ST. CHARLES COUNTY HISTORY

Sonderen Street in O’Fallon Missouri was once home to many of the families whose loved ones and families are buried in Sage Chapel Cemetery.

Eldora Abington (15 June 1863- 25 March 1921) , wife of Liberty Abington (21 December 1857 – 14 June 1931), passed away on March 28, 1921, in her home, next door to Sage Chapel A.M.E., in O’Fallon [on Sonderen Street]. She was born June 15, 1868, the daughter of Alex Welch. She leaves behind Jessica born 1887, Bessie born 1889, Allie born 1892, Todie born 1896, and a son Eddy born 1903.  After a memorial at the church, E.A. Keithly of O’Fallon served as the undertaker for the Abington family for the burial in Sage Chapel Cemetery, next to her husband who is also buried there, but no headstone has ever been found.

Cora E. White passed away on Thursday, November 23, 1972. She had been born Cora Abington on September 10, 1882, the daughter of Louis and Mollie Abington. She grew up in the community of the Hopewell Baptist Church, a very old African American Church south of Wentzville on Hwy N (the Boone’s Lick Road). We know she had brothers and sisters named Fred, Ardalia, John, Oregon, Tennessee and Troy. When she was a young girl of 18, she married Simon “Samuel” L. White on June 3, 1901 and they made their early home in O’Fallon on Main Street. near the home of the town’s founder, the  widower Nicholas Krekel, where he lived with his daughter Bertha Krekel. Simon and Cora had several children, some whose names we will never know, because there were no records. We do know there was Margaret “Flossy”, Arthur, Sylvester, sweet  Jessie who they lost when she was just 19 years old, Frona, Beulah, Tommy, Eugene (pictured), Robert, Corine (Thornton) and LuLurean (Vardeman). By the 1920s, Cora and Simon had moved their  family over to “the Hill” which is today’s Sonderen, and were members of Wishwell Baptist Church.  There they had more room for their family, and could raise chickens and have a larger garden because O’Fallon was growing and changing. When she passed, she joined her dear husband Simon who had preceded her in death, at Sage Chapel Cemetery.