Historians are really the keepers of our memories. They preserve our history in so many forms, using everything from primary sources to the oral history passed down through generations. Working with both, they are often able to take the story past the brick walls that black families face, with the scarce records of those enslaved prior to emancipation.
Recently, a local family was invited to share such a history with a packed room anxious to hear about Smith Chapel Cemetery. When research began for a submission to the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, researchers were able to identify three of those buried there as U.S. Colored Troops who had resisted their enslavers and had used the local network to freedom to enlist. Afterward, with a grant from the Network to Freedom and AASLAH, young people who are students in a local community college, with the guidance of a great professor, Grace Wade Moser, were able to take that number to nine! With another being a veteran of World War I. With the help of a local Chapter of the Sons of Union Veterans, those US Colored Troops will now get their military markers. Their stories will now be documented in stone for all of history.
Because of this listing on the National Park Service’s Program established in 1998, creating the Network to Freedom program, this site will not be local history anymore, but our nation’s history. This program honors, preserves, and promotes the history of resistance to enslavement through escape and flight, which continues to inspire people worldwide. Through its mission, the Network to Freedom helps to advance the idea that all human beings embrace the right to self-determination and freedom from oppression. Smith Chapel Cemetery has over 100 African American burials on one-third acre of land. Now it is not only local history, but our nation’s history as well. The families are so proud that now their story is our country’s story. Never forget, for as long as a name can be said, it is not forgotten.
For more information about the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, see https://www.nps.gov/orgs/1205/index.htm
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