Jurisdiction: Bainbridge Township Section 6
Established: October 4, 1850
Status: Under went a restoration in 2002 and a new granite sign was added
Location: Southwest Corner of Carmody Road near Boyer Road
Cemetery Governing Body: Bainbridge Township
Location of Cemetery Records: No records on file other than BCGS readings 1972 & 2002
Size: .92 acre
The burying ground was established October 4, 1850 when Justin Boyer and Austin Boyer gave one half acre of land to Lemuel Clark, N. S. Bishop and Horace Vincent, trustees of the Burial Ground. The 1850 deed states that the Boyers’ would deliver a title to the land after the trustees built a “good and permanent board fence”. Justin and Austin were also to have the “privilege of selecting two plots free of charge within the burial grounds”. In 1862 Justin Boyer and his wife, Olive, sold one half acre for $3.00 to the Bainbridge Township Board of Trustees of the Burial Grounds. It is unclear whether this is the same ½ acre Justin and Austin gave in 1850 or if it is another piece. Maybe the board fence was never built and the title never given in 1850?
Justin and Olive Boyer again sold one-eighth acre to the township for $6.25 in 1883. There is not a legal description of the grounds in any of these three deeds.
The infant daughter of John and Sarah Bishop, Hope Bishop, is the first burial in Boyer Cemetery. She died Sept 12, 1850. There are six Boyer family members buried here, including Justin and Olive.
Boyer Cemetery was in very poor condition when restoration began in 2001. At one time cattle were pastured on the grounds maybe they were responsible for tipping over some of the stones. Many rogue trees were cut down in order to even begin locating the rows. There seems to be a large open area in the middle of the grounds where it has been suggested this may have been the area that the committal tent was placed in poor weather or the team of horses would stand with the funeral procession.
Justin, Norman and Austin Boyer, three brothers, exchanged lands in Jefferson County, New York, for some of Smith and Merrick’s land in Bainbridge Township, and, with their families, settled there in 1844, Justin on section 6, where he still lived in 1880, and Austin adjoining him on the south. Austin Boyer later moved to Kansas.
Written By Marge (Hess) Yetzke
