While Atlanta has been my home most of my life, I wasn’t born here. When we arrived, that was immediately apparent to others from the way we spoke and my ignorance about certain important historic events. To be more precise, I mean the Civil War. Also known as the War Between the States or the War of Northern Aggression. Take your pick.

Atlanta’s Cyclorama depicting the Battle of Atlanta is one of a handful of panorama paintings still in existence.

At the tender age of five, I knew nothing about Sherman’s famous March to the Sea, the Stars and Bars or even Gone With the Wind. But when kids would ask me where I was from and I said Ohio, there would be a pause before they nodded and said, “Oh, you’re a Yankee.” They were kind enough to leave out the “d” word that often goes with it.

The only Yankee I knew about at the time was Yankee Doodle Dandy. But I soon learned that while the folks where I came from had moved on after the Civil War, many in the South had not. And some still haven’t.

Scarlett O’Hara being entertained by the Tarleton twins at the beginning of Gone With The Wind. My first date was with a fellow whose mother had specifically named him after one of the twins, Brent. The other twin, Stuart, was played by Superman actor George Reeves.

I can happily report that my family was warmly accepted by our Southern neighbors, despite our Yankee origins. I grew to love living here, the kindness of the people and more relaxed way of life. Now that Atlanta is made up of more transplants than natives, newcomers are not a curiosity like we were back then. But Atlanta’s Civil War history still lingers in the background.

A few weeks ago, my friend Sherri and I were hunting for graves at a church cemetery in Forsyth County. It was hot, humid and the bugs were driving us crazy. But when we found a small headstone tucked away on the hillside, we forgot all about that.

Adeline Bagley Buice is not a name you’ve probably heard. But you won’t soon forget her.

The simple monument for Adeline Bagley Buice has a powerful inscription: “Roswell Mill Worker Caught and Exiled to Chicago by Yankee Army 1864 – Returned on Foot 1869”.

Needless to say, we were stunned. And the story just got better from there.

Adeline Bagley Buice was one of about 400 women working in the Roswell mills (two for cotton, one for woolens) in 1864. Her husband, Joshua Buice, was away serving in the Confederate Army. Despite the fact most of the more well-to-do residents of Roswell had fled in fear of the Union Army’s impending arrival, these women remained at their jobs. You can visit the ruins of those mills even today.

“The Bricks”, as they were called, housed the women working in the Roswell mills. Built in 1840, they have since been restored and are a historic site. Photo courtesy of the Roswell Historical Society.

On July 5, 1864, seeking a way to cross the Chattahoochee River and get access to Atlanta, Brigadier General Kenner Garrard’s cavalry began the Union’s 12-day occupation of Roswell, which was undefended. Garrard reported to Major General William T. Sherman that he had discovered the mills in full operation and proceeded to destroy them because the cloth was being used to make Confederate uniforms. Sherman replied that the destruction of the mills “meets my entire approval.”

Sherman then ordered that the mill owners and employees be arrested and charged with treason, an action that puzzles historians to this day. He said, “I repeat my orders that you arrest all people, male and female, connected with those factories, no matter what the clamor, and let them foot it, under guard, to Marietta, whence I will send them by [railroad] cars, to the North. . . . Let them [the women] take along their children and clothing, providing they have a means of hauling or you can spare them.”

The mere mention of William Tecumseh Sherman can raise the hackles of many Southerners and for good reason.

The women, their children, and the few men, most either too young or too old to fight, were sent by wagon to Marietta and imprisoned in the abandoned Georgia Military Institute. Soon after, with several days’ rations, they were loaded into boxcars that proceeded through Chattanooga, Tenn., and after a stopover in Nashville, headed to Louisville, Ky., the final destination for many of the mill workers. Others were sent across the Ohio River to Indiana.

First housed and fed in a Louisville refugee hospital, the women later took what menial jobs and living arrangements they could find. Those in Indiana struggled to survive, many settling near the river, where eventually mills provided employment. Penniless, some of them resorted to prostitution. Unless husbands had been transported with the women or had been imprisoned nearby, there was little probability of a return to Roswell. Some of the remaining women began to marry and bear children.

Adeline, who was heavily pregnant when she and her co-workers were arrested, was among those shipped North. She made her way to Chicago and in August, she gave birth to a daughter she named Mary Ann. Over the next five years, Adeline and Mary made their way home to Georgia, mostly on foot. It’s a journey I cannot fathom. Many of her fellow mill workers never made it back.

Adeline and Mary’s return was quite a shock to her husband, Joshua, who had long since come back from the battlefield. Thinking Adeline was dead, he reportedly remarried. I don’t know how that delicate situation played itself out. In 1867, Adeline had given birth to a son, John Henry. Someone wrote to me recently who said this must have happened during her journey home. While John Henry only lived to the age of 15, his tenacious sister Mary Ann lived to be 88. My guess is that Joshua accepted John Henry as his own and the reunited family went on from there.

Adeline’s original broken headstone is located behind the one created by the local chapter of the Sons of the Confederate Veterans.

In 1998, the Roswell Mills Camp No. 1547 chapter of the Sons of the Confederate Veterans began a project to honor the deported mill workers. While some descendants were found, most of their deported ancestors had settled in the North. In July 2000, the project culminated in a ceremonial event highlighted by the unveiling of a memorial monument in Roswell’s mill village park to commemorate the sacrifices of the mill workers and to honor the 400 women.

The monument’s inscription reads:”Honoring the memory of the four hundred women, children and men mill workers who were charged with treason and deported by train to the north by invading Federal forces.”

It’s hard for me to reconcile the atrocity of slavery practiced by wealthy Southern plantation owners with the equally heinous treatment by Union forces of these innocent women taken from their homes, and sent North for no good reason. It serves as a lesson to us even now, both sides in a war can commit great wrongs.

I like to think Adeline’s determination to return home to her husband transcends North and South, and is a testament to what a person can do when faced with seemingly insurmountable odds.

Even a Yankee like me can salute that kind of courage.

There are plenty of famous men buried in Georgia, but the ladies often get overlooked. This week, I am featuring a handful of those enterprising women. Some you may already know about, but a few of them may surprise you.

Rome, Georgia is home to Shorter and Berry Colleges. Class A minor league baseball team the Rome Braves draw plenty of crowds. But did you know a U.S. President’s wife is buried there?

Woodrow Wilson was not a household name when he met Ellen Axson at her father’s church.

President Woodrow Wilson’s first wife was born Ellen Louise Axson. The daughter of a Presbyterian minister, she grew up in comfortable circumstances. Her parents believed in the importance of a good education for both sexes, so Ellen became an intelligent, observant young lady who eventually studied art in New York City. She enjoyed painting throughout her life and even spent time at an artists’ colony.

Ellen met the future president at her father’s church long before he entered politics. After her father died and Wilson was offered a teaching position at Bryn Mawr College, the couple decided they were financially prepared to marry. They eventually had three daughters together.

Sadly, Ellen’s tenure as first lady was brief. Having suffered from Bright’s Disease (a deterioration of the kidneys) since the birth of her youngest child, Ellen died in 1914, only a year and a half after her husband was elected president. Her body was taken back to Rome for her funeral. She is buried at Myrtle Hill Cemetery.

First lady Ellen Wilson’s body was transported through the streets of Rome, Ga. after her funeral. Photo courtesy of the Georgia Archives.

Ellen Axson Wilson is buried in Myrtle Hill Cemetery in Rome, Ga. I was finally able to visit her grave many months after I originally wrote this post.

One acclaimed Hollywood actress buried in Georgia was tops at the box office for years. Born Edythe Marrenner in Brooklyn, N.Y., Susan Hayward arrived in Hollywood in 1937 to do a screen test for the role of Scarlett in Gone With the Wind. While she did not get the part, she went on to star in films like “With a Song in My Heart”, “I’ll Cry Tomorrow” and “I Want to Live” (for which she won her only Oscar).

Actress Susan Hayward got the nickname “Red” from the fiery color of her hair.

After a failed marriage to actor Jess Barker, Susan met wealthy Southern real estate developer Floyd Eaton Chalkley in 1957. His Southern charm won her heart and they were married not long after that. They lived happily on their large ranch (which they called Chalk-Marr Farms) in Carrolton, Ga. for several years. Locals often saw them together around town.

Chalkley died in 1966 of hepatitis. Always a heavy smoker and drinker, Susan learned she had brain cancer in 1972. She died in 1975 and is buried with her husband at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Cemetery in Carrolton. On their shared memorial plaque, she is listed simply as Mrs. F.E. Chalkley. A smaller flat stone with her name is placed off to the side.

Susan Hayward’s grave is simple compared to “the Broad from Brooklyn’s” flamboyant Hollywood image.

Life at the turn of the century in the Deep South was far from easy for African-American women. Gertrude Pridgett knew this first hand growing up poor in Columbus, Ga. The product of a musical family, she eventually hit the vaudeville circuit, which was a booming business in a river port city like Columbus.

In 1904, Gertrude met and married minstrel show manager William “Pa” Rainey. Together, they toured the country at various shows and with tent performers. That’s when her fame began to grow and she took on the name “Ma” Rainey that would stick with her for life.

Ma Rainey’s life of poverty and hard work was reflected in songs like “Bad Luck Blues” and “Trust No Man.” Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Ma enjoyed a successful recording career with Paramount Records for five years. She collaborated with other well-known musicians such as Joe Smith, Coleman Hawkins and Louis Armstrong. But just as she was getting to the top of her game, Paramount dropped her, claiming that her rough around the edges kind of music had gone out of style. She retired to Columbus and died there in 1939. She is buried in Porterdale Cemetery.

I have a special appreciation for Ma because unwittingly, I crossed paths with her past in my younger days. As a member of my high school chorus, I performed on the same stage she did at Columbus’ Springer Opera House. A year later, I had the good fortune to attend a Broadway production of the play about her life, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.”

Ma Rainey’s music earned her the nickname “Mother of the Blues”. Photo courtesy of Ronald Self.

Perhaps the most well known female Georgian is author Margaret Mitchell. A headstrong young woman, she loved hearing stories about the Civil War from Confederate veterans. She dropped out of Smith College after the death of her mother in order to run her father’s home where he and her younger brother still lived.

A bit of a rebel herself in her youth, Margaret Mitchell treasured the stories told to her by Confederate veterans.

During her first rocky marriage, Margaret began writing for the Atlanta Journal’s Sunday magazine to make ends meet. After her divorce, she married former suitor and editor John Marsh, and left her job to recover from a series of illnesses. While convalescing at home, she wrote the Pulitzer-prize winning novel Gone With the Wind in 1936. The book and eventually the movie made it financially possible for her to support a number of philanthropic interests for the remainder of her life.

Margaret Mitchell was killed in 1949 when she was hit by a car while attempting to cross at the intersection of Peachtree and 13th Streets in what is now Midtown in Atlanta. She is buried with Marsh at Oakland Cemetery, where thousands of visitors trek to visit her grave every year.

Although she only wrote one book, Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind continues to draw the adoration of readers around the world. Photo courtesy of Richard Earl Post.

These four women made their marks on the world in many different ways. But in the end, they all chose to make Georgia their final resting place.

While I’ll never be famous like these female icons, I hope to do the same some day.

Remember the saying “like looking for a needle in a haystack”? Sometimes cemetery hopping can be like that in reverse. Something rare is sitting right under your nose and you weren’t even looking for it.

As part of my Find a Grave efforts, I took on the task of photographing many of the graves at Sugar Hill Baptist Church Cemetery in north Gwinnett County. Most of the graves are already documented because of my dedicated FG friend Wesley, who referenced the cemetery book that lists everyone who is buried there (along with the dates). However, his wife is in a nursing home now so photographing graves is not something he can do. I asked if I could take it on for him and he gave me the green light.

Home Spun Restaurant is an awesome meat-n-three. Try the country chicken if you ever visit.

Sugar Hill Baptist Church Cemetery is a large, well kept cemetery situated across from the town’s impressive city hall complex. A small park with a gazebo is across the street and a community center is next door to the cemetery (where I parked my car). Close to 1,500 graves make up the cemetery. I’ve made several trips to take pictures but I’m not quite done. Eating lunch at the nearby Home Spun Restaurant (a meat and three) after these photo sessions makes visits even more pleasant.

It was during one of these trips to Sugar Hill that I photographed a very simple flat stone marker with the name Ralph K. Davis on it. His death was on April 17, 1964. It was located in a decent sized gravel square with the Davis monument behind it. It is rare for me to find a family plot with only one grave in it so as usual, I got curious and began digging for information.

It didn’t take me long to feel my breath catch in my throat.

Ralph Davis’ death was much more dramatic than his marker indicates.

Ralph King Davis was an officer for the Gwinnett County Police Department. Today, the county is a sprawling mass of homes, businesses and interstate highways. The population is incredibly diverse. But back in 1964, Gwinnett County was a rural backwater somewhat trapped in time. Catching moonshiners was still a going concern for law enforcement. To make matters worse, some lawmen were known to have gotten their hands dirty by taking part in such crimes themselves.

On the evening of April 17, Davis and his partner, Jerry Everett, were giving a ride home to an ill fellow officer, Marvin Jesse Gravitt. En route, they got a suspicious activity call at a home on Arc Way, which was a dirt road connecting Beaver Ruin and Pleasant Hill Roads at the time. What started out as a routine response quickly became something that would make headlines across the country.

Retired former Atlanta police officer Mackie Carson recently wrote a book about it called Judas Deputy. He kindly gave his consent for me to quote from it.

Slain Gwinnett officers Marvin Jesse Gravitt, Ralph King Davis and Jerry Everett. Photos courtesy of Mackie Carson.

People think chop shops (garages where stolen cars are “chopped up” for parts that are then resold) are a modern phenomenon but not so. In 1964, a number of car theft rings were operating in Gwinnett County for that very purpose.

Thieves would purchase a car from a salvage yard, then steal a similar car and strip the stolen car of its parts. The parts then would be put into the salvaged car — which had no “hot” vehicle ID number.

According to Carson, the “finder’s fee” for stealing a car was $25, and rose to $100 if you took it out of the county. As a result, it became a very tempting crime to commit.

It was this kind of activity the three officers stumbled upon that April night. They found three men beginning the process of stripping a stolen Oldsmobile for parts. One of the thieves, in an attempt to flee, threw the Oldsmobile in reverse and sped back down the road only to be blocked in by the police car. When Everett was examining the inside of the Oldsmobile, the other two thieves came into sight. They were armed and took fatal control of the situation.

The next morning, the bodies of all three officers were found in the nearby woods, handcuffed together with their own handcuffs. They had been shot dead execution style with their own weapons. The Oldsmobile was nearby, torched to destroy evidence.

Alec Evans, Wade Truett and Venson Williams were arrested for the triple murder. Truett got immunity for his testimony against Evans and Williams.

The ultimate irony is that one of the killers was one of their own, a former Gwinnett County deputy sheriff named Alec Evans. He had even been an ATF agent at one time. The other two, Venson Williams and Wade Truett, owned a garage together in South Carolina and had helped Evans steal the Oldsmobile the previous day.

Gwinnett deputy sheriff Jerry Griswell was one of the first to arrive on the scene the next morning. He never forgot what he saw. “A waste of three fine men,” Mr. Griswell said in a 1989 Atlanta Journal-Constitution article.

According to many witnesses, Evans swore he would find the officers’ killers, even going so far as to visit the Everett family more than once to assure them the murderers would be caught.

Later that year, with no one yet suspecting his role in the murders, Evans was arrested for running illegal moonshine and sent for a short stint in a federal prison in Michigan. He was eating lunch with the other inmates when he was informed he would be going back to Georgia.

Evans, along with Williams and Truett, was arrested for the murders. Evans was convicted and given a death sentence that was later commuted to life in prison. At age 86, he is still incarcerated. Williams (now deceased) served 25 years and was paroled. Wade Truett, also now deceased, was given immunity for his testimony against Evans and Williams. He served no prison time. Carson says Truett was the only one of the trio who did not shoot the officers.

Jerry Everett, only 28 when he was killed, came from a strong law enforcement tradition. His brother, Kelly, was the former Norcross police chief. Another brother, George, was a Doraville police officer.

Brothers Randall and Roger Everett owned and operated Everett’s Music Barn in nearby Suwanee and the store is still a magnet for bluegrass music lovers. It has roots in the tragedy. Those paying condolences to the family would return to hold impromptu bluegrass jam sessions on the Everett family’s porch. The brothers and their friends felt the music was a form of therapy amid their grief. Randall and Roger have since passed away, but the legacy of their music continues.

While many living in Gwinnett today have no idea what took place on a dark country road in 1964, memories of the triple murder linger. Long-time residents remember three police officers being cut down by a gang of thieves, one a wolf in sheep’s clothing. They walked blindly into a crime in progress and paid with their lives.

According to Carson, Ralph Davis’ neighbor, George Kelly, remembered his last conversation with him. Davis told Kelly that he was seriously thinking of leaving law enforcement because of the danger involved.

Sadly, he never had a chance to do so.

I get some bemused looks when I tell people about my cemetery hopping habit. Some people have commented that it must be so depressing going to cemeteries or that death itself is too sad to linger on.

I’ll be brutally honest. Losing a loved one is HARD. I don’t make light of that or disrespect the gravity of death. I lost my father almost 10 years ago and you never really “get over it”. Even though I knew he had accepted Jesus Christ as his personal Savior years before, even though I knew he was exactly where he wanted to be, I still had trouble moving forward. I didn’t want him to be in Heaven because I wanted him here with me.

Thankfully, the healing process helped ease that emotional struggle. It took God’s patient love and an amazing program called Griefshare to get me back on track. Part of that included laughing at some of Dad’s quirks and remembering his more irreverent moments.

One of his favorite shows was the Mary Tyler Moore Show. When I think about grief, I remember a classic episode called “Chuckles Bites the Dust.”

The staff of WJM (the TV station where Mary works) are mourning the loss of Chuckles the Clown, host of a beloved kids’ show. Chuckles met his demise while costumed as character Peter Peanut in a local parade. As Lou Grant explains, a rogue elephant tried to “deshell” Chuckles. When announcing Chuckles’ death on the air, anchorman Ted Baxter deadpans, “He died a broken man.” Mary is mortified at her co-workers’ jokes about Chuckles’ death and tells them to stop being so disrespectful. Even as Chuckles’ funeral starts, she scolds Murray for whispering jokes.

After chastising her co-workers for laughing at Chuckles’ death, Mary can’t stop giggling at his funeral.

But when the minister delivers the eulogy, Mary (to her horror) gets a case of the giggles. When he recounts Chuckles’ famous line “A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants”, she’s on the verge of losing it. But when the minister encourages her to laugh as a way to celebrate Chuckles’ life, Mary bursts into tears.

Lou Grant sums it up well when he says, “We laugh at death because we know that death will have the last laugh on us.”

While it’s certainly not a good idea to bring a whoopie cushion to a funeral, humor can definitely help us through the grieving process. It can act as a release of the pressure cooker of stress a person is under. That inner turmoil breaks free and finds relief in laughter.

Dad was in his last hours when I, my sister, husband and brother-in-law went to the cemetery to purchase a plot for him. We were all in a bad way, facing a very difficult situation. The kind woman we were working with was explaining everything and casually mentioned that in the years to come we would need to maintain Dad’s grave by personally keeping the grass cut, etc.

This jolted us all out of our fog and we stared at her in stunned silence. Was she for real? She smiled and said, “It’s a joke, you guys, relax!”

This epitaph was used first by Irish comedian/musician Spike Milligan, who said, “I Told You I Was Ill” should be his epitaph. It shows that even in death, humor can shine through.

Now some people might have taken offense at that. But we all collapsed into laughter. We needed something to help shake us out of our gloom, and humor did the job. I think of that woman from time to time with much appreciation. She knew it was just what we needed to do at that moment.

In 1998, one of my best friends died of a sudden, fatal heart attack. John was only 30 and it was a shock to all of us who knew him. I gave one of the eulogies at his funeral, wanting to share not only how much John had meant to me but how funny he could be. So I shared the story of when, while an engineer at a small Pennsylvania radio station, he impersonated a Polish polka DJ (who didn’t show up for his shift) for an entire hour with nobody being the wiser. Later, I learned his family had not known this bit of John trivia and had gotten a lot of joy from hearing it.

John and I at a Christmas party. People used to call us Mutt and Jeff because of the disparity in our heights. He made me laugh every time we were together.

Death is a serious business. But mourning doesn’t have to be constant pain. There is a place for laughter, for joyful remembrance amid the sadness. Ecclesiastes 3:2-8 is often quoted but I think God inspired every word in its anonymous author.

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:

a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.

Humor can heal. And it can bring great relief in the depths of despair.

I’ve mentioned Steel Magnolias before as one of my favorite movies. Dolly Parton, who plays sassy beautician Truvy, says, “Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion.”

It’s one of mine, too.