10/13/2026
**ELAM ALEXANDER — WHEN THE PIECES OF HISTORY FINALLY COME TOGETHER.**
Sometimes cemetery preservation is more than cleaning monuments and repairing stone. Sometimes it's about solving a mystery that has been waiting decades to be uncovered.
Rose Hill Preservation & Restoration, Inc. was originally asked to clean the Elam Alexander monument at historic Rose Hill Cemetery. During the cleaning, something caught our attention.
The urn didn't belong.
The urn was carved from Georgia marble, while the monument itself was made of Italian Carrara marble. Something wasn't right.
We eventually discovered another urn farther down the slope, sitting atop a monument in a completely different burial plot. At first glance, it looked as though it belonged there. But something deep down told us otherwise.
**Then came the missing piece of the puzzle.**
A few weeks ago, we discovered a historic photograph taken before the 1954 tornado. There it was — the Elam Alexander monument with its original urn!
The photograph confirmed what we had suspected all along. The urn down the slope belonged to Elam Alexander.
At some point in the monument's history, the Elam Alexander Foundation had commissioned a replacement urn. That newer urn was the one we encountered when our preservation work began.
And now, this story has another chapter.
Today, after receiving a thoughtful thank-you letter from the organization, Rose Hill Preservation & Restoration, Inc. was given permission to offer the newer urn to help raise funds for our preservation mission.
THE NEWER GEORGIA MARBLE URN IS NOW AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE.
Proceeds will support our ongoing efforts to preserve, restore, and protect the historic monuments of Rose Hill Cemetery, established in 1840.
If you are interested in purchasing this unique piece of Rose Hill's preservation history, please reach out to us directly.
*Rose Hill Preservation & Restoration, Inc.*
*Boots on the Ground — Preserving History, One Monument at a Time.*
