HISTORY

The History of Eppes.

In the 1830s, the U.S. government awarded land to individuals who had the means to develop self-sustaining settlements. To take advantage of the land awards, which were known as “patents,” the Cates, Eppes, Ford, Warnock, and Tucker families moved together from North Carolina to South Carolina, Mississippi, and eventually in the 1830s to the Greenwood and Caddo Parish area. Upon arrival, many chose to lay claim to choice land along or near the Old Texas Trail (now Greenwood Road/Highway 80), which ran from what would become downtown Shreveport on to opportunities in the west. Ballard Finch Eppes and Mary Cates Eppes’ property on the Old Texas Trail is of special note. Located about ten miles (or a day’s journey) from the area’s central trading district near the Red River, the Eppes’ property was an ideal stopping point for travelers heading west. Ballard and Mary opened a stagecoach station, general store, and rooming house on their property, creating a natural hub for friends and family members living nearby. When the community needed a place to bury their dead, Ballard and Mary offered up a piece of their land, and the Historic Eppes Cemetery was born. Ballard and Mary’s Infant daughter, Judith Elizabeth Eppes, died in 1837 and was the first to be buried in the cemetery. Ballard died in 1855 and was buried in the cemetery’s only above-ground vault.

In 1926, the non-profit Eppes Cemetery Corporation was formed. In the 1970s, after years of cemetery neglect, Boykin Witherspoon unselfishly took an interest in maintaining the cemetery. Deteriorating headstones were replaced with granite to preserve marked graves for generations to come. In the 1990s, George and Joe Ann Tucker began gathering family members and other volunteers for twice-a-year maintenance work, a tradition that continues today.

Many notable individuals are buried at Eppes, including Ezra J. Cates, a descendant of Declaration of Independence signer Benjamin Harrison, and many Civil War veterans including S.O. Jones, E. J. S. Cates, E. D. Tucker, and R.P. Cates, whose headstone inscription says he was killed at the Battle of Sharpsburg.