Re: Capt. Wills and St. John's Burial...

"Until the year 1825, when Shockoe Hill cemetery was established, the interments of the dead in the city of Richmond were chiefly in the grounds of St. John's Church." (page 99 Annals of Henrico Parish published in 1904).

A hiatus exists in the burials between the years 1826 and 1836.  The vestry book has also been mutilated.  On the page before the burials for 1836 seven pages are cut out.  Many burials were made between 1815 and 1830 of which no record exits.

Prior to the Civil War, the ground had become in very poor shape and unattended.  Stones were weather worn, storm damaged, vandalized or broken and many lost (removed) with some becoming land fill.  Burial sites were mounds later flattened and stones lost to that event. Livestock roamed the grounds until after the war when they put a fence around it and cleaned it up.

I was told by the director that Church expansions do rest over marked but mainly unmarked grave sites and the older section where Wills should be buried in now has the school building over it.

Lastly, the children in the family fought over property and it took years to settle.  I am sure there may have been some animosity with the father and possibly no stone was erected no matter his wealth?

But keep in mind that even if there is no written word that says Capt.. Charles Wills 1775-1820 is buried at St. John's Church, all one has to do is add up the facts to make an educated guess that he is - all been given before.

Eric
 

-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Craig Kilby
Sent: Wednesday, August 08, 2012 12:25 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VA-HIST] War of 1812 Service for Charles Wills

Eric,

Mike Lyman writes to me that (1) if your Charles Wills was a wealthy merchant, why does he not have a tombstone? and (2) if you contact St. John's cemetery and they can say it is at least "likely" he is buried there, he will include him in the revised Addendum for the book.

Contact information at St. John's is:

Judith Bowen-Sherman 804 649-7938 website www.historicstjohnschurch.org

Craig 
 
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