Stone Gardens: One of the early pioneers of Scott County lies in historic Kirk Cemetery in the Caughron community
- Dennis McCaslin
- Nov 18
- 2 min read
Daniel Pearce arrived in what would become eastern Scott County in 1843. That year his name first appears on the county tax list, assessed for 160 acres in Township 3 North, Range 28 West, the same ridge where Kirk Cemetery sits today.
He was born about 1814 in Warren County, Tennessee. By 1840 he had married Elizabeth Center, and the couple began moving west with the first wave of permanent settlers into the Fourche La Fave River valley. They brought several young children with them and would have nine in all.
Pearce added to his holdings in 1848 with a federal land patent for another 240 acres. By 1860 he was farming 480 acres and was among the largest landowners in Tomlinson Township.In
1872 he deeded two acres “for church and burial purposes forever.”
That parcel became the site of Kirk Methodist Church (later destroyed by fire) and Kirk Cemetery. The original deed is recorded in Scott County Deed Book C, page 411.
Daniel Pearce died between June 1880 (when he was enumerated on the census, age 66) and early 1884 (when Elizabeth is listed as a widow on the tax rolls). No death record exists.
His grave is marked by a single native sandstone fieldstone bearing the scratched initials “D.P.” In 1996 descendants placed a modern granite footstone beside it that reads:
Daniel Pearce
Pioneer Settler of Cauthron
ca. 1814 – ca. 1885
Founder of this cemetery Elizabeth Center Pearce (1820–1898) lies next to him under a matching modern stone.
Kirk Cemetery remains small and wooded, with fewer than seventy known burials. Most are Pearce descendants or families who intermarried with them: Dozier, Oliver, Center, Condren.
Every second Sunday in June the Pearce family still holds its reunion at the cemetery. Attendees clean the grounds, eat lunch under the oaks, and maintain the site that Daniel Pearce set aside 153 years ago.
The land around the cemetery is still owned and farmed by his direct descendants.
