In Which There Are Ten

(This is the first in a series.)

I started writing this blog in 2009 as a college class assignment.  I didn’t know I’d keep writing.  I didn’t have a clear purpose for the blog.  I don’t even have a fancy name.  I like the fact that the blog name still has the word “blog” in it, because, people, this is just my opinion and random facts knitted together.  If you want hard news and current events, this is not your place to be.

If you want news about cats and yarns and dead people, step right up.  And comment, please, ’cause bloggers are needy and we love comments.  Of course, out of the three, cats cause the most controversy because everyone has an opinion about cats.  Yarns, not so much.  Dead people are in a category by themselves.  If I’m not writing about your particular dead people, you just might not be interested.

Dead people stories are fascinating.  We make up entire stories around the most remote facts and family history.  What I like about my dead people stories is that I have facts in the form of source materials, like birth & marriage & death records, census records, old letters and family collections, and court records.  Sometimes I can find a photo of a person, but mostly, I take photos of headstones and cemetery lots.

I make family trees for people that ask, or for people that don’t ask but are clearly interested in their family tree.  I have over 50 trees on ancestry.com, and I’ve made them private.  Sometimes I receive messages from people who want to know more about a particular family tree, like this message two weeks ago from Brussels.

I think that the Richard Bateson b 1824 Westhoughton in your Bateson Family Tree is probably the Richard Bateson who married Susannah Wagstaff in 1847 ? This Richard Bateson was a younger brother of my 3xG grandfather, Henry Bateson, and I wondered if/how you are related.

I am particularly trying to find out about descendants of Richard Bateson’s son, Charles Edward Bateson who I think emigrated to the US – but it’s proving somewhat tricky as I only have access to UK records. I have seen his gravestone on the findagrave site and there are various ‘calculated relationships’ to other Bateson family members but it is difficult to know if this information is complete and/or accurate. I think you are probably the same person who created the memorial for Richard Humpreyes Bateson (1947-61) and so I hope that you might be able to give me more information on this Bateson line.

Best regards,
Julie

This nice lady is asking about Sugar’s family.  The Charles Edward Bateson who emigrated?  Sugar’s great-grandfather.

She went on to say that there are Batesons buried in Savannah in Laurel Grove Cemetery, and she produced the proof from an online source, the City of Savannah Burial Records.

Sugar didn’t know anything about any Batesons buried in Savannah in the 1800’s.  The most recent burial was 1879.

BATESON, ALICE LAUREL GROVE NORTH 6/19/1853 8 YRS 9 MOS

BATESON, CHRISTOPHER H. LAUREL GROVE NORTH 10/19/1870 30

BATESON, CHRISTOPHER R. LAUREL GROVE NORTH 5/13/1855 36

BATESON, MARTHA LAUREL GROVE NORTH 5/3/1874 25 YRS 7 MOS 20 DAYS

BATESON, MARY JANE LAUREL GROVE NORTH 8/16/1853 12 HRS

BATESON, THOMAS LAUREL GROVE NORTH 11/8/1877 36 YRS 3 MOS

BATESON, THOMAS R. LAUREL GROVE NORTH 9/28/1879 7

It appears that these Batesons were in New York City for a while, then moved to Savannah.  This family is in Lot 322, and we were curious to learn more.

I found Christopher H. and Thomas Bateson in 1860 living with Jonathan and Mary Graham.  Who were the Grahams?  Sugar suggested that the boys were living with their mother who had remarried after the death of her husband Christopher R. Bateson in 1855.  And you know what?  He’s right.  I searched the database for Mary Graham, and she’s also buried in Lot 322.

GRAHAM, MARY LAUREL GROVE NORTH 4/12/1869 50 YRS 10 MOS

This means a field trip was in order.

*****

We started bright and earlyish for Savannah.  Not many tourists were out and about, and one lone runner traced the lanes in the cemetery, back and forth, his bright yellow jersey a spot of color in all the gray headstones and mausoleums.

We already knew the general area of Lot 322, and as we made our way, Sugar commented on names that he recognized.  I said that we had been this way before, and how had we missed an entire lot of Batesons?  It’s not a common name.

We arrived at the Lot 322.

Sugar:  There it is.

YoursTruly:  There they are!

Sugar:  There’s nothing there.

YoursTruly:  There’s the marker for 322.  There they are!

Sugar:  No, the lot is empty.

We pulled in from of Lot 322, which was.  Empty.  The marker was off to the side, next to the lot next door which did have residents.

 

Sugar walks the empty lot.

This shot is taken from the back of the lot. There are markers in each lot on either side.

The lot in the foreground in Lot 321. Lot 322 is the strip of green next to the van, and it appears to be the same size as the outlined Lot 321.

Sugar spots something buried in the ground.

He pried it up, and it appears to be a section of fence. Whatever it is, it’s metal.

This concrete piece is next to the curbing that outlines Lot 321. It’s not clear if there was a fence here, but there’s a bit on metal embedded in the concrete.

This is the only other thing remaining on the lot, and it’s also next to the curbing for Lot 321. There appears to be a small hole in the granite.

Well, this was weird, and sad.  I felt like crying.  Eight people, buried right here for over 135 years, and possibly cemetery workers had been piling debris here on this EMPTY lot for later removal.

Why else would there be a piece of decorative metal lying on the ground?

Sugar decided he wants to have a marker put here.  I call the cemetery office for him to find out, just on the outside chance, if there are any other people buried here.

The main office is at Bonaventure, and a nice lady named Earline helped me.  She found that there are TEN people buried here, not the eight we knew about.  This confounds things.  We don’t know how the other two fit into this family.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Tags: Bateson, Bonaventure, Family History, Georgia, History, Laurel Grove, Savannah