Hickory Grove Cemetery
Linden, Cass County, Texas
Marker Inscription
On Oct. 15, 1872, the Rev. James A. Steger (1831-1902) deeded this site to trustees of the Hickory Grove Methodist Church for use as a community burial ground. Steger, a Civil War veteran, may have used it as a family cemetery before that date. The Methodist sanctuary was located north of the cemetery and a later building, at the northwest corner, was used for funerals and school classes. The church eventually disbanded, but this cemetery, the burial place of several pioneer families, remains as evidence of the area's early settlement. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836 - 1986
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In 1872 the Rev. James A. Steger, a Civil War veteran, deeded this ground to trustees of the Hickory Grove Methodist Church for use as a community burial place, though he may have buried family here even earlier. A Methodist sanctuary stood nearby, and a later building served for funerals and school classes. The congregation eventually disbanded, but the cemetery — resting place of several pioneer families — still marks where the community first took root.
Why it matters
It preserves the memory of early Cass County settlement, where a church, a school, and a graveyard once anchored a frontier neighborhood that has otherwise vanished.
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Related people
- · Rev. James A. Steger
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Floyds' Hill Church - Cemetery
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In 1854 Killis S. Floyd donated four acres for a Missionary Baptist congregation, and the Floyds' Hill Church was organized that December with fifteen charter members. Services first met in a pioneer family's home, then in a log church of 1855 and a frame building raised about 1858 with the help of enslaved labor; Black members worshiped here until Floyd gave land for a separate church. The adjoining cemetery, with some 200 known graves, holds the settlers who came from Alabama and Georgia in the 1850s, and though regular services ended in 1926, descendants still gather each year.
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John Robin Heard, who came to Texas in 1853 and founded the nearby town of Cussetta, donated the one-acre ground for this family cemetery, where the first burial in 1861 was his infant grandson Cornelius Floyd. Its twenty-three graves include Heard himself and his second wife, Mary Hopkins Heard, while a fence was later provided by another grandson, W.Q. Henderson. Descendants organized a cemetery association and perpetual-care trust in 1974 to preserve the family plot.
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