Carolyn Newcomb, from Huntington Beach, California asked me via Email mail), to try to find an ancestral family cemetery of hers in Stafford County. Her cousin's attempt last year to find it came up empty handed. So she asked me to try, since I live in Stafford. So I told her I would give it a go.

I went out to find your cemetery today. I followed the directions to the tee and could not find the private road. I reversed my direction and went down Norman Road. I came upon a farm with a farmer feeding his cattle on the side of the hill. I waved him over, it took awhile since he had to finish putting the hay down for his cattle. After a while Charles Janda a 72-year-old farmer that has lived on this farm since he was, eight months old came over to see what I wanted, out of curiosity.

Since he appeared to be very old, I  figured he knew where the Norman and Towson Cemetery might be, and sure enough he did. He offered to take me to it, telling me that he had taken a group of Norman's from Sterling Virginia there some years before.  Charles said he needed a break from his chores, so he slowly climbed into, my wife Ruth Anne's, 1992 green Jeep Cherokee and off we went. I asked Charles if he was married. He said he never went into town with the other young men of his age, he was too interested in farming, so he never got to meet any girls or women. I asked him if he served in World War II, he said he had headaches and the draft board decided not to take him. I believe he doesn't own a telephone since he doesn't socialize with anyone and hasn't any relatives that would call him.
c1997 Harry H. Leichter
The private road which the directions from Musselman's 1983 Stafford Cemetery Book, no longer has access to Brent Point Road. It is behind the first house on the right past the Salem Methodist Church.

We parked just the other side of the house. The three of us, I, Charles and Ruth Anne crossed the creek and started up the two hundred foot high hill. Charles lead the way moving remarkably fast and agile for his advanced age. Using a staff that he had broken off of a tree limb for support and something to part the underbrush with, I followed close behind talking to him about his life on his farm. Ruth Anne followed, with her cane for support. Charles, leading the way, circled around to the property just behind the house. The back of the house yielded sounds of many roosters crowing constantly, dogs barking and excited chickens squawking. That is where we found the remnants of the old road. We followed the road up the hill a distance of approximately one half of a mile. The underbrush wasn't too bad. The road has become a depression with rotting trees crisscrossed up and down its length. Upon reaching the top of the hill and the end of the road, we saw a flowering ground cover, vines up trees and brambles, completely different from the forest we had been moving through. This normally indicates that there had been a farm stay on this land at one time. Charles said that this type of flowered covering was brought from England by the original settlers.

Charles said, "the grave site is around here somewhere, I should have brought my pruning clippers" for he was referring to the brambles that folks in North Carolina call "dammit weeds". The reason they use that term to describe brambles is because when you get stuck and cut by them you say real loud, "dammit".
c1997 Harry H. Leichter
Well we started to hunt for the graves, Charles was getting a little frustrated and commented that maybe the Norman's from Sterling Virginia had moved the graves to another location.

After about 15 minutes of pushing through the brambles, it was like trying to walk through barbed wire, we found a Towson grave and then just a few feet away I found Thomas Norman Esq. died 1848, 56 years old. Right next to his grave was his wife Paulina P. Norman's grave. I photographed both stones but I could hardly read them. To read Paulina's stone, I had to trace with my finger to determine what the spelling was. The stones were carved from some sort of shale and the Towson graves were carved in freestone, a native sandstone that was quarried within a thousand feet of the grave site. Charles said there should be a lot more gravestones on this site but we couldn't see anymore. Charles started pushing his way out of the brambles. I decided that I would try one more time to get into the heart of the brambles to see if there were anymore gravestones.  After pushing through a solid wall of brambles, I surprised  an eastern ribbon snake as I crawling under a downed cedar tree, I found about 8 Norman gravestones in a row, with two jammed under the fallen cedar tree. I crawled a couple more feet and got close to one of the gravestones. Within a year some of these stones will deteriorate to the degree and no one will be able to read them. I decided to withdraw from the site and planned to return with the proper pruning clippers to cut my way into the site so as to get the information off of the gravestones.
c1997 Harry H. Leichter
We withdrew from the site and retraced our path back out to the road. I took Charles back to his farm. Charles told me that the Norman's settled here in the 1600's. He also said the Norman's on this farm had made corn whiskey for Washington Continental Army.

After dropping Ruth Anne off at home, I took my pruning clippers and bow saw and went back to the site. This time I parked in the same place but when crossing the creek, I followed a line of blue blazes (paint sprayed on trees commonly used to Mark a hiking trail) that were painted on a line of trees for surveying purposes. I climbed straight up the hill to the top. By the time I reach the summit I was wheezing from effort, but I was happy to find that my path intersected with a well worn path that was going parallel to the old road. The roosters will still crowing and the dogs were still barking and a new sound was added to the chorus, someone firing a shot gun, probable target shooting for it continued the whole time I was there. The path took me right back to the cemetery with very little effort. Using the pruning clippers I cut a path to the fallen tree. Using clippers and bow saw I cut my way under the fallen cedar tree. On the other side of the tree the first gravestone was of Elizabeth Norman wife of Thomas Norman who departed this life in the year 1771 at the age of 57 years of her life.  I cleared the brambles away from each of the graves in this row. It took approximately two hours. The next gravestone was Thomas Norman, the dates have eroded away on this stone, but it was approximately the same design as Elizabeth's gravestone. To the left of Elizabeth's stone, wedged under another fallen tree was that of her son, James Norman. This stone was in surprisingly good condition for its age. I guess because it had been sheltered by the fallen cedar for so long. This one read, James Norman son of Thomas and Elizabeth Norman Oct. YEA 11th A.D. 1771 in the 32nd year of his age. The next stone down from Thomas Norman was Thos & Ellinor Towson two infants died Dec 27 1809. The next one is Edward Norman who departed this life Dec 20 1814 in the 63rd year of his age. Next to him is Jane wife of Edward Norman died Dec 23 1814 at the age of 58 years. Next to her is James S. Norman died Dec 17 1814 and was 37 years old. Next stone was in very good condition and is Matthew Norman died Dec 24 1814 in the 35th year of his age.  I thought, "these four died in a span of 10 days in the same year, what was this tragedy that took their lives, could be influenza, the war of 1812 or what". Then I had to circle around a large barrier of brambles to get back to the original two stones that I had photographed earlier. Thomas Norman Esq. died Dec 8th or 18th 1846, 56 years of age. Next to him on the left is Paulina P. Norman died August 8 1830. Intermingled are a few Towson gravestones and are very hard to read since they were carved in the sandstone. Unless this site is rescued soon, it may suffer further damage.

I have a few blisters from cutting away all the underbrush around the graves and a few cuts from the brambles, but I feel that I have accomplished something today.
****
Chapter 2

I followed the path out, the same way I came in. I judged that because I saw some of the briars that I cut on the way in. Suddenly the shotgun ceased firing, I guess he got tired or he ran out of shells. As I walked back along the path towards the squawking chickens and crowing roosters a Blue Jay darted forward, coming to rest on a tree branch some 25 yards ahead of me. When I got 10 feet from the Jay it would dart ahead of me once more coming to rest on a tree branch about the same distance as before.
c1997 Harry H. Leichter
 ***

I went back to the Cemetery about 8 am on the following Friday so that the sunlight would be low on the horizon and right for photography. As I approached the farm stay, once again, I noticed that it seemed like an oasis, because of the starkness of the forest and the bright green of the farm stay. The ground cover had grown a full three inches since last Sunday and the whole place seemed extremely lush. As I approach the gravestones I noticed something different. The Thomas Norman stone that I couldn't read last Sunday had a chalk like substance across the area where the date of death was and now I could read it. As I proceeded along the row of graves I noticed that the thicket that I had not cut down, because it was too thick, had been cleared, giving access to the entire line of gravestones.

I stopped and examined the brambles that had been cut away by the newcomer and decided that because the brambles were not cut cleanly but rather a rough slice was visible, that a machete had been used.  Obviously someone with experience in genealogy had read my email on the subject and had come out to look the site over.  I photographed all the stones and departed using the same route as before.  I was happy to get out of the woods, due to my acute sneezing from pollen, that was being released into the air by the current outburst of new tree and ground flowers.
c1997 Harry H. Leichter
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