DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Dew Cemetery, out there in Freestone County. Now, the name on the map says Dew — D-E-W — but that's not exactly what anybody asked for. We'll get to that.
First, let's back up to the 1850s, when the first families came drifting in from Alabama and put down roots on what folks were callin' Avant, or Avant Prairie. Wide open country, cotton land, the kind of place you could almost hear the future growin'. Then came 1870, and the Sunshine Methodist Church picked up and moved itself here from Harrison Chapel.
With it came a new name for the settlement — Sunshine. Has a hopeful sound to it, doesn't it? Though as this story goes on, you'll find the ground here held more than hope.
A year before that church arrived — back in 1869 — two of the early settlers decided this community needed a proper place to bury its dead. W. S.
Compton and D. A. Self, who was the local merchant and dentist all in one, donated the land for what would become this community cemetery.
The first soul laid to rest here was a young girl. Her name was Missouri A. E.
Humphrey. She was born in 1869. She was gone by 1871.
That's how this ground began — quietly, and with grief. Other early graves followed. Some of them date from the yellow fever epidemic of 1873.
Yellow fever didn't ask permission, and it didn't pass anyone by out of courtesy. The cemetery filled in ways nobody wanted. Now — that name.
By 1885, the settlement was growin' enough to get its own post office, and someone put in an application requestin' the name Drew, to honor a local resident. Seemed simple enough. But postal officials misread the application.
And so the post office opened not as Drew, but as Dew. D-E-W. The town followed the post office, and Dew it became.
One misread letter, and that's the name that stuck through history. Dew built itself into a market center for the cotton farmers of the area — a cotton gin, several stores, the kind of industry that keeps a rural community breathin'. The Dew Post Office itself kept runnin' until 1909, when rural delivery took its place.
Meanwhile, the cemetery kept growin'. In 1901, a man named Wiley Black donated more land and enlarged the graveyard. Around 1912 or 1913, a cemetery association was organized, giving the place the kind of stewardship a community's resting ground deserves.
The cemetery lies right adjacent to Dew Methodist Church, where funeral services are held to this day. And still the ground accepted the departed. The years 1918 and 1919 brought the influenza epidemic, and many of those graves are here too — another wave of loss folded into this quiet acreage.
All told, this eleven and one-third acres holds around a thousand graves. A thousand stories. Every Memorial Day, descendants and community residents gather here to tend the site — to pull the weeds, straighten what time has leaned, and remember.
Started by two men with a land donation. Named by a postal official's misreading. Shaped by yellow fever and influenza and all the ordinary losses in between.
The people who come back every Memorial Day know something worth knowin' — that tending the ground where your people rest is itself a kind of answer to everything this place has seen.
What the marker says
The first families in this community migrated from Alabama i the 1850s. Originally known as Avant or Avant Prairie, the settlement became Sunshine after the Sunshine Methodist Church moved here from Harrison Chapel in 1870. In 1869 W. S. Compton, one of the early settlers, and D. A. Self, local merchant and dentist, donated land for this community cemetery. First burial was that of a young girl, Missouri A. E. Humphrey (1869-1871). Other early graves date from the yellow fever epidemic of 1873. The town was renamed in 1885 when Dew Post Office opened. The name "Drew" was requested to honor a local resident, but postal officials misread the application. A market center for cotton farmers of the area, Dew had a cotton gin and several stores. Rural delivery replaced the Dew Post Office in 1909. A land donation by Wiley Black in 1901 enlarged the graveyard, which lies adjacent to Dew Methodist Church where funeral services are held. About 1912-13 a cemetery association was organized. Descendants and community residents gather at annual Memorial Day observances to tend the 11 and 1/3 acre site. The 1000 graves here include many from the 1918-19 influenza epidemic.