Leagueville,
an isolated community in eastern Henderson County, owes its beginning to a land
certificate that originated in 1850 by Aaron York, surveyor of a league of land
west of the Neches River.
The
area was referred to “The League” and the “ville” was later added, probably when
the community secured a post office in 1889.
By 1855, the Sublett family had gained control of the land around Leagueville
and sold it to Matthew Cartwright in 1857. In 1871, B.T. and Annie (Cartwright)
Roberts had acquired the property. But when the couple died, the York heirs sued
to regain control of the property, but lost on appeal in 1875.
The
litigation slowed the development of the area and it really didn’t become a community
until the late 1800s. The community had a school, and a cemetery was established
on the school property. The school, however, was consolidated with Brownsboro
in 1934. At its
peak, Leagueville had two general stores, its church, two cotton gins, a blacksmith,
and a grist mill. A
broken discarded mill stone from the grist mill was placed around a Texas historical
marker by the cemetery when it was erected in 2004.
The coming of the railroad through Brownsboro in the late 1800s left Leagueville
off the beaten path and, with the building of Highway 31 from Tyler
to Athens beside the railroad,
Leagueville suffered another blow. In the old days, a road running through Leagueville
was known as the Athens-to-Tyler
road. Leagueville’s
cemetery was once maintained in the way of many old East
Texas cemeteries. The grounds were hoed, grass was removed, and the graves
were mounded. But because of erosion and the time required to maintain the graveyard,
mowing was begun in the 1950s. Many
graves in the cemetery are unmarked and the names of those buried have been lost
in the passage of time. One
year, when the cemetery was being expanded, an old dipping vat used to control
ticks on cattle was discovered in the ground. Leagueville’s
church, which began as the Hopewell Missionary Baptist Church in 1880, remains
in its original location and was preceded by churches at Rock Hill and New York.
One of the town’s
earliest settlers was Malachiah Reeves, a Civil War veteran, who served as a postmaster
in 1906 and 1907. He was licensed to preach at Leagueville and is buried in the
local cemetery. Each
second Sunday of June, Leagueville’s former residents and their families come
back to the old town for a memorial day.
Bob Bowman's East Texas
February 20, 2010 Column
A weekly column syndicated in 109 East Texas newspapers
Copyright
Bob Bowman | 
