--Photo by Leroy Blair
The funeral home marker in the foreground is the only visible marker left here.
This cemetery is about three and a half miles east of Pangburn, about a quarter-mile off Highway 124 in Section 5, Township 9 North, Range 7 West. It was originally listed on New Year’s Day 1963 by Cloie Presley of the White County Historical Society and her young nephew who prepared a listing of nearby Coffey Cemetery that same day. (See COFFEY CEMETERY.) Mrs. Presley described Coffey Family Cemetery as being east of Coffey Cemetery "under the hill at an old house place." She reported finding "five or six graves but no markers."
The cemetery was visited August 8, 2000, by Historical Society member Leroy Blair, who filed the following report: "To get to this cemetery from Pangburn go east on Highway 124 about three and a half miles to the Ramsey Access Road to the Little Red River. Go about a quarter-mile to the second road that goes up the hill to a large house. The cemetery is directly on the other side of Ramsey Access Road from the road that goes to the house. It is about 100 feet back in the woods… The cemetery is in very bad condition. It has had a fence around it but it has fallen down. There is one grave that is marked by an old funeral home marker that is not readable. There is one grave marked by two rocks. There appear to be about three or four other graves without any markings. This cemetery is located near the Coffey Cemetery which is on a hill on the other side of Ramsey Road." Blair said in May 2004 that a local resident, Louie Yingling, told him that he recalled a "Red" Coffey being buried in this cemetery around 1935. Leon Van Patten of Searcy said in 2004 that J. Reed Coffey is buried here.
Another Historical Society member, Scott Akridge of Bradford, visited the cemetery in September 2004. He noted that the single funeral home marker here bears a patent date of December 1927. This means the burial occurred later than 1927 and might fit with the recollection that Red Coffey was buried here around 1935. Akridge noted that the cemetery is directly east of the driveway to a home that sits on a knoll east of Coffey Cemetery.
Leroy Blair visited this site again on February 18, 2005, and found evidence of recent logging activity nearby. However, the cemetery had not been damaged.
If you have corrections or additional information on Coffey Family Cemetery, contact the White County Historical Society at P.O. Box 537, Searcy, AR 72145.