The Highlands are a natural bluff along the edge of the Mississippi River flood plain just south of Baton Rouge, LA. The early settlers of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century were awarded Spanish land grants along this 10 mile stretch of rolling hills overlooking fertile flood lands. These early German and French families must have developed a sense of community apart from the nearby town of Baton Rouge. One of their leaders, George Garig who owned the plantation where the LSU campus is now located allowed the use of a high point on the bluff to be used as a community burial ground. The first known burial was that of John James Neilson on March 13, 1813. We use his death date as the birth date of Highland Cemetery.
On June 9, 1819, Garig donated the cemetery to the Congregation of the Roman Cath0lic Church in Baton Rouge, essentially, St. Joseph Church located in the town of Baton Rouge about three miles away. There is no evidence that the cemetery was ever actually, officially consecrated as a Catholic burial ground but it was certainly treated as such well into the twentieth century.