Back in the 1980’s, the Joyner family bought a plot of land near the Baptist Children’s Home that had once been part of Ingleside Plantation. While clearing it, they uncovered a pile of broken headstones from the 1800’s that had been piled in a ditch and forgotten. (The ditch had formerly been the original Kansas Lane) Dr. Russ Williams was called in to examine the stones and was interviewed by the News-Star-World about the find. The most important find was a headstone for Robert Williams. Dr. Williams stated that it was possibly the stone of an early Mississippi governor, whose daughter Eliza, wife of Samuel Richardson, owned Ingleside plantation. Dr. Williams thought that in his old age, he retired to his daughter’s home and was buried there. The earliest stone was for Eliza and Samuel’s two baby boys who had been born and died in 1819. John M.A. Hamblin, Eliza’s second husband and one of their children’s stones were found, along with the stone of Eliza’s third husband, who was a Warfield. If I remember correctly, the stone of Eliza’s son-in-law, W.J.Q. Baker was also found. An elderly lady stated she remembered a cemetery next to the water tower at the Children’s home many years ago. The stones were gathered and put in the Joyner’s shed, where they remain today. As construction begins on the Kansas Lane connector, I wonder if they will stumble across the graves during their digging. I found a feasibility study done years ago for the connector project, and the cemetery was mentioned in passing, but they felt it was not where they would be constructing. We will see!
To read more about Robert Williams and the others buried there, someone has created a cemetery for them on findagrave, referred to as “Bon Aire Cemetery”
https://www.findagrave.com/cemetery/2381977/bon-aire-plantation
Ouachita Parish History Tidbits 