HistoricSiteMarkers
Civil War

High Cemetery

Canton, Van Zandt County, Texas

Marker Inscription

The first burial in this public cemetery, that of Nancy Jane Hubbard, took place in 1859, six years after the High community was first established. More than 100 graves date from the 19th century. Many members of the High family, including Samuel A. High (1809-1894), first permanent landowner in the area and original donor of land for the cemetery, are buried here. Also interred in the High cemetery are veterans of the Civil War and members of other pioneer families and their descendants. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

High Cemetery opened in 1859 with the burial of Nancy Jane Hubbard, six years after the High community took shape in Van Zandt County. More than a hundred of its graves date from the nineteenth century, including that of Samuel A. High, the area's first permanent landowner and the man who donated the ground. Civil War veterans and generations of pioneer families rest here, making the cemetery a roster of the settlers who built the community.

Why it matters

A pioneer burial ground like this one preserves, name by name, the ordinary settlers and Civil War soldiers whose lives knit together frontier East Texas.

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Related people

  • · Samuel A. High
  • · Nancy Jane Hubbard

Themes & tags

Civil WarWestward ExpansionFrontier HistoryMemorial

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