Morton Memorial
Cochran County, Texas
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Morton Memorial Cemetery
Morton Memorial Cemetery is a perpetual care memorial under the ownership and supervision of Cochran County. Citizens in Cochran County pay a cemetery tax each year to insure the upkeep of the grounds and a caretaker is employed by the county.
Source: Cochran County Legacy Vol I pages 21-22. Cochran County Historical Commission. Written by Dorothy Barker, adapted by Mary Helen McKnight.
The location of the cemetery was determined in 1923 by an unknown family traveling through the area. The family was camped near Enochs when their baby became ill. Eventually the baby died and the family buried their child on a slope outside present day Morton. There is no marker and the baby’s resting place and name remains unknown. At the time the town of Morton did not exist.
Dora Lee Lytle, the infant daughter of Walter and Cornelia Lytle was the second burial in 1924 and William Monroe Ross, who carried the mail out of Littlefield and along the Lamb and Cochran lines, was the third on March 16, 1925.
The cemetery contains numerous handmade markers that are illegible and many of the burials that took place in those early years are those of young people killed in accidents and from diseases there were yet no cures for.
Morton J. Smith deeded ten acres of labor 8 Lg. 103 to Morton for Morton Cemetery on June 20, 1932. Trustees of the cemetery at that time were Judge J. L. Winder, and county commissioners R. W. O’Neal and A. C. Hooper. County officials operated the cemetery until April 1942 when the Morton Cemetery Association was formed and the records moved to city hall. The association operated thirty-four years.
In 1973 the Cemetery Association met with Judge Glenn Thompson and Alvin Allison, an attorney from Levelland to petition the State Legislature to enact a state law designating Morton Memorial Cemetery as a county facility under the jurisdiction of the Commissioners Court and enabling them to levy a cemetery tax for the purpose of maintenance and upkeep. The law was enacted in 1977.
If you know of a cemetery or burial in Cochran County that is not listed here, please email me.