FROM BOILING SPRINGS TO OCONEE: A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE CEMETERY PART I OF II
A
nson West wrote in the History of Methodism in Alabama that in 1836, east of Oxford, was the Boiling Springs Methodist Church. One history tells that the church burned after a controversy, and another says that the church was given to freed slaves after the Civil War. Before the war, in the early years of the establishment of the church, members of the congregation included the Allen, Bush, Caver, Clawson, Cumming, DeArman, and Turnipseed families. Many of the members transferred their memberships to the First United Methodist Church some years later. An article from The Anniston Star, dated December 13, 1925, states that John DeArman came to Benton County and exchanged “a drive of ponies” for possession of several thousand acres of land between Oxford and White Plains from Chief Oconee. References to Chief Oconee are few to none. There is, however, a few counties across the Southern United States that
bear the name, as well as a lake and a river. It seems that the word is in association with the Muscogee Creek Tribe. According to notes of local historian, Bessie Coleman Robinson, the Oconee Church (often referred to as “Old Cony”) was later established where the Boiling Springs Church was. Members of the Oconee Church included many former slaves and their descendants. Presently, the cemetery contains an overwhelming majority of African American graves, except for a few earlier graves including William Cornelison, Joel Caver, Major John and Nancy King Bush, and Mary Simmons Turnipseed. The cemetery contains approximately 150 graves with only about 75 marked with some type of headstone, marker, rock, or block. The earliest recorded burial is from 1847, but the earliest marked grave is from 1852. The last burial at Oconee was in 2012. Sources: Ancestry.com, Findagrave.com, Public Library of Anniston-Calhoun County, and The Anniston Star
BY HUNTER C. GENTRY
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OXFORD ACCESS MAGAZINE | WINTER 2018
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