Turn Around, Look at Me

Got back last week from another research trip. I probably won't get another chance to do any out-of-town searching until later next year, so I tried to make the most of this one.

There is one cemetery that I visit every chance I get because a number of the relations back in the line seem to be buried there. I have a numbered plot map of the entire cemetery (no names though), so once I know where they are buried, I can find the sites relatively easy. Or so I thought.

I got to the approximate location and found a few markers that confirmed that I was in the right area, but I just couldn't find any headstones for the two I knew should be buried in that plot. I did see one fairly large headstone that had a familiar name on it but it was on a stone with a family name I did not recognize. After about a half hour search, we gave up, and I went to the cemetery office to ask if I did indeed have the correct plot number. They confirmed it, and even made a copy of the burials from the plot book. (This is somewhat significant because I have always had to pay for that information when I write to them.) Anyway, I noticed that several of the burials have that unrecognized family name that I had seen previously. Turns out that a daughter of the couple I was seeking had married into that name - and she was buried there. So I went back out to the lot to take pictures and make a note of the headstone transcription.

I don't know what made me walk around the headstone, but there in full view were the names of the couple I was originally looking for. And I can't believe that I hadn't done that in the first place. I can only attribute it to not wanting to walk up the hill anymore than I had and thinking that I had already looked in the correct area for their names. The one familiar name I had initially noted was another daughter, but I just didn't put it together with the other daughter's married surname.

So that will be a lesson for me not to give up too soon.