George McGarrah Cemetery
McKinney, Collin County, Texas
Marker Inscription
A member of the Peters Colony, George McGarrah (1804-1879) brought his family to this area in the 1840s. Prior to his arrival in Texas, McGarrah had lived in Fayetteville, Arkansas, where he is credited with helping to build many of the historic structures still extant in that city. McGarrah's wife had died in Arkansas in 1838 while giving birth to their daughter, Harriett. George McGarrah and his three children established a new home near this site, and he later married Sarah Ford. The McGarrah Cemetery contains ten graves. George McGarrah had set aside one-seventh of an acre on his land to be used for a family cemetery. He was the first person buried here, in 1879. Two of his grandchildren, George W. (1870-1887) and Mattie A. (1874-1894) Ottenhausen, children of Harriet McGarrah and her husband Henry Ottenhausen, were the next interred in the family plot. Sarah Ford McGarrah was buried next to her husband in 1896. Also interred here are Harriett McGarrah Ottenhausen (1838-1930), Henry Ottenhausen (1839-1911), and his mother, Christina Ousenkoff Ottenhausen (1810-1904). There are three unmarked burials, one of which is that of a slave. (1988)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
George McGarrah brought his family to this corner of North Texas in the 1840s as a member of the Peters Colony, having already left his mark as a builder in Fayetteville, Arkansas. On his own land he set aside a small family burying ground, becoming its first occupant in 1879. Its ten graves hold three generations of his family—and, in an unmarked plot, a person he had enslaved.
Why it matters
A frontier family cemetery like this preserves both the settlement of the Peters Colony and the quieter, often unmarked, presence of the enslaved in early Texas.
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Related people
- · George McGarrah
- · Sarah Ford McGarrah
- · Harriett McGarrah Ottenhausen
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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