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Generations of African Americans are buried across the Shenandoah Valley, but many of their final resting places remain unmarked or undocumented. In response, the Shenandoah Valley Black Heritage Project is launching a public database to identify and preserve these burial sites.
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From Winchester to Roanoke, residents are encouraged to share any information they may have about African American graves, marked or unmarked, so they can be added to the digital archive.
¡°We want people to use this database as a way of helping them complete their genealogy, for them to know where their folks are buried,¡± said Monica Robinson, executive director of the Shenandoah Valley Black Heritage Project.
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The project¡¯s goals are to assist families in tracing their ancestry and to protect historic sites from being lost to time or disturbed by future development. Robinson said when the database goes live, it will note the location of the graves and if they are on private or public property.
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¡°We won¡¯t open this database and say go out on private property and start looking,¡± she said. ¡°We document that it¡¯s on private property. If you want to access this graveyard, then you need to go through the property owner.¡±
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The organization is currently gathering public submissions and will use the data to contact landowners and advocate for preservation. The organization aims to launch the database to the public in the Summer of 2025.
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To submit burial site information,?.
