I Left a Stone Unturned

On a hot summer day in 1998, July 9 to be exact, I visited the Bunker Hill Cemetery in Buda, Illinois to visit the graves of my Third Great Grandparents Charles and Susannah Lee. Notes in some family papers had told me they were there. 

It was getting toward evening when we got to the cemetery. Bunker Hill has only a few hundred graves and sits just north of a little church which I think was still in use at that time. It was the first time I made my family take time while on a vacation to let me do some genealogy work. They were patient (worn out from swimming) and even a little helpful. 

My husband might have found it first, to the left of the entrance only a few rows back under an old cedar tree. It was lying down with Charles' inscription on the up-side. There was just enough light left to read the inscription. I was sure that Susannah's name would be on the other side, but I didn't dare to turn it over. A few years later, someone posted photos on Find A Grave of the stone upright and with Susannah's inscription. Obviously, the photo had been taken years before it was posted and before I was there. 


Susannah died April 24, 1851 after giving birth to their third child, Thomas Jefferson Lee. She left a five-year-old son and two-year-old daughter, my Great Grandmother Sarah. I haven't confirmed any other family members for her, I've found very few records with her name at all.

Thomas died at four months old on September 8.


It was just ten years later when Charles died. I'd love to uncover the cause of his death at only 41. He had one sister that I know of - Hannah Holmes, wife of Lewis. She was also living in Bureau County when both Susannah and Charles died. I assume she helped Charles raise his two children until her death in 1858.

Charles' mother Polly Lee was living with Hannah and her husband in 1850, but I've found no record of her after that. There are some possible leads through DNA for parents of Charles, but finding documentation that confirms anything has been difficult.  I've had no success with what few records I've had time to discover.