It is not unheard of, but from time to time when there is an amputation, the limb may be buried by itself. There happen to be two such burials at Motley Cemetery in Mesquite, Texas, as noted below:
John Motley was born in Dallas County on September 29, 1877, the son of Robert Page Motley and Emma Sarah Lawrence Motley. When he was seventeen years old, John lost his right arm in an accident. He had driven a wagon load of cotton to the Reinhart gin. While he was waiting for his load to be ginned, he was looking at the ginning equipment. He noticed that there was a piece of equipment called a lintseed stand that was jammed by rocks. As John attempted to remove the debris, his arm was caught in the equipment and was severed. In a custom of the day, his arm was buried at Motley Cemetery. Undeterred, John went on to complete high school and attend college at Baylor University. John never was considered to be disabled and did not consider himself to be handicapped. He and his wife, Eliza Nash Motley, raised a large family. John farmed the family property, was an avid hunter and was known to be a skilled craftsman. Mr. Motley died at the age of 48 in 1925 and was buried in Southland Cemetery in Grand Prairie. His wife Eliza survived him another 49 years and died in 1974. Eliza is also buried in Southland Cemetery.
There was still another unusual burial at Motley Cemetery in 1911, the foot of Grover Cleveland Motley. The details of the accident sometimes varied according to who related it, but Mr. Motley suffered severe damage to his foot after a fall while he was riding a horse (or possibly a pig). His foot was amputated about four inches above the ankle, after which it was buried at Motley Cemetery. Like his relative John, G. C. married and lived a long life. He and his wife, Sibbie Ellen Garrett Motley, each lived well into their senior years and are interred at Grove Hill Memorial Park in Dallas.
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