Smithson Valley Cemetery
New Braunfels, Comal County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Located off state highway 46 on Farm to Market Road 311 in the Texas Hill Country, the Smithson Valley Cemetery is the final resting place for German immigrants who settled the Smithson Valley community area. At one time, the community had a store, post office, blacksmith shop, one-room schoolhouse, dancehall, bowling alley and saloon. Many descendants of Johann Startz, one of the first 240 founders of New Braunfels and citizen of the Republic of Texas, are buried here. In 1876 the cemetery began as a family ranch cemetery for the burial of baby Karl Ohlrich, Jr., the young son of Heinrich Pantermuehl’s sister, Louise Pantermuehl Ohlrich. Heinrich Pantermuehl (1842-1921), husband to Johann Startz’s granddaughter, Pauline (1856-1933), formally deeded this land for a cemetery in 1898. The landscape of the Smithson Valley Cemetery is representative of other German family cemeteries found throughout central Texas. Graves face east to west arranged in uniform rows with curbing, perpetuating a custom widely used in Germany. Granite, marble and limestone gravestones are present, along with several unmarked graves thought to belong to children. Many inscriptions are in German. The grave of a young soldier, Herbert Startz (1893-1918), is decorated with a blanket of shells believed to be the signature of German cement finisher Henry Theodore Mordhorst. The Smithson Valley Cemetery Association, organized in 1970, maintains this historic cemetery, a reminder of german immigration and settlement in the hill country.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In the Texas Hill Country, this cemetery is the resting place of the German immigrants who settled the Smithson Valley community, once home to a store, post office, schoolhouse, dancehall, and saloon. It began in 1876 as a family burial ground and was formally deeded for a cemetery in 1898 by Heinrich Pantermuehl. Its east-facing rows, curbed plots, and German-language gravestones carry on customs brought from Germany.
Why it matters
The cemetery preserves the material culture and burial traditions of German immigration that shaped rural central Texas.
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Related people
- · Johann Startz
- · Heinrich Pantermuehl
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Pantermuel House
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Heimrich and Pauline Pantermuehl were German-born settlers who put down roots in Comal County during the great mid-19th-century wave of German immigration to the Texas Hill Country. The limestone-and-native-cedar cottage they raised about 1865 follows the compact, sturdy style typical of small German farm homes in the region.
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Just four years after German immigrants founded New Braunfels in 1845, they organized the Schuetzen Verein in 1849 as one of the nation's earliest shooting clubs, carrying a beloved target-shooting tradition from the old country. On the frontier the marksmanship also served practical ends, helping settlers hunt and defend their homes. Its Koenig (King) matches, held since before the Civil War, continued even through wartime ammunition shortages and endure today.
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