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Are there ghosts in the Texas State Cemetery
Death has always been both celebrated and feared. As far back as 60,000 BC, man buried their dead with ritual and ceremony. Researchers have even found evidence that Neanderthals buried their dead with flowers, much as we do today.
Of all the 50 states Texas is the only state that totally owns, supports and manages its own official state cemetery. Testimony to its self awareness as a once great country. It was created by the legislator in 1851 when an important founder of the Texas Republic died suddenly.
What you see today is not what the state cemetery looked like for most of the years since it was founded in 1851. It was neglected for much of that time.
There are over 3000 people important to Texas and their spouses buried at the TSC.
On two occasions efforts were made to give the Cemetery a face lift and collect important Texans buried elsewhere. In 1913 Joanna Troutman who designed the Texas flag out of an old dress when the boys in her town were being recruited to fight for Texas freedom and Stephen F. Austin who took over the reigns after his father died and helped bring the first Americans to Texas soil.
Also, a Texas businessman had a similar idea in the 1920’s and he found 76 Texans buried around the US and had them reinterred here.
And the shortest state highway runs through the middle and was originally called State Road – Spur 165 but in 1995 they wanted to expand the road.
And for for 43 days during the summer of that year the TSC had a few unexplainable events take place and they were undeniably associated with the exhumed burials of 57 confederate veterans and their spouses.
I had always believed the least haunted places would be formal cemeteries. Surely if a spirit was going to remain it would be drawn to what is familiar? I was wrong.
Ghostly activity began when when 57 Confederate Veterans were re-located
A back hoe was first used to remove much of the dirt and then there were three people per grave who did the rest of the excavating. It turned out that the buried were poor people who had lived at the Confederate Men’s Home, a hospital and old age home facility for indigent veterans of the war.
At each grave archeologists removed all skeletal remains, artifacts and casket hardware and put them into reburial boxes. Except for one large metal coffin, all of the remains were stored on this property until reinterred.
- During the 43 days strange things were happening. The backhoe obviously serviced regularly and used at other locations was a constant problem at the state cemetery.
- Landscaping staff and the groundskeeper who lives in the house on the property who always felt other presences felt them even stronger. Something had been stirred up in the cemetery where before it was a peaceful presence.
But when it was all done. The bodies reburied and normal renovations resumed. The equipment worked just fine and the gentle feeling of not being alone returned.
