Chapter 7

MARKERS OF CHANGE: GRAVESTONES IN THE BOONSLICK

I INTRODUCTION    
    A gravestone, tombstone, monument, grave markers, memorial plaque, is a memorial to the deceased, no matter what the name used.  Throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance and even in the era of first settlement of the eastern coast of what is now the United States, many people felt no need for a visible tomb or memorial tablet.¹  Even those who did have visible tombs constructed did not necessarily have their bodies placed inside.  Horizontal tablets placed on the floor of churches allowed maximum walking space while still memorializing the deceased, beginning a concept that was eventually carried to the Boonslick.  As expressed by James Deetz, the study of the East coast of the United States shows a European culture (basically English) bringing a new standard to the North American continent.²  The descendants of these early English settlers populated the Boonslick, and thus the traditions of Europe and more particularly, England, were carried to the Boonslick by people basically of English origin, even though there were several stops along the way.

    First, no wooden markers of any style were found in any of the 177 cemeteries surveyed.  This is mentioned here because many of the other scholarly studies on the cemeteries of the United States have found wooden markers in place.  The harsh winters and wet springs in the Boonslick region of Missouri may mean that no wooden markers were ever used or it could mean merely that none have survived.  Since all the cemeteries still in use in the Boonslick were included in this survey, wooden memorial markers certainly are not part of the modern funeral scene either.  However, numerous graves were found marked with only the funeral home marker.  This was particularly true in African American cemeteries although it was also found in strictly white burial grounds as well.  Although these funeral markers were usually made of a thin metal, the most recent one found was on a Cooper County grave (C39) and was made of tan plastic and featured red, sticker tape (Illustration 58).  

    In the Boonslick, the major gravestone styles follow the styles found throughout the United States.  The type of gravestone can be roughly divided into three categories in the Boonslick: 1) those locally carved, 2) individualized stones made of marble which are both locally carved and imported, and 3) imported granite gravestones which were and are mass produced.  Table 3 illustrates the different categories of gravestones found in the Boonslick.  These locally carved gravestones will be discussed in Chapter seven, and the individualized and mass produced memorial markers will be discussed in Chapters eight and ten.  Chapter nine deals with the men who carved these gravestones.  

TABLE 3

BOONSLICK GRAVESTONE CATEGORIES, MATERIALS, MOTIFS, PERIODS, AND PAGE NUMBERS    

*Unique markers exist in each group

** Dates are approximate

II.  GRAVESTONE MOTIFS  

1.  ANTHROPOMORPHIC GRAVESTONES  

    The first in situ gravestones that was carved contemporaneously to the death of the commemorated person is the anthropomorphic gravestone to Angelica Hardin (Illustration 33) which was discussed in Chapter 4, the chapter about church cemeteries. Four of these anthropomorphic stones were found in situ in Boonslick cemeteries .Interestingly, all four are in excellent condition; three are in church graveyards. Red Top (Disciples of Christ) Christian Church Graveyard (B20) contains two (Illustration 34 and Illustration 35) while the third one is in New Salem Baptist Church Graveyard (B60).Thegravestone to Angelica Hardin (Illustration 33) is in a private, family burial ground called the Jewell family cemetery (B37).

    None were found in an abandoned cemetery. This shows either there never were any markers of that style in other cemeteries or that they have been destroyed over the course of time. The anthropomorphic shape makes the latter possibility not as likely, even if there was no inscription. This human effigy shape may be of African origin since it appears in African American graveyards in the South, often in wood.³At least two of the four gravestones memorialized children, a new concept for the time because the mortality of infants and children was so common. They usually were not commemorated since they died so young and most couple could expect to lose half their offspring to death. The third anthropomorphic stone is to an adult while the fourth stone does not contain any writing. Interestingly enough, all four stones are in Boone County which makes it more likely that one person carved them.

2.  and 3.  BOX CRYPTS AND LEDGER GRAVESTONES

    A surprise in the course of this survey work was the number of ledger gravestones and false box crypts. A ledger stone is a flat gravestone that was laid either on top of the actual ground or was more commonly set just at ground level on some sort of rubble foundation. There were also so-called table gravestones in the eastern part of the United States, but only one gravestone in the Fayette Cemetery (H64)matches the description of that type. Table gravestones were flat like the ledger gravestone, but were raised off the ground with a stone support at each end, giving the impression of a long, dinner table when viewed from the side. The one remaining in Fayette may well be a box crypt in which the two long stone side supports have been removed and not an authentic table gravestone. A box crypt contains a ledger top which sits on stone supports around the perimeter of the top and forms the appearance of a closed box. The side panels to this crypt may or may not be carved.

    These designs are associated with the East Coast of this country and the criteria for this survey was based upon the incorrect premise that they would not be in this Boonslick region. They not only were in the region, they were in the region in force. As could be deducted from the settlement pattern of the Boonslick region (spreading outward away from the Missouri River into the open prairies at the edges), the earliest settlers were in the area closest to the Missouri River and these box crypts and ledger gravestones are found in the oldest cemeteries. But they occur in all three types of cemeteries from private family and community burial grounds, to church graveyards, to municipal cemeteries. The roots for this type appear to come from the East Coast with perhaps influence from French New Orleans. No box crypts remain from this time period down the Missouri River in St .Louis, but they must have been there originally. Another area containing box crypts is Ste. Genevieve, along the Mississippi River in southern Missouri. Certainly, New Orleans does contain tombs with above ground inhumation, but these Boonslick box crypts are false tombs because the corpse was not placed in them, but was buried in the ground in the standard manner and the crypt erected on top, hence the term false crypt. This gives the visual impression of a permanent mound which is a characteristic of Upland Southern cemeteries. In deed, in the Boonslick all the people buried with such box crypt tombs were from the Upland South tradition.

    The more remote the cemetery and the less maintained, the better the chance of the box crypt surviving, albeit usually in a damaged condition, as shown by the box crypt to George Tolson in Mt. Gilead graveyard (H84) in Howard County. Here, the ledger top remains while two of the side panels are leaning against the top and two of the side panels are totally missing. (Illustration 59) In Washington Cemetery in Glasgow in Howard County (H47), a horizontal ledger gravestone top has been vertically erected in memory of Mrs. Susan Ross Aull. The Aull family was a nearly merchant family of the Boonslick region immortalized by George Caleb Bingham. They settled north of present day Glasgow in the Missouri River bottoms at the original site of Glasgow, which was called old Chariton. There was a cemetery at this settlement which was abandoned for health reasons and flooding for the higher bluff of Glasgow.⁴The 1825 recorded date of death for Susan Ross Aull means she died before Glasgow and the Washington Cemetery were established so this ledger gravestone was probably over her grave in Old Chariton. It probably is now a cenotaph which means it is a memorial, but without a body underneath. Also, it probably was a box crypt and only the inscribed top was brought to Glasgow sometime after the town was established in 1836, thus explaining the peculiar vertical placement. However, there are also identical vertical ledger stones with the same beveling in the Columbia Cemetery (B38) in Boone County so perhaps there was a person in the Boonslick who made traditional ledger gravestones and these stones were set upright as a matter of custom rather than being placed on the ground. Either way, they create a strange appearance with the beveled sides set vertically with no attempt to distinguish the bottom part placed in the actual ground.

    The first ledger stone then dates to1825 while the end of the tradition dates to 1863 and will be discussed later in this section. During the forty years of this stylistic period, these box crypts occasionally appear. Usually one member of the family died in the 1820’s or 1830’sand was buried with such a crypt. Then, other and later burials were added with the same style of gravestone. Some of the flat top stones, whether used as ledger gravestones or used as the top for a box crypt, were beveled on all four edges. Others used in both types were not. There does not seem to be a correlation between a stone brought from St. Louis and one made in the Boonslick in this respect. Stones signed as being made in the Boonslick and stones from St. Louis might or might not have this beveling. Two Boonslick carvers, Philip Baier of Glasgow, and Elias J. Bedwell of Boonville, signed box crypts and on one crypt the word “St. Louis ”could be distinguished, but the actual sculptor’s name was illegible.

    All of the ledger stones and box crypts dating prior to 1850 contain the name of the deceased, vital statistics and nothing else except information about the deceased. For example, the 1848 box crypt to Ameriferdin and Hughes in the Hughes burial ground (H61) in Howard County proclaims,“ In Memory of Ameriferdin and Hughes, born May 11, 1827, died in New Mexico April 30, 1847, Entombed Sept. 1848, aged 19 years, 11 months &16 days.” Still in the future in the Boonslick, at this time in 1848, is the urge to romanticize. The death of Ameriferdin and or Ferd. gave example availability. He sneaked away from his widowed mother, Mary Ann Morrison Hughes, and enlisted under Genera l Alexander Doniphan in the Mexican War. Accompanying him was his older brother, Morris Hughes, who had been a student of George Caleb Bingham. Heading westward, General Doniphan marched his men into New Mexico where fifty died of a fever including Ferd. Upon learning the news, his mother took a wagon and a slave to assist her, and set off to New Mexico where she disinterred her son, and then made the six week trip home to the Boonslick with his coffin in the bank. She buried him in the private, family cemetery behind her house with her deceased husband.⁵The entire episode comprised exactly all the elements Romanticism found so enticing. The lack of any idealization on this tomb shows that Romanticism had not yet reached the Boonslick.

    Another prosaic box crypt over the remains of Sampson Wilhoit in Walnut Grove Graveyard in Boone County (B33) proclaimed“ Emigrated to Ky. In 88, thence to Mo. in 1818 and was a member of the Baptist Church 36 years.” Most box crypts did not even state that much. The box crypt to Abraham J. Williams, in Columbia Cemetery in Boone County (B38), contains only the vital statistics of his birth and death. A modern bronze plaque proclaims the fact that he was Governor of Missouri; it is not part of the original inscription.

    Beginning about 1850, a touch of Romanticism enters box crypts. The best illustration of this is not a photo of a box crypt, but a watercolor made of the rapidly disintegrating box crypt of Theodore Stapleton. (Illustration 60). This 1855 gravestone in Mt. Zion Methodist Graveyard or the Stapleton family burial grounds (H69), in Howard County is an excellent example. Containing all the standard vital statistics of the deceased and carved by Philip Baier of Glasgow the flat, ledger surface proclaims:

“In the midst of life and usefulness  
A lover of his race, is missed among men  
An Angel’s arm can’t snatch me from the Grave  
Legions of angels can’t confine me there.”

    The 1854 ledger stone to Jonathan Bozarth in the Mt. Gilead Graveyard (H84) in Howard County, may have been a box crypt originally, but in either case, the top is inscribed with not only the vital statistics, but also has an open Bible in top above his name. Elias J. Bedwell of Boonville carved this stone.

    Finally, there is the 1863 box crypt to William D. Swinney and Lucy Ann Jones Swinney in Washington Cemetery in Glasgow (H47) in Howard County (Illustration 61).William D. Swinney was one of the richest men in the Boonslick during the antebellum period and died before his wife. His box crypt is unsigned. It is traditional in stylistic terms while employing the most modern materials. Made out of marble rather than native limestone or fieldstone, the crypt shines in the sun. The vital statistics of the deceased are inscribed onto plaques on each side of the crypt with one evidently reserved from the beginning for his wife, Lucy Ann Jones Swinney. Nothing is inscribed onto the flat top which instead contains a carved, open Bible on a stand set in the middle of the box crypt. This box crypt is approximately four feet tall which is unusually tall in comparison with the others in the Boonslick which average about 30 inches in height. It also sits upon a firm foundation which is unique. Perhaps the late date accounts for these changes or perhaps the extreme wealth of the family allowed them to purchase this larger and better constructed size. An iron fence surrounds the lot as well, setting off this family plot with the marble crypt. As illustrated by the above Swinney crypt, the tombs marked by this style of stone are the final resting places of people of the Boonslick who were in the upper financial echelon of the ante bellum Boonslick world. A review of the crypts shows they are not placed over the graves of people of middle to lower class incomes. Thus, to see a ledger stone or a box crypt in the Boonslick is a correct and true symbol about the socio-economic status of the person memorialized.

    Some of these memorial markers may have been either horizontal or vertical. Such is the marble gravestone to Thomas Hickman at the University of Missouri Experimental Farm near New Franklin (H58).Signed by J. C. Wilson of St. Louis, the stone features several styles of lettering as was common during this period. Obviously brought up the river by steamboat from the metropolitan area of St. Louis, it probably was carved soon after the death of Thomas Hickman in 1849. One reason for this supposition is the lack of any Romantic poetry or motif.

    A unique ledger stone is in Sunset Hills Cemetery (C9) in Boonville in Cooper County. This stone is coffin shaped (Illustration 62) and obviously was always placed at ground level. New England gravestones from the1770’s feature this coffin motif and sometimes even show the deceased within the coffin, but they are carved onto the gravestone and are not the actual gravestone shape.⁶Although now broken the inscription is still legible and reads: “Sacred to the Memory of Mrs. Mary., consort of Eli E. Hammond who departed this life August 9^th, 1841.aged 39 years & 5 months. She was a dutiful wife, a fond mother, and a steadfast friend, most esteemed by those who knew her best.”

    This unique monument contains no signature, but the carving is uniform and appears to have been done by a person who was literate. No other stone in the other 176 cemeteries even remotely approaches this one in style. Nor is there any coffin carved onto any other gravestone in the Boonslick. Not only does the marker not match any other stylistic trend found anywhere in the regions, the family vanishes from the Boonslick scene and does not appear in local records which might give a clue to the section of the nation of their origin. The influences and the reasoning for this gravestone are unknown, but are most intriguing

    Also unique in the Boonslick is a brick mound cemented with concrete serving as a grave cover in Gooch’s Mill (Big Lick Baptist Church) Graveyard (C17) in Cooper County. This semicircular memorial contains no information about the name, age, sex or race of the deceased (Illustration 63).In appearance it matches the tumulus found in northern Africa and the Boonslick was a slave area; this cemetery contains burials dating to before the War Between the States. The tomb is also set definitely apart by itself at the east end of the cemetery in an area that appears to have some graves, but not other markers. Thus, this easily could be the segregated part of the cemetery and perhaps this tumulus was made for a family member in remembrance of some distant African tradition. It is a fascinating piece of material culture, no matter what the roots. Being in deplorable condition, it likely will come apart and be thrown away within the next five years if conservation work is not done and this is extremely unlikely. More probably the lawn crew will simply pitch the bricks as they continue to disintegrate and interfere with mowing.

4.  LOCAL FIELDSTONES OR SLABS

    Not everybody could afford a large box crypt or a ledger stone placed over the grave. It thus seems appropriate to discuss the native stones placed over graves which do not give a death date and might therefore date to anytime period. In Log Providence Missionary Baptist Church Graveyard (B57), approximately twenty native rocks taken from the nearby creek mark graves (Illustration 64).They have not writing or shaping and have merely been taken up and then placed in a new spot. Even though this cemetery is an African American burial plot, this is true throughout the Boonslick and thus cannot be a reflection of race, but is instead a reflection of the cultural milieu of the region. Some of these primitive stones have carved initials such a “W” and “A W” in Boone Femme Baptist Church Graveyard (B51) in Boone County (Illustration 65).Here a rock from nearby Boone Femme Creek has been roughly shaped into a semicircle typical of the marble gravestones of the period 1955 to 1885.In Boonsboro Christian Church Graveyard (H54) in Howard County (Illustration 66), a similar stone goes so far as to proclaim,“ J. S. Mc.”

    Some gravestones were made in memory of the deceased years after the actual death. Perhaps no gravestone had originally been erected due to lack of finances or perhaps there had not been a family member who lived close and could see that it was done. At Copps Chapel (C21), which is actually in Moniteau County but was used by Cooper County citizens, the concrete stone to Lou Giles is an excellent example of this. Copps Chapel Cemetery was started on top of a Native American mound (Illustration 1).One reason for the selection, if not the exclusive reason, was that it was the highest point around and thus the people deemed it appropriate since it was nearest to Heaven .The cemetery was named for Michael Copps who donated the land and who is also buried within the premises. Within this cemetery Lou Giles was also buried, a relative of Copps. For unknown reasons her grave was never marked. This always bothered her niece, Gladys Kinney Blank, but she lacked the financial resources to purchase a gravestone. The years passed and Gladys moved to Boonville, approximately twenty five miles to the north. In the 1960’s, her electric skillet wore out and just as she was about to throw it in the garbage can, the large size stopped her and she decided to make a gravestone using the skillet.⁷She purchased a sack of Quik-Crete which she stirred up and filled the skillet to the top. As it hardened, she took a nail and scratched the name“ Lou Giles” into the wet surface. She let it dry for several days and then prevailed upon her husband and a neighbor to go with her to Copps Chapel ,and carry the concrete marker which was extremely heavy for its size (Illustration 67).Placing it on the head of the grave she felt at last that “Aunt Lou” had the respect shedeserved.⁸Each of these primitive gravestones must tell a similar tale, but only this one came to attention during the course of this survey.

5.  LOCALLY CARVED GRAVESTONES

    Box crypts were the traditional answer for gravestones for the economic elite of the region. For the people who came to maturity under the spell of Jackson Ian Democracy (with the attendant emphasis upon the land west of the Appalachians), and had the funds to purchase a gravestone, the emphasis shifted from styles found along the Tidewater to styles associated with Classicism and Greco/Roman motifs in a symbolic connection with the theme of Independence and Republicanism.

    Excellent examples of this type of funerary monument can be found in the Jewell family cemetery (B37) in Boone County, a State Historic Site. Here are buried members of the Jewell family that eventually gave the money to found William Jewell College in the Kansas City area under the auspices of the Baptist church. Behind and to the west of the white graves, are the graves of the family slaves which are not inscribed, but are marked with individual stones. The entire cemetery is enclosed with a stone fence. In the middle can be found the early box crypt graves to members of the family who dies soon after emigrating to the region. As stated before, there is also an anthropomorphic stone (Angelica Hardin, (Illustration 33) which is the earliest in situ stone in the entire Boonslick region.

    The marker to George Walter is immediately south of the anthropomorphic stone to Angelica Hardin. It is an excellent example of the gravestones used during the years 1835 to 1855.This stone measures approximately eight feet in height and is about three feet wide, being square and made of fieldstone or sandstone, although it does not appear to have weathered as much as the later type of stone (Illustration 68).It is unsigned, but surely must have been imported from some point to the east where the type of tools and skill to make this large monument could be found. n decorative motif, it is a square pedestal, reminiscent of a Roman altar, topped with a Greco/Roman cornice with antique inspired acroteria and then an obelisk capping the marker. Its inspiration came from ancient Green and Roman sarcophagus lids. For example, even John Haviland’s Practical  Builder’s Assistant dating to 1830, illustrated a basic classical sarcophagus with pediment and acroteria.⁸ This style of gravestone was already popular in Europe, specially in France and the ability to have such a stone in the family cemetery showed not only the wealth of the people, but also but also their“ culture” and education.

    The other gravestone belonging to this time period is made of a similar stone (Illustration 69). It was erected:“ In Memory of Ann Eliza Jewell, the daughter of W. R. and S. E. Lenoir (Walter Raleigh & Sarah E. Bouchelle Lenoir-ed.) who became the wife of Thomas B. (Boyle-ed.) Jewell.”⁹ All the above information is inscribed on the tomb in typical laconic fashion as was done on the box crypts. There is no poetry or signature. Ann was only 23 years old at the time of death, and her gravestone gives the impression of great bulk and solidity when viewed. Certainly, it is not meant to convey a feeling of feminine helplessness. Also approximately eight feet tall and three feet wide, it does not taper like the monument to George Walker. The square column assumes the Roman altar position although the memorial is taller and is capped with a plain cornice and sculpted stone urn which appears to have a flame shooting out the top. This Neo-Classical motif symbolized the fires of liberty. Several other gravestones in the area also feature this flame effect which was quite popular in French tombs such as those at Pere La Chaise in France and New Orleans in this country.

    Carrying forward this theme of European inspiration, the Columbia Cemetery (B38) also contains a small gravestone to Emmer Palmer (the name is not Emma), a two year old girl who died in 1855.The forty inch tall, sandstone gravestone is topped with a pyramid, one of only two references of any type to the Egyptian Revival found in the Boonslick (Illustration 71).

    The final, locally carved, gravestone with a reference to the antique world is located in Goshen Primitive Baptist Church Graveyard (B62) in southern Boone County. Here a sandstone gravestone about forty two inches in height features a triangular pediment, carved with a Grecian capped urn in the center (Illustration 72).This gravestone to Richard Fulkerson who died in November 1852, was “Erected by his sons Abraham and James II”.  Adding their names gave symbolic status and showed noblisse oblige; probably the sons no longer lived in Wilton, the town where the cemetery is located. The gravestone is unsigned and unique among the cemeteries surveyed so its source is uncertain. Yet, it is not marble, which was the dominant material already being used in St. Louis and other eastern cities so it surely must be a local product.

    Not classically inspired, but of Romantic inspiration is the 1842 marker to William T. Almond in Sunset Hills Cemetery (C9) in Cooper County (Illustration 73).Made of sandstone, it has weathered severely, but still faintly shows the motif of a weeping willow tree leaning over a box crypt. The style is typically Romantic. Its roots can be traced back as far as 1790 in New England, where weeping willows were carved above Grecian burial urns, but not box tombs. The Almond gravestone is a new combination; this must be the provincial answer to the New England gravestone and shows that the unknown carver was unaware of the inspiration  behind the Grecian burial urn. Instead of the Neo-Classical ideals and all the attendant symbolism, this carver has confidently substituted the traditional box crypt. Lalla Almond married in Howard County and is given in the1883 History of Howard and Cooper Counties, Missouri, as a daughter of Judge William B. Almond, provenance not stated. Perhaps this Judge was the father of this William T. Almond .No other data has been found about this family.¹⁰

    Most locally made gravestone were sculpted out of either sandstone or fieldstone and were not classically inspired. Little, if any, decoration was carved in them. The cheapest were simply plain, rectangular stones carved with the vital information about the deceased (Illustration 74).These stones were more sophisticated than the carving on the anthropomorphic head stones, but not much.

    Around Glasgow in northern Howard County, an unknown carver used the classical pediment acroteria motif without understanding the rationale and reasoning behind it and began sculpting gravestone with three distinct top sections. Examples still exist, they are almost totally illegible and are extremely weathered since they are sandstone and unusually soft. Compounding that problem, the gravestone in Washington Cemetery in Glasgow (H47) to Thomas Dunnica was involved in the October15, 1864, Battle of Glasgow (Illustration 75).Bullet holes still exist and are visible in the western face of the gravestone because soldiers crouched behind it on the east side, for safety. This stone was poorly repaired around the turn of the century, when the Federal government finally paid off damages to the Boonslick from the War Between the States, 35 years after the hostilities ceased.¹¹This three prong motif was used in the gravestone of William T. Almond in Boonville as discussed above; however, the Almond gravestone features a toning down of the acroteria into the more traditional size where it becomes once again a decorative accent (Illustration 81).

    Two gravestones, both in Howard County, continue the anthropomorphic motif, but with a variation. Found in the Grimes family burial ground (H31) and at Clark’s Chapel United Methodist
Church Graveyard (H57), these gravestones have an abstracted round circle (a head) with no decoration, then a gentle curving downward (neck to shoulders) toward the ends of the stone with an uplift at both ends forming wings (Illustration 76).There are three projections upward as was done in the Thomas Dunnica stone in Glasgow (Illustration 75).Here the similarities end because the two ends are angel wings (Illustration 77).The gravestones are extremely weathered, and the wings are faint, but they are still visible. This gives the overall appearance of the vital statistics of the deceased being inscribed on the angel’s chest. Both of these gravestones date to the 1840’s.

    Thus, two motifs dominate the local carving in the 1834-1885 period. One motif is based upon the anthropomorphic theme while the other continues abstracting the three points at the top of the gravestone.

    The gravestones carved to Ruth Burckhart from 1836 (Illustration 78) in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery (H71), the stone carved to Mary Duncan from 1844 (Illustration79) in Clark’s Chapel United Methodist Church Graveyard( H57), and the stone carved to Matthew Alverson (Illustration80), from 1848 in Wesley Chapel Cemetery (H3), contain three similar projections, the largest being in the middle. However, any resemblance to a head is missing, and the larger, middle section illustrates how these shapes are turned into decorative touches of three different styles while originating in the same basic type.

    The gravestone to Malvinia Haydon, in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery (H71) in Howard County, also features no decoration (Illustration 81).This appears to be yet another step in the anthropomorphic motif. Malvinia Haydon died in 1840 or nineteen years after the last documented anthropomorphic gravestone. The head is now absent, but where the neck joined the head there is a flat area and then the stone makes two curves downward in imitation of shoulders. Perhaps even at the time of sculpting, this choice was merely copying the older style. In either event, the lettering is excellent and shows a high quality of workmanship.

    Also working in Boone County during this period is an unknown carver who placed geometric designs on the top of his gravestones. These simple patterns were used on gravestones of several styles (Illustration 82 and Illustration 83).The monument to Stephen Evans who died in 1845 and is buried in Locust Grove Methodist Church Graveyard (B36), features a simple, geometric circle in the upper portion. The marker to Louesa Payne who died in 1849 and is buried in Walnut Grove Graveyard (B33), likewise features geometric patterning. These two graveyard are very close geographically and it is tempting to ascribe the workmanship to the same person, but there is no written documentation for this attribution. Such a simple design could have been the work of more than one person, although the proximity of the two graveyards makes it extremely unlikely that more than one person carved both gravestones.

III.CONCLUSION

    The Boonslick region is a vast storehouse of early, locally produced gravestones. Even more importantly, these gravestones are in situ in almost all instances. Anthropomorphic gravestones exist in the United Methodist Cemetery in Defiance, Missouri, also along the Missouri River and near the burial site of Daniel and Rebecca Boone (Boon) whose original gravestones are in a Boonslick museum (Illustration 36).The Missouri River location of these anthropomorphic gravestones reveals their early date and they could definitely have all been carved by one person, address unknown. Museum inventory records explaining the two Boone (Boon) gravestones, state that Daniel Boone had the stones carved near Defiance after the death of Rebecca Boone and paid for them. No name or evidence to substantiate this claim is given. However, the record dates to approximately 1879; the people who donated the gravestones could vouch for their authenticity and would have no reason to falsity the origination of these monuments.¹²If this is true, and if one person or one establishment made all the anthropomorphic stones, the source should be located near Defiance. However, if these anthropomorphic stones are based upon African traditions, then many of the slaves in the Boonslick had the masonry skills to create these stones. The problem with the latter is that the two known families who used this style (the Roberts family near Hallsville and the Jewell family in Columbia) were both slave holders with prejudices that should have prevented them from consciously using African forms.

    The box crypts, ledger gravestones, and locally carved headstones show that at least adults of middle to upper class could have a memorial marker if one was desired. Many adults of the period 1810 to 1855 did not have gravestones erected to them. Chapter 11 deals with the philosophy behind this phenomenon.

    Slabs from local creeks and streams also dot Boonslick cemeteries. Without dates or names in many instances, these serve only as delineators of a burial and cannot be considered a true memorial, commemorative marker, or gravestone. Yet, they reflect a shift from nothing permanent at the grave. A few gravestones are still locally carved in the late 1980’s; these are invariably located in African American cemeteries and reflect both tradition and economic status.

    These locally carved stones are rapidly disappearing. The slabs with no inscription are even more endangered. The 1981 Cooper County survey for the State Office of Historic Preservation mentioned river slabs used as gravestones in Strickfaden Cemetery (C72) in Cooper County.¹³A visit to the cemetery in the fall of 1988 (six years after the original survey), revealed that the grounds had undergone recent mowing, trimming, seeding with fescue grass, and the removal of all the plain slabs. Perhaps the person cleaning the cemetery thought they were merely pieces from the adjacent bluff which had been placed incorrectly in the family cemetery .For whatever reason, they were completely removed because the immediate area was scoured for them without success. This is all too typical. Most Boonslick citizens in the late1980’s are unaware that these plain slabs are even gravestones.

    No names were found of the people who carved these gravestones, other than Gladys Kinney Blank and she made only one gravestone for a family member. Evidently, it must have been a sideline and not a steady business. The number of such locally carved gravestones reveals that a person would be hard pressed to earn a living doing just this work during this period .However, there are six probable “gravestone schools”:

¹.Anthropomorphic gravestones, probably carved near Defiance

2.Angel (winged) gravestones with abstracted head, possibly a continuation of the Defiance establishment or actually carved in the Boonslick.

3.Classically inspired motifs that lack the understanding of the motif and are often incorrectly copied.

4.Gravestones with three equal projections. Many of these are located in northern Howard County, although some are also in Boone County. None are in Cooper County. One person or one establishment had to be responsible for them.

5.The box crypts and ledger stones could have been made by any of the first four groups above. Some of the monuments with this motif are primitive, but some reveal a high standard of carving.

6.Geometric designs are found on gravestones in Boone County, perhaps the work of one carver.   Slabs without an inscription that were merely placed upon graves probably were  positioned by friends and family members. The services of a carver were not needed.

Some unsigned stones must have been imported because they feature a sophistication not available in the frontier Boonslick of this period. Signed gravestones from St. Louis show it to be the probable location for the more sophisticated unsigned gravestones as well.

Perhaps a cemetery survey in an eastern Missouri county adjacent to the Missouri River will reveal the names of these local carvers.  Until such a survey is conducted, speculation will abound with no definite proof either way.

ENDNOTES