Our Lady of Mercy Cemetery

Hidalgo Co. Cemeteries of Tx

Submitted by Frances Isbell

With Permission  of Hidalgo Co. Historical Commission (2005)

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LOCATION:  Northeast Mercedes on  Anacahuitas Street, just south of Mile Seven North and west of Mile One West   Drive north two blocks past  Expressway 83 on Vermont Street, turn west for .5 mile.

SURVEYED:  Our Lady of Mercy Cemetery Association, 2005.

HISTORY:  Our Lady of Mercy Cemetery was founded in 1910 on four acres donated to the Diocese of Corpus Christi by the Capisallo Town &  Improvement Company, which developed the new town of Mercedes.  .

 Centrally located is the Peter Keralum monument, a life-size Calvary Group.  Erected in memory of  the Valley’s beloved lost missionary, Father Peter Keralum (1817-1872), it was donated by his fellow Oblate priests of Texas, New Mexico, Louisiana, Belgium and Holland in 1920.  Keralum, who regularly visited 120 nearby ranches on horseback for forty years, lost his way in the brush.  His remains, discovered in 1882, were later moved from Brownsville to the monument.  In 1952, they were transferred to the Oblate Cemetery at San Antonio.

The cemetery is maintained by Our Lady of Mercy Cemetery Association, organized in 1992 with consent of the Diocese of Brownsville.  The Cemetery Association began a cleanup campaign in 1994.  Many volunteer citizens, businesses, the City of Mercedes and the Judge Homer Salinas Rehabilitation Center in Edinburg worked to remove brush and trash, trim trees, and grade and improve roads, to bring the grounds to their present neat and orderly appearance.

 There are about 3,000 graves.  During the past 95 years, the cemetery has been the resting place for many Mercedes pioneers and continues to serve.  Texas Historical Marker 2001.

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