Old Saltillo Cemetery

Old Saltillo Cemetery. . Settlers established the community of Saltillo around 1850 along the Old Jefferson Road. John A. Arthur III and G.B. Hackleman opened the first stores, and a post office began operation in 1860. Arthur is credited with naming the town after the capitol of the Mexican state of Coahuila. , Land including the cemetery was conveyed from W.E. English to G.B. Hackleman in August 1871. Three months later, G.B. and Wester Ann Hackleman deeded land to trustees to build a church for public worship by all denominations and for school purposes. The cemetery is first mentioned in a deed to trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, in 1894, after the town relocated to a new railroad site and the older settlement took the name Old Saltillo. Additional acreage has been donated and purchased over the years. , The first known burial dates from 1870, but is unmarked. Many pioneer settlers and generations of their descendants are buried here. More than 100 veterans have been identified dating back to the Civil War. In addition to numerous granite markers, there are many examples of marble markers for Woodmen of the World members. By the 1930s, families of those buried here gathered for an annual cemetery meeting, initially the third Thursday of July and changed in the 1960s to every third Sunday of July. The Old Saltillo Cemetery Association officially formed in the late 1950s. , Even since Saltillo relocated in the late 1880s, this cemetery has served surrounding communities, including Greenwood and Weaver. In nearly 150 years, more than 1,200 known graves have been documented, and there are likely many more early burials. Old Saltillo Cemetery and Old Saltillo United Methodist Church remain among the few historic resources that embody the long history of this early Hopkins County settlement. , Historic Texas Cemetery - 2018.