Titus County, Texas Cemetery Search

Shady Grove Cemetery is a large African-American cemetery located at the Shady Grove Church about 1 mile Southwest of Cason. It is surrounded by a chain link fence, well maintained, and has ample room for expansion. Exactly who established the cemetery and when it was established is unknown, but it was no doubt preceded by the Pitt Cemetery a little further South on the same county road.

Several anomalous grave markers encountered during the survey are: at least thirty-two unreadable funeral home markers, three concrete-encased graves marked only by unreadable funeral home markers, three concrete-encased graves with unreadable inscriptions in the concrete, and two unidentified concrete-encased graves. There were six concrete blocks, six concrete slabs, five round tiles, two concrete urns, one broken granite marker, one rock, two piles of rocks, one brick column, one piece of marble, a broken plastic bible, an iron strap, and two metal posts. Additionally, two fresh graves had no identification, one grave had been in existence (grass covered) but no identification, a military monument was buried but the name Otis C. Traylor was uncovered, a monument had fallen face down and could not be read, thirteen graves were marked by flowers only, a broken piece of concrete that had “we love you Carla, Kate, Shy” inscribed, a granite slab with St--- LaFayette inscribed, and finally three marble slabs with no inscription marked other gravesites. Numerous depressions in the ground indicate other gravesites as there are numerous marked graves that have severely settled and are not being filled in.

DRIVING DIRECTIONS FROM THE TITUS COUNTY COURTHOUSE:

Travel 0.3 miles South on Madison Street to Ferguson Road. Turn left (east) on Ferguson Road (which becomes Texas Highway 49) and travel 3.8 miles on Highway 49 to the intersection of Texas FM 1735 (Chapel Hill Road).

Turn right onto FM 1735 and continue for 8.4 miles to the intersection with Texas Highway 11. Turn left onto Highway 11 and proceed for 2.1 miles to the intersection from the right with Farm Road 144. Turn right onto FM 144 and proceed approximately 0.1 mile to the intersection with Titus County Road 4950. Turn right onto County Road 4950 and proceed 0.7 mile. The cemetery and church will lie alongside the road on the right.

GPS COORDINATES: 33°01.697' N 094°49.286' W

DECORATION DAY: Unknown

MARKED BURIALS INDEXED IN TCS DATABASE: 664 (2008-04-01)

FREE BURIAL INFORMATION IS AVAILABLE FOR THIS CEMETERY.

SEE OUR HOME PAGE FOR DETAILS.

(NOTE: This cemetery contains un-named burials marked by irregular makers like natural stones and other methods that could not be included in the Titus Cemetery Search database.)

LAST TCS PHYSICAL SURVEY: 2006-03-14

Historical information for this cemetery was provided by and used with the permission of David Horton, and was compiled from Mr. Horton's work and the earlier work of Lynch Harper. Map provided courtesy of Ark-La-Tex Council of Governments GIS department. Please forward any mapping questions to http://www.atcog.org/gis_mapping.htm.