Ok Folks, up for a little mystery...........this may be a little long, but eventually leads to where a missing cemetery containing some long lost northern Benton County graves maybe located....... <Please note the list of names who donated land for this church, school & cemetery below>. The following is supposed to be an exact copy of the 1st page of the Sessions Book of the Pleasant Hill Cumberland Presbyterian Church in Big Sandy <later known as Pleasant Ridge CPC>. It appeared in Vol 7 # 1 of the Benton County Genealogical Society Quarterly and is also reprinted in the Benton County "Families & Histories", Vol 1, 1987 p.369 along with the minutes of the 1st Sessions Meeting <the CPC Archives would love to have this book or even a facsimile>. The transcript is attributed to Catheyrn Brown of Camden. Problem is...after my wife, Debby, spoke with Catheryn directly in an attempt to locate the book says,...... it ain't so.....she's not aware of the facsimile or the Sessions Book. So..... >BENTON COUNTY AND STATE OF TENNESSEE, September 9, 1853. > >We, inhabitants of Benton County, Tennessee, being desirous to have the >means of grace amoungst us do form ourselves into a Society to be known as >the Pleansant Hill Society within the bounds of Hopewell Presbytery and do >look to that presbytery for such supplies of the gospel and other ordiances >of God's House as He may enable them to give us and we promise to submit to >the government and discipline of the Cumberland Presbytery. > >Where unto we have set our hands this 9, September 1853. > > 1. Daniel Graham, Elder > 2. Cristain Graham > 3. Mary Beton > 4. Margaret Buckhanon > 5. Catherine Beton > 6. Nancy McQuage > 7. Margaret Brewer > 8. Nancy Beton > 9. Danel Buckhanon >10. Catherine Beaton >11. Levisa Debruise >12. Margaret McCawly >13. Danl McQuage >14. Hyman Taylo, Elder. >15. Zacharias Childers >16. Mrs. Childers " C. Clement, Catherine Graham, Isabel Graham, Caroline Cooper, J.P. Cooper and William Pierce donated 2 acres for the church , school and cemetery. David J. & Lillie Cooper donated 1 acre for the cemetery. And T.M. Little and Sam Nicky deeded one acre each to the church. Notice the surnames in the list (correct for spelling please) are very early, well known names in the area. Anyone know where most of these folks are buried ???? Susan Knight Gore, the archivist for the CPC Church in Memphis, has also kindly provided the following information from the Hopewell Presbytery archives: that Daniel Graham was the 1st representative from Big Sandy to the Presbytery meetings, then Z. Childers and then until his death in 1887, Elder Gilbert McKenzie. None of these folks are interned in the Church's Pleasant Ridge Cemetery even as late as 1887. Ever wonder where these folks went to church prior to 1853 ??? Wasn't at a CPC in Benton County or was it ?? Susan also uncovered the existence of a prior CPC in Big Sandy dating to back to 1835. Seems one was organized at that early date before Benton was a county and was known as the Big Sandy CPC in the Church archives. Anyone know where it was located ???? Venture a guess ??? "Shorty" Brewer, in his Family Charts in the Benton Co. Library, lists the cemetery for a large number of the members of these families and others in this area as "Willow Point". "Willow Point" doesn't appear in the Benton Co. Gen Societies Cemetery book. Ole "Shorty" was a reasonably accurate fellow. <Had a birth listed that I couldn't verify anywhere until I found "Willow Point" Cemetery and found the gravestone>. Yeah, Willow Point exists <it's where cemetery #176 is located on the Benton Cemetery Book map. #176 should actually be located above the number "158">. the in the middle of a pasture under a raspberry patch up New Hope road a couple miles north of Big Sandy. And there you'll find the McKenzies, Beatons, & others from the area. Earlier cemetery sources indicate over 35 graves are located there. How many more, I don't know. I could only locate 5 headstones under the raspberry bushes. Rumour has it that the rest were bulldozed into the neighboring woods, but I couldn't locate them. Additionally, older folks tell tale of a 'Willow Point" school once, but no longer there. >From 'Shorty's" records and other sources, it's evident that 'Willow Point" is a communial and not a family cemetery. The early McKenzies are buried there, but they didn't even live closeby. Their homestead was down on Sugar Creek about 3 miles outta Big Sandy on the Point Mason Road along with the Grahams, Brewers, Pierces, etc. So why are they buried there instead of on their homestead ??? I suspect, but won't know without further research and documentation, that Willow Point Cemetery is the congregational cemetery of the 1835 Big Sandy CPC and forbearer of the later Pleasant Ridge CPC cemetery. The current Pleasant Ridge Cemetery is just down the road from Willow Point and has internments starting in the 1860's <apparently no one died in the church from 1853 til then>. If anyone knows the whereabouts of the early Pleasant Ridge CPC Sessions Books or has information <hear-say is good also> of the 1835 Big Sandy CPC and/or Willow Point Cemetery, churc or school, please contact Susan Knight Gore, the CPC Archivist, or myself. We're on the list. Thanks for your patience, Dave