{"id":463456,"date":"2025-05-30T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-05-30T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=463456"},"modified":"2025-05-30T22:15:35","modified_gmt":"2025-05-30T22:15:35","slug":"cemeteries-at-the-great-place-boast-new-flowers-from-visitors-descendants-of-families","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=463456","title":{"rendered":"Cemeteries at The Great Place boast new flowers from visitors, descendants of families"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n Billy Dixon looks at the graves of his ancestors May 25, 2025, who were buried in the Hubbard Cemetary in a live-fire training area of Fort Cavazos, Texas. This was Dixon’s first time visiting, and he looks forward to sharing photos of the graves with his other relatives during their annual family reunion.
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\n Ruth Cemetery, located within the live-fire training area of Fort Cavazos, Texas, is the last remaining vestige of the Ruth Community, according to the marker provided by the state of Texas. More than 170 people are buried in Ruth Cemetery.
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\n A placard marks the gravesite of Staff Sgt. Robert Rudd, who was laid to rest Dec. 9, 2023, in Bethel Cemetery, located in the northern training area of Fort Cavazos, Texas, after being killed in action Jan. 30, 1945, during the Battle of the Bulge. Rudd’s body was originally marked as unrecoverable, but it was later discovered his remains had been recovered by Belgian locals. Due to the dedicated long-term research and field investigations by Defense POW\/MIA Accounting Agency, Rudd and nearly a dozen others were identified.
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\n A piece of a headstone rests against the base May 25, 2025, in Bethel Cemetery, located in the northern training area of Fort Cavazos, Texas. It is not uncommon to see headstones in various states throughout the at-least 19 cemeteries on Fort Cavazos, as some of the cemeteries date back to the mid-1800s.
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\n The Bates family is just one of several to have a prominent section in Walker Cemetery, located in the training area of Fort Cavazos, Texas. The Walker Cemetery is one of more than a dozen located on the installation, with more than 1,000 people buried across them. Visitors are invited every year on the Sunday before Memorial Day to visit the cemeteries located within the training area, as it is a day of rest.
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FORT CAVAZOS, Texas \u2014<\/strong> More than a dozen cemeteries can be found dotted across the training areas of Fort Cavazos, making them difficult to visit throughout the year. However, every year for more than 30 years, the installation pauses all live-fire training and opens each cemetery on the Sunday before Memorial Day to visitors and the descendants of the families who once lived in this area.<\/p>\n

It provides the opportunity to honor the heritage of those families of those who lived here prior to Fort Cavazos, set against the holiday known for honoring America\u2019s heroes.<\/p>\n

Clear markers were put out, American flags dotted the way and headstones throughout the cemeteries boasted new flowers this May 25 by those visitors, including on the headstones of the Dixon family, located in the Hubbard Cemetery.<\/p>\n

Billy Dixon was able to visit the gravesites of A.D. Dixon, his wife, Mary Christian, and three of their deceased children. This was Billy\u2019s first time visiting their graves.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt means a lot to me,\u201d Billy expressed. \u201cI\u2019m a direct ancestor. \u2026 It\u2019s historical, it\u2019s history. These were pioneers here in Central Texas in the 1870s; this was unsettled land. This was frontier back then. \u2026 It just connects me, obviously, to that American history going all the way back. It\u2019s great. I\u2019m very thankful that the fort maintains this cemetery for the descendants to be able to come pay their respects.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dixon family moved to Texas from Georgia after the Civil War to restart their lives, owning farms in the Central Texas area. In early 1942, though, the federal government took over the property, acquiring 41 settlements and communities in Bell and Coryell Counties for a large training center, officially establishing Camp Hood on Sept. 18, 1942. The families who once lived in those communities and settlements, including the Dixon family, moved and settled in other areas. Despite that, Billy\u2019s family remembers a time they lived within these grounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy grandfather, \u2026 he grew up here,\u201d he shared. \u201cMy father did as well. My father picked cotton somewhere here \u2026 when he was a little 5-year-old boy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Billy took an interest in his ancestry, diving into the histories of A.D. and Mary. When he learned this annual event was an opportunity for him to actually see the graves, he took it and drove up from Houston.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy family has a long history, 150 years, in the Central Texas area,\u201d he expressed, adding he plans to share photos at the annual Dixon family reunion, a traditional gathering that has been going on for 55 years.<\/p>\n

The cemeteries across the installation are named after the former settlements and communities taken over, as well as the prominent families who occupy them. This includes the Ruth Cemetery, named for the Ruth Community that was located on the Gatesville to Killeen public road. The oldest dated gravestone is that of J.J. Stovall, who died April 27, 1878.<\/p>\n

Ruth Cemetery is also one of two on the installation that has a Historic Texas Cemetery designation by the state of Texas.<\/p>\n

While the annual event provides guaranteed visiting for all cemeteries, including those in the \u201cred line,\u201d which is either on or near high-impact training areas, families are welcome to request a visit year-round.<\/p>\n

For those interested, or for those who wish to learn more about the cemeteries located on Fort Cavazos, call Range Operations at 254-287-3321.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1 \/ 5 Show Caption + Hide Caption \u2013 Billy Dixon looks at the graves of his ancestors May 25, 2025, who were buried in the Hubbard Cemetary in a live-fire training area of Fort Cavazos, Texas. This was Dixon’s first time visiting, and he looks forward to sharing photos of the graves with his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":463458,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-463456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463456","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=463456"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463456\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":463464,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463456\/revisions\/463464"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/463458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=463456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=463456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=463456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}