Bushdale was a German town that never grew beyond a one-room school and a business or two. After the school was consolidated with the Rockdale ISD, the community lost what little identity it had. Bushdale no longer appears on highway maps, official or otherwise.

The Cemetery is the only reminder that a community did exist. The founders and early inhabitants of Bushdale remain together as they did in life. Immediately after entering through the gate, you'll see the headless torso of a fallen statue. This was a Union officer who served during the Civil War.

History of Bushdale

Bushdale is said to have been named for the valleys and woods characteristic of the area. The earliest settlers were of German descent. Among the group that came were Adolph Stork, Jacob Stork, Frizt von Gonten, Sr., George A. Doss, Bernhardt Hirt, Henry Brockenbush, Herman Henniger, Ludwig Menn, Henry Gustav Backhaus, John Mayer, John Strube, Paul Pieper, John Brockel, Ferdinand Voss and Mrs. Tracy Seidl.

Ben Loewenstein, a Rockdale resident, came to the home of Mrs. Tracy Seidl, a widow, to teach the children in the community. Later a building was erected near the graveyard and was used for church services and for a school. Bushdale School consolidated with Rockdale on July 6, 1949.

The Reverend Immanuel Glatzel organized Peace Lutheran Church on June 24, 1883, in the small German community a short distance from Rockdale. The first resident pastor, Reverend Julius E. H. Schroeder, a young theological candidate from a German seminary arrived in 1888. Under his leadership the first church and parsonage were built.

Bushdale was a lively community in the early days with a large dance hall where the Herman Sons Lodge #61 sponsored picnics with plenty of barbecue and barrels of beer. The parade with a brass band under the direction of August Seidl, Sr. would begin in Rockdale and continue to the hall for a dance.

The May Feast, July 4th holiday, October Feast and Christmas were the big celebrations. After the leader’s death in 1907 the band disbanded. A man’s signing group and the Farmers’ Union held their meetings at the hall. In 1894 a Society of Froshin was organized.

Besides the hall, there was a grocery store operated by Johnnie Brockenbush, a cotton gin and a blacksmith shop owned by Henry Gustav Backhaus.

Herman Henniger, a farmer in Bushdale and the man who gave the seven acres of land for the first Lutheran Church, immortalized himself in the local graveyard by erecting an almost life size statute of himself in Federal Army uniform with the inscription which recorded that he had been a “late and honored member of Company B of the 12th Regiment of Illinois Calvary.

Another interesting citizen of this community was August Seidl, Jr. who was disabled by paralysis from the age five years. He was interested and active in all community affairs. He was election manager for 52 years. He was a school trustee, and an officer of the Cemetery Organization.

SOURCE: Marshall, Ida Jo (ed.), Rockdale Centennial: A History of Rockdale, Texas, 1874-1974. Rockdale, TX: Rockdale Reporter, 1974. (p. 92)

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