Harris Chapel Cemetery

The Avinger Citizen's 1954 historical edition tells this church's story with a few differences from the marker. It says the first church was log, built in slavery times, and the present building is the third on the same site, with the second damaged by a windstorm in 1947. It says the founder's daughter was the first person buried here. Family records compiled by a descendant say the preacher Solomon O'Dell came from Henry County, Georgia, in the mid-1850s with his wife Sarah (Childress), and that both are buried in this cemetery.

What the plaque says

Harris Chapel Cemetery This area of Cass County was settled in the 1850s. The rural community became known as Harris Chapel after John T. Harris and his family came to the area in 1853 and purchased land on which a Methodist log church and cemetery were located. The church building was also used as a schoolhouse for area children. The first log church was replaced by a larger wooden structure near the cemetery in 1859. The Rev. Solomon O'Dell preached the first sermon in the new church. Although there are many unmarked graves in the Harris Chapel Cemetery, some of which may date from an earlier period, the oldest legible tombstone marks the grave of Zelpha E. conley (1839-1859). In 1868 M. g. Harris, son of John T. Harris, deeded the church and cemetery property to the community. Harris family graves are enclosed by a wrought iron fence. The second church was destroyed by a tornado in 1949 and was replaced by a brick structure in 1953. In addition to the graves of many early pioneers, those interred here include veterans of the Mexican War, the Civil War, World War I, World War II, and Korea. The historic Harris Chapel Cemetery serves as a reminder of early rural life in Cass County. (1988)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Daingerfield State Park — 6.0 mi
  A pine-and-hardwood park built in 1935-39 by a white and a Black Civilian Conservation Corps company, with a dammed lake, Bass Lodge and a 2.4-mile loop trail around the water.
• Jefferson Historical Museum — 21 mi
  A four-floor museum in Jefferson's 1888-90 federal post office and courthouse, with rooms for African-American history, Jewish heritage, the Caddo and Diamond Bessie, bought by the historical society in 1965 for $8,100.
• Excelsior House Hotel — 21 mi
  A brick-and-timber hotel at 211 West Austin that began as a river captain's boarding house in 1858 and was revived by a garden club in 1959, and still takes guests with rosewood furniture.
• Lake Bob Sandlin State Park — 28 mi
  A 1987 state park on a 9,000-acre reservoir, where a Republic of Texas stockade called Fort Sherman stood in 1838 and the Caddo lived from A.D. 800 to 1860, now with fishing piers, trails and cabins.

More markers nearby

• Chalybeate Springs — 4.5 mi
• Trammel's Trace — 4.5 mi
• Town of Hughes Springs — 4.6 mi
• Nash Iron Works — 7.8 mi