Wyatt Chapel Community Cemetery

This cemetery is located on land that was originally part of Jared E. Kirby's Alta Vista Plantation. According to oral tradition, the Kirby family set aside this land as a burial site for their slaves, as well as slaves from nearby Liendo Plantation, owned by Kirby's cousin, Leonard Waller Croce. The numerous unmarked graves here are believed to date to the Antebellum period, when most slaves would not have had the resources to erect lasting grave markers. The cemetery continued to be used by African Americans after the Civil War ands after Kirby's widow, Helen Marr Swearingen Kirby, deeded the plantation to the state in 1876 for the Alta Vista College for Colored Youth (now Prairie View A&M University). Later, the cemetery became associated with and named for Wyatt Chapel, a nearby African American church. The oldest marked grave is that of MAttie (Wyatt) Wells (d. 1882), the daughter of a former slave. Area religious leaders, veterans of World Wars I and II, and former slaves and their descendants are also buried here. Used until the 1950s, the cemetery remains a tangible reminder of African Americans' historic presence in this area.

Wyatt Chapel Community Cemetery is a historical marker in Prairie View, Waller County, dedicated in 1991. It is one of 52 historical markers documented in Waller County in the Texas Historical Commission Atlas, among 135 historic sites cataloged across the county.

The site sits at 30.1042, -95.9865 near Prairie View. The nearest cataloged historic site is Prairie View (cemetery), about 0.2 miles away. Others within a short drive include Woolfolk, G.R., Social and Political Science Building, Hillard Hall, and Veterninary Hospital.

This record corresponds to Texas Historical Commission Atlas #5473008115. Use the map below for its exact position and turn-by-turn directions.