Southern Graves

The Southern Christian Advocate  is a weekly religious newspaper that began publication out of Charleston, South Carolina in the early summer of 1837. Obituaries published in the paper are characterized as having a strong religious emphasis, often including the manner of death or descriptions of the "death-struggle," and flowery, triumphant, and emotional language. The obituaries are excellent examples of the 19th-century "Good Death" ideal, where a person's behavior and spiritual state on their deathbed were seen as the ultimate evidence of their character and salvation. In the obituary transcribed below, you'll notice a candid admission of a "spiritual lapse." That is a rare find in these usually polished tributes. The following is a transcription of the obituary published in the Southern Christian Advocate  on the death of Thomas D. Walker of Pulaski County, Georgia. Thomas, born 9 May 1808, was a son of George Walker II. Burial was in the Walke...

Robert L. Walker was born in 1853, a son of Ann Lucus (1811-1881) and David Walker (1798-1861). Robert died in November 1875 "at his home on Longstreet" in Pulaski County, Georgia. Longstreet was a community settled by the Walker family in the early 1800s. George Walker II, a Revolutionary soldier and grandfather of Robert, settled in Pulaski County about the time of its formation in 1808. His home is said to have been built in a hilly section near the Twiggs County line. Sons of George, including David, built their homes on a three and a half mile stretch of the surrounding flatlands that became known as "Longstreet." The Walker family cemetery, where Robert was laid to rest upon his death, is located in what is now Bleckley County (created from Pulaski in 1912). He is memorialized on a stone largely dedicated to his parents. While searching for an obituary for Robert, I came across a "Tribute of Respect" published in the 4 December 1875 edition of the  G...

Five counties in northeast Georgia—Madison, Elbert, Oglethorpe, Oconee, and Clarke—were the entire world for three generations of the Eberhart family. Landscapes ranged from deep rural isolation to a bustling, rail-connected, manufacturing mecca. The more than three decades between the birth of John Eberhart, about 1841, and that of his son Stokely (Stokes) in 1878 were a whirlwind. The railroad arrived—bringing the outside world with it; the Civil War emancipated, devastated, and nearly starved; and Reconstruction came and went. Stokes probably thought the stories he heard about the gains African Americans made shortly after the Civil War were tall tales and not to be believed. Just months before he was born, Georgia adopted a new state constitution that instituted a poll tax used to disenfranchise Black voters. The lives of Stokes and his children, including a son named John Lee, were defined by a complex navigation of agrarian labor and the rigid, often violent, social codes of the ...

Edward W. Abernathy was born on 15 May 1887 in Appleton, Missouri, a village located along the south bank of Apple Creek, the boundary line between Cape Girardeau and Perry counties. Appleton Bridge, originally built in 1879, connects the two counties. We know E.W.'s birthplace thanks to his World War I draft registration. Edward's parents, Henderson William Abernathy and Rachel M. Hemrich, were residing in Apple Creek Township, Cape Girardeau County, Missouri seven years before his birth. A June 1900 U.S. Federal census record places the teenaged Edward in Salem Township, Perry County, Missouri. On 26 January 1909 in Perry County, Edward Abernathy married Mary L. Cox in Perry County. Mary was one of more than ten children born to Elizabeth Cotner and Rev. William Marion Cox. The younger couple would go on to have at least eight children of their own. Although we can be certain that the Abernathy family experienced times of joy and sorrow in every decade, the 1930s proved to be...

(AI Generated Image) On 1 April 1866 in Ladonia, Fannin County, Texas, 18-year-old Nannie Hawkins and 23-year-old Lafayette Abernathy welcomed baby Emma into the world. Nancy A. "Nannie" Hawkins was a daughter of Sarah and William A. Hawkins. Lafayette was one of at least eight children born to Emily and Alphonzo Abernathy (1809-1893). Emma Abernathy married Exile C. Eagleton (1863-1924), a native of Tennessee, on 1 January 1890 in Fannin County. He was a son of Mary Ethlinda "Ethie" Foute (1836-1917) and Rev. George Ewing Eagleton (1831-1899), both also from Tennessee. Emma and Exile had nine children over eighteen years: Nancy Ethie (1890-1973) Lafayette Ewing (1892-1918) Statire Jane (1893-1902) E. C. (1896-1974) Mary Ross (1897-1975) Marcus D. (1899-1966) Amelia Abernathy (1900-1979) Foute Wilson (1905-1984) Marvin Dunlap (1909-1969) City Hall, Ladonia, Tex. abt 1909. From DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University . The 1910 census notes Emma as the mother...

(Plainview Cemetery) Harry Joseph Abernathy was a man of the southeast Missouri soil whose life bridged two distinct eras. Born in the tiny hamlet of Shrum in Bollinger County, Harry belonged to a generation that witnessed their rural birthplaces fade from the map. Named for a local landowner, the hamlet was once a distinct community in Crooked Creek Township. However, like so many small Missouri towns, it fell victim to modernization; the Shrum post office, which had opened in 1900, was discontinued in 1937 as rural mail routes consolidated. Its closure shuttered the town's identity nearly fifty years before Harry himself passed away. As a farmer in the Ozark foothills, Harry was not merely an agriculturalist but a survivalist. Through the lean years of the Great Depression, his labor stood between his large family—spanning two marriages and at least six children—and the economic hardships of the times. As any lifelong farmer knows, the circle of life and death is a constant. Whet...

When Gladys Marie Campbell Abernathy died in early 1941, she was just 37 years old. On paper, her death certificate lists a "coronary occlusion" as the cause, but the location of her passing reveals a much more heartbreaking reality. Gladys died inside Missouri’s State Hospital No. 4 in Farmington, a facility for the mentally ill. While the official record cites a heart issue, the contributing cause—"Manic Depressive Psychosis"—hints that this young mother of six wasn't just battling a physical ailment, but likely suffering from what we now recognize as severe postpartum psychosis. Gladys's mother Hattie died on 8 June 1933, at the age of 49. Gladys was 29 at the time and had given birth to her fourth child just six months prior. To understand the sheer weight Gladys was carrying, consider that over the course of thirteen years, she bore six children. She seemingly never got a break from birthing and nursing. When the 1940 Federal Census was enumerated in Ap...