The Lloyds of LM

[It’s not known if the Lloyds of Livingston Manor are descendants
of the famous LLOYDS of LONDON but are likely related]

William Lloyd and Miss Marion Lyden of Livingston Manor were married at the Presbyterian Manse on November 6 by Rev. Joseph E Harvard. They were attended by the groom’s sister, Mrs. Lester Vredenburgh and her husband.

The Western Union office at the O&W station was closed on the 15^th. Mrs. Robert Lloyd, operator, returned to her home in Port Jervis.

Robert Lloyd has returned from New York where he was a patient for several weeks in the Hospital for Bone and Joint Disease, undergoing surgery for fractured vertebrae. He is much improved and expects to recover completely

“While details are missing, three Manor soldiers are reported wounded in action and another is missing in action, according to reports received by their families from the War Department.

“Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd were notified that their son, Oscar, was wounded in action November 11^th, while serving with the 9^th Army in Germany. He is the husband of Mrs. Marion Lyden Lloyd.

“Mr. and Mrs. Martin Tuttle have received word that their son, LeGrand Tuttle, has been wounded on the European front.

“Word has been received by his parents that Paul Rheinheimer of Shandelee, a half brother of Chris Rheinheimer of the Manor, that he has been wounded while fighting in the Pacific area. He is a brother of Mrs. Ernest Schleiermacher of the Manor.

“Mrs. Ida M. Cobb of bovina, formerly of Livingston Manor has been notified that her son, Sergeant Robert R. Owen, has been reported missing in action since November 8^th in Germany.” 47-19

“PVT Oscar Lloyd, son of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd, who was first reported missing in action and later reported killed.

“PVT Lloyd was born in Hazel in 1920. He made his home there until 1936. His parents moved to Livingston Manor at that time. He entered the service February 29, 1955. After only four and a half months training in the infantry, he was sent overseas. He was serving in Patton’s third Army in France. His wife received a telegram December 7^th of her husband’s death. Besides his wife and a son, he is survived by his parents and two sisters.” 47-21

“Robert Lloyd Sr., a boiler fireman in the employ of the A. Leighton co at their Elk Brook factory, was badly hurt last Thursday evening while trying to board train 3 at Roscoe station.

“Lloyd had been in town all day and had been drinking some, but was not intoxicated at the time of the accident. He wanted to go to Rock Rift and bought a ticket for that place. A number of men from Horton and Elk Brook were waiting at the station and when the train came all got on but he and two others, who waited until the train was ready to start. A trainman then seeing them stand there, told them to get aboard if they were coming, but they still made no move to come and he closed the door as the train started. Seeing they were goint to be left, all three made a rush and caught the handrail of the next car, but in some way Lloyd was pushed off by the two men and fell, the wheel passing over his foot. The train was stopped and the company surgeon sent for. The injured man was taken on the train to his home at Elk Brook and the let amputated above the ankle by Drs. Miller and Allaben.

“Mr. Lloyd condition was very serious for some time, as he is subject to heart disease but he is now doing well and will probably recover.” 54-48

“A son, William Oscar, was born to Mr. and Mrs. Robert O Lloyd of Hazel, August 10.” 63-98, 67-110

“Robert Lloyd Jr. and Wm. Harty were callers at the county seat Saturday.” 34-11 [Hazel]

“Robert Lloyd and family were calling on friends and relatives in Carbondale Pa. over the weekend.” 34-12 [Hazel]

“Robert Lloyd Jr. and family made a business trip to Roscoe on Monday.” 34-12 [Hazel]

“Ford Darling and family of Forest City, Pa. were weekend visitors at Robert Lloyd’s.” [Hazel] 34-14

“Mrs. L. Kannigeaser and daughter Mary, also Mrs. R. Lloyd were callers in Roscoe Saturday.” [Hazel] 34-24

“Mrs. Robert Lloyd was a business caller in Roscoe on Saturday. [Hazel]” 35-34

“Mr. and Mrs. Louis Kennigeaser and Mrs. Robert Lloyd and son Oscar were callers in Roscoe on Saturday. [Hazel]” 35-35

“R. Lloyd Sr. returned here Thursday of last week after spending several days with relatives in Parksville. [Hazel]” 35-35

“Mr. and Mrs. F. Darling and daughter Alice, also Mrs. Leonard Page and three children of Forest City, spent Friday until Sunday at the home of Robert Lloyd. [Hazel]” 35-35

“Mrs. F. Darling of Forest City, spent a few days last week with her mother, Mrs. R. Lloyd, who has been very ill.” [Hazel] 35-37

“Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd Jr are rejoicing over the arriver of a new daughter, Lydia Iona.” 65-30

“Mrs. Robert Lloyd Sr. who is critically ill at the home of her son Robert Lloyd Jr. does not improve as fast as could be desired.” 65-129

“Mrs. Robert Lloyd Sr. who has been ailing so very long, passed away Monday morning.” 65-133

“Fire destroyed the building containing the oven room at the Keery Chemical Company plant at Hazel early Wednesday morning, threatening the rest of the large factory. Timely aid by the Roscoe fire department saved property worth many thousands of dollars.

“The blaze was discovered at about 3:20 by Robert Lloyd and John Brining Jr. who found flames coming from the acetate hopper from a kiln. ….” 34-17

“Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd and children, also R. Lloyd Sr. are spending a few days with relatives in Forest City.” [Hazel] 34-28

“Children who cannot go out in the snow to play because they have no shoes and men who cannot to into the woods to work because they have no clothes – these are only two of the difficulties faced by the eighty men, women and children of the hamlet of Hazel where the Keery acid factory, the only source of employment, closed last week for an indefinite period.

“Discovery of the acid workers’ plight came indirectly through an infection of the right arm, suffered by Mrs. Rose Moore, 54, widow of a woodcutter who died last week. Mrs. Moore, delirious from pain, was taken Sunday by Mrs. Potech to Monticello Hospital, where she was found to be suffering form malnutrition as well as from blood poisoning. Her condition, described as serious on admittance, was improved Monday night.

“Families living in company houses wonder how they are to pay the $7 monthly rent – with $9 added for fuel – if they can’t work. Men whose credit is exhausted at the company store and others whose credit is running low there because their last pay envelopes didn’t cover their food bills, wonder how they are going to feed their families.

“For their part, the men who own the acid factory, wonder how they are going to reopen the plant when the market for wood acetate, wood alcohol and charcoal is so bad that it doesn’t pay to make any of the three any longer. And the children who attend the district school on route 17, half a mile from the acid works, wonder why their parents can’t but them sweaters, and shoes and stockings and things other boys and girls have.

“The acid plant is owned by the Thomas Keery Co., Inc., of Hancock which also operates a plant at Cadosia. There is no bitterness evident because of the shut-down.

“Officials of the Keery firm are expected in Hazel to see what can be done toward providing emergency employment. It was the hope of most families that a plan would be developed to permit each man to cut a cod or wood a day, which, at the company price of $1.85, would give them $37.50 in their pay envelopes at the end of the month.

“Houses at Hazel rent for either $3 a month for dwellings “across the brook”, or for $7 a month for the more substantial but hardly luxurious frame type that comprises the company row. In addition, each house pays $9 a month for fuel, which means all the wood that can be burned.

“Rockland township, through its welfare officer Douglass Collins, has given assurance that no one will go hungry. Mrs. Susanna Potech, county Welfare commissioner, has promised to do what she can for the hamlet. And there is a report that the Keery company intends to replace the wood acetate stills with new equipment for manufacturing a solvent recently developed at the Cadosia plant and said to have found a ready market among paint manufacturers.” Loose

“The James Lyden family have moved from an apartment in Mrs. Rose Park’s house on Pearl Street to Beaver Lake Hotel, where they will act as caretakers for the winter.” 47-82

“Mrs. Robert Lloyd of Livingston Manor was a business caller here Thursday.” [Hazel] 35-39

“Mrs. Robert Lloyd of Livingston Manor spent several days here at the home of Mr. and Mrs. George Clapper.” [Hazel] 34-21

“Mrs. Gussie Lloyd and daughter Alida of Livingston Manor are spending some time at the home of Mr. and Mrs. George Clapper.” [Hazel] 34-21

“A son, Robert James, was born on November 21^st, to Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Lloyd of Livingston Manor. The other was Marion Lyden.” 48-34

“James Lyden and son, Paul, spent the holiday at their home here. Mr. Lyden is employed in the shipyards at Newark and Paul is working in a store in that city.” 48-10

“Oscar Lloyd who was inducted into the Army several weeks ago left on Tuesday of this week for Camp Upton.” 47-130

“While details are missing, three Manor soldiers are reported wounded in action and another is missing in action, according to reports received by their families from the War Department.

“Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd were notified that their son, Oscar, was wounded in action November 11^th, while serving with the Ninth Army in Germany. He is the husband of Mrs. Marion Lyden Lloyd.

“Mr. and Mrs. Martin Tuttle have received word that their son LeGrand Tuttle has been wounded on the European front.

“Word has been received by his parents that Paul Reinheimer of Shandelee, a half brother of Chris Reinheimer of the Manor, that he has been wounded while fighting in the Pacific area. He is a brother of Mrs. Ernest Schleiermacher of the Manor.

“Mrs. Ida M. Cobb of Bovina, formerly of Livingston Manor, has been notified that her son, Sergeant Robert R. Owen has been reported missing in action since November 8^th over Germany.” 47-19

“James Lyden and son, Edwin, of Newark, have been in town for several days.” 47-115

“Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd were notified that their son, Oscar Lloyd was wounded in action November 11^th while serving with the Ninth Army in Germany. He is the husband of Mrs. Marian Lyden Lloyd.” 47-115

“Mrs. Oscar Lloyd and baby had gone to Newark to make their home with her parents, Mr. and Mrs. James Lyden, the day before word was received here of the death of her husband in action.” 47-115

“PVT Oscar Lloyd, son of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Lloyd, who was first reported missing in action and later reported killed.

“Pvt. Lloyd was born in Hazel in 1920. He made his home there until 1936. His parents moved to Livingston Manor at that time. He entered the service February 29, 1944. After only four and a half months training in the infantry, he was sent overseas. He was serving in Patton’s Third Army in France. His wife received a telegram of her husband’s death. Besides his wife and a son, he is survived by his parents and two sisters.” 47-21

“Mrs. Gussie Lloyd, her daughter-in-law Mrs. Oscar Lloyd and the latter’s brother, Edwin Lyden of Newark were in town the first of the week.” 47-116

“Mrs. Gussie Lloyd and grandchildren have moved into the Wright house just south of the village on Route 17. Her daughter, Mrs. Lester Vredenburgh of Newark is with her at present.” 47-115

“Mrs. Jane Lyden, son Paul and daughter Mrs. Robert Lloyd and baby of Newark spent the weekend in town.” 47-121

“In loving memory of our beloved husband and father, Oscar W. Lloyd who was killed in action November 18, 1944;

“Robert Lloyd is in a New York hospital where he was operated on Tuesday for a back injury. Eighteen months ago when Mr. Lloyd and his brother-in-law were tearing down an old building in Roscoe, a staircase caved in, heavy timbers pinning him down. Several vertebrae were fractured. His son-in-law and daughter, Mr. and Mrs. Glenford Shaver, were allowed to visit him briefly Wednesday.” 48-23

“Robert Lloyd has moved from an apartment in the Hanson building on Main Street to one in the Ramsey house farther up the street.” 48-132

“James A. Lyden, aged 66, died in Newark, New Jersey, Wednesday, November 30^th. He was born in Livingston Manor May 27, 1894, a son of John and Margaret A. Kelly Lyden who for many years conducted the Lyden Hotel which stood on or near the present site of the Abe and Yetta Schwartz home on Main Street.

He was married to Mildred Sprague who survives him. Also surviving are two sons, Paul of Callicoon Center and Edward of Newark; two daughters, Mrs. Loretta Korth of Callicoon Center and Mrs. Marian Imiff of Newark, also two brothers, Frank and John Lyden of Livingston Manor.

“Interment was in the family plot in St. Peter’s Cemetery, Liberty.” 48-38

“Funeral services will be held today at the Russell Funeral Chapel in Livingston Manor for Gussie Lloyd who died in the Monticello Hospital February 6^th. Mrs. Lloyd, who was 74, had been living in Bloomingburg for the past several years.

“Mrs. Lloyd was born February 17, 1886, the daughter of Mahilan and Ella Swarthout Knox. She was the widow of Robert Lloyd. She is survived by two daughters, Mrs. Alida Shaver and Mrs. Virginia Steenrod, both of Bloomingburg.

“Marion Lyden Imhoff of Livingston Manor, a life-long area resident, died Saturday, July 25^th at Community General Hospital, Harris, after a long illness. She was 65.

“The daughter of the late James and Mildred Sprague Lyden, she was born March 9, 1922 in Livingston Manor.

“Survivors include one daughter, Debbie DeJesus of Danbury, Conn.; two brothers, Edward Lyden of Livingston and Paul Lyden of Lakeland, Florida; one sister Loretta Korth of Callicoon.

Oscar William Lloyd’s son, Robert James Lloyd, was born November 21, 1942. Oscar was born at Roscoe and was a laborer and was married to Marian Irene Lyden, age 20, who was born at the Manor. 47-75

Oscar W. Lloyd, Private First Class, US Army, was part of the 134^th Infantry Regiment, 35^th Division and died on November 18, 1944. He is buried at Lorraine American Cemetery at St. Avold, France. 47-69

The 1930 census has the family of Robert Lloyd, age 39, and his wife, Augusta, 45, and employed as a laborer in the alcohol plant, probably at Hazel. Three children are listed; Oscar 9, Virginia 7 and Elida 3.

William Oscar Lloyd, age 18, married Marian Irene Lyden, age 18, on November 6, 1940 by the Rev. Joseph Harvard.

Lloyd was a laborer, born at Hazel, the son of Robert and Gussie Knox Lloyd. Marian was the daughter of James and Mildred Sprague Lyden.

Oscar and Marian Lloyd had a son, Robert James Lloyd, who was born on November 21, 1942. The father’s age was 22, the mother’s 20.

Virginia Mae Lloyd was born November 20, 1922. She was the daughter of Robert Lloyd, a night watchman for the factory, age 32, and Gussie Knox, age 37.

Lida Iona Lloyd was born September 24, 1926 to Robert Lloyd, age 36, and Gussie Knox, age 41, whose residence was at Hazel. They had four children, three of whom were living. Robert was born at Keeryville and was employed as a laborer while Gussie was born at Port Jervis.

Frances Lloyd died on November 22, 1926 at Hazel. She was married to Robert Lloyd. She was born on July 4, 1848 and was 78 years, 4 months and 18 days old. She was self-employed as a housekeeper. She was originally from Orange County and lived in the town of Rockland for 7 years and 4 months. Cause of death was labor pneumonia. [Oscar’s grandmother]

Robert Oscar Lloyd died on May 14, 1928, at the age of 77 years, 3 months and 6 days. He was born on February 8, 1851 at Otsego County. He lived in the town of Rockland for 8 years and 7 months. His father was Oscar Lloyd, born at Cooperstown, and mother was Elizabeth Simmonds, born at Cooperstown. He had chronic heart disease and died of labor pneumonia. [Oscar’s grandfather]

On a knoll overlooking the junction of the Willowemoc and Beaverkill rivers near the village of Roscoe, is located the community burial ground known as Riverview Cemetery. Winds whisper through the boughs of the stately pine trees that reign over the cemetery's inhabitants, perhaps offering solace to those weary travelers whose life journeys have ended and are laid beneath these trees. With the end of the acid
factory era, the Lloyd family journey has come to rest in a quiet corner of this cemetery, in graves simply marked in which three of the four family members lie. However, the son, Oscar Lloyd, is not amongst them, for his journey ended on a French battlefield in November of 1944 and is buried at Lorraine American Cemetery in France.

In the same Roscoe cemetery, along its outside boundary where the brambles struggle to intrude onto the burial ground, lays a lone grave adorned with the simplest of headstones. The stone is no more
than a well-weathered boulder, with an inscription hand-chiseled into its surface. This rock's ledger describes the grave's occupant as being Robert Lloyd, accompanied with the date of November 21, 1942; the date of the birth of Oscar Lloyd's son. The how and why of the stone and its inscription is intriguing, but unknown. Likewise, the particular circumstances of Robert Lloyd remain a mystery.

The end of World War I brought on the beginning; the beginning of the end of the wood chemical industry. Before the war, the chemical products produced by the burning of wood was beginning to be replaced by synthetic substitutes, but with the conflict and the new need for the products as components for explosives and wood alcohol, demand was up and the local factories were once again prosperous. Of the local factories, Thomas Keery’s plants were to have an advantage as they were located along the Ontario & Western Railroad. At the Hazel chemical factory, a track siding, which connected to the O&W main line, offered the company easier access to railroad transportation and less handling of the products. When the wartime demand was over, and natural resources becoming depleted, smaller companies either closed or suffered devastating fires. As competition lessened, the Keery plants continued to prosper, somewhat, though this prosperity was not necessarily shared with the company’s labor force.

At Hazel, drab dwellings were erected to house families of the factory workers. Other employees, including factory workers, wood-choppers and teamsters, made their residence in the large boarding house, for a time run by Elmer Knapp, manager of the Hazel factory. The families came from Delaware County and from across the Delaware River in Pennsylvania. Most of the men were experienced in the chemical business and had worked at other factory localities, often in a Thomas Keery plant, which at one time were numerous throughout the upper Delaware River valleys. The work was long, hard and dangerous, but for these folks, especially before the outbreak of the Second World War, felt fortunate to have work. The pay was meager, a weekly paycheck of $13 to $15 during this period was common, most of which went for supplies at the Keery company store. They were poor, and even though they had work, they would remain poor until they moved out, which was often to another factory community.

The biggest fear for these folks was the closing of the factory. As smaller chemical plants closed during the years after the First World War, many of these families wound up at the large Keery factories at Hazel and Cadosia. A fire at one of these factories would be devastating , not only to the factory but for the families that it supported. Early in the morning of January 26^th, 1925, the chemical factory of G.H. Treyz at the community of Willowemoc was discovered to be on fire. The large, one story, metal covered frame building was completely consumed by flames, leaving only embers and a pile of twisted metal in its wake. The twenty-five employees who worked at the factory were immediately thrown out of work, and with the eventual abandonment of the enterprise, the community never recovered.

Early in the morning of April 27^th 1927, Robert Lloyd, night watchman of the Hazel factory, discovered flames coming from the building that housed the oven room. The Hazel plant was considered a modern facility for instead of burning wood in retorts, as was the practice, wood was loaded on small steel cars and moved on the tracks into the oven building where it was heated until the byproducts were produced. The smoldering wood on one of these cars ignited and set the oven building on fire. Fortunately, Lloyd discovered the fire soon enough so that the fire was contained to just the one building, minimizing the damage. It was immediately replaced with an all-steel structure and the plant continued to operate, to the relief of the workers and their families.

The Lloyd family moved to the Livingston Manor area in 1912. The family origins, in the mid nineteenth century, were at Cooperstown, Otsego County, when the family began its odyssey of following the acid factory trail. Oscar Lloyd worked at the original Keery factory located at Keerysville, in Delaware County, where his son, Robert Oscar Lloyd was born. Robert O. Lloyd migrated to the factory town of Elk Brook, along the lower Beaverkill, and worked at the acid factory of Arthur Leighton. His son, Robert Jr. worked at the Leighton plant as a child, until, at the age of 20, made the move to Hazel. He married Gussie Knox and together had four children, three who survived. William Oscar Lloyd, known as “Oscar”, who was the oldest child, was born August 10^th, 1920, followed by two sisters, Virginia in 1922 and Lida in 1926.

By the mid thirties, competition from synthetic chemicals coupled with hard economic times shut down the smaller and unproductive wood chemical plants throughout the upper Delaware River valley region. Those few that survived, including the Keery factory at Hazel, went for long periods where the plant ceased operations, creating severe hardships on those families already accustomed to a hard life. Those families living in company houses paid a monthly rent of $7, and without the plant operating, were required to pay a $9 monthly bill for home-heating fuel. Without the monthly income, as slight as it was, credit was soon exhausted at the company store. The families scrimped and scavenged what they could, or they simply did without.

The plight of the Hazel residents became known when, in January of 1835, Mrs. Rose Moore, who was suffering from an infection, was taken to a Monticello hospital. There, it was quickly determined that she was suffering from severe malnutrition besides the blood poisoning. Authorities at the county seat’s welfare office, along with the Town of Rockland welfare officer, soon discovered that the condition of Mrs. Moore was not an isolated incident, but rather just the tip of the iceberg of troubles plaguing the eighty-some men, women and children from the acid factory community. Besides being malnourished, some families lacked heating fuel, worn-out clothing could not be afforded to be replaced and many of the children were without shoes. The children were sent to the Hazel school, just one half of a mile down the state highway from the community, lacking shoes, stockings and warm sweaters. During this era when all suffered from economic hard times, the crises situation for the Hazel residents was an obvious emergency.

When the news made the front pages of the local newspapers, the folks from Sullivan County responded. Within a week, donations of clothing, food, shoes and toys poured in from all over other areas of the county. The Thomas Keery factory, though still remaining closed as it was being refitted with new equipment, agreed to open the surrounding woods to woodchoppers, allowing the idle men to cut four-foot cordwood both for storage at the Hazel plant or to be transported down the line to Keery’s factory at Cadosia. For all those who were able to swing an axe, cutting cordwood at $1.25 a cord gave the family a monthly income of over $30, plus allowing them credit in the company store. Other men found work in government subsidized programs, the sewer project at Roscoe and the Conservation Camp that became the Beaverkill Campsite. Eventually the Hazel factory reopened, but never again operating at its earlier pace, and again leaving many of the folks at Hazel idle, and poor, for long periods of time. Many of the families, no longer able to depend on the factory for work, began to move out.

The Robert Lloyd family moved out of the Hazel factory house in 1936, renting an apartment at Livingston Manor. There, young Oscar met Marian Irene Lyden, daughter of James and Mildred Lyden. Marian’s grandparents, Maggie and John Lyden, conducted a hotel business on Main Street, the old Robert Bloomer place that was known as the Lyden House, a very popular social hall for both the local and traveling public. James, their son, was responsible for transporting the guests to and from the depot, and when the family sold the hotel, continued in the delivery business, serving other area hotels, as well as becoming the caretaker for the Beaver Lake Hotel above Old Morsston. With the war years approaching, he found work for the war effort at Newark, New Jersey, moving and remaining there.

Oscar Lloyd and Marian Lyden were married on November 6^th, 1940, at the Presbyterian Manse at Livingston Manor by the young minister, Reverend Joseph Harvard. Oscar found work as a laborer and the young couple resided in an apartment on Main Street, when on November 21^st, 1942, they began a family with the birth of a son. Robert James Lloyd was the baby’s name, adopting both the names of his grandparents. The lives of this family, as well as that of the young minister who joined them together, would be interrupted by the drumbeat of the coming war.

Oscar Lloyd was inducted into the service on February 29^th, 1944. With the escalation of hostilities on the European war front after the Normandy invasion, the dire need of manpower and the rush to end the war before the coming winter, new recruits were quickly rushed through stateside training and into action on the battlefront. Lloyd spent only four months in infantry training before departing from New York to join the 134^th Infantry Regiment in England. On July 6^th, 1944, one month after D-Day, the 134^th Regiment, as part of the 35^thInfantry Division, landed on Omaha Beach and by the 11^th was engaged with the Germans. Throughout that summer and early fall, the Allied army pressed the German army through France back to the German borders. Outpacing their supply lines, along with the severe wet weather during October, caused the Allied army to pause, allowing the Germans time to strengthen their lines. The 134^th Regiment were in a defensive position along the Foret de Gremercy, near the French city of Nancy, patrolling, gathering information on the enemy, fighting off half-hearted enemy counter-attacks, and suffering from the relative inactivity through the rain and chill of the European autumn.

On November 8^th, the Allied offensive resumed in spite of the weather. The 134^th, initially held in reserve, joined in the fray on the 10^th, initially encountering light resistance. On the morning of Armistice Day, the 11^th, the assault battalions resumed their drive until met by German tanks, offering stubborn resistance and stalling the 134^th’s advance. Infantry soldiers, with their light weaponry, were never considered a match against the heavy guns of enemy tanks, unless they could get within close range, a risky proposition. Platoons from the 134^th stalked the German armor through the withering blasts from the heavy guns until they were within ten yards of the tank, close enough to drop grenades into the turret. Similar stories of heroism were common amongst the boys of the 134^th that day, but it was not without some cost.

During the first week of December, 1944, Robert and Gussie Lloyd received a letter from the War Department notifying them that their son had been wounded in action on November 11^th. Little other information was divulged, the parents not knowing that, in fact, when they received the message, Oscar Lloyd had already suffered for a week with his grievous wounds and had already died in an Army hospital on November 18^th. Upon word of her husband being wounded, Marion, along with her infant son, moved to the comfort and sympathy provided at the home of her parents at Newark, New Jersey. There she received final word of her husband’s true fate.

On a knoll, overlooking the junction of the Willowemoc and Beaverkill creeks in the village of Roscoe, is the community burial ground known as Riverview Cemetery. Winds whisper though the boughs of the stately pine trees that intermingle with the cemetery’s inhabitants, perhaps offering solace to those weary travelers whose life journeys have ended up within the roots of these trees. With the end of the acid factory era, the Lloyd family journey has come to rest in a quiet corner of this cemetery. In simple marked graves, tended to by descendants, the parents of Oscar Lloyd, Robert and Gussie, lay alongside that of his sister, Virginia. The son, though, never did return home, remaining in the foreign country he defended and died for, forever separated from wife, son and family. The journey’s end for Oscar Lloyd is located at plot J, row 25, grave 23, Lorraine American Cemetery, St. Avoid, France.

In the same Roscoe cemetery, along its outside boundary where the brambles are intruding onto the burial-ground, lies a lone grave with a simple headstone. The stone is no more than a well-weathered boulder, the inscription finely hand chiseled. The rock’s ledger describes the grave’s occupant as Robert Lloyd, accompanied with the date of November 21, 1942; the date of birth for Oscar Lloyd’s son. The how and why of the hand carving must be intriguing, though not known. What is known is that this grave is marked with a memorial marker, same as the graves of his ancestors, proving that he and his father, along with the rest of the family are still being remembered;

“In loving memory of our beloved husband and father, Oscar W. Lloyd, who was killed in action November 18, 1944;

During the first week of December, 1944, Robert and Gussie Lloyd
received a letter from the War Department notifying them that their
son had been wounded in action on November 11th. Little other
information was divulged, the parents not knowing that, in fact, when
they received the message, Oscar Lloyd had suffered for a week with
his grievous wounds and had already died in an Army hospital on
November 18th. Upon word of her husband being wounded, Marion, along
with her infant son, moved to the comfort and sympathy provided at
the home of her parents at Newark, New Jersey. There she received
final word, at the end of the month, of her husband's true fate.

On a knoll overlooking the junction of the Willowemoc and Beaverkill
creeks at the village of Roscoe, is located the community burial
ground known as Riverview Cemetery. Winds whisper through the boughs
of the stately pine trees that reign over the cemetery's inhabitants,
perhaps offering solace to those weary travelers whose life journeys
have ended and are laid beneath these trees. With the end of the acid
factory era, the Lloyd family journey has come to rest in a quiet
corner of this cemetery. In simple marked graves, tended to by
descendants, the parents of Oscar Lloyd, Robert and Gussie, lay
alongside that of his sister, Virginia. Their son, though, is not
amongst them, for he never returned home from the foreign country he
defended and died for. The journey's end for Oscar Lloyd can be found
at plot J, row 25, grave 23, Lorraine American Cemetery, At. Avoid,
France.

In the same Roscoe cemetery, along its outside boundary where the
brambles struggle to intrude onto the burial ground, lies a lone
grave adorned with the simplest of headstones. The stone is no more
than a well-weathered boulder, with an inscription hand-chiseled
into its surface. The rock's ledger describes the grave's occupant as
Robert Lloyd, accompanied with the date of November 21, 1942; the
date of the birth of Oscar Lloyd's son. The how and why of the stone
and hand carving must be intriguing, though not known. What is known
is that this grave is marked with a memorial marker, same as the
graves of his grandparents, proving that he and his father, along
with the rest of the family, are still being remembered;

“Funeral services will be held today at the Russell Chapel in Livingston Manor for Gussie Lloyd who died in the Monticello February 6^th. Mrs. Lloyd, who was 74, had been living in Bloomingburg for the past several years.

“Marion Lyden Imhoff of Livingston Manor, a life-long area resident, died Saturday, July 25^th at Community General Hospital, Harris, after a long illness. She was 65.

“The daughter of the late James and Mildred Sprague Lyden, she was born March 9, 1922 in Livingston Manor.

“Survivors include one daughter, Debbie DeJesus of Danbury Conn.; two brothers, Edward Lyden of Livingston Manor and Paul Lyden of Lakeland, Florida; one sister Loretta Korth of Callicoon.

Cemeteries are the treasures left behind by our local history. We walk upon this world but for only a brief period of time but once entombed into the heavenly portions of earth, our legacies become eternal. At these hallowed grounds, life becomes condensed in death’s script, chiseled upon the headstone marking the grave. To ramble amongst the tombstones of our local cemeteries is to walk through lesson after lesson of local history. By interpreting the words and numbers of these once meticulously carved furrows and grooves cut into the stone, the sharp edges weathered away by nature’s elements, stories that have been taken to the grave and long-forgotten over the passage of relentless time are again brought to life. Whether it’s a celebration of a life or its tragic ending, these stones are history’s textbooks within the classroom of Rockland’s cemeteries.

When the headstone records its grave’s occupant to have died at a young age, such as the above inscription found in the Methodist Church Cemetery at Livingston Manor, it often represents some tragic event that befell the deceased. George Huftalin had worked at the Mandeville Chemical Factory at the Manor since the plant first began operating in 1880. But accidents can happen even to the most experienced workers. During the late evening of March 12, 1891, when, as he was walking along planks above vats of boiling chemical, he became blinded by a sudden burst of acidic steam. Unable to see where he was walking, his foot missed the plank and he fell into one of the vats. Though quickly pulled out of the boiling cauldron, the burns that he received were so severe that he survived only a few agonizing hours.

“In Memory of Dr. O B Maynard and Maretta, His Wife, Who Died January 16, 1873, Aged 30 & 20 Years; They Were Drowned While Returning From a Donation”

This tombstone located at the Lew Beach Cemetery describes another tragic event. After the Civil War, Orrin Maynard, who was a hospital steward during the war, became a physician and set up a practice at Hamden, in Delaware County. After attending a donation held to raise funds for the local minister, Dr. Maynard and his young bride, along with an acquaintance, set off in their sleigh for home. With the recent January thaw filling the Delaware River with snow melt, the valley had quickly become flooded during the evening. Crossing the Hamden covered bridge in the dark of a winter’s night, Maynard was unable to see that the lower portion of the bridge had been washed away. Exiting the bridge’s eastern portal, the sleigh and its occupants were dumped into the frigid waters and swept away. Nobody survived.

Though this headstone is located outside of the Town of Rockland in the old cemetery at the neighboring village of Parksville, the date of October 3, 1874, is noteworthy for being the date of one of the most infamous events to occur at Livingston Manor. Sylvester Carr, a burly Civil War veteran who was well-liked throughout the community, was working behind the bar that evening at the Purvis Hotel. When Mark Brown, who labored as a lumberman in the local forests and had a weakness for intoxicant beverages, became overly zealot in demanding to be served at the bar, “Vet” Carr grabbed the young hot-head by the neck and threw him out of the hotel and into the street. An hour after the fracas Brown returned to the hotel and confronted Carr. Without hesitation the instigator pulled out a revolver from his pocket and shot Carr in the side of the head. The death of “Vet” Carr over an unpaid bar tab of $1.20 led to the arrest of the hot tempered Brown, who would later be hung the following summer at the courthouse in Monticello.

One headstone in the Beaverkill Cemetery stands out, not because of the make of stone or style of its sculpture, but due to its proximity to the church building that the cemetery surrounds, being only about a foot distant from the structure. George and Mabel Dorler purchased a potion of the Llewellyn Jersey farm, situated along the banks of the Beaverkill River. Here, on a knoll overlooking the river, George erected a hotel which became known as the Beaverkill Mountain House. Unfortunately, the Dorlers did not have clear title to the property, and when they tried to straighten the matter out, they found that Jersey was unsympathetic to their problem. After a day of business, and heavy drinking, in the village, the Dorlers returned to their hotel. That night, it was alleged, Mabel ventured outdoors in the summer evening’s warmth and did not return. Search parties formed the following morning soon found her lying in the bottom of the river, somehow being tangled up in a rope which was wrapped around her. George was so distressed over the death of his wife that, while Mabel’s body lay in the hotel’s parlor in wait for the arrival of the coroner, he shot himself, his body slumping over his lifeless wife. Was it a murder-suicide or an accident? The mystery has forever remained unsolved.

High on the bank, overlooking the road to Lew Beach, is the small private cemetery of the John Davidson family. John Davidson, a carpenter and lumberman from the Beaverkill section, is perhaps most likely remembered as being a bridge builder. The three covered bridges that remain in the Town of Rockland, and are still in use, are credited as being built by Davidson. He was also the proprietor of a saw mill, which explains the date of August 5, 1875 on the tombstone. At the Davidson mill, a stack of logs being prepared for the sawyer’s cut had been piled high into a pyramid. When one of the bottom logs shifted, the whole pile broke loose sending a stampede of logs tumbling through the mill’s yard. Unfortunately, John Davidson was not able to escape quickly enough, and was struck by one of the logs and flattened as the log rolled over him.

Tragedy sometimes is not a lonely number, as this family headstone in the Henry Cemetery, a small cemetery located a couple of miles above Debruce, indicates. Abram and Helen Burton’s family was made up with a total of seven children. Unfortunately, six of the Burton children are accounted for here. Though no records exist as to the circumstances concerning the family deaths, perhaps disease may have had a hand in it. With the lack of qualified medical personal in these isolated sections, primitive medical knowledge and unaware that unsanitary living conditions affected health, these rural families often treated illnesses by applying home remedies and waiting out the “fever.” The common deadly diseases of this era, such as typhoid, diphtheria, cholera and consumption, were particularly deadly amongst the elderly and, which may have been the case with some of the Burton children, the young.

Some grave markers, such as this headstone in the Orchard Street Cemetery, offer little information on the identity of the individual who lies beneath. Throughout the latter part of his life, Patrick Flynn lived a life of seclusion at his mansion at Hodge Pond, hiding his whereabouts from those who sought to pummel his personal wealth. In death, he continued to seek anonymity. Patrick Flynn made his fortune as a railroad mogul, a construction contractor and a New York City political power. Among his achievements are the construction of one of the piers that make up the Brooklyn Bridge and the Jersey City water system. Buying a large tract above Debruce, he sought to make the Hodge Pond section into his personal game preserve, but when creditors attempted to reclaim their investments and political enemies extract their revenge, he turned his mansion into a secluded hideaway. The creditors were relentless, however, and Flynn eventually died with little left to his name.

As for his grave marker, Flynn was seventeen when he enlisted with the Union Army near the end of the Civil War. His unit participated in the 1865 Union’s final military campaign in Virginia, beginning with the Battle at Five Forks and concluding with the Confederate surrender at Appomattox Court House.

There is another headstone in the Roscoe Cemetery, bearing the name Lloyd and having a similar letter carving as Robert Lloyd's. This image was taken off of findagrave and probably was posted by Judie Darbee Smith

Next to Robert Lloyd's grave was a depression, signifying a grave, which was without any marker. It may be associated, or maybe not. This photo was taken seven years ago

Also, I'm not able to verify my note about Robert Lloyd being married to a Elizabeth Simmonds. I'll keep searching for my reasoning behind that statement, but unless I can provide proof, consider that an error on my part. The family would know better. - Fred

Notable grave markers found scattered about within our cemeteries are the narrow, upright headstones signifying the location of deceased military veterans. These white stones made of Vermont marble acknowledge the contributions, or the sacrifices, made by local residents in service to our nation. One such stone stands within the Green family plot at the Bon Air Cemetery.

Lawrence Green enlisted long before the nation was plunged into World War Two, inducted into the US Army in February of 1941. Green was part of the Allied invasion force that stormed the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944 where he was wounded. He quickly recovered and was rewarded with a promotion to staff sergeant. He returned to action but was again wounded on July 30, this time fatally, while on a dangerous mission along German lines clearing the way for his infantry division’s breakthrough near St. Lo, France. His remains were placed in a military cemetery in France.

Four years later, his sister succeeded in bringing her brother’s body back home. Returning by way of the O&W railroad, Green’s casket was met at the Livingston Manor station by a veteran’s honor squad. A full military style funeral was held at the gravesite on July 25, 1948.

The appropriate word on this Brown Settlement Cemetery headstone may be the word “Lies” for many of the old-timers who remembered Christopher Whipple, known to them as “Kip,” knew him as the best yarn teller in this area. Kip was a descendant of one of the earliest families to settle the Mongaup section. Throughout his long life spent on the hill known as Brown Settlement, Kip would delight with the opportunity to narrate family lore or his escapades (whether the story was true or not didn’t matter) to any who would listen. As a story teller, no one surpassed his genius, wit and talent when recounting these tales.

The Westfield Flats Cemetery had its beginnings with the first documented interment in the township, that of Henry Shaw in 1796. For the next eighty years the cemetery grew in size as its population grew in number, but it also became despoiled with misuse. Surrounded by Dr. Leroy Wheeler’s farm, the cemetery was utilized as a cow path to reach the neighboring pasture lot. The earthly residents of the cemetery were certainly not ones to complain about being beneath the bovine passage, those who were more lively thought the Wheeler herd trampling over their ancestors' graves a disgrace and in 1874 erected iron fencing around the burying grounds.

Leroy Wheeler was an old-time country physician, who for nearly sixty years served the residents of the rural outpost of Westfield Flats. His death resulted from injuries sustained in an accident.

“In Memory of Asa Crippen Who Departed This Life Fbry 6 1806 In The 28^th Year Of His …”

In many of the older cemeteries in the Town of Rockland, such as the Mott cemetery located on the flats north of Livingston Manor, many grave locations have headstones that are made from native fieldstones, or in many cases the sites not marked at all, only shallow depressions marking what appears to be sites of earlier burials. Few of these old fieldstones have any inscription. Those that do have lettering that had been crudely hand chiseled, markings that have weathered away over time. Such is the case with the piece of sandstone that marks the grave of Asa Crippen, placed over his grave well over two centuries ago. The particulars of his life, and death, have long faded from anyone’s memory, and sadly, they are also fading from the face of his headstone, with much of the wording now illegible.