Prairie View Cemetery

Pioneer settlers in this vicinity worshiped in the Gum Springs Schoolhouse until 1892, when Stephen Taylor deeded land here for church and cemetery purposes. The cemetery began in the churchyard of the First Methodist Episcopal Church, South, also known as Prairie View Church, in the early 1890s. Its earliest documented grave is that of Scottish native James Smith (1836-1892), who immigrated to Texas in 1884. Those buried here include pioneer settlers, many infants and small children, and veterans of the Civil War, World War I, World War II, and Korea. Prairie View Church moved to Briggs in 1906 and became the Briggs Methodist Church. The congregation later dissolved, and its members worshiped in neighboring communities. The church building was moved to Lampasas in 1951 and converted into a parsonage. The cemetery remains a physical reminder of the area's pioneer heritage, and the Prairie View Cemetery Association, organized in 1977, maintains the historic graveyard.

Texas · United States