I haven’t spent much time in this city but I grew up hearing about the legend of the lost gold that might just still be lingering about and waiting for a lucky and intrepid fortune hunter. So I feel like I’ve known about it forever and a day even though I’ve only stepped foot in town about twice now.

To me, the real treasure of Washington is the Resthaven Cemetery! Once called Washington City Cemetery, it was first founded in 1857 and has some of the most unique detailing to classic embellished funerary art stylings that I’ve found in such a small cemetery like this one…

I’ve not found many lutes/harps in my searches but this one is one of the most intact I’ve come across so I was beyond delighted. And it was about the size of my palm!

These two graves – Little Jimmie & Mary Toombs Hardeman – have such sad and poignant epitaphs. Little Jimmie’s plaque reads: First buried in the upper house garden between the residence and the Baptist Church, but moved to this location because the little grave was a constant reminder to his grief stricken mother.

And I’ll end the post with a few examples of beautiful architecture around two family plots.

The first is glazed terracotta pieces edging a grave from the early 1900’s. I couldn’t find an identifying mark, and some of the stones had sunk into the earth or were broken but a surprisingly large number were still whole. I don’t know much about this type of graveyard artistry but I did find one plot at Oakland that had some terracotta pieces although they were very different. If anyone has information please email me as I’d love to know more!

The other was this iron fencing that is almost 100% still intact even though the metal is showing its age. The small plaque reads Made By Geo. R. Lombard Augusta Ga. While the Lombard company primarily made items for railroads and factories, it also created iron fencing and architectural metal works. I’ve run across a few of their works before but never a) such a large square footing of fencing (this area was huge!) and b) in such good condition. Even the gates pull knob slid smoothly and with barely a creak/squeak!

I can’t wait to to go back and spend more time researching and exploring. Maybe during the spring when there will be blooms on allllll those trees…