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Pensacola's Citizenry in St. John's Historic Cemetery
Clara Garnier Barkley (Vienne) Dorr
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Gertrude
Roberts went to Palmer College, then she went to New Orleans and went into
nurses training, which was a venturesome thing for a young lady to do in those
days. She graduated and became a registered nurse in 1919. She took advanced
training in Memphis, then went to New York City and learned to be an anesthetist
at Columbia University. She worked in a New York hospital for some time before
she was offered a post as a nurse for the United States Lines where she crossed
the Atlantic many times on the luxury ship, Leviathan. She met and married
Gordon B. MacKenzie (1899-1992), and they had one son, Gordon (1929). They moved
to Pensacola in the 1930s where Gertrude used her nursing skills to care for her
mother and many others in Pensacola during the remainder of her life. She was a
well known Bible teacher, and was one of the founders of Pensacola Christian
College, where one of the buildings is named for her.
Two memorable women buried in St. John’s are
my mother, Gertrude Roberts MacKenzie (1897-1989) and my grandmother, Annie
Simpson Roberts (1859-1943).
contributed by Gordon MacKenzie of Gulf Breeze FL
Annie Simpson Roberts was the daughter of Ezekiel E. Simpson (1803-1875) and Susan Alexander Overman Simpson (1831-1920), and she was the granddaughter of Benjamin A. Overman (1808-1888) and Eliza Wilson Overman (1806-1885).
Simpson and Joseph Forsyth, along with Overman
started the Bagdad Sawmill near the Blackwater River, and later started a cotton
mill and a railroad and became leading citizens of northwest Florida.
During the Civil War in 1862 the Confederate forces burned the mill to keep it from falling into the hands of the Federals. The partners took their families to Greenville, Alabama until the war ended. They returned after the war and built other mills, a blind and door factory, and a shipyard and accumulated 200,000 acres of timberland. Lumber was shipped from Pensacola by schooner all over the world.
Simpson owned a large house at “Arcadia Farms” near the Pond Creek site of the original mill, and a large home in Pensacola at Palafox and Gregory Street. He had twelve children, who were active in Pensacola and elsewhere. His wife and his sister, Leah Simpson contributed the property for the original First Presbyterian Church.
Annie Calhoun Simpson, one of E. E. Simpson’s daughters married W. N. Roberts (1857-1914) in 1885, and they had five children, John M. Roberts (1890-1949), Horace Simpson Roberts (1893-1978), Ellen Adair Martin (1895-1979), Gertrude Lee Roberts MacKenzie (1897-1989), and William N. Roberts, Jr. (1899-1970).
Two memorable women buried in St. John’s are
my mother, Gertrude Roberts MacKenzie (1897-1989) and my grandmother, Annie
Simpson Roberts (1859-1943).
contributed by Gordon MacKenzie of Gulf Breeze FL
On
driving into St. John’s Historic Cemetery through the main gate, looking to the
left, one is impressed with the long, military-like rows of grave markers
representing the 100 or so British seamen who died in Pensacola around 1900.
Looking to the right are scores of time-encrusted graves of those Pensacolians
who were interred in the cemetery’s earliest years. The first gravesite on the
right side, next to the road, is a simple Victorian slab inscribed: Emma L.
Varner, wife of C. M. Sanders, born in Lexington, Georgia March 25, 1843, died
in Pensacola, Florida August 9, 1908.
Like so many other gentle ladies of her times, Lucy Sanders was not recognized as a leading citizen, but only as a “wife of …”or “mother of…”. Indeed, she was the wife of a Confederate soldier; mother of Frank Dent Sanders, mayor of Pensacola in 1919; mother-in-law of George E. Smith, sheriff of Escambia County, Florida, 1894 to 1904; and grandmother of Pensacolians Ernestine Smith Fleming and Gladys Smith Champlin. Judging from the persona, style and graciousness of Lucy Sanders’ daughters, Mitt Watson and Rosa Smith (and Rosa’s six daughters) – all known to the writer – Lucy must have been a very charming and spunky Southern Lady.
At the turn of the 20th century it was common for a gentle lady, on the death of her husband, to leave a substantial home and position in her community to move and live with her children or, alternately, with two or more of her children’s families. A new community probably would not know much about her. When Cicero Marion Sanders died, Lucy moved from her home in Eufaula, Alabama to live with her daughter, Rosa, and her family in a spacious house on East Chase Street. (This house was moved years later by architect Hugh Leitch to its current site at 226 East Government Street and is now a land- mark building, a lawyer’s office, facing Seville Square).
Lucy Varner Sanders knew who she was. Her father’s family roots went back to Rhineland- Palatinate in western Germany near the Moselle valley. Her mother, Lucy Callaway Varner had taken her on visits to the many Callaway and Lumpkin cousins in Georgia and Virginia. Her grandmother, Martha Lumpkin, told her about being the only girl in her family with six brothers. One brother, Joseph Henry Lumpkin, was the first Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court, before “The War Between The States”. Another brother, Wilson Lumpkin, was the governor of Georgia in the 1830’s when he named a busy railroad junction:“ Marthasville”. She liked to think that it was a little bit for her but Governor Lumpkin’s daughter also was named “Martha”. Anyway, the “Marthasville” name, eventually, was changed to “Atlanta”. Martha’s father, as a veteran of the Revolutionary War, came from Virginia to Georgia, to claim “Head Right” land, in spite of hostile Indians and pioneer conditions. There were family stories about ancestors in Northumberland and Scotland, and accounts of Cromwell’s seizing land from their Anglo-Norman ancestors in County Kilkenny, Ireland.
Lucy must have passed on some of her determination, common sense and gumption to her daughter, Rosa, who relayed to her children: “ You are no better than anyone else – but nobody is better than you are!” Lucy died in 1908 and is buried in St. John’s Historic Cemetery, 1 North, Section 3 , the first lot on the right , next to the road.
Lucy’s daughter, Rosa, was widowed at at 37 years of age when her husband, George E. Smith died suddenly; he was 50 years old. There were nine children, with ages ranging from infancy to late teens. George E. Smith’s mother, of Columbus, Georgia, was a Reese, descended from Welshman, David Reese, a signee of the Mecklenberg Declaration. A relative, banker J. Simpson Reese served as executor and helped Rosa and her family to conserve their resources. The youngest children, assigned the task of presenting the reasons for special withdrawals, called him Mr.“Skin’em” Reese, when he pretended to give them a hard time, always in their best interest. The family grew up together and retained a very close, lifetime relationship. They all had a sense of assurance and support, without arrogance, of a kind, loving and caring family – perhaps a gift from Lucy Varner Sanders, Rosa Smith Sanders, Rosa’s siblings and their forebears.
George and Rosa Smith, and daughters Evelyn, Sybil and Marjorie are buried in St. John’s Historic Cemetery 4 North, Section 51. Ernestine Smith Fleming, along with her husband James Monroe Fleming and their infant daughter, Beth, and son, Richard Marion Fleming, M.D. are buried in St. John’s 5 North, Section 71.
Historic Burial in St. John's Cemetery Revealed
Recent research has turned up yet another historic figure from Pensacola's past
who is buried in St. John's historic cemetery. Mary W. Willis was a direct
descendant of the Washington family and mother of a princess of the court of
Napoleon III.
She was the wife of one of Virginia's wealthiest gentry. She was a frequent socialite with the likes of Andrew Jackson at the famous Virginia "Jockey Club" race track owned by her husband. One of her daughters was a princess in the court of Napoleon III during France's Second Empire. Her father commanded George Washington's Lifeguard during the American Revolution. She rode in carriages driven by liveried servants and her fields were plowed by expensive thoroughbreds. Her grandmother was none other than Betty Washington, only sister of President George Washington. Her name was Mary W. Willis, and she lived and died in Pensacola, and is buried here in St. John's Cemetery, a victim of yellow fever in 1834.
Wife of Pensacola brickmaker Colonel Byrd Charles Willis, Mary W. Willis arrived in Pensacola from her home in Virginia, by way of Tallahassee, in 1825. Her husband was a Pensacola brickmaker who also served as agent of President Andrew Jackson at the Pensacola Navy Yard. His title of Colonel derives from appointment in the Florida Militia. Family genealogical records always identified Mary W. Willis's burial here in a private family plot, but a new look at some old material confirms that Betty Washington's granddaughter and the mother of a princess of France is in fact buried in our St. John's Cemetery.
Pensacola's Mary W. Willis, grandniece of the esteemed George Washington, died here in a yellow fever year on October 7, 1834. At her death, the Pensacola Gazette eulogized that "We have lost a friend and the city has lost one of its brightest ornaments, a lady the center of social attraction, one whose place will not soon be filled." The Gazette went on to lament that the scourge of yellow fever, whose source was not yet understood to be Pensacola's prodigious mosquitoes, had taken her life. "If her life alone could have been saved by preventive measures, they would have been cheap at thousands of dollars."
A Pensacola News Journal article dated Nov 1, 1934 reports that Mary W. Willis and several family members were disinterred from the "Cantonment Clench" cemetery and reinterred in St. John's Cemetery in March 1899. St. John's Cemetery records identify her gravesite only as a very old stone "unknown Willis." Because the Cantonment Clench cemetery had no gravestones other than Willis family stones, it had become incorrectly identified as the Willis family cemetery. Graves had fallen into disrepair through vandalism when it was abandoned following Byrd Charles Willis's return to Virginia in 1836.
Two of Mary Willis's children, George Willis and Dr. Lewis Willis are also buried in Pensacola's St. John's Cemetery along with their mother. Dr. Lewis Willis drowned while attempting to cross Grande Lagoon on horseback.
Some believe that our revered "Old" Christ Church on Seville Square was built with her husband's brick. According to Sandy Johnson, Executive Director of the Pensacola Historical Society, many Willis brick have been found at the site, stamped with his name.
In addition to descent from the Washington family, Mary W. Willis's family was connected to the Bonaparte empire in France. Her daughter Catherine married Charles Louis Napoleon Achille Murat, Crown Prince of Naples and son of Emperor Napoleon I's sister Caroline. Achille Murat's father was Napoleon's greatest cavalry commander,. Marshal of the Empire, Grand Duke of Berg and Cleves, and King of Naples, Joachim Murat. Tchaikovsky's famous "1812 Overture" was written to commemorate Murat's thundering cavalry charge at the Battle of Borodino.
After her husband's death, Catherine Willis Murat, daughter of Pensacola's Mary W. Willis, was recalled to France from frontier Florida by Emperor Napoleon III and made a Princess of France. She returned to Tallahassee where she lived out her years, and is buried beside her prince in Tallahassee's St. John's Cemetery. Her simple wood-frame home has been relocated from it's original site to the grounds of Tallahassee's Museum of History and Natural Science, a far cry from the glittering palaces of France.
By connecting the dots of family genealogy records and books, the 1834 Pensacola Gazette article, and the 1934 News Journal article, Pensacolians can now, along with other historic facts, boast that the granddaughter of Washington's only sister Betty and the mother of America's first princess is buried here in our port city.
Mary W. Willis is buried in St. John’s Historic Cemetery Lot 23, Section 19, Block 2 North.
By Colonel George Willis Tate, great-great grandson of Mary W. Willis Copyright 2003