It later became the final resting place for more family members, their neighbors and some travelers who died while staying at the inn. Rutherford believes the Huntingtons are buried there because they were related to the Jacksons by marriage.

William Huntington was best known as Castle Rock’s first postmaster and preacher. His family settled in the area in 1854 on nearly 300 acres of land, according to historic records.

The graveyard, though, never served as a public cemetery during its nearly 90-year lifetime, according to research by the Lower Columbia Genealogical Society. And no one ever built a public road to the cemetery.

Cemetery District No. 1 has not had access to the site since 2015, Rutherford said.

“It just sort of ate me up” that the cemetery was unattended, Rutherford said. And it inspired her to find the new way in.

Rutherford’s first trip to the cemetery — a nearly 800-foot trek through a hay field, over a stream and up the hill —she was greeted by crumbling headstones laden with moss or covered by wet leaves. Some headstones have snapped off and tumbled down the hill to new resting places. Others fell over and got suctioned into the mud.