Bell's Chapel Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it: and it's a story worth telling right. Way out in Ellis County, there's a cemetery that carries a name, and behind that name is a man, a community, and a piece of ground that somebody had to be first to lie down in. John and Elizabeth Gibbons gave that ground, deeded it over on December 27th, 1875, right there at the tail end of the year.

That tract, along with some later purchases, went to the Methodist Episcopal Church South, and something started to take root in the Rockett Community. The church and the cemetery both got named in honor of Jodie M. Bell, a Confederate war veteran, a church leader, a civic leader.

The kind of man a community leans on. And here's where the story gets quiet for a moment: Jodie M. Bell was also the first person to be buried there, in 1877.

The place bears his name because the community put it there, and then he became part of the ground itself. Now, you don't build a legacy like that without neighbors showing up. Red Oak Masonic Lodge No. 461, chartered in 1876, helped raise a two-story chapel and meeting hall on the site.

Two stories; that's no modest little box of a building. That's ambition. The lodge worked alongside the congregation for years, until 1894, when they pulled up and moved on to Red Oak.

But the chapel stood. The cemetery kept its name. Bell's Chapel Cemetery, founded 1875, and still out there in Ellis County, holding its ground.

What the marker says

Founded 1875. Site for church cemetery was given on Dec. 27, 1875, by local landowners John and Elizabeth Gibbons. This tract and some later purchases were deeded to the Methodist Episcopal Church South. Church and cemetery were named in honor of confederate war veteran Jodie M. Bell, a church and civic leader in Rockett Community, and first person to be buried here, 1877. Red Oak Masonic Lodge No. 461, chartered in 1876, helped build 2-story chapel and meeting hall. The lodge moved to Red Oak in 1894.