White Chapel Cemetery 
 Coleman vicinity,  Coleman County, Texas
Cemeteries of Texas Coordinator: Dolores I. Bishop

Information provided by the State of Texas Atlas Site

 Location: 
8 miles west of Coleman on SH 153; then 1 mile north on FM 503
 
Marker : 
Coleman County was organized in 1867. The landscape in this 
area included high grasses, pecan and live oak trees. Deer, turkey, 
bear and antelope roamed freely. Into this wilderness came such pioneers as 
John Thomas and Julia Gowens Hamilton, Julia's parents G. A. and Rachel 
Ann Berryman Gowens, and Rachel's father Benjamin Berryman and his family. 
The group passed Coleman, choosing instead to settle in this locality. The village 
of White Chapel grew from the efforts of these settlers and their neighbors. 
The earliest interment on this burial ground was that of Joseph Shipman, who 
died in 1884. When land was deeded for a school that year, the cemetery was 
established on the same site. The school, cemetery and community were known 
as White Chapel. The Rock Crusher School District was created in 1916 and included
 White Chapel District #44, but White Chapel voters rejected consolidation in 1917. 
The White Chapel Baptist Church was moved to the school grounds in 1930. In 1936 
the Centennial High School District was formed and older grade levels were consolidated 
into the new organization. In 1951 all White Chapel students were consolidated into the 
Centennial District. In 1952 the cemetery was granted a separate deed from the school. 
Pioneer family names represented in the cemetery are Berryman, Brooks, Collier, Fenton, 
Gowens, Jameson, Kelley, Hamilton, Nelson, Saunders and Stacy. Three Civil War veterans 
and several members of the U. S. Armed Forces are interred here. The White Chapel Cemetery
 remains a chronicle of the early settlers of this wilderness. (1999)