Josephine (Brown) Johnson

Josephine 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 husband, Robert W. Johnson Sr., appear in the 1850 census among the “Free Inhabitants” of Richmond, making them members of a very small minority (in 1860, free people of color made up less than seven percent of the city’s population). Robert, a shoemaker, outlived his wife by about two decades (he was still alive in 1900) and is likely buried at East End, though we have not yet found a gravestone.