As the United States nears its semiquincentennial and marks 161 years since formerly enslaved people hosted the first Memorial Day parade in Charleston, South Carolina, native Washingtonian Anntoinette “Toni” White-Richardson is considering the wealth of history at Woodlawn Cemetery in Southeast D.C.
“In our cemetery, we probably have some of the most prominent historical figures,” White-Richardson, president of the Woodlawn Cemetery Perpetual Care Association, told The Washington Informer. “We may be the only existing cemetery in city limits where Black Civil War affiliation remains.”
White-Richardson is on a mission to make sure that the legacies and stories of those buried at the Ward 7 historical site are unearthed and remain alive for generations to come.
“Woodlawn Cemetery is not only D.C. history; it is an integral part of the 250 years of American history,” she said in a February statement when the cemetery received $125,000 from the District’s Paul E. Sluby Sr. Historic Burial Grounds Preservation Program. “The saying ‘ties that bind’ is at the heart of my dedication to preserving Woodlawn, for my grandfather is buried in this place of historic significance.”
The association president’s grandfather is one of thousands of African Americans buried at Woodlawn who contributed to the District’s fabric and nation overall. Others include Blanche K. Bruce, a former U.S. senator from Mississippi and the first Black register of the Treasury, and Lindsay Muse, who is known as the first messenger for the Navy Department.
Born enslaved in North Cumberland County, Virginia, Muse was an abolitionist as well as charter member and officer at Nineteenth Baptist Church who worked more than 50 years for the secretary of the Navy.
While people like Muse and other D.C. changemakers of the past may not appear in history books, Woodlawn — which officially opened on May 13, 1895 — keeps parts of their narratives alive.
“As long as America has [its] government documents, we will never be lost,” White-Richardson said about the cemetery, which is generally closed to the public but will be open on Memorial Day from 10 a.m.- 1 p.m. “[Woodlawn shows] up in legal documents [and] wills … [so] you can’t lose people that you have so intertwined in your government documents.”
Preserving Woodlawn’s History
Located in the Benning Ridge neighborhood of Southeast D.C., Woodlawn Cemetery was created as a solution to a problem.
The decomposition of bodies from Graceland Cemetery, built in 1871, began polluting the nearby water supply and creating a health hazard. With the District government planning to close Graceland, five white men created the Woodlawn Cemetery Association in January 1895 and purchased a 22.5-acre plot of land adjacent to Payne Cemetery.
A portion of the site was Fort Chaplin during the Civil War.
“Some Civil War officers were buried there,… [but] there was a period of time when they were moving people from one cemetery to the other,” White-Richardson told The Informer. “They put a stone out there at Woodlawn honoring the Civil War soldiers, but we don’t know their names. It’s kind of like a mass grave.”
Today, Woodlawn — which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1966 — contains approximately 36,000 burials and nearly all African American. However, maintaining a 131-year-old cemetery takes work.
“Other than military, all cemeteries are privately owned, and that is some of the problems that we run into,” the Woodlawn Cemetery Perpetual Care Association president explained. “[We’ve] got to keep raising money and funds.”
The breadth of Black history buried at Woodlawn is why the site was one of two cemeteries selected for a $250,000 grant that was distributed in February as part of centennial Black History Month celebrations.
“D.C. history is Black history. And we know that it is the responsibility of each generation to preserve that history and to pass it on, and that is why we are proud to award these grants that will help protect and preserve historic Black cemeteries in our city,” said D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser in a statement. “We are a city that represents Black excellence in everything we do – from the arts to medicine to technology; and that is something we celebrate year-round because it is such an important part of our city’s history and culture.”
For Woodlawn and the Mt. Zion and Female Union Band Society Cemeteries in Northwest D.C. — managed by the Black Georgetown Foundation — the grant is not simply about aesthetics. The funding is about safeguarding and uplifting important African American sites and narratives at a time when federal leaders have threatened ramifications for acknowledging parts of Black history and eliminated diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
“We feel a sense of urgency to ensure these historic Black cemeteries are restored and cared for,” said Anita Cozart, director of the Office of Planning. “Under Mayor Bowser’s leadership, we are committed to preserving the District’s cultural heritage for future generations of D.C. residents.”
Woodlawn plans to use the funding to tend to maintenance necessary to ensure the cemetery’s security and longevity.
“I’m grateful we were able to get that money,” White-Richardson told The Informer. “I tell people it was badly needed because of the general hard upkeep. It’s going to… get us a new sign. We need to put [up] new fencing,…. [and] there are some trees that are invasive that have to be removed.”
A Call to Action to Honor Ancestors, History
The first iteration of Memorial Day started on May 1, 1865, as a way for newly minted freed African Americans in Charleston to remember 257 Union prisoners of war who were unceremoniously buried by a retreating Confederate Army, according to the National Park Service.
After speeches discussing the importance of the long and bloody American Civil War, members of Colored troops performed drills and marched, as onlookers celebrated their contributions and those of the fallen. Then people took to the graves of the soldiers and decorated them, a tradition that became known as Decoration Day, until the first official Memorial Day in 1868, three years after the Civil War.
“They laid flowers on graves of Black and white Union soldiers in the South,” Frank Smith, executive director of the African American Civil War Memorial Freedom Foundation and Museum, told The Informer last year. “They were soldiers for our freedom. Those soldiers helped transform the South from a slavocracy to a democracy.”
Beyond Memorial Day, maintaining Woodlawn is one way the cemetery association works to honor those who have served in the armed forces and the District at large.
While the Paul E. Sluby Sr. Historic Burial Grounds Preservation Program funding helps tremendously, the upkeep of Woodlawn is a community effort that includes hosting clean-ups, meetings and more to ensure the historic site is maintained.
This year, the cemetery is officially open to visitors for just five days for a few hours: D.C. Emancipation Day (April 16), Memorial Day (May 25), Juneteenth (June 19), Labor Day (Sept. 7) and Veterans Day (Nov. 11).
Ahead of Memorial Day, volunteers took to the cemetery on May 16 to tend to the grounds. The next community clean-ups are scheduled for June 19, July 25, Aug. 22 and Sept. 26.
“For the rest of the year, I want people to show up when we open up, because my volunteers, there’s no paid staff, and I emphasize that, because they give us their time and their energy to come out,” White-Richardson told The Informer. “All we got is just good manpower, people with good hearts and good strong hands and arms to help us to keep it because that’s the only way it’s going to be kept.”
Although Memorial Day offers one day to honor those who have served in the military, volunteering at Woodlawn offers people an opportunity to celebrate District ancestors and history year-round, White-Richardson emphasizes.
“Our commitment to not only Black history, but our commitment to the history of this city… is in that cemetery,” she told The Informer. “You can’t separate… D.C. history, Black history and United States history.”
