Walking in Westview - At Peace with History

Getting interested in one’s family tree could be called a hobby, I guess. For some folks it becomes a life’s work. Those who have been at it for years have developed not just the raw information, but also instinctive approaches to identifying their ancestors. Mike’s cousin, Judy, is a pro, passionate about the pursuit of this particular knowledge and clearly enjoying the adventure.

I am a novice, but already hooked. Reaching into the past, exploring the lives of those who came before. Having begun with the online marvels of Ancestry.com, I’ve moved on to shamelessly query family members, digging names and places out of their memories. I’ve studied the family Bibles and photographs and wished a thousand times that I had paid more attention to my parents’ stories and asked more questions when they were alive.

Raymond Artope's Marker

All this led me to a sunny February afternoon wandering through Westview Cemetery in Southwest Atlanta, a place I haven’t been since the early 1960s when we buried my mother’s mother there. Westview is a huge burial site, complete with an ornate Gothic mausoleum called Westview Abbey. My maternal grandparents are buried on a sloping section almost in the shadow of the three-story Abbey, itself home to a multitude of crypts, according to cemetery information. About 100,000 folks rest in these grounds.

Mike with his camera and I with my notepad entered the rolling grounds that cover about 600 acres through the stone gate flanked by a gatehouse in the same aged stone, rough Georgia granite, cut in blocks of varied sizes. The gatehouse’s Romanesque tower is said to be one of the oldest standing structures in Atlanta. Within a few yards of the entry, Mike spotted a beautiful huge tree (photo above), spreading its magnificent limbs above the grounds.

Our first stop was in the office just inside the gate where a helpful lady looked up the locations of the Artopes and other relatives buried there and with a few clicks on her computer gave us their plot numbers and a map. She thoughtfully starred the maps for us and gave us very specific instructions about how to find first one section then another.

I had some sense of the history of Westview from both family teaching and from Google. Opened in 1884, its early history included a “receiving vault” where coffins were placed in the winter months when the unpaved roads sometimes became mired in icy mud. It would hold only 36 coffins, a reminder that Atlanta in 1884 was much less populated than the sprawling metropolis it has become. Now sealed, the vault’s inscription tells its history.

That story includes the vault’s use for a different reason in 1917-1918 when the influenza epidemic was killing Atlantans at a rapid rate. There is other rich history here, too. As quiet as it was on the day we drove and walked its hallowed ground, it was noisy and filled with both life and death in July, 1864, when the Battle of Ezra Church was fought here. Confederate troops attempted to stop William Tecumseh Sherman’s army here from its “March to the Sea,” but were outmatched. A monument amidst the graves commemorates that battle.

In between visits to the gravesites of our relatives, we found ourselves awed by the burial sites of famous Atlantans like the journalist, Henry W. Grady, for whom the University of Georgia’s School of Journalism is named, and the city’s longtime mayor, Ivan Allen, Jr. There are vaults and memorials in myriad designs and sizes, sometimes appearing to be competing for the beholder’s attention. I couldn’t help but imagine that a competitive spirit might have spurred some families to make a better showing, even in death, than their peers.

There are a number of family “vaults” in Westview. These are small buildings that encompass crypt spaces. One that caught our attention was still decorated for the holidays, including solar-powered lights leading to the door. Through the glass in the door we could see a chair, a table and Valentine decorations. These are  indications of love and grief, loss and a sense of how those left behind cope, telling stories that strangers might not understand, but reminding us that families need to express their feelings in their own ways.

Abbey Facade

Sitting above them all is the Abbey, a remarkable edifice that, for all its immensity, creates a peaceful, however elaborately decorated, respite for those who rest there. When I asked whether there are photographs of the interior, I was told they were not available in the office. A simple typed page of the cemetery’s history was made available with its paragraph extolling the wonders that exist inside the Abbey’s walls. Mike’s photographs of the façade with its tiled mosaics only hint at what might be behind those closed doors. Running out of time, we didn’t attempt to go inside, but there are photographs online.

Abbey Mosaic

Building of the “community Mausoleum” began in 1943, says the brochure. It was planned to “challenge the finest the masters of the past ever built.” It is reported to be the largest structure of its kind ever built under one roof, said to have space for 11,244 entombments. It includes 27 stained glass panels depicting the life of Christ, among paintings and other artworks representing religious texts. A man-made lake once lay below the Abbey to the south, but it was drained in the 1980s.

 

 Our time in Westview answered some of my questions about specific birth and death dates for our family members. The time spent there also was a walk through Atlanta’s history, from the devastation of the Civil War through the late 19th and early 20th century’s “simpler times” to the present. Many famous citizens are buried here, alongside those less well-known, but remembered on markers and stones, small and large. On the day we were there, cemetery workers were preparing sites for those to be buried in the days to come. Only about half of the available land has been developed and there are yet thousands of spaces available in the developed sections.

Even on the chilly winter day we walked in Westview, when its trees were bare of leaves and its grassy hills and valleys were the dull color of a harsher winter than this Southern city usually knows, it was a haven removed from Atlanta’s bustle and rush. It remains a peaceful place, Westview, true to the premise of its original charter -- “a landscape park in which may safely rest the dead.”

All photos by Mike Lumpkin