Elijah B. Sneed - Bridges Chapel Cemetery - Titus County, TX, USA - Doves of peace on Waymarking.com

Thanks to Findagrave for information about his name. This one is interesting in that there is a reference to "My wives" on the plinth, with a hand whose index finger is pointing to the left. Mr. Sneed is the only Sneed buried in the cemetery, and there is no indication that there are any burials in the space where the hand is pointing. At nearly thirty years old, he would have been a little young to have had two wives, but given the fatality rates of the time period, it's certainly possible. Findagrave simply has no record of any spouses, and there are no other Sneeds buried in Titus County who might fit the bill. If he had a wife or wives, they probably moved on to other parts, even remarrying.

The Woodmen of the World are known today as WoodmenLife, a fraternal society that provides insurance to its members. Visitors to older cemeteries can frequently spot the tree trunk monuments that they placed at the graves of their members, although not every tree trunk monument out there was placed by the Woodmen of the World: It was common in the late 19th century to use a log to note that a person had died young, and many infants have such grave markers. Eventually, those tree trunk monuments became too expensive to produce, and headstones would be marked with a Woodmen of the World emblem of some kind. Earlier ones featured a dove of peace with an olive branch in its beak, flying over a fallen log where the tools of the woodmen's trade -- hatchet, mallet, and wedge -- can be seen. Later ones would show a simple tree stump instead, and the dove and the tools would be displayed somewhere on the monument, in relief. In this case, the dove is perched atop the scroll that hangs from a rope on a sawn-off branch. The inscription reads:

Elijah B.

Son of W.D. & S.A. Sneed

Born
May 10, 1878,

Died
Sept. 30, 1907.

-----

Our darling ones have
gone before
to greet us on the
golden shore.

-----

Kind of dove: Dove with olive branch Used material for the dove: Other (explanation in the long description) Address: 215 Titus County Road 1465 Bridges Chapel Community Mt. Pleasant, TX USA 75455

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