Price-Sossaman-Slaughter Cemetery
San Augustine, San Augustine County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Little physical evidence remains of the family graveyard near this site that contains the burials of members of several early San Augustine families. The remaining historic tombstone, that of James H. C. Price, dates to 1852. James Price was the son of Col. Elijah Price (1791-1852) and Temperance Thomas Price (1805-1859), who came to San Augustine in the 1840s. Elijah Price was a prosperous planter and merchant; he and his wife are both buried in the cemetery, which, as was the custom, was located near the family home. Their son Albert married into the Slaughter family, and their daughter Cornelia married into the Sossaman family; hence, members of those two families are also interred in the Price family cemetery. (2001)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Only a single 1852 tombstone still marks this San Augustine family graveyard, that of James H.C. Price, son of prosperous planter and merchant Elijah Price. Like many early Texas families, the Prices buried their dead near the family home, and marriages into the Slaughter and Sossaman families brought their members to rest here as well. The cemetery preserves the memory of several of the community's founding households.
Why it matters
Family burying grounds like this one are quiet records of the planter households that settled early East Texas and of the kinship ties that bound frontier communities together.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
In the 1840s, Texas was changing fast. The Republic of Texas was drawing settlers from the American South with the promise of cheap, fertile land, and in 1845 it joined the United States. East Texas, with its rich soil and established towns, was one of the most attractive destinations.
San Augustine was already a well-established community by then, a center of trade and politics in the Redlands. Families arriving in these years could find both farmland and a market town, which made it a natural home for someone who was both a planter and a merchant.
The planter economy of East Texas, like that of the wider South in these years, was built largely on cotton and on the labor of enslaved people. That broader reality is part of the backdrop to any prosperous planting household of the era.
People & events
Colonel Elijah Price and his wife, Temperance Thomas Price, came to San Augustine in the 1840s and built a prosperous life. Elijah worked both as a planter and as a merchant, a combination that placed the family among the more substantial households in the area.
As was customary at the time, the family laid out its burial ground near the home. Elijah died in 1852, and Temperance in 1859; both rest here. The one historic headstone that survives belongs to their son, James H. C. Price, and it too dates to 1852, meaning the family suffered more than one loss in that single year.
The cemetery grew beyond the Price name through marriage. Their son Albert married into the Slaughter family, and their daughter Cornelia married into the Sossaman family. Members of both families were later buried alongside the Prices, which is how this small graveyard came to carry three family names.
Its place in the American story
Family cemeteries like this one were once a common sight across rural America. Before towns built community cemeteries, families buried their dead on their own land, close to the house, where graves could be tended and visited.
These small burial grounds are fragile. Wooden markers rot, stones break or are carried off, and once a family moves away, the site can disappear from memory. That so little physical evidence remains here is typical, and it is exactly why historical markers matter: they preserve what the landscape itself is losing.
The Price-Sossaman-Slaughter cemetery also shows how frontier communities were woven together. Through marriages, a handful of families became one extended network, and that network shaped the social and economic life of towns like San Augustine for generations.
If you visit
Don't expect rows of monuments here. The marker itself says little physical evidence of the graveyard remains, with only a single historic headstone surviving. The experience is quieter and more reflective than that of a larger cemetery.
Take a moment to imagine the landscape as it was: a family home nearby, fields beyond, and a small plot of graves within sight of the house. The absence of stones is part of the story, a reminder of how easily these places fade.
This stop fits naturally into a visit to San Augustine, one of the oldest towns in Texas. Combine it with the other historical markers around town to get a sense of the families who built this corner of East Texas. Please treat the site with respect, as it remains a burial ground.
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
- · James H.C. Price
- · Elijah Price
- · Temperance Thomas Price
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Hillcrest
San Augustine, TX
Raised in 1872 and enlarged to twelve rooms in 1878, this house was built almost entirely from the land around it — hand-hewn timbers, locally cut heart-pine floors and ceilings, and brick fired at the old Ayish Bayou kiln. Its seven fireplaces are dressed with marble mantels imported from France, carried inland by boats up the Sabine River. The blend of local craft and worldly finish speaks to a prosperous Reconstruction-era East Texas.
Home of Matthew Cartwright
San Augustine, TX
Built in 1839, in the days of the Republic of Texas, this house was purchased in 1847 by Matthew Cartwright, a member of a prominent East Texas family. Remarkably, it remained in the hands of his descendants for generations, and the State of Texas honored it with a marker during the 1936 centennial of Texas independence. Homes like it anchored San Augustine as one of the oldest Anglo-American settlements in the region.
Home of Col. Stephen William Blount
San Augustine, TX
Born in Georgia in 1808, Stephen William Blount came to Texas in 1835 and signed the Texas Declaration of Independence before joining the Army of Texas in the fight for independence. He went on to serve his adopted home as the first county clerk of San Augustine County and the first district clerk of the First Judicial District, living out his life in the town until 1890.
Site of the First Methodist Episcopal Church
San Augustine, TX
On January 7, 1838, with the rites of the Masonic order, the cornerstone was laid here for the first Methodist Episcopal church building erected in the Republic of Texas. The Reverend Littleton Fowler and General Thomas J. Rusk—a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence—delivered the addresses at this early milestone of organized religion in the new republic.