Officers from the Murphy Police Department and Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office re-erect gravestones that had been knocked down in Harshaw Cemetery.
Murphy – Law enforcement officials worked together last week to re-erect several gravestones that had been vandalized at Harshaw Cemetery.
Some local residents had reset a few of the headstones following an article about the vandalism in the July 21 edition of the Cherokee Scout. However, some of them were too heavy to be lifted by only a couple people. After Cameron Killian noticed that Felix Axley’s gravestone remained toppled over, he reached out to social media for help.
“Axley was a pretty important person,” said Killian, a board member of the Cherokee County Historical Museum who also works with the sheriff’s office. “He came here around 1836, so even before the county was founded.”
Axley was the first lawyer and “Father of the Bar” in Cherokee County, according to historical accounts. Born in Sevier County, Tenn., Axley rode the circuit from Murphy to Asheville, at one point serving as Judge of the Court of Common Pleas and Quarter Sessions.
A “deeply religious man” who sometimes preached at area Methodist churches, Axley married Martha Temple Porter, and the couple had eight children.
Axley, who was also a Freemason, died Aug. 12, 1858, a month shy of his 56th birthday. His gravestone reads, “Mark the perfect man and behold the upright. For the end of that man is peace.”