Betts Chapel

Betts Chapel, a small black farming community, is on a county road known as old Highway 44 six miles northwest of Giddings in southwestern Lee County. Abram Betts, the founder, came from Virginia to Fayette County after emancipation and subsequently settled in Lee County. The town was named for his son Wright. Betts Chapel had a community store, Missionary Baptist and Methodist churches, and a one-teacher school. The school held classes in the Methodist church on Abram Betts's land; this church may have been named Betts Chapel. In 1898 the school had thirty-three students. The Rosenwald Fund provided for a new school some years later, officially named Willy Branch No. 21 but commonly known as Betts Chapel School. The only trace of the community in 1990 was the Betts Chapel cemetery, which was partially covered by plants in 1973 and had around forty-five graves.

Adapted from the official Handbook of Texas, a state encyclopedia developed by the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA). It is an authoritative source of trusted historical records.