Bethlehem Presbyterian Cemetery aka. Cox, Cass County Indiana

sometimes known, in former days, as the COX Cemetery, because the land, once part of the Cox Farm, was originally conveyed to the church-trustees by the late J. G. Cox of Bethlehem township, and because the cemetery is understood to have contained the graves for some years of a number of persons of the Cox family.

There are today no surface-indications of any cemetery at all in this churchyard. But such regional authorities as the venerable and respected William A. Wells, Rural Route 4, Logansport, confirm the recorded testimony of the late local historian, Dr. J. Z. Powell (himself a Presbyterian and a native of this particular township), to the effect that a number of persons still lie buried here though in graves which now are entirely unmarked. Mr. Wells and his son, Kirk Wells (now township trustee of Clay township, just south, and an officer of the L'ANGULLE VALLEY MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION), plainly recall a rather large number of slabs (15 or 20) along and south of the PRESENT south wall of the church (erected 1899), and perhaps southeast of the church. They disbelieve that there are any graves UNDER the church. But local historian Powell says that the present church stands directly upon a portion of the pioneerday cemetery, and that its site is, on that account, doubly hallowed. He states that the church was intentionally so placed, in order that the honored dead might "join in the services that are rendered...above."

[This somewhat unusual state of affairs is reminiscent of the Vincennes, Indiana, tradition that the INDIANS of their vicinity once held an important treaty (with the U.S.) in their Indian burial-ground in order that, as one of their chiefs said, "our departed chiefs and other loved ones may WITNESS --- and from their beds look up approvingly upon --- all that we say and do."]

The present church, one of the leading rural churches of this portion of the county, is on the EASTERLY side of the historic old "MICHIGAN ROAD," --- now paved and heavily traveled Indiana State highway 25 (the Logansport-to-Rochester road); but between the highway and the church is a grassy parking-lot. The church is about 1 3/4 miles southwest of the point (at Metea, Indiana) where State highway 25 is crossed by State Highway 16 (the Monon-to-Denver-and-Huntington road); and is approximately seven and one-half miles north-northeast of the Cass County Court House, which is at Logansport, in which city is located the headquarters of the L'ANGULLE VALLEY MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION. The church is not far from the center of the NORTHEAST QUARTER of SECTION 29 of T.28 N., R.2 E., of the second Indiana Principal Meridian, and hence is in southwestern BETHLEHEM TOWNSHIP, of northern CASS COUNTY, in northcentral Indiana.

With regret that it seems impossible to furnish a better and more complete record, the ensuing report is respectfully submitted to the INDIANA HISTORICAL SOCIETY by Robert B. Whitsett, Jr., Secretary, L'ANGULLE VALLEY MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION, 500 Front Street, Logansport, Indiana, DECEMBER 20, 1941.

NAME	BORN	DIED	REMARKS
1) James COX	1808	1863	Later disinterred and removed (by J. G. Cox?) to Mt. Hope Cemetery at Logansport's northern edge. Present reporter has searched city-of-Logansport records, and has searched out the monument for THIS PARTICULAR James Cox on Lot No. 562 of Original Plat (about 165 feet, or the equvalent of half a city-block, northwest of the very large Cass County Soldiers and Sailors' Monument). On this Cox monument and from city-cemetery-records for this lot number 562, we find the data listed at the top of this present sheet, also the following data for other persons, some of whom very possibly were likewise moved in to Mt. Hope from the Old Cox Cemetery now under review:

NAME	BORN	DIED	REMARKS
2) Maria COX	1822	1872	COMMENT: It seems difficult to understand how so many people could be buried on this one single lot in Mt. Hope Cemetery as the monument and records seem to show are buried here. If anything in the nature of a mass removal of Cox family-remains took place, (from the old cemetery to this lot), this would become more understandable; for the (unembalmed) remains of long-buried persons would presumably occupy little space. The date of removal eludes the present reporter. The late historian Dr. Jehu Z. Powell, who was himself not only a physician and a student of cemeteries, but also a Presbyterian and a prominent resident of Logansport who had been born in BETHLEHEM TOWNSHIP and not far from the Bethlehem Presbyterian Church and cemetery, and who therefore was very likely to have firsthand and dependable information on this subject, said --- in his 1913 "History of Cass County, Indiana" --- that the remains of J(ames?) G. Cox had "IN RECENT YEARS" been removed from the Bethlehem Presbyterian Cemetery to Mt. Hope Cemetery. ... Powell is silent as to any other Cox removals; but death-dates on the Cox family-monument (Lot 562, O.P., Mt. Hope) in a few instances antedate even the (June 26, 1869) purchase of that Mt. Hope lot (by J. G. Cox, who may have been a son of the James or Jas. G. Cox originally buried in Beth. Presb. Cem. and removed to Mt. Hope); and actually about eleven of them may antedate the (somewhat problematic date of the removal of the remains "of J.G. Cox" from the Bethlehem Presbyterian Cemetery to this lot 562 in Mt. Hope.
3) Maria COX	1841	1879
4) Christiana COX	1843	1887
5) Sallie COX	1845	1886
6) Anna TWELLS	1872	1873
7) Caroline COX	1851	1876
8) Frank COX	1859	1859
9) Mary COX	1861	1887
10) Tillie AMOSS	1866	1869
11) John AMOSS	1869	1883
12) Joseph H. COX	1854	1926 (abt Feb 1)
13) Mrs. Fannie COX HENDRIE	1863	abt 11/29/1928
14) Mary Ellen COX	1864	9/3/1932 (age 67)
15) Gardner HENDRIE	1877	abt 4/17/1935
16) George COX	1856	1934
James COX (not carved)		abt 2/21/1896 (bur. 2/23/1896)

We therefore list the persons recorded as buried on the Mt. Hope lot; because it seems not unlikely that at least a number of them had been originally interred in the Bethlehem Presbyterian Cemetery now under review (as members of the family of the man who had originally deeded the land on which the cemetery and church are situated, and who is KNOWN to have been himself originally buried there and later moved to Mt. Hope.)

Persons reported (by Dr. Powell) to have been buried in the Bethlehem Presbyterian Cemetery, and presumed to be still lying there (beneath the Church), include:

Report was transcribed by Debby Beheler on January 24, 2007 for the Cass County INGenWeb Project.

NAME	BORN	DIED	REMARKS
Eliza BARNETT	----	----	d/o Mr. & Mrs. Henry Barnett. (EDITORIAL COMMENT: The Barnett family has been a prominent one in northern Cass county, including this immediate vicinity. Court House research discloses that in association with Asberry Barnett, a HENRY Barnett did indeed own land in this immediate neighborhood (a farm in Section 13), though he sold it in 1840 to E. V. Covault. (Comment: Articles in the "Logansport Journal" in March, 1910, give this lady or girl's first name as "ELVIA: and as "ELISHA," rather than Eliza; but these are thought to be merely typographical errors.)
(------) DIPERT	----	around 1852 or 1855	Understood by historian J. Z. P. to have been the earliest known interments in this cemetery. EDITORIAL COMMENT: Thought by the present reporter to have been members of the family of Washington Dipert, who, research discloses, owned ten acres of land in the S.E. 1/4 of nearby Section 29 during at least the last half of the decade of 1850.
(------) DIPERT	----	around 1852 or 1855
Mrs. (--------) RUSSELL (or Russel?)	----	"Late 1860's"	EDITORIAL COMMENT: Research discloses that during at least much of the 1840's and 1850;s a Mr. THOMAS Russell owned 82.47 acres of land in Section 19, only a mile or more northwest of cemetery. Possibly this was HIS wife and daughter.
Miss (--------) RUSSELL (or Russel?)	----	"Late 1860's"
Mrs. (--------) CORNWELL	----	"abt 1859"	EDITORIAL COMMENT: Court House investigation reveals that in 1847, e. g., a farm in nearby Michigan Road Lands Section 44, not far north of cemetery, was owned by SAMUEL and CORNELIUS Cornwell.