NOVA Parks News

NOVA Parks and the Fairfax County NAACP hosted their Second Annual Juneteenth celebration to recognize the largest private emancipation of the enslaved, commemorate the cemetery where many of the freed are interred, and visit the site where Blacks and whites worshipped as early as 1775. 

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The Juneteenth celebration, held June 17 at Bull Run Regional Park, included remarks from NOVA Parks Board Chair Cate Magennis-Wyatt, Fairfax County NAACP President Michelle Leete, and Reverend Linda Alicudo, who will tell the story of the Harris Family Cemetery and Bull Run Baptist Church. A poetry reading by Anita Gill-Anderson, musical performances by Heritage Baptist Church singers, and a presentation by guest speaker Bishop Brett Fuller, Washington Commanders Chaplain and founder of Grace Covenant Church, will take place at the site of the cemetery.  

NOVA Parks discovered that more than 90 people are buried in the former Harris Family Cemetery, located at Bull Run Regional Park, using ground-penetrating radar. Interpretive signage unveiled at the 2022 Juneteenth celebration tells the story of Robert Carter III, who once owned the 65,000 acres of land. After converting to the Baptist faith, Carter built a church that was open to both Black and white residents of the area. Carter emancipated 500 enslaved people in the 1790s and allowed them to own land, resulting in a thriving Freedmen's community at Bull Run 70 years before the Civil War and Emancipation Proclamation. Those buried at the cemetery were descendants of enslaved people freed by Carter, including the parents of Alfred W. Harris, who served as Alexandria City Councilmember and State Delegate and chartered the first Virginia public college for African Americans.

Northern Virginia-based Thunderbird Archaeology, a subsidiary of Wetland Studies and Solutions and Davy Trees, will be acknowledged as a long-term partner to contribute their expertise in historical research to learn more about the site and its stories. They will begin by determining the exact location of the church’s foundation and will identify whether the site contains additional graves. Thunderbird Archaeology’s historic preservation expertise includes the excavation of an 18th century historic ship along Alexandria’s original shoreline and the historic Columbian Harmony Cemetery in Washington, D.C.

Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day, Jubilee Day, Liberation Day, and Emancipation Day, marks the event on June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers told 250,000 enslaved African Americans in Galveston, Texas, that the Civil War was over, and they were therefore free. The Emancipation Proclamation had freed slaves in 1863, but it was not enforced until long after in many places. Celebrated since the late 1800s across the United States, Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021.

The event will take place at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, June 17 at Bull Run Regional Park, located at 7700 Bull Run Drive, Centreville, Virginia 20121. Ceremony remarks will begin at shelter 10 next to Atlantis Waterpark. Parking is available in the Atlantis Waterpark parking lot near the road.

Visit novaparks.com/ParkHistory for information about Robert Carter III, the Harris Family Cemetery, and more stories uncovered in Northern Virginia regional parks.

About NOVA Parks

Founded in 1959, NOVA Parks (Northern Virginia Regional Park Authority) represents three counties and three cities -- Arlington County, Fairfax County, Loudoun County, the City of Alexandria, the City of Falls Church, and the City of Fairfax. The regional agency manages over 12,000 acres of parks and recreational facilities, including water parks, golf courses, boat launches, and a high adventure ropes course.

NOVA Parks owns and manages the 1,500-acre Bull Run Regional Park located in Centreville, Virginia. The park features Atlantis Waterpark, Festival of Lights holiday light show, campsites, disc golf, picnic shelters, and miles of hiking, including access to the 19.7-mile-long Bull Run Occoquan trail.

 

About Fairfax County NAACP

The mission of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate race-based discrimination. Founded on February 12, 1909, the NAACP is the nation’s oldest, largest, and most widely recognized grassroots-based civil rights organization. The Fairfax County Branch of the NAACP began meeting in 1918 and was chartered in 1944. To learn more, please visit www.fairfaxnaacp.org.