Re: Old Christian Chapel Church Cemetery

[Clayton Mann]

I've heard it said that the cemetery you walked through is the "old" Christian Chapel Church Cemetery, but I've never been able to corroborate this.  There are stones as old in the "new" cemetery, and some that look even older, but maybe the one you mention is the original one.  Wish we could confirm what the cemetery name was.  I wonder if the WPA checked this cemetery back in the 1930s.  I know many old cemeteries in NC were canvassed, but I don't know which ones were from Chatham County.  The records are in the Archives in Raleigh, but that's a set of records I never had the chance to plow through.

When I first saw the William Mann gravestone you mentioned many years ago it was legible enough to read.  It said William was born August 26th, 1846 and he died April 14, 1882.  Who he is/was has puzzled me for years.  I know the Mann families of that area and that period very well I think, but I can not place this William Mann.  William Taylor Mann, son of Zachariah & Celina Woodell Mann, was born about the same year, but he lived beyond 1900.  Incidentally, Taylor Mann married Maturia Holt, daughter of George & Elizabeth Johns[t]on Holt.  There was a William A. Mann, born 1844, son of William & Grace Holt Mann, but he married Augustin Ann Yates and moved in the 1880s to Texas.  There is not anyone left except perhaps one: Burwell Mann in the Jeremiah & Dicey (nee, Williams) Mann family in 1850.  I wonder if he was really William Burwell Mann.  He is not listed in the 1860 census, but the Eastern District of Chatham County for that year is a train wreck.  Anyone who has ever reviewed it knows what I mean.  There are others who lived in that period I know of that are missing, names that are butchered, pages out of order, household and family numbers that make no sense, etc.  William Burwell could have been living, in other words, just skipped over by a very sloppy census taker.  In 1870 there is a William Mann, age 22, who at first glance looks to be the William Taylor Mann who was the son of Zachariah Mann because he is listed right beside Zach.  But Taylor Mann is listed also a couple of pages over, so this has to be a different person and I think must be the William who died in 1882.  But oddly enough, I can not find him in the 1800 census, nor can I find Hinton, or the others you have listed.  I have looked for them before and struck out.  The whole group is a mystery to me.  Does anyone have the years that Hinton and the other kids were born?  Seems I have seen that before somewhere, maybe years ago?

Clayton

On 9/13/05, erm...@hotmail.com <erm...@hotmail.com> wrote:

I made a trip to Chatham County last week and had a chance to explore
the "old" Christian Chapel Church Cemetery down the road (and in the
woods)from the church and "new" cemetery.  It appears to be a Mann
family cemetery.  It was surveyed by the Heisers in their 2001 edition
of "The Grave sites of Chatham County, North Carolina" although their
readings of the headstones differ slightly from the decipherings of
myself and the cousins who accompanied me.  There were approximately
seven graves with inscriptions which were very difficult to read:  Bety
Mann died at 12 yrs old, Hinton Mann died at 14 years old, Letty? Mann
died at 10 years old, Claudy Mann, age 8 years, Infant of WS and SC
Certain 1 day old, B.? C. Certain born July 15 1834? Died July ?,
William Mann(died as an adult in the 1800's but dates illegible).  Does
anyone have any information about the history of this cemetery?