Morse-Bragg Cemetery -- Houston, TX, USA
N 29° 45.281 W 095° 27.628
15R E 262075 N 3294138
This sign at a small family cemetery recalls the 19th century community of Pleasant Bend, which was formerly located about 1/2 mile north of the Old San Felipe Road, AKA the San Felipe to Harrisburg Wagon Road
Waymark Code: WM19N4Z
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 03/21/2024
Views: 1
The Morse-Bragg Cemetery is all that remains of the 19th century community of Pleasant Bend, now protected by Harris County from further development.
The cemetery and community of Pleasant Bend in the 19th century was formerly located about 1/2 mile north of the Old San Felipe Road, which followed Buffalo Bayou from Austin's colony to the town of Harrisburg.
In the 21st century, it is in the middle of a high-end luxury housing development at 23-65 S Wynden Road in the city of Houston, part of the Pleasant Bend-Reinermann historical district of west Houston.
Harris County historical marker inside the cemetery reads as follows:
"MORSE-BRAGG CEMETERY
The permanent settlement of this vicinity began with the construction of the San Felipe to Harrisburg Wagon Road in 1830, which lay half a mile south of here. Connecticut-born Agur Tomlinson Morse (1801-1865) and his wife Grace Baldwin Morse (1814-1890) left their cotton plantation in Mississippi and founded the Pleasant Bend plantation in 1851. Their house lay about 500 feet to the south. Agur built a gristmill in the cotton gin, and two sons built a steam sawmill. Their landholdings grew to nearly 8 square miles, including much of modern Tanglewood, Post Oak-Galleria, River Oaks, West University Place and Southside Place. Agur’s brother Rev. John Kell Morris and his wife Carolyn A. Jones Morse held Methodist Church services on the plantation. Agur served as a volunteer head of Houston’s Home Guard during the Civil War, and three sons were Confederate soldiers. Thomas MacGowan started a small nearby farm in 1847, which was sold to James McFee and his wife Cassandra Huff McFee in 1852.
The cemetery was used from the early 1850s by the Morse family and the Pleasant Bend community, and it contains the remains of many early citizens of rural Harris County. Pioneer settler Thaddeus Bell (1822-1871), the first male child born in Stephen F. Austin’s colony, is buried here, as are at least four members of the African-American Banks family, and it least seven Confederate veterans. Deaths from yellow fever, cholera, and typhoid fever reflect the dangers of the Pioneer era. Grace Morse deeded the cemetery in 1874 for its continued use by the Morse family and surrounding neighbors, with an additional part sold to Benjamin A. Bragg. All but two of the headstones were destroyed in the late twentieth century.
HARRIS COUNTY HISTORICAL COMMISSION - 2015"
Group that erected the marker: Harris County, Texas
URL of a web site with more information about the history mentioned on the sign: [Web Link]
Address of where the marker is located. Approximate if necessary:
23-67 S Wynden
Houston, TX USA
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