Today's tour is centered around finding old cemeteries in the Uwharrie National Forest. I'm in the large tract of National Forest near Mt Gilead. The tract is bisected by two roads, Lovin Hill and McCallum, named for Scotsmen that lived in the area. First on Lovin Hill Road, the above roadside marker leads one to a small 3 grave cemetery of the Hall family.
Situated on a hilltop with a dramatic drop off behind it. This cemetery is actually an inholding. Forest Service survey marker is at the corner. This area has been recently thinned, so you can see long views right through the remaining Loblolly pines.
Next stop is on McCallum Road by a Forest Service road leading to Lewis Mill Pond, a popular waterfowl hunting spot. Hiking beyond the mill pond I took the next left on an old road and shortly reached this old homesite with a large chimney. Nearby were remains of another building's foundation and pit. One large Eastern Red Cedar graced the homesite. Just a hundred yards away was a fenced cemetery.
The headstones are barely visible. My guess is that this is 6-8 years of growth here. I was able to squirm through to look at the 6 headstones/footstones.
Several of these looked like professionally carved stones, possibly added later.
This is typical of what I have seen with hand carved stones. Often the words that don't fit are just continued on the next line.
I knew there was another cemetery nearby but finding it was an adventure. I tried to find other old roads in the area and follow them. I walked several miles following every old road I came to. Finally, I cheated and looked up the coordinates on Find A Grave. It took me back to the cemetery I was just at and through the woods about 200 yards to another fenced area.
This cemetery, known as Poe-Cockran, was surrounded by hardwoods. It was fenced just like the other with cedar logs held together with rebar. I suspect the Forest Service enclosed them at some point so timbering operations in the area would steer clear of them. Both enclosures are many times larger than the burial area. This one had 5 stones all in a short line, much like the nearby cemetery.
Abraham Cockran's grave had a pile of stones atop it and a marker added in the 1990s.
Pollyan Poer. The cemetery is listed on Find A Grave as Poe-Cockran which seems like a misspelling to me.
Lewis Mill Pond
The mill pond backs up Big Creek with this dam. There is a nice road bridge just below the dam. the photo below was taken on the bridge looking back at the dam.
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