PICKENS CHAPEL CHURCH CEMETERY, Anderson County, SC

A.K.A. Pickens Family Cemetery
 
The Easley Progress
October 22, 1980
Church News, by Carnis B. Davis
Walking among the graves of old Pickens Cemetery is like turning 
the pages of  time back two hundred years.

You read names and dates and you see a tall young man riding off to war; a beautiful young mother dying at childbirth for lack of proper medical care; infants dying at the age of ten days...two months...two years.

You see a grave marked only by a rough field stone, a name chiseled by hand into the granite surface. No last name. No date. You wonder who "Martha" was, and why she died. You can almost see a grieving husband with hammer and chisel, shaping the crude letters into the rock.

Pickens Cemetery is probably the oldest burying ground in Upstate South Carolina. It was begun around 1785, barely eight years after the land had been won from the Cherokee Indians.

At least 25 to 30 soldiers of the American Revolution are buried in the cemetery. Some say this is probably more than you will find in any other cemetery in the state.

Some of the head stones are almost completely illegible. Most of the graves of the soldiers are marked to indicate that the men fought in the Revolution.

Pickens Cemetery is a fascinating place to visit.

Aware of the historical significance of the cemetery, the members of the Col. John Robins Chapter, Colonial dames XVII Century have erected a roadside marker at the entrance to the cemetery and Pickens Chapel Church. The cemetery is a short distance behind the church, hidden in a grove of trees but easily accessible on foot or by car.

The marker will be unveiled in a dedication service on Saturday, Nov. 1 at 2:00 p.m. Descendants of the Revolutionary soldiers are especially invited to the dedication, as well as other interested friends.

According to early historians the first church to stand on the site, a log structure built about 1785, was called Richmond Church. The church was built on land belonging to Capt. Robert Pickens, one of the sons of Robert Pike Pickens who had come to America from Ireland in the early eighteenth century.

Capt. Robert, it is said, had settled here after the war, having brought his aging father with him to live at the headwaters of Three and Twenty Creek. The father, a cousin of general Andrew Pickens of Revolutionary War fame, was the first person to be buried at Pickens Cemetery.

General Andrew Pickens is thought to have worshipped at the church and possibly to have been a member there in the beginning. Later, however, the General and his neighbors organized Hopewell Church, now known as Old Stone Church, near Pendleton.

Although much of the early history is hazy or lost, it has been established that Richmond's name was later changed to Carmel; that the church was moved from its first site where the graveyard stands to another location on the Pickens plantation; that the congregation eventually split, the church was torn down, and two new churches were built, one on either side of what is now the line dividing Anderson and Pickens counties.

C.T. Martin, an early editor and publisher of The Easley Progress, described the split between the two churches in his history of Carmel Church written for The Presbyterian Church in South Carolina. He said, "About the year 1802 the log church situated on Three and Twenty was torn down and removed to the present site on 'Indian Creek.' Tradition says that the removal was caused by a division in the church, several members having withdrawn and joined the Methodist, a new sect that made their first appearance in the state in 1785.

"It is stated that a little girl daughter of one of the Pickens families appeared before the Session of the church for admission. On account of her age, the Session failed to receive her, which offended the child's mother, causing the family and others to withdraw from the Presbyterian Church and join the Methodists."

Dr. A.L. Pickens, in a book called "Skyagunsta" referred to the split at Carmel in this excerpt from the book: "At old Carmel the Methodists had drawn off a large part of the congregation, establishing a new church just far enough away for the shouting and book board thumping not to worry the more staid Presbyterians. Captain Robert's family was invaded by the schism, and tolerantly  he contributed more land, both churches using the same cemetery for years. He saw to it that it was one of the best kept anywhere near, and hence a little company of twenty-odd Revolutionary soldiers, with the captains and majors among them for good measure, lie here."

Another book, "Historic Places in the S.C. Appalachian Region, documents the present Pickens Chapel building as having been erected in 1888. According to this account, the Pickens family went back to the original site of Old Richmond-Carmel and erected their new church in front of the Old Pickens cemetery.

The Methodist church was known as Wesley Chapel, having been named for John Wesley, founder of Methodism. It remained an active Methodist congregation until 1928-29 when the small group was dissolved.

The building, renovated and freshly painted, is now the home of Lighthouse Baptist Church. However, the property still belongs to the Pickens family, as it has for the last two hundred years.

Most of the older graves in the cemetery lie together on the east and southeast side. Their epitaphs tell a poignant story of life and death in the early days of Upcountry South Carolina.

Four neatly squared markers of native stone read:

"Amanda E. Pikle (sic) was Born 4 Sept.1839 and Died 20 Nov.1841."
"Nancy J. Pickle was Born 16 July 1840 (died) 8 Dec. 1844."
"Caroline F. Pickle was Born 19 Mar. 1843 and Died 21 June 1849."
"Pickle. A Still Birth. 8 Apr. 1845."

Another headstone reads: "Sacred to the Memory of Eliza Tyrrell wife of Henry
Tyrrell and Daughter of Majr. A. Hamilton, who departed this life August 23,
1818 Aged 17 years."

Another: "Sacred to the Memory of Mrs. Margaret Hamilton, Consort of Major Andrew Hamilton Who was born on the 6th of August, 1782, and Died on the 4th of November 1822, leaving a Husband and ten children to lament their irreparable loss, and an extensive circle of relatives and friends, who will long appreciate her worth."

During the slavery period of the 1800's many faithful slaves shared a burying ground with their masters. One such testimonial to the devotion of master to slave can be found at Pickens Cemetery. In one corner there is a grave marked simply, "Aunt Jemima."

According to the June, 1933 issue of The National Genealogical Society Quarterly, the names of the Revolutionary War soldiers who are buried at Pickens Chapel are:

James Dickson, John Hamilton, Peter McMahan, Alexander Oliver, Benjamin Smith, Joseph Smith, Charles Wilson, William Wilson, James Watson, Robert Henderson, Job Smith, Laban Mauldin, Rucker Mauldin, John Arial, Samuel Barr, Edward Boggs,  Micajah Hughes, Hampton Smith, Joshua Smith, Mead Smith, Capt. James Anderson, Robert Pickens, Michael Smith, William Wadle, John Wilson, Michael Dickson, John Dickson, Mathew Dickson and William McMurray.

The cemetery is, indeed, rich in history.

From: Carl Garrison
Sent: Saturday, June 06, 2009 1:19 AM

I'm going to type in below the church name history as much as I know below. There's a big gap in my knowledge from about 1820-40 to about  the 1950s or so until the church was forced to close by either the SC Health Dept or Fire Marshal in the mid to late 1970s. At that time it  was being leased out by Dr. Andrew Lee Pickens' son Andrew Lee Pickens Jr. (Sr. having died in 69, and buried in Greenlawn cemetery in Greenville SC (at least I think that's the name of the cemetery just to the east of N. Main St. across from what used to be the Daniel Building when I was living there. I graduated from Wren High School in 1969, then got a BA in Secondary Education from Clemson in 73 and a commission from the Air Force; all I wanted to do was go to pilot training; I did 1974-75 at Moody AFB in Valdosta GA only 50 miles east of where I am now - the world comes full circle. 

The church was founded circa 1785 or so on the original land of Capt Robert Pickens (buried in the cemetery). The church was first called Richmond; of course the cemetery had no name. The first grave in it  was the Capt's father, Robert Pickens (by the way, regardless of what  is said or written in Kate Pickens Day's book, his name is not nor never was Robert Pike Pickens). He was born in Ireland in 1697. This grave is reputed to be the earliest birth date in all of Anderson County. I don't know if this is true or not. He died in 1787, and his will was probated in Ninety Six in 1793. That would have been the final settlement probation - or whatever they called it back then. 

{Family history note: His grandson was still living when my great grandfather was easily old enough to remember and question him and know all about the old patriarch and would have known all about him, so this death date is secure.} Sometime in the mid 1790s, probably  93-95, it appears another group of Presbyterians, maybe even another church, merged or joined with Richmond, and the name was changed to Carmel. Note that it is just plain Carmel, not Mt. Carmel like the later one of 1800s origin. This is from the book on the History of the Presbyterian Church in SC that's in the SC Archives.

I've got the Title, author, etc somewhere, but can't lay my hand on the quote and citation at the moment. {Note: this move here to GA from Grand Junction, Colorado, has just plain destroyed all my system of filing, etc}. Then in the 1820-1840 period, the Pickens family changed from Presbyterian to Methodist. As they still owned the land (they had never deeded it to the church), they had the Presbyterians move. It became Wesley Chapel or maybe Wesley Methodist Chapel. The Presbyterians moved about 1.5 miles "as the crow flies" to the WNW and built a new church (its very near SC 135, south of Easley maybe 5 miles or so across the highway from an elementary school, or at least there was an elementary school there when I was living there in the late 1960s). The school may be closed or even torn down now. I haven't been through there since then. I'll make an effort to check on it the next time I get up home. Now I pick up the church in the 1950s: it was called Pickens Chapel and it was rented out by Dr. Pickens to a pentecostal denomination, so the full name was Pickens Chapel Church of God of Prophecy. It stayed that way till the early 70s when another group from a different denomination took it over, still pentecostal, but now I believe it became Pickens Chapel Assembly of God. They kept it till it was forced to close because it had no water system, hence no indoor plumbing. The church was not complaining, only the state dept of whatever. Pickens, Jr. wanted to  give it to the 3 & 20 Volunteer Fire Dept to use as a training building to burn down so it would quit attracting vandals, but the state said no because burning the shingles on the roof would be "hazardous." So now it just sits there, a waste and draws vandals and is an attractive nuisance, because some state bureaucrat won't let the fire dept do what it should do.