Evergreen Cemetery in Colville
Aladdin Rd. North of Colville
Colville, Stevens County, Washington 99114
(509) 684-5690
Evergreen Cemetery is an old pioneer cemetery established in approximately 1868. It served the town of Colville, Washington, and the surrounding areas. The earliest known burial in Evergreen Cemetery was on June 11, 1868. This cemetery has been long neglected, and care was nonexistent for many years. Vandalism and lack of care have left their mark on many of the headstones and gravesites.
The North East Washington Genealogical Society (NeWGS) has been given the authority to maintain the cemetery by the Department of Archeology & Historic Preservation (DAHP). In the last few years, improvements to the cemetery have occurred at an amazing pace. A new entrance sign was erected in 2008 with help from a local Boy Scout troop. In 2009, a sign board was erected which contains a list of names and burial location for the known burials in the cemetery. The cemetery is now mowed regularly by devoted volunteers. Some headstones have been reset through donations to NeWGS.
There are no original records for Evergreen Cemetery. Through much painstaking work, the NeWGS and its members have done their very best to recreate the original records. This was accomplished by using old transcription, funeral home records, and information extracted from old newspapers.
It is a "natural cemetery" with no water or electricity supply. There are over 600 graves in the cemetery. This pioneer cemetery is the burial place of soldiers who fought in the Indian Wars, Civil War, Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, and Korean War. The cemetery is also the final resting place for many homesteaders and early pioneers of the Stevens County area.
“Evergreen cemetery is about 2 miles northeast of Colville on Aladdin Rd. It can be reached by driving north on the main street of Colville, then take a right onto 7th Ave (Hwy 20) and continue till you reach Aladdin Rd. Take a left onto Aladdin Rd and the cemetery lies less than a mile north of 7th Ave. on the left side of Aladdin Road.”
“While not a perpetual care cemetery, I found it in fairly good condition. It is used occasionally for burial, only by previously owned lot owners. Many headstones are missing, and some of them are very difficult to read, resulting in the possibility of errors. Some are almost impossible to decipher.”
“The cemetery has three distinct sections running north and south, with two roads separating them. Each section seems to be divided into bordered family burial plots, however, in some areas the borders are deteriorating or missing, while in others the markers and stones are not there.”
“The cemetery gets some care to control the overgrowth, but the stones are not all kept cleaned and many are deteriorating beyond legibility, covered with lichen or simply crumbling. If anyone knows who owns this cemetery and holds the records, please get in touch with me. The listings I have are dated from 1868-2004.”
“In February 2009, NeWGS requested (and was granted) a Certificate of Authority from the State Department of Archaeology & Historical Preservation for the Care and Maintenance of Evergreen Cemetery in Stevens County, WA. Later that year I volunteered to be chairman of the NeWGS Evergreen Cemetery Restoration Project. According to Gordy Struve, Much work has been done to improve this cemetery.”
“I first surveyed this cemetery on Aug 19 & 20, 1999. I revisited on Jul 12 & 17, 2005, reading it with a digital camera. I found no stone for many of the people that I found in 1999, and some were illegible. An asterisk * follows those for which I have no photo.”
