Overmountain Men Honor Guard
Located on the grounds of the former National Guard Armory, 2717 W. Market St., Johnson City, Tennessee. The cemetery can be reached from McKinley Road. See map.
GPS location: 36.17.25N 082.22.25W
NAME BIRTH DATE DEATH DATE COMMENTS
R. Y. B. D. 1708/1718 4 A 1792 [Inscription is plain, but difficult to decipher]
Young, Robert [No date] [No date] Within this plot lies the body of Robert Young, a Revolutionary Soldier who did heroic service at Kings Mountain. Erected 1920 by the John Sevier Chapter DAR
S. B. L. [No date] 10 Aug 1823 [Samuel Bell Love]
Young, M. F. [No date] 28 Sep 1829 [This could be Mary, wife of Robert Young, Sr.]
T. Y. 1755 21 Dec 1794 [Difficult to read, dates are questionable]
S. Y. 15 Sep 1826 [Difficult to read, date is questionable]
Several unmarked graves. It has been suggested that members of other families besides the Youngs are buried here.
Burts and Lyle Cemeteries
As land changed owners, the name of this cemetery also changed.
In Washington County Tennessee Tombstone Inscriptions, Volume I, page 217, has the Lyle Cemetery located 2 miles West of Johnson City, on Government Land. In a typewritten history of the Bayless family, it states that Richard Bayless died the Fall of 1866 and was buried in the Burts graveyard inside of the National Sanitorium, a short distance from East of the crossing of the Southern and the CC and O Railroad.
Joseph L. Burts married 09 Jan 1823 Elizabeth Young , daughter of Joseph and Esther Young. She and her husband inherited the bulk of her father’s estate. (Deed book 23, page 301) The Burts family were buried in the Young Cemetery but were later moved to Oak Hill Cemetery in Johnson City.
J.L. Burts sold the land to John Lyle 02 Mar 1841 (Deed book 23, page 405).
The Robert Young Cemetery has clusters of graves, indicating different family groups. Only fieldstones and unmarked graves are in the other sections.
Surveyed, transcribed and donated to the Washington County TNGen Web March 2000 by Donna Cox Briggs and Betty Jane Hylton, members of the Cemetery Survey Team of Northeast Tennessee.
Copyrighted 2013 by the Cemetery Survey Team of Northeast Tennessee. No part of this work may be copied without written permission from the Cemetery Survey Team.
Click on map to enlarge.
Map to Robert Young Cemetery
Genealogical data by the late Dessie Little Simmons.
Samuel Bell Love was the husband of Mary Young, daughter of Joseph Young and granddaughter of Robert Young, Sr. and Mary Young. Mary’s mother was Esther Crockett Young.
Note: Joseph Young had two wives, both named Esther Crockett (They were cousins). In the late 1970’s, Fred and Dessie Simmons attempted to find all the stones underneath the vast amount of debris which covered the cemetery. The ground was covered with dead leaves, twigs, pieces of tree limbs and poison ivy. After the Armory became “owners” of the area where the cemetery is located, the men at the Armory cleaned the cemetery and fenced it. After the clearing, 72 graves or spaces were found. James Dykes and his father, copied the stones on a day at noon.
From Washington County Tennessee Wills, 1777-1872 by Goldene Fillers Burgner, 1983:
p. 4 Robert Young February 8, 1792
County of Washington, Territory of the United States of America, South of the Ohio River. Wife, Mary. To son Joseph, 600 Acres here I live. Children: Elizabeth Gillaland, Marth Cashedy, John, William, Robert, Thomas, Charles, Jane Long, Margaret Bates, Mary Dugless, Agnes Henry. Grandsons: Joseph Young, son of deceased son James, Robert Gillaland and Robert Cashedy. Executors: Wife Mary and son Joseph. Teste: Thomas Gouley, James Gannon, Absolem Scott. May Sessions, 1792.
Signed: Robert Young.
The DAR erected a monument to Robert Young, Sr. in 1928.
The Robert Young log cabin, built about 1775 on the waters of Brush Creek was restored and marked in 1938 by the U.S. government and the John Sevier Chapter of the DAR. The cabin was moved to Optimist Park on Market Street beside the Boys Club in 1976, which was still on the original land grant. In 1996, the cabin was moved from the original land grant to Winged Deer Park at Boone Lake. It has been modernized, porches added and is being used as offices.
More information about the Young Family can be found in Robert Young, Sr. Patriot and Pioneer by Dessie Little Simmons and Fred Simmons. Also, in History of Washington County, Tennessee, 1988 compiled by the Watauga Association of Genealogists – Upper East Tennessee.
The Tennessee Society Sons of the American Revolution presented a Grave Marker Service honoring Robert Young and his six sons who served at the Battle of Kings Mounton on 7 October 1780. The service was sponsored by the Watauga and Kings Mountain Chapters on 20 September 2013.
Robert Young Markers
2013
Robert Young’s Tombstone
2013
Cannon Salute
2013