Savitz Church Cemetery in China Grove, North Carolina

About

Located behind Mt. Zion United Church of Christ, 1415 South Main St.
China Grove, North Carolina, USA

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Cemetery ID:

Members have Contributed

127 Memorials
93% photographed
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About these numbers These percentages indicate the number of Find a Grave memorials that have a grave photo or GPS coordinates. We don't know the total number of burials in a cemetery, so we cannot calculate a percentage of those with memorials, photos or GPS coordinates.

Photos

3 open photo requests.

The United German Congregation of southern Rowan County, NC, which was comprised of Mt. Zion United Church of Christ (formerly German Reformed Church) and Lutheran Chapel Church, purchased the property Savitz Church was built on in June of 1799, and the church was likely built not long afterward. George Savitz, Jr.'s dwelling house and Grants Creek grist mill were located in close proximity to the church, and it is most probable that this is how the church's name was derived. There can be no doubt that the congregation anticipated building their church at this site at least nine months prior to purchasing the property, as the oldest grave stone gives the date of the deceased's death as Sept. 10, 1798. The cemetery eventually surrounded the church building. In the 1820s, some of Lutheran Chapel's members organized a new congregation, which came to be known as Mt. Moriah Lutheran Church, and from its beginning, that congregation also met in Savitz Church. By the 1840s, all three congregations had built separate church buildings for themselves, and Savitz church was abandoned. Local lore reveals it was eventually moved to a nearby farm and used as an out building for a time, until it burned. Lutheran Chapel and Mt. Moriah at some point ceded their interest in the property to Mt. Zion, with the provision that the Lutherans could continue to be laid to rest in the cemetery, and members of both denominations were buried there until the late 1800s, when Greenlawn Cemetery was established on the opposite side of the road.