Walthall Cemetery
Ballinger, Runnels County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This burial ground is the last surviving evidence of Walthall community. Situated west of here, just across the Colorado River, Walthall was the first stable settlement in Runnels County. It was located on land claimed in the 1860s by the John W. Guest family, and surrounded a stagecoach stop on the Camp Colorado - Fort Concho Road in the 1870s. The cemetery contains at least one unmarked grave. The oldest marked grave is that of infant Penny Cotten (1877-1878). Mrs. John W. Guest (1820-1878) was another early burial. A stone from the river marks her grave.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
This quiet burial ground is all that remains of Walthall, the first stable settlement in Runnels County. The community grew up around a stagecoach stop on the Camp Colorado–Fort Concho road in the 1870s, on land the John W. Guest family had claimed the decade before. Its oldest marked grave is that of infant Penny Cotten, who died in 1878; a stone hauled from the Colorado River marks the grave of Mrs. Guest, who died the same year.
Why it matters
Vanished settlements like Walthall, remembered only by their graves, mark the first fragile footholds of Anglo settlement on the West Texas frontier.
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Related people
- · John W. Guest
Themes & tags
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