You Are In The South - Willowdale Cemetery

I took a trip to Goldsboro, NC, to visit the Willowdale Cemetery, which is located right next to the downtown area. Willowdale cemetery is somewhat famous - it is the home of a mass gravesite for some 800 Confederate soldiers, some 200 of which remain unidentified. It is also built on the edge of an abandoned factory-looking thing.



At first, it doesn't seem any different from any other cemetery. There are the usual signs of subtle humor:



This poor fellow should have seen this coming and stayed out of the lake...



Two wives, no husband. Wonder where he absconded to? And do his two wives enjoy being buried next to each other sans hubby?

But then, you see something that reminds you that you're in the South. And it is not really very funny.



Seeing as how the Goldsboro Rifles were instrumental in setting up this cemetery as a mass grave, complete with massive monument to Confederate Soldiers, I must presume that this was a (ahem) white (ahem) cemetery. Given that, this must have been a signal honor. But I have no idea how to feel about it now. I'm confused as to what it all means now. Dead is dead. Are the passions, hatreds, and prejudices of long ago dead as well?



These two monuments are within twenty yards of each other, by the way.



Then you look up smack dab at the far edge of the cemetery, right up next to the abandoned factory I mentioned earlier, and there - the 'Jewish' sector of the cemetery. Yes, we're in the South.







Anyway, my cemetery photos. No disrespect intended. I like visiting cemeteries, and I am always highly respectful of the last resting place of these souls. I just spend a lot of time thinking in them, is all. And I've never seen some of the things I've seen since moving to the South. Makes you think.

On and On,

Wiggy