Lockett Cemetery
Jefferson, Marion County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Royal and Martha (Smith) Lockett came to Texas from Georgia between 1856 and 1858 with their eleven surviving children and the family's slaves. Seven of their eight living sons survived in the Confederate Army. The earliest marked grave on this site is that of Walter R. McGarity (1853-1862) son of James H. and Marie Antoinette (Lockett) McGarity and grandson of Royal and Martha Lockett. Six generations of Lockett descendants are interred here. according to family oral history, a Union solider who died on the Lockett Plantation also is buried in the graveyard. Of the more than 45 interred here by 1999, two were verterans of the Confederate Army and three were veterans of World War ll. The Lockett Cemetery continues as a chronicle of Marion County history. (1999)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Royal and Martha Lockett came to Texas from Georgia in the late 1850s with their eleven surviving children and the people they enslaved, and seven of their eight living sons went on to serve in the Confederate Army. The earliest marked grave is that of young Walter R. McGarity, a Lockett grandson who died in 1862. Family memory holds that a Union soldier who died on the Lockett Plantation was also buried here, and by 1999 the grounds held Confederate and World War II veterans among six generations of descendants.
Why it matters
A family plot holding Confederate sons, an enemy Union soldier, and later veterans captures how the Civil War divided and then bound together the households of the plantation South.
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Related people
- · Royal Lockett
- · Martha Smith Lockett
- · Walter R. McGarity
Themes & tags
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