John Drayton Pitts was born at sea on August 26, 1798, during the voyage of his parents, John and Jane Pitts, from England to Charleston, South Carolina. They moved to Georgia during the War of 1812, and John D. married Eliza Permelia Daves in April 1819.

John D. Pitts was elected to the Georgia Legislature in 1841, but later moved to Grimes County, Texas. He persuaded his extended family in Georgia to join him, and in 1843 eleven Pitts families moved to Texas.

John D. Pitts served as Adjutant General under Texas Governor George Wood from 1848 to 1849. Pitts bought land here from his friend General Edward Burleson in 1850, and eventually much of his extended family settled along the nearby San Antonio-San Marcos stage route in a community called Stringtown.

Pitts Cemetery began in 1850 with the burial of John Malone, infant son of James L. and Eliza (Pitts) Malone and grandson of Eliza and John D. Pitts. Eliza Pitts was buried here in 1851. In 1861 John D. Pitts died on his way home from a secessionist convention in Austin, and was buried here. The cemetery was set aside by Pitts' sons-in-law, James Malone and Samuel Kone, Sr., in 1875.

The cemetery continues to serve as a burial site for the descendants of John D. and Eliza Pitts.

(front):
Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor 1791-1873. Founder of Baylor University under the Republic of Texas 1845, donor of the first thousand dollars to the institution; president of the first board of trustees. Professor in the first law faculty. He exemplified in his life the motto of Baylor University "Por Ecclesia Pro Texana."

(Right):
CONSTRUCTIVE STATESMAN-JUDGE BAYLOR. Was a member of the Kentucky legislature, congressman from Kentucky, congressman from Alabama, United States Senator from Alabama. He served five years as associate justice of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Texas. Twenty years as district judge for the state courts. As commander of a company in the War of 1812 and as a soldier in the Creek and Indian war, Mexican War and the Texas-Indian War.

(Left):
RELIGIOUS LEADER-JUDGE BAYLOR. Organized the Union Association. The first Baptist organization in Texas. Presented the first report in behalf of Christian education in Texas. He was the first president of the Texas Educational Society, sponsor of a free public school system. Preacher and lawyer. He preached the first sermon and held the first court in Waco giving direction and destiny to Texas by upholding the law and proclaiming the Gospel.

Born in the Natchez District of Spanish West Florida on March 12, 1790, Randolph Foster was the son of John and Rachel (Gibson) Foster. After service in Captain Randal Jones' Company during the War of 1812, Randolph hunted and explored throughout what was then the southwest, including stops in this part of Texas. When he heard that Moses Austin had permission to settle 300 families in Texas, he headed back to the area.

Foster arrived in Texas with Stephen F. Austin in 1821 as an "old three hundred" colonist. In 1824, he received title to 4,400 acres in present-day Fort Bend and Waller Counties. He served as an Indian scout for the colony. In 1829, he married Lucy Ruffin Hunter (1804-1872). They made their home on the John Foster Grant and had seven children.

During the War for Texas' Independence from Mexico in 1836, Foster helped procure munitions for the Texian Army, then joined Captain Wyly Martin's Company. In April 1836, when Santa Anna and his vanguard troops sought to cross the Brazos at present-day Richmond, Foster and his outnumbered comrades delayed them long enough to prevent them from reaching Harrisburg in time to capture the Texian Government.

A prominent planter and rancher, Foster signed the petition to create Fort Bend County and supported the Foster Community School. In 1856, he was appointed a trustee of the Frost Institute, a private school, by the Texas Legislature. He died at the home of one of his daughters, near the later established Foster Community, on August 18, 1878.

Born in Granville County, North Carolina, Robert Graves Stadler was a veteran of the War of 1812 and the Texas War of Independence. He purchased land in this area in 1845 and settled near the already established community of Griffin (2 mi.SE). By 1853, Stadler had encouraged relatives from North Caroline to make their homes here. He died just as the Civil War began, having laid the foundation for what became the farming community of Blackjack.

The oldest continually used cemetery in Jefferson County, This graveyard has served the citizens of the Sabine Pass area since the 1840s. The earliest documented grave is that of a 12-year-old John A. Dashiell, son of William V.C. and Mary Dashiell, who died on August 27, 1847. The large site now known as Sabine Pass Cemetery represents a combination of five formerly distinct burial grounds. Included in what was once called "The Colored Peoples Cemetery" is the unmarked grave of 108-year-old Louis Williams. Born a slave in Mississippi in 1813, Williams died on June 23, 1921.

Among the burials in this historic graveyard are those of many distinguished military veterans. Able Coffin (1792-1862) and Burwell Jackson (1783-1864) fought in the War of 1812. Jacob Harmon Garner (1814-1887), Benjamin Johnson (1815-1872) and Niles F. Smith (1800-1858) were Texas Revolution veterans. Soldiers and sailors from both the Union and Confederate forces of the Civil War also are interred here. The two Union sailors Patrick Ferlin and Albert W. Marshall, died of wounds sustained during the offshore naval encounter on January 21, 1863, while serving on the ship Morning Light. A number of Confederate veterans rest in the cemetery, as does Kate Dorman, dubbed "the heroine of Sabine Pass" for her assistance of the southern troops. A number of graves have been specially marked with military or state historical markers.

Maintained by Jefferson County and cared for by local volunteer organizations, the Sabine Pass Cemetery remains in use by citizens of the area. Its historic gravestones and monuments provide a unique component of the cultural history of Jefferson County.

Established by Samuel Calhoun (1788-1871), native of Abbeville, S.C.; Captain of Cavalry, State of Georgia, during War of 1812. He came to Texas 1845. Bought land in Gordiana Badillo and Jose Ortega grants, in this area. Lived near Calhoun Ferry. Children by his first wife Elizabeth Finney (who died 1836): Martha Ann, Mary, Antonette, John H., Catherine, William. By second wife Catherine O'Brien: Ella and Louis. Had sons in Mexican War and Civil War. Generations of descendants are buried here. Calhoun's tomb was brought (1872) to Cincinnati by steamer "Wren".

This cemetery lies within the Mexican land grant acquired by Thomas J. Chambers in 1834. Chambers died in 1865 and in 1867 his widow, Abbey, sold 3,000 acres containing this site to H.N. Duble at an estate sale held in Galveston. A portion of the cemetery site was purchased by Freedman Peter Roberts in Galveston in 1868. Local tradition suggests that slaves of the area's earliest settlers were buried here prior to the first recorded burial, that of Major C. Rogers in 1876.

The San Marcos Cemetery Association was organized in 1876 by Edward Burleson Jr., L.W. Mitchell, W.J. Joyce, E.P. Raynolds, Wallace Carnahan and W.O. Hutchison. That year the association bought 10 acres here from Judy Covington Dixon and her husband, Shadrach Dixon.

By 1924 the cemetery acreage had increased to more than 20 acres due to land acquisitions from: H.S. and Laura Jane Harvey in 1890; W.O. Hutchison in 1892; Dock and Sarah Roberts in 1902; Beverly Hutchison in 1904; and Dock Roberts and John McGehee in 1908. San Marcos acquired the cemetery in 1924 and in 1964 a perpetual care trust fund was created by private citizens.

Interred here are many pioneer settlers, War of 1812 veteran Louis Lawshe, and veterans of other conflicts ranging from the Texas Revolution (1835-36) to Vietnam.

Sergeant 11th Regiment, U.S. Infantry, War of 1812. One of Austin's surveyors, laid out the town of San Felipe. Born in Vermont June 19, 1790. Died May 12, 1857.

A native of South Carolina, Sinclair David Gervais was a soldier in the War of 1812. He and his wife Katherine were the parents of four children. Following her death, Gervais and two of his daughters came to Texas in 1835. He was appointed the first alcalde of the municipality of Mina (Bastrop) by provisional governor Henry Smith. Gervais came to Matagorda in 1837 and was appointed the second chief justice of Matagorda County by President Sam Houston.

Settled 1821 by privateer James Campbell (1791-1856), U.S. Navy veteran, War of 1812, who after discharge was Lieutenant and close friend of buccaneer Jean Lafitte, operating out of Galveston (then called Campeche). In Karankawa Indian rituals about 1817, Mary Sabinal (1795-1884) became Campbell's bridge. When Lafitte left Texas in 1821, Campbell pleased his wife by settling here as a rancher. Community remained until its second destruction by hurricane, 1915. Graves of the Campbells and many other early Texans are in cemetery at Campbell's Bayou.