Estes Cemetery
Mansfield, Tarrant County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Estes Cemetery began as the burial ground for the family of Sarah and James Estes. By the middle of the 1850s, the Estes family had moved to Tarrant County. The two were Kentucky natives who married in Missouri. The earliest marked grave is for Sarah Estes, who passed away in 1857. During the next several years, additional members of the Estes family were interred in the burial ground. By 1867, the Estes family opened the cemetery to residents of the area who were not part of the family. During the 1880s, communities developed nearby and residents started to use the burial ground as well. These communities included Webb, Gertie and Britton. Veterans of military conflicts dating to the Civil War are also interred here. A cemetery association cares for the burial ground, which features an arched entryway, vertical stones in its older area, interior fencing and a sloping landscape. The cemetery is still active, continuing to serve descendants of those buried in the cemetery, and it remains a memorial to early settlers of southeast Tarrant County. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2003
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Estes Cemetery began as the private plot of Kentucky-born pioneers Sarah and James Estes, who settled in Tarrant County by the mid-1850s; Sarah's 1857 grave is the oldest marked burial. By 1867 the family opened the grounds to their neighbors, and as the communities of Webb, Gertie, and Britton grew nearby, they too laid their dead here. With its arched entry, old upright stones, and sloping ground, the cemetery still serves the descendants of southeast Tarrant County's first settlers.
Why it matters
The cemetery traces the arc of frontier settlement in North Texas, from a single family's homestead to the shared burial ground of vanished farming communities.
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Related people
- · Sarah Estes
- · James Estes
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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