February is a busy month for people in my line of work. Black History Month is a time of celebration and reflection. Black history is American history and all the stories of the people who made this nation blend together and yet still stand on their own strength. African American history research can be very challenging because of the lack of records, but it is also one of the most rewarding branches of research. Telling the stories of people who are no longer here to tell them is so important for future generations. Today, I’m bringing my readers the stories of the Tucker’s Grove community.
Tucked away in the woods of rural Iredell County, North Carolina lies an abandoned church cemetery. Technically, that statement is true of dozens of abandoned church cemeteries, but this site was once the location of Tucker’s Grove Church. The church was one of the many African American congregations in the county whose members included former slaves. After narrowing down where I thought this cemetery was located, a few locals chipped in to confirm it and bring me to see it. The last survey to be conducted on this site was 1990 by Mildred Miller, author of Time Is, Time Was. At that time, it was reported that the cemetery was “overgrown but easily identifiable” with “approximately 40-50 graves set off by a deteriorating woven wire fence.” Knowing that time can be the enemy of abandoned burial grounds, I was nervous at the condition in which I would find it.
The fence has almost entirely fallen. Fortunately, it is still visible all the way around the perimeter of the graveyard. The overgrowth of the woods has dominated the landscape, and the cemetery is no longer identifiable as such from the road. There are two large stones with inscriptions and a few old funeral home markers, but the majority of the burials here are unmarked.
I came across a rectangle shaped grey stone that appeared to be face down. A few of us attempted to turn the stone over, but it was not budging. I started digging and realized that it went down much farther than I expected for a headstone. That’s when I realized it must be a base. After probing around the stone, I felt a long, flat stone under the fallen leaves and dirt. Tree roots had also started growing over the stone. Eventually, we were able to extricate the stone from the forest floor and resurrect a memorial that had long been forgotten. The stone belongs to Mattie Graham.
In the spirit of my hashtag (#everyburialastory), I wanted to learn as much about Mattie as possible. Who was she? Who was her family? I know which church she attended, but what of the other aspects of her life?
Mattie’s last name before her marriage to Richard Graham is a mystery. Her death certificate records her father as being William Bailey. In the 1880 census, there is a William Bailey living in the Sharpesburg Township with his wife and children, one of whom is named Martha and her age fits with Mattie’s. The family is only a few pages away from the Graham family.
However, when I started looking for a marriage record for her and Richard, I could not find one. In 1880, Richard married Martha Flowers. They had several children. The death certificates for their sons Everett and Thomas (1925 and 1964, respectively) give Mattie’s maiden name as Flowers, as does the obituary for her son Joshua in 1979. The 1923 death certificate for her daughter Ella, however, lists her mother as Martha Bailey.
Regardless of who she was prior to her marriage, Mattie married into a very large, well-known, and respected family in the Sharpesburg Township. Richard’s father Ned was the patriarch of the Graham family in these parts of the county. Unfortunately, as is common with Black history, nothing is known of Ned Graham’s family prior to the Civil War. Based on his short obituary, we guess he was born around 1810, but we know nothing about his parentage or if he had siblings. His name is not found in the slave deed index.
The Iredell County News, which is the only African American newspaper for the area, began in 1980 and featured a column called “Today in History” for a short time. The column was written by Rev. M.L. Newman. In an unknown issue, Newman discussed the Tucker’s Grove burial site, the Graham family, and the old Mulberry cemetery on the same road. According to oral tradition reported to Newman, Ned Graham was the first person buried at the Mulberry site. The story goes that one day while working as a slave on the Graham plantation, he took a break to enjoy the shade of an old mulberry tree. Afterwards, he requested to be laid to rest there after he died. He died in 1903, long after the Civil War, and his wish was granted. Others have been buried at this site, all in unmarked graves. Sometime before 1920, a church was established up the road for the Blacks in the neighborhood and it was called Tucker’s Grove AME. The church then took over as the community burial ground.
Locals mention that there was a school of the same name which met in the church building. Little information is known about the church and school other than stories being passed through the generations. The local newspaper reported that the school was eliminated by vote of the school board in 1933, and although the last known burial in the cemetery was 1955, it seems that the church was gone long before that. In March 1938, the Statesville Daily Record reported that a man named Bud Graham had torn down the church/school building and sold the timber to a friend for five dollars.
According to the 1910 census, Mattie and her family were living close to other church members including Adaline Martin, Abner and Rener/Rena Graham. Adaline and Abner were also children of Ned Graham. Rena Graham died in 1932 and although her death certificate recorded the official cause of death as “cardiac insufficiency,” the newspaper tells a more dramatic tale. The Landmark reported on the front page of their October 21 issue that Rena Graham “literally died from joy” when her son Sherwood Graham, who had not been home in several years, returned unexpectedly to visit his family. Rena supposedly took one look at her prodigal son and collapsed from heart failure. Sherwood would be buried in the Tucker’s Grove cemetery not far from his mother and father in 1945.
The last known burial in the Tucker’s Grove cemetery was Isabelle Bennett. Her maiden name was Graham, and she was another daughter of Ned Graham. Her first husband was Rev. Levi Hawkins whom she married in 1886. Sometime before 1900, Rev. Hawkins passed away and Isabelle was listed as living with her brother and widowed in the 1900 census. In 1908, Isabelle was remarried to John Bennett. In handwritten notes among the papers of the Genealogical Society of Iredell County, someone reported that Rev. Hawkins is buried in the Mulberry Cemetery near Ned Graham. This cannot be proven and it contradicts the timeline that has been given which places Ned as the first burial in 1903. However I believe that it is highly likely that people were laid to rest here before Ned given the fact that burials did not start at the church site until after the turn of the century. It is even possible that the site was used as a burial ground for enslaved people prior to the Civil War, but this is not known for sure.
This was the Tucker’s Grove community. Of course, this wasn’t the entire community, but these are a few of the stories from the church cemetery. This is just a brief moment from another time. I was honored to be able to resurrect Mattie Graham’s stone and uncover just a fleeting glimpse of her life and the lives of those around her. These people lived, loved, mourned, worshipped, and celebrated together. They left a legacy of resilience and strength which was passed to their descendants. As always, thank you for reading, but more importantly, thank you for caring.
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