Comfort A. McMillen moved to the area in 1846. The community was first called Old Decatur and then Maxwell Branch. In 1888 when the St. Louis and Southwestern Railroad (Cottonbelt) came through, the name was changed to Murphy. It was named for William Murphy, who moved to the area in 1850. At one time Murphy had 3 gins, a drug store, several grocery stores, a post office, a barber shop, an ice house, a blacksmith shop and a cafe. In 1886, While a resident of Coryell County, James Maxwell, Jr., sold three acres of land for five dollars to trustees C.A. McMillan, H. Willaford and W. Brinson and formally established Maxwell Cemetery, members of the families of the tree trustees are buried at the cemetery, but no Maxwell family members are interred at the site. The cemetery's earliest marked burial is that of Samuel McCreary, who died in 1853. Over one-third of the graves are those of small children, showing the difficulty of childhood at the time. Durials at the cemetery include veterans of the Black Hawk War, Civil War and World War I. The Maxwell Cemetery served the Murphy area for over 100 years, with the last burial in 1966.