Miller Cemetery
Winston County, Alabama, T9S R10W S31
This cemetery was located in Haleyville at the intersection of 6th Avenue and 10th Street. Possibly in the 1970s, a person just decided to build a house where the cemetery was. It's said that the tombstones were used as doorsteps, and at one time, you could actually see the bones in the yard. The railroad and road also was built through the cemetery earlier.
Although all this happened to the cemetery, it's not completely destroyed, as a few rocks and markers still exist. In 2006, descendants of the Miller's along with the Haleyville Historical Society visited what was left of the cemetery. Plans include an historical marker.
Advertiser-Journal, May 31, 1950:
A small family cemetery in South Haleyville, now overgrown with vegetation and fallen tomb stones, contains the reamins of early Northwest Alabama settlers who helped build Haleyville.
Charles Newton Miller and wife, Martha Miller, and other relatives are buried in a plot near the Illinois Central railroad. Mr. Miller, who one owned 1200ac. of land in this region, laid off a plot, 85 X 100 feet, for the cemetery.
Today a house stands over part of this cemetery, with the few remaining tombs standing or lying amid a vine-covered area in back.
The Miller land was laid off in lots and sold, except for the cemetery land. This, according to a relative, was not to be sold to anyone. However, a few years later, the plot, through error or misunderstanding, was sold for taxes.
One tomb still remaining, is over the grave of Yancy Lea Taylor, 6mo. old son of Mr. and Mrs. R.W. Taylor, who died April 12, 1881.
No tomb remains for Charles Newton Miller, but is assumed he was buried beside his wife, Martha Miller, whose tomb is pictured above. As can be seen in the picture, she was born April 11, 1824 and buried Jan. 14, 1883. She lived to be 59 years of age, and was the mother of 12 children.
Charles Newton Miller came to this section of Winston County from Georgia, where he was an overseer of slaves doing farm work. He did the same thing for a number of years on the Iron Davis plantation near here.
Following the freeing of slaves, Mr. Miller farmed, and later he and his wife were proprietors of Miller's Stand, a feeding and lodging place on the old Byler Road, which mule and hog dealers used on trips between Tennessee and Tuscaloosa, and Columbus, MS.
Miller's Stand was operated during the stage coach days, and a Miller relative recalled events of interest that occured in that period.
Mr. and Mrs. Charles Newton Miller were parents of six sons and six daughters, all dead now except the youngest son and youngest daughter.