Site of Extinct Town of Hammond

The plaque describes Hammond as a planters' depot; it was also a freedom colony. Dr. B. F. Hammond enslaved more than 100 people before the Civil War. After emancipation most of the freed families stayed on the land as tenant farmers, supplied by the small stores near the station. The Texas Freedom Colonies Project traces the community to a place called Box quarter, where enslaved people met for worship under a brush arbor on the Walker farm, and lists Bethlehem Baptist Church. A 1983 county map still showed Hammond's school, church and cemetery southwest of the old depot.

What the plaque says

Site of Extinct Town of Hammond Dr. Ben F. Hammond moved here from Alabama in 1853 and built a plantation home about a mile to the west. Neighbors included James Love and Robert S. McCall. Hammond Depot and Post Office were opened at this point on the Houston & Texas Central Railroad after the doctor granted right-of-way through his land in 1869. Near the depot, used by planters for their shipping, were a few stores. As the railroad declined, the town had vanished by 1950. Area residents are mostly the descendants of persons given land at Emancipation (1865) by Dr. Hammond and other planters. (1976)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Calvert — 8.5 mi
  A railroad cotton town of 1868 on State Highway 6 that claimed the largest cotton gin in the world and elected Black men to county and state office during Reconstruction.
• Milam County Courthouse and Jail — 23 mi
  Cameron's 1892 Renaissance Revival courthouse and the 1895 St. Louis-built jail beside it, now the county museum, are listed together on the National Register.

More markers nearby

• Wootan Wells — 3.0 mi
• Site of Harvey Massacre — 3.3 mi
• Paul Bremond — 5.2 mi
• Bremond — 5.4 mi