Along the James River in Kingsmill lies a memorial site called Utopia. The memorial marks a spot around where twenty-five enslaved Africans and their descendants were buried:
“Researchers from the James River Institute of Archaeology discovered the remains of twenty-five enslaved Africans and their descendants located in a cemetary near the site at a slave quarters known as Utopia.
The land where the cemetary was situated was owned by the families of Colonel Thomas Pettus and later by James Bray.
It is estimated that they lived between the seventeenth century (ca 1690) and early eighteenth century (ca 1770). America was not yet a nation during their life time.
The remains of their bodies were moved to protect from further deterioration and are buried under this monument. Their souls are forever free.”
I have visited this site on many occasions while visiting our close family friends who live along the James River in Kingmill. Their house is situated about a hundred yards away from Utopia. This place is very dear to me, and when I visit our friends, I usually make it a point to walk down and visit Utopia. It’s a very peaceful place. I just go to sit and meditate.
Last night, I came across an archaeological database called the Digital Archaeological Archive of Comparative Slavery. The database devotes itself to helping people learn about the enslaved Africans living in the Chesapeake, Carolinas, and Carribean during the Colonial and Ante-Bellum periods. The database also has a big section with a lot of good background information on Utopia.
A nice feature of this database allows one to access artifact queries. An artifact query is a basic inventory of artifacts found at each site. In this sense, a viewer of this database can get an idea of the many possessions these people carried with them. The artifact query section is just one of the many queries that people can access at this database. Click here for more.
I’ll leave everyone with a few pictures that my dear friend, Sally Lewis, sent to me.
Utopia:
May their souls remain free forever.