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Contributed by
Judy Carlson, 2000
By the late 1800’s, many immigrants had settled into various areas of Knox County. There were Swedes, Czechs, English, Germans, Irish, Norweigans, etc. Many of you do not know that we once had a Quaker settlement. In fact, we had two, only a few miles apart. One was at the settlement of Morrillville and the other was the settlement of Kemma. Both were located in Central township.
Having a need for a school, land was bought from William Boyce and a building was started in 1879 and completed in 1880. This is the same school that Jack Luckert moved to Center to restore, and after his death the family donated this school to the Knox County Fairgrounds. By 1881, church services were being held in the Morrillville school, and many early funerals were held in it also. Because Creighton was the nearest post office to this community, the people circulated a petition asking the Postal Department that a nearer post office should be granted. In 1883 a post office was granted in the Henry Morrill home, thus giving the community the name Morrillville.
In 1886 Amasa Andrews deeded, for the sum of $2.50, two acres in section 14 to the East Branch Cemetery Association. By the time the deed was filed, there were at least five burials here. The first recorded grave is that of Lester Cross, 6 month old son of James and Cynthia Cross. There are at least 65 recorded burials here, but I believe there to be more.
In 1890, Edward and Caroline Mark sold about three acres to the Trustees of the Friends Church, later known as the Kemma Friends Church. This was located in section 29. Not a lot of history is known about Kemma, but in the early local papers, a column was placed almost weekly with the news about the villagers of Kemma. There is now an old school house sitting where the church once stood, at the entrance to the field where the cemetery is located. No plat has ever been found for the Kemma cemetery, but with the inscriptions on the stones and the records from the State Historical Society, it is believed to hold at least sixteen burials. The first known burial is of Thomas Moorman who died in 1890, the same year the land was purchased. By 1915 there were no longer burials being made here.
The thing that struck me as odd in the Kemma Cemetery is that out of the sixteen burials, twelve were males. Of those, eight were under the age of 25. Typically you find more young women and babies in the pioneer cemeteries due to childbirth deaths.
The Morrillville Cemetery is located 6 miles west of Bloomfield, 1 ½ mile south, and ¼ mile east into a field. To get to the Kemma Cemetery, travel 6 miles west of Bloomfield, 4 miles south, 2 ½ miles west, ½ mile north and ¼ mile west into a field. Both cemeteries are over-grown with weeds and bushes. It is sad to see the beautiful stones hidden in this dense cover. Some of the stones have fallen off their pedestal and are lying face down in the dirt. The sunken ground clearly indicates where the burials are, adding to the disheveled look of the cemetery. It is understandable why later burials were placed in public cemeteries.
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