Lilly Island Cemetery
Barnes, Polk County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This burial ground served residents of several communities that formed in this area beginning in the late 19th century. Former slaves resided in these settlements; some came to Texas from Savannah, Goergia with plantiation owner Daniel Hamilton. When Hamilton passed away, his daughter Margaret, with husband John S. Havis, began to manage the plantation. They donated property for church purposes after two former slaves, Cal Hamilton and Delila Scott, requested land on which to conduct worship services. By the late 1880s, members of Lilly Eylan (Island) Missionary Baptist Church met here to worship. In 1903, the congregation relocated to a settlement between Barnes and Camden which took the same name as the church. The original church site became known as Lilly Island Cemetery. The burial ground served residents of Barnes, Camden and Lilly Island. Many settlers were formers slaves and most farmed. Many of the freed slaves also worked for W.T. Carter and Brother Lumber Company, which provided boarding and houses, schools, medical services, a company store and a post office for its employees. The company was the area's main employer and thrived until the end of World War II, when many African American workers migrated to urban areas, leading to the decline of this area's communities. The earliest burial here, of Morris W. Washington, an infant, dates to 1884. Other interments include verterans of foreign conflicts dating to World War I. Today, the Lilly Island Cemetery Assocaition cares for the cemetery, which continues to serve the area and remains as a testament to the former slaves and other residents of the Barnes, Camden and Lilly Island Communities. Historic Texas Cemetery-2006.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Lilly Island Cemetery grew from the freedom communities that formed in this corner of Polk County after emancipation, settled in part by formerly enslaved people who had come to Texas from Savannah, Georgia. Two of them, Cal Hamilton and Delila Scott, asked the plantation's heirs for land to worship on, and by the late 1880s a Missionary Baptist congregation met at what became the cemetery site. Many residents farmed or worked for the W.T. Carter lumber company until, after World War II, African American workers moved to the cities and the settlements declined; the earliest burial here dates to 1884.
Why it matters
The cemetery is a testament to the freedpeople who built independent Black communities, churches, and livelihoods in the Reconstruction-era South, and to the Great Migration that later scattered them.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Lilly Island Cemetery lies in the piney woods of Polk County in deep East Texas, and its story begins in the years after emancipation — the era of Reconstruction and the decades that followed. This was the moment when four million people freed from slavery had to build entirely new lives: to find land, form families on their own terms, gather into congregations, and create communities of their own making. In this corner of Polk County, that is exactly what they did.
The marker records a striking origin: some of the people who settled here had come to Texas from Savannah, Georgia, with a plantation owner named Daniel Hamilton before the war, and it was on that land, once freed, that they began to shape independent settlements. Several small communities took root in this area beginning in the late nineteenth century, home to former slaves and their descendants.
The surrounding country was timber country, and that shaped everything. The great East Texas pine forests drew lumber companies that became the economic engine of the region, and the fortunes of these communities would rise and fall with the mills. This is a landscape where faith, freedom, and hard labor in the woods were braided tightly together.
People & events
At the heart of the story are two formerly enslaved people, Cal Hamilton and Delila Scott, who asked for land on which to hold worship services. When Daniel Hamilton died, his daughter Margaret and her husband, John S. Havis, took over management of the plantation, and it was they who donated property for church purposes in answer to that request. From that act grew the Lilly Eylan — Lilly Island — Missionary Baptist Church, whose members were meeting here by the late 1880s.
In 1903 the congregation relocated to a settlement between Barnes and Camden, carrying the church's name with it, and the original site became Lilly Island Cemetery. It went on to serve the residents of Barnes, Camden, and Lilly Island alike — a shared resting place for a cluster of connected communities. The earliest burial recorded here is heartbreaking in its ordinariness: Morris W. Washington, an infant, laid to rest in 1884. Among the graves are veterans of the nation's wars reaching back to World War I.
Many of the people buried here farmed, and many also worked for the W.T. Carter and Brother Lumber Company, which dominated the local economy. The company built a whole world around its workforce — boarding and houses, schools, medical services, a company store, and a post office. It thrived until the end of World War II, when many African American workers left for the cities and the surrounding communities began to decline. Today the Lilly Island Cemetery Association tends the ground, keeping it as a testament to the people who made these communities.
Its place in the American story
This quiet burial ground holds two of the largest movements in African American history within its fence line. The first is the founding, after emancipation, of independent Black communities anchored by their own churches — a nationwide story of freedpeople building institutions of their own in the Reconstruction-era South. The request by Cal Hamilton and Delila Scott for land to worship on is that entire history in miniature: freedom expressed as the right to gather and pray in a congregation of one's own.
The second is the Great Migration. When workers left these settlements for urban areas after World War II and the communities declined, they were part of one of the largest internal movements of people in American history, as millions of African Americans moved from the rural South to cities in search of work and a freer life. The rise and fall of these Polk County communities traces that national arc in a single place.
The cemetery also preserves the memory of the company-town South, where a lumber firm like W.T. Carter and Brother could be an entire community's employer, landlord, doctor, and grocer. And the graves of veterans reaching back to World War I are a reminder that the people of these communities served a country that too often denied them full citizenship — a truth that gives this ground a particular dignity.
If you visit
Come to Lilly Island Cemetery with quiet respect; it is an active burial ground and a place of memory, cared for by the association that keeps its history alive. Walk gently among the markers and read the names and dates, which are the surest record left of the people and communities that once flourished here.
As you stand among the graves, let the span of them speak — from an infant buried in 1884 to veterans of the nation's twentieth-century wars. Each stone represents someone who helped build an independent community out of the hardest possible beginnings, and the ground itself is the clearest testament to lives that the written record too often overlooked.
The cemetery sits in the deep East Texas pinewoods, a landscape shaped by the timber industry that once drew these workers and their families. Reaching it takes you into quiet, rural country, and part of what you carry away is a sense of how much history can rest in a small clearing in the woods — a place that honors the freedpeople and the neighbors of Barnes, Camden, and Lilly Island who called it home.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Cal Hamilton
- · Delila Scott
- · Daniel Hamilton
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Sturrock Cemetery
Rockland, TX
When brothers John and William Sturrock left Scotland in 1830 with their siblings, they carried old-country burial customs to the banks of the Neches River in East Texas. William built a mill complex—gristmill, sawmill, and cotton gin—and set aside land for the family cemetery, where his first wife Cynthia was laid to rest in 1853, the earliest documented grave. Distinctive Scottish house tombs and false crypts mark generations of Sturrocks and their neighbors, among them children, Civil War and World War I veterans, and an enslaved man who died in 1864. Descendants still maintain the graves in their traditional east-west alignment.
Hoshall
Lufkin vicinity, TX
When the Houston East and West Texas Railroad reached Angelina County in 1882, a settlement called Bitterweed Flat grew up along the line. W. E. Hoshall bought land and timber rights in 1913 and began shipping logs from a switch there, and in 1917 Luke E. Wright built a sawmill and a company town — named Hoshall — complete with churches, schools, and a commissary, home to both Anglo and African American workers. When the mills closed, the town emptied, until by 1940 only a cemetery and a mill pond remained.
Moscow, Camden & San Augustine Railroad
Camden, TX
Chartered in 1898 by lumberman W. T. Carter, the Moscow, Camden & San Augustine Railroad linked the sawmill town of Camden to the main line at Moscow along just seven miles of track. It became Texas's shortest mixed-train railroad, carrying both passengers and freight behind a single engine. One of its retired engines, "Panama No. 201," had helped build the Panama Canal in 1914 before serving here.
Town of Corrigan
Corrigan, TX
Tucked in the piney woods of East Texas, Corrigan began about 1860 when settler James B. Hendry donated land for a townsite. The coming of the Texas & New Orleans Railroad in the early 1880s sparked a timber boom, and the town — named for railroad official Pat Corrigan — soon boasted a hotel, stores, a blacksmith shop, and even a ten-pin bowling alley. Lumber, ranching, and farming still anchor the local economy.