Some of you may think I haven’t shown due diligence in explaining who is buried in the Linton family graveyard in Washington County since we had Billy Wilkerson come with his ground penetrating radar machine in April of this year.  I can’t tell you yet.  Not that I don’t want to, I’m still in the process of elimination. 

I printed a list of Captain John Hancock and Ann Mason Linton’s children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.  A significant amount of people is on this list – over 300.  Of all the children who came to Washington County with their parents, only one returned to Loudoun County.  Daughter Elizabeth Rebecca Linton and spouse, Richard Keene, missed Loudoun County, and moved back.  Richard, one of their sons, remained in Kentucky and married Susan Linton Moran, his first cousin.  Yes, that was more acceptable at that time period than it is today!

It is possible to search Find A Grave by entering a last name and a county and state.  In doing so, for example, all those buried with the last name Linton in Washington County, will be listed in alphabetical order.  Sometimes I sort these by ‘birth date (Older),’ especially if I am searching for someone buried in the early days.  I have searched with almost all Linton and extended family names – Edwards, Green, Keene, Taylor, etc.  This is the way I have eliminated many Linton descendants, finding them buried in various cemeteries in the counties of Washington, Nelson, Marion and Spencer.  You can search state-wide, but you get an enormous amount of possibilities!

This is an old photograph of the Linton cemetery I found this morning.  I cannot tell you when this was taken. 

Another old photograph, perhaps taken the same day.  You can see small trees, bushes, and brush growing there.  I remember asking my grandmother where this cemetery was located.  She told me it was on the road where she was born and raised, at one time called Old Hwy 555.  My parents went to this cemetery and took a couple of photos, probably the two I’ve inserted.  I must have been at college at the time – 1976?

Taken in 2010 if you didn’t know there was a cemetery in this spot it would be passed by.  When Reed Spalding owned the land, he kept the cemetery immaculate.  Other owners were not as concerned.

To give you an idea how tall the weeds and bushes were!

The poor captain surrounded by weeds!

This photograph was taken in 2016.  I see two additional stones, one in the second row on the left and in the third row. 

Taken in May.  There are a few inches of one stone left, but there is no third row.

Time waits for no man – or woman.  Everything grows, evolves, grows back, is cut back, pieces of stones go missing.  It is what it is.  But when we research every possibility for the people who are buried here, this cemetery will have more history, even if there are few stones to tell the story.