300 Year Old Cemetery Abandoned in the Woods

well I'll write in today's video or this morning's video should say I'm hoping to find a nearly 300 year old cemetery I'm in shanks ferry wildflower preserve here in southern Lancaster County right along Susquehanna River I've been here a number of the times but there's a cemetery back here some are called the Benedict Ashland Cemetery goes back to 17 27 so I don't have exact coordinates for it I have some general directions or ideas where it may be back here but there should be a trail leading to it I did find some sites but they wouldn't tell you where it was they wanted you to do some other stuff in order to get that information I didn't wanna do that so but I'm hoping we will find it today we'll see some other wildflowers and stuff as well here so hopefully it's okay R&T in this video that will find it but it should be out there somewhere nearly nearly 300 years old so hopefully we do I love finding these old cemeteries on the woods and it's a beautiful day too so here's hoping we find a cold cemetery all right so to find this cemetery I am gonna start here along the main trail for the wildflower preserve here and I'm gonna I'm also looking for a dynamite factory out here so I'm gonna follow the same directions for that there's a if you watch that video I don't know which or I'll put these in but well the follow those same directions is about looking for crossing the ppl cut across the trail and then crossing the creek and then heading up into the hollow up there so far up there is an old cemetery I don't have precise directions like I said but we shall see we're gonna do what we do and see if we can find this thing well regardless of whether we find that cemetery or not this is a nice path to walk on with all these pretty wildflowers so I've come across the power line cut here and I'm gonna take this little side trail the main trail continues but uh it's it's kind of the same way it's gonna should take me to the dynamite factory that I'm looking for as well so somewhere across this Creek and up in these woods somewhere there should be a really old cemetery just out here and forgotten for the most part so I've just crossed the creek following those directions the trail does come up here but echoes goes up that way it goes down this way two circles around goes down the hollow I think the dynamite Factory I'm looking for might beat down that way but uh I'm curious I think the cemetery might be up there so we'll see it's just part of is this part of exploring you don't know always you know where things are so but then let's I see a trail that goes up the other hill over there too oh boy am I gonna go up here I'm gonna follow this trail up because I know the cemetery was on top of the hill and they also said it was just south of what was called the enola low grade Rail Trail which is just actually just up there aways so let's head up here and hope we find tombstones sticking out of the ground here's hoping whose I'm out of breath Phyllis so we're nearing the top of this hill so let's find out together if this is the correct Hill mmm I'm not seeing anything oh boy it's a nice open spot but no tombstones little campfire over there oh all right wrong Hill well there's a faint trail that continues on past that point whereas I'm gonna follow this just a little bit just to see check out these cool mushrooms these are called uh what's called dryads saddle there's sometimes pheasants back it's kind of neat name you know dryads or there's little mythical fairy light creatures I guess someone thought they look like a saddle let her dry ed could sit on anyway these are edible when they're younger those ones they are far too big to eat though when they're younger about the size of your hand they are edible if you cook them they can taste like cucumbers a little bit kind of crunchy if you wait till they're too big or gross but this is a huge tree right here check this out that's a massive Wow only for myself up next to it here yeah it's pretty big you know perspective is difficult in video sometimes but that's a big tree so there we go still following this trail which must go somewhere so we shall see don't know if the cemetery is up here or not and just as I was beginning to lose hope guess what I see poking on the ground up here tombstones well there's no trail that comes up this way if that goes down to that anyway my mind is wandering anyway but up here yeah here we go this is it awesome Wow this is what exploring is all about bonding this out here so old forgotten cemetery Wow I'm gonna sit down and take a little bit of a break first before you look around sit I'm gonna sit and take a break among the dead it's interesting the trail continues on oh you know what this trail pray it goes right up to the enola low grade trail I might check that out I might be a shorter way for some people to get here pretty sure it does actually anyway I'll get back to you huh yeah sit down relax a little bit he'll take a good look at some of these and talk about dates and stuff sometime taking my little break by this tree sitting among the dead out here taking a break but like I said there are a number of trails leading to this cemetery nuts besides the one that I came on if you want to know exactly where this is I will give you the coordinates but you can send me an email or some other kind of message on Facebook I'm not gonna put them on here just - I'm learning to try and protect some of these sites a little bit more this site is has not been vandalized you know nothing's knocked down a few more broken maybe just from the ravages of time but there's no spray-paint trash or vandalism here because you know I've been to some cemeteries recently where they've just been destroyed by idiots so anyway this one's not so if you want to know exactly where this is you can send me a message and I will give those to you as long as your intentions are respectful so we're gonna look around some of these tombstones this cemetery is nearly 300 years old I'll use word nearly because it was purchased this land was purchased in 1727 obviously there's a 20 27 yet but I think the the oldest tombstone is not from 1727 no so but you know if it was purchased in 1727 they could have who knows when they first buried some here is back then sometimes the first burials were not didn't have tombstones form they just had like maybe a stick or something like a wooden cross or something or just field stones like there are some spots where it's just field stones it's no dates also this could be really old grave sites so sometimes just because you don't you know the newer well the newer ones have dates on them in eighteen hundreds and stuff but there could be very well easy easily be grapes from the 1720s and 1730's in here so that's well that's why I'm gonna call it a 300 year old cemetery you know that if you look at the dates you won't see that all right so let's quit quit yappin here and check some of these out is just a problem is picking which one to start I love this I love finding stuff like this out in the woods makes makes hiking up and down these hills worth it so let's just start over here somewhere it's one problem with these old Pennsylvania graveyards is the dairy in German that's why you German but the name there's Barbara good you can see it says get Boram that means born 1777 she died in 1821 1777 look at some of these here's a Peter Peter Wharf Warfel some look like that see 1778 - 1803 so you didn't live terribly long here just says Katherine well look every single tombstone we'll just get it feel for some of them Elizabeth Warfel that name Wuerffel or something like that 18:16 so here's a David esselman 1799 says he's born I should mention I don't think I mentioned the name of this cemetery this is called the Benedict special men's cemetery Benedict uh Sherman so you look about line to find more information about it that's its name well here's an old one Johannes good 17:52 he was born he died in 1826 that's our oldest date so for us when he was born 17:52 when Kristian Kristian goose what's the name 1776 he was born in 1806 you can see somes tombstones here that are in a different style and the others these are harder to make out the dates and stuff pretty worn off worn away I think I see a 1776 down there not sure if that's when he died or that's when he was born it looks like there's a date up there anyway might be a date down there too anyway so these are a little hard to read that's the way it is I'll check out this cool bug topless tombs down just chilling out here that's when there's assassin bugs here's one looks like he was born in 1788 died in 1793 so these must be the older ones 88 to 93 that's only what like 5 years old this person was Wow here's one it's been damaged but I see a date a 17 20 that they were born I think as we go further back we're getting to some of those older ones like see some of these back here they're just field stones they don't dates on them at all I don't know that these these are just like this is just a stone in the ground I don't know if there's any I don't think there's any writing on here at all see that there's no writing on there so these are even older there's some back here they're just moss covered rocks marking people's graves even back in here there's just little to check out there's this little let me get see if my shadows in the way the little stone way if there's an even smaller stone just marking someone's grave yes oh these are the ones that could be these are the ones that could be almost 300 years old no writing on them it's like even here mcdeere's over stone right they're just they're all in a little row marking people's graves worn back there so that's why they say this cemetery could easily be 300 years old it's marking people's graves out here oh there's see they come only back here - here's another one little field stone back here gessie other ones just scattered around here so these back here just don't have any markings on them they're that old Wow got some aged out here so the ones in front are the newer ones cool some kind of found this one loan tombstone all by itself off this side some of the older ones are up there it was kind of sad though in memory of Elizabeth daughter of Susannah seabrooke's who departed this life June 10th 1828 she was aged she's like 17 years old pretty young when I was I mean not as young as some of the others we've seen but you know 17 you're just kind of hitting that pier in your life where you're starting out you know there's it's lots of memories out here but they're forgotten you know that was someone's daughter that passed away at only 17 and you know no one no one remembers her anymore or only what she look like or anything it's nice and peaceful out here I keep saying if I love this is what makes what I do so worthwhile it's coming out and it's funny in abandoned 300 year old cemetery just out in the middle of the woods like this I mean someone obviously comes out here every now and then and cleans it up a little bit you don't mow back here but you leave it's not overgrown with brush and trees so it is maintained a little bit I haven't heard any haunted tales about this place but I know some of my viewers and other youtubers I've met some of the meetups love to do haunted stuff they come to like cemeteries and come out there at night and do their little sessions and stuff but anyway might be an interesting place to check out for some of you I don't know like I said I don't know I haven't heard anything about it being haunted but anyway all right I'm gonna leave this peaceful low spot I got some other stuff to look for today but I'm thrilled to have found this out here this is I you know I didn't have exact exact directions for this I was just kind of you know following my gut feeling a little bit to some extent and yeah it's a thrill to actually find it then so I saw when I was coming up the trail saw those tombstones poking up I was like yes anyway so I will give you one last look and I'm gonna get back to looking for some other things out here I stopped to find the dynamite factory that I'm looking for that's out here so I think that is just down in the hollow behind me but anyway cool it's like I said if you want to know where this is you can send me a message i couldnõt gonna put it on like I say it here just to protect the site from idiots so this place is so cool I don't want people coming out here and destroying it so anyway thanks for watching and I will see you the next video

Channel: The Wandering Woodsman

Views: 242,069

Rating: 4.8549256 out of 5

Keywords: Abandoned Cemetery, Benedict Eshelman cemetery

Id: eciZyeayXgY

Length: 17min 59sec (1079 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 04 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/sidfinch1588]

I was stationed in Warner Robins GA. Use to see these back in the woods fairly often when I was deer hunting. Sad and creepy at the same time.