Larissa, Texas
| Larissa, Texas | |
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| Unincorporated community | |
 Larissa
Larissa
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| Coordinates: 32°3′31″N 95°19′29″W / 32.05861°N 95.32472°W |
Larissa is a rural community and abandoned townsite in northwestern Cherokee County, Texas, United States. Larissa lies west of US Hiway 69, off Farm Road 855 and approximately halfway between Jacksonville and Bullard. Larissa is about 20 miles (32 km) northwest of the county seat of Rusk.
Larissa was originally settled by the Killough, Wood, and Williams families. Larissa was the scene of the Killough Massacre, possibly the worst single Indian incident in the history of east Texas. The settlers had moved there from Talladega County, Alabama, in 1837.
Unaware, apparently, that the land made available to them was hotly disputed by the Cherokee Indians who lived in the area, Isaac Killough and his homesteaders began building homes and clearing land for crops. Only a year before, however, the area surrounding their settlement had been set aside to the Cherokee under a treaty negotiated and signed by Sam Houston and John Forbes. When the Senate of the Republic of Texas refused to ratify the treaty and then in fact nullified it, the Cherokee, who already thought they had conceded enough, became extremely agitated.
The immediate and increasing influx of Anglo settlers into lands thought to have been theirs did nothing to calm resentments among the Indians and there being also residual bitterness among some Tejanos still loyal to Mexico, the atmosphere in the region became tense in early 1838. Complicating matters was the fact that some militant Cherokee were also loyal to Mexico. By the summer of that year, there were rumblings of coming insurrection from either or both of those factions, and evidence did exist for collusion between them.
Fearing this growing unrest, Killough, his relatives and friends, fled to Nacogdoches for refuge. On condition they would leave the area after doing so, the Cherokee leaders agreed to their safe passage if they would return simply to harvest their crops. They did so. But on October 5, 1838, a band of Cherokee who had not been party to the agreement attacked the settlement. Most of the Killough group—a total of eighteen—were killed or abducted as they worked their fields. Those who survived fled for a time to Lacy's Fort on the San Antonio Road, just west of present-day Alto, Texas.
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