Historical Marker
Rock Chapel
Carmel, DeSoto County · Louisiana
Erected 2007
Carmelite monks came from West Texas to DeSoto Parish in 1888, and soon had a monastery and a bakery. Father Anastasius Peters led the 1891 building of this chapel from field stone and creekbank mud, a room only 15 by 25 feet. Accounts differ on its purpose: one historian says it served Black residents and was the parish's first private school open to Black students, while others call it a place for the monks to pray apart. Two monks were shot by a white parishioner of a nearby church, and fire and a Vatican order ended the mission.
Where it stands
32.09618, -93.60933 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Mansfield State Historic Site — 6.7 miA 1957 museum and three-quarter-mile trail on the ground where Confederate troops broke a Union line on April 8, 1864, in a park begun by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
- Lake Bistineau State Park — 27 miA 903-acre state park on a lake the Great Raft made, opened in 1946 with a separate section for Black visitors from 1956, and now known for cypress water and a lake that is drawn down.