To request a copy of this photo for your own personal use, please contact our state coordinator. If you are not a family member or the original photographer — please refrain from copying or distributing this photo to other websites.
Thank you for visiting the Texas Gravestone Photo Project. On this site you can upload gravestone photos, locate ancestors and perform genealogy research. If you have a relative buried in Texas, we encourage you to upload a digital image using our Submit a Photo page. Contributing to this genealogy archive helps family historians and genealogy researchers locate their relatives and complete their family tree.
Submitted: 8/13/15 • Approved: 8/13/15 • Last Updated: 3/25/18 • R86593-G0-S3
Old Hall Cemetery
Texas Historical Markers
Lewisville, TX, USA
Latitude & Longitude: 33° 3' 44.5428", -97° 1' 39.1656"
Texas State Historical Marker
In the 1840's the Republic of Texas government granted colonization contracts to people who would advertise and bring new settlers to Texas. The Peters Colony, led by W. S. Peters, was located in North Texas and included the area later known as Denton County. In 1844 families began arriving in this area, including those of John and James Holford of Missouri. The place where the Holford families settled, on the prairie west of Big Spring Creek (Big Elm), became known as Holford Prairie. By 1855 a two-story building was constructed for use as a community meeting place. Referred to as Holford Prairie Hall, it housed a Masonic Lodge on the second floor, and the first floor was used for school and church purposes. This cemetery, situated next to the lodge building, became known as Old Hall Cemetery. The earliest graves date to the 1850s and include many infants and children. According to local oral tradition, the first burial may have been that of a man who died as his family was traveling through the area. The cemetery contains over one hundred twenty-five burials from the nineteenth century. A cemetery association, organized in 1972, maintains the historic graveyard. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986Photo Courtesy of RMLeahy
Contributed on 8/13/15
Suggest a Correction
Record #: 86593