ST. ELIZABETH’S
L'Anguille Valley Report:
One mile south of LUCERNE, INDIANA Near
north edge of northeast quarter of northeast quarter of Section 27, Township 28
North, Range One East, of 2nd Ind. P.M. in southeast central HARRISON
TOWNSHIP of northern CASS COUNTY.
Cemetery is six
miles slightly south of due east of
Cemetery is just
west of the site of the earliest (1859?) edifice of St. Elizabeth’s Church.
Which earliest edifice was dedicated during the Civil War, in 1863.
(The present church-edifice is a little more than one mile farther north,
and near east edge of the town of Lucerne, Indiana, the former site having been
abandoned for church purposes on---according to historian Dr. J.Z. Powell---
November 12, 1905.) Except for a very short (quarter of a mile?) stretch
immediately east of cemetery (which road is used by jog of a north-and-south
gravel-road), the east and west road which passes at north edge of cemetery is
entirely unimproved and seldom used. (1941).
John Newbrough, for
a –t-ted consideration of $5. deeded an 8 X 25 rod tract, containing one acre
and 25 rods of land, on January 11, 1859, to Right Reverend John Henry Luers,
Bishop of Fort Wayne, or his ensigns for use and benefit of Catholic population
of Harrison township, Cass county, Indiana, and that their de-cendants of the
same faith. East end of this tract, where old church formerly stood, is now a
grassy parking place for automobiles used in funerals. At this writing, May 11,
1941, this is rather a beautiful “lawn cemetery,” though quite a lonely one.
Except for a lone barn a couple of hundred yards north, and a large two-story
white-colored frame house (and a few barns) a third of a mile or more across
fields to the southeast, there is today no structure of any sort at all near
this cemetery; though the cemetery nevertheless seems well cared for. Cemetery
contains only a couple of trees; but one of these near the north edge, is
somewhat remarkable one:--- a tall cedar having four separate trunks emerging
from the roots or base, each trunk being approximately 18 inches in diameter.
Copyists were volunteer committee of four persons who are well acquainted
in this neighborhood (and have dozens of relatives and other friends buried in
this cemetery), one of them having long been in charge of the cemetery. This
committee is as follows:
Mrs.
Mary R. Conn,
Mrs.
Margaret Weaver, Rural Route 1,
William
J. Weaver, Rural Route 1, the
?.
P. Conn,
Checking and correcting of field notes, and compiling of this present
report, was by
Robert
B. Whitsett, Jr., Secretary, L’ANGUILLE VALEY MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION,
First
field work was done early in May 191, follow-up fieldwork (checking) was done
Sunday May 11, 1941