Denson Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna tell it to you. Joseph Denson came into this world in 1823, and sometime in the 1830s, he packed up with his family and made the long journey out of Alabama and into Texas. They weren't wandering blind, either.

The Denson family came as part of a community, Predestination Baptists, settling in Houston County alongside the very founder of their church, Elder Daniel Parker. That's the kind of rootedness that tends to stick to a piece of ground. And stick they did.

Joseph put down roots so deep that when he married, in about 1851, he married into Texas legend. Her name was Caroline L. Houston, born in 1836, and she happened to be the niece of Sam Houston.

You just can't wander too far in Texas history without that name turning up somewhere. Together, Joseph and Caroline raised eleven children on that farm. Eleven.

The land worked, the family grew, and Joseph being the kind of man who thinks ahead, he set aside one and a half acres of his own farm for a family burial ground. When he died in 1889, he was the first to be interred there with a marked headstone. His own land, his own ground, his name cut into stone above it.

Caroline lived on until 1918, and over the years the cemetery grew along with the family's memory of itself. In 1977, two additional acres were deeded to the cemetery, giving that little patch of Houston County ground a little more room to hold what the Denson family had built. And every year, the family still comes back.

A homecoming, right here, at the place Joseph first set aside for them. Some men build monuments. Joseph Denson just set aside an acre and a half, and the family kept showing up.

That's how you make something last.

What the marker says

Joseph Denson (1823-89) came to Texas from Alabama with his family in the 1830s. They were among the Predestination Baptists who settled in Houston County with the Church's founder, Elder Daniel Parker. Joseph married Caroline L. (Houston) (1836-1918), niece of Sam Houston, about 1851, and they had eleven children. He set aside 1.5 this acres from his farm for a family burial ground and was the first to be interred here with a marked headstone. Two additional acres were deeded to the cemetery in 1977. The annual Denson family homecoming is held here.