Last updated: December 1, 2022
Place
Shawnee Indian Cemetery
Photographed by Susan Jezak Ford, courtesy of Kansas State Historic Preservation Office
Quick Facts
Location:
Shawnee, Kansas
Significance:
Native American, Social History
Designation:
Listed in the National Register of Historic Places, reference number: 100008244
MANAGED BY:
The Shawnee Indian Cemetery in Shawnee, Kansas is listed in the National Register of Historic Places for its connection to the Shawnee Tribe and burial practices in North America.
The Shawnee Tribe is an Algonquin-speaking Eastern Woodland tribe originating in the greater middle Ohio River Valley region with ties to the Fort Ancient civilization. As such, the historic homeland of the Shawnee Tribe includes portions of the modern states of Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky and West Virginia. Despite forced removal and marginalization from the region, the Shawnee Tribe maintains strong ties to this land dotted with Shawnee settlements, sacred sites, and burial grounds.
The half-acre Shawnee Cemetery is the most prominent of just a handful of Johnson County cemeteries in which only members of the Shawnee Tribe are buried. The oldest physical marker in the cemetery documenting a burial is for Nancy Parks, who died at the age of six years old in 1837. Nancy was the daughter of Shawnee leader Joseph Parks and his Wyandot wife Catherine. The marker with the next chronological date is that of Robert Bluejacket, who died in 1858. Most of the cemetery’s burials took place in the 1860s. The latest stone bears an 1870 date for Julia Ann Bluejacket, second wife of Charles Bluejacket.
Charles Bluejacket, acting as a representative of the Shawnee Methodist Church, leased the five acres to Peter Wertz, the owner of a local grocery store in 1897. Wertz was given permission to use the portion of the property not occupied by graves as a garden. Bluejacket gave Wertz a 99-year lease on the five acres to expire on October 25, 1996. Today only three gravestones are standing. The Joseph Parks obelisk, located on the cemetery’s east boundary, was re-set and restored in 2004. There is a short marker for Charles Silverheels, who died in 1864, just north of the Joseph Parks obelisk. The third standing stone, located in the center of the cemetery, is for James Randall, one-year-old son of M.P. and E. Randall.
In 2022, Kansas Governor Laura Kelley signed Senate Bill 405, authorizing the Kansas State Historical Society (KSHS), to convey the Shawnee Indian Cemetery located in Johnson County, to the Shawnee Tribe.
The Shawnee Tribe is an Algonquin-speaking Eastern Woodland tribe originating in the greater middle Ohio River Valley region with ties to the Fort Ancient civilization. As such, the historic homeland of the Shawnee Tribe includes portions of the modern states of Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky and West Virginia. Despite forced removal and marginalization from the region, the Shawnee Tribe maintains strong ties to this land dotted with Shawnee settlements, sacred sites, and burial grounds.
The half-acre Shawnee Cemetery is the most prominent of just a handful of Johnson County cemeteries in which only members of the Shawnee Tribe are buried. The oldest physical marker in the cemetery documenting a burial is for Nancy Parks, who died at the age of six years old in 1837. Nancy was the daughter of Shawnee leader Joseph Parks and his Wyandot wife Catherine. The marker with the next chronological date is that of Robert Bluejacket, who died in 1858. Most of the cemetery’s burials took place in the 1860s. The latest stone bears an 1870 date for Julia Ann Bluejacket, second wife of Charles Bluejacket.
Charles Bluejacket, acting as a representative of the Shawnee Methodist Church, leased the five acres to Peter Wertz, the owner of a local grocery store in 1897. Wertz was given permission to use the portion of the property not occupied by graves as a garden. Bluejacket gave Wertz a 99-year lease on the five acres to expire on October 25, 1996. Today only three gravestones are standing. The Joseph Parks obelisk, located on the cemetery’s east boundary, was re-set and restored in 2004. There is a short marker for Charles Silverheels, who died in 1864, just north of the Joseph Parks obelisk. The third standing stone, located in the center of the cemetery, is for James Randall, one-year-old son of M.P. and E. Randall.
In 2022, Kansas Governor Laura Kelley signed Senate Bill 405, authorizing the Kansas State Historical Society (KSHS), to convey the Shawnee Indian Cemetery located in Johnson County, to the Shawnee Tribe.