Hello everyone,

 

From 1987 to 1992, the Historic Blandford Cemetery Foundation carried
out a survey of Blandford Cemetery in Petersburg as part of the
procedure for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places.
Survey workers recorded names, dates, and inscriptions from over 16,000
graves, and noted the physical characteristics and general condition of
grave markers.  In the case of some one-third of the surveyed graves,
survey workers also took a photograph of the tombstone.  

 

These records are now available in the Historic Blandford Cemetery
Foundation Survey Records (Acc. 41780).  The collection is organized
according to Blandford's alphanumeric plot identification system.  It
would be extremely difficult to search for a record knowing only the
name of someone buried in Blandford.  Therefore, we have created an
online database
<http://www.lva.lib.va.us/whatwehave/blandfordsearch.asp>  with which
patrons can use an individual's name to obtain the plot identifier.  

 

The database contains names and dates of birth and death (when given),
but no inscriptions, photographs, or descriptions of the graves.  This
may be all of the information that some patrons want; for everyone else
the complete record is available at the Library (and via interlibrary
loan, on microfilm).  

 

It is important to keep in mind that the survey ended in 1992, and that
it was not a complete record of the graves in Blandford even at that
time.  Still, we feel that it will be useful to a good number of
researchers.

 

To access the catalog record, which contains links to both the online
database and the complete finding aid for the collection, search 41780
in the Archives/Manuscripts catalog at
http://ajax.lva.lib.va.us/F/?func=file&file_name=find-b .

 

Take care,

 

Jessica Tyree

 

Sr. Accessioning Archivist

Library of Virginia

 


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