Susan Dowell was the 11th of 12 children of James Board Dowell and Barbara Shacklett. Susan was a younger sister to Elizabeth Dowell Barnes who is also buried in this cemetery.

Susan Dowell married Burnis B. Shacklett.

Susan Dowell wrote from Gainesville, Texas on May 17, 1915;
"I Susan J. Dowell, was born July 12, 1830 in Brandenburg, Kentucky, Meade County. My parents were Colonel James Board Dowell and Barbara Shacklett. I spent a happy childhood and was the eleventh child having five brothers and five sisters older than myself and one brother younger. When I was fifteen years old, I attended a camp meeting on Ruff Creek Kentucky and while I was there that God for Christ sake forgave my sins. I have been trying ever since to serve to serve the Lord to the best of my ability.
I married Burniss B. Shacklett on March 1, 1849. He had just returned from the Mexican War where he served two years under General Scott.
We lived a happy life in Kentucky for ten years. Had four children born to us B. C. Shacklett, Barbara Shacklett, J. T. Shacklett and Nancy Helen Shacklett, she was two years old when we left Ky for Texas. We left our native land in April 1860, taking boat Mongomery and the captain by the same name. Went down the river from Rochester. Had a storm near Paducah, laid over there until they could repair the boat. We went on to New Orleans and stopped there two days and nights. Then we crossed the river and took the train for the bay. There we boarded the ship for Port Lavaca. We were on the ship two days and nights. We landed at Galveston for a while. We stayed at Port Lavaca several days waiting for our goods to be unloaded.
Then we hitched our wagons and started out by land for El Paso, Texas, eight hundred miles away. We went by way of San Antonio. We camped there for one week on account of the hot weather and mosquitoes.
We went on three hundred miles west on Turkey Creek. We camped there for a month, waiting for a train of wagons. We could not travel any further alone on account of danger of Indians. We traveled at night because the Indians were so hostile and water so scarce. It was forty miles from one watering place to another. We carried water in kegs for the family but the poor mules had to do without. Stopping at the watering places we would rest and cook enough food to do us until the next stop. The children were very scared of the Indians. We could see them at distance watching us closely, but due to the large number of well-armed men in the wagon train they did not attack us. We got to El Paso on August 15th or near that time. We lived on a ranch for one year. We had Mexicans to herd and milk the cows. We had thirty fine milk cows. I made fifteen pounds of butter a week, the first ever made in that country. I sold it for one dollar a pound. Our house had an adobe wall built around it. The Indians would come around at night. We could not see them - only their tracks around the house. One day the man that carried the milk and butter to town did not return by nightfall and my husband and some of the ranch hands rode out to look for him. They found him by his wooden cart. He had been killed and scalped by the Indians. So we thought it was time for us to leave.
So we went into El Paso and kept a hotel until the Northern Troops came in on the north and our soldiers were cut off from their supplies and they had to retreat and come south. We came with them as far south as San Antonio. From there we came to Sherman, Texas. We lived in town until my brother James died in July 1863. My husband went into the army in the winter of 1863 and served on the Rio Grande near Brownsville, Texas until the war closed in 1865. He left me with six children to care for, two more having been born since we left Kentucky: Mattie and Sallie. We later had another daughter; Susan. The oldest child; Cad was only ten years old, but steady and manly for a child. I had a hard time for two years, weaving and spinning all-day and sewing until twelve o'clock at night. When my husband came home from the war all broke down, in poor health and for two years unable to do much. We bought a farm four miles east of Sherman, Texas. We lived there fifteen years. Then we sold the farm and moved to Gainsville Texas in the winter of 1881.
On November 6th, 1888 my husband died leaving me alone. I have been living around ever since at different places, sometimes in Dallas, Dennison and in Missouri, Oklahoma and Kentucky. I came back to Gainesville in 1910 and have lived with my son, Cad ever since. God has been good to me and has blessed me with health and strength to perform the duties enjoined upon me. I will be 85 years on the 12th day of July 1915."
She wrote this on May the 17th, 1915 when she was almost 85 years old. She died October 20, 1920 and is buried beside Burnis in the Redmon Cemetery 3 miles south east of Gainsville. They both have markers.

From the local newspaper;
"Mrs. Susan Shacklett, Age Ninety Years, Died at Home this Morning - Mrs. Susan J. Shacklett, one of the pioneer citizens of Gainesville, died at 12;30 o'clock this morning at the home of her son, B. C. Shacklett, on East Broadway. Mrs. Shacklett, born in Brandenburg, Ky., July 12, 1830, was past ninety years of age and during that long and useful life she had seen the country grow from a wilderness to its present modern accomplishments. For many years past she had kept a daily diary of her life and the important happenings of the community, which is said to be a most interesting record. Excerpts from this book will be published in this newspaper at an early date.
Deceased was a devout Christian woman and had done much in her career that was of usefulness to mankind and ??? Master. She reared a large family, most most of the children being alive today. Accompanied by her husband, E. (B.) B. Shacklett, and three children, she moved to Texas in 1859. Forty years ago they moved to Gainsville, where she has since resided, the declining years of her life being spent at the home of her son, Cad.
Surviving are the following children all of whom is expected to be present at the funeral: Mrs. Barbary Dudley, Dundee, Texas; Mrs. Nannie Brown of Missouri; Mrs. Sallie McGlathery and Mrs. E. C. Darnell of Dallas; Mrs. Mattie Hicks of Durant, Okla., and Cad Shacklett of Gainsville.
The funeral will start from the late residence on East Broadway tomorrow afternoon about 2 o'clock, after which the remains will be taken to Redmon Cemetery, three miles southeast of Gainsville for interment. Rev. Wesson of the Grand Avenue Baptist church will officiate, with services at the grave. Undertaker Gibson will have charge of the arrangements."

A family note states that Susan J. (Dowell) Shacklett died at 907 Broadway, Gainesville, Texas of Pulmonary Hemorrhage.

Note that the site stithvalley.com lists that Burnis and Susan J.'s son, Burnis Cadwallander Shacklett, was born December 21, 1854, died June 10, 1931 in Brandenburg, Kentucky. This certainly warrants further investigation.