heroism, romance, betrayal, unrequited love, and famous last words. (original) (raw)

Texas | Features | Cemeteries

GRAVE THOUGHTS

Heroism, romance, betrayal, unrequited love,
humor and famous last words.
Pathos, bathos and lassos.
Think of it as a Texas Spoon River.

Table of Contents

	A German Love Story by Michael Barr 11-15-18 Friedrich and Emma Schnerr of Fredericksburg, and a tombstone by Elisabet Ney

	Rope Walker by Dianne West Short In the old Hebrew Cemetery in Corsicana, Texas is a headstone with only two words on it, �Rope Walker.� Almost nothing is known of the man in the grave except the manner of his death...

• Mystery Tombstone
• Old Emporia by Bob Bowman
  It is on one of the most enduring mysteries in East Texas. In the early 1900s, an explosion and fire struck the old Emporia sawmill south of what is now Diboll. More than thirty sawmill workers, most of them black, are believed to have perished in the conflagration. Burned beyond recognition, the men were reportedly buried in a mass grave somewhere on the Emporia town site, now a part of Diboll, with no tombstones to mark their final resting place.
• One Man Two Graves by Mike Cox
  Anyone wishing to visit the final resting place of John E. McGuire is going to have to travel to two different cemeteries...
• Ben Thompson's Tombstone by C. F. Eckhardt
  When the old Iron Front Saloon on Congress Avenue in Austin, Texas was torn down in the 1920s, a most peculiar object was found in the basement. It was a fine marble tombstone�but there was no inscription on it...
• Billy the Kid's Tombstoneby C. F. Eckhardt
• The Boy With Two Tombstones Or Iraan's �Little Boy Lost.� by Mike Cox
  "Ellis�Son of [missing] Born March 3, 1870 � Died Nov. 28, 1872." Not only was it odd to discover a tombstone in a flower bed, the dates it bore presented a mystery on top of a mystery...
• Is Quantrill buried in East Texas? by Bob Bowman
  One of the most intriguing legends in East Texas claims that William Clarke Quantrill, the guerrilla leader from the Civil War and the mentor of the Younger and James brothers, is buried in Angelina County.
• Old Rangers and Sam Houston's Grave by Mike Cox
  The old Texas Rangers who gathered in Austin for a reunion in the early fall of 1897 surely figured they had fought their last fight. After all, they had battled and survived Mexican soldiers, Comanches and outlaws. But that�s before they heard what some folks in Tennessee were up to...
• Graves of the Famous by Bob Bowman
  A reader called a few days ago, asking where John Wesley Hardin, one of East Texas� most famous outlaws, was buried. His call brought up the question of where other famous people are buried in Texas and elsewhere...
• Johnson Island by Mike Cox
  National Historic Site
  The graveyard, accessible today only by boat or toll bridge, is all that�s left of the Johnson Island Military Prison, a Lake Erie facility that held an average of 2,500 Confederate prisoners � all of them officers � throughout the Civil War...
• Finding the Polancio Grave Marker by Barclay Gibson
  "Back in the 1870s a stage was attacked by Indians and a man, Jose Maria Palancios, was killed. He was buried right where he fell, at the base of the Peak and a crude rock slab had the information scratched on it."
• The Wrong Grave by Bob Bowman
  In East Texas, where John Alexander Greer spent his life, there is the lingering question if his bones really lie beneath the Texas State Cemetery tombstone...
• Go see your old people, write it down by Delbert Trew
  For reasons not understood yet, the past month has provided several incidents in which cemeteries were included. As I review the various happenings it gets a bit spooky at best.
• Ranger Cemeteries by Mike Cox
  Except for the occasional thunder-like sound of a jet taking off or landing at Austin�s Bergstrom International Airport, the small cemetery could be out in the middle of nowhere...
• Samuel Everitt Rogers' Grave
  Samuel Everitt Rogers, killed and scalped by Comanche Indians on May 03, 1863, in Carlton, Texas.
• Monumental Texas: The Stolz Name Is Written In Stone by H.H.Howze
  �The faults of our brothers we write upon the sands. Their virtues on the tablets of love and memory.�
• Humor in graveyards by Bob Bowman
  "Traveling across East Texas, graveyard visitors are often rewarded with... humorous and poignant tombstone inscriptions."
• Ghost of Nicaragua Smith Still Haunts Graveyard by W. T. Block, Jr.
  If you should ever pass near the Old City Cemetery in Galveston on the night of January 8th, you might hear a screaming voice out of the ocean mists...
• The Legend of Ann Eliza's Grave
  " It soon became a byword among the Sabine River boatmen that no other grave ever received more attention than that of Ann Eliza Pavell."
• Fairmount Cemetery by Bob Bowman
  "Cemeteries are not just resting places for the dearly departed; they are also repositories of a community�s history--from its beginning to the present. Such is Fairmount Cemetery, a well-kept graveyard nestled among the pines and oaks of southeastern Sabine County, near the Texas-Louisiana border."
• Texas War Casualties by John Troesser
  Delhi, Smithville and Praha. Stone markers and chapels quietly reveal where America gets its soldiers.
• Menard Grave by Mike Cox
  A few folks knew of a solitary tombstone surrounded by a fence in a live oak mott east of Menard off what locals call River Road (FM 2092)...
• Sarah by Mike Cox
  If Sarah is buried in Bosque County, her tombstone either has been lost or the devoted genealogists and grassroots historians who have recorded most of the inscriptions in the county's 126 cemeteries somehow have missed her. She needs to be found and a historical marker placed at her grave.
• "Ghosts in the Graveyard, Texas Cemetery Tales" by Olyve Hallmark Abbott. A book review
• Private and Corporal York: Lee County Cousins killed in the Great War. Giddings City Cemetery
• Bill Longley Does Not Get Along Well With Others. A Visit to the Giddings City Cemetery
• In search of Robert Elgin: Houston's Glenwood Cemetery
• Diamond Bessie: The Trial of the (19th) Century
• Monument Hill
• Wends in Texas - The Brides Wore Black: A look at Texas' most unique immigrant group
• The Double Hanging at Bellville in 1896
• The Graves of the 10th Cavalry Soldiers
• Mass Grave in Gonzales ( 1905 ) by Murray Montgomery
  Still a mystery today.
• What Ate Albert Grape? And why is his Tombstone in Gonzales?