Sunday, May 12, 2013

Upcoming UDC Dedication for Riley Crawford in the works


This is not a UDC dedication but a Crawford Family dedication.  We would like you to be a part of it if your members think it is something they want to do.  Members of the Quantrill Society and UDC are invited to attend.  Some of the Crawford Family members plan to speak, we plan to ask Paul Peterson to speak since he is very familiar with the Crawford story having written the book, “Lost Souls of the Lost Township”, though he may have other obligations.  We very much would like to have Chaplain Rudd pray with and speak with the group.  Probably not much could be done in the way of ceremony for Jeptha at the time of his murder.  We are trying to get as many family members together to dedicate this memorial in a very special ceremony.  I’m not familiar with the SCV ceremony for veterans but suppose a color guard, piper, would be appropriate.  Four Crawford sons were Confederate soldiers. 

These are some pictures of the front and back of the marker with the text:
Riley Crawford rode with Quantrill and I wish I was ready with his memorial marker next to his parents but it has taken some time checking down all the references I had to his burial in Cooper Co.  We will be ordering a marker for him but that will take two months at least, maybe three.  He is mentioned twice on the marker for the Crawford family though.  While his two sisters who were killed in the prison collapse on Grand in KCMO, are buried at Knobtown (Raytown), they are mentioned also as well as Charity McCorkle Kerr and Josephine Anderson who were also killed.
We have set no date but would like thirty days so we can give the Crawford family who live out of state time to make arrangements.  Once we learn your schedule we can make a plan.  We really appreciate your help because your part of the dedication we really look forward to.  Riley has no descendants but some of his brothers lived long enough to have families and these are who the living Crawford descendants are from.
While we look forward to the day when we can place a monument on the actual grave site of the Smith-Davis cemetery where two Crawford daughters and Charity Kerr are buried we are taking this opportunity to tell their story because no one knows when or if we will actually get to mark their graves in Raytown.
Let me know if the photos do not come through of the marker and the text I prepared for Duncan Hansen's Vol. III of "Reunion in Death", soon to be published.  I must ask that you keep the photos and text private at this point in time.
Thank you and my number is (816-792-2730).  Our address is:  John & Rosa Rogers, 5817 N.E. 132 St., KCMO  64166-1226.  My husband's great grandfather, Joseph Rogers, was a member of the Holloway Camp of Confederate Veterans.  He fought under Hughes at the Battle of Independence, under Upton Hays.  He fought at Pea Ridge under Benjamin Rives who was killed, Gen. Stand Watie took some of his men so he was also under him, then Joseph Bledsoe's Battery and then Richard Collins' battery all under Gen. Shelby.  John had two other grandfathers under Shelby as well.  Pretty miraculous they all survived!
Sincerely,
Rosa Rogers/John Rogers (descendant of Wm. & Rhoda Harris) on whose farm the Blue Springs Cem. is located at Walnut between R.D. Mize/7 Hwy
Assoc. member #710 Independence UDC
Current Board member and general member WCQS 15 years