It is not uncommon in the Pine Barrens for ironstone blocks to used in farmstead and other graveyards, especially to mark child burials. In one instance, I know of an old log-cabin-church burial ground associated with Black colliers with perhaps 35 interments, yet only a couple of ironstone block headstones remain today. Wooden crosses that marked the other interments have long since rotted away.
According to Stewart (1917: 267),
"Many of the settlers had their own private burial grounds on their plantations. The roads were poor, transportation was difficult, and they preferred having their dead in a place convenient of access rather than in church cemeteries, which were difficult to reach and not particularly well kept. Many of these private burying-grounds are still in existence and some are even used to this day; but others have been entirely lost track of."
He continues (1917: 288),
"In the part of Old Gloucester Co., now known as Atlantic Co., it is not uncommon for hunters to find in the woods graves in what seems today to be virgin forest. The exact location of many of the old family burial plots inadequately described in deeds cannot be located today. Tales of tombstones being used for various purposes are so common that many of them must be true, Vandals smashing tombstones and farmers plowing up graveyards should be imprisoned in the county jails."
Stewart, F. H., 1917: Notes on Old Gloucester County, New Jersey: Historical Records Published by the New Jersey Society of Pennsylvania, Vol. 1. Camden and Woodbury, NJ: Gloucester County Historical Society. 342 pp. (reprinted 1977, 4 volumes in two).
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