Center Grove Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Center Grove Cemetery, up in Titus County. Now, every graveyard has a beginning, and this one's beginning is about as somber as they come. Back in the mid-1860s, a man named David Yancey, Sr., donated the first parcel of land for a cemetery.

The place was called the Yancey Cemetery, after him, plain and simple. Yancey had made the long journey from Tennessee to Texas, and he brought a group of travelers with him. Among that group was an orphaned infant.

And that infant, before the journey could truly be called finished, was the first soul laid to rest in that ground. No grand monument. No carved inscription.

Just a rough stone, the kind you'd pick up from a field, set into the earth to mark the spot. In fact, many of the graves here, including that very first one, carry nothing more than a rough stone to say that someone mattered, that someone passed through this world and was remembered, at least this much. Over the decades, the cemetery filled with others.

Veterans came to rest here. Men who had served in the Civil War. Men who had gone off to both World Wars.

All of them finding their way back to this quiet piece of Titus County ground. Then, in 1900, the cemetery's name changed. The graveyard sat in the same area as the Center Grove Church of Christ, and so the name became Center Grove Cemetery, and that's what it's been called ever since.

It all started with a donated plot of land, a grieving group of travelers, and a rough stone marking a small grave. Some beginnings you don't forget.

What the marker says

This cemetery was originally called the Yancey Cemetery because the first parcel of land was donated by David Yancey, Sr., in the mid-1860s. An orphaned infant, who was a member of the group that traveled with Yancey from Tennessee to Texas, was the first to be buried here. Many of the graves, including the first, are marked with only a rough stone. Veterans of the Civil War and both World Wars have been buried here. The name of the cemetery was changed in 1900 because the graveyard was located in the same area as the Center Grove Church of Christ. (1984)