Hillside Cemetery
Cuero, DeWitt County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The new community of Cuero was surveyed for the Cuero Land & Immigration Co. in 1873. That same year, the city incorporated, and the GWT&P Railroad extended its track to it from Indianola. The land company conveyed 12 acres at this site for use as a municipal burial ground in 1875. By 1880, local women formed a cemetery association to maintain burial plots. They raised funds and collected dues to employ a groundskeeper to make cemetery improvements. The site grew to include additional acreage and the once segregated African American cemetery, Evergreen. The Ladies' Cemetery Association turned over its duties to the city in 1972, but an endowment established in 1919 continues to generate funds for cemetery projects. Today, Hillside Cemetery is the final resting place for generations of area residents. In addition to pioneer settlers, artists, writers, educators and civic leaders, those buried here include elected officials and military veterans of conflicts dating to the Mexican War. Large monuments are reminders of the victims and survivors of the Indianola storms of 1875 and 1886. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2004
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
The town of Cuero was surveyed and incorporated in 1873 as the railroad reached inland from the doomed coastal port of Indianola. In 1875 the land company set aside twelve acres here for a municipal burial ground, and by 1880 local women had formed a cemetery association to maintain it, hiring a groundskeeper and later endowing its upkeep. The grounds grew to absorb the once-segregated African American cemetery, Evergreen, and hold veterans back to the Mexican War alongside victims of the Indianola hurricanes.
Why it matters
Hillside Cemetery gathers the pioneers, storm victims, and separated communities of DeWitt County, its women-led association a quiet record of civic stewardship in the Gilded Age.
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Related events
- · Indianola hurricanes of 1875 and 1886
Themes & tags
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