There’s several graveyards clearly marked in Croft State Park and possibly one more that isn’t, but for those who need premium graveyards (you know, with like associated ruins and tombstones that are more than upright field stones) this particular hike is a good one for you. This isn’t a one monument easter egg chase or a couple of field stones buried in the leaves snipe hunt.
Oeland Cemetery boasts impressive monuments dating from before the Civil War right up until the 1980s with tombstones as varied as traditional Victorian weeping willow tree slabs surrounded by rough stone walls, to unmarked fieldstones, hand cut and lettered stones, and a few vaults. In addition, the steps of the church, the chimney of what was probably the parsonage, and the ditch that once delinated the areas of the burial ground remain, along with a few dogwoods.
The other cemeteries are less impressive but no less unique: an unnamed cemetery near the center of the hike has a metal fence and victorian-esque tombstones dating to the 1800s, and the final cemetery of the hike, Fleming Cemetery, lies peacefully on a knoll beneath a giant oak tree next to the now closed Croft dump where members of a family that was represented in just about every war starting with the one for independence now repose. This cemetery, unlike the others on the hike, still sees burials as recently as 2021. It was most likely part of a homestead cemetery rather than a church – one tombstone records the person buried there was born less than 200 yards from the place she was laid to rest. Given the rest of her globe trotting family, she probably left right after she was born and didn’t return till they carried in the coffin.
Important: while digging up historical relics in any state or nation forest is illegal, in Croft State Park it can be lethal if you hit buried World War II ordinance. Stay out of the dirt, on the trail, and away from anything metal sticking out of the ground.
Is it goat approved? Absolutely. I have permission (though it dates from several years ago) to hike with a goat here and no one really had a problem with the goat. I will say these are bike trails, so I give way to bikers preferentially on the trail. Most of the goats I own prefer to get out of the way of the bikes on their own anyway.
How you get there: You’ll be parking at the “southside park” parking area. It’s $3 for a hang tag, but it’s a nice, safe parking location that is moderately trafficked. Located at 34.853867, -81.863054. The actual trails however are part of Croft State Park, go figure.
Time for the hike: 7.2 miles round trip, in a lollipop-esque configuration. It’s mostly flat or nearly flat the whole way. If you’re used to the mountains, it’s like walking at the mall.
Best season to do this hike: When the bugs aren’t that bad. The section along the creek is an absolute bug fest.
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Trails to Take
Starting out at the parking lot you want to walk over to the Southside Loop Trail, which is basically the extension of the road you came in on into the woods. This place is a bit of a maze in a few spots where mountain bikers have done what mountain bikers are notorious for doing – not staying on the trail. This has created a bit of a “follow the blazes on the tree” situation in certain areas, so be mindful.
The road extension continues into the woods, with various unofficial offshoots, (again, stick to the trail signage nailed to trees), and is super easy, if also boring excepting the occasional abandoned roadbed. There are a lot of abandoned road beds out here – the place has been occupied since before the Revolutionary War by a lot of different people. You’ll also see some of the fantastic erosion ditches created by our forefather’s less than stellar land management. Most official trails are marked by wood posts with arrows and trail names or by a physical map on a post. The first real turn of the hike is you need to stay straight on the Centerline Trail while Southside Loop will head off to your right. The first cemetery of the hike is on your left, just slightly off the trail and uphill after Southside Loop branches off. There’s not a serious footpath up to it (surprisingly) but it’s got a great old school metal fence and some 1800s era tombstones of the classic Victorian vintage. Probably a family graveyard, though I could not find any nearby house ruins and because Croft was used as a dumping ground and firing range for WWII munitions I tend to stay on the trails and out of the dirt. Farmers in France still get blown up occasionally by WWI munitions they dig up during plowing. WWII is even more recent than that. So you know, stay on the trail.
There are several small foot paths leading off from the graveyard – these mostly go to the extant old road bed that once lay below the graveyard. Not an exciting hike, and again, the trails are guaranteed free of old bombs, so stick with the trail. Centerline goes up to the creek where it dead ends. You want to turn right at this point on Southside Loop Trail, and now you’re walking along the bank of the creek. At first, let’s face it, the scenery is ugly at best, but it rapidly improves as you keep hiking (though the bug situation will only get worse). The creek floods regularly, so there’s deep sand and wash outs plus the occasional downed tree on the trail, but nothing unpassable. You’ll pass the turn off to Lizard Trail, then the big bridge over the creek to the main part of Croft. It’s new and fancy if you’re into that kind of thing. From the bridge stick to the edge of the creek and keep going forward on Southside Loop.
Now’s the time to start really paying attention. The first thing to see is the trail will cross a long collapsed stone wall, which appears as a ridge of stone most visible on the right hand side as you are walking slightly downhill toward the creek on the trail. Then start looking to your left to see piled stone peeping out of the leaves from what was once a retaining wall that propped up the road bed you’re traveling around and on on this trail and kept it from getting washed out by the creek. The first really easy spot to see this stacked stone is located at 34.858307, -81.834476. If you’re paying attention more stacked or piled stone will appear here and there from under the leaves. The trail will come up to and start running on the left hand edge of a very deep old road bed. Part of this “edge” appears to be actually stacked stone used to potentially protect the road from flooding out by that wily creek you’ve been hiking along for a while now.
The road bed will come out of its hole and the trail will rejoin it at a flat place, and then leave the old road bed and head out through the woods. The trail comes up to a gravel road, then goes back into the woods, making a sharp turn into the park to come up to Oeland Cemetery. The trail circles around the edge of the graveyard to continue, but stop a moment here to see the many extant ruins of this nearly complete church yard. There’s a chimney stack now fallen that was probably part of the parsonage. The concrete steps of the church remain, though the church itself has long fallen to dust. The parishioners of said church lie buried in a graveyard still bounded by the old ditch that once marked its boundaries, though later generations (or perhaps slaves) have spilled over the rough ditch. and towards the remains of the chimney as a line of rough and mostly illegible fieldstones. The exception to this is Gentrys – a family whose skills included working stone. Theirs are the most beautiful and ephemeral of the field stones – shaped almost into arrow heads, with the names cut neatly into the lichen surface by hand.
The graveyard also includes a classic collection of Victorian weeping willow era stones bounded by a field stone fence, a few modern stones, and a vault that commemorates a woman who died among strangers (but got an expense vault so they could not have been true strangers to her). While the other graveyard on this hike is called “Fleming Cemetery” I will say the Fleming headstone at this graveyard has the best epitaph I have seen in a while for someone. Martha Fleming, died 1874 got this on her tombstone “Shed not for her the bitter tears, nor give the heart no vain regret, ’tis but the casket that lies here, the gem that filled it sparkles yet”. Damn that’s a good one y’all.
Once you’ve had your fill of graveyard wandering, the trail continues out through the woods. You want to stay on Southside Loop Trail, which will, at one point, necessitate walking down that gravel road about 100 yards (for real, I know the Croft map doesn’t depict that well). You’ll know you’re at that point when the trail peters out at the road and there’s a huge erosion ditch on the other side that you can’t easily cross. Walk up the road, then cut back into the forest on your right. You’ll pass a couple of mini hills that the mountain bikers play on, and then you start hearing gunfire. The trail comes right up to the shooting range and actually runs behind one of the earthen berms that keeps idiots with guns from unintentionally killing someone.
Keep going, through more woods, staying on Southside Loop till it runs up to Centerline again, then hang a left to go back towards the car on Southside Loop. To avoid walking through the parking lot you’ll need to cut cross on Fern Gully Trail (que 80s kids whining about bad ecology and 1980s cartoons) which comes off to your right. This is a cut and dry (if popular) cut around the parking lot. You’ll come back up to the Southside Loop Trail at a messy intersection with some sign posts and way too many previous bikers having gone off trail. The basic jist is you need to go right.
This will drop you down and across a creek, then out through the woods were numerous again unofficial side trails made by bikers who can’t follow the rules confuse the situation entirely. You’ll want to stay near the powerline cut, and follow any blazes/trail signage you see. Eventually you’ll come up to an asphalt road. This used to be the way into the Croft dump, which closed in 1996 due to being filled. The trail crosses the asphalt and continues, but hang a right on the asphalt to go to the graveyard.
At the fence across the road that blocks entrance to the Croft dump, hang a left on the gated gravel road. While it looks like numerous cyclists have employed their two wheeled mayhem to enter the dump a large sign on the gate says they’ve had methane leakages, so maybe don’t take something that doesn’t have a spark arrestor out there. You can get to the graveyard just fine by following the gravel road, which dead ends at the little hillock the graveyard sits on.
The graveyard itself still appears to be in active use – the most recent internment was in 2021 (maybe from COVID). The other graves are mostly from the late 1800s into the present day with a few exceptions. The original family name of this family graveyard does appear to be the Flemings, but obviously as people married and exchanged names other names are represented here. There are some beautiful tombstones, particularly the one topped with a bible from the early 1900s and the one from 1846 portraying the city of heaven or possibly the second coming, not sure which. There’s also an impressive variety of military stones – WWII (Geddis Fleming & William Fleming), a rare WWI (Wilford Lee), a Civil War metal marker the stone of which has fallen, an out of war time military death in 1931 (Edward Pritchett), and even a Revolutionary War marker that was probably from the Daughters of the American Revolution for Jas. Fleming. No Korea, Spanish American, or Vietnam, but this family’s been in just about everything else by the look of it. In case the wild globe trotting life of this rather interesting family wasn’t complete, they also appear to have had a missionary among the group, who died in 1893.
Anyway, after some graveyard oggling of all the interesting stuff in this particular bone orchard, it’s time to turn around and retrace your steps back to the parking lot.
Oeland Cemetery
Fallen Wall
Trail running along edge of old deep roadbed
Parsonage Chimney
Church Cemetery
Hand cut tombstone
Revolutionary War tombstone (probably not original, Daughters of the American Revolution may have donated this one)
Heaven tombstone
Draperies tombstone
In sum: Which is the more meaningful life – the person who leaves and goes out into the world, or the person who remains and welcomes the ones who left back home when they return?
packgoats 