Bunch - Old Union Cemetery

 Tombstone inscriptions for Bunch Cemeterey transcribed from Cemetery listings of the Carroll County Historical Society by Shawn Boswell Davis <GSTCDavis@rkymtnhi.com>

 

Note:  Below is a description of Bunch Cemetery penned by Coy Logan on p. 28 of the CARROLL
COUNTY HISTORICAL QUARTERLY Vol. XVI 1971, Fall Edition No. 3 combined with Vol. XVI 1971 Winter Edition No. 4:

The cemetery has a beautiful location on a north slope at the end of a lane a short distance from the Bunch Community county road.  Open fields surround the cemetery on the south and west with timber on the north and east sides.  The cemetery is well kept with the exception of some sunken graves and many graves marked with only field stones that do not have any identification on them.  The entrance of the cemetery on the east side has parking space and shade trees that give a nice appearance to the quiet resting place of the many pioneers of this section of Carroll County.

A HISTORY OF THE BUNCH--OLD UNION--CEMETERY

The cemetery originally had its beginnings as a church organized at the home of Joel Plumlee in July of 1838 with Rev. Charles Booth Whitely as the moderator.  The first meeting of this church was held at the Plumlee home in what would later become Berryville, AR.  It was a year later that the Old Union Church settled in a building constructed of Black Jack logs, that was located about five miles north of Berryville and religion was brought to a new wilderness.

As more settlers arrived in Carroll County, the need for another church was great and Charles B. Whiteley organized one near the home of Bradley Bunch.  The name of  Old Union was taken as a moniker for this church and the church on Clabber Creek was renamed Pleasant Hill in the year of 1847.  The Old Union Church near the Bunch farm prospered until the War Between the States erupted and two occupants of the cemetery bear witness to this war.

Jesse Stoddard Champlin had brought his young wife and two small children from Tennessee in 1858 and settled on their homestead.  Two more children had been born to their union when the Civil War began and life for the young family turned from happiness to horror.  On a winter day in January of 1864, Jesse S. Champlin was killed by bushwhackers in front of his wife and children and in the front yard of a once happy home.  His body was taken to the church ground in the dead of night and he was buried by the women in the light of the moon.

Only two weeks earlier, these same bushwhackers had murdered young George Dallas Bunch, a son of Bradley Bunch, and he, too, had been lain to rest in the Old Union church grounds.  With the war over in 1865, the church was reorganized and life began anew.  As the years passed, a school was organized in the church house and it took the name of Bunch, in honor of its main benefactor.

In 1901, the St. Louis & North Arkansas Railroad put a track through to Berryville via Harrison and Eureka Springs and  this train track ran directly beside the Bunch Schoolhouse.  It is said that sparks from a passing train caused the schoolhouse to catch fire and it was burned to the ground.

A new schoolhouse was built over the old, but with the consolidation of the public schools in the 1940's, the building began to be used for community activities.  However, may years have passed since then and all that remains of the school and the church is the stone foundation and the cemetery beyond it.  Overgrown with brush and trees, the Bunch--Old Union--Church is now a remnant of the past.