Mt.
Zion Cemetery
Mount Zion Cemetery,
27 Jul 1843,"This cemetery is located in the southeast quadrant
of Red River County, Texas. GPS COORDINATES: Datum WGS84: 33
Deg 36.629N, 95 Deg 02.822W. This cemetery is located one block
west of Zion Traveler Baptist Church in Clarksville. The oldest
marked burial is that of Nancy Russell who died on 27 Jul 1843.
The following story was researched and written by Bob Merriman
of The Paris News, Monday April 20, 1998... HISTORY SHOWS BANDITS
HAVE LITTLE LUCK AT CLARKSVILLE BANK CLARKSVILLE This robbery
occurred in the 1890's. The bad guys might have been from the
Clarksville area or maybe they just robbed a bank in Clarksville.
In any event, after the robbery the crooks fled across the Red
River to Oklahoma. 'There was a marshal or deputy marshal there
saw them riding along the trail in Oklahoma,' Lee Somerville
said. 'He knew who they were, so he got behind a tree.' Somerville
is a writer of Western and mystery stories and novels. The lawman,
Somerville said, had a good rifle and was a good shot. 'He dropped
the three of them, right there.'_____ 'The three men were buried
in unmarked graves outside the old Catholic Cemetery,' Somerville
said. 'Now, good men are always buried facing east, so on the
day of judgement, they'll rise up facing the sun. However, the
bank robbers were buried facing west, so that on Judgement Day
they could get a running start.' County Clerk and historian Mary
Hausler agreed that there were three bank robbers and their bodies
were returned to Clarksville for burial. 'I always heard they
were buried in old Mount Zion Cemetery,' she said. That cemetery
is not too far south of St. Joseph's Catholic Cemetery. 'The
graves were not marked.' Possibly, these were the last burials
in old Mount Zion Cemetery and they occurred on July 13, 1894.
Mrs. Hausler said she understood the robbers were buried face
down and with their heads to the west. This cemetery is at present
badly overgrown and contains no markers.
There have been some of the old graves that have washed into
the creek. Excerpted from CLARKSVILLE TIMES, 7 July 1961: In
1941, at the edge of the cemetery, when the channel of the creek
was changed three skeletons were found in the face down, facing
west position. This article would be worth the time to read from
the microfilm. On a visit to the cemetery on 25 Feb 1999 we talked
with an elderly black lady who, not knowing the above, related
the following 'my daddy when I was a little girl.. worked on
the crew that straightened Delaware Creek, they found a body
that was buried on the creekline and buried face down with the
hands tied behind the back'. This cemetery was surveyed by Lawrence
and Sue Dale on 25 Feb 1999. As of 29 Jan 2003 the site is once
again overgrown and harder to find the remaining markers. We
took the GPS Coordinates at this time. We returned to the site
on 26 Jan 2004 and took pictures of some of the markers."
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