There is a small Jones Cemetery on the old Nesbitt Dairy off Jeffress Road in Mills River.
There is no genealogical relationship between this Jones family and the majority of folks with the surnames of Jones in Henderson County who are descendants of John Jones Sr. and his brother Thomas Jones.
In the lawn of a home can be found headstones of Nancy, wife of J.W. Jones, 1806-?; James Walker Jones, 1806-1872; Rachel M. 1853, daughter of J.W. and M.A. Jones; and Juriah A. Jones, 1860-1861.
It is known that a relative of this family, Alexander Jones, was elected to the U.S. Congress twice immediately after the Civil War for this district. Alexander Jones lived in Buncombe County.
The headstones were standing upright when the cemetery was surveyed by a team with the Historical and Genealogical Society in the late 1980s. The graveyard was then overgrown and not maintained.
There were a number of unmarked graves.
A house was built adjacent to the cemetery and a well-maintained lawn now covers the old cemetery. All the stones are lying flat and grass must be pulled up and brushed aside to read the inscriptions. Four inscribed stones were located, with footstones, but no unmarked stones.
The cemetery can be found on the county’s GIS cemetery layer.