History of the Aiguier Cemetery
DETAILS
Historical marker: no marker
Location: The Cemetery located in the northwest part of Hopkins County. Take Highway 19 north from Sulphur Springs, at Birthright turn left to Farm Road 71. Take next right hand turn, go through Addran community, and then take the first left hand turn. The cemetery will be on your left.
Aiguier Cemetery was named for original land grant holder, Ulysses Aiguier. He was also one of the first people to be buried in the cemetery in Addran.
Addran is a formerly unincorporated community in Hopkins County. A post office was established at Addran in 1890, and remained in operation until 1906. The area was first settled in the late 1850s when Hopkins County was beginning to flourish, and the community was named by a minister who had attended Add-Ran Male and Female College, according to the Texas Handbook Online.
In the mid-1930s the community had a school, two churches (Baptist and Methodist), one business, and a number of scattered dwellings. The population reached a peak of thirty-one in 1933, according to the Texas Handbook Online.
However, the school consolidated into North Hopkins ISD after its creation, and soon lost its business and many residents. The population held at 25 until the mid-1970s, according to the Texas Handbook Online.
In 2019, the cemetery fell victim to a spate of vandalism wherein many of the tombstones were knocked over. The Hopkins County Sheriff’s Office and its trustees worked to rehabilitate the damage.
June Tuck and Deborah Tuck Young have indexed this cemetery. Click here to read their index.
CLAIMS OF HAUNTINGS
Located in Addran, a Hopkins County community near Birthright, there are many rumors about the ghosts of children who haunt the Aiguier Cemetery.
A frightened guest to the cemetery wrote on the “Ghosts of America” website about his or her experience in 2016.
“I heard about this cemetery just south of the town where only children and a few young adults were buried over a century ago. It was deep in the woods, and I only found one resident that would tell me where this place was actually located,” the visitor said.
“I made it into the actual grave site about twenty yards in when everything fell silent and everything except the darkness seemed to cease. Armed with only a flashlight, not expecting to actually be in danger I heard footsteps. They were particularly of children’s. First it was one, then two, then three. I could not see anything due to the massive overgrowth of the vegetation. As I turned to leave as fast as I could!… I can honestly say I felt the presence of evil in that place.”
Historical documents from Hopkins show that Aiguier Cemetery was always used as a regular cemetery, where adult burials have taken place as recently as 2000. Like many of Hopkins County’s community cemeteries, Aiguier has a board of caretakers and undergoes regular maintenance. However, the cemetery’s reputation as a haunted child cemetery persists.
“Outside of Cooper where the dead refuse to stay in their graves, the majority of the cemetery’s residents are believed to be babies, this does not mean the place is harmless,” a different visitor recounted in 2017. “You can feel an evil presence just being in the area. Many people try and test their courage going into this place but it’s not advised the supernatural is definitely residing there.”
By Taylor Nye. Research by June Tuck, Deborah Tuck Young and Jillian Smith and Texas Handbook Online
