A Brief History of Flint Hill Cemetery

By David G. Farmer

Version 1.1: 17 May 2012

Flint Hill Cemetery, located in Oakton, Virginia, is one of the few active association-run cemeteries in Fairfax County. The land that the cemetery occupies is adjacent to a Civil War fort, which today hosts the Oakton Church of the Brethren.[1] At least 24 Civil War Veterans have been documented as buried in the cemetery, including four of Mosby’s Rangers.[2] Two more Civil War Veterans are buried in the church cemetery adjacent to Flint Hill Cemetery. Not much is known about the cemetery before the Civil War other than what can be found in the land records of Fairfax County, Virginia.

The nearly three acres of land that today is Flint Hill Cemetery was originally part of the Harle/Trammell patent that had been sold to the Reverend John Moncure of Stafford County, Virginia, prior to 1807.[3] The land was parceled out and some of it eventually ended up in the hands of Isaac D. and Maria Coc who sold the parcel to Cornelius Ostrander, then of Fairfax County, Virginia, on 28 March 1845.[4] The first official acknowledgement of what would become Flint Hill Cemetery was on 15 March 1852 when Cornelius Ostrander sold 68.5 perches (or .43 of an acre) to Ezra Wilbur, William Davis and Joseph J.S. Bentley, Trustees of an unnamed public burial ground for $1.00.[5] The ground was set aside for the burial of any and all persons, and “for no other reason.”

By 1857, the Ostranders had relocated to Orange County, New York and sold their remaining tract of land that surrounded the burial ground transferred to the Trustees in 1852, to William Terry of Albany County, New York, on 2 November 1857 for $1,779.37.[6]

Local legend suggests that part of the land was used as a burial ground as early as 1832;[7] however, no documentation and/or tombstones support that contention. Since Ostrander did not own the land until 1845, he could not have set aside a graveyard in 1832, as local legend holds. Ostrander could have, however, set aside the graveyard in the 1840s, several years before he transferred the burial ground in 1852 to the Trustees aforementioned. The discrepancy leading to the belief that the graveyard was established in 1832 could stem from an easy-to-make reading error on the deed where Ostrander sold the bulk of land he had purchased from Isaac D. and Maria Coc to William Terry in 1857. The “5” in the year 1857 easily can appear to be a “3”, leading to an incorrect determination of the year the graveyard was set aside.  

About six weeks after the land was formally transferred into the hands of the Trustees, the first burial is evidenced by the tombstone of infant George E. Brooks, with his death date recorded as 28 April 1852.[8] Two more burials would take place that first year of the cemetery – Anna Eliza Collar and Deyo Watkins.[9] In 1853, four people were buried in the cemetery including William R. Davis[10], a neighbor that left 132 acres of land to his heirs and likely the same William Davis listed as one of the first Trustees of the burial ground.[11]  Through the Civil War period, up to when an association was formed to administer the cemetery in 1875, up to five burials took place each year.

On 30 January 1875, citizens living in the vicinity of Flint Hill Cemetery convened at the Flint Hill School House with the intent to organize an association to oversee the burial ground.[12]  James L. Smith and Dr. Benjamin M. Collins were selected as Chairman Pro Tem and Secretary Pro Tem, respectively. The participants were primarily concerned with whether there was an official deed given to the original Trustees for the burial grounds. Jonathan Constable and William P. Speer thought there was a deed, but they did not know where it was.  Benjamin M. Collins reported that James L. Smith and William P. Speer were assigned to go to the Clerk’s Office of Fairfax County to find out.

At the next meeting, on 6 February 1875, the Association’s constitution and bylaws were written and unanimously adopted.  The name of the burial ground was officially identified as Flint Hill Cemetery. The constitution also specified that anyone who paid $1.00 was entitled to membership in the association and for an additional $4.00, a member was entitled to an 8’ x 16’ lot. 

In accordance with the constitution, the following were elected as the first Trustees of the Flint Hill Cemetery Association (FHCA): Jonathan Constable, William P. Speer, Anthony Miller, Thomas H. Walker (one of Mosby’s Rangers) and Bleeker Caufield.[13] The Trustees were confirmed by the Fairfax County, Virginia, Circuit Court on 16 June 1875.[14] At the meeting, Jonathan Constable offered a gift of a “half-acre of land,” more or less, to enlarge the cemetery. The Trustees thankfully accepted the gift, and the transfer was made official in a deed dated 6 March 1875[15] as recorded in the land records of Fairfax County, Virginia. The land that was donated actually amounted to .35 acres. 

Two years later, the third meeting was held on 6 February 1877[16] and the minutes of the meeting indicate that the cemetery was nearly full. Cemetery records and tombstone inscriptions suggest that at that time 54 people were buried at Flint Hill. “Nearly full” may have meant that no more lots were available to sell. The FHCA had other business to tend to, so the Trustees decided to hold an adjourned meeting ten days later on 16 February 1877.  At that meeting the concern as to whether there was a deed for the burial ground was discussed (held over from the last meeting in 1875). The Committee assigned to investigate the matter reported that “Mr. [Cornelius] Ostrander had by deed or otherwise granted in fee simple the old burial grounds, reported he had reserved the right by deed to Jonathan Constable for burial purposes.”[17] Jonathan Constable was not listed in the deed as one of the Trustees of the old burial ground in 1852; however, it is possible that he was involved with the Trustees at that time, which could explain the report by the Committee as stated. There is no evidence that any of the Trustees of the old burial ground were buried in Flint Hill Cemetery. Jonathan Constable may have been one of the few people involved with the old burial ground when FHCA was formed, making a logical transfer of that original land to FHCA.

Between 1877 and the end of 1886, 43 more burials occurred in the cemetery. The next expansion of the cemetery took place on 22 December 1886, when Mary S. and B.B. Miller sold a little more than one acre of land to the Association for $100.[18] It is not clear when the Cemetery was officially partitioned into Sections A and B because the record books only make reference to lot numbers until the lots sold in the year 1900 were identified by Section.[19]  However, the old burial ground extended into about the middle of today’s Section B where Wilson B. Ostrander is buried. His death date is noted to be 12 July 1854 on his tombstone.[20] At the 29 December 1886 Association meeting, the Trustees raised the rates for lots as follows: $18.00 for a 20’ x 20’ lot, $10.00 for a 20’ x 10’ lot, and $5.00 for 16’ x 8’.[21]

The cemetery grew gradually through a couple of minor additions between 1887 and 1923. In the meantime, the Trustees needed to expand again and had tried to carve a deal with W.R. and Fannie C. Gray to buy a 1.5-acre lot for $500. An agreement could not be reached and on 14 December 1922 the FHCA decided to pursue acquisition through a condemnation proceeding on the land.[22] In January 1923, ten citizens of the Providence Magisterial District, where Flint Hill Cemetery lies, filed a petition asking for the condemnation of Gray’s parcel of land for cemetery purposes.[23]  In the March Term 1923 of the Circuit Court of Fairfax County, the Court ruled that a smaller lot (.881 acres) would be condemned and the FHCA would pay $350 for it.[24] Most of this land is part of today’s Section C. However, Section C included some land from earlier purchases, as the first recorded burial in the Section was in 1896.[25]

On 21 January 1955 Gilbert Douglas Hite and Lena Elizabeth Ann Munday sold one and a half acres to the FHCA for $2,000, which became Section D.[26] By the time the first burial occurred in Section D in 1957,[27] the Cemetery held the remains of at least 965 people.

Although a serene and quiet cemetery, vandals overturned 41 tombstones in early August 1976.[28]  FHCA worked with as many lot owners as possible to repair the damage. As of May 2012, the remains of more than 2,300 people rest in Flint Hill Cemetery. The cemetery continues to be managed by a group of volunteers still known as the Flint Hill Cemetery Association.