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Abney, Mary Ellen

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Clapp's Cemetery, Columbus, Muscogee, Georgia, United States of America

Notes: ====Newspaper article===
Pioneers, Indians, Dixie Soldiers
Rest in Forgotten Hilltop Cemetery

By SID THOMAS

An almost forgotten cemetery lies on a hill
overlooking the river north of Columbus.

It is an old cemetery. Residents who remember it as
it was in days gone by recall that there were a few
Indians buried there.

It is also the resting place of some 20 Confederate
soldiers from Georgia and Alabama, some of whom may
have fallen in the battle of Columbus.

Many persons who worked at the old Clapp Factory are
buried there.

The cemetery near the water works reservoir, once
was beautiful. It had an iron fence, a gate, and
around some of the graves were hand-made bricks.

Covers Five Acres

But today, a person can walk through the burial
site, which covers about five acres, and not know
there ever was a burial there unless he looks
closely.

The fence and gate are gone. Only a handful of
bricks are scattered here and there.

The weather, the curiosity seeker and the
unscrupulous have leveled the mounds of earth and
carried away or broken the grave markers.

Tall, tornado-twisted trees blanketed by Spanish
moss stand like gray ghosts on the hill.

The silence is nearly unbroken.

River Visible

Below, the river is visible through the trees and
the sound of the water rushing over the shoals
drifts up like a fading hymn. The wind brushes
through the trailing banners of moss.

Two or three grave markers still left lie almost
buried. Scrape away the red clay and one of the
markers, carefully chiseled by hand, reads:

M. C. Skipper ; Born Nov. 28, 1829 ; Died in faith
Sep. 10, 1880.;

C. W. Peddy, 305-D Baker Village, who used to walk
to the cemetery when he was a boy, looks at the
marker and shakes his head. Probably
Entailed Sacrifice There no telling what somebody
sacrificed to get hold of that piece of marble.;

Another slab has the following inscription crudely
marked into it:

John P. Lewis Born Dec. 12, 1812 Died Feb. 10,
1885

And a small grave slab, apparently that of a child,
bears only a name J. F. Cain.

E. D. Phillips, an old-timer in that section of the
city, said he used to walk among the Confederate
soldier graves when each had a marker giving his
name and rank. Many of the soldiers were only 16 or
17 years old when they died, he recalls.

Born Near Cemetery

Mrs. Emma Watson, 4410 Third Ave., says she was born
in the Clapp Factory mill village near the cemetery.
She doesn;t know in what year she was born, but
believes she is around 90 years old.

Her mother is buried in the cemetery along with 14
more of her relatives. ;It used to be the prettiest
place you ever went into in your life,; she tells
you.

Mrs. Watson said a lot of people were buried there
from the mill village, which once stretched all the
way from the old factory site to River Road.

She said she remembers hearing her father comment
that workers in the mill had money deducted from
their pay to purchase grave sites in the cemetery.

Has Mystery Touch

No one seems to know the origin of the old burial
grounds. How the Indians and the Confederate
soldiers came to be buried there is a mystery.

Property on which the cemetery is located is owned
by the Georgia Power Co., which purchased it from
the Clapp family about 30 years ago.

Edwin M. Clapp, vice president of Georgia Power Co.
and no relation to the Clapp family which owned the
land at one time, said the new power dam will be
constructed above the cemetery.

Most of the descendants of persons buried in the
cemetery probably have moved away from Columbus or
have forgotten about the graves.

Meanwhile, the wind blows through the trees and
rustles Spanish moss hanging over graves that are
becoming more and more obscured.


-Copied from in the Columbus Enquirer, Vol. CXXVII,
No. 216, page 1, column 4 and page 8, column 4,
Friday Feb. 4, 1955, by Gwen Grant Bryan, Great,
Great Granddaughter of M. C. (Mary Catherine)
Skipper, on June 16, 2001. Ggbryan821@aol.com

M.C. Skipper (Mary Catherine) born Nov 28, 1829 died
in faith Sep. 10, 1880

(daughter of Isaac W. Woods and Eliza/Elizabeth
Patterson. She was married ca. 1848 in Dale County,
Alabama, to my Great, Great Grandfather Jacob S.
Skipper, the son of Silas S. Skipper and
Esther/Ester.

Jacob S. Skipper enlisted in Company E, 4th
Battalion, Hilliard's Legion, Alabama Artillery,
which later was consolidated with the 2nd Infantry
Battalion and designated the 59th Infantry Regiment.
He was killed during this war.

Men in Grey/Interments Vol. II, page 192, by Thomas M. Spratt, has the following:
J. S. Skipper
6/10/65 (p)
Co. E
59th Alabama
W470
His records indicate he died June 11, 1865, as well
as a list of Confederates who died in Jackson
Hospital in a book in Birmingham. UDC said the W470
indicates the grave location in Hollywood Cemetery
for Jacob.

Jacob and Mary are listed in the 1850 and 1860
census records of Dale County, Alabama. In 1870
Mary is listed as head of household in the Dale
County, Alabama census. In 1880 Mary (age 50) along
with my Great Grandfather Jacob Newton Skipper are
listed in the household of her older son, Nathan
(Nathaniel Green) Skipper and his wife Francis, in
Muscogee County, Georgia.

I had been told earlier by members of my family that
Jacob Newton Skipper came to Griffin, Spalding
County, Georgia, after the "closing of Clapp's
Factory". Probably Nathan, Jacob Newton and
possibly Mary Catherine worked at Clapps Factory??

Richard Ivy (also Ivey) MORRIS
b. 28 FEB 1818 in Elbert Co, GA
d. 16 APR 1888 in Phenix City, Russell Co, AL
buried APR 1888
Son of Joseph & Nancy (ALLGOOD) MORRIS
Lay Methodist preacher

Other possible families buried at Clapp’s include:
Hopkins, Miller, Cain, Warren Watson and Bird

Researcher: Gwen Grant Bryan Ggbryan821@aol.com


Information contained in this file also appears in the USGenWeb Archives at:

ftp://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgenweb/ga/muscogee/cemeteries/clapp.txt

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