HistoricSiteMarkers
Reconstruction & Gilded Age

Walnut Creek Cemetery

Bremond, Robertson County, Texas

Marker Inscription

The Walnut Creek community was established in the 1850s with the arrival of several farming families. J. Grant Taylor came as a child to this area with his parents. Tradition says the Walnut Creek Cemetery began before 1869 with the death of a two-year-old girl. She was the daughter of a horse trader who lived nearby. Taylor gave permission for the child's burial on his 30-acre tract of land. The unmarked grave is at this site under a cedar tree. The first marked grave is located under the same cedar tree and is that of Sarah Lane Johnson (1866-1869), daughter of P. and S. H. Johnson. About 1871 Taylor donated two acres for a burial ground, Union meetinghouse, and school building. Since area students attended Stump Toe School (3 mi. N), a structure was not built here until 1888. Baptist, Church of Christ, and Methodist congregations held services here, constructing brush arbors on the grounds in the summers. Classes were held in the school building until World War II when Walnut Creek consolidated with Bremond schools. Afterward, the schoolhouse was used for annual memorial services. This cemetery is all that remains to mark the Walnut Creek community.

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

The Walnut Creek community took root in the 1850s as farming families settled this stretch of Robertson County. Its cemetery is said to have begun before 1869 with the burial of a horse trader's young daughter beneath a cedar tree, on land given by settler J. Grant Taylor, who later donated acreage for a burial ground, meetinghouse, and school. Church congregations and classes gathered here until the school consolidated with Bremond during World War II.

Why it matters

The cemetery is the last trace of a vanished rural community whose church, school, and graves once bound its farming families together.

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Related people

  • · J. Grant Taylor
  • · Sarah Lane Johnson

Themes & tags

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