Old Roach Cemetery (also called Union Electric Cemetery) is located in Camden County, Missouri, on the south side of old Highway 54 and 200 yards north of the present Highway 54. This cemetery contains several of the graves that were relocated when Bagnell Dam was built, because of the flooding of the Osage and Niangua River bottoms.

Union Electric kept records of the graves that were moved.   A very legible copy of these hand-drafted Union Electric records is kept at the Camden County Historical Museum, and is available for public viewing.  Contact the museum at 573-346-7191 to make an appointment.   An appointment is usually not needed in the summer months, but the museum is open fewer hours during the winter months.

The Union Electric records track graves by the individual cemeteries from which they were moved (complete with specific location of the old cemeteries, layouts of each of the old cemeteries, and names and tombstone inscriptions including dates).  These records also show the cemetery each of the graves was moved to.  This “Old Roach” or “Union Electric” cemetery is called “New Prairie Hollow” on the Union Electric records.

A separate set of Union Electric lists shows the “identified“ moved graves alphabetically by people’s names, including the name of the old “inundated“ cemetery, a number identifying location within the old cemetery, the name of the cemetery to which the grave was moved, and the number of the grave at the new location.   This alphabetical list does not include the dates and inscriptions from the tombstones; that information is only included on the “moved from” lists of the old cemeteries.  “Unidentified” graves (those for which Union Electric did not have a name) are not on the alphabetical list.

On the Union Electric records, they show a layout of the moved graves at the new cemeteries, with “shadings” to mark those graves that were unidentified.  The footnote on the Union Electric layout says:  “Graves shaded have metal markers, but no record of them is given in the tabulations.“  Thus, you will see many graves at the Old Roach Cemetery that have metal Union Electric number tags, but are not on the Union Electric list and are not on this list.

On this list, we’ve attempted to provide as much information as possible.   Thus, we’ve shown some birth and death information that came from the Union Electric “moved from” lists . . . even if we could no longer find a tombstone in the Old Roach Cemetery for that person.   We’ve attempted to list every name identified on the Union Electric “alphabetical” list, even in cases where the Union Electric list shows that the original grave was  unmarked.

Names on this list with an asterisk ( * )  next to the name, are names from the Union Electric lists of moved graves.  You may click on the link to the list of graves cites that were moved, (Osage River Project), or visit the Camden County Historical Society to look at the lists personally.   As a convenience for you, we have included the “moved from“ cemetery names on this list.

One more caveat . . . The entries on this list that have the last name capitalized are graves that I did not find when I inventoried the cemetery in February, 2006 . . .but they were on a previous inventory list done by someone else and recorded on the Internet.