This beautiful area is solely kept looking nice by personal
donations made to the Cassville Cemetery Assoc; POB 514; Cassville,
Ga. 30123. Originally this was a Cherokee Burial Ground. The cache
is very special to me. It takes me back to a time when I was in the
second grade and I had a teacher that was truly a teacher in every
way, Mrs. Jo Pittard. She was a teacher in a day when teachers had
the freedom to teach beyond the textbooks. She taught us so much
about life. And EVERY year, she took one weekend and took all the
2nd grade girls home with her. And the next weekend, she took all
the 2nd grade boys home with her. We would leave the school there
in Cassville, and walk to her house, drop our belongings, and then
we would walk to this confederate cemetery. There she taught us
about honor, about history, and about men and women who gave there
lives for our freedom and liberty. We sat in this spot and shared
things we found in the cemetery. We discovered each life in this
cemetery, talked about their lives, and learned respect and honor.
Then she would give us all ‘hubba bubba bubble gum’. Mrs. Jo did
this for many classes for many years. I’ve talked to others in this
area who also remember what a wonderful time we had in Mrs. Jo’s
class, and all the wonderful lessons we learned from her. This one
weekend experience gave me a love to visit places like these and
realize that it was not just tombstones, but lives and each one
different and meaningful. To this day, when I look at a tombstone,
I see so much more. And my heart breaks every time I see a grave
marked Unknown Soldier and wonder what their lives must have been
like, and the pride their families must have for them. I’ve never
found cemeteries morbid, and I don’t think of death, but I think of
life – and how their’s was significant.
The following excerpts are found on this webpage:
http://roadsidegeorgia.com/site/casscemetery.html
Small note: Cache placed with permission of the
Cassville Cemetery Association
Cassville Cemetery
The Cassville Confederate Cemetery is the final resting place for
300 unknown soldiers of the Civil War. The cemetery lies just west
of the eastern ridge where Confederate troops prepared to do
battle. Their trenches remain along with a Confederate Monument
placed in honor of those who died at the hospitals in Cassville. In
May 1899 the Cassville Chapter of the United Daughters of the
Confederacy honored the dead by placing headstones at each of the
graves.
With the unknown is the grave of General William Tatum Wofford, a
lawyer and community leader, who was one of the three Cass County
representatives who voted against seceding from the union. Wofford
served as a Cavalry Captain in the Mexican War and achieved the
rank of Brigadier General in the Civil War. On January 23, 1865
General Wofford was placed in command of Confederate troops in
North Georgia to protect the citizens from bushwhackers and
guerrillas. In his final act of service to the Confederacy, General
Wofford surrendered the last Southern troops east of the
Mississippi, on May 12, 1865 near here in Kingston.
One story that has been handed down and represents the spirit of
the people of this region, is the story of the John F. Milhollin
family. Mr. Milhollin served as clerk of the inferior court from
1855 until he enlisted in the Confederate Army in 1861. Killed in
Virginia, his body was returned to Cassville some time in the
summer of 1864. His wife and children remained in their home across
the road from the cemetery. When the order came on November 5, 1864
to destroy Cassville, their home, along with the rest of the town,
was burned.
The family escaped, with few belongings, to the cemetery. There in
the misty rain and smoke, they took the planks covering John
Milhollin's grave. Using the planks and some quilts, they
constructed a makeshift tent against the cemetery fence. There they
spent a rainy night across the road from the smoldering ruins of
their home.
The next day 14-year-old John, now the man of the family, found an
abandoned slave cabin four miles from Cassville, and the family
moved in and began again.
Young John grew to be a very old man, and for all those years he
continued to call Cassville home. Like so many people who lived
through the war, the family had done what was necessary to survive.
That was life in war time.