W.L. Moody Confederate Reunion Grounds

The Handbook of Texas gives a different start date. It says Fairfield's annual Confederate reunion ran from 1890 to 1931 and again in 1933, on land donated by William Lewis Moody and his brother Leroy, while the plaque dates the gatherings here from 1891. The 1951 centennial held on the old campground was so successful that townspeople began an annual rodeo and homecoming, which grew into the county fair each November. The veterans' cause was a Confederacy built on slavery, in a county where more than half the people were enslaved in 1860.

What the plaque says

W.L. Moody Confederate Reunion Grounds The Freestone County W.l. Moody reunion grounds have been used for reunions, celebrations and remembrance of U.S. war veterans since 1891. The grounds were named after Col. William Lewis Moody, who organized Co. G of the 7th Texas Infantry, C.S.A., based in Freestone County. An ex-Confederate Association formed in 1890 and began meeting at this site in 1891. In 1892, the veterans group was incorporated into the United Confederate Veterans organization as W.L. Moody Camp No. 87. By 1896, they obtained the deed to the reunion grounds from the Moody Family. Brush arbors were erected by the veteran families for the three-day encampment which included speeches, concerts, musicals and dances. The reunion would begin with a firing of Valverde cannon, which now sits at the courthouse. As many as 8,000 attendees would come in from surrounding communities. As time went by, more and more of the old soldiers were taking their final roll call. By 1933, the Confederate reunions ceased. The Moody family designated the grounds as the W.L. Moody Camp, Memorial Park in 1947, and placed it under the supervision of the City of Fairfield as a memorial to veterans of all U.S. wars. In 1951, the grounds were used for the Fairfield Centennial Celebration, as well as the Freestone County Boys Club and Livestock Show. Area families continue to use the camp grounds for gathering during the County Homecoming, Fair and Rodeo week. Since 1991, the W.l. Moody Memorial Park Campsite Association has assisted the city in maintaining the family campsites and encouraging the community spirit of the old historic reunions. (2014)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Blind Lemon Memorial Cemetery — 19 mi
  The Freestone County grave of the Texas blues singer Blind Lemon Jefferson, who recorded for Paramount in Chicago from 1926 and died there in December 1929.
• Confederate Reunion Grounds State Historic Site — 25 mi
  Where Limestone County Confederate veterans gathered each summer from 1888, later a water supplier in the Mexia oil boom, now a Texas Historical Commission site on the Navasota River.
• Old Fort Parker — 26 mi
  A rebuilt 1830s family stockade near the Navasota River, where a May 1836 attack killed men of the Parker settlement and took five captives, among them nine-year-old Cynthia Ann Parker.

More markers nearby

• Colonel Wm. L. Moody — steps away
• Fairfield Female College — 0.3 mi
• James Bonner Rogers — 0.5 mi
• David Hall Love — 0.5 mi