WALTER CEMETERY

The transcript of Walter Cemetery was graciously contributed by Scott Ives, a descendant of Ezra and Desire Stearns:

"This small cemetery is on private property at Water Street and is not visible from the road. My wife and I visited this cemetery in late 1997, after getting permission from the owners of the property. Some of the tombstones which were readable c1930 are no longer readable, some other tombstones no longer there (possibly in the ground or simply gone). The owner of the property told us the original name of the street should have been WALTER Street, but the city (township, county) mistakenly named it WATER Street and it stuck.

The identity of some of the people are unknown to me. Desire Stearns, wife of Ezra J. Stearns, was the mother of Anna Stearns who was the wife of John Walter - his age of 105 is from the NYGBR article. The children Charles W. & Lucinda Stearns buried here are great grandchildren of Ezra and Desire Stearns - through their son Ezra and Jane (Paddock) Stearns and then through their son John and Lucinda (Monroe) Stearns. Ezra and Desire (nee Baker) Stearns came to Amsterdam from Pittsfield, Berkshire MA about 1794 - a brother of Ezra, Jasiel Stearns and his wife Bethia Russel, also lived in Montgomery County. in the early 1800s. Two of Ezra and Desire's sons moved to WI about 1852, but some members of the family stayed and lived in Montgomery and Fulton counties. I am (you may have guessed) researching the Stearns family, am a descendant of Ezra and Desire Stearns's son Asa who went to WI about 1852, and would enjoy contact with anyone else researching this family."

Scott Ives
Maple Grove, MN
skives@mn.mediaone.net