Holy Cross Catholic Church
Yorktown, DeWitt County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Holy Cross Catholic Church This church was established by Polish families who first came to Texas in the 1850s and settled in Panna Maria, then migrated to this area. A group of Polish Catholics split from the primarily German Catholic Church in Meyersville and joined the Catholic Church in Yorktown. By 1867, there were 13 Polish households as members of the Yorktown congregation, and the time had come to build a new church facility. In 1867, Anton and Lucyia Koszielsky deeded land at this site to the church, and the building that was constructed was dedicated to St. Mary. After it burned in 1915, the parish hired architect F. B. Gaenslen to design their new building. Completed in 1916, the building utilized the cross from the steeple on the former church and thus came to be called Holy Cross. Construction work was overseen by Falbo Contractors of San Antonio, with much of the labor supplied by parishioners. Gaenslen's design for a simplified Romanesque style church was carried out in red brick, with polychrome brick detailing on the tower. Its Romanesque features are evident in its tower, semi-circular arched windows and corbelled parapet. Since 1916, Holy Cross Catholic Church has served Catholics in Yorktown and the surrounding area. The building stands as an architectural landmark in the region, as it houses the parish's ongoing ministries of worship, education and outreach. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 2001
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Polish Catholic families who first landed in Texas in the 1850s and settled the pioneering colony of Panna Maria later migrated to the Yorktown area, splitting from a largely German parish to form their own congregation. On land deeded in 1867 they built a church dedicated to St. Mary; after fire destroyed it in 1915, architect F. B. Gaenslen designed the present red-brick Romanesque building, completed in 1916 with much of the labor supplied by parishioners. It reused the cross from the old steeple, giving the church its name.
Why it matters
It marks one of the oldest Polish immigrant communities in the United States, whose Texas settlements preserved language, faith, and culture generations after crossing the Atlantic.
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Related people
- · Anton Koszielsky
- · Lucyia Koszielsky
- · F. B. Gaenslen
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery
Yorktown, TX
In 1867 Anton and Lucyia Koszielsky deeded land near Yorktown for a Catholic burial ground to serve a growing immigrant community, and later families enlarged it and adorned it with a crucifixion monument and statuary. The spelling of the founders' name shifting from Koszielsky to Kozelski over the generations quietly records the assimilation of Central European Catholics into South Texas.
Union Veteran 2nd. Lt. Adolph Strieber
Yorktown, TX
Adolph Strieber, born in Zellerfeld, Germany, came to Texas as a boy through the port of Old Indianola in 1846. Like many Texas Germans who believed the Union should be preserved, he crossed Confederate lines on foot, by stagecoach, and by steamboat to enlist as a private in Springfield, Illinois, serving in Company G of the 16th Illinois Cavalry from 1863 to 1865. After the war he returned to Texas as a merchant and prominent citizen of Yorktown.
Lithuanians in Texas
Yorktown, TX
Amid the great mid-nineteenth-century European migration to Texas, a small group of Lithuanians settled around Yorktown in DeWitt County—so thoroughly absorbed into the larger German community that their story was long forgotten. The first family, David and Dora Stanchos, arrived about 1852, making them among the earliest documented Lithuanian immigrants to America, and roughly seventy more followed by 1874, most from the Gumbinnen region of East Prussia. They farmed, became citizens, fought on both sides of the Civil War, and left their dead in the Jonischkies Cemetery south of town.
Eckhardt Ranch House
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Robert Christian Eckhardt left Germany at 13 to join an uncle who helped found Yorktown, part of the wave of German immigrants who reshaped 19th-century Texas. A merchant with a large family, he built this ranch home in 1879 and commuted to his store, and the house has stayed in the family ever since. His descendants went on to include a U.S. Congressman, doctors, lawyers, teachers, and other community leaders.