Courtney Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, as best as Duane can carry it to you. Out here in Grimes County, the land has a way of holding onto things. Names.

Dates. The quiet weight of whole lives. And this particular piece of ground has been holding on for a long time.

We're talking about Courtney Cemetery, tucked in adjacent to what was once known as McAlpine Town, a subdivision laid out in 1873. The man behind that subdivision was a developer named Dugald McAlpine, born in 1795, died in 1876. And before he was gone, he did something that outlasted nearly everything else he ever built.

He established this cemetery. Now the oldest documented grave belongs to a man named W. S.

Draper, born 1828, gone 1873. That date on his stone, same year McAlpine was platting the town next door. But here's the thing that'll make you slow down when you walk through a place like this.

There are unmarked graves here too. Graves that may reach back even further than Draper's stone. Nobody left a name.

Nobody left a date. Just the earth remembering. The people buried here aren't strangers to this county's story.

Community leaders rest here. Descendants of early settlers. And veterans, men who answered the call across more than a century of conflict, from the Civil War, through World War I, through World War II, all the way to Korea.

That's a lot of generations leaving somebody behind in this ground. In 1971, a cemetery association was formed to care for the place. Somebody decided the forgetting stops here.

And so far, they've kept that promise.

What the marker says

Located on land which is adjacent to the 1873 subdivision of Courtney known as McAlpine Town, this cemetery was established by developer Dugald McAlpine (1795-1876). The oldest documented grave in the cemetery is that of W. S. Draper (1828-1873). There are some unmarked graves which may date from an earlier period. Those interred here include community leaders, descendants of early settlers, and veterans of the Civil War, World War I, World War II, and Korea. A cemetery association, formed in 1971, cares for the historic graveyard.