The previous episode was on the history of Bonaventure Cemetery. I wanted to share a little more about the famous graves of Bonaventure Cemetery and the stories attached to them should you ever make your way to the hauntingly beautiful, oak-arm-cradled cemetery.
Little Gracie
One of the most visited graves at Bonaventure is that of little Gracie Watson. She is interred inside a lovely wrought iron fence at E-98. Gracie Watson was the daughter of a downtown hotel manager, W.J. Watson and his wife, Frances Watson. The Watson family originated from Boston, Massachusetts and moved to Savannah when W.J. got the offer to manage the Pulaski Hotel. The Pulaski Hotel once stood on the corner of Bull and Bryan Streets. Gracie welcomed and chatted with guests. She entertained guests by singing and dancing in the lobby. Everyone loved the bright-eyed, sweet Gracie.
In 1889, little Gracie died of pneumonia two days before Easter at the tender age of six. Her monument was sculpted by John Walz, based on a photograph of the young girl.
But Gracie’s fame grew after her death. Visitors began leaving gifts at her gravesite, especially around the holidays. The striking, sweet features of the sculpture often tug at the heartstrings of those who see it. Even children were known to bring gifts. One story mentioned on bonaventurehistorical.org recounts seeing children purchase gifts for Gracie at the downtown five-and-dime store and bicycling three miles to Bonaventure to leave them for Gracie. People still leave gifts for her today.
Local lore claims that little Gracie still roams Johnson Square, where the Pulaski Hotel once stood.
Johnny Mercer
Born November 18th, 1909, Johnny Mercer is among the most famous buried at Bonaventure. He was a lyricist, composer, and singer. He rose to fame in the 1930s-1950s. Some of his most popular songs are “Moon River,” “Autumn Leaves,” and “Days of Wine and Roses.”
He was born in Savannah, GA. One of his first jobs was sweeping floors at the iconic Leopold’s Ice Cream, which is still in business today and serves the best ice creams you’ll ever eat. He lived on Lincoln Street. His father was an attorney and real estate developer. His mother, Lillian, was once his father’s secretary and his second wife. Mercer was his father’s fourth son, his first one with Lillian.
He was a teen during the Jazz Age and was heavily influenced by African American music. His father owned the first car in town, instantly making Johnny extra popular. He attended the Woodberry Forest School in Virginia until 1927. He moved to New York in 1928 at only 19 years old. He began working for Miller Music for $25 per week. He married a chorus girl, Ginger Martin, in 1931. They lived with her mother in Brooklyn to save money in their early days. Ginger quit the chorus line and became a seamstress.
They eventually moved to Hollywood in 1935, and Mercer began writing music for films. He enjoyed many years of composing and musical success. He co-founded Capitol Records in 1942 and also co-founded Cowboy Records. He signed Nat “King” Cole to Capitol. And by the mid-1940s, he was known as a Hollywood musical legend.
Mercer had an affair with Judy Garland in 1941. The couple broke it off when Judy married composer David Rose, but they later rekindled their romance.
Mercer died June 25th, 1976, from a brain tumor. The line drawing on his memorial bench at Bonaventure is a reproduction of a self-portrait.
He was accredited with writing or co-writing over 1,500 songs throughout his long career.
He can be found in Section H, Lot 48. He was buried with his wife and family.
Conrad Aiken
This isn’t the first time we’ve talked about this talented Savannahian here on the podcast. You may remember Conrad Aiken from Episode 10, The Most Famous Poet You’ve Never Known. Conrad Aiken was born in Savannah on August 17th, 1889. He won the Pulitzer Prize for his “Selected Poems” in 1930. He later won the National Book Award for “Collected Poems” in 1953. When Conrad was just a child, his father killed his mother, then killed himself. Be sure the check out his episode for more on that story.
Conrad was raised by relatives in Massachusetts. He studied at Harvard from 1908-1912, having been classmates with none other than T.S. Eliot. He was the editor of Emily Dickinson’s “Selected Poems” and was largely responsible for her posthumous fame.
He penned over 50 books in his lifetime. His grave became particularly notable at Bonaventure after its mention in John Berendt’s book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. His tombstone is actually a bench, and legend goes that he wanted it that way so poetry lovers could sit and enjoy a drink or two while soaking in the beauty surrounding them.
What’s most captivating to me is the inscription on the bench: “Cosmos Mariner—Destination Unknown.” It’s been said that one day while visiting his parents’ graves, he saw a ship on the Wilmington River named Cosmos Mariner. He looked in the papers to see if he could find where the ship was heading, but it was a mystery. The paper read: Cosmos Mariner—Destination Unknown. This must have deeply resonated with Conrad, as he wondered what life if any, existed after this one.
He’s located in Section H, lot 78.
Corinne Elliott Lawton
Perhaps the most mysterious of all the inhabitants of Bonaventure is the resting place of the young Corinne Elliott Lawton. Corinne was the daughter of a prominent figure in the Civil War, Brigadier Alexander Robert Lawton and wife, Sarah Hillhouse Alexander. She was the eldest child and was born in 1846. Legend has it that when Corinne was a young lady, she fell in love with a man below her station. Her well-to-do parents forbade the romance and arranged for her to marry someone of their choosing.
Corinne informed them that she could never love another man. Her father told her that she’d learn to love him. The wedding arrangements were made, and Corinne had given up all hope. One day before the wedding, Corinne rode her father’s horse to the banks of the Savannah River, threw herself into the swift current, and drowned. Angered by her defiance, her parents buried her outside the family’s plot and later commissioned sculptor Benedetto Civiletti from Sicily to create her statue.
The monument is created in her likeness and lifelike size. She sits at the base of a cross, a gown covers only one shoulder, her eyes are wide and without pupils, and she’s barefooted. I’m still learning the different Victorian cemetery symbolism, so I consulted my friend Kristen Stafford of the Halloween Art and Travel podcast for help. Kristen pointed out that Corinne’s monument has the Chi Rho symbol, which is a Christian monogram formed by the first two letters X and P of the Greek word for Christ. A garland—possibly laurel, representing victory, eternity, and chastity—is falling from her grasp, and the wreath hanging beside her knees gives her the feeling of sorrow.
The expression on her face is that of a woman who has given up. It’s eerie, and there’s a sadness that’s difficult to express with words.
Strangely, Corinne’s statue faces away from her family’s plot. There’s a life-sized sculpture of Jesus facing her back from her father’s monument. Corinne died in 1877, at just thirty years old, and was initially buried in Laurel Grove Cemetery. Her father was buried at Laurel Grove, as well. Both were removed and reburied at Bonaventure on April 26th, 1898. They’re located in Section H, lots 166-167.
Though the tale of the star-crossed lovers makes for a good story, it’s not documented. We know that Corinne’s mother, Sarah, kept a diary. There’s no mention in Sarah’s writing about the scandalous love affair. Corinne’s obituary mentions that she passed away from a “short illness.” Many believe that the position of her monument is due to the fact that she had been moved to Bonaventure after the death of her parents.
Initially, I wanted to do an entire episode on Corinne, but because I was unable to find much documentation of her life—outside of the narrow lens of her mother—I decided against it. I find her story somewhat bizarre. Don’t get me wrong, many tall tales are being told on tours in Savannah, but this one is so far off from the documentation that it made me wonder. I don’t feel like we’re getting a complete understanding of things with the limited documentation we have available to us.
As if things aren’t obscure already, her epitaph reads: “Allured to brighter worlds and led the way.” This is a line from Oliver Goldsmith’s 1770 poem, “The Deserted Village.” It’s a social commentary condemning rural depopulation, corruption, consumerism, and the pursuit of excessive wealth. A section of the poem even talks about the fate of a girl who moves to a corrupt city. It says:
Where the poor houseless shivering female lies.
She once, perhaps, in village plenty blessed,
Has wept at tales of innocence distressed;
Her modest looks the cottage might adorn,
Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn:
Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue fled,
Near her betrayer’s door she lays her head,
And, pinched with cold, and shrinking from the shower,
With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour,
When idly first, ambitious of the town,
She left her wheel and robes of country brown. (Lines 326–36)
Sort of a strange poem to have quoted on an epitaph, don’t you think?
In Stories of the Forgotten: Infamous, Famous, and Unremembered, J’aime Rubio mentions Corinne’s locket, which contained an image of her betrothed. Corinne had been engaged to Ulysses Wade of Screven County, Georgia, from her account. After Corinne’s death, Ulysses didn’t marry until 1894, when he was 49 years old. He died three years later, in 1897. He’s buried in Sylvania, Georgia (p. 176-177).
Here are the questions that, even after all my research, I still can’t answer.
- Sources on the average age of women getting married in the late 1800s differ. But everything I’ve read, for a woman in the South post-Civil War, it was common to marry between the ages of 21-26. Why was Corinne just being married at 30?
- Where did the star-crossed lover story originate? In most legends, there is at least an element of truth.
I don’t know why I’m so unsatisfied with the story of Corinne Elliott Lawton, but I am. I wouldn’t say that I believe the legend, and I wouldn’t say that I believe the quote-unquote truth. Diary entries and a locket doesn’t paint a perfect picture for me. I wonder—and this is just speculation, something that’s been tumbling in my head for months now—if something happened between her and another man when she was younger, and the two stories got merged by the locals who only observed and never knew Corinne. This would explain two things: why she would have married slightly older, and why locals would have begun telling this story of the star-crossed lovers (according to some accounts, it’s believed that this tale has been told for well over a hundred years). I can’t say for sure, of course. Again, this is only a thought that I kept having.
The real story of Corinne Elliott Lawton will probably always be a mystery to me. Still, if you’re ever in Savannah and visit Bonaventure, I hope you’ll visit her and the others we spoke about here.
Other Podcasts Mentioned:
https://www.halloweenartandtravel.com
Music
The following music was used for this media project:
-Ghostpocalypse – 6 Crossing the Threshold by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
-Sovereign by Kevin MacLeod
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/4397-sovereign
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://incompetech.com
