We drove east on Hwy 40. We passed a number of churches with cemeteries beside them, some with old tombstones we could see from the road, but I knew we didn't have time to stop at each of these cemeteries and search all the graves, and the chances of getting lucky and running across the right cemetery out of the hundreds of cemeteries and graveyards in the county were slim to none. So we passed them by. We continued east on Hwy 40 and crossed the county line into Dinwiddie Co. Very shortly after that, we passed an old, white frame church on the right, Butterwood Methodist Church. There were graves on both sides of the church. I noticed it, but planned to pass it by too. After all, it wasn't even in the right county and I had passed by many others that were in the right county. Just past this church, out in a field separated from the church cemetery itself, I could see several very old tombstones. I knew I had to go back and check those graves! I don't know how I knew - I just knew. Dave just shook his head. It was pretty obvious he thought this was a rediculous wild-goose-chase, but he knew I wouldn't be satisfied until I had checked out those graves. Common sense told me that there was no hope of finding the Goulder graves in this cemetery, but I still felt that I had to check it out. The stones were turned so that we had to approach from the back side and couldn't see the inscriptions. Since Dave was ahead of me, he was able to walk around to the front side of the stones while I was still coming up behind them. He read the first inscription and looked up at me in total disbelief. We had gone straight to the stone of George Edwin W Goulder. Beside his stone was his wife, Susan Ann Tucker (Goulder). Nearby were a number of their children, their children's husbands and wives, and a few of their children's children.
I know coincidences happen, but this is simply too much for me to chalk up to coincidence. How did I know I had to check that one cemetery in the wrong county when I had passed by so many others in the right county? It left me with a really spooky feeling - not a scary spooky feeling - more of a feeling of warmth mixed with amazement and awe. As crazy as this may sound, I am convinced that the spirit of one of my ancestors was responsible for this. I can't explain it, but I also can't think of any other possible explanation.
Perhaps it was my mother's spirit that was responsible. She might have known where those graves were located although I don't think she had ever taken me to see them. I'd had another strange experience prior to this one that I think might have involved her spirit.
A month or two before her death, Mama pulled me aside to tell me a story she said I should hear straight from her before she died so I wouldn't be shocked when I discovered the truth later. She seemed terribly ashamed and I was expecting something really horrible. She told me that she and my father had eloped several months before their formal wedding. The family knew of their elopement, but no one outside of the family. I didn't think this was so shameful at all - as a matter of fact, I thought it was pretty romantic. She seemed to think that some day I would find the record of their elopement, and she wanted to make sure I would know the whole story. At that time, I wasn't into family research, and it never occurred to me to ask where they had been married. Years later, after her death, I began looking for that marriage record. I checked every county I could think of and came up with nothing. I finally just gave up.
Mama had left boxes and boxes of old family letters and papers. They sat in my brother's house for years untouched. When I got interested in family research, I asked him for those papers. It seemed like it was always an inconvenient time for him to find them and drag all those boxes and papers out for me, and it was quite a while before I actually got my hands on that material. Once I got it home, it took days just to look through all those boxes and get some idea what was there. Down at the very bottom of one of the boxes I found the marriage certificate - the first one. I looked at the date of their marriage - then I looked at the calendar on my watch. You guessed it - I had found the marriage certificate on the anniversary of their marriage. I suddenly felt my mother's presence in the room with me. It wasn't frightening. It was a feeling of love and warmth. Again, I can't explain it. All I know is what happened and what I felt. I know the odds of me finding the certificate on the date of their anniversary were only 1:365 which could be explained by coincidence, and the feeling I had could be explained by the power of suggestion. That's what I told myself at first. But after the subsequent experience with the Goulder graves, I think there might have been more to it than that.
When I found the Goulder graves a couple of years later, I couldn't help but wonder if my mother's spirit had led me there. If not her spirit, then maybe the spirit of one of her ancestors. There were no notes in her papers describing the location of the Goulder graves, and no notes of the inscriptions on these graves. Mama had always kept records of the birth and death dates of her ancestors if she could determine them, but she had never recorded the dates from these stones. Perhaps she had never seen these graves either. I had the same feeling that some gentle spirit was nearby helping me to find those graves. I'm just not sure whose spirit. That second experience with the Goulder graves totally convinced me that there was more involved than just coincidence. The odds against me going straight to the Goulder graves at the first and only cemetery that I checked - and not even in the same county where the family lived - are phenomenal.
I know that some people will read this and chalk me up as some kind of lunatic, or perhaps be a little kinder and say that I am not totally in touch with reality or that I let my imagination run away with me. So I am going out on a limb by relating these experiences. I am fully aware of how "crazy" this sounds, but I really believe I am not alone. I remember seeing a story on "Unexplained Mysteries" a few years ago about a woman who had found an ancestor's grave under similar circumstances. I have talked with other genealogists who felt that sometimes we receive a little "help". If you have had an experience like this and you felt that an ancestor's spirit was involved, please write it up and send it to me so I can include it here. I suspect there are many such tales to be told, and I'd like to start a collection. You can remain anonymous if you like. My email address and snail mail address are both on my home page.