Rural North Dakota cemetery home to Titanic couple’s monument

AMENIA, N.D. — Simply north of Casselton, outdoors of Amenia, is a small cemetery with a big monument within the center. It honors the reminiscence of one among this area’s greatest Bonanza farm couple who simply occurred to be on board the Titanic 110 years in the past.

Bookended by the quiet Rush River and a freshly planted soybean subject, the Amenia Cemetery sits nestled in a grove of bushes. However except you realize what you’re trying to find, you’ll by no means know the historical past behind this Chaffee household monument.

“It is an exquisite little cemetery,” Shaun Schipper, of Fargo, stated.

Schipper was out scouting for a spot to document a music when he stopped at this cemetery.

“Strolling by way of this cemetery — it is such as you’re drawn to this huge gravestone,” he stated. “I came to visit right here and browse the names of the Chaffees, of after they have been born and died right here.”

What Schipper did not discover was the writing on the again of the stone, however that modified as he continued his stroll.

“‘Herbert Fuller Chaffee. Born in Sharon, Connecticut, Nov. 20, 1865. Misplaced at sea with S.S. Titanic April 15, 1912,’” Schipper learn. “That about blew my thoughts, to seek out this out right here, simply at random. It is on the bottom, so lots of people would not see it.”

H.F. Chaffee died on the Titanic. He and his spouse, Carrie, lived in Amenia and have been rich Bonanza farm and land house owners right here. They have been a part of the Amenia-Sharon Land Firm.

The Chaffees have been in Europe on trip after they bought information they have been anticipating a grandchild, in order that they wished to get again to the states, and so they bought on the primary ship headed again: the Titanic.

Herbert wouldn’t survive the sinking of the Titanic, however Carrie bought in a lifeboat. She advised a newspaper her husband, “pushed her by way of the slim area between the rail and the boat” and advised her they might be reunited quickly. They by no means have been.

“It was completely superb, one of many coolest finds I’ve ever come throughout,” Schipper stated. “Out of the lots of of thousands and thousands of headstones in the USA, (…) and I come throughout this one in Amenia, North Dakota, within the nation, on this tiny little cemetery with, I feel, lower than 75 headstones.”

North Dakota State College Archives acquired the whole assortment from the Chaffee household paperwork, together with the Titanic passenger listing of survivors and those that died. H.F. Chaffee’s physique was by no means discovered. Carrie returned to the mansion in Amenia, North Dakota.

“The home that that they had, it feels like she did not wish to reside there anymore, and so they ended up tearing it down. There have been simply too many recollections,” stated John Hallberg, an NDSU Archivist.

Roughly 1,500 folks died within the sinking of the Titanic. One other North Dakota passenger survived the tragedy. The Norwegian immigrant, Olaus Abelseth, returned to America and lived in Hettinger.

For Schipper, that fast journey to a rustic cemetery turned out to be an interesting historical past lesson. One of many world’s greatest tragedies at sea has an unimaginable connection to a Cass County prairie.