This cemetery is the final resting place for many African Americans, including members of the Payne family, whose association with Stratford Hall dates back to the early 19th century and possibly to the period when Stratford was owned by the Lees. A 1953 monument’s reference to “those negroes who served Stratford so faithfully” reflects the attitude of the time shown by upper and middle class whites to former slaves and their descendants. Wesley Payne, who lived from 1875 to 1954 and continued to work at Stratford Hall after its acquisition by the Robert E. Lee Memorial Foundation in 1929, provided the names of some family members interred here: his uncle Walter Payne; his mother Hannah Jackson Payne, circa 1845 to 1886; his brother Ardrick Theodorick Payne, 1868 to before 1880; his brother Lal Lawrence Payne, 1879 to 1883; his great-grandfather Wesley Payne; his great-uncle Ardrick Theodorick Payne; his great-uncle William Payne; his great-uncle Walter Payne; and his infant sister Hannah Payne, 1886 to 1886. William Wesley Payne, son of William “Bill” and Hannah Jackson Payne, spent all but four years of his life at Stratford Hall and is buried in the cemetery at Shiloh Baptist Church near Stratford Hall’s entrance gate.