There's one of these in the Decatur cemetery also.....just left of the entrance....maybe 3 or 4 rows in on the left side. As a boy, I always thought it meant the mother arranged for the tomb stone. I don't recall the exact date of the stone but I remember knowing at the time that it was the grave of a Civil War soldier with the date of death being during the Civil War....or the Great War of Northern Aggression......depending on how you look at it, I guess.....mac ----- Original Message ----- From: Stacy Smith To: IADECATU-L@rootsweb.com Sent: Sunday, May 23, 2004 6:23 PM Subject: [IADECATU] "By Mother" Ok all you smart cemetery people. I have a question for you. What does "by mother" mean when found on a gravestone? My grandmother and I were out cemetery walking last weekend, and we ran across two stones next to eachother and they both had the man's name birth/death year and below this, it said By Mother. Ok, what does that mean? They weren't infants...I can't remember exactly how old they were, but I think they were both older than 20.... Any ideas? (I am not going to tell you what my grandma thought it might mean.) :-) Thanks in advance Stacy (searching for the surnames: Green, McLaughlin, Wion, Jones, White, Truitt, Newberry, ?McCoy? and Stephen(s) that came to Decatur county, IA, AND Stone, Elkins, Ward, Johnston/Johnson, Bowen, Gillespie, Coots, Shain, Polley, Clevenger, Hook, Bridges, Moore and Smith that were in Harrison County, MO) ==== IADECATU Mailing List ==== Stacey Dietiker, Momdit@aol.com: Decatur County List Administrator, Website Coordinator, Decatur County IA Genweb - http://www.rootsweb.com/~iadecatu ============================== View and search Historical Newspapers. Read about your ancestors, find marriage announcements and more. Learn more: http://www.ancestry.com/s13969/rd.ashx