From the Richmond Dispatch, 3/14/1861, p. 1, c. 6

St. John’s Church-Yard. – The burial-ground surrounding this ancient receptacle of the dead is now in such a condition that an appropriation must soon be called for from the city to put it in good order. In passing through it yesterday, we saw that the fine tomb-stone surmounting the last resting place of Thomas W. White, the original founder of the Southern Literary Messenger, had fallen down, and broken in its descent several mural records adjacent to it. As St. John’s Church is regarded by our citizens with a feeling akin to veneration, no doubt whatever sum may be demanded to put the burial-ground in a state of repair, will readily be granted; but it does, nevertheless, seem strange to us, that the descendant of the dead who sleep so silently therein, are so wanting in pride of ancestry as to let the tomb-stones of their progenitors lay around “helter skelter” as they are now doing.

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