Walkin' the East Side #3

Two more cemeteries this time, but not very many pictures (and I'm not sure why).  They're interesting ones, though.  After the break...

 Our first stop was City Cemetery #2.  We set out on this walk with the idea that I wanted to find the Confederate cemetery I know to be over here (we did find it earlier this week; it'll be in the next photo essay).  There were a handful of Confederate graves in this cemetery, but it wasn't what I was looking for. 

 This was in City Cemetery #3, which was seen in my last post on this subject.  A--full, unopened--bottle of wine, and a candle.  I can only assume these things were left by her husband as a Valentine's Day remembrance.  If true?  What a love, as she died in 1980.

 This is my oldest daughter, practicing her vampire-staking skills.  For some odd reason, this turned into a game of fetch, because she thinks that the way you kill vampires is by throwing stakes at them.  Not sure if it's obvious from the picture, but this was at the very start of twilight.

 This is the inside of a mausoleum, seen through the gate covering the opening.  This is the only one we've come across that wasn't sealed up already.  As you can tell, there are two cubbies (what's the right word?) where the covers are missing.  Unlike the one in the bottom corner, the cover for the one at the top wasn't there, not even broken.  Most likely, this is related to why the mausoleum isn't closed up yet--it's still awaiting its final resident.  Of course, that didn't stop me from telling the girls that that's where the vampires live.

 Sometimes we come across a famous name, and I wonder whether the grave is related to something else with the name.  Is this, for example, the Witte of the museum?  (Apparently not; that was Alfred P. Witte.  I cannot find any info online for this George Witte; only a poet of the name.)

 Miss Esther, at the grave of one of the Chittims (this isn't one of the weirdnesses of that plot), who coincidentally was Ro's age when she died.  Of course, this lamb topper is typical of a child's grave; I've taught the girls to look for it.  (Ro loves the cemetery walks.  We went in a different direction today, & she was upset that we skipped the graves.)

 This was the strangest thing about the Chittim plot.  These two graves are apparently right on top of each other, though you can tell that they're not two headstones for the same person.  This plot is very crowded.  To make it even weirder (and I could have sworn I'd taken a picture of this), there is an absolutely empty plot right behind this one, also labeled Chittim.  One interesting thing about family plots like this is trying to piece together everyone's relationships.  There were several generations of this family there, plainly.

 A somewhat-closer view of the statue in this post.  As BobG figured out for me, this is most likely James Madison Chittim, a cattleman.  (His wife, Annie Elizabeth, is under the headstone in the foreground of the picture right above this.)

I think this is actually also from City Cemetery #2, but I'm not positive.  It's very interesting, not just because of the fact that it's an obviously-repaired headstone, but because the woman whose name is on the stone was born in the White House.  There's got to be one hell of a story behind the wording there.  There's no sign of her father, husband, or brother nearby.  I am guessing this A. J. Donelson was her father; it appears she was the granddaughter/great-niece of President Andrew Jackson (her father was adopted by Jackson's wife, his aunt).  There's a wee bit of info on her here.  (Most of the results when I search for her name are for Rachel Donelson Jackson, the First Lady.)  John Eckford was her second husband.

That's all for tonight.  Next time, photos of that Confederate cemetery.