St. Paul United Methodist Church

To see what freedom changed at Double Bayou, start with the 1860 census. It counted 344 enslaved people in a county of 1,508. Sixty families held slaves in 1859, and one man, John White, held thirty-three of them. By 1870 about a third of the county was Black, and as many as fifteen Black residents owned property. Double Bayou itself stayed largely Black into the 1930s, an isolated place where boats carried people and produce across Trinity Bay to Galveston. St. Paul, founded in 1869, was one of the places that community built for itself.

What the plaque says

St. Paul United Methodist Church This church was established in 1869 by a group of former slaves who had settled in the rural Double Bayou community. Land at this site was deeded to the congregation in the 1870s by charter member Martha Godfrey, who also donated the original tract of the nearby cemetery. Born about 1812 in Tennessee, Martha had been brought to Texas as a slave of the Mayes family, early area pioneers who settled here in the 1830s. St. Paul United Methodist Church has served as a focal point of the surrounding area for well over a century. The Double Bayou Community School was held here from the early 1880s until 1920, when a new schoolhouse was built. Church events have become important social activities, and the Martha Godfrey Cemetery, long associated with the congregation, has been the burial place of many area leaders. Funerals here have traditionally included the ringing of the church's toner, a small bell with a muffled sound. One of the oldest churches in Chambers County, St. Paul United Methodist Church has played a vital role in the area's development. the fellowship's growth continues to reflect the ideals of the Freedmen who founded it shortly after the Civil War. (1982)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Site — 27 mi
  The 1,200 acres of coastal prairie and marsh where the Texas Revolution ended in eighteen minutes, and the 567-foot shaft of fossil-studded limestone that has stood over them since 1939.

More markers nearby

• Graydon — 2.6 mi
• Birthplace of Governor Ross Shaw Sterling — 3.1 mi
• Round Point — 4.7 mi
• Juan Davis Bradburn — 5.7 mi