Known 1838-1899 as Deming's Bridge Cemetery. Second post office in Matagorda county was located nearby in 1858. Two acres donated by Emelius Savage and his son Norman for the cemetery and Tres Palacios Baptist Church, founded 1852. More land given by Jonathan E. Pierce, who in 1900 named area Hawley, honoring United States senator Robert Bradley Hawley. Buried here are the brothers Jonathan E. and Abel H. ("Shang") Pierce and many other famous early cattlemen; also, more than 50 veterans of Civil War and all U.S. wars since 1865. (1967)