Found an Abandoned Graveyard

[coinman123]

I was looking for two cellar holes I found on an abandoned colonial road during research. On the way to the cellar holes I found I noticed a very old gate in the opening of a stonewall, when I looked inside I was very surprised to see around 20 grave stones dating from the late 1700's to the 1880's. I obviously didn't dig in it, as I felt that would be very disrespectful to the people buried there. I had a lot of fun looking around though, very cool and creepy to see a graveyard deep in the woods that has been abandoned for such a long time. It is sad to think of the people who are buried there though, as their resting spots have been forgotten and very neglected. It might be fun to maybe come back sometime try to ghost hunt. Also, at the cellar holes I didn't find anything, very few signals at all actually. The people who lived in that area were very poor farmers though and didn't have much to lose.

Has anyone else came across an abandoned graveyard while metal detecting?

 

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[GB1]

neat maybe some pics next time i haven't found one detecting

 

[coinman123]

neat maybe some pics next time i haven't found one detecting

I really regret not taking any photos of the place. My phone's battery was empty by the time I got to the graveyard because of the 45 minutes I had used it as a GPS (30 minutes driving, and 15 minutes or so looking for cellar holes). If I ever go back there I will definitely make sure to take some photos, my mom is into ghost hunting, so perhaps we will go there sometime for that. Not worth metal detecting there again though, two cellar holes and I never found anything except for bullets and shotgun shells. Didn't find anything at the last three cellar holes I went to last weekend either. There was also a stone lined well that was incredibly deep, and still full of water, I wish I took photos of that too.

 

[BigWaveDave]

Ok so maybe if you knew a kid, or a guy with a kid, who is in Boy Scouts, that would be a project to clean up and rehab the place.
A friend of mine in HS was an Eagle Scout, and got kudos for fixing up old grave in the woods that had been forgotten.

 

[Joe hunter]

Yes I found one in the woods .There was only about 10 stones Maybe five intact.
About half were children as with you I didn’t find much at the neighboring cellar holes.

 

[Joe hunter]

Oh yea it was creepy very creepy

 

[GA_Boy]

For you that are searching cellar holes there may be too much overburden that has fallen into the hole through the years and any good stuff is too deep for your machine. Just a thought.
Marvin

 

[smokeythecat]

This one farm has a cemetery on it. I know because the farmer decided to detect and got a machine and showed me a casket handle. That's all that's left of it, I think he died some years back. It is not marked. No stones, no gates.

 

[uglymailman]

Never while detecting. Have been around several while hunting but they were mostly Family Plots and were fenced. Did come across some slave graves that were not marked, buried along a Section Line while surveying on a U.S. Corp of Eng. Lake project. Buried among the slave graves was a man at one time know as the "Desperado". As a desecration they buried him among the slaves. His relatives had heard about the lake and when they found out his grave would not be underwater they did nothing. The problem would have been figuring out which grave was his.
We have a local Historical Society that located all the family cemeteries in the county and got records and field collected data on all of them. You might see if you have one where you are that know something of it. Good luck.

 

[SusanMN]

I would try googling “abandoned cemeteries (your state) to see if there is an association you can contact or any state laws providing direction on abandoned cemeteries. There may be an organization that will catalog grave sights or arrange for maintenance.

 

[coinman123]

I would try googling “abandoned cemeteries (your state) to see if there is an association you can contact or any state laws providing direction on abandoned cemeteries. There may be an organization that will catalog grave sights or arrange for maintenance.

"289:19 Neglected Burial Ground. – Whenever a burial ground within the boundaries of the town has been neglected for a period of 20 years or more, the municipality may declare it abandoned for purposes of preservation, maintenance or restoration.

Source. 1994, 318:2, eff. Aug. 7, 1994.

Section 289:20
289:20 Procedure. – To declare a burial ground abandoned:
I. The municipality shall place an advertisement in at least one newspaper having general distribution in the municipality and surrounding area. The advertisement shall state the intent of the municipality, identifying the burial ground by name, if known, and by names and dates of the oldest stones in the burial ground, with a request for any direct descendent to contact the town selectmen's office, the town manager, or mayor, as applicable. If the burial ground contains no stones with legible inscriptions, the site may be identified by a detailed description of its location.
II. Not less than 60 days nor more than 90 days after the notice of the intent has been published, the notice shall be read at a regularly scheduled selectmen's meeting or in the case of a city, a city council meeting.
III. If any descendants were located and grant permission, or if no descendants were located, then, after a public hearing, the municipality may declare the burial ground abandoned by a majority vote of the selectmen or city councilmen present and voting.

Source. 1994, 318:2, eff. Aug. 7, 1994.

Section 289:21
289:21 Rights and Responsibilities. – Any burial ground declared abandoned under these provisions shall become a municipal cemetery for management purposes and shall be managed by the cemetery trustees, who shall assume all the authorization and rights of natural lineal descendants.

Source. 1994, 318:2, eff. Aug. 7, 1994."

A little bit confusing to read (and I only just skimmed through), but if I am reading it correctly it seems like you have to have a direct descendant discuss with the town what they would like to happen with the graveyard. If no descendant is available and the graveyard is classified as abandoned then it will be managed as a municipal cemetery. The cemetery I found is only around 500 feet (according to Google Earth path measure) away from the main road (an extremely quiet one lane dirt road, but a road in use nonetheless), so it wouldn't be that hard for the town access it and try to maintain it.

 

[Charlie P. (NY)]

I know where there is a large tract of state land and a Pike family cemetery is still there.

Not abandoned - I think the participants still lie there.

 

[Dave Rishar]

A little bit confusing to read (and I only just skimmed through), but if I am reading it correctly it seems like you have to have a direct descendant discuss with the town what they would like to happen with the graveyard. If no descendant is available and the graveyard is classified as abandoned then it will be managed as a municipal cemetery. The cemetery I found is only around 500 feet (according to Google Earth path measure) away from the main road (an extremely quiet one lane dirt road, but a road in use nonetheless), so it wouldn't be that hard for the town access it and try to maintain it.

I'm neither a lawyer nor a member of your town council, but my initial reaction upon reading the first line ("...the municipality may declare...") is that if nobody pushes the issue, they're not going to pursue it. If I were in charge of the public's coffers, I knew that there was an overgrown graveyard somewhere within my area of responsibility, I had a "may" statement in there giving me leeway as to whether or not I had to deal with it, and there were no interested parties pestering me about it, I'd just leave it alone. By my way of thinking, any living descendants that cared would have already complained, so why claim ownership of another drain on the budget that nobody is worried about?

There's also the question of land ownership. If it's private property, somebody is paying taxes on it. When private property becomes public property, it no longer generates tax revenue.

It wouldn't be hard to access and maintain it, but it's far easier to simply not worry about it until somebody brings it up.

 

[Truth]

If I found one I wouldn’t detect it either. It’s a hard way too have the best gold ring day of your life.

 

[Kace]

I really regret not taking any photos of the place. My phone's battery was empty by the time I got to the graveyard because of the 45 minutes I had used it as a GPS (30 minutes driving, and 15 minutes or so looking for cellar holes). If I ever go back there I will definitely make sure to take some photos, my mom is into ghost hunting, so perhaps we will go there sometime for that. Not worth metal detecting there again though, two cellar holes and I never found anything except for bullets and shotgun shells. Didn't find anything at the last three cellar holes I went to last weekend either. There was also a stone lined well that was incredibly deep, and still full of water, I wish I took photos of that too.

Hi CMan... There could of been a Church very close to that cemetery where a lot of community functions/activities took place. I wouldn't mess around the cemetery but I'd try and find out if there was a Church or community grounds nearby.

Lots of good stuff can be found in those areas.

Great Post and Good Luck,

Kace

 

[huntsman53]

I would try googling “abandoned cemeteries (your state) to see if there is an association you can contact or any state laws providing direction on abandoned cemeteries. There may be an organization that will catalog grave sights or arrange for maintenance.

I can't remember them off hand but there are organizations that investigate and record abandoned cemeteries which are then entered into a National database. They also try to organize a cleanup of the property and record any names and dates that are legible on headstones. To think that some of this Nation's Founding Fathers or Heroes of the Revolutionary War might be buried there and forgotten, is in my sense, an atrocity.

 

[Joe hunter]

The cemetery I found does have an old rd and minimal maintenance. It’s sad to see so many of the stones broken.

 

[sprailroad]

I would think to detect around the outside of the yards perimeter and areas leading up to it.

 

[chub]

I have found two over the years. One here in africa is a yard of stones , about 12 -18 inches tall, standing on end. The other is in a very desolate spot with about a dozen graves from the 1860s to 1940s. Mostly children and young folk.
I cant find a pic now but the paris creek cemetary in goolwa South Australia (next to the gun club) was probably the most eerie Ive been in.

I found a lone grave once in the Willunga hills and another high up in Hotentots Holland. Both around 100 -150 yards from the ruins.

Chub

 

[Dr. Syn]

Well I have 3 graveyards in and around my place up in PA. They are what I would call family places, you tend to see the same last names on the stones. Closest one to even a road now is a good mile as the crow flies. The other two are a good days hike up into the woods to get to them from dirt roads/logging trails.
This is/was farm country and as the kids moved off, and their kids did, they become forgotten. The local govt. isn't going to spend the money to up keep these places, it's not in the budget nor would it be feasible for an employee to make a 3 day jaunt to clean up the places.

Two of the yards now sit on coal company property, and good luck with them taking care of the places, more like good luck they didn't "accidentally" dispose of them. Bat Rasturds!

Anywho, do some digging,no not in the graveyards, in the old records. If there is a graveyard, then folks were in the area. Find out why. Farm, trading post, fort, indian camp, village/town, what ever. That's where the goodies will be.