Lee Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Lee Cemetery, out in Lamar County. Now, every good graveyard has a story, and this one starts the way a lot of Texas stories do: with somebody coming from somewhere else. Herbert J.

Lee, out of Virginia, had made his way to this part of the country by 1859. Didn't take long before the land he settled on became more than just a homestead. In 1860, a one-year-old girl named Georgiannia W.

Derrick was buried right there on the Lee property. She was the first, but she wouldn't be the last. Herbert Lee knew what that meant.

And when he sat down to write his will in 1865, he made it official: that land was designated a cemetery. His way of honoring what had already begun. Now here's where things get a little mysterious, and a good cemetery story always has at least one mystery.

At some point after May 1908, two stones went up bearing the names of George W. and William B. Derrick, men who died all the way back in 1831. Whether those two pioneers are actually buried on that site, well, nobody knows.

The marker says so plain: it remains unknown. Could be they rest there. Could be the stones are monuments to memory more than to bones.

That question just hangs in the air above the grass, unanswered. Most of the graves you'll find there are dated between 1870 and 1890, which puts them square in the Reconstruction era. Money was tight in those years, and the marker reckons that may explain why you won't find a lot of ornate stonework.

Simple markers for hard times. And the land itself didn't do those markers any favors. There was an underground vault right in the center of the graveyard, and over time it filled with dirt.

The markers inside that vault deteriorated. The ground, patient as it always is, took back what it could. But even in their worn and weathered state, the stories those graves hold are something.

At least one person buried there was a citizen of the Republic of Texas. Think on that. Others were veterans of the Civil War.

People who had lived through the founding of a nation, through a war that tore another one apart, and they ended up here, in this quiet corner of Lamar County. The last burial took place in 1913. After that, silence.

Herbert Lee came from Virginia, designated a piece of ground, and left behind a place that holds pioneers, veterans, a mystery or two, and more than a few people who shaped what Texas became. That's not a bad legacy for one man's will.

What the marker says

Herbert J. Lee of Virginia moved to this area by 1859. One-year-old Georgiannia W. Derrick died in 1860 and was buried on the Lee property. Herbert Lee designated the land for a cemetery in his 1865 will. At some time after May 1908, two stones were erected bearing the names of George W. and William B. Derrick, who died in 1831. Whether or not the two pioneers are interred on this site remains unknow. Most graves are dated between 1870 and 1890. Money was tight during the Reconstruction era, which may explain the lack of ornate stones. An underground vault in the center of the graveyard filled with dirt and the markers within the vault deteriorated. At least one grave on this site it that of a citizen of The Republic of Texas. Others were veterans of the Civil War. The last burial took place in 1913. (2000)