Save a Historic Cemetery in Gainesville, VA!
Donation protected
Dear friends and family, near and far, old and new,
The historic Davis-Brady Cemetery in Gainesville, Virginia is at risk of being lost and needs your help!
We have no time to lose to save the Davis-Brady cemetery. Historical cemeteries serve as important markers of another time, but the continued rapid development in the Gainesville area increases the risk that we will lose them and the memories of the hard-working pioneers they represent. I am creating this fundraiser to raise the money needed to purchase and install a granite obelisk to ensure the historic Davis-Brady family cemetery is preserved and the memory of my 12 ancestors buried there are not forgotten. My ancestors are currently buried in unmarked graves at the edge of a housing development and golf course.
I am doing this fund-raiser in honor of my grandmother, Nannie Frances Brady Brown (1900-1993). Time is of the essence. I would like to fulfill this fund-raising goal while my mother, 84, and aunt, 94, Nannie’s daughters, are living.
How the Funds will be Used:
We will purchase a 6-feet tall granite obelisk from Kline Memorials, Manassas, VA, for approximately $12,000, including installation costs. Kline will install the obelisk on a concrete footing, which will require two visits to the cemetery to complete the job. The process will take about six months for design and installation. We need the funds by end of March 2021 to be able to contract with Kline for a late summer or early fall 2021 installation. Installation timing will depend on raising the funding on whether the pandemic is under control. This obelisk will stand the test of time!
The obelisk will have the following names and information:
1. Isaiah Matthew Davis, Sr. (1827-1902)
2. Frances D. Davis (1830-1890)
3. Sarah C. Davis King (1851-1879), Daughter and Ike King’s mother
4. Infant Davis (15-17 February 1856), Son
5. Mary F. “Mollie” Davis (1857-1893), Daughter
6. Nancy E. Davis (1858-1931), Daughter
7. Isaiah M. Davis, Jr., (1859-1874), Son (died in a carriage accident)
8. Octavia Somerville “Summer” Davis Brady (1861-1913), Daughter
9. Albert Marion “Al Marion” Brady (1859-1918), Son-in-law
10. Elizabeth Davis (1867-before 1880), Daughter
11. Lucy R. Davis Godfrey (1869-1915), Twin Daughter
12. Others unknown
I know the year 2020 has been difficult for everyone. We have been isolated from loved ones and friends. Many have lost friends and loved ones to COVID-19. Some have lost jobs and experienced economic hardship. The past year made me reflect on the past and what my ancestors went through. I decided to launch this fundraiser after thinking about values that are timeless and what is worth preserving versus what is temporary in our lifetimes. The cemetery is worth saving and is at risk.
Historian John Toler wrote in his 2013 article in Haymarket Lifestyle magazine:
“Nearly all of the original structures that made up ‘Old Gainesville’ are gone, and with the re-routing of Linton Hall Road and Galleher Road and the erection of the new overpasses, even the old sites are difficult, if not impossible to locate.”
Gainesville continues to change. The last time I visited Gainesville in the fall of 2019, just before the Covid-19 pandemic struck, I could not find the former site of the Gainesville Unite Methodist Church and historic cemetery somewhere under the new Route 29 overpass. The shopping centers along new Linton Hall Road make it a far cry from the “…little hamlet made up of a filling station, a handful of houses, and a few stores.” This is how Gainesville was described in the Works Projects Administration Writers Program documentation of 1941, according to Toler’s article.
Davis-Brady Cemetery background:
With this Go Fund Me project I want to honor and preserve the memory of Isaiah and Frances Davis and their children buried with them in Gainesville. The cemetery is in the Virginia Oaks development on a hill at the end of Club House Road. We came close to losing the cemetery during construction of Virginia Oaks, but thankfully the developer agreed to build around the cemetery.
The cemetery has no original headstones. Family members were buried with wooden crosses, which was what the family could afford. The wood rotted long ago leaving the graves unmarked for decades.
My uncle, Donald Ray “Don” Brown, added one small rectangular stone marker in the mid-1990s with only two of the names, Albert Marion and Octavia Somerville Brady. The marker has Somerville’s name misspelled as “Summerville” because an 1870 census taker had misspelled it that way. We discovered the mistake a few years later.
Octavia Somerville Davis was named after a prominent citizen, Miss Somerville Gaines. The town itself was named after the Gaines family. Somerville Gaines donated land for the construction of the Gainesville United Methodist Church and church cemetery. We believe the Davises attended the Methodist Church with the Gaines family. The original white church building was demolished, but the church cemetery is still there.
For 80 years, the names of people buried there resided only in the memories of the two final living next generation heirs who attended the gravesite burial services for their parents. My grandmother, Nannie Frances Brady Brown, was there at age 13 in December 1913 for the burial of her mother, Octavia Somerville Davis Brady, and in 1918 for the burial of her father, Albert Marion Brady.
Ethel Godfrey Rabbitt (1902-1997), my grandmother’s cousin, attended the burial of her mother, Lucy R. Davis Godfrey, in 1915. Lucy married Charley Mosby Godfrey on April 23, 1893 and together they had four children. Ethel was the second to the youngest child.
Currently the Virginia Oaks housing development and golf course borders the east side of the cemetery. The cemetery is located at the end of Club House Road on a slight elevation when facing east toward the golf course. An old cedar tree, four aluminum posts from a former chain link fence, a concrete bench, and a temporary bronze sign marked the cemetery as of 2019.
The house where Isaiah and Frances Davis lived and in which they raised their children was located about 100 yards down the slope from the cemetery heading north toward Linton Hall Road. Construction workers removed what little remained of the house, including chimney and foundation stones, during the construction of the homes and golf course for Virginia Oaks.
Family History:
Cemeteries like the Davis-Brady cemetery represent the history of the pioneers who farmed the land, experienced the hardships of the Civil War, and suffered illness and early deaths without modern medicines and healthcare that we take for granted today. The Davis, Brady, Mayhugh, Florance, and Godfrey families were among the larger families in the area during the 19th century; members of these families frequently inter-married.
My third great grandfather, Matthew Davis, Sr., (1802-1875), inherited a large amount of land in Gainesville, VA (Prince William County) from his parents, Henry Davis and Sarah “Sallie” Fairfax Davis. In Matthew’s will, he divided the farmland among his children. Matthew Sr. and his wife, Sarah Mayhugh Davis (1803-1876) had the following children together: Daniel N., Henry P., Frances T., George F., Matthew Jr., William E., Oscar D.F., and Sarah Elizabeth Davis.
Their oldest daughter, Frances, married a cousin, Isaiah Matthew Davis, who was a cooper at the time; he made barrels and casks. When Frances received her father’s bequest of land, Isaiah became a farmer. Isaiah’s cooperage skills no doubt came in handy on the farm. Barrels preserved food and grain during this era before refrigeration. He and Frances lived in a white farmhouse with gray stone chimneys on their property, which today is part of the Virginia Oaks subdivision and golf course. The Davis house is no longer standing. According to family stories, the house burned down circa 1902, the year Isaiah died. For many years two gray stone chimneys stood guard over the house’s ruins, which were surrounded by a growing forest that grew up over the 90 years after Isaiah died.
We do not have photographs of Isaiah and Frances, but I imagine Isaiah had white hair like his brother Matthew Jr., and Frances perhaps had long dark hair like her daughter, Summer. My grandmother said the Davises were of Welsh descent. Isaiah and Frances had 13 children together. In order of birth, they were Sarah C., Helen Margaret (moved to Ohio), Mary F., Nancy E., John Bennett, Isaiah, Jr., Octavia Somerville “Summer,” Alice, Madison Elkron, Elizabeth, and twin girls, Lucy R. and Lucelia Davis.
Isaiah outlived his wife by approximately 10 years. He experienced many family tragedies over his lifetime. He lost his eldest daughter, Sarah, from “consumption” (tuberculosis) and raised her son, Isaiah “Ike” King, as his own. Little Ike was only a year old when his mother died. Ike’s father, Franklin Pierce King (1859-1918), also lived with Isaiah for several years until he re-married and moved to Alexandria, Virginia. Ike remained with his grandpa, Isaiah, in Gainesville. Franklin and his second wife, Sarah “Sallie” Heflin King, had 11 children together.
Isaiah’s daughter, Nancy, was the last child still living at home during Isaiah’s older years. He needed someone to care for him and Nancy did so until he died. Nancy never married and sadly lost the family home when it burned down. She went to live with her niece, Grace Brady Davis (my grandmother’s oldest sibling), in Washington D.C. where she had various jobs, including housekeeper. My grandmother, Nannie, and her younger brother, Harry, were orphaned after both parents died, and lived with the compassionate Grace and her husband Lucian Davis. Nannie got to know her sweet Aunt Nancy well during this time. Nancy died in 1931 without money in her estate to afford a headstone. A death announcement in the Washington Star says she was to be buried “in Gainesville.”
My grandmother said her beloved Aunt Nancy, for whom she is named, is buried in an unmarked grave in the historic Gainesville Methodist Church cemetery. Sadly, the little white church was demolished a few years ago. My grandmother told me she always wanted to buy a headstone for her aunt but could never afford it. Nancy is buried near her brother, Madison Davis. However, the church has no record of Nancy E. Davis being buried there, so I am including her name on the obelisk with her parents and siblings to make sure she is remembered.
After Isaiah’s death, his farmland was divided up among his living heirs. The remaining property with the house ruins and cemetery sat idle until the 1990s. The forest grew thick around the property as nature reclaimed it. Cousin Ethel, Lucy R. Davis Godfrey’s daughter, paid the taxes on the property for many years. When Ethel died, the property was sold to the developer of Virginia Oaks.
My grandmother always wanted to protect the gravesites of her mother father, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. She especially worried about preserving the final resting place of her mother, Octavia “Summer” Brady. She also worried about her aunt Nancy’s forgotten gravesite. She never had the resources during her lifetime to buy headstones.
In the 1960s, my grandmother asked her sons, Earl, Warren, Roland, and Don Brown to install a chain link fence around the cemetery, which they did. They had to borrow a four-wheel drive Jeep to make it up the rugged overgrown dirt path to the site. My uncles had to guess at the dimensions of the cemetery and did not quite get it right. When we rediscovered the cemetery in 1992, I saw some coffin-shaped depressions in the ground. I could tell the western side of the fence was on top of some of the graves. One rectangular depression closest to the giant cedar tree was less than five feet long. I imagined this was the grave of either the infant Isaiah and Frances lost in 1856, likely the first burial at this site and when they planted the cedar tree, or that of young Isaiah Davis, Jr., who died in a carriage accident in 1874, the second known burial.
Getting to the cemetery from old Linton Hall Road in the early 1990s was a challenge. There was no visible path much less a dirt Jeep trail. We parked in the parking lot of an apartment complex in the 7800 block of Old Linton Hall Road and made our way like wilderness trekkers through the thickets the mile or so to the cemetery. My grandmother said to keep going up the slope and toward the south.
Large trees had fallen and blocked the egress leading up the gradual slope to the cemetery. Those of us making our way for the first time in decades had to climb over huge logs and push through vines and briars to get to the cemetery. In the group making the first trek since the 1960s: my mother Dianne (Nannie’s daughter and Somerville Davis Brady’s granddaughter); my brother, Matthew; my father, Lawrence; and my uncle, Don, Dianne’s twin brother).
I was elated to see the cemetery for the first time. It was shaded by surrounding tall trees except for rays of light shining directly on the cemetery’s groundcover. Periwinkle, or Vinca by its scientific name, covered half of the cemetery and some stubborn grass remained. I read in genealogy discussions on Ancestry.com that periwinkle is a sign that helps people find hidden cemeteries in wooded areas. People planted vinca on the graves for the evergreen foliage and as a symbol of never forgetting loved ones that had passed. An animal, perhaps a fox, had made a den at the edge of the hill, no doubt taking advantage of the hollowed-out graves.
Isaiah and Frances chose the highest point of their property for the cemetery. They called it the “Cedar Knoll” because they had planted cedar trees there. In 1992, one large ancient cedar was still there, probably more than 160 years old.
I noticed that all the old cemeteries in the Gainesville area had cedar trees. According to a question researched on Justanswer.com, people in the 1800s planted cedar trees in cemeteries because they can live up to 200 or 300 years. Sometimes cedars are called the “tree of life.”
A May 17, 2011 blog post, “A Grave Interest,” (https://agraveinterest.blogspot.com/), said “Cedar trees were planted to keep some color in a graveyard year-round.” The blogpost quoted a Purdue University International Arborist, Larry Caplan: “Evergreens are frequently used in cemeteries because they remain green and living all year round. Visitors want to feel the concept of ‘rebirth’ or ‘eternal life’ that evergreens represent.”
When we rediscovered the cemetery, a large tree had fallen on the southern side of 1960s era chain link fence, bending it beyond repair. Periwinkle was growing in patches over the gravesites with tiny purple flowers blooming. An antique rose vine was growing up the northern side of the fence. One tiny red rose was blooming that day. Some tulips where growing near the fence entrance.
My grandmother always wanted to buy a headstone for her parents but could not afford it. She told me about her mother, who everyone called Summer. She said her mother worked hard to take of the family while her husband worked for the railroad. Summer was an excellent cook and made the best cornbread my grandmother ever tasted. Summer often brought cornbread to her husband and to other workmen in the city. Summer Brady contracted “double pneumonia” in 1913 and suffered a painful death, with little that her husband and daughters could do for her. The remedy they tried was a “mustard poultice.” The day Summer Brady died in 1913, age 52, she still had long dark hair.
After my grandmother died at age 92, her youngest son, Donald Brown, bought a simple headstone for his grandparents, Albert Marion and Summer Brady, without dates. He placed it in the center of the cemetery, with no way know were there actual graves were located. Currently, there are no other grave markers for the other ancestors buried there.
Isaiah and Frances Davis represented typical Gainesville farm families of the mid to late19th Century. Their farmland was close to a crossroads and turnpike that Civil War soldiers frequented. Real estate representative Rita Gibbons wrote in a July 14, 2007 article that the area started out with the name “Middle Grounds” because it was a “high spine between the drains of Broad Run and Bull Run.” The town at first was called “New Stable” because it served as a “changing point for stagecoach horses on the Fauquier and Alexandria Turnpike.”
According to Gibbons’ research:
“…in July 1852, when the Manassas Gap Railroad reached the pike, Thomas Brawner Gaines owned the land, and the railroad stop became Gainesville. In 1858, Pembroke Gaines became postmaster. During the Civil War, nearby Thoroughfare Gap in the Bull Run Mountains served as a path for soldiers to reach the First and Second Battles of Manassas. By this time, Gainesville had become the leading market town of the Middle Grounds, a shipping point for grain, timber, and cattle (except on Sundays). Edward C. Marshall, president of the Manassas Gap Railroad, did not let his trains run on the Lord's Day. Gainesville's population was listed as 100 during the early 1900s.”
Civil War Impact:
Isaiah and Frances Davis farmed the land and raised children in their house 100 yards from their family cemetery. Isaiah was slightly older and starting his family, but he and Frances lost younger siblings in the Civil War and tussled with Union soldiers who tried to steal their food. One of their children or a farmworker would alert the family that Union troops were coming. The family acted quickly to hide all the hams and food stores they could in the attic of the house or loft of a barn so the troops did not take it all.
According to a family story Frances stood her ground against Union soldiers who demanded to enter the house to get food and water or to sleep. The soldiers were filthy and crawling with body lice. Frances told them they would not be entering her house until they washed up in the farm hands’ bunk house. They obeyed her, probably responding, “Yes, ma’am.” Frances died in her 60s. Records of Frances’ life are scarce. I have not found a death certificate or cause of death, but I will keep looking for records and clues.
Isaiah’s younger brother, John Bennett Davis (1837-1863), was killed during a Civil War battle in Alexandria, VA. He is buried at Christ’s Church in Alexandria. Isaiah named his son after his brother; his son was born the same year his brother was killed.
Another of Isaiah’s brothers, Charles Luther Davis, a “tinner” by trade, enlisted in the Confederate Army on May 1, 1863 at Port Republic, Virginia. He was 20 years old and his enlistment rank was 2nd Sergeant. He was assigned to Company F, 27th Infantry. Seven months later he was wounded in Lexington, Virginia and listed as a casualty and absent on December 1, 1862. It is unclear whether Charles died from his wounds.
The Davis and Brady families passed down the value of taking care of family. During my genealogy research, I found several times when members of the family allowed other family members in need to live with them. They cared for family members when they were older , ill, or unable to support themselves financially. Isaiah’s son, John Bennett Davis (1863-1941), who people called “Bennett,” became a barber and lived for many years with this sister and brother-in-law, Alonzo and Lucelia Davis King (1869-1938), in Falls Church, VA. After Alonzo died, Lucelia and Bennett went to live with their niece in Washington D.C. My grandmother called Lucelia “Aunt Lou.” Aunt Lou’s twin sister, Lucy R. Davis Godfrey, is one of the 12 buried in the historic family cemetery.
Please share this with others who feel a strong connection to the history of Gainesville, Haymarket and western Prince William County and its early residents and want to help preserve this historic cemetery and the memory of the people buried there.
My sincere gratitude for everyone who can contribute even a small amount to this worthy cause to preserve Gainesville history.
Thank you – Lisa Gilley
Octavia Somerville "Summer" Davis Brady, my great-grandmother
Albert Marion Brady, my great grandfather
Dink Godfrey, surveying the cemetery at dusk
Matthew Davis Jr., Frances Davis' younger brother. My second great grand uncle.
Florance, Davis and Brady ancestors visiting Davis-Brady Cemetery #1 on Old Linton Hall Road before it was cleaned up and mowed in 2015.
Parking at the end of Club House Road, Virginia Oaks. The path leads up to the Davis Brady Cemetery #2.
Walking up the hill to the cemetery. And old concrete bench and a remaining post from the 1960s chain link fence are visible at right.
A 1992 Brady family reunion in Manassas, VA. John R. Brady is seated second from right. His father is to his right wearing a western hat.
Headstone of Miss Somerville Gaines at the historic Gainesville United Methodist Church Cemetery. Octavia Somerville Davis Brady is named after Miss Gaines.
David Zurek, a Davis and Brady ancestor, has worked hard many times to clean up overgrowth, weeds and brush at both Davis-Brady cemeteries. He lives in Virginia Beach.
Dink Godfrey surveys the cemetery. He is related to Lucy R. Davis Godfrey's husband, Charley Mosby Godfrey.
The historic Davis-Brady Cemetery in Gainesville, Virginia is at risk of being lost and needs your help!
We have no time to lose to save the Davis-Brady cemetery. Historical cemeteries serve as important markers of another time, but the continued rapid development in the Gainesville area increases the risk that we will lose them and the memories of the hard-working pioneers they represent. I am creating this fundraiser to raise the money needed to purchase and install a granite obelisk to ensure the historic Davis-Brady family cemetery is preserved and the memory of my 12 ancestors buried there are not forgotten. My ancestors are currently buried in unmarked graves at the edge of a housing development and golf course.
I am doing this fund-raiser in honor of my grandmother, Nannie Frances Brady Brown (1900-1993). Time is of the essence. I would like to fulfill this fund-raising goal while my mother, 84, and aunt, 94, Nannie’s daughters, are living.
How the Funds will be Used:
We will purchase a 6-feet tall granite obelisk from Kline Memorials, Manassas, VA, for approximately $12,000, including installation costs. Kline will install the obelisk on a concrete footing, which will require two visits to the cemetery to complete the job. The process will take about six months for design and installation. We need the funds by end of March 2021 to be able to contract with Kline for a late summer or early fall 2021 installation. Installation timing will depend on raising the funding on whether the pandemic is under control. This obelisk will stand the test of time!
The obelisk will have the following names and information:
1. Isaiah Matthew Davis, Sr. (1827-1902)
2. Frances D. Davis (1830-1890)
3. Sarah C. Davis King (1851-1879), Daughter and Ike King’s mother
4. Infant Davis (15-17 February 1856), Son
5. Mary F. “Mollie” Davis (1857-1893), Daughter
6. Nancy E. Davis (1858-1931), Daughter
7. Isaiah M. Davis, Jr., (1859-1874), Son (died in a carriage accident)
8. Octavia Somerville “Summer” Davis Brady (1861-1913), Daughter
9. Albert Marion “Al Marion” Brady (1859-1918), Son-in-law
10. Elizabeth Davis (1867-before 1880), Daughter
11. Lucy R. Davis Godfrey (1869-1915), Twin Daughter
12. Others unknown
I know the year 2020 has been difficult for everyone. We have been isolated from loved ones and friends. Many have lost friends and loved ones to COVID-19. Some have lost jobs and experienced economic hardship. The past year made me reflect on the past and what my ancestors went through. I decided to launch this fundraiser after thinking about values that are timeless and what is worth preserving versus what is temporary in our lifetimes. The cemetery is worth saving and is at risk.
Historian John Toler wrote in his 2013 article in Haymarket Lifestyle magazine:
“Nearly all of the original structures that made up ‘Old Gainesville’ are gone, and with the re-routing of Linton Hall Road and Galleher Road and the erection of the new overpasses, even the old sites are difficult, if not impossible to locate.”
Gainesville continues to change. The last time I visited Gainesville in the fall of 2019, just before the Covid-19 pandemic struck, I could not find the former site of the Gainesville Unite Methodist Church and historic cemetery somewhere under the new Route 29 overpass. The shopping centers along new Linton Hall Road make it a far cry from the “…little hamlet made up of a filling station, a handful of houses, and a few stores.” This is how Gainesville was described in the Works Projects Administration Writers Program documentation of 1941, according to Toler’s article.
Davis-Brady Cemetery background:
With this Go Fund Me project I want to honor and preserve the memory of Isaiah and Frances Davis and their children buried with them in Gainesville. The cemetery is in the Virginia Oaks development on a hill at the end of Club House Road. We came close to losing the cemetery during construction of Virginia Oaks, but thankfully the developer agreed to build around the cemetery.
The cemetery has no original headstones. Family members were buried with wooden crosses, which was what the family could afford. The wood rotted long ago leaving the graves unmarked for decades.
My uncle, Donald Ray “Don” Brown, added one small rectangular stone marker in the mid-1990s with only two of the names, Albert Marion and Octavia Somerville Brady. The marker has Somerville’s name misspelled as “Summerville” because an 1870 census taker had misspelled it that way. We discovered the mistake a few years later.
Octavia Somerville Davis was named after a prominent citizen, Miss Somerville Gaines. The town itself was named after the Gaines family. Somerville Gaines donated land for the construction of the Gainesville United Methodist Church and church cemetery. We believe the Davises attended the Methodist Church with the Gaines family. The original white church building was demolished, but the church cemetery is still there.
For 80 years, the names of people buried there resided only in the memories of the two final living next generation heirs who attended the gravesite burial services for their parents. My grandmother, Nannie Frances Brady Brown, was there at age 13 in December 1913 for the burial of her mother, Octavia Somerville Davis Brady, and in 1918 for the burial of her father, Albert Marion Brady.
Ethel Godfrey Rabbitt (1902-1997), my grandmother’s cousin, attended the burial of her mother, Lucy R. Davis Godfrey, in 1915. Lucy married Charley Mosby Godfrey on April 23, 1893 and together they had four children. Ethel was the second to the youngest child.
Currently the Virginia Oaks housing development and golf course borders the east side of the cemetery. The cemetery is located at the end of Club House Road on a slight elevation when facing east toward the golf course. An old cedar tree, four aluminum posts from a former chain link fence, a concrete bench, and a temporary bronze sign marked the cemetery as of 2019.
The house where Isaiah and Frances Davis lived and in which they raised their children was located about 100 yards down the slope from the cemetery heading north toward Linton Hall Road. Construction workers removed what little remained of the house, including chimney and foundation stones, during the construction of the homes and golf course for Virginia Oaks.
Family History:
Cemeteries like the Davis-Brady cemetery represent the history of the pioneers who farmed the land, experienced the hardships of the Civil War, and suffered illness and early deaths without modern medicines and healthcare that we take for granted today. The Davis, Brady, Mayhugh, Florance, and Godfrey families were among the larger families in the area during the 19th century; members of these families frequently inter-married.
My third great grandfather, Matthew Davis, Sr., (1802-1875), inherited a large amount of land in Gainesville, VA (Prince William County) from his parents, Henry Davis and Sarah “Sallie” Fairfax Davis. In Matthew’s will, he divided the farmland among his children. Matthew Sr. and his wife, Sarah Mayhugh Davis (1803-1876) had the following children together: Daniel N., Henry P., Frances T., George F., Matthew Jr., William E., Oscar D.F., and Sarah Elizabeth Davis.
Their oldest daughter, Frances, married a cousin, Isaiah Matthew Davis, who was a cooper at the time; he made barrels and casks. When Frances received her father’s bequest of land, Isaiah became a farmer. Isaiah’s cooperage skills no doubt came in handy on the farm. Barrels preserved food and grain during this era before refrigeration. He and Frances lived in a white farmhouse with gray stone chimneys on their property, which today is part of the Virginia Oaks subdivision and golf course. The Davis house is no longer standing. According to family stories, the house burned down circa 1902, the year Isaiah died. For many years two gray stone chimneys stood guard over the house’s ruins, which were surrounded by a growing forest that grew up over the 90 years after Isaiah died.
We do not have photographs of Isaiah and Frances, but I imagine Isaiah had white hair like his brother Matthew Jr., and Frances perhaps had long dark hair like her daughter, Summer. My grandmother said the Davises were of Welsh descent. Isaiah and Frances had 13 children together. In order of birth, they were Sarah C., Helen Margaret (moved to Ohio), Mary F., Nancy E., John Bennett, Isaiah, Jr., Octavia Somerville “Summer,” Alice, Madison Elkron, Elizabeth, and twin girls, Lucy R. and Lucelia Davis.
Isaiah outlived his wife by approximately 10 years. He experienced many family tragedies over his lifetime. He lost his eldest daughter, Sarah, from “consumption” (tuberculosis) and raised her son, Isaiah “Ike” King, as his own. Little Ike was only a year old when his mother died. Ike’s father, Franklin Pierce King (1859-1918), also lived with Isaiah for several years until he re-married and moved to Alexandria, Virginia. Ike remained with his grandpa, Isaiah, in Gainesville. Franklin and his second wife, Sarah “Sallie” Heflin King, had 11 children together.
Isaiah’s daughter, Nancy, was the last child still living at home during Isaiah’s older years. He needed someone to care for him and Nancy did so until he died. Nancy never married and sadly lost the family home when it burned down. She went to live with her niece, Grace Brady Davis (my grandmother’s oldest sibling), in Washington D.C. where she had various jobs, including housekeeper. My grandmother, Nannie, and her younger brother, Harry, were orphaned after both parents died, and lived with the compassionate Grace and her husband Lucian Davis. Nannie got to know her sweet Aunt Nancy well during this time. Nancy died in 1931 without money in her estate to afford a headstone. A death announcement in the Washington Star says she was to be buried “in Gainesville.”
My grandmother said her beloved Aunt Nancy, for whom she is named, is buried in an unmarked grave in the historic Gainesville Methodist Church cemetery. Sadly, the little white church was demolished a few years ago. My grandmother told me she always wanted to buy a headstone for her aunt but could never afford it. Nancy is buried near her brother, Madison Davis. However, the church has no record of Nancy E. Davis being buried there, so I am including her name on the obelisk with her parents and siblings to make sure she is remembered.
After Isaiah’s death, his farmland was divided up among his living heirs. The remaining property with the house ruins and cemetery sat idle until the 1990s. The forest grew thick around the property as nature reclaimed it. Cousin Ethel, Lucy R. Davis Godfrey’s daughter, paid the taxes on the property for many years. When Ethel died, the property was sold to the developer of Virginia Oaks.
My grandmother always wanted to protect the gravesites of her mother father, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. She especially worried about preserving the final resting place of her mother, Octavia “Summer” Brady. She also worried about her aunt Nancy’s forgotten gravesite. She never had the resources during her lifetime to buy headstones.
In the 1960s, my grandmother asked her sons, Earl, Warren, Roland, and Don Brown to install a chain link fence around the cemetery, which they did. They had to borrow a four-wheel drive Jeep to make it up the rugged overgrown dirt path to the site. My uncles had to guess at the dimensions of the cemetery and did not quite get it right. When we rediscovered the cemetery in 1992, I saw some coffin-shaped depressions in the ground. I could tell the western side of the fence was on top of some of the graves. One rectangular depression closest to the giant cedar tree was less than five feet long. I imagined this was the grave of either the infant Isaiah and Frances lost in 1856, likely the first burial at this site and when they planted the cedar tree, or that of young Isaiah Davis, Jr., who died in a carriage accident in 1874, the second known burial.
Getting to the cemetery from old Linton Hall Road in the early 1990s was a challenge. There was no visible path much less a dirt Jeep trail. We parked in the parking lot of an apartment complex in the 7800 block of Old Linton Hall Road and made our way like wilderness trekkers through the thickets the mile or so to the cemetery. My grandmother said to keep going up the slope and toward the south.
Large trees had fallen and blocked the egress leading up the gradual slope to the cemetery. Those of us making our way for the first time in decades had to climb over huge logs and push through vines and briars to get to the cemetery. In the group making the first trek since the 1960s: my mother Dianne (Nannie’s daughter and Somerville Davis Brady’s granddaughter); my brother, Matthew; my father, Lawrence; and my uncle, Don, Dianne’s twin brother).
I was elated to see the cemetery for the first time. It was shaded by surrounding tall trees except for rays of light shining directly on the cemetery’s groundcover. Periwinkle, or Vinca by its scientific name, covered half of the cemetery and some stubborn grass remained. I read in genealogy discussions on Ancestry.com that periwinkle is a sign that helps people find hidden cemeteries in wooded areas. People planted vinca on the graves for the evergreen foliage and as a symbol of never forgetting loved ones that had passed. An animal, perhaps a fox, had made a den at the edge of the hill, no doubt taking advantage of the hollowed-out graves.
Isaiah and Frances chose the highest point of their property for the cemetery. They called it the “Cedar Knoll” because they had planted cedar trees there. In 1992, one large ancient cedar was still there, probably more than 160 years old.
I noticed that all the old cemeteries in the Gainesville area had cedar trees. According to a question researched on Justanswer.com, people in the 1800s planted cedar trees in cemeteries because they can live up to 200 or 300 years. Sometimes cedars are called the “tree of life.”
A May 17, 2011 blog post, “A Grave Interest,” (https://agraveinterest.blogspot.com/), said “Cedar trees were planted to keep some color in a graveyard year-round.” The blogpost quoted a Purdue University International Arborist, Larry Caplan: “Evergreens are frequently used in cemeteries because they remain green and living all year round. Visitors want to feel the concept of ‘rebirth’ or ‘eternal life’ that evergreens represent.”
When we rediscovered the cemetery, a large tree had fallen on the southern side of 1960s era chain link fence, bending it beyond repair. Periwinkle was growing in patches over the gravesites with tiny purple flowers blooming. An antique rose vine was growing up the northern side of the fence. One tiny red rose was blooming that day. Some tulips where growing near the fence entrance.
My grandmother always wanted to buy a headstone for her parents but could not afford it. She told me about her mother, who everyone called Summer. She said her mother worked hard to take of the family while her husband worked for the railroad. Summer was an excellent cook and made the best cornbread my grandmother ever tasted. Summer often brought cornbread to her husband and to other workmen in the city. Summer Brady contracted “double pneumonia” in 1913 and suffered a painful death, with little that her husband and daughters could do for her. The remedy they tried was a “mustard poultice.” The day Summer Brady died in 1913, age 52, she still had long dark hair.
After my grandmother died at age 92, her youngest son, Donald Brown, bought a simple headstone for his grandparents, Albert Marion and Summer Brady, without dates. He placed it in the center of the cemetery, with no way know were there actual graves were located. Currently, there are no other grave markers for the other ancestors buried there.
Isaiah and Frances Davis represented typical Gainesville farm families of the mid to late19th Century. Their farmland was close to a crossroads and turnpike that Civil War soldiers frequented. Real estate representative Rita Gibbons wrote in a July 14, 2007 article that the area started out with the name “Middle Grounds” because it was a “high spine between the drains of Broad Run and Bull Run.” The town at first was called “New Stable” because it served as a “changing point for stagecoach horses on the Fauquier and Alexandria Turnpike.”
According to Gibbons’ research:
“…in July 1852, when the Manassas Gap Railroad reached the pike, Thomas Brawner Gaines owned the land, and the railroad stop became Gainesville. In 1858, Pembroke Gaines became postmaster. During the Civil War, nearby Thoroughfare Gap in the Bull Run Mountains served as a path for soldiers to reach the First and Second Battles of Manassas. By this time, Gainesville had become the leading market town of the Middle Grounds, a shipping point for grain, timber, and cattle (except on Sundays). Edward C. Marshall, president of the Manassas Gap Railroad, did not let his trains run on the Lord's Day. Gainesville's population was listed as 100 during the early 1900s.”
Civil War Impact:
Isaiah and Frances Davis farmed the land and raised children in their house 100 yards from their family cemetery. Isaiah was slightly older and starting his family, but he and Frances lost younger siblings in the Civil War and tussled with Union soldiers who tried to steal their food. One of their children or a farmworker would alert the family that Union troops were coming. The family acted quickly to hide all the hams and food stores they could in the attic of the house or loft of a barn so the troops did not take it all.
According to a family story Frances stood her ground against Union soldiers who demanded to enter the house to get food and water or to sleep. The soldiers were filthy and crawling with body lice. Frances told them they would not be entering her house until they washed up in the farm hands’ bunk house. They obeyed her, probably responding, “Yes, ma’am.” Frances died in her 60s. Records of Frances’ life are scarce. I have not found a death certificate or cause of death, but I will keep looking for records and clues.
Isaiah’s younger brother, John Bennett Davis (1837-1863), was killed during a Civil War battle in Alexandria, VA. He is buried at Christ’s Church in Alexandria. Isaiah named his son after his brother; his son was born the same year his brother was killed.
Another of Isaiah’s brothers, Charles Luther Davis, a “tinner” by trade, enlisted in the Confederate Army on May 1, 1863 at Port Republic, Virginia. He was 20 years old and his enlistment rank was 2nd Sergeant. He was assigned to Company F, 27th Infantry. Seven months later he was wounded in Lexington, Virginia and listed as a casualty and absent on December 1, 1862. It is unclear whether Charles died from his wounds.
The Davis and Brady families passed down the value of taking care of family. During my genealogy research, I found several times when members of the family allowed other family members in need to live with them. They cared for family members when they were older , ill, or unable to support themselves financially. Isaiah’s son, John Bennett Davis (1863-1941), who people called “Bennett,” became a barber and lived for many years with this sister and brother-in-law, Alonzo and Lucelia Davis King (1869-1938), in Falls Church, VA. After Alonzo died, Lucelia and Bennett went to live with their niece in Washington D.C. My grandmother called Lucelia “Aunt Lou.” Aunt Lou’s twin sister, Lucy R. Davis Godfrey, is one of the 12 buried in the historic family cemetery.
Please share this with others who feel a strong connection to the history of Gainesville, Haymarket and western Prince William County and its early residents and want to help preserve this historic cemetery and the memory of the people buried there.
My sincere gratitude for everyone who can contribute even a small amount to this worthy cause to preserve Gainesville history.
Thank you – Lisa Gilley
Octavia Somerville "Summer" Davis Brady, my great-grandmotherAlbert Marion Brady, my great grandfatherDink Godfrey, surveying the cemetery at duskMatthew Davis Jr., Frances Davis' younger brother. My second great grand uncle.Florance, Davis and Brady ancestors visiting Davis-Brady Cemetery #1 on Old Linton Hall Road before it was cleaned up and mowed in 2015.Parking at the end of Club House Road, Virginia Oaks. The path leads up to the Davis Brady Cemetery #2. Walking up the hill to the cemetery. And old concrete bench and a remaining post from the 1960s chain link fence are visible at right.A 1992 Brady family reunion in Manassas, VA. John R. Brady is seated second from right. His father is to his right wearing a western hat.Headstone of Miss Somerville Gaines at the historic Gainesville United Methodist Church Cemetery. Octavia Somerville Davis Brady is named after Miss Gaines. David Zurek, a Davis and Brady ancestor, has worked hard many times to clean up overgrowth, weeds and brush at both Davis-Brady cemeteries. He lives in Virginia Beach.Dink Godfrey surveys the cemetery. He is related to Lucy R. Davis Godfrey's husband, Charley Mosby Godfrey.Organizer
Lisa Gilley
Organizer
Silver Spring, MD