Hudgins Family Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm gonna give it to you straight. This is the story of the Hudgins Family Cemetery, out in Wharton County, and it reaches back a good long ways before the first Hudgins ever set foot on the land. The ground itself was granted to a man named Alexander Jackson, way back in 1824.

When Jackson passed, it went to his daughter Mary. And when Mary died, in 1836, the property transferred to her husband, James McKenzie. So already, before our story's main players arrive, this land has passed through three sets of hands.

Now McKenzie remarried, wedding a woman named Rachel Ann Northington three years after Mary's death. Then McKenzie himself died, in 1845, leaving Rachel with three children and the Jackson land, along with McKenzie's other property. All of it sitting in what would become Wharton County the very next year, in 1846.

Rachel Ann Northington was not a woman who stayed still for long. The year after that, 1847, she wed Joel Hudgins, a widower with one child of his own. Together, the two of them had nine more children.

Thirteen young lives connected to this family. But only six of those thirteen survived to adulthood. You let that settle a moment.

Out on that Texas land, in that era, even a big family was never a sure thing. Joel did what a man of standing did. He served as a civic leader and established the Hudginsville School near his home in this very vicinity.

And then, in 1873, Joel Hudgins died and was buried in Chappell Hill, Texas. After his death, Rachel and her sons got to work, increasing the family's holdings. Rachel herself lived on until 1903.

Now, the cemetery. Family members had been using this site as a burial ground beginning in 1851. But after Rachel died, the ground went quiet for a long, long time.

More than eighty years passed without a burial here. Then, in 1977, Rachel's grandson Edgar Hudgins, together with his sons, purchased the land back from relatives. And in 1986, Edgar Hudgins was laid to rest here.

His grave was the first since his grandmother's, more than eighty years before. That's the thing about a family cemetery. It waits.

It keeps its silence until the family finds its way back. Today, Edgar's heirs continue to care for that burial ground, tending the history that the land has been holding since 1824.

What the marker says

Beginning in 1851, family members of Joel and Rachel Hudgins used this site as a burial ground. Property including the site was granted to Alexander Jackson in 1824 and inherited by his daughter Mary. Upon her death in 1836, it transferred to her husband, James McKenzie, who wed Rachel Ann Northington three years later. He died in 1845, leaving Rachel with three children. She gained ownership of the Jackson land as well as McKenzie's other property, all part of what became Wharton County in 1846. The next year, Rachel wed Joel Hudgins, a widower with one child. The couple had nine more children, but only six of the thirteen survived to adulthood. Joel served as a civic leader and established the Hudginsville School near his home in this vicinity. After his death and burial in Chappell Hill, Texas in 1873, Rachel and her sons increased the family's holdings. She died in 1903. In 1977, grandson Edgar Hudgins, along with his sons, purchased the land from relatives. His grave, dating to 1986, was the first here since that of his grandmother more than 80 years earlier. Today, his heirs continue to care for the burial ground. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2003