On sacred ground: Fort Bend breaks ground on historic African American Memorial

KENDLETON – Around 200 people gathered at Kendleton’s Bates Allen Park Saturday to witness the first step toward cementing history.

In front of the Newman Chapel Cemetery, politicians, advocates and residents joined to commemorate the groundbreaking of what will be the largest African American Memorial in the region.

Precinct 4 Commissioner Dexter McCoy led the effort to make the project, years in the making, a reality. McCoy allocated $10 million in previous park bonds to fund the project.

In a time where one-third of cemeteries in Texas go without consistent care or oversight , the African American Memorial will create a permanent place to honor the history, journey and contributions of African Americans in Fort Bend County. Kendelton, a town about 25 miles southwest from Sugar Land, was established by emancipated slaves after the Civil War and is one of the first Freedmen’s towns in Texas.

In addition to the African American Memorial, Bates Allen Park will also be home to the Black Cowboy Museum – another extension of sharing Black history in Fort Bend County.

The ceremony brought together several political powerhouses, such as former Houston mayor Sylvester Turner, U.S. Rep. Al Green, D-Houston, and Precinct 1 Commissioner Rodney Ellis, along with Fort Bend County Commissioners and other elected officials.

As a gospel choir sang, guests raised their hands to give praise. The usually quiet, serene park was filled with voices from the audience singing hymns such as “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing.”

McCoy emphasized the importance of knowing that they stood on sacred ground.

“The African American memorial that we break ground on today will be a timeless homage to our history and be a place where those stories can be shared for generations to come,” he said.  “Every child deserves to know the truth of how we got here and to celebrate how we got here. Like the rest of America, we thrive because of the sacrifices and triumphs of African Americans.”

Just a few feet behind the crowd, beneath the sun and covered with flowers and ribbons, laid the graves of a few of Fort Bend’s Black trailblazers. Benjamin Franklin Williams, Texas’ first Black state representative, and Walter Moses Burton, the first Black man elected sheriff in the United States, are laid to rest beside the site of the planned memorial.

McCoy credits figures like Williams and Burton for laying the foundation for future Black politicians.

“We’ll talk about the plight of the people who came before us,” he said. “But we’ll celebrate the freedom, our freedom, and their ingenuity that led to the founding of among our nation’s first freedmen’s town – Kendleton, Texas – where we sit today. Now, it’s by no accident that we find ourselves in this place, on this sacred ground.”

The project, funded by previous county park bonds, will feature tributes such as a three-story monument, walking trails and reflection spaces, as well as 95 trees to represent the Sugar Land 95, a site where the remains of 95 African Americans were discovered during the construction of a Fort Bend ISD technical school.

Robin Cole, president of the The Society of Justice & Equality for the People of Sugar Land (SOJES) — an organization dedicated to the memorialization of the Sugar Land 95 – has advocated for years for a proper memorial of the unmarked graves.

To know that this memorial will honor their memory is a full-circle moment, she said.

“It feels like the ancestors are finally being heard,” she said. “I feel joyful. I feel hopeful. And just seeing the progress that has been made so far, even the paving of the roads that lead here …. I feel as though those 95 lives are not going to be in vain, that those 95 trees that they’re going to plant tells the story.”

Former U.S. Rep. Pete Olson, R-Sugar Land, played an instrumental role in the start of this memorial process. In 2022, Olson came to Bates Allen Park to pay his respects to Williams, who died in 1886. But when he got there, he couldn’t find his headstone.

When he did, it was face down, broken in some places, covered in weeds and fire ants.

“To see that disregard, that disrespect. It was very hurtful,” he said of the discovery.

At the ceremony, Olson honored McCoy’s contributions and tenacity to bring this project to life.

“It’s very rare for a group of people like us to come together knowing that we are making history. But you know what? Today, we are making history,” he said.

Relatives of Kendleton Mayor Darryl Humphrey are buried in the Newman Chapel Cemetery. As he gestured to their resting place behind the crowd, he expressed the personal importance of the memorial.

“I just wish today my mom and Miss (Majorie) Adams and people like that could be here today to see everything that they talked about and dreamed about years ago. It’s come to fruition,” he said.

Bobby Russell and her son Kevin Crump stood quietly as they peered over the resting place of Williams.

Russell’s grandparents lived in Kendleton. As they drove through the city, she recalled going to church here and lessons taught to her by her parents.

Places like this are important for young people to understand where they come from, she said.

“When I heard about this, it just gave me chills to know that somebody remembered to come back,” she said. “Don’t just put these graves like they’re nothing. Let’s do a memorial for this. Let’s build something so that they can be remembered.”