Lee Cemetery
aka Land-Tidwell
Gregory
Coords: 35.155900, -91.310842
From Gregory, east on AR 19 (1st St) for about 1.5 miles, at the curve, go straight onto Rex Hancock Rd about 1/3 mile and through a gate on the left. This is private property and you must have permission before visiting.
This cemetery is located 2 1/4 miles east of Gregory. Around 1862, Samuel Watson bought this particular land from E. Thomas Easley. In 1867, he sold the land back to the Easley children. Evidently, Mrs. Callie Tidwell, Evelyn K. Land and Frances Land bought the land sometime and sold it to John W. Lee. It is located in the southeast quarter of Section 9, Township 6 North, Range 3 West. The cemetery may have been known as Tidwell Cemetery or even Land Cemetery (Abram Land, the father-in-law of William Alexander Reed, whose mother and children are buried here), although research fails to record it as such.
At the time Mrs. Callie Tidwell owned the land, she advised a group of Negroes to buy a plot of land for a cemetery, as the next generation would not sell; they did not take her advice. Another record indicates that Mrs. Tidwell and Susan gave a mortgage to the land to Minor Gregory, April 8, 1893. Rae Coleman notes that an instrument dated January 31, 1907, mentions the right of the renters to bury their dead in a the graveyard on the land. John W. Lee's first wife and several children are buried in the cemetery, and he was the last to be buried here when he died in 1928.
An inventory of the cemetery was made in 1974 by Elo Peters, who married Opal Lee, daughter of John W. Lee. The Peters family lives near the cemetery, and part of the area is owned by a brother, Charlie Lee.
It was the custom of the more affluent citizens who lived before and during the Civil War to line their graves with bricks, extending a foot or so above the ground. Mr. Peters noted that the grave of a small child had been lined with bricks.
Ed Holler spoke of a Mr. King being buried in this cemetery. King was shot by an unknown person through a window. He was employed to operate a store (Hall and Reed) by Mrs. Reed following the deaths of Mr. Hall and Mr. Reed.
Brewster, Annie E., b. July 25, 1836, D. February 14, 1883 (*Wife of John W. Brewster)
Brewster, John W., d. April 13, 189?, aged 70 years (*Husband of Annie E. [Alexander] Brewster)
King, William H., b. February 24, 1874, d. October 20, 1898 (*Son of William H. King, Sr. and Mary A. (Easley) King, shot by an unknown person through a window)
Land, Eugenia V., d. 1878 (*Born 1862 and died 1878)
Lee, John Wilson, B. 1846, d. 1928, aged 82 years.
Lee, Mrs. _______ (and several children of John Wilson Lee)
Reed, Annie E., born and died July 30, 1885, daughter of W.A. and M.E.
Reed, Douglass H., b. November 6, 1881, d. November 5, 1882, son of W.A. and M.E.
Thompson, John Franklin. d. 1925
Thompson, Spicey Ellen, b. 1868
Tidwell, J. Elbert, b. January 22, 1885, d. October 31, 1897, son of J.C. and C.
Tidwell, Susie, b. January 15, 1890, d. December 1891, daughter of J.C. and C.
Note: Transcribed and notes added by Gary Telford, Family Roots, Woodruff County Monitor.
*1910 Census
*Thompson, John S., 49, born in NC, laborer (sawmill); Spicy E., wife, 50, born in NC, mother of 4 children. 2 living; married 10 years, Minnie L., daughter, 17 born in AR.