Ferrell Cemetery
Colmesneil, Tyler County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Also known as the Holly Fork Cemetery, Ferrell Cemetery is located near the rural community of Holly Fork, near the Neches River. As early as the 1820s, area settlers established farms and transported goods on the Neches. Burials occurred here before the earliest tombstone in 1866, long before the one acre of land for the cemetery was deeded to R.G. Rawls, trustee for Ferrell Cemetery, in 1914. The grounds are the final resting place of many of Holly Fork’s pioneer families including Rawls, Conner, Cowart, Hopson, Lewis, Grimes, Bohler, Cryer and Wigley. Confederate soldier brothers John W. Rawls and Richard G. Rawls as well as veterans of other conflicts are buried here.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Near the Neches River community of Holly Fork, settlers began farming and shipping goods by river as early as the 1820s, and buried their dead at this ground well before its first dated stone in 1866. Deeded formally in 1914, the Ferrell (or Holly Fork) Cemetery holds generations of pioneer families—Rawls, Conner, Cowart, and others—alongside Confederate brothers John W. and Richard G. Rawls and veterans of later conflicts.
Why it matters
The cemetery is a durable record of the frontier families who first settled the Neches River bottomlands of East Texas.
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Related people
- · R.G. Rawls
- · John W. Rawls
- · Richard G. Rawls
Themes & tags
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