Forest Hill Cemetery
Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas
Marker Inscription
One of the oldest burial grounds in Tarrant County; named for its location and used for many years before record-keeping began. In 1883 landowner J.W. Chapman deeded the property to Forest Hill Cumberland Presbyterian Church. ("Cumberland" was later dropped from the name.) Among the many interments of pioneers were Press and Jane Farmer, who lived at site of Fort Worth before the U.S. Army established the Fort in 1849. The cemetery is full although few headstones are visible, as most graves were unmarked or marked with field stones that have since disappeared. (1974)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
One of Tarrant County's oldest burial grounds, Forest Hill was used long before anyone kept records; landowner J. W. Chapman formally deeded it to a Cumberland Presbyterian congregation in 1883. Among those laid to rest here were Press and Jane Farmer, who lived on the site of Fort Worth even before the U.S. Army planted its fort there in 1849. Though largely full, the cemetery shows few headstones, as most early graves were unmarked or set with field stones long since vanished.
Why it matters
Pioneer cemeteries like this preserve the memory of the first settlers on the North Texas frontier, many of whom predate the towns that later grew up around them.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Long before Fort Worth had streets, stockyards, or a skyline, the country along the Trinity River in North Texas was open prairie and scattered timber, a borderland between settled Texas to the east and the Comanche-held plains to the west. Families who pushed into this region in the 1840s lived far from towns, courts, and churches, and they buried their dead wherever the living could tend them, often on a rise of ground near home.
That is how many of Texas's oldest cemeteries began: not with a deed or a plat, but with a single grave, then another. Forest Hill Cemetery was one of these. It was in use for years before anyone thought to write down who lay here, which is why its earliest history survives mostly as memory rather than paperwork.
In 1849 the U.S. Army set up a small outpost on the Trinity to guard the line of frontier settlement, and named it for General William Jenkins Worth, a hero of the Mexican War. The soldiers did not stay long, but the settlement that grew up around the post kept the name. By the 1870s and 1880s, as railroads and the cattle trade transformed the town, rural congregations around it were putting their informal burial grounds on firmer legal footing. That is the world in which this cemetery got its formal deed.
People & events
The names that anchor this place are Press and Jane Farmer. They were living at the site of Fort Worth before the Army arrived in 1849, which places them among the very first Anglo-American settlers on that stretch of the Trinity. Picture a couple keeping a homestead on an exposed frontier, with no fort, no town, and few neighbors, and then watching a military post and eventually a city rise around the land they already knew.
The Farmers were buried here along with many other pioneers whose names were never written down. That is the quiet heartbreak of a place like this: the cemetery is full, but most graves were either unmarked or set with simple field stones, and over the years those stones were lost. The people are still here; the markers that named them are not.
In 1883 landowner J. W. Chapman deeded the property to the Forest Hill Cumberland Presbyterian Church, giving the old burial ground a caretaker and a legal identity. The Cumberland Presbyterians were a denomination born in the frontier revivals of the early 1800s, and they were well suited to rural Texas communities like this one. In time the congregation dropped "Cumberland" from its name, but the cemetery kept the name of the hill it stands on.
Its place in the American story
Across America, the first chapter of almost every town is written in a cemetery like this one. Before the courthouse, the newspaper, or the city directory, there were families, and when they died their neighbors buried them. Pioneer graveyards are often the only physical evidence left of the people who settled a place before it had a name.
Forest Hill Cemetery also captures a common pattern of the American frontier: settlers often came first and the government followed. The Farmers were already here when the Army built its post. The fort that gave Fort Worth its name grew up around people who had arrived before it.
The disappearing field stones are a reminder of how fragile the historical record really is. Much of ordinary American life in the nineteenth century was never written down, and sites like this, recorded and marked before they are forgotten entirely, help keep those lives in the story.
If you visit
Come expecting a quiet, open burial ground rather than rows of tall monuments. The point of this place is what you cannot see: the cemetery is full, but most of its graves have no visible marker. Walk slowly and look for low, rough stones or slight depressions in the ground, the faint traces of a frontier burial ground.
Be respectful: this is a cemetery, and the people buried here have descendants. Stay on paths where they exist, do not move or disturb any stones you find, and leave things as they are.
Forest Hill makes a thoughtful stop on a Fort Worth history day. Pair it with a visit to the city's downtown and the bluff above the Trinity where the original Army post stood, and you'll see the whole arc of the story: from scattered pioneer homesteads, to a short-lived fort, to the city that grew up around both.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Press Farmer
- · Jane Farmer
- · J. W. Chapman
Themes & tags
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