Hidden History: African American Cemeteries in Central Virginia

Notes

1. Finding Zion 1. Historical Census Browser, University of Virginia Library, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, Slave Population search, http://mapserver.lib.virginia.edu/php/newlong.php?subject=9. 2. To test this approach I counted the number of “blacks” and “mulattos” listed during one year, in the 1860 mortality list. There were 298 deaths in Albemarle County from January to December 1860; this is at the end of the period cited here when the overall population figures were higher. Thus the eighty-six deaths per year is a conservative estimate. 3. The punishment for free blacks congregating to learn how to read or write was up to twenty lashes, while any white person instructing them could “be fined not over $50.00, also be imprisoned not exceeding two months.” If a white person assembled slaves to teach them to read or write he or she would be fined ten to one hundred dollars for each pupil. Guild, Black Laws of Virginia, 175–76. 4. In later years I located a handful of archaeological reports on slave cemeteries, but as they were in the gray area of literature produced by contractors, few libraries carry these titles. Two other single-cemetery studies were published: in 2003 a book was released describing a community study of a slave cemetery (Rawlings, Gone but Not Forgotten), and in 2008 a journalist wrote about her efforts to record a slave cemetery (Galland, Love Cemetery). 5. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Historic American Buildings Survey, reproduction no. HABS VA, 2-NOGAR.V, 1, survey no. HABS VA-995. 6. Ibid., 4. 7. Free black population of Albemarle County compared to its enslaved population, 1820– 1860, Historical Census Browser, University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, accessed 28 December 2008, http://mapserver.lib.virginia.edu/. 8. For example, Samuel Miller, Albemarle, Virginia. U.S. Census 1930, roll 2434, p. 10B, enumeration district 10. 9. Richmond Planet, 12 April 1890. 2. Locating and Recording the Dead 1. Historical Census Browser, University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, “Free Colored Males” and “Free Colored Females” results, http://mapserver.lib.virginia.edu/ index.html. 2. As a colony of Great Britain, Canada freed its slaves in 1843, much earlier than did the United States. Notes 168 Notes to pages 13–31 3. “Old City Cemetery,” Lynchburg Insider, accessed 29 February 2012, http://www.the -lynchburg-va-insider.com/old-city-cemetery.html. 4. The U.S. Census Bureau compiled only two slave schedules, one in 1850 and one in 1860. 5. Rainville, “Home at Last,” 59–64. 6. Hildreth, The Slave, 82–83. 7. Named after Brightberry Brown (1762–1846). 8. Lay, The Architecture of Jefferson Country, 55. 9. U.S. Census 1810, Fredericksville, Albemarle, Virginia, roll 66, p. 187, image: 0181426; U.S. Census 1830, Albemarle, Virginia, p. 232, NARA series M19, roll 197, family history film 0029676. 10. Even though Brightberry is a private home (not a business) it can be found as a “place” on VA Home Town Locator, accessed 15 March 2012, http://virginia.hometownlocator. com/maps/feature-map,ftc,2,fid,1675010,n,brightberry.cfm. 11. Brightberry’s wife, Susan Suca Thompson Brown (1776–1832), one of his daughters, Millie Brown (1788–1852), and one of his sons, Horace L. Brown (1807–1882), are buried here. There are several illegible and unmarked stones, one of which may mark the grave of Brightberry himself. 12. For more information on additional slave cemeteries in Albemarle County see Rainville, “Home at Last”; Rainville, “Saving the Remains of the Day”; Rainville, “Social Memory and Plantation Burial Grounds”; and Rainville, “An Investigation of an Enslaved Community.” 13. Undated blueprint for the Oakwood Cemetery, in Dr. Scot French’s possession, and oral remembrances recorded by him in the early 2000s regarding the possible presence of a fence. 14. See J. F. Bell Funeral Home Records, http://www2.vcdh.virginia.edu/jfbell/. 15. Later I learned from a descendant that the family calls this the “Douglas Cemetery.” Unaware of this, I had used the designation “Thompson Family Cemetery,” found in J. F. Bell Funeral Home Records, http://www2.vcdh.virginia.edu/jfbell. 16. U.S. Census 1880, Whitehall, Albemarle, Virginia, roll T9_1352, p. 69.3000, enumeration district 3, dwelling 30, family 30. 17. I retained the name “Thompson Family Cemetery” for the site that I found first, where Robert Thompson was buried. This experience highlights the difficulty in determining how to best identify historic cemeteries, based on community...