Humble Negro Cemetery

The Humble Negro Cemetery is located in Harris County, Texas, just north of the City of Humble, Texas. It is located about 200 yards north of the FM 1960 by-pass which runs along the north side of Humble, Texas and east of the railroad tracks and U.S. Highway 59. (GPS Coordinates: Latitude: 30.006264, Longitude: -95.261829).

History

The City of Humble, Texas incorporated as a city in 1933. At that time, by vote of the City Council, racial segregation was invoked to make the town "lily white". The black population was forced to relocate their families as well as the graves of their dead to another location, outside the city limits. Starting in 1933, blacks began to move out of Humble. By 1935, almost everyone had moved [http://www.hcnonline.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=19686156&BRD=1574&PAG=461&dept_id=635648&rfi=6] .

There used to be a sawmill north of Humble that was owned by Mr. Bender, one of the founders of Humble. Blacks migrated from Gladysville, Cleveland, Splendora and Fastoria to work there [http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/TX-CEMETERY-PRESERVATION/2003-06/1056983853] . He was kind to the African-American people and gave them some property to live on and a place to bury their loved ones. The entire area is now referred to as Bordersville (informal), because the African-Americans were made to live outside the "border" of incorporated Humble.

Time took it's toll on the cemetery over the years and the entire cemetery became overgrown. In 2008, however, there was an incident that involved disturbing one of the graves and descrating one of the bodies interred there [http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=news/local&id=6149385] . This incident brought the cemetery back into the public eye. The members of Grace Church of Humble took the cemetery under their wing, and since May of 2008, church volunteers have been working to reclaim the cemetery, restoring some of the stones, clearing the brush and attempting to restore the dignity of those buried there.

Currently

The gravesites here are not arranged in rows or plots and only a few stones remain. They are randomly placed. Many of the graves are unmarked, or the stones have been removed [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=cr&GScid=2264776&CRid=2264776&pt=Humble%20Negro%20Cemetery&] . And, because the people were black, very few, if any records were kept.

External links

*[e-mail] [http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/TX-CEMETERY-PRESERVATION/2003-06/1056983853]
*ABC13.com [http://http:abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=news/local&id=6149385]
*Find-A-Grave [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=cr&GScid=2264776&CRid=2264776&pt=Humble%20Negro%20Cemetery&]