I added Bailey and Bailey’s Sandy Level Cemetery Burial Records to my little local history set yesterday. Sandy Level is in Nash County, but this is a valuable Black Wide-Awake resource for many reasons.

(1) Sandy Level Cemetery is on present-day Stoney Hill Church Road at Bailey Road, less than three miles from the Wilson County line. Extended families often straddled the line between Nash County’s Bailey and Jackson townships and Wilson County’s Old Fields township.

(2) Sandy Level A.M.E. Church established the cemetery circa 1900. (The church itself was formed before 1875, and Willis Cone was an early trustee.) Mount Carmel A.M.E. of Bailey, which is still active (and my mama’s church!), was more or less its successor. Dozens of church members are buried in Sandy Level, but the cemetery also seems to have become a community burial ground by mid-twentieth century.

(3) Many who left the Bailey area for different opportunities returned to Sandy Level for burial. Some only migrated 15 miles east to Wilson. Others joined the Great Migration North. And Mercy Hospital was the closest African-American hospital during the Jim Crow era, so many Nash County residents buried in Sandy Level actually died in Wilson.

(4) The Baileys’ book is an exemplar for recording and preserving African-American church and cemetery history. The 154 known burials are presented alphabetically, with a brief description drawn from obituaries or death certificates.

If you’re interested in ordering a copy of Sandy Level Cemetery Burial Records, please contact Margaret Bailey at baileym@uncw.edu. The book costs $25, shipping is $5, and the order turn-around time is impressive.