Goose Creek Cemetery Part 2

Boy am I lost without my computer. Well, I guess I should amend that. Boy am I lost without the internet on my computer. My fan went out on my laptop and is in the shop being repaired. Well, it's somewhere being repaired. For all the service I bought they never seem to be able to fix anything onsite. So my files and sources are on that harddrive.



Yesterday my cousin, Rosie, and her husband, Robert, and I went to the cemetery which was supposed to be behind the house once owned by R. B. and Siller Houston Meade. We went up to the locked gate that I had encountered on Saturday. The construction company used to be headquartered there and have moved the headquarters to Whitesburg. This site is more storage and sometimes someone is working there, but it could be locked. They told us if it were locked they would come and unlock the gates for us. They gates were unlocked.



We had been told that you needed a four wheel drive or 4 wheeler to get up the graveled road. Robert drove up as far as he could, and then we started walking. It was steep, but at least cleared and nothing like trying to climb up the creek wall when I was going toward Aunt Annie Bentley Wright's grave. It was a long walk, too.



Finally, we got to the graves. They were covered with leaves. We split and started going through the graves looking for Thaney and Betsy. When I had called Archie Meade, R. B. and Siller's son, he said that the graves outside the fence were Jane, her husband and two babies (Siller's first child and Denton's daughter, Mae.). Archie said that the first grave inside the fence behind Jane's was Thaney's grave and next to him was where Betsy Fleming Houston was buried. He did not remember Annie and did not know where her grave was located there. He said it had been about 53 years since he had been there. He said Thaney and Betsy had tombstones.



The road we followed took us in to the back of the cemetery. There are quite a few tombstones up there. The newest grave seemed to be 1967 if I remember correctly. We set about trying to find Jane or Thaney or Betsy's grave. Rober or Rosie found Jane's. Next to it we found Charlie McCray. We didn't find the babie's graves but think they must have been only marked with rocks.



Behind Jane's grave was the remains of a fence. It had fallen down. I saw another part of old fencing at the back, but those were the only two traces I saw.



Now did I tell you how prepared we were? Rosie was in layers. She had leggings, gloves, and a toboggin. I had gloves, a toboggin, leather coat for windbreak, and a bag with chalk, a notebook, and a broom. The broom fell out of the bag and it stayed in the car. Rosie brought along two walking sticks and gave me one. We used it at the graves to try to find stones in that area where we think Thaney and Betsy were. Archie was right on with his directions. We just know that they were there, but something we couldn't find.



Rosie discovered a couple of stones that had fallen over and we were able to clear them and chalk them so we could read them. I took pictures of everything. I will post them later when I get my computer back and can take the pictures from my camera to the computer.



I was suprised to find so many Collier graves. I asked Rosie if this could be the Wright Collier cemetery they talked about. She said, no, that was the one down the right hand fork and it was an easy one to reach. There weren't any Wrights



Here are some of the names we found:

Letha Isom 1924-1925
Charlie McCray son of Benjamin & Mahala McCray 1860-1930
1865-1926
Bertha Gay Johnson
Elihu Pendleton Johnson 1916-1917
James Conway Johnson 1908-1917
Nancy Jane Potter 1877-1917
Earnest Carter
Sarah Yonts 18860
O B Houston 1880-1919
Jane McCray 1871-
Arthur Denton Collier
J. A. Collier 1874-1930
Robert Collier 1899-1926
Thomas Luther Collier 1908-1941
Orlena Ruth Isaacs 1900-1947
Robert Eugene Isaacs 1931-1993
Florence Collier Hall 1898-1922
Carrie Collier 1908-1920
Sgt. Hayes Bentley 1921-1944
Luther Potter 1908-1927
Joe Potter 1901-1923
Pina Mae Venters 1899-1918

Some names I know well. Some are mysteries to me. There were more that I could not read through my 3 inch LCD screen. If you recognize any of them and want to share the info, please email me.