Special Delivery

My grandparents, Joe and Sallie Smith, lived on a farm in Union Hall. Here's how they looked when they were first married in 1903—a year before my father was born.

Before my grandparents moved onto the farm, it had belonged to William Bernard and his wife Gillie Ann. William might have built the cabin in the early 1850s, or possibly one of his relatives did. When Gillie Ann died in 1897 at the age of 58, she was buried up on the hillside.

William cut a little window in the wall of the log cabin (now covered with clapboards) so he could sit by the fire and look at her grave.

When William died 10 years later, he was buried beside her. A plain stone marked his grave.  My grandparents bought the farm in 1906.

In 1952, Joe received a letter from West Virginia: 

Obviously the stone was delivered and placed. It's been there for 62 years.

But the old stones weren't removed.

They, along with William and Gillie Ann, rest on the hill.

~

Note: Two other posts on this blog are about this graveyard: https://peevishpen.blogspot.com/2011/11/vines-stones.html and https://peevishpen.blogspot.com/2017/04/lilacs-and-connections.html