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Meltabarger Cemetery
Howell County, Missouri

Lat: 36° 36' 49"N, Lon: 91° 45' 57"W
T23N R7W Sec 32

Contributed by Kay Olberding, Aug 25, 2006 [kay_o@bigfoot.com]. Total records = 18.

From West Plains take 63 south 4 miles to PP on right, go 5 miles, turn right on County Road 9230. Cemetery is 1 mile on the right surrounded by a chain link fence with native stone corner posts. The name is not posted prominently but hangs on the fence.

The cemetery was named for a family who lived near it. The first burials were during or soon after the Civil War. These were supposed to be soldiers, but there were no major skirmishes in this part of the Ozarks, and they have not been identified. These graves with stone markers are now lost.

Colonel Jay Torrey, noted for helping Teddy Roosevelt organize the Rough Riders, purchased a large tract of land that included the cemetery in the early 1900s. The local community formed an association for the cemetery and contracted with Col. Torrey for one acre to include the cemetery and a union church, which was never built. After a period of neglect descendants of original association members oversee the care of the cemetery, but it has become inactive.

I have taken the transcriptions from existing stones and compared with older published cemetery records in the West Plains Library. It includes all the known burials since 1877. Completed in Aug of 2006.

- Kay Olberding

Coldiron, J. I., b. 28 Mar 1848, d. 27 Feb 1878
Coldiron, M. A., b. 17 Jul 1868, d. 5 Jun 1880, "dau of J I & L"
Hunter, Elizabeth Jane, b. 23 Mar 1834, d. 28 Dec 1919, "At rest"
Meltabarger, Hannah E. Renfro, b. 30 Aug 1843, d. 23 Sep 1890
Meltabarger, J. G., b. 12 Oct 1841, d. 30 Mar 1933, "Btry. E, 1 Mo Lt. Arty."
Meltabarger, Mary W., b. 26 Apr 1864, d. 1883, "dau of J G & H E"
Meridith, James F., b. 16 Mar 1872, d. 5 Aug 1878
Meridith, Mary L., b. 18 May 1846, d. 18 Aug 1879, "wife of J. M. Meriedeth"
Meridith,, b. 6 Mar 1877, d. 26 Mar 1877, "infant son of J M & M L Meriedith"
Miller, Elizabeth, d. 15 Jan 1881, 42 yrs 11 mos, "wife of Ira"
Miller, Mary E., d. 24 Feb 1880, 21 yrs 4 mos 19 dys, "dau of Ira and Elizabeth"
Prantl, Edna, d. 15 Sep 1920, s/w Edward Prantl (infant)
Prantl, Edward, d. 15 Sep 1920, s/w Edna Prantl (infant)
Prantl, Elizabeth, b. 1914, d. 1914, no mark.
Smith, James Speed, b. 4 Apr 1881, d. 29 Nov 1922
West, John W., b. 1853, d. 1938, s/w Sarah E. Renfro West
West, Sarah E. Renfro, b. 1854, d. 1936, s/w John W. West
Yates, Mary Smith, b. 20 Jun 1854, d. 8 Jun 1935, "Mother"