Anderson County ScArchives Cemeteries.....Bennett Family Cemetery - Complete Survey ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/sc/scfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Paul M. Kankula gcgenweb@bellsouth.net July 19, 2004, 3:27 pm **************************************************************** REPRODUCING NOTICE: ------------------- These electronic pages may not be reproduced in any format for profit, or presentation by any other organization, or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. Paul M Kankula Seneca, SC, USA Anderson County SC GenWeb Coordinator Anderson County SC GenWeb Homestead http://www.rootsweb.com/~scandrsn/ CEMETERY LOCATION: ------------------ Four miles SE of Anderson Latitude N 34 28.656 x Longitude W 82 34.899 CHURCH/CEMETERY HISTORY: ------------------------ TRADITIONS and HISTORY OF ANDERSON COUNTY author Mrs. Louise Ayer Vandiver states...after some thoughts about rivers and springs, etc. "No place is fit for human habitation unless it is well watered, hence the interest in springs and rivers and creeks, they must accompany the homes of people. There is another necessity near to human habitations, and that is a place to bury the dead; a place to live and a place for a grave must go together. Our ancestors lived closer to their dead than we do, every farm had its family graveyard in the first days, then followed community cemeteries. The traveler along the hgihways may not realize that often the clump of trees which he admires at a little distance from the road conceals one of those old burying grounds. If the traveler happens to be of an investigating turn of mind, and dismounts, turning aside to see what is hidden by the trees, he is sometimes startled at being confronted with grave stones, often moulded and broken. Such a graveyard lies on the road from Anderson to Carpenter's Mill, a clump of trees across a cotton field. When the thicket is penetrated one finds four neat head stones bearing the name Bennett. Elisha Bennett died September 30th, 1833, age 66 years; Sarah Bennett died November 27th, 1828, age 54 years; Egloe Bennett died March, 1828 age 18 years; Mitchell Bennett died January 20th, 1827, age 10 years. Perfect strangers to the intruder, yet there speaks the sorrows of a long past day---a father and mother and two sons. The little boy died in January, 1827, his eighteen-year-old brother in March, 1828, and the mother unable to bear the double loss, follows them the next November. The father lingers a few years, and probably they were sad years, then he, too, is gone. There was some one left, however, who did not forget. Those stones are distinctly modern, they have been put there in recent years. Lying on the ground not far from the graves, is a rough native rock, still bearing signs of having been inscribed, and "age 66 years" is still decipherable. Other graves there are in this old burying ground, but the rough boulders at their heads, if they ever bore any inscription, show no remains of it now. Sometimes there is not even the rude headstone, only a sunken place in the ground tells that once a human body was placed there. The Bennetts were early settlers, the name occurs every once in a while in the study of the county history, and after years, one accidentally stumbles on the fact that a member of the family went to New Orleans and got rich, and visited Anderson along in the 80s, that of course, was when he put up the stones in memory of his parents and his brothers. It is believed that one of the other graves may be that of a Revolutionary soldier, father of the Elisha Bennett whose grave is marked." TOMBSTONE TRANSCRIPTION NOTES: ------------------------------ a. = age at death b. = date-of-birth d. = date-of-death h. = husband m. = married p. = parents w. = wife BENNETT, Egloe, b. c1810, d. __-Mar-1828 BENNETT, Elisha, b. c1767, d. 30-Sep-1833 BENNETT, Mitchell, b. c1817, d. 10-Jan-1827 BENNETT, Sarah, b. c1774, d. 27-Nov-1828 File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/sc/anderson/cemeteries/bennett5gcm.txt