Salem Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Salem Cemetery, out in Llano County. William Leggette Lewis was a man who wore more than one hat. Physician.

Ordained Methodist minister. Civil War veteran. And in 1878, he packed up his family and came to Texas.

Now, when a man like that puts down roots, the land around him tends to take on meaning. The Lewis land was likely being used as a family and community burial ground before 1884. Probably, the marker says, which is an honest word.

History doesn't always keep clean records. What we do know is this: the earliest marked grave on this site belongs to Rebecca Ann Stevenson, daughter of Joseph M. and Eliza T. Stephenson, interred there in 1884.

And just a month later, Dr. Lewis' own son, M. Dee Lewis, was laid to rest in that same ground.

You get a sense, right there, of what this place meant. Not just a patch of earth. A place where a community brought its grief.

Four years on, in 1888, Dr. Lewis and his wife, Isabelle D. Palmer Lewis, made it official.

They deeded one hundred square yards of that land to the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Put it in writing. Made it permanent.

Today, Salem Cemetery holds more than two hundred and nine known graves. Sixty-one of them are unmarked. A few carry nothing but initials scratched into rocks, which is its own kind of quiet testament to lives that almost slipped through the record entirely.

Twelve of those graves belong to veterans of the Civil War. Others who rest here served in World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. Generations of service, all gathered in one hundred square yards of Llano County soil, on land that a doctor and minister from somewhere else decided to call home.

What the marker says

William Leggette Lewis, a physician and ordained Methodist minister who served in the Civil War, came to Texas with his family in 1878. Lewis land probably was used for a family and community burial ground before 1884, when Rebecca Ann Stevenson, the daughter of Joseph M. and Eliza T. Stephenson, was interred in the earliest marked grave on this site. Dr. Lewis' son, M. Dee Lewis, was interred here a month later. Dr. Lewis and his wife, Isabelle D. (Palmer) Lewis, deeded 100 square yards of land for the cemetery to the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, in 1888. Of the more than 209 known graves in the Salem Cemetery, 61 are unmarked; a few have initials scratched on rocks. Twelve graves are those of Civil War veterans. Others served in World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. (1999)