Elmwood Cemetery Biographies

George Edwards, Jr.: While his tombstone indicates that he was a part of "Co. F of the 8th W.Va. Cavalry", there was no such regiment and the original stone must be considered carved in error (not an uncommon situation).  Military record shows that George Edwards, 18, mustered into Company D of the 8th Virginia Infantry December 31, 1861.  This regiment was organized in the Kanawha Valley in the Fall of 1861.  George Edwards died April 2, 1862 at Buffalo, Putnam County, West Virginia. Later that year, the regiment was assigned to General Averell's brigade.  They were mounted and became part of the 7th West Virginia Cavalry. 
     George is the son of George Edwards, Sr. and Nancy Gray, whose farm in the 1850's was located near the site of the Elmwood Cemetery. For a time, prior to his enlistment, he worked as a farm laborer on the George Wears farm just south of Elmwood in Putnam County.  The Wears were closely related to Martha Wears Gray, a childhood neighbor-woman to young George.  
     Though further research remains to be done, there is the chance that other members of the Edwards family are also buried at Elmwood Cemetery.

Elizabeth Harrison Knapp: Daughter of Joseph and Isabella Harrison, first wife of William Knapp, Sr., and mother to 2 sons [John A. and Joseph Harrison Knapp]. William and his second wife Almira Buck are buried in unmarked graves at Smith Church Cemetery in Union District, a few miles northwest of Elmwood.  There is no record of Elizabeth being buried at Smith Church, and considering her young age at death, only a few short years into her marriage with William, there is considerable likelihood that she would have been buried near her parents' farm.  If this is the case, she may be one of the earliest interred at Elmwood Cemetery.

John C. Harrison: John was the husband of Nancy B. Hill, daughter of Jonathan B. Hill and Roxanna Warner, and father of 7 known children [William M., Marion, Thomas C., Francis M., Mary, John C. Jr., & Permelia]. He died from cholera at the age of 32, the first recorded case of this disease in this part of the state. According to Hardesty he died about 1832.  However, John was included in legal dealings with family estates in 1835, and his daughter Permelia was born in 1835, so it is known that he had to have at least survived to that time.  Some have speculated that he may have been buried at Warner Chapel Cemetery, though the church was only newly established in the early 1830's and was still meeting in homes. The cemetery had not yet been established, nor the church building built. The stronger likelihood is that John was buried alongside his parents. 
     Following his death, John's wife Nancy married the widower William Atkinson and bore 3 more children, which she raised along with William's 5 children from his first marriage. Nancy and William Atkinson are buried at Warner Chapel Cemetery just up Mud Lick at Tribble.

Joseph Harrison: Born in Rockingham County, Virginia at Lacey Springs, the son of Capt. Reuben and Lydia Donnell Harrison and twin brother of Reuben H. Harrison.  Joseph and his brother Reuben settled first in Monroe County, WV on Second Creek not far from Gap Mills, where they met and married the only wives either would have in their lives. In 1789 Reuben married Mary Higginbotham, the daughter of Moses Higginbotham (a large landowner in the Second Creek area), and in about 1795, Joseph married Isabella Jeffers.  Near the turn of the century, both Joseph and Reuben had migrated northwestward with their young families into the Kanawha Valley and finally settled on the lands where they would later be buried. Reuben near (according to family tradition) the Dog Fork of the Pocatalico near Goldtown in Jackson County, and Joseph on the banks of Mud Lick Fork of Thirteenmile Creek at what was later to become known as Elmwood.  Joseph's land lay just to the west and north of the site of Elmwood Cemetery.
     Joseph & Isabella Harrison are the 4-great-grandparents of WVCPA co-founder, D. Joel Duprey.  The loss of their burial place, and the tombstone that marked it, were key motivators for Joel and his wife Donna to establish the West Virginia Cemetery Preservation Association.  

Isabella Jeffers Harrison: (to be written)