Julius Howard Williams

1793 – 1862  (68 years)

Every year, the day after Thanksgiving, my cousin and I give thanks by honoring our distinguished ancestors. This consists of identifying new family cemeteries and maintaining existing ones. This years goal was to find a new one.

My cousin Billy Pittard located the resting place of our 4th Great Grandfather: Julius Howard Williams. There are two Williams family cemeteries in the area. One is located at 12649 Cainsville Rd, Lebanon, TN 37090, the Julius Williams location is about 3 miles southeast on Greenvale Road (it’s on private property).

Julius was the first to settle in Tennessee of this family line. He was the son of Joesph Williams, which is suppose two be buried there too (although no headstones were legible with the name). The original homestead was near a spring down the hill from the cemetery.

Julius owned a racetrack on Cainsville Road where Simmons Bluff intersects. President Andrew Jackson was a friend and raced horses there according to family legend.

His daughter Rebecca Jane (Becky) married out 3rd Great Grandfather Reverend John Phillips. John Phillips died of unknown causes at the age of 40 in April 1862, only about a week after the Battle of Shiloh. His father-in-law Julius died the next month, and we discovered several other Williams family deaths July thru October 1862. #coincidence?

Becky died a year after the war at age 43. Her children (our great grandfathers and their sisters) were scattered to various families in Wilson and Rutherford Counties.

The cemetery has been very well taken care of over the years. In fact, it’s the most intact one we have discovered. If only other landowners were so reverent of the hundreds of small family cemeteries across the region.