the wrong tombs.

All of the burials in this part of the cemetery are Spalding family members and in-laws.

Names include Wylly, Bell, and Leake, among others.

In 1867 Charles Spalding (1808-1887) donated the land surrounding the family plot to St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church for use by the city of Darien as a cemetery. The ground was consecrated in 1876 by the Right Reverend Dr. Beckwith, Bishop of Georgia and is known today as St. Andrew’s Cemetery.

Dr. James Holmes (1804-1883) was a prominent 19th century physician who left his home to study medicine in Philadelphia and returned to practice in Darien. A fastidious note taker and diarist, Holmes wrote of his encounters as “Dr. Bullie”. Dr. Bullie’s Notes: Reminisces of Early Georgia and of Philadelphia and New Haven in the 1800s, edited by Dr. Delma Presley, was published by Cherokee Publishing Company in 1976 and remains an insightful resource for students of the era.

Hilton Family

Lachlison-Clark-Fox Families

Reverend Henry Kollock Rees & Family

Jamie Manson (1890-1895)

Schmidt Monument

Churchill-Wilcox Mausoleum

This is the most prominent memorial in the cemetery.

Wilcox Children Memorial

Thomas A. Bailey (1828-1917) Ornamental Gate

Lewis Myers Bealer (1857-1942)

Adam Strain (1840-1897)

Barclay Family

Sutton Children

Lawrence Bailey Daniels (1894-1900)

Donnelly Family

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ruins of Wormsloe, 1740s, Savannah

Noble Jones was one of the original settlers of Georgia, coming to the colony with General James Oglethorpe in 1733. He applied for a land grant on the southern end of the Isle of Hope but the grant wasn’t formally approved by George II until 1756. Construction on the fortified tabby-and-wood house began around 1739 and was completed around 1745. The fortifications were seen as a necessary foil for a potential Spanish invasion.

Jones named the plantation Wormslow. It was originally thought that this was a reference to the silkworms that optimistic early colonists hoped would make Georgia a leading producer of silk, but in fact it was a prominent place name in the English-Welsh borderlands from which the Joneses came to the New World.

Noble’s son, Noble Wimberly Jones (c. 1723-1805) was the next owner and spent little time at the estate, preferring life in the city of Savannah. His sister, Mary Jones Bulloch also had a life estate in the property. The ruins of the first house remain today as material evidence of Georgia’s earliest days.

In contrast to his loyalist father, Noble W. Jones was a Whig, and after service in the provincial and state legislature pursued a career in medicine. He was elected to the Continental Congress but was unable to serve. Still, his dedication to the cause of revolution earned him the moniker “Morning Star of Liberty”.

George Jones, son of Noble Wimberly, was the next owner, and his son, George Frederick Tilghman Jones changed the spelling from Wormslow to Wormsloe. He also changed his own name to George Wymberly Jones and then added the surname De Renne. He was an active builder of improved structures on the property and was a large slave owner. De Renne was also an important collector of early Georgia documents and manuscripts, reprinting many rare items. The family is still involved in these pursuits to this day. A later descendant, Wymberly Wormsloe De Renne fell on financial hard times just before the Great Depression and opened the estate, with the fine gardens he had developed, to the public. Wormsloe Gardens became a prominent tourist attraction. Wormsloe House remains in the family but the surrounding grounds became a state historic site in 1979. One of the best events in Savannah, the annual Colonial Fare & Muster is staged here each year.

National Register of Historic Places

 

First African Baptist Church, Riceboro

The First African Baptist Church of Riceboro is considered the “Mother Church of all Black Churches in Liberty County”; the present structure was built in the 1960s to replace the original church. The community, just west of Riceboro, is locally known as Crossroads.

A marker placed by the Liberty County Historical Society notes: The First African Baptist Church, the oldest black church in Liberty County, had its origins in the North Newport Baptist Church, founded in 1809. In 1818 the North Newport Church, composed of both white and black members, purchased this site and erected a church building here [circa 1849] which had a gallery for the slave members. In 1854 the North Newport Church moved to Walthourville, but the black members in this area continued to use the old building. In 1861 the black members formed their own church organization and the first black pastor was the Reverend Charles Thin. On July 20, 1878 the North Newport Church sold the building to A. M. McIver for $225 for use by the First African Baptist Church.

One of the early white pastors of this church was the Reverend Josiah Spry Law to whom a cenotaph was erected here in 1854 by both blacks and whites.

Three other neighboring churches have been formed from the membership of this church: First Zion Baptist Church in 1870, First African Baptist Church of Jones in 1896, and Baconton Baptist Church in 1897.

 

Walthourville Baptist Church, 1923

A marker placed by the Liberty County Historical Society in 2003 notes: Founded in 1809, the North Newport Baptist Church has had several homes over the years. In 1923, the Church moved to this location and in 1952 the Church voted and renamed the church Walthourville Baptist Church. The original Church did not have a building of its own, so it shared facilities with the Sunbury Baptist Church. In 1864 the church building was burnt by General Sherman’s army as a signal for gunboats anchored in the channel. Before the building was burnt, the original Bible of the North Newport church was saved by members of the church.The present sanctuary was built in 1923. This building has two unique features; solid brick walls and a theater style floor made of heart pine. In 2000 the original tray ceiling and pine floor were restored.

 

Raised Cottage, Circa 1820, Isle of Hope

Tracking the history of this one is proving to be a challenge. It has traditionally been known as the Noble Glen House, presumably for the first owner, but that name has fallen out of use in recent references, likely due to the fact that Noble Glen died in 1816, before it was built. There is a gap in the history between its construction and its use by the Confederate Army as part of Camp Claghorn during the Civil War. John H. Estill purchased it in 1888 and built a larger house overlooking the Skidaway River, retaining the Noble Glen House as a caretaker/gatekeeper cottage. Judge George W. Tiedman bought the estate in 1909 and renamed it Carsten Hall. The 1888 house burned in 1933 but the caretaker’s cottage survived. I will update as information becomes available.

Isle of Hope Historic District, National Register of Historic Places

Old City Cemetery, 1736-1806, Darien

One of the earliest documented European cemeteries in Georgia, Darien’s Old City Cemetery is all but gone today. The Highland Scots who first settled Darien’s predecessor, New Inverness, were buried here. The only preserved section of the cemetery contains the crypts of two Loyalists, enclosed in a brick and stone fence. Other earlier known burials were: Hugh Clark, John Cunningham, Donald Fraser, John Grant, Major Elisha B. Hopkins, James MacKay, Archibald McBean, Alexander McDonald, Lt. Colonel William McIntosh, Thomas McKenzie, Angus McLean, Donald McLeod, Hugh Morrison, Alexander Munro, Alexander Murray, David Stewart, Robert Sutherland, Colonel Abitha Thomas.

The two visible crypts contain the remains of John Cunningham [1767-22 June 1806] and his sister, Margaret Cunningham Pearis [1775-18 April 1805]. Margaret was the wife of South Carolina Loyalist Richard Pearis. John and Margaret’s father, Brigadier General Robert Cunningham, was exiled to Nassau, Bahamas and received a land grant from the King for his loyalty. He was well-known in the Bahamas and died there in 1813.