Sardis Church & Cemetery Tours

 

 

 

 

As part of the Atlanta Preservation Center’s Phoenix Flies: A Celebration of Historic Sites, Buckhead Heritage hosted tours of Sardis Church and Cemetery on Saturday, March 22nd.

 

The present Sardis church, completed in 1927, was designed by architect Owen Southwell. It is at least the third church building on the site, however. In fact, in 1926, congregation member James Collie recalled that in the mid-to-late 19th century, the congregation members “didn’t dress up to come to the Saturday meeting, but came right from the field at eleven o’clock. We thought nothing of walking five miles to church. Everybody around here belonged to that church.”

 

Meanwhile, the adjacent cemetery’s earliest marked grave dates to 1869. The cemetery is the final resting place of many of Buckhead’s earliest citizens including Henry Irby (1807-1879), Wesley Collier (1824-1906), and Napoleon Cheshire (1843-1921).

 

The church and cemetery were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012. Buckhead Heritage prepared the nomination materials.