Schlobohm Cemetery
Houston, Harris County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This historic family burial ground marks the homestead of a veteran of the Texas revolution and early settler of HarrisCounty. Johann Schlobohm (1807- 1882) was born in the Hanover region of Germany, and was in New Orleans by March 15, 1936, when he enlisted in Zavalla Guards, 2nd Regiment Volunteer Infantry. His group arrived in Galveston before the battle of San Jacinto, and after the battle they were placed as guard over Mexican General Santa Anna. Johann (John Slaburn) continued to serve in the Texian army in Company D, First Regiment, Permanent Volunteers from April 1836 to November 1837. Schlobohm married Charlotte Caroline Kleibrink (1823-1886) in 1850 at the home of his neighbor and comrade-in-arms Peter Dykeman. In 1856, the Schlobohms bought 82 acres along Greens Bayou and built their home here, expanding their farm to 246 acres in 1858. The family cemetery began with burial of their daughter Fredericka in 1873. John and Caroline had eight children; six of them are interred here with their families and descendants. A quarter-acre of land was officially dedicated for the family cemetery in 1895, and expanded eight years later to a full acre. Members of the Schlobohm and Nicol families were caretakers of the graveyard for many years. At a family reunion in 1988, descendants formed the Schlobohm Cemetery Association, which has since maintained the property. At least ten veterans are buried here, including confederate veteran John Milton Morin and those who served in both world wars and later conflicts. Granite, marble and bronze grave markers are prominent. The 82-acre homestead was still forested and undeveloped in the early 21st century, 150 years after the Schlobohm family settled here. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2007
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
This family burial ground marks the homestead of Johann Schlobohm (1807–1882), a Hanover-born German immigrant who enlisted in New Orleans in 1836 and reached Texas in time to help guard the captured General Santa Anna after the Battle of San Jacinto. After further service in the Texian army, he married Charlotte Caroline Kleibrink in 1850 and in 1856 bought 82 acres along Greens Bayou, where the cemetery began with his daughter Fredericka's burial in 1873. At least ten veterans rest here—spanning the Texas Revolution, the Confederacy, and both world wars—among generations of Schlobohm descendants who still tend the graves.
Why it matters
The cemetery ties one immigrant soldier of Texas independence to the land his family held for 150 years, a durable link between the founding of the Texas Republic and the German settlers who helped build early Harris County.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
This burial ground carries you back to the very birth of Texas as an independent republic, and to the wave of immigration that helped populate it. In the 1830s, Texas was a contested frontier, and 1836 was its hinge year—the year of the revolution against Mexico and the Battle of San Jacinto that decided it. Men came from far beyond Texas to fight in that struggle, some of them recent arrivals to the continent itself.
The man at the center of this story, Johann Schlobohm, was born in 1807 in the Hanover region of Germany. His life traces one of the great currents of nineteenth-century America: German immigration into Texas, which over the decades built farms, families, and whole communities across the region. He was in New Orleans in early 1836—one of the gathering points from which volunteers streamed toward the Texas fight—when he enlisted to join the cause.
The marker's era, the Early Republic, was a time when Texas was inventing itself, and when land along the bayous of what would become Harris County was still being claimed and worked by hand. The Schlobohm homestead is a window into that founding generation and the immigrants who were part of it from the start.
People & events
Johann Schlobohm's revolutionary service reads like a compressed drama of 1836. Enlisting in New Orleans in the Zavalla Guards, 2nd Regiment Volunteer Infantry, he reached Galveston before the Battle of San Jacinto, and after that decisive fight his group was placed as guard over the captured Mexican general, Santa Anna. To have stood watch over the very man whose defeat secured Texas independence is a remarkable place in history for one immigrant soldier. He continued in the Texian army—known also by the anglicized name John Slaburn—serving in Company D, First Regiment, Permanent Volunteers, from 1836 into late 1837.
The soldier eventually became a settler. In 1850 he married Charlotte Caroline Kleibrink at the home of his neighbor and comrade-in-arms, Peter Dykeman—a small detail that shows how the bonds of shared service carried into peacetime life. In 1856 the Schlobohms bought eighty-two acres along Greens Bayou and built their home, expanding the farm to 246 acres by 1858. Together John and Caroline raised eight children, six of whom would come to rest here among their families and descendants.
The cemetery itself began in sorrow, with the burial of their daughter Fredericka in 1873. A quarter-acre was formally dedicated to the family cemetery in 1895 and expanded to a full acre eight years later. The Schlobohm and Nicol families tended the graves for years, and in 1988 descendants gathered for a reunion and formed the Schlobohm Cemetery Association to care for the ground—an unbroken chain of stewardship reaching back to the founding generation.
Its place in the American story
Schlobohm Cemetery ties one immigrant's life to two of the largest themes in American history: the founding of new political communities and the peopling of the land by newcomers from abroad. Here a man born in Germany helped guard the prisoner whose capture sealed Texas independence, then stayed to farm the country he had fought for. That single biography links the revolution to the immigrant settlement that followed it.
The graves themselves tell an even longer story of service. At least ten veterans rest here, spanning the Texas Revolution, the Confederacy—including Confederate veteran John Milton Morin—and both world wars and later conflicts. In one modest family plot you can trace generations of Americans answering their era's call to arms, a compressed record of the nation's military history written in granite, marble, and bronze.
There is also a quieter kind of significance in the land's endurance. The original eighty-two-acre homestead remained forested and undeveloped into the early twenty-first century, a century and a half after the family first settled it. In a fast-growing metropolitan county, that persistence is its own monument—a piece of the founding era's landscape surviving intact.
If you visit
This is a place to visit with reverence and a sense of scale. It is a working family cemetery, so treat it as the resting place it is—but let the span of it register. Among the granite, marble, and bronze markers lie people whose lives reached from the Texas Revolution through the twentieth century's wars, all within one family's ground.
Look for the layers of time. The story here begins with a young daughter's grave in 1873 and grows outward through generations, so the stones themselves chart a family—and a nation—aging across the decades. Knowing that descendants still gather to care for the site, you'll sense that this is a living memory rather than an abandoned relic.
Set against the growth of the surrounding Houston area, the survival of this old homestead ground is part of what makes it worth seeing. It is a stop for the history-minded traveler—a quiet, durable link between the founding of the Texas Republic and the immigrant families who helped build early Harris County, still tended by the people who descend from them.
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
- · Johann Schlobohm
- · Charlotte Caroline Kleibrink
- · John Milton Morin
Related events
- · Battle of San Jacinto (1836)
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Washington Cemetery
Houston, TX
Founded by the Deutsche Gesellschaft von Houston, the German Society Cemetery was established in 1887 on land then outside the city, selling family lots to members and the public. Anti-German feeling during World War I prompted its 1918 renaming as Washington Cemetery, and its more than 7,600 graves include Republic of Texas citizens, immigrants from over 20 nations, and 300-plus veterans of nine wars — among them Sarah Emma Edmonds Seelye, who served in the Union Army disguised as a man.
Joseph Ehlinger
Houston, TX
Born in the Alsace region of France in 1792, Joseph Ehlinger was among the European-born settlers who cast their lot with the Texas cause. He served in Captain William J. E. Heard's company at San Jacinto in 1836, the battle that won Texas its independence, and lived out his years in Houston until his death in 1845.
David Grieves
Houston, TX
David Grieves was a Scottish immigrant who cast his lot with the Texas struggle for independence, serving in Captain Henry Teal's company at the Battle of San Jacinto in 1836. That short, decisive fight secured Texas's break from Mexico. Grieves lived only briefly afterward, dying in the raw new town of Houston in 1837.
Evergreen Cemetery
Houston, TX
The Evergreen Cemetery Association organized in 1894 and laid out 25 acres in Houston, opening with the burial of infant Nellie Storkes that October. Generations of the Hooper family tended the grounds into the 1980s, watching over a burial place that reflects three distinct traditions—fenced Southern folk family plots, finely carved German sections screened by evergreens, and individually adorned Hispanic graves. Among those resting here are veterans from the Civil War through World War II and members of fraternal orders like the Masons and Odd Fellows.