The hospital was known as Spencer State Hospital, or the Second Hospital for the Insane.

Some of the patients who died there were buried in one of the two cemeteries associated with the hospital on the State Hospital Farm. Records for these burials were, to put it mildly, incomplete. The most complete record of these is in the Roane County Historical Society's Cemeteries of Roane County West Virginia, Volume IV. Records from many sources were used to generate this record, but it is still incomplete.

The majority of the graves were unmarked, and although the location of the cemetery is known, no markers remain.

The burials there were typically those who had no family involved and/or were indigent. In general, obituaries were not published. If the family was involved, any obituary, if any, would be published in their home town, which could be anywhere in the state.