The first Locust Old Fields Baptist Church was established here in 1803 and was among the first churches founded west of Asheville. Though the original building no longer stands, it served the small community for many years as both a place of worship and a place of education. During the Civil War, local tradition holds that it was a muster site for the 112th Beaverdam Militia Regiment and a campground. In September 1863, after Union forces captured Cumberland Gap, about three or four hundred soldiers of the 62nd North Carolina Infantry escaped, and many Haywood County natives returned to their homes here. They joined other members of the regiment who were on furlough and camped at Pigeon River, the name given to Canton before the town was officially incorporated nearly thirty years later, and Locust Old Fields Church was likely the camp location. The church and cemetery were used again as a Confederate encampment in the winter of 1864-1865, when Col. James Robert Love and six companies of Thomas’s Legion camped here before taking part in some of the last fighting of the war in Asheville and Waynesville in April and May 1865. As one of Haywood County’s oldest cemeteries, Locust Field Cemetery remains associated with the county’s Civil War role, and dozens of Confederate veterans are buried here.