The Journey - Part Two

Picking up the journey story from last week, my brother found the Robuck family cemetery. It was on private property, so we asked the neighbors if they knew anything about it. They were familiar with the property, its owner, and confirmed that it was indeed Robuck Cemetery.

The neighbor unlocked the gate for us. We could have driven up to it, but the walk was much better.

At the wood gate we carefully wrangled it open. I had never been in a private cemetery, and it felt like being in a movie.


We read headstones and were appalled at the condition of the graveyard. Monuments and gravestones were knocked over and broken. Large patches of briars grew and small trees crowded the markers.

That cemetery stirred my spirit as we began to find our ancestors. The most significant for me were my 4G grandparents,William and Mary Anne (Homma) Robuck. They had walked the Trail of Tears as children (1831), each burying a parent along the way. While hunting on Robuck Lake as young adults, they met again. They were married a year later.

Grandfather William was a prominent man in the Choctaw Nation and government. William and Mary built Robuck Ranch complete with cattle, bee hives, a grist mill, sorghum mill, and crops. They had 9 children and eventually moved to Rock Hill, where we now stood in the family cemetery.

The grave that had initiated the cemetery was of their oldest son, Ephraim Robuck. He was killed in Arkansas as a soldier during the Civil War. Other children and even grandchildren followed before Grandfather William Robuck was buried there in 1885.

Grandmother Mary Anne (aka Granny) was the mystery. We couldn't find her marker, though it's possible it might have been knocked over and buried in the dirt, as one of the son's was that we unearthed, 3G UncleWillie Jr..

We did find why some of the stones were knocked over and broken. While taking a semi-path through the briar bushes, I found a break in the fence on the back side where the cattle, that roam the pasture land, had broken through. They had apparently rubbed their large bodies against the fragile stones, toppling them.

Also buried in the cemetery is my 3G Grandmother Lucretia, a daughter of William and Mary Anne, who died at the early age of 32 from cancer. She left three children behind, including a three week old baby girl. Her husband brought the children to Robuck Ranch, then mysteriously disappeared a year later. Grandfather and Granny Robuck raised the three grandchildren. My 2G Grandmother Ada was the oldest.

By the time Granny Mary Anne died in 1901, only three of her and Grandfather's children were still alive.

It was a moving experience for me. Seeing a picture of a headstone on the internet, as opposed to seeing it yourself in the fresh, quiet, chilly air, taking your own pictures....well it's totally different.

Coming Soon: Our trip to Tennessee, with the detour through Mississippi to the Choctaw's original homeland. Stories of William's father, 5G Grandfather Ezekiel Robuck Jr., who was a prominent business man known as the "Honey King." He died on the Trail of Tears. Stories of William's mother, 5G Grandmother Elsie (Beams) Robuck, the "Queen of the Yazoo River" and pictures of their place called Honey Island...

What a history. My history.