Moore Cemetery
Waco, McLennan County, Texas
Marker Inscription
LAND WAS BEING SURVEYED IN THE CHALK BLUFF COMMUNITY IN THE 1830s, THOUGH PERMANENT SETTLEMENT DATES TO THE 1850s. MISSOURI NATIVE LOUIS MOORE MOVED FROM ARKANSAS TO TEXAS ABOUT 1834, AND RECEIVED TITLE TO ONE-FOURTH OF A LEAGUE ON THE EAST BANK OF THE BRAZOS RIVER ABOVE THE WACO VILLAGE ON AUGUST 20, 1835. JOHN MOORE, SON OF LOUIS AND ELIZABETH MOORE, DIED IN 1858. THIS FIRST RECORDED FAMILY DEATH MAY BE THE FIRST BURIAL IN MOORE CEMETERY, BUT RECORDS ARE UNCLEAR. THE MOORES’ INFANT DAUGHTER DIED IN 1862 AND ELIZABETH DIED THE FOLLOWING YEAR. LOUIS BURIED THEM AND OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS ON TOP OF A HILL THAT WAS THE HIGHEST POINT OF HIS ESTATE. LOUIS DIED IN 1894 AND IS BURIED ALONGSIDE HIS FAMILY. THE MOORE FAMILY BURIAL GROUND EVENTUALLY EVOLVED INTO A COMMUNITY CEMETERY. IN 1921, THE MOORE SPRING CEMETERY ASSOCIATION FORMED WITH MRS. R. L. CARPENTER AS PRESIDENT. APPROXIMATELY THREE ACRES WERE FENCED AT THAT TIME; ALTHOUGH DEEDS INDICATE 16 ½ ACRES WERE DESIGNATED AS A GRAVEYARD. A HISTORIC METAL FENCE ENCASES THREE ROWS OF UNKNOWN GRAVES. HEADSTONES VARY FROM ERODED LIMESTONE MARKERS TO GRANITE, LIMESTONE AND MARBLE MARKERS. SEVERAL FRATERNAL ORGANIZATION MARKERS ARE PRESENT, AND MILITARY VETERANS FROM THE TEXAS REVOLUTION TO PRESENT ARE INTERRED HERE. THE CEMETERY NOW ENCOMPASSES MORE THAN 11 ACRES BOUNDED BY HOMES. THIS PEACEFUL BURIAL GROUND, SHADED BY OAKS ON A HILLSIDE SLOPE, IS A CONTINUUM OF CHALK BLUFF HISTORY FROM PIONEER TIMES TO THE PRESENT.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Missouri native Louis Moore came to Texas about 1834 and received title in 1835 to land on the east bank of the Brazos above the old Waco village. When his son John died in 1858 and his wife and infant daughter soon after, Moore buried them atop the highest hill on his estate, beginning what grew from a family plot into a community burial ground. Formalized by an association in 1921 and now spanning more than eleven acres, the cemetery holds veterans from the Texas Revolution to the present.
Why it matters
Moore Cemetery preserves a continuous thread of Central Texas settlement from the Republic era onward, marking where pioneer families put down permanent roots along the Brazos.
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Related people
- · Louis Moore
- · John Moore
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Chalk Bluff Baptist Church
Waco, TX
Founded in 1870 as White Rock Baptist Church by settlers who wanted a Baptist congregation nearby, this church was received into the Waco Baptist Association in 1871 and worshipped at the Union Grove School until it built its own home in 1878. A move to dissolve in 1907 was rescinded the next year, and the congregation carried its old building's materials to a new home at Chalk Bluff. That structure burned in 1934 and was rebuilt, and the church still serves the Waco area today.
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Thomas Hudson Barron
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