Chita Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Out here in Trinity County, there's a piece of ground that's been holding stories since before the Civil War even got started. Chita Cemetery.

And like most places that matter, it began with a death. The earliest known burial there is that of Virgil Foster, who died in 1861. Same year, another man named Peter Parker died and was laid to rest in that same ground.

Now, local tradition holds that it was Peter Parker himself who chose the site for the burial ground. Think about that for a moment. A man picks the spot, and then becomes one of its first permanent residents.

The land had a way of keeping its own counsel out here. The cemetery served primarily the residents of Chita, Sebastapol, and other communities nearby, and over the years it became what cemeteries always become when you pay attention to them: a reflection of the people. The tombstones tell you things.

They disclose the military service of veterans from the Civil War, World War I, and World War II, generations of men who went off to fight somebody's war and, some of them, came back to rest in this same Trinity County earth. But there's another story written in those stones, quieter and harder to sit with. Many of the graves mark people who died of typhoid fever.

Not in battle. Not old age. Typhoid.

And the marker calls that what it is: an indication of the harshness of pioneer life in the area. No softening it, no dressing it up. The land was beautiful and the land was brutal, and both of those things are buried at Chita Cemetery.

What the marker says

The earliest known burial in this cemetery is that of Virgil Foster, who died in 1861. According to local tradition, Peter Parker, who died the same year and is interred here, chose the site for the burial ground. Used primarily by residents of Chita, Sebastapol and other communities, the cemetery is a reflection of the area's pioneer heritage and burial customs. Tombstones bear inscriptions disclosing the military service of Civil War, World War I and World War II veterans, and mark the graves of many who died of typhoid fever, an indication of the harshness of pioneer life in the area. (2001)