Harry Orcutt, right, commander of Jackson-Silver Post of the American Legion in Greenwood, and Blaine Mills, the unofficial historian of Greenwood, meet recently at Cummings Plot in Greenwood. An effort is underway to locate the graves of Joseph Cummings, his son, Joseph Jr., a veteran of the War of 1812, and his grandson, Joseph Cummings Jr., a veteran of the Civil War, believed buried there along with family members. Rose Lincoln/The Bethel Citizen
GREENWOOD — Longtime town resident Blaine Mills spent summer days bicycling from his house in Locke Mills village, along the ponds on newly-paved Greenwood Road to his aunt and uncle’s farm on nearby Wesley Road to roam with his three cousins.
“As kids, we’d range all over the place,” he said, going swimming and running up the knoll to the Cummings family cemetery.
“We didn’t pay much attention to who was buried, we just knew it was a family cemetery,” Mills said. It was part of the Joseph Cummings Farm built in 1841 at the corner Greenwood and Wesley roads and across from the town beach on South Pond.
In November 1960, he came home from serving in the Air Force and was driving along Greenwood Road.
“As I was passing the Wesley Road, there was some idiot with machinery dragging logs out of the woods into the cemetery,” he said. “He was using the cemetery as a log landing.”
Mills couldn’t see the face of the man, but saw that the cemetery had been trampled on. Stones were knocked over and driven into the ground.
When he reported to Greenwood selectmen that someone had wiped out the cemetery they said they couldn’t do anything about it because it was privately owned.
Apparently abandoned, the town took it over, he said, and there is no evidence of the five or six stones he remembers being there.
More interest in the burial ground surfaced a few years ago when Sue Nusbaum of Florida was researching her family history and discovered she has ancestors buried in the cemetery, known as Cummings Plot and marked now with a sign.
Greenwood Town Manager Kim Sparks gave her the news about the destroyed burial ground.
“I think it’s horrible that they ran over the gravestones and destroyed the cemetery,” Nusbaum said. “The cemetery should be restored. It has American patriots in it from multiple wars. Veterans who should be honored. As far back as the Civil War, The War of 1812 and the Revolutionary War.”
Harry Orcutt, commander of Jackson-Silver Post of the American Legion in Greenwood, said, “Tibbetts used it as a wood lot because he didn’t know there were graves because there was no (cemetery) sign at that time and there was about three feet of snow. He didn’t see any of the grave markers or he never would have done it. I have absolute guarantees from numerous of his cousins that he wouldn’t have done it.”
Orcutt was referring to Stub Tibbetts, who had died by the 1970s.
Believed buried in the 20- by 40-foot plot at 905 Greenwood Road are Joseph Cummings, a veteran of the Revolutionary War, his son Joseph Sr., a veteran of the War of 1812, and Joseph Sr.’s son, Joseph Jr., a veteran of the Civil War. One of their wives, named Ruth, and a baby named Wellington are also believed buried there.
On a recent Monday, Blaine Mills, the unofficial town historian, and his wife, Margaret, climbed the steep incline to reach the site. Several gangly trees grow on the plot. In a far corner are huge boulders left by the town when Greenwood Road was rebuilt. In the center are two new veterans’ markers with American flags placed by Orcutt.
Mills and Orcutt readily exchanged information about the Cummings family.
Mills spent 40 years traveling to the Oxford County Registry of Deeds to research the history of every homestead in Greenwood and the genealogy of the people who lived there. Eventually he computerized his documentation and stored it in five separate places.
“There are about five or six Cummings families and most of them are not related to each other or at least not very closely,” Mills said. “Just down the road there you had Samuel Cummings. Down at the mill at the other end of Twitchell Pond you had the Cummings brothers that ran the mill. Over on the gore there were a bunch of Cummings, too.
“They all descend from the same guy, Isaac Cummings, who came from Scotland,” Mills said.
“In the 1600s,” Orcutt added.
Joseph Sr. built the farm in 1840,” Orcutt said. He came home and found his wife dead on the floor. She’d had a heart attack and died.
“Joe later was buried here, too,” Mills said.
“The last Cummings to live here was in 1872,” Orcutt said.
The Cummings Farm is now the summer home of a woman from Massachusetts, according to Mills.
Orcutt, who is interested in military history, said it’s unclear if Joseph Jr.’s record of desertion was expunged. He was enlisted in the 13th Maine volunteer regiment known for very poor camp conditions. He became ill and did not head south with the regiment.
“He didn’t desert the regiment. The regiment deserted him,” Orcutt said.
In Nusbaum’s search, she discovered her great-great-great-great-grandfather, Joseph Cummings, 1751-1843, and great-great-great-grandfather, Joseph Cummings Sr., 1791-1876. She said Joseph and Joseph Jr. are buried next to each other in the cemetery, according to newspaper reports at the time of Joseph Jr.’s death.
“We think there are six or seven people buried there,” Nusbaum said.
“In this family are some of the earliest settlers in the United States,” she said.
Restoration
Next month, Nusbaum, Sparks, Orcutt and Mills plan to meet at the site with a historical archeologist with ground-penetrating radar to identify the graves.
“We want to be very careful we don’t destroy bodies,” Nusbaum said. “We may try to use DNA to identify who is where.”
Orcutt said they hope to define the plot as a veterans’ cemetery with spouses and children included. Encircling the plot with the huge boulders strewn in the corner will help ensure there is no further destruction of the site.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has approved replacing headstones for two of the veterans.
Nusbaum said Orcutt applied for the first headstone, she received permission for the second, and they are hoping the third will be approved for Joseph Cummings, the Revolutionary War veteran.
“It has been a privilege to work with several others on this project,” Sparks said. “We are honored to acknowledge both of our Joseph Cummings’ service to our country and look forward to installing marble headstones from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.”
Nusbaum said she has cousins who are interested and may help monetarily with replacing the headstones.
Orcutt said he has enlisted the many area Cummings’ cousins to help clear the site. In mid-May they will have a cleanup day for anyone in the community to help.
Once the stones are being erected, they will have a gun salute and celebration,” Nusbaum said. “A party” because “it’s a big deal.”
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