JOHN RANDOLPH'S DUST -- TO BE REMOVED FROM ROANOKE TO HOLLYWOOD CEMETERY
RICHMOND, VA., DEC. 13, 1879 -- The remains of John Randolph of Roanoke, are to be removed from their present resting place in Roanoke, Charlotte County, to Hollywood Cemetery, near this city, for reasons best known to friends of his family, and some members left the city on Thursday to carry their purpose into execution. Mr. John Randolph Bryan is the son of the late Joseph Bryan of Georgia, who was an intimate friend of John Randolph, of Roanoke, and named his son after him. In 1816 Mr. Randolph took upon himself the education of this and another son of his then deceased friend, and while they were not at school they lived with him at Roanoke, his home in Charlotte County. He treated them as though they were his own children, making them often sleep in the same bed with him. When absent he often wrote to them. In 1830 John Randolph Bryan married Elizabeth Coulter the niece of Mr. Randolph and the only daughter of his only sister, who was one of the children of the marriage
of his mother with St. George Tucker. Mrs. Bryan was a great favorite with her uncle, who used to speak of her as "my charming niece". John Randolph died on the 24th. day of June, 1833, in a chamber of the City Hotel, No. 41 North Third Street, Philadelphia, where he had gone to embark for England. He wrote to his niece for a long time once a week and her husband has now over two hundred of his letters to her. His last writing, which was done only two days before his death, was addressed to Mr. Bryan and his wife , as his children. Mr. Randolph's remains were brought to Roanoke and buried near his front door, under a tall pine. Nothing but a stone marked the grave. Not long before the late war Judge Wood Bouldin, who lately was a member of the Supreme Court of Appeals of the State, bought the tract of land on which Randolph had lived, known as his middle quarter in slave times, and built a handsome residence using Mr. Randolph's small framed house as part of the structure. During the present year this residence has been burned to the ground and the family of Judge Bouldin have sought another home on an adjoining place. Under these circumstances Mr. Bryan, who stood in such a near relation to Mr. Randolph, has deemed it best to remove his remains to Hollywood, the beautiful cemetery near Richmond. It is supposed by some that one motive which has determined Mr. Bryan to this course is his dissatisfaction with the character of John Randolph, as depicted by Powhatan Bouldin, a relation of Judge Wood Bouldin, in a book lately published under the title of "Home Reminiscences of Randolph, of Roanoke". In this work the dark side of Randolph's character is strikingly presented.
Source: ASHLAND PRESS (Ashland, Ashland Co., Ohio): 25 December 1879, Vol. XXXIV, No. 23