Clear Creek Cemetery

Duane's take

The official marker tells it this way, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Out here in Colorado County, there's a piece of ground that's been holding the stories of a community for well over a century and a half. That place is Clear Creek Cemetery, and the story of how it came to be is the story of a whole neighborhood rising, thriving, and quietly stepping back into the grass.

The Clear Creek Community formed in the eighteen fifties, settled in near the route of the Old Gonzales Road. That road ran from San Felipe through Columbus, Oakland, and Gonzales, all the way on to San Antonio. A well-traveled corridor in its day, and the Clear Creek folks were right there alongside it.

A church organized in Clear Creek in those same eighteen fifties, and a decade later, in eighteen sixty, a man named Edward M. Glenn made it official, deeding land to three trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church South: Zachariah Payne, O. B.

Crenshaw, and John Tooke. Put their names on paper, made it real. The cemetery grew up around that church, and through the eighteen eighties it served as the main burial ground for the whole area.

And here's something worth pausing on: records indicate that several burials had already taken place at the site before the cemetery was even formally established. The ground was already doing its work before anyone got around to naming it. Among the earliest burials are J.C.C.

Barnett, son of Joseph and Mary Carnett; Cynthia Cleveland, wife of Horatio Johnson Cleveland; and Martha Miles Burgess. All three interred in the eighteen fifties, laid to rest in a place that was still findin' its shape. Then eighteen seventy-three arrived, and with it, the railroad, coming to nearby Weimar.

When the railroad comes to town, the town shifts, and that's what happened here. The population in the Clear Creek area began to decline. And then in eighteen eighty-six, the Clear Creek Church itself was torn down, the timber used to build a new church over in Oakland.

The congregation moved on. But the families, they didn't entirely let go. They kept coming back to bury their dead at Clear Creek for several more years.

The last recorded burial was John Anderson Lamkin, who died in nineteen twenty-nine. Long after the church was gone, long after the community had thinned out, the cemetery was still receiving the people of that place. More than a dozen veterans of the Civil War are buried here.

So are members of the Sons of Temperance, a fraternal organization of the nineteenth century. When you walk the grounds, you'll notice the notable features the marker calls out: false crypts, iron and wooden fences marking off family plots, grave markers of marble, of granite, and some cut from local sandstone quarried right out of Clear Creek itself. Stone from the same creek that gave the whole community its name, shaped into monuments for the people who lived alongside it.

The Clear Creek Cemetery Association formed in two thousand and seven to see to the care and preservation of this ground. The marker went up in two thousand and nine. A community formed in the eighteen fifties, a church built and then taken apart, a road that carried people through, a railroad that pulled them away, and through all of it, a piece of ground that just kept its arms open.

That's Clear Creek Cemetery.

What the marker says

Clear Creek Community formed in the 1850s near the route of the “Old Gonzales Road,” which ran from San Felipe though Columbus, Oakland and Gonzales on to San Antonio. A church organized in Clear Creek in the 1850s. In 1860, Edward M. Glenn officially deeded land to Methodist Episcopal Church South Trustees Zachariah Payne, O. B. Crenshaw and John Tooke. The cemetery that grew up around the Clear Creek Church became the main burial ground for the area through the 1880s. Records indicate that several burials had already taken place at the site prior to the cemetery’s formal establishment. Among the earliest burials are J.C.C. Barnett, son of Joseph and Mary Carnett; Cynthia Cleveland, wife of Horatio Johnson Cleveland; and Martha Miles Burgess, all interred in the 1850s. When the railroad came to nearby Weimar in 1873, the population in the Clear Creek area began to decline. However, even though Clear Creek Church was torn down and used to build a new church in Oakland in 1886, families continued to use the Clear Creek cemetery for several years. The last recorded burial was that of John Anderson Lamkin, who died in 1929. More than a dozen veterans of the Civil War are buried here, as are members of the 19th century fraternal rganization the Sons of Temperance. Notable features include false crypts and iron and wooden fences for family plots. Grave markers are made of marble or granite, with some of local sandstone quarried from Clear Creek. The Clear Creek Cemetery Association formed in 2007 to perpetuate the care and preservation of the cemetery. Historic Texas Cemetery – 2007 Marker Dedication - 2009