The Parsons Burying Ground was the burying ground for the Thomas Parsons family who came to the area in 1841 and built the large brick house (now on Lee Street, Defiance). They had bought the property from Joseph Haines family. Whether Joseph who d. in 1834 is buried there is not known. The site was used as a cemetery as early as 1811 when Mary A. Moore dau of Zachariah and Alice Moore was buried there. Several others were buried there prior to the arrival of the Parsons family. The first Parsons family member was buried at this site in 1851. The property was in the Parsons family for over 100 years. In the book on St. Charles County Cemeteries it is noted that the Burying Ground was now known as the Pleasant Hill Memorial Methodist Church Cemetery.

The old Pleasant Hill Methodist was a mile south of Defiance on Howell Road. That was the site of the Darst Family Burying Ground and in the 1850's when the Darst family sold land there for the first Pleasant Hill Methodist Church it became the Pleasant Hill Methodist Cemetery. Later after the church was destroyed in a storm the decision was made to rebuild in the village of Defiance. They and the Parsons family maintained the cemetery till the Parsons family sold the property, and the Pleasant Hill Memorial Methodist Church took over the maintance of the Cemetery. This occurred in the 1980's.