Oak Lawn Cemetery

K-163

Seven African American trustees acquired land here in 1885 and established Oak Lawn Cemetery. Community leaders interred here include John W. Richardson, president of the Phoenix Bank of Nansemond; Wiley H. Crocker, founder of the Tidewater Fair Association and Nansemond Development Corporation; William W. Gaines, Baptist minister and founder of the Nansemond Collegiate Institute; Fletcher Mae Howell, Baptist missionary; Dr. William T. Fuller, physician and banker; and William H. Walker, Tuskegee Airman. Also buried here are late-19th-century local politicians, United States Colored Troops, and veterans of World Wars I and II, Korea, and Vietnam.

Department of Historic Resources, 2019

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References/Bibliographic Citation:

Oak Lawn Cemetery Deed, Suffolk Circuit Court. https://www.findagrave.com/cemetery/51482/oak-lawn-cemetery The Historic Oak Lawn Cemetery Foundation: www.oaklawncemeterysuffolk.com Norfolk Journal and Guide, 19 Feb. 1921, 9 Sept. 1939, 17 July 1943, 21 Sept. 1963. Death Certificates: John W. Richardson, Wiley H. Crocker, Fletcher Mae Howell, William T. Fuller. Fletcher Mae Howell and Blanche Sydnor White, Working Together: History of the interracial Committee of the Baptist Women of Virginia (Richmond, 1952). Annette Montgomery, Suffolk (Mt. Pleasant, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2005).