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Greenlawn Cemetery, Scioto County, Ohio

Location: Lat: 38�44'42"N, Long: 82�58'57"W
Office: 1618 Offnere Street, Portsmouth
Phone: 740-353-4969

Greenlawn is the largest cemetery in Portsmouth proper, but due to lack of space for expansion, nearly all burials for the area are now conducted at Memorial Burial Park in Wheelersburg, about 10 miles east of Portsmouth. Greenlawn is completely fenced but due to repeated acts of vandalism, security cameras were recently installed.

The caretaker and maintenance staff are very helpful to visitors and the grounds are well maintained. Unfortunately, little planning seems to have gone into the original layout for this old cemetery so the various sections, added over the period of years, ended up as a bizarre conglomerate of different shapes and sizes. Since there are no markers that indicate the numbers for these sections, finding particular graves is a real test of patience and you can easily get lost even with a map in hand.

The inventory I have provided here is not complete though only a couple of Gilliland stones are not represented here. I hope to add photos of those remaining stones later this year.

Report and photos by Kate Maynard, 2008

(Click on a thumb for larger image.)


	Edward S. Gilliland, 1865-1921, and wife Ida (Lewis), 1866-1946 More information about this couple would be welcome. Edward and Ida were married in Lawrence County, Ohio in November of 1887 but I believe Edward was from Jackson County, where he was later found on the census with wife Ida and daughter Gladys.

	Firman B. Gilliland, 1890-1943, and wife Florence, 1892-1972 Firman was a son of prominent local attorney Nate (Nathan) B. Gilliland and Lucinda Monroe.

	Harry C. Gillilan, 1877 - 1926 Bertha S. Gillilan, 1872 - 1945 Robert A. Gillilan, 1875 - 1922 Siblings Harry C., Bertha S. and Robert A. Gillilan were the children of Capt. Coleman and Sarah K. (Frye) Gillilan. These brothers and sister never married and are buried together at Greenlawn. Their father was buried at Sinking Spring in Highland County.

	Mattie Gilliland Dever, 01 April 1852 - 20 April 1946, and the Dever vaults at the Old Mausoleum Martha G. "Mattie" Gilliland Dever, a daughter of Samuel B. Gilliland and Elizabeth Ellen Buckley, was the wife of Noah J. Dever. The poor quality of my photo can be attributed to poor lighting, the polished marble surface of the vaults and the fact that the inscriptions on several of the vaults were not darkened to provide any contrast with the surrounding marble. There are two mausoleums at Greenlawn and the impressive Dever vaults are situated in what is known as the "Old Mausoleum". The mausoleums are locked throughout the week but are open to the public on the weekends. There have been no recent burials in the Dever section and it appears these particular vaults have not been visited for quite some time, as the floral arrangements are some decades old.

	George Franklin Gilliland, 1872-1937 The marker for my grandfather, George Franklin Gilliland, who was a son of Washington Gilliland and Huldah Elizabeth Brown. Mary (Dice) Gilliland, his wife and my grandmother, is buried at Memorial Burial Park in Wheelersburg along with her daughter Margaret Gilliland Crabtree and son Warren P. Gilliland.