Corinth Shiloh Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Corinth Shiloh Cemetery in Denton County. Now, every good story in Texas starts with somebody deciding to go somewhere. And this one starts with a man of two callings: physician and lay preacher both, named Thomas A.

Ball. He and his wife Nancy, born a Yeats, packed up their lives in Missouri and came to Denton County soon after the Civil War ended in 1865. Two callings, one wagon, a new piece of Texas land ahead of them.

The Ball family settled on ground that would grow into the community of Corinth. And like a lot of folks who put down deep roots, they made sure there was a place for what comes after. The Ball family donated land already in use as a graveyard to the Primitive Baptist Church at Shiloh.

The first marked grave on record belongs to a man named William Garrison, who died in 1870. That stone is still out there. Native sandstone, the kind cut from the county itself.

Some of the early markers are accompanied by decorative mussel shells (harvested from nearby creeks) and if you stop and look at them, they'll stop you right back. A decade on, in 1880, the Wichita and Dallas Railway came through and gave the settlement its name: Corinth. Railroads had a way of making things official like that.

For years the burial ground kept the name Shiloh Cemetery (honoring that original church connection) and people knew it that way across generations. Then in 1959, a cemetery association formed, and the members did what associations do: they voted. They adopted the name Corinth Shiloh Cemetery, threading both names together like a knot that holds.

The land itself kept growing too. An additional donation in 1953 enlarged the cemetery to two and a half acres. More room for more names.

More sandstone. More shells from the creek. Today, Corinth Shiloh Cemetery chronicles the history of area settlers; that's what the marker says, and it means it.

Descendants and friends still reunite for annual decoration days, coming out to clean and decorate the graves of those buried there. Generation finding generation across a stretch of Denton County ground. Thomas A.

Ball came here a doctor and a preacher, and donated a piece of earth so his neighbors would have somewhere to rest. That land is still doing exactly what he gave it for.

What the marker says

Physician and lay preacher Thomas A. Ball and his wife, Nancy (Yeats), came to Denton County from Missouri soon after the Civil War ended in 1865. They settled with their family on land that would become the community of Corinth. The Ball family donated land already in use as a graveyard to the Primitive Baptist Church at Shiloh. The first marked grave is that of William Garrison (d. 1870). In 1880, the Wichita & Dallas Railway named the settlement Corinth. An additional land donation in 1953 enlarged the cemetery to 2.5 acres. The community called the burial ground Shiloh Cemetery for many years until a cemetery association formed in 1959 and members adopted the name Corinth Shiloh Cemetery. Features of the early cemetery include native sandstone markers and decorative mussel shells harvested from nearby creeks. Today, Corinth Shiloh Cemetery chronicles the history of area settlers. Descendants and friends reunite for annual decoration days to clean and decorate the graves of those buried here. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2003