At 1001 S. Washington St. in Alexandria, Virginia, you find quiet ground once set apart for the newly free. This ground was set aside in February 1864 by the Union military commander of the Alexandria District as a burial place for African Americans who had escaped slavery, called contrabands and freedmen. During early Reconstruction it was operated by the Freedmen's Bureau, but it closed in late 1868 after Congress ended most of the Bureau's operations; the last recorded burial took place in January 1869.
The Union Army initially buried soldiers of the United States Colored Troops here, until African American troops in Alexandria's hospitals demanded burial in the Soldiers' Cemetery, now Alexandria National Cemetery, and in January 1865 those remains were moved. The history of this site was rediscovered in the late 20th century, and archeological techniques were used to identify its boundaries and burials. The city later acquired the land, the site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on August 15, 2012, and the cemetery was re-established as a memorial in 2014.
Read the markers before you, each name a life once claimed only in freedom.