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McDow Cemetery

Photo submitted by Allen L. Austin, [email protected].

Headstone Readings

Let me begin by introducing myself. My name is Allen L. Austin. I began researching my mother’s family in late 1990’s. I began by writing down in a notebook the information I knew. Like the names of my mother’s parents and siblings and cousins and so forth. After some time had past my research took me to the County Clerk’s office where I started gathering documents to aid in my research. I also visited a couple of the local funeral homes. While an uncle of mine was in town visiting. He told me of a cemetery in Otterville where he and his brother and their Uncle Bill Carlton would drive up to from Godfrey to mow because several Balcom relatives were buried there. He referred to it as the Balcom Cemetery. We drove up to Otterville to find it. Upon finding it we learned it was called Ferguson Cemetery. We walked through it; looking to find the headstones of our family with no luck. My uncle recalled being told by his uncle that two Balcom babies were buried near the entrance and that a cousin said that John and Fannie Lane Balcom were buried in a wrought iron fence area of the cemetery. Of course this turned out to be false.
     Over the years we have visited the cemetery several times. In my research I have discovered that the cemetery has been called by many different names. Here are few: McDow, Otterville, and McDow-Otterville, McDowell. Of course this is a misspelling, the pronunciation of the name. Here are few more names: Methodist, Old Methodist Evangelical (old M. E. for short), Gowin, Hagen, Picket because of who owned the land in which the cemetery is located on or near. Ferguson due to large headstone at the front of cemetery. If you talk to Gladys Drainer she will be quick to tell you the correct name of the cemetery is McDow and that her son recently donated the Drainer Addition to the cemetery. She currently has records for McDow. She also is cemetery trustee for Noble Cemetery.
     During those visits I make it a point to check on a headstone of a John Rummerfield, who served in Company E of the 144 Illinois Infantry. Most recently during a visit to the Jerseyville library I was looking through the books they have in their Illinois and found a Jersey County Veterans Burial Index. As I was looking through it I came across a listing for John Rummerfield buried at Old M. E. Cemetery in Otter Creek Township. He was listed as serving in the Civil War in Company E of the 144 Illinois Infantry and died May 27, 1867. That is when I remembered seeing his headstone at McDow Cemetery. I mentioned this to Marsha Buis at the County Clerk’s office and she told me that was the Methodist Cemetery and depending on who had the most influence in town was who the cemetery was named after. So as you can tell with various names for McDow Cemetery, a person can get confused as to where a deceased ancestor is buried if there is no headstone and they are listed in another cemetery.
     In our search, my uncle and his grandson and I only found the headstone for our ancestor William Balcom at Salem Cemetery in Otter Creek Township. Most of the family members at Oak Grove Cemetery in Jerseyville have headstones, but not all of them. But that is a story for another time.
     Since all I have is the death certificates and funeral records of my ancestors who are stated to be buried at McDow Cemetery, I have not included them in headstone reading. As for the rest of the McDow cemetery burials, I will use the headstones in the cemetery and funerals records if possible. Since I could not find any records for an Infant Balcom, born in 1921 and dying April 25, 1922 (This baby was 8 months old was the time of death and parents unknown), I looked in an April 1922 newspaper and could not find anything. I left the infant off also. I believe also that an Annie Balcom Osburn and her infant child are also buried at McDow. No headstone or records have been found to date. Annie’s husband was Dellie J. Osburn. Now on to the headstone reading . . .

As you can tell some of the older headstones were hard to read. Corrections can be sent. Click here for email address.

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