African American Cemeteries Research Articles

Visual narrative research: African American cemeteries in Alachua County, Florida

AbstractElla Spencer (my mom) was born in 1908 and died in 2002. She once told me that people of color were treated worse than farm animals, especially when they died. “They didn't get funeral rites like White folks,” she said. I contend the problem is that no one is keeping vital records such as photographs, maps, and burial ledgers of where African Americans were buried. After numerous years, several American states, cities, and counties had reported bountiful discoveries of unknown African American remains of all ages during constructions or demolitions. In 2023, more than a few news outlets were continuously reporting the findings of African American remains from beneath buildings, parking lots, overgrown vegetation, and woods. This qualitative research project was based on digital archival data research methodology and theoretical visual anthropology framework adding creativity components (e.g., photography, painting, and photo bashing technique) to effectively collect data of Alachua County, Florida African American cemeteries. This paper aims to add to the academic literature and fill the gap in African American life after death acknowledgment. In conclusion, this is a project that has many branches that need to be researched to get the whole story of African American cemeteries' survival.

A geospatial and archaeological investigation of an African–American cemetery in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA

AbstractOberlin Cemetery, located near downtown Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, was founded in 1873 following the American Civil War (1861–1865). This 3.2 ac (~1.29 ha) parcel of land served as the main cemetery for the people of Oberlin Village—the largest freedmen's community in Wake County. Today, descendants of the village founders and other neighbourhood residents, organized as the Friends of Oberlin Village (FOV), are preserving this community landmark and working to have its historical significance recognized. In support of these efforts, terrestrial laser scanning, global‐positioning‐system‐enabled pedestrian and ground‐penetrating radar (GPR) surveys were conducted during the winter and summer of 2016. We inventoried 276 formal grave markers identifying 221 individuals, 296 elongate depressions without a formal marker interpreted as sunken graves, and 130 fieldstones interpreted as burial markers, resulting in an estimate of 517‐to‐660 persons interred within the cemetery. The GPR survey supported the interpretation of topographic depressions as sunken graves; however, the undulating topography, as well as the density of trees and shrubs, limited this survey to ~12% of the site. Based on the birth dates listed on monuments, ~23% of these persons were born before the end of the Civil War. Death dates show the community's continued use of the cemetery throughout the early 1970s and less frequent use after that, with the most recent burials in 2009. A comparison with a 2012 inventory of monuments within Oberlin Cemetery suggests that ~3% of the markers were lost or displaced in 4 years, highlighting the importance of survey and preservation efforts. This work contributed to the FOV's successful nomination of the cemetery to the US National Register of Historic Places and was used to support several grants received for its preservation.

The Material Culture of Pennsylvania’s African American Cemeteries and Burial Grounds

ABSTRACT Pennsylvania’s historic African American cemeteries share common physical characteristics with Black cemeteries found in other regions of the United States. However, the Commonwealth’s unique history, culture, and geography have influenced these sites’ material culture and shaped them into unique landscapes with distinctive features. This article begins by examining the historical forces that contributed to the creation of more than 150 separate burial grounds across the state. It then considers five characteristics that together make Pennsylvania’s African American cemeteries distinctive. These include: (1) the cemeteries’ open spaces and significant number of unmarked graves; (2) grave marking traditions; (3) the presence of Pennsylvania state-issued veteran grave markers; (4) the existence of church buildings and ruins, and (5) the scars of indifference and racism that led to the abuse or destruction of many historic Black burial grounds. Collectively, these elements shaped Pennsylvania’s unique African American funerary landscape.

Finding Zion: Spectral intimacy and state indeterminacy at an erased American cemetery

ABSTRACT In 2018, a previously erased African American cemetery was dramatically rediscovered in Tampa, Florida. The rediscovery was accompanied by multiple acts of remembrance: archaeologists set about confirming the presence of coffins and bodies; people living on top or nearby this and other burial grounds began reporting a series of ghostly visions and visitations; and the city government and its contractors put forward plans to memorialize the erased cemetery. Based on participant-observation with city employees, developers, and activists undertaken as part of a broader project on the politics of race, empire, and urban life in South Florida, this article investigates the erasure and rediscovery of this and other historic cemeteries in order to inquire into the social and political life of indeterminacy at sites of necropolitical violence. While some residents attempted to enter into meaningful interpersonal relations with the spirits of actual deceased persons, taking their existence as a potentially transparent fact, agents of the state instead developed a position on the question of haunting more in line with social theories of the spectral as an impossible possibility. Attending to this fact ethnographically reveals the relationship between statecraft, the nonsecular, and the politics of indeterminacy in a new light.

The genetic legacy of African Americans from Catoctin Furnace.

Few African Americans have been able to trace family lineages back to ancestors who died before the 1870 United States Census, the first in which all Black people were listed by name. We analyzed 27 individuals from Maryland's Catoctin Furnace African American Cemetery (1774-1850), identifying 41,799 genetic relatives among consenting research participants in 23andMe, Inc.'s genetic database. One of the highest concentrations of close relatives is in Maryland, suggesting that descendants of the Catoctin individuals remain in the area. We find that many of the Catoctin individuals derived African ancestry from the Wolof or Kongo groups and European ancestry from Great Britain and Ireland. This study demonstrates the power of joint analysis of historical DNA and large datasets generated through direct-to-consumer ancestry testing.

Recovering a Black Cemetery: Automated Mapping of Hidden Gravesites Using an sUAV and GIS in East End Cemetery, Richmond, VA

Estimates suggest that over 15,000 people are buried at East End Cemetery, a historic African American cemetery in Richmond, Virginia, that until recently received no public funding for upkeep. Here, we present a case study analysis and potentially replicable methodology for counting and locating unmarked burial depressions in non-forested areas using a low-cost sUAV (drone) and simple, hydrology-based geographic information systems analyses. Upon visual inspection of 12% of our final 8,000 burial site dataset, we find our dataset is a plausible representation (75% accuracy) of potential grave locations. We hope that the methods presented below can be implemented to assist in reclaiming historically underfunded Black cemeteries across the American South.

Review: Death and Rebirth in a Southern City: Richmond’s Historic Cemeteries, by Ryan K. Smith

Review: <i>Death and Rebirth in a Southern City: Richmond’s Historic Cemeteries</i>, by Ryan K. Smith

Interpreting error in the estimation of skeletal growth profiles from past populations: An example demonstrating skeletal growth in historic African American communities.

The study of growth in the past is a critical component of bioarcheological analyses. However, our understanding of growth in the past is subject to a number of methodological challenges. This study aims to model the skeletal growth of past populations by considering the challenges associated with the data collection process and the challenges associated with the age estimation procedures. We use skeletal remains from two historic African American cemeteries in the American South to model femoral diaphyseal length-for-age. We estimate the age of each individual using dental development techniques and present growth curves as both a product of the maximum likelihood (MLE) age estimate and the estimated posterior age distribution. Growth was compared against a reference sample from the University of Colorado Child Research Council Study. The results of our analyses showed that femoral diaphyseal length in two historic African American communities is small-for-estimated age as compared to a modern reference sample. However, the magnitude and characterization of this difference is variable when taking into account the broader posterior age distribution. Both samples may be small-for-age due to physiological stress associated with racism, inequality, and the compounding effects of early urbanization. However, the interpretation of growth in the past is muddled when considering the relationship between the study sample and the reference sample, when accounting for uncertainty in the age estimation procedure, and the error-inducing steps taken during the data collection process. Future interpretation of skeletal growth in the past must include a full account of the possible sources of error in order to present an accurate representation of growth.

“Sacred to the Hart”*: Identity and Dignity as Reflected in the Memorial Landscapes of Postemancipation African Americans in Pensacola, Florida

ObjectiveThis article broadens the discussion of 19th century monuments associated with the Lost Cause by exploring the monument landscapes of post‐emancipation African American cemeteries and the people who are associated with them.MethodExemplars from several cemeteries in Pensacola, Florida, are used to examine how the postemancipation population maintained deep ties to their cultural roots while assimilating into society as free people.ResultsThe built environment of postemancipation African American cemeteries contains monuments reflecting black identity and dignity in life and in death.ConclusionsExamining a broader sample of memorial landscapes can be a starting point in expanding the national dialogue on our country's history in a more inclusive fashion. Historic cemeteries, especially African American cemeteries established post‐Civil War, offer an excellent means of doing this in a manner that almost all citizens can understand and respect.

Preservation at the Intersections: Patterns of Disproportionate Multihazard Risk and Vulnerability in Louisiana's Historic African American Cemeteries

Cancer Alley is an 136,794 meters stretch of chemical and industrial plants along the Mississippi River between New Orleans, Louisiana, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Since 2005, the area has experien...

“Missing Cemeteries” and Structural Racism: Historical Maps and Endangered African/African American and Hispanic Mortuary Customs in Texas

Historical cemeteries across the United States are endangered due to development, neglect, and vandalism. Cemeteries of historically oppressed groups, specifically African, African American, and Hispanic populations, are even more susceptible to destruction or damage due to systematic, institutionalized racism; neglect; segregation; and unique mortuary patterns that often result in these cemeteries being ignored, damaged, or “lost.” A specific example is provided by historical cemeteries in Texas going “missing” from maps. Several cemeteries were known and marked on historical maps, but were later omitted from modern maps. This discrepancy is significant and leaves these “lost” cemeteries vulnerable. Minority cemeteries, particularly African and African American cemeteries, have a history of being damaged or destroyed during construction projects, only to be located on historical maps after the fact. Interdisciplinary research, including examinations of historical maps and an anthropological/archaeological understanding of mortuary customs, can help to preserve these unique and often underrepresented sites in American history.

A Death, A Funeral, A Repast.

A Death, A Funeral, A Repast.

McLeod Plantation Historic Site

In 2015 the Charleston County Park and Recreation Commission opened McLeod Plantation Historic Site. What remains of the former 1,693-acre Sea Island cotton plantation is 37 acres, 14 historic structures, and an African American cemetery. Interpretation of the former plantation is focused on the African American struggle to achieve freedom, justice, and equality from 1851 through 1990. The cultural history interpretation coordinator and co-author of the National Association for Interpretation award winning exhibits at the site explores the development, implementation, and adjustments made to interpretation since the opening and comments on the current state of Black museums in America.

Commingled and Unprovenanced: A Case Study Highlighting the Utility of Multiple Techniques for Testing Investigative Leads

Unprovenanced skeletal remains were located by law enforcement in a private residence in rural Missouri. Forensic anthropological assistance was requested to determine the origin and medicolegal significance of the material. The homeowner provided written documentation that the remains were legally obtained from an archaeological site in Guatemala; however, police expressed concern they were actually illegally looted and retained from a local historic African American cemetery. The recovered skeletal material was inventoried and a minimum number of individuals established based on crania and cranial fragments. The ten most complete crania were subject to further analyses. Assessment of biological profile, DNA analyses, and stable isotopes were utilized by three forensic anthropological practitioners to address three hypotheses of potential origin. Based on the collaborative results, none of the recovered skeletal material tested was from the proposed region of Iztapa, Guatemala. Data indicate that at least two of the recovered crania cannot be ruled out as being from the historic African American cemetery. However, results show it is likely the skeletal material is representative of multiple historic sites within the central and eastern Missouri region. This case emphasizes the need for utility of collaboration within the forensic anthropological field. KEYWORDS: forensic anthropology, stable isotopes, DNA

A Comparison of Ethnicity and Tuberculosis in the Historic Southeast

The prevalence and occurrence of tuberculosis can be attributed to a number of intrinsic factors, including sex, age, and ethnicity, as well as extrinsic factors, such as socioeconomic standing, occupation, and nutrition. Evidence of a severe infection, recovered during the 2007 salvage excavation of Foster Cemetery in Lawrence County, Alabama, is presented. Recorded within an African American cemetery population, the tuberculosis case is placed into an historical and regional context through comparison with other 19th- and 20th-century African American and European American cemetery populations in the southeastern United States. Extrapulmonary skeletal tuberculosis frequencies within comparative populations are examined, and the relationship between ethnicity and tuberculosis is assessed. It can be determined that not only does this relationship exist, but it is also one of statistical significance, suggesting that, historically, African American populations had a higher occurrence of tuberculosis than European American populations.

Perpetual Neglect: The Preservation Crisis of African-American Cemeteries

Perpetual Neglect: The Preservation Crisis of African-American Cemeteries

Lynn Rainville, Hidden History: African American Cemeteries in Central Virginia. Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 2014. Pp 194. Cloth $33.21, Paper $19.50.

Lynn Rainville, <i>Hidden History: African American Cemeteries in Central Virginia</i>. Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 2014. Pp 194. Cloth $33.21, Paper $19.50.

Finding the Back Entrance Unsuitable: Liberation, Pedagogy, and South-View Cemetery

Founded in 1886 in Atlanta, South-View Cemetery is the oldest for-profit African American cemetery in the United States. South-View exists because African American freed persons rejected the poorly maintained plots designated for them in segregated cemeteries like Oakland. In an English course, students learn to read the landscape of this cemetery, with a particular focus on its relationship to Martin Luther King Jr., who was originally buried there. The cemetery allows students to ponder the kinds of idiomatic expressions of black history and experience that scholar Kevin Quashie posits as crucial for studying black humanity beyond the language of resistance. Alongside the fenced-in plots of 1906 Atlanta Race Riot victims, students consider how black cemeteries restored a sense of dignity to the black community. Before the seven graves of Atlanta’s missing and murdered children, students may reflect on those unmarked plots. With guidance from the cemetery’s historian, students learn how South-View Cemetery locates the ongoing, substantive performance of race, poverty, and justice in the context of the Black Lives Matter movement.

Book Review: Hidden History: African American Cemeteries in Central Virginia

Book Review: Hidden History: African American Cemeteries in Central Virginia

Hidden history: African American cemeteries in central Virginia

Hidden history: African American cemeteries in central Virginia