DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about this place — so take it straight from the record. Now, every good graveyard deserves a good mystery, and the French Cemetery in Liberty County, Texas, comes by one honestly. Local tradition holds that somewhere near this very site, a group of French settlers were killed and buried — sometime during the 18th century.
No physical evidence of those burials has ever turned up. Not a bone, not a marker, not so much as a rusted buckle. And yet the name has stuck for more than a hundred years, passed down through generations who couldn't quite let it go.
Can't say I blame them. Before it carried that name, folks in the mid-1800s called it the Pruett Family Cemetery. And that name, at least, has solid ground under it.
The land itself was acquired by a man named Beasley Pruett from the Mexican government in 1824. He made it his. He worked it.
And when he died in 1835, he was buried right there on his own land grant — in a grave that today goes unmarked. The earliest marked grave in the cemetery belongs to Martha Day, dated 1860. She was a daughter-in-law of Beasley Pruett.
After that, the names start filling in. Reason Green, born in 1800 and died in 1868, rests here — a man who held several public offices during the 19th century. Other early Liberty County settlers and Pruett family descendants found their way to this ground too, among them people bearing the surnames Brashear and Linney.
Veterans of four wars and the Korean Conflict are interred here as well. That's a long stretch of service and sacrifice laid quiet in just two acres. Two acres — and that's not an accident.
In 1946, the landowners W. T. Jamison, Sr., born in 1878 and died in 1962, and J.
N. Coleman, born in 1882 and died in 1948, formally set aside those two acres as part of the sale of the surrounding land. They made sure the cemetery wouldn't get swallowed up when everything else changed hands.
So here it sits — ground that may hold the unnamed French dead of the 1700s, a pioneer buried without a stone in 1835, a daughter-in-law marked in 1860, a public servant, soldiers, and generations of Liberty County names. The French Cemetery. A mystery for a name, and a whole county's worth of history underneath it.
What the marker says
According to local tradition, this cemetery derives its name from a group of French settlers who were killed and buried near the site sometime during the 18th century. Although no physical evidence of the French burials has been found, the name has been in common use for more than 100 years. Referred to in the mid-1800s as the Pruett Family Cemetery, the graveyard is located on land acquired by Beasley Pruett from the Mexican government in 1824. Upon his death in 1835, Pruett was buried on his land grant in a now-unmarked grave. The earliest marked grave here, dated 1860, is that of Martha Day, a daughter-in-law of Beasley Pruett. Other early Liberty County settlers and Pruett family descendants buried here include Reason Green (1800-1868), who held several 19th-century public offices; surnames of other prominent citizens buried here include Brashear and Linney. Veterans of four wars and the Korean Conflict are interred here. In 1946, landowners W. T. Jamison, Sr. (1878-1962) and J. N. Coleman (1882-1948) formally set aside these two acres of the French Cemetery as part of the sale of the surrounding land. The graveyard remains an important reflection of Liberty County history. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836 - 1986