Thursday, June 5, 2008

Wild Bill's Orginal Gravesite and Some History

John Korneman 1893-1973 picture by Judge Will Severns

Here is some first hand history and pictures from the Deadwood School Bus Driver John Korneman. He took or obtained the following pictures sometime before 1903 and gave me copies in the early 1970's. The interest point of these pictures is the original Whitewood Gulch Cemetery where Wild Bill Hickock was originally buried in 1876 and was then moved to Mount Moriah Cemetery in 1879. The Whitewood Gulch Cemetery was in the Ingleside part of Deadwood so it was also known as the Ingleside Cemetery.

The first picture aligns on Jefferson Street looking Northish. Jefferson Street was the main access road to Mt. Moriah for many years. In the first picture you can see that the original cemetery borders on Lincoln Avenue. The second picture, which is an enlargement, shows some grave crosses, a monument and two dark spots that could be holes dug in the grave sites. Sorry that the picture quality is not better.

John Korneman was born in 1893 and was avidly interested in Deadwood history and assembled an extensive photo collection in his colorful lifetime. He died in 1973 at age 80 and is listed by Social Security as retired railroad worker which is true. Judge Will Severns of Rapid City was close friends with John in his last years and recorded John in an interview of John's life history. John told of neat experiences with the railroad, power company, and the Lead/Deadwood Trolley. His last long time job was with the Deadwood School as bus driver and etc. Around 1970 John became ill and Dr. Smiley told him to retire. He did retire immediately as he was concerned about the school children when in his care.

In the Severn's recording, John told a story about when he was young. He and a friend assembled some digging tools and set off to dig in the hill side for something fun to do. They dug for some time and then started to uncover human bones. Also about this time some other kid "ratted" to his Deadwood School Teacher about John's diggings and she immediately contacted the City of Deadwood. Within a short order the human bone dig was shut down. It is my assumption that the digging was in the hill side at the Whitewood Gulch Cemetery but John was not specific to the dig location. I don't see any record that Korneman graduated from Deadwood School but at this point it does not matter and he is richly in instilled in the School history and in our hearts. How many kids showed their report cards to John Korneman while he guarded the cross walk as he was aways happy to see you and say a cheery "hello thar".



For more Deadwood Cemetery information see http://www.cityofdeadwood.com/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC=%7BA0DB4AD3-F0E9-4EAC-8E22-995D27A3329B%7D. A Maggie Rail researched and transcribed 3626 burial records for the Mt. Moriah Cemetery in October 2002 and provides an interesting history http://www.mrail.net/data/cemete/sdak/lawrence/moriah/index.htm .

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