Oak Island Cemetery has served as a final resting place since the War Between the States, with the earliest recorded graves being Julia Gayle in 1862 and Rev. J.K. Harper in 1863. Rev. John Welsey DeVilbiss's field notes of August 11, 1875, record his survey of this tract from properties given to the Oak Island Methodist Episcopal Church South by Mr. Jesse Applewhite. Within its boundaries are six ministers: Rev. J.K. Harper, Rev. John Wesley DeVilbiss, Rev. J.A. Richardson, Rev. Noah W. Carter, Rev. Marvin P. Burton, and Rev. Ralph Heickman; two Texas Rangers, Lt. Col. William Glenn Jett and James Mitchell Putman; Oak Island Methodist Episcopal Church South original member "Aunt" Chloe Stephens, a free slave of the Dever family who lived across three centuries; Dr. Judson S. Swearingen, professor of chemistry and key scientist of the Manhattan Project; and numerous veterans of many wars and conflicts continuing into current times.