The Swinney Cemetery

The Swinney Cemetery is located on a forested ridge at the edge of the Swinney Place and adjacent to our neighbor's working farm. This portion of the adjacent farm was originally part of the Swinney Homestead. The Swinney Family Cemetery has seven marked headstones and a number of smaller unmarked stones.

The earliest occupants of this land were James Swinney (1785- 1861) and Elizabeth (Byrd) Swinney (1785- 1830). James Swinney and Elizabeth Byrd were married on November 5, 1807 and had 5 children:

  •  Loretta Swinney (1810-1860)
  •  Malinda Swinney (1811-1880)
  •  Anderson Swinney (1814-1882)
  •  David Swinney (1820-1899)
  •  Elizabeth Mahala Swinney (1824-1875)

Of these children, only David Swinney's grave is found with a marked stone in this cemetery. This headstone is accompanied by one for his wife, Mary (Wright) Swinney (1817-1892).

David Swinney and Mary A. (Polly) Wright were married in 1842 and had 8 children:

  •  Eliza Swinney (1843-?)
  •  Stephen M. Swinney (1846-1916)
  •  Lucinda Swinney; (1848-1900)
     (Lucinda Swinney married Joseph Moore, son of Riley Ptolony
     Moore and Sidney Hill, on October 18 1867. She is Cindy Moore    )
  •  William H. Swinney (1851-1859)
  •  Orville Anderson Swinney (1853-1903)
  •  Julia Ann Swinney (1856-1892)
  •  James Fletcher Swinney (1859-1940)
  •  Mary Jane Swinney (1862-1940)

The youngest son of David and Mary Swinney, James Fletcher Swinney (or Fletcher Swinney), married Martha Francis Moore (1854-1943) on September 21, 1882. 'Fletch' and Martha Swinney lived in a log cabin on the Swinney Place and had one son, Ira Clinton Swinney (1883-1972). The 'Fletch Swinney Log Cabin' remains on the property in poor condition and appears to be of early 19th century construction.

Ira Clinton Swinney married Ada Frances Moore on December 12, 1900. Ada Frances Moore (1882-1946) was the daughter of Weldon Moore and Euphamy "Fammie" Vaughan. Ira and Ada Swinney had one daughter, Nana Roosevelt Swinney. Ada Swinney died on March 1, 1946 at the age of 63 and is buried in the Swinney Cemetery. Ira Swinney and Nana (Swinney) Patton are buried in the Liberty Hill Cemetery.

David and Mary Swinney's youngest daughter, Mary Jane, married Alfred Lyons on Sept 13, 1883. Alfred Lyons (b 1863) was the son of William S. (b 1815) and Sarah E. (Bartlett) Lyons (b 1816). Alfred's father, William Lyons, is listed in the 1870 Grayson County census as a blacksmith and both he and Sarah Bartlett were born in North Carolina and relocated to Grayson County ca.1830.

Alfred and Mary Lyons had three children:

  •  Cordia Louvenis Lyons (b/d unknown)
  •  Girtha D. Lyons (1893- 1988)
  •  Murl A. Lyons (1898-1988)

 

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