Hamilton-Beeman Cemetery
Corsicana, Navarro County, Texas
Marker Inscription
William Harvey Beeman (1817-1860) received a Mercer colony grant of 640 acres in Navarro County and brought his family here in the 1840s. He and pioneer Samuel Hamilton (1820-1900), who owned adjacent property, each gave one acre to establish this cemetery in the 1850s. The first burial was that of Hamilton's infant son in 1859. Both Hamilton and Beeman, a freighter and local justice of the peace, are buried here. Gifts and purchases of additional land have enlarged the cemetery to over 47 acres.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
William Harvey Beeman claimed a 640-acre Mercer colony grant in Navarro County and brought his family here in the 1840s, when the region was newly opening to Anglo settlement. In the 1850s he and neighboring pioneer Samuel Hamilton each donated an acre to establish this cemetery, whose first burial — Hamilton's infant son — came in 1859. Both founders lie here, and later gifts of land have expanded the grounds to more than 47 acres.
Why it matters
The cemetery marks the earliest wave of empresario-colony settlement that peopled north-central Texas, preserving the names of the families who first broke its prairie.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · William Harvey Beeman
- · Samuel Hamilton
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
J. A. Megarity Homestead
Corsicana, TX
Georgia-born James A. Megarity served in the Confederate army through some of the Civil War's hardest fighting, including Gettysburg and Petersburg, and was present at Robert E. Lee's surrender. Having married Narcissa Hardman in 1859, he brought his family to Texas in 1872, rented land for a time, and bought this site in 1876 to build a home. His holdings grew to 187 acres, making him a prosperous farmer and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South.
Pleasant Grove United Methodist Church
Corsicana, TX
In the years before the Civil War, Methodist circuit riders carried their preaching to the scattered farms of the Mercer Colony in Navarro County, gathering pioneer families first in a settler's schoolhouse. By 1870 the congregation had land for weeks-long camp meetings held after harvest, and in 1877 it settled here amid a grove of oaks that likely gave the church its name, raising a frame sanctuary later rebuilt in 1905.
Meritt Drane
Corsicana, TX
Born in Kentucky to a wealthy farming family, Meritt Drane set out for Texas in 1858, drawn by "the fire of youth." Unable to serve in the Confederate army because of a disability, he instead helped manage the affairs of soldiers' wives during the Civil War, then built lasting success in farming and stock raising in Navarro County's rich Blackland soil. As a Corsicana civic leader he sold farm machinery, served on the school committee that opened the town's first public schools in 1882, and helped establish the State Orphan Home—so respected that a post office was named "Drane" in his honor.
James Clinton Neill
Corsicana, TX
Born in North Carolina in 1790, James Clinton Neill joined Stephen F. Austin's colony in 1831 and threw himself into the Texas Revolution as an artillery officer, commanding the guns at the Siege of Bexar. Appointed to lead San Antonio and the Alamo, he left that post in February 1836 to tend to family illness — handing command to William B. Travis and narrowly missing the fall of the Alamo. He was wounded serving Sam Houston's army the day before San Jacinto, and later helped found the seat of Navarro County.