Golden Hill Cemetery: history and property survey

              Golden Hill Cemetery
Seven Mile Ferry Road
Clarksville, Montgomery County, Tennessee
Text by Tammy Allison Sellers and Carroll Van West, 2001
Photos by Carroll Van West, 2001
Description
Established in 1863, Golden Hill Cemetery currently and historically contains 7 .56 acres of land.
The cemetery is located southeast of the central business district and historic residential areas
and in a part of Clarksville reserved for cemeteries since the nineteenth century. Greenwood
Cemetery, established as the city's white cemetery, is located about one-fourth of a mile north,
on Greenwood Avenue. Evergreen Cemetery, a second cemetery for African Americans ,
developed immediately to the west of the nominated property, beginning in 1929.
The cemetery entrance is located off Seven Mile Ferry Road. The entrance is defined by red
brick gateposts on each side of the dirt drive into the cemetery. From the gates is a historic,
tree-lined driveway that runs to the top of cemetery's "Golden Hill," and then turns west toward
the adjacent Evergreen Cemetery. The exact date of the gates is unknown , but the gates were
constructed prior to World War II, circa 1940. A wooded area runs along the southern
boundary. The wooded area consists of a variety of trees , shrubs, and undergrowth. The
wooded area covers approximately one-half acre of the cemetery, with older burials located
within the wooded area. A metal and wooden fence marks the eastern boundary of the
cemetery. Beyond the fence, hay grows in an open field in front of the only residential building
bordering Golden Hill Cemetery. The western border of Golden Hill Cemetery is shared with the
later Evergreen Cemetery and is clearly marked by a line of large, mature trees that separate
the two cemeteries.
During a survey of the cemetery in March 2001, an exact count of the remaining cemetery
stones was not determined. Many of the family plots lacked distinctive markers showing the
location of each of the burials in the plot. Some headstones also appeared to be broken into
one or more pieces, again making an exact count difficult to achieve . Approximately 200 to 250
headstones remain, with a number of graves being marked with only metal markers, which date
from the 1970s to the 1990s. The overwhelming majority of the burials at Golden Hill Cemetery
occurred during the cemetery's period of significance, between 1863 and 1951, with the period
of greatest concentration being from 1890 to 1930. A rough estimate, based on extant markers,
indicate that 80-90 percent of the burials took place before 1951, which is not surprising since
the adjacent Evergreen Cemetery was established in 1929 and most of its burials date after
1951.
The oldest historic headstones are located in the southern half of Golden Hill Cemetery , near
the top of the "Golden Hill," with the greatest number of family plots located around the summit
of the hill. The more recent historic burials, such as those associated with the Dr. Robert Burt
family, are located closer to the entrance of the cemetery on the northern border.
The majority of the grave markers from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are
concentrated around the historic tree-lined drive. The oldest markers line the road in the
southern section of the cemetery . Most of the individual burial markers and family plot markers
face east. The family plots are most often rectangular in shape and consist of materials and
designs ranging from poured concrete with decorative urns at the corners to cinder blocks