Cedarvale Cemetery

Cedarvale began as a paper association. The Bay City Cemetery Association was chartered on February 28, 1896, with W. C. Carpenter, John W. Gaines, John W. White, D. P. Moore and J. M. Sims as incorporators, and Moore's deed for four acres was filed March 14. Rufus Mathis, the young engineer superintending the new courthouse, died on January 9, 1896, and was buried before plans were approved. In 1906 members raised money with turkey dinners and ice cream suppers, charging three dollars a grave. By 2016 the cemetery held 53 Confederate veterans and three Union soldiers.

What the plaque says

Cedarvale Cemetery The Cedarvale Cemetery traces its history to 1896, when Rufus A. Mathis was killed in a hunting accident and buried on land owned by D. P. Moore. At the time of his death, Mathis and other community leaders were in the process of establishing a cemetery for the community. Moore officially deeded four acres of land for a cemetery on March 14, 1896. By 1906 the Cedarvale Cemetery Association was established to care for the cemetery and subsequent purchases were made to enlarge the burial grounds. Many of Bay City's early settlers are buried here. (1992)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Levi Jordan Plantation State Historic Site — 19 mi
  A sugar and cotton plantation on the San Bernard River whose enslaved builders and their descendants left one of the best-preserved African American archeological sites in Texas.
• Varner-Hogg Plantation State Historic Site — 23 mi
  A Brazos sugar plantation built by enslaved people for the Patton family, later leased convict labor and Hogg family oil, now told through Rachel Patton and Sarah Ford.

More markers nearby

• Eastview Cemetery — steps away
• Daily Tribune and Matagorda County Tribune — 0.7 mi
• Bethel Baptist Church — 0.7 mi
• Site of Early Bay City School — 0.9 mi