"If we have the courage and tenacity of our forebears, who stood firmly like a rock against the lash of slavery, we shall find a way to do for our day what they did for theirs." —Mary McLeod Bethune
African American Richmonders from all walks of life are interred at East End. There are lawyers and letter carriers, ministers and midwives, bankers and barbers, teachers and tobacco stemmers. There are cooks, laundresses, waiters, and porters. Farmers, drivers, grocers, and tailors. Fannie B. Scott taught at the Baker School. William I. Johnson, born into slavery in Albemarle County, became a successful contractor. John W. West worked for many years at Central State Hospital in Petersburg; when he died in 1902, his colleagues paid tribute to him in the Richmond Planet. But people's professions tell only part of the story. Within the confines of Jim Crow, East Enders founded churches, created mutual aid societies, and joined fraternal organizations. They were deacons and trustees, officers and presidents, secretaries and sextons. And soldiers too — at least one hundred veterans are buried at East End. Their stories, and thousands more still waiting to be discovered, shed new light on our collective past and allow us to write a truer, more inclusive history of our city and our country.
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Daniel Webster WashingtonDaniel Webster Washington18801962Neighbors were grumpy. Postman Daniel W. Washington went on vacation and the post office assigned a substitute carrier to deliver mail in the Northside neighborhoods of Richmond. The substitute wasn’t...
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Mercia MitchellMercia Mitchell18801911Mercia Mitchell's maternal grandmother was Catherine Davis, who was born between 1828 and 1830. Catherine's parents were born in Virginia. Mercia's maternal grandfather was Peter Lockett, who may have been...
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Thomas W. ChinaThomas W. China
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William Henry Banks Sr.William Henry Banks Sr.18901959William Henry Banks, Sr., affectionately called “Big Daddy,” was born on December 18, 1890, in Henrico, Virginia. He was the fourth child and only son born to Commodore...
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Howard EasleyHoward Easley19211975Mr. Easley was a veteran of World War II, as were at least two of his brothers, William Stonewall Easley and George Allen Easley.
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Clarence HubbardClarence Hubbard19131956Mr. Hubbard was one of the 20,000 Montford Point Marines, the first African American men to serve in the Marine Corps, which until 1942 had been all white.
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Rachel Allen (Tharps) BooneRachel Allen (Tharps) Boone18851938Mrs. Boone led an eventful life, cut short by tuberculosis. A graduate of Hartshorn Memorial College in Richmond, she and her husband, Clinton Caldwell Boone (a doctor and minister), both...
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Charles A. J. BriggsCharles A. J. Briggs18681914Charles A. J. Briggs, a post office watchman and later an insurance agent, married Cora H. Robinson of Ohio in Jackson County, Michigan, in 1905. How or why Mr. Briggs...
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Artelia (Richardson) RossArtelia (Richardson) Ross18801918Artelia Ross and her husband, Emanuel, died two days apart, both of "phthisis pulmonalis" (tuberculosis).
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Rosa Dixon BowserRosa Dixon Bowser18551931The most famous of those buried at East End Cemetery, Rosa Dixon Bowser was a pioneering educator, writer, and civic leader. She graduated from the Richmond Colored Normal School in...
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Signolia HaleySignolia Haley19041914The daughter of George Emmett Haley and Jennie Adams, Signolia Haley was only ten years old when she died of diphtheria in 1914. By 1920, her mother had returned home...
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Florence Capela (Jackson) JudkinsFlorence Capela (Jackson) Judkins18851920Florence Capela Jackson married Julius Caesar Judkins on June 10, 1919, at Richmond's Ebenezer Baptist Church. He lived in Marion, Indiana, where he practiced law, but had studied earlier at...
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Elizabeth (Chapman) Evans PayneElizabeth (Chapman) Evans Payne18671935More than a decade after the death of her first husband, Robert Bruce Evans, in 1899, Elizabeth (Chapman) Evans married the Rev. Evans Payne, who pastored Fourth Baptist Church from...
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Lucy (Curd) BenjaminLucy (Curd) Benjamin
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Mary E. (Staples) BrownMary E. (Staples) Brown
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Sara E. BrownSara E. Brown
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William F. BrownWilliam F. Brown18451901We don't have definitive proof, but some evidence suggests that William F. Brown, born ca. 1845, was the son of Elizabeth Brown and brother of Josephine (Brown) Johnson. His family...
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Josephine (Brown) JohnsonJosephine (Brown) Johnson18281882Josephine Johnson, née Brown, died in 1882, some 15 years before East End was founded. To our knowledge, hers is the earliest death date at the cemetery. Josephine and her...
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Catherine (Vandervall) HarrisCatherine (Vandervall) Harris18421920Catherine Vandervall Harris was the daughter of Martha Green and Nelson Vandervall. Her father was born free circa 1816 and after the Civil War served on the Richmond City Council. We...
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Walter Wooldridge Sr.Walter Wooldridge Sr.18591940Walter Wooldridge Sr. was born on August 7, 1859, in Hanover County, Virginia. According to his death certificate, his parents were Thomas D. Wooldridge and Fannie —. Research...
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Henry Williams (aka James Henry Ferguson)Henry Williams (aka James Henry Ferguson)18321915We were first alerted to the presence of United States Colored Troops veteran Henry Williams at East End by cemetery researcher Nadia K. Orton in 2015. Because East...
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Virginia A. (Brown) SmithVirginia A. (Brown) Smith18631910Ever since this headstone was uncovered a few years back, we’ve wondered who “Wife of Cpt. J. G. Smith” might be. We’d come up empty online (the name Smith didn’t...
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William A. MitchellWilliam A. Mitchell18561920William A. Mitchell was born on February 26, 1856, to James and Charlotte Mitchell of Richmond, Virginia. According to the 1860 census, William’s father was absent in his early life;...
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Rosanna (Harris) ScottRosanna (Harris) Scott18611943Rosanna Harris Scott, daughter of George Harris and Adaline Cox, was born in May 1861 in Richmond or Chesterfield County, Virginia. She died on January 18,...
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Julia ParkerJulia Parker18621923Mrs. Parker is buried in the plot of William Ferguson, husband of Lavinia (Johnson) Ferguson, with whom she was boarding in 1910. A possible earlier record identifies her as the...
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John W. WestJohn W. West18441902John W. West was born in 1844 and spent most of his life working at Central State Hospital, a facility for mentally ill African Americans in segregated Virginia. (Until 1894, it...
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Dr. Richard Fillmore TancilDr. Richard Fillmore Tancil18521928Richard Fillmore Tancil, MD (ca. 1852–8 Mar 1928), was a Virginia-born physician, banker, property owner, and citizen activist who lived in Richmond from 1883 until his death in 1928. He was...
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Sarah Beatrice "Sallie" (Wooldridge) JonathanSarah Beatrice "Sallie" (Wooldridge) Jonathan18611938
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Stanley Fulton JonathanStanley Fulton Jonathan18961918The oldest child of Hezekiah F. Jonathan and Cora G. Robinson, Stanley Fulton Jonathan died of influenza during the 1918 pandemic. He was 22 years old.
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Hezekiah F. JonathanHezekiah F. Jonathan18591913
A prominent merchant — the Richmond Planet described him as “one of the best known colored men in the State” — Hezekiah F. Jonathan owned and operated a fish business...
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Alexander JonathanAlexander Jonathan18401908The son of Moses Jonathan and Rebecca Scott, Alexander Jonathan was born free in Henrico County circa 1840. He became a fish dealer, as did his son, Hezekiah, and a...
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William Isaac Johnson Sr.William Isaac Johnson Sr.18401938William I. Johnson was born into slavery in Albemarle County, Virginia, more than two decades before Emancipation. During the Civil War, he freed himself, walking out of a Confederate camp...
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Fitzhugh Lee HillFitzhugh Lee Hill18661932Fitzhugh Lee Hill was born on October 20, circa 1866, likely in Chesterfield County, Virginia, where his mother, Emma Agnes Graham, and father, Nathaniel Hill, had settled by 1870. We...
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William CustaloWilliam Custalo18401907William Custalo was a lifelong Richmonder and for many years the proprietor of Custalo House, a well-known bar and restaurant at 702 E. Broad, the same spot where the National...
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