The Dixon cemetery is located on Route 658 (Toll Gate Road), about 2 miles southwest of Concord Virginia in Campbell County. In August 1758, King George II of England granted to Thomas Dixon 1,025 acres located now in Campbell County, Virginia. Thomas Dixon bought much land besides the grant and the estates were passed down finally to James Dixon. The original Dixon home was located at map coordinates N 37° 18′ 43.13 W 78° 59′ 35.23?. The first persons buried in the cemetery were buried circa 1752.
The Dixon farm was sold to Andrew Cook Martin by James Dixon who said “I’ve done an awful thing—I’ve Sold my father ‘s grave” and Martin said “Do not worry – I’ll deed the land to the cemetery” and he did. The cemetery, with map coordinates: N 37° 18′ 38.52′ W 78° 59’30, is located within farm land variously owned by Thomas Dixon, James Dixon, Andrew Cook Martin, Tommy Cardwell, O.B. St. Clair, W.S. Brummett, L. A. Elliott, and recently, Concord Central LLC, Glover D. Gilliam, President. The burying ground was deeded to trustees in 1873. The south portion was designated for use by “the white population” and the north portion by ”the colored population”, with separate bounds noted for each. Due public record was made and a board of trustees was appointed by the Court. The size of the south portion is more than an acre and the north portion about 1/4 of an acre.
According to a November 21, 1948 story in the Lynchburg News, Dixon Cemetery trustees, who had recently been appointed, held their first meeting at the home of Dr. William Harman Evans of Campbell County, Virginia. According to the story: “The following officers were elected: Andrew B. Martin, Concord, president: Elmer E. Dixon, Grundy, vice president: George Bruns, Concord, second vice president: John E. Hunter, Gladys, third vice president: H. P. Evans, Concord, secretary: and George M. Evans, treasurer. Other members of the board are Jones F. Rucker, James W. Cardwell and for the Negro race, George Bruns and Marvin Gibson.” The cemetery had been neglected for many years and had been overgrown with brush and large trees. The trustees committed an initial $100 towards work to clear the burial ground. The number of graves in The Dixon Cemetery was estimated to be 500 or as many as 2000 estimated from later surveys; many are unmarked or marked with common field stones.
Around 1962, Dr. Joseph Evans wrote that Miss Nancy Sue Evans, daughter of Thomas Washington Evans, had passed on to him this information which had been given her by her cousin Charles Franklin circa 1935: “Starting from Elizabeth Harvey Evans’ grave at big black oak to Joe Callaham and family stone is Callaham and Evans line. Northeast of the line is the Akers row. Philip Akers is southwest of and at the foot of a hickory tree on the east side of Annie Glover Booth on the east slope.”
For five people there is one marble shaft in the cemetery with the inscription “Killed by the Southern RR at Lawyers, Virginia, September 16, 1895.” Their runaway buggy was hit by the train. There are only a few legible tombstones in the section deeded as the “African Burying Ground” but numerous people are known to be buried in the section. On a big beech tree are carved the initials “ VRC and EWC”.
In 2014, descendants of those buried at The Dixon and other supporters, began to organize and hold Fall clean-up Saturdays at the cemetery. On May 15, 2017, they became the “Dixon Historical Cemetery Association, Inc.” (DHCA), a Virginia non-stock charitable corporation. On September 12, 2017 the cemetery and a strip of access land connecting it to Toll Gate Road were conveyed to DHCA thanks to the generosity of Mr. Glover D. Gilliam and Mr. James E. Hamilton. The corporation received exemption from federal income tax under Internal Revenue Code 501(c)(3) on May 17, 2018. DHCA continues the work of clean-up and restoration.