Finding Lucinda
Anyone who visits Mallory Cemetery can count the headstones standing inside its walls. There are nine: Roger Mallory and his wife, Lucy; John Mallory and his wife, Sarah, known as “Sally" and four of their children - Dr. Andrew, Newton, James (buried alongside his wife, Susan) and Sarah. Nine stones, nine names. But that's not the full story.
Williamson County Archives | Mallory Cemetery | Burial Book 1, Page 185
Early in my research, I located a burial list at the Williamson County Archives documenting the names of those interred at Mallory Cemetery. It was last updated in 1973 with information provided by Mrs. Marvin Pratt, who owned the Mallory farmland between 1954 and 1985. The list names 10 individuals, not nine. The tenth name is Lucinda, the eldest daughter of John and Sally. However, there is no headstone bearing her name.
Newspapers.com | The Tennessean (Nashville, TN) | April 18, 1891
With the help of Leesa Harmon, public archivist at the Williamson County Archives, Lucinda’s death notice from April 1891, published in a Nashville newspaper was eventually located. It reported that she died at the home of her nephew, J.W. Mallory, and was buried in the family burial ground. She was in her 79th year, well-known throughout the county and had long been a member of the Methodist Church. The notice confirms exactly what the burial list suggests, Lucinda is laid to rest at this cemetery alongside her parents and siblings. More than a century later, there's no headstone to mark the location.
History is still being written. The City of Franklin has expressed interest in conducting a ground-penetrating radar (GPR) survey of the cemetery grounds. If that survey moves forward, it could finally locate the unmarked grave where Lucinda has rested since 1891. Though unnamed on the surface, Lucinda's story serves as a reminder that much remains to be told and that this work is far from finished.