History of Ward's Chapel Church & Cemetery, eastern Union Parish Louisiana Submitted for the Union Parish Louisiana USGenWeb Archives by T. D. Hudson, 4/2004 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ************************************************ Researched & Written by T. D. Hudson Sources: US Land Records for Louisiana, conveyance records of Lowndes County Alabama, census records, Bible records ================================================================================== ================================================================================= It is generally accepted that the Ward's Chapel Cemetery is the oldest cemetery in Union Parish. Below is a history of the Ward's Chapel Church and Cemetery. Ward's Chapel Church and Cemetery are located on the Ward's Chapel Road, Louisiana Highway #828, about five miles east of Farmerville. Specifically, it is in the SE 1/4 of NW 1/4 of Section 24, Township 21 North, Range 1 East. ================================================================================== ================================================================================= ================================================================================== ================================================================================= History of Ward's Chapel Church & Cemetery, eastern Union Parish Louisiana ================================================================================== ================================================================================== Only a handful of families lived in what is now Union Parish prior to 1836, and we have no records of any permanent white settlers in the Bayou d'Loutre region of east/central Union Parish any earlier. The United States Government first offered the lands in that region for sale to settlers at the Ouachita Land Office in Monroe in 1835. Only a few men purchased land there in 1836, including Thomas T. Ratcliff, who came over from neighboring Claiborne Parish. Ratcliff and his wife Rhoda had moved to north Louisiana from Tennessee in the 1820s. News that the government had put the northern Ouachita Parish lands on the market apparently travelled fast. Colonel Matthew Wood made a trip from Lowndes County Alabama to what was then northwestern "Washita" Parish Louisiana and purchased government land there in January 1836. Wood's son-in-law, former Butler County Alabama Sheriff John Taylor, may have accompanied him on that trip. Wood apparently remained in north Louisiana for the balance of the calendar year, for he again purchased land in what is now Union Parish on 13 December 1836. However, soon after this purchase he returned to Alabama and began making preparations to lead a large group of settlers of that region back towards north Louisiana, with the intent to settle there permanently. A group of residents of Lowndes County Alabama began planning their westward migration towards north Louisiana even before Colonel Wood's return. William Ham (c1801 – 1867) and his wife Clarenda Seale (1811 – 1897) sold their Alabama plantation on December 13th, the exact same day Wood made his purchase back in Louisiana. The following month, on 6 January 1837, Clarenda's brother, attorney James Hayden Seale (1814 – 1860s), sold his plantation to their father, James Seale. On January 13th, David Ward (1806 – 1882) and his wife Cyntha Seale (c1812 – 1857) sold their property, followed the next day by Colonel Matthew Wood and John Taylor's sale of their plantations. All of these people lived in southern Lowndes County, just north of the Butler County line; during the 1820s, all had resided in northern Butler County, near Fort Dale and Greenville. Colonel Wood and his group departed from Lowndes County soon after January 14th, for they made the trek from central Alabama to north Louisiana within one month. On February 14th, Ward and Ham appeared together in person at the Ouachita Land Office in Monroe and purchased adjoining tracts of government land in present-day eastern Union Parish. On 4 December 1837, David Ward and his brother-in-law James H. Seale returned to the land office in Monroe and purchased additional land. This time Ward purchased 120 acres located some six miles northeast of present-day Farmerville. David Ward followed the Protestant Methodist faith, and soon after his December 1837 purchase of government land, he authorized the local church to construct a meeting house on his property near his family cemetery. The cemetery clearly originated as Ward’s private family burial ground on the edge of his plantation. The need for a cemetery came quickly with the death of David's father Elisha Ward in August 1838, and undoubtedly he was the first person buried there. The earliest tombstone still standing in the Ward’s Chapel Cemetery marks the grave of William B. Cooper’s four-year old son who died on 26 September 1842. Cooper was David Ward’s neighbor and the brother of Adam Bynum Cooper who married Cyntha’s sister Elvira. Cooper buried his other young children in the cemetery in 1845 and 1847, and his family buried Cooper himself there upon his death in 1856. The earliest Ward tombstone currently standing marks the grave of David Ward’s grandson who died in 1862; none of Ward’s children who died between 1843 and 1870 have grave markers that survived until the 1950s (when the first cemetery survey was made). The earliest reference to the cemetery’s name dates from 1845, when the Turner Family Bible recorded the death of David Ward’s niece, Mary Theodosia Reddock Turner, with the notation that she and her stillborn son were buried in the “Graveyard at David Ward’s”. By the 1857, the locals referred to it as Ward’s Chapel, for the Bible entry recording the death of Cyntha Seale Ward stated that she was “Buried at Ward’s Chapel”. This shows that what began as David Ward’s private family cemetery gradually became a community cemetery, and then as the church established itself, Ward’s private graveyard evolved into the church and community cemetery. In 1861 both David Ward and his brother-in-law William Ham served the Ward’s Chapel Protestant Methodist Church as deacons, and in that year they purchased additional land for the use of the church. The Ward’s Chapel Protestant Methodist Church appears to have thrived through the 1870s. But by the early 1880s, most of the original Methodist settlers of that region had died, moved away, or converted to other religions. In 1883, Ward's Chapel switched to a Church of Christ, which it remains today. However, from those very early years through the present day, it has always been known as the Ward’s Chapel Church. ###########################################################