The Saint Martin’s Cemetery, although tributary to the now defunct Saint Martin’s Lutheran Church, was actually organized before the church. Theodore and Bertha (Haase) Sell donated the land for the cemetery around 1883, which is located in the SW¼ of the SE¼ of Section 18, Amenia Township, Cass County, North Dakota. The oldest marked burial in the cemetery is that of Karl Mergner, who died on September 17, 1883. Interesting to note is that Theodore Sell and his wife Bertha were not buried in the cemetery and are buried in nearby Casselton, N.D. The St. Martin’s Lutheran Church was organized on February 2, 1890, and it met in an Amenia Township schoolhouse until a frame church was erected 3½ miles to the northeast of the cemetery in 1905. As church services were conducted in German for the first several decades, the name of the church in German was “Evangelische Lutherische St. Martin’s Gemeinde.” Translated to English, this means “Evangelical Lutheran St. Martin’s Congregation.” As the Sell family who donated land for the cemetery were members of the newly organized St. Martin’s Church, the cemetery was subsequently named after the church and from that point on it was operated and maintained by the church. At some point, the land was deeded in the church’s name as well. It is unknown as to whether or not the cemetery had any previous name before being named after the church. The only public access to the cemetery is a narrow road between two fields that leads up a steep hill to the quiet little spot shaded by big old trees sprawling along the curve of the nearly hidden Rush River. At some point, the St. Martin’s congregation constructed a fence with a neat steel gate to enclose this peaceful burial place. Over the gate in German print are the words “FRIEDHOF DER EV. LUTH. ST. MARTIN’S GEMEINDE.” Translated to English, this means, “Cemetery of the Evangelical Lutheran Saint Martin’s Congregation.” Today, the cemetery is known as “Saint Martin’s Cemetery,” (or also Saint Martin’s Lutheran Church Cemetery,” etc.). In October, 1949, the St. Martin’s Church was struck by lightning during a thunderstorm that swept over the area. The congregation suffered a complete loss of their church building after it burned to the ground and they voted to merge with nearby St. John Lutheran Church of Arthur, N.D., with whom they had been in a two-point parish since their organization. Consequently, the last burial in the St. Martin’s Cemetery was Ida (Schumann) Priewe in 1948. As of today, there are 40 marked graves in the cemetery, and in addition to several unmarked graves, many of them being children and infants, the estimated total burials is 53 persons. No maps of the cemetery and lots are presently known to exist. Following the church’s closing in 1949, several gravestones in the cemetery were knocked over by a local farmer’s cattle. A fence was constructed around the cemetery to keep the pesky cattle out and the knocked over stones were returned to their proper upright position. Charles R. Viestenz, John A. Grieger, Dallas E. Grieger, John A. Pueppke, and others have cared for the cemetery in the decades following the church’s closing. Members of the Charles and Mary (Pepper) Viestenz family met at the cemetery in July, 2018 during a family reunion and performed major cleanup work at the cemetery as part of their reunion activities. Presently, the cemetery is still cared for by local residents. The St. John Lutheran Church of Arthur, N.D. possesses the remaining record books of the St. Martin’s Lutheran Church (secretary’s book and treasurer’s book), though no cemetery records are known to exist. Unfortunately, the St. Martin’s Church minister’s log which contained death and burial information of the congregation, which included more information about burials in the Saint Martin’s Cemetery, has been missing since 1988 when it was used for the creation of the St. John Lutheran Church centennial history book.