McGregor Cemetery (Scottish Presbyterian Cemetery)
Nelsonville, Austin County, Texas
Marker Inscription
A group of settlers came to this area of western Austin County from North Carolina in the early 1850s. Many of the pioneers were originally from Lismore, Argyleshire County, Scotland, and had immigrated to the United States together. Included among the group were members of the McGregor, Carmichael, McLean, McDougald, and McLeod families. Galatia Presbyterian Church was founded nearby in October 1860, but was discontinued in 1883 after most of the members moved away from the area. The church property was sold and the proceeds donated to Austin College, a Presbyterian school founded in Huntsville, but relocated to Sherman in 1878. This cemetery, which contains fifteen marked graves, was established on August 22, 1868, with the burial of Mary McGregor (1793-1861), wife of Malcolm McGregor. Two days later another Scottish settler, Peter John McLean, died and was laid to rest in the graveyard. The cemetery continued to serve the small rural community until 1900, when six-year-old Billy Boy Carmighael was the last person interred here. Maintained by an association of descendants, the McGregor Cemetery is the last physical remnant of the area's pioneer Scottish settlement. (1997)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In the early 1850s a close-knit band of Scottish immigrants—McGregors, Carmichaels, McLeans and more, many from the isle of Lismore in Argyllshire—settled western Austin County by way of North Carolina. They founded Galatia Presbyterian Church and, in 1868, opened this graveyard with the burial of Mary McGregor. When the last interment came in 1900, the cemetery remained as the community's final trace.
Why it matters
This quiet churchyard is the last physical remnant of a transplanted Scottish Presbyterian settlement, a window into the immigrant threads woven through rural Texas.
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Related people
- · Mary McGregor
- · Peter John McLean
Themes & tags
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