"Gone But Not Forgotten"-Dorsey & Derden, gives directions to original gravesite:

Go down U.S. 1 South and turn right on State Route 297. Go approximately 1/2 mile and turn left to the second gate on James Carmichael's farm. Follow the road across the field to the head of the branch. The grave marker is in a plot of chinaberry trees.

In the spring of 1978, I (Norman E. Masters) visited with James L. Carmichael in Swainsboro, Ga. I was accompanied by P. Douglas Fowler, a member of the faculty of Georgia Southern College in Statesboro, Ga. Mr. Carmichael took us out to his farm to a wooded area adjacent to his property, which he stated made up part of the old Lot Youmans (Homer Youmans) place. He said the farm had recently been sold to Marvin Collins and Mr. Collins cleared the wooded area, saying he did not realize there was a cemetery there until it was cleared except for one gravestone. Mr. Carmichael stated that as a child and a young man he remembered there were a number of gravestones there. The gravestone that was left still standing was one erected by the D.A.R. to David Edenfield, and had the inscription, "David Edenfield, Weakly's Regt., S.C. Troops, Revolutionary War, Jan. 19, 1761." There was a dented gravesite to the left of this marker. Through talking to members of the family who had seen this cemetery, we believe there were about 18 graves there. Up from the cemetery there was a draw and a group of trees which gave the appearance that a house might have been there at one time. Old timers in the family have stated that David Edenfield's house was in sight of the cemetery. A search was made for other gravestones but no more could be located. It is assumed that David's wife was buried in the grave next to his, and probably his son, Jesse, and his wife were there, also.

NOTE FROM OLIVIA:

I, too, visited this burial site in 1978, shortly after it had been bulldozed. My group first went to the Marvin Collins house and received permission and directions. We went down the dirt road beside their house and crossed over a pond dam on the left side of the road--as I recall, we continued left along the edge of the woods until we saw where bulldozing had taken place. I saw David Edenfield's marker and several broken pieces of other tombstones scattered about in disarray, partially buried in the dirt, some had portions of names on them. I have often wished I'd brought a camera and recorded the devastated site. I was so upset, I didn't even write down the partial names I found, and I so wish I'd gone back and asked permission to dig up and remove all pieces of tombstones and tried to restore them. Shortly thereafter, in passing on the highway (297), I saw Mr. Carmichael there working on his fence. I stopped and had a talk with him, and he told me basically what he had told the gentlemen in the above article. He said I could more easily find the site by going through his pasture gate and across his land. Over the years, I have been back to the general area of the original Edenfield burial ground, but could no longer find the site. By then, Mr. Carmichael was deceased and I had no one to show me the original homesite and burial ground of my great-great-great-great-grandparents. In recent years, I discovered the David Edenfield stone has been moved to the Moore Cemetery near Nunez, but there is no explanation accompanying it about the destroyed cemetery and that this is not the true place of his burial. The James Moore (RS) stone is beside David's in the Moore Cemetery, and there is no explanation on it, as well; I don't know if it was placed in this cemetery by the DAR or moved from another site as David's was. (James Moore is also a direct ancestor of mine.) To me, this is such a tragedy! These are only stones; they do not mark the sites where my ancestors' bones actually lie! Their family burial grounds that they, themselves, established on their own property, land that was given to them for their services in the War, where they built homes for their families, reared their children, and worked the fields, were desecrated and totally destroyed by uncaring individuals. And what is worse, their own descendants never stepped forward and did a thing to stop it.