Thomas Cemetery
Walker County, Walker County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This cemetery marks the site of Thomas Plantation and Steamboat Landing. John R. Thomas, a native of Alabama, settled here in 1854. A Confederate soldier during the Civil War, he was captured at the Battle of Arkansas in 1863 and transferred to Camp Chase, Ohio. He died there one month later. Graves include those of his mother Lucy Day Thomas (1794-1869) and brothers Budd Fry Thomas (1838-1862), also a veteran of the Confederate army, and Leroy Thomas (d. 1871), who owned land across the river. A nephew, Jack Thomas, sold this property by 1883 and moved to Polk County.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
This burial ground marks the site of the Thomas Plantation and its steamboat landing on the river, settled by Alabama native John R. Thomas in 1854. Thomas served in the Confederate army, was captured at the 1863 Battle of Arkansas Post, and died a month later as a prisoner at Camp Chase, Ohio; his mother and two brothers, one also a Confederate veteran, lie here as well. By 1883 a nephew had sold the land and moved on, leaving the cemetery as the family's last mark on the place.
Why it matters
The Thomas Cemetery preserves the story of a planter family swept up and ultimately broken by the Civil War, its riverside landing a token of the steamboat commerce that once knit the region together.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · John R. Thomas
Related events
- · Battle of Arkansas Post
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Site of Thomas Plantation and Steamboat Landing
Walker County, TX
John Richard Thomas left Alabama for Texas in 1854 and carved a 1,060-acre plantation along the Trinity River, raising cotton, corn, and molasses. He built wharves here so steamboats could carry his crops to market, and Thomas' Landing became a busy port of call. The Civil War and Thomas's death in 1863 broke the enterprise, and when the railroad reached Walker County in 1872 the riverboats fell silent; today only the cemetery marks the spot.
Newport
Walker County, TX
Newport was founded in 1846 by Joseph Werner, a German emigrant who staked his hopes on the traffic of the Trinity River. Like many antebellum Texas river towns, its fortunes rose and fell with the water: when steamboat navigation on the Trinity declined, the town was left behind and abandoned.
Town of Riverside
Riverside, TX
Riverside sprang up in 1872 as the Houston & Great Northern Railroad pushed through Walker County, where landowners gave earth, timber, and rock to win shipping facilities. The post office moved in from riverside Newport, whose wharves sat idle when the Trinity ran low—a telling shift from river to rail. The town grew to include churches, a school, a two-story hotel, a cotton gin, and other businesses, and in the 1920s gained Fuller's earth refining plants.
Waco, Beaumont, Trinity & Sabine Railroad
Trinity, TX
The line that became the Waco, Beaumont, Trinity & Sabine began in 1881 as a humble logging tram, the Trinity & Sabine Railway, and passed through the hands of the MKT and lumber magnate William Carlisle before Col. R. C. Duff bought it in 1924 with Trinity as its hub. Despite its grand name, it never reached Waco, Beaumont, or the Sabine—only Trinity, where it started. At its peak it ran 115 miles of hastily laid track through the piney woods, hauling timber, tomatoes, and later oil, and earned the affectionate nickname "Wobbly, Bobbly, Turnover and Stop" for its frequent derailments. Abandoned in 1961, its restored Engine #1 survives at the Galveston Railroad Museum.