Boren Cemetery

Duane's take

The official marker for Boren Cemetery in Ellis County: here's how it goes, the way the record tells it. Now, Michael Boren was a Kentucky man, born and raised, but somewhere along the way Texas called to him (the way it has a habit of doing). In 1847, he packed up his second wife, Mary Ann, who carried the maiden name Ridgeway, and together they moved to this part of Texas with their children and their slaves.

A whole household, uprooting and replanting itself in new ground. Mary Ann didn't get many years in that new ground. She died in 1857, and the belief is that she is among the earliest souls laid to rest in what became Boren Cemetery.

But here's the thing about belief and record; they don't always match up. The earliest death date that anyone actually carved into a stone marker belongs not to Mary Ann, but to a child. Sidney T.

Boren. Five years old. He was the grandson of Michael and his first wife, Bettie (Bettie Morrow before she was Bettie Boren), and that stone bearing 1868 stands as the oldest legible testimony the ground has left us.

Michael Boren and his son George eventually donated the land itself, set aside for the use of two communities: Reagor Springs and Bethel. A gift of ground to the people around them. And those people came to fill it, generation after generation.

Numerous military veterans. Ellis County pioneer families. The whole sweep of the area's history, pressed into one quiet place.

There's something about a cemetery that tells you more about a community than almost anything else: who they honored, who they remembered, who they made sure would not be forgotten. Boren Cemetery has been doing that work since before 1868 was even a date anybody knew to carve.

What the marker says

Kentucky native Michael Boren and his second wife, Mary Ann (Ridgeway) moved to this part of Texas with their children and slaves in 1847. Hers is believed to be among the earliest graves in Boren Cemetery, as she died in 1857, but 1868 is the earliest death date recorded on a stone marker. It belongs to Sidney T. Boren, the five-year-old grandson of Michael and his first wife, Bettie (Morrow). Boren and his son George donated land for this cemetery for the use of the Reagor Springs and Bethel communities. A reflection of the area's history, it contains the graves of numerous military veterans and members of Ellis county pioneer families. (2001)