Prussian-born Johann Joachim Giesenschlag (1817-80), his wife Anna (Schulze), and their children came to Texas in 1855. After settling first in Washington County, they moved to Burleson County in the 1870s and bought over 1,000 acres there. Giesenschlag set aside this tract for a family cemetery and was the first to be interred there. In 1883 his family donated the property to the Evangelical Lutheran Trinity Church at Mound Prairie. For many years, a schoolhouse stood on former Giesenschlag land next to this pioneer cemetery.