HUNTER
CEMETERY (Historic)-MAURY COUNTY,
MT PLEASANT, TENNESSEE
From Mt. Pleasant go
south on Hwy. #43, take the left fork, entering Enterprise Road (Hwy 166). (Old Military
Highway). After the railroad crossing, the cemetery is on left side of the road.
The western part is the old Hunter (White) part and the eastern section is the
modern Hunter (Black) portion of the cemetery.
(Hunter Meetinghouse -
Hunter Cemetery is located just southeast of Mt. Pleasant,
Tennessee past the fork of
Highway 43 and the road to Enterprise community on what is known as the Military
Road. Long before this land was inhabited by
some of the earliest settlers of
the area, it was being mentioned in court records, and plans for it were being
made.)
Hunter Cemetery Listing
Area
photos of the Cemetery
My
first visit to historic Hunter Cemetery, by Mary Bob Richardson
Civil War Soldiers buried in Hunter Cemetery
Lightning Strike - July 12, 1887 in the
Hunter (black) Cemetery.
The Giant Red Oak tree dies - 2014 - and
falls, crushing many tombs.
For information on Burials
from other sources see Hunter Meetinghouse and it's Cemetery Records, Mt.
Pleasant, Tennessee; compiled by Sara Tom McKennon and Deane Kennedy Hendrix;
1983 page 40.
From: "They
Passed This Way."
There are hundreds of
other graves in this cemetery. Some are marked with plain fieldstones,
others with markers that have faded or shaled. The bases for several monuments
are in place but the stones are missing. Still other burial spots were never
marked at all. Fred Hawkins "Maury County Tennessee Cemeteries", 1986.
Update
There are many monuments that have broken and are on the ground since the
listing Mr. Fred Hawkins did in 1986. However, it is my observation that some
caring souls have been to Hunter Cemetery in an effort to repair or replace many
of the broken stones. The day I was there the grass, weeds, brushes etc., were
just beginning to start Spring growth. There are little orange flags over some
areas on the cemetery as though marked for a future repair or placed there for
mowing purposes. It is naturally saddening to the genealogist or cemetery
preservationist to see this historic cemetery in Mt. Pleasant fade away. Yet, since
my first trip to Hunter Cemetery in 2002 there has been some improvements. I did
have a concern when I first got to the cemetery. I parked in front of two large
piles of chirt (dirt). Wondering what the dirt was pile up there for the first
thought: Someone is going to fill in sunken graves, forever to be lost. Well I
hope not, unless a marker or memorial is placed on the grave site. This update on
Hunter Cemetery will not be the last one. Mr. Hawkins the author of MCTC sites
his reference for his listing in the book by McKennon, Sara Tom & Deane
Kennedy Hendrix; The History of Hunter Meetinghouse and its Cemetery Records;
1983. I have a copy of this wonderful story of an little known historical cemetery.
You cannot read this book without wanting to go see for yourself the rich
history of the early settlers of Mt. Pleasant, Tennessee.
March 2005, by Mary Bob McClain Richardson. Programming by C. Wayne Austin.
