West Chester Cemetery, sometimes referred to as Union Township Cemetery or Brookside Cemetery, was formally organized circa 1865 by 23 lot owners of the West Chester Cemetery Association.
The sacred ground – accessible today by way of West Chester Road about 1,000 feet west of the Cincinnati Dayton Road intersection – was established decades earlier as the Cummins family graveyard. Generations of the family owned and developed dozens of acres of land in the heart of Union Township in the first half of the 19th century. James Cummins sold cemetery plots to neighbors and townspeople in need in the years before burial would be made available to the public at-large. Many members of the Cummins family are interred in the southwest section known as the “Old Yard.”
The white brick building in the Old Yard is the vault. Built sometime before 1875, the vault was used in those days to care for the deceased until conditions allowed for a proper burial. The centrally located, white chapel building is thought to have been built after the vault, maybe in the late 1870s or 1880s, in the era before funeral homes.
Today, West Chester Cemetery encompasses about 22 acres with more than 4,500 burials. There are about 800 U.S. veterans laid to rest here, including Revolutionary War veteran John Beckett (1752-1843) and about 100 veterans who fought in the Civil War. Burial plots are no longer available for purchase.
Per Ohio Revised Code, townships are obligated to care for cemeteries. This task falls to the West Chester Community Services Department. Community Services oversees our community’s "public works" functions including infrastructure, roads, facilities, vehicles, parks and cemeteries.
West Chester Township maintains two additional cemeteries – a 5-acre cemetery off Dimmick Road (known as Pisgah Cemetery), and a .42-acre graveyard (known as Jeffras Cemetery, McMakin Cemetery or Tylersville Cemetery) in a residential area southwest of the intersection of Tylersville and Lesourdsville West Chester roads. Ohio law stipulates that townships care for abandoned cemeteries.
Cemetery guests are asked to please be respectful of the property and mourners visiting their loved ones. No pets allowed.
Fun Facts
The oldest burials in the cemetery based upon readable markers are Solomon Brecount, who died September 8, 1799 at age 36; and Nancy (Legg) McMaken, daughter-in-law of early West Chester settler Joseph McMaken, who died October 9, 1820 at age 27. Joseph is considered Union Township’s first pioneer, and he is buried at Greenwood Cemetery in Hamilton.
Revolutionary War veteran John Beckett is laid to rest together with his family. Their headstones face northwest toward the hills of their old farm property, which would be developed much later into the Beckett Ridge neighborhood over a period of years from about the early 1970s to early 1990s.
A memorial to those who served in World War I and II with flagpole is situated near the entrance and was donated in 1949 thanks to a fundraising project by members of the Maud Dooryard Garden Club. The community’s annual Memorial Day ceremonies still take place here every May.
Among many notable people and families buried here are Walter W. Wharton (1833-1907), a Civil War veteran who is credited as the originator of our community's Memorial Day celebration; Casper H. Bedacht (1881-1980), our community’s first mail carrier; and Virginia Shewalter (1916-1978), a Gano resident, World War II veteran, educator, author and historian who wrote “A History of Union Township, Butler County, Ohio,” published posthumously in 1979.
The cemetery contains a "Potter's Field" for those who were unable to pay for their loved ones' burial. This area lies in a seemingly empty field at the far west border. A Civil War veteran is among those believed to be buried there.
Although not among the buried, famous newspaper magnate Edward Willis (E.W.) Scripps once made his home in our community and, upon his death March 12, 1926, the Township received $123,000 of inheritance tax money from his estate of which $30,000 was used to make improvements to West Chester Cemetery. The Scripps farmhouse, which happens to be less than a half mile away from the cemetery entrance, is now part of property owned by St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church.
The Dimmick Road Cemetery began as a church cemetery in 1827 by James Irwin, a member of the Presbyterian Society and one of the earliest settlers in the Pisgah area. Just more than 100 people are believed to be buried there. It’s accessible today by way of Tamarack Terrace.
The Jeffras Cemtery began as a family graveyard by Thomas Jeffras who, in 1855, made plots available to the public because, it’s said, the village of Tylersville in particular was hit hard by the cholera epidemics of the time. Today the cemetery is mostly landlocked by private homes.
“Foundations” is a series of stories recounting momentous occasions in West Chester, Ohio history. Subscribe to the COMMUNITY REPORT e-newsletter and visit www.WestChesterOH.org/200 to learn more about Township history as we celebrate our 200th birthday bicentennial anniversary.