PROJECT HIGHLIGHT: Old City Cemetery Restoration

Memorial site of Bransford Vawter, a poet from Lynchburg, VA

Restoring & Preserving Lynchburg History

Old City Cemetery is a Lynchburg landmark with a lush arboretum and beautiful public gardens, as well as the resting place for nearly 20,000 city residents since its founding in 1806. In 2023, we joined the effort to preserve its charm for decades. 

Bransford Vawter, often called "Lynchburg's first poet," gained national attention with his poem "I'd Offer Thee This Hand of Mine" in 1834. A local Quill and Scroll Society chapter presented a memorial stone for his grave in the 1930s, but the wall surrounding his memorial had fallen into disrepair in recent years. Our team restored it to its original beauty.

Local lore claims that Bransford wrote his poem about a forbidden love for Flora Ann Norvell, the daughter of a well-to-do family and above-class for Bransford.

I'd Offer Thee This Hand of Mine

I'd offer thee this hand of mine

If I could love thee less

But hearts so warm, so fond as thine

Should never know distress.

My fortune is too hard for thee

T'would chill thy dearest joy

I'd rather weep to see thee free

Than win thee to destroy.