DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Evergreen Cemetery in Orange County, Texas. Now, before we even get to names and dates and headstones, let me set the scene. Local lore places the first burial here as early as 1840.
Eighteen forty. That's before Texas was even a state. Before the railroad, before the telegraph, before most of the country had ever heard of Orange, Texas.
Somebody was already being laid to rest on this ground. Fast forward to 1853. A man named Robert Jackson purchases thirty-five acres of land — and when he walks that property, he finds at least one grave already waiting for him.
Now, most men might have fenced around it and called it a curiosity. Robert Jackson did something finer than that. He allowed that portion of his land to be used for further burials.
Just like that, a cemetery had itself a home. The earliest marked grave on the property is dated 1860. The majority of those who died in the city of Orange between 1850 and 1853 — that narrow window before private cemeteries began operations in the area — are buried right here on this site.
Think about that. This ground caught the city in its earliest, most vulnerable years. For a long stretch, folks just called it what it was — The City Cemetery.
Or sometimes, with a kind of grateful plainness, they called it the cemetery that Mr. Jackson gave to the city. Then somewhere around 1898 or 1899, the name Evergreen came into use.
Simple, steady, enduring. Seems about right. A ladies' cemetery association had formed back in 1891, tending the place and keeping it from being swallowed whole by time and East Texas undergrowth.
And it needed tending. By 1911, a man named Robert Russell wrote — and I want you to hear this exactly as he put it — that more graves are lost in there than are in sight. More lost than in sight.
That's not neglect talking, that's history being honest about how much it forgets. Fewer than a hundred marked graves date from before 1900. Most of them belong to pioneer settlers who died in their forties and fifties.
The frontier did not coddle its people. Then came the years 1917, 1918, and 1919. The number of marked burials increased sharply across all three of those years, driven by a series of influenza epidemics.
Those graves aren't monuments to glory. They're a record of something quiet and terrible that swept through Orange and didn't ask permission. By 1998, Evergreen had grown to nearly four times its original size, holding an estimated seventy-five hundred graves.
Walk through it and you'll find family mausoleums, the markers of fraternal orders, and military markers honoring veterans of the Civil War, the Spanish American War, World Wars I and II, and the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam. Several U.S. and international conflicts, all accounted for in stone. Evergreen Cemetery, the marker tells us, is a record of the pioneers of Orange.
And it continues to serve the city and the surrounding area to this day. From one grave that Robert Jackson found waiting for him in 1853, all the way to seventy-five hundred souls. Some places just decide, early on, what they're going to be.
This one decided in 1840.
What the marker says
Local lore places the first burial in this cemetery as early as 1840. When Robert Jackson purchased 35 acres of land including this site in 1853, at least one grave was already present. Jackson allowed that portion of his land to be used for further burials. The earliest marked grave is dated 1860. A ladies' cemetery association was formed in 1891, and for many years the graveyard was referred to as "The City Cemetery" or "The cemetery that Mr. Jackson gave to the city." The name Evergreen came into use in 1898 or 1899. Fewer than 100 marked graves date from before 1900. Most are those of pioneer settlers who died in their 40s and 50s. In 1911, Robert Russell wrote that "more graves are lost in there than are in sight." The number of marked burials increased in 1917, 1918, and 1919 due to a series of influenza epidemics. The majority of those who died in the city of Orange between 1850 and 1853, when private cemeteries began operations in the area, are buried on this site. Nearly four times its original size, the cemetery contains a variety of grave markers, including family mausoleums, the markers of fraternal orders, and military markers honoring veterans of several U. S. and international conflicts, including the Civil War, the Spanish American War, World Wars I and II, and the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam. With an estimated 7500 graves in 1998, Evergreen Cemetery is a record of the pioneers of orange. The cemetery continues to serve the city and surrounding area. (1998)