Connersville Primitive Baptist Church African American Cemetery
Round Top, Fayette County, Texas
Marker Inscription
African American citizens of Fayette County established Connersville Primitive Baptist Church sometime between Dec. 10, 1883, and Nov. 10, 1885. By the later date, Thomas Cooper owned 11 1/4 acres of land adjacent to Richter Cemetery on FM 1457. Cooper gave permission for the Black community to erect a building for the church. The Connersville Primitive Baptist Church African American Cemetery is the burial site of many slaves and their descendants who lived and died in the area. The cemetery site is located within the west property line of land once owned by the Ledbetter family. Oral tradition indicates that this site was used by several slave owners for burials long before the abolition of slavery. It is the only known Black cemetery within a three-mile radius. There are many unmarked graves within the cemetery but marked graves are significant. The earliest dated grave marker is for George Craft (1848-1904). One of the earliest births recorded is for Piggy Dwiard (1812-1912). The inscription reads "Asleep in Jesus peaceful rest, whose waking is supremely blest." Another inscription reads "In the back woods we lay," a reference to a common trait for historically African American cemeteries. Several markers are for people born shortly after Emancipation. Additional land was deeded to the church on May 20, 1957. The officers given the deed to hold in trust were Beatrice Breedlove, Shelley Ferguson, and Pastor J. Joseph Ferguson. In 2003, the sanctuary was relocated to the Carroll A. Wood Annex in Round Top by the Round Top Area Historical Society. The building was dedicated as the Connersville Primitive Baptist Church African American Museum in honor of African American pioneers of Fayette County. The cemetery remains as a testament to the lives and legacies of African Americans in Round Top and Fayette County. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2018
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
African American residents of Fayette County founded Connersville Primitive Baptist Church in the mid-1880s on land where Thomas Cooper let the Black community build. The adjoining cemetery holds many of the enslaved and their descendants, with a tradition that burials here predate emancipation; its stones — the earliest dated 1904, one for a woman said to have lived a century — bear epitaphs like "In the back woods we lay." The relocated sanctuary now serves as a museum honoring the county's African American pioneers.
Why it matters
The church and its burial ground are a rare surviving record of an African American community's faith, freedom, and endurance from slavery through the 20th century in rural Texas.
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Related people
- · Thomas Cooper
- · George Craft
Themes & tags
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