Amazing Gracie



Little Gracie Watson

 

Bonaventure means “good fortune”, but the Savannah, Ga. residents who now reside there might have a word or two to say otherwise about that.  In my opinion, no visit to Savannah is complete without wandering the hauntingly beautiful 160 acre Bonaventure Cemetery.  Giant live oak trees, Spanish moss suspended from the branches, adorn the grounds.  Ornate sculptures mark the location of the earthly remains of area residents who departed this life as early as 1765.  

 

 

As we followed the directions of our GPS to Bonaventure on an unseasonably warm January morning, my wife asked “Do you think they will have restrooms there?”  “Have you ever been to a cemetery with restrooms?” I asked.  After neither my wife nor I could think of any cemetery’s that had restrooms, we made a quick stop at McDonalds.  Shortly after arrival at Bonaventure we were greeted by members of the Bonaventure Historical Society who answered our questions, including “Yes, they do have public restrooms at Bonaventure”.

 

I am a student of epitaphs, words deemed important enough to inscribe on the headstone of one’s final resting place.  Corrine Elliott Lawton died January 24, 1877.  About Corrine, her headstone says “Allured to brighter worlds and led the way”.  John Russell Kellam expired March 18, 1892.  His headstone says the following about John:  Thou are gathered safely home free from pain and toil and care.  12-year-old Carrie R. Mallare (Mallard?) died August 10, 1898, the same summer my grandfather was born.  Her grieving parents inscribed “She was a bright sweet child and gave promise of a lovely womanhood”.

 

Famous musician Johnny Mercer’s remains are interred at Bonaventure.  Mercer received 4 Oscars for movie lyrics and is known for songs like “Accentuate the Positive”, “Moon River”, Autumn Leaves” and “The Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe”.  His gravesite has a bench with a caricature of him and the words “Buddy, I’m a kind of poet and I’ve gotta lotta things to say”.  Savannah recently erected a bronze statue of Mr. Mercer between the City Market and Paula Deen’s restaurant.

 

 

The most amazing gravesite to me was that of 6-year-old Gracie Watson who died of pneumonia two days before Easter, 1889.  Gracie’s dad was the manager of Savannah’s Pulaski Hotel and commissioned sculptor John Walz to create a life-size Georgia-marble replica of Gracie from a picture of her in her Easter finery. 

 

 

Bonaventure Cemetery was featured in the movie Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil based on the 1994 novel of the same name by John Berendt.   That movie was directed by Clint Eastwood and is based on a true story.  In the movie, visits to the cemetery were made at 11:30 pm.  The 30 minutes before midnight were for good.  The 30 minutes after midnight were for evil.  If you plan a visit, I’d suggest you do it between the normal operating hours of 8 am – 5 pm.  Some visitors have reported seeing little Gracie Watson playing among the graves of other children buried at Bonaventure.   Maybe that’s why they have restrooms.  If I saw her I know I’d sure need one.