FREEMANTOWN CEMETERY

FOUNDED: 1871

ADDITONAL NAMES: Freemans, Jones, Montgomery, Rogers Sanfords

AFFILIATION(S): None

HISTORY:

Several sources, however, make it clear that by this time the name Freemantown is well established. In November 1910 Henrietta Freeman and her children Mingo Freeman, Josephine Rodgers, Henrietta Montgomery, and Fredonia Perry confirm a lost deed from Thomas Freeman to the Trustees of Freemans Chapel Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States of America. In a 1949 document describing his 1909 marriage to Luna Presley, Henry Grady Terrell recollects “Driving to Mountain Springs Methodist Church at the foot of Lavender Mountain and just off old Bryant Gap Road … At the home of George Rolland and Sally Vaughn Presley. From there took Luna Presley … And at midafternoon we drove to Freeman Town, then to Redmond Gap Road and drove along the fence toward Rome. To the Rev. William Cooper's home which was about one mile west of Berry Schools an[d] about one half of a mile north of the present Battey State Hospital, and united in Holy matrimony.”[18] In the 1910 census, Luna's father Roland Presley and his second wife Ella, who are white, are enumerated on the same page as Henrietta Freeman’s daughter Josephine Rodgers and her sister-in-law Susan Freeman.

The first sale of Freeman land to the Berry Schools occurred in 1916, when Essex Freeman’s widow, Hannah Montgomery Freeman, sold her portion of Lot 20 for $1,450.[19] By 1920 the impact of the school is becoming significant. School Superintendent Henry Grady Hamrick, his wife Ethel, son, and three Berry students are practically next door to Henrietta Freeman and her granddaughter Beatrice Freeman.[20] Of the children, only Mingo and Francis Freeman are close. Henrietta and Gib Montgomery are in an adjacent district and Hannah Freeman lives in Rome. Fredonia Perry still lives in Tennessee and Henrietta and Gib Montgomery have moved to Michigan. Burials in the Freeman Chapel cemetery will continue for a few years[21], but the end of Freemantown is near.

On 21 March 1923, five months before her death, Henrietta Freeman sold the 25 acres she inherited from Thomas Freeman to the Berry Schools for $800. Fredonia Perry sold the same year. The other children and the heirs of those who had died would hold on to their land for a few more years, finally selling the last of the land in 1926. The places of residence of the sellers include Rome, Georgia; Arlington, Tennessee; Detroit; and Seattle.

Henrietta Freeman died on 17 August 1923, of heart disease, at the age of 95. Her son Mingo Freeman gave information for her death certificate, including the names of her parents, William and Dista Freeman. She was buried at Freemantown Cemetery, on 19 August 1923.

BCN Contact Information:

Cheryl Freeman Snipes

cfsnipes@gmail.com