F.T. Rea from the Fan District Hub writes about the importance of building a state of the art museum in the location of Lumpkin’s Jail to educate the public about a crucial point in our nation’s history and bring a unique tourist attraction to the Shockoe Bottom neighborhood. [via Richmond.com]

The only thing we can do now, to do any justice to those who were sold like beasts of burden, is to tell their story as honestly as we can.

On April 15 at 9 am, a presentation on the history and archaeology of Lumpkin’s Jail will be held in the Wilder Library at Virginia Union University. VUU was founded in 1865 to educate newly emancipated freedmen. The school initially held classes in Lumpkin’s Jail, the largest slave trading center in the US before the Civil War.  The presentation is free and open to the public. [via]

A few weeks ago, Richmond residents were excited that the Slavery Museum planned for Fredericksburg might be moved to Richmond. Doug Wilder posted a response this week to the recent discussion on Virginia Tomorrow stating that the museum will not be moved to Richmond.

The Museum Board is committed to its stated and moral obligations to the Fredericksburg community…

ACORN’s March newsletter has a pointer to the story in the March issue of Smithsonian about the dig at Lumpkin’s Jail:

From the 1830s to the Civil War, when Richmond was the largest American slave-trading hub outside of New Orleans, “the devil’s half acre,” as Lumpkin’s complex was called, sat amid a swampy cluster of tobacco warehouses, gallows and African-American cemeteries. This winter, after five months of digging, researchers uncovered the foundation of the two-and-a-half-story brick building where hundreds of people were confined and tortured. Buried under nearly 14 feet of earth, the city’s most notorious slave jail was down a hill some eight feet below the rest of Lumpkin’s complex—the lowest of the low.

Discussion on the possibility of moving the National Slavery Museum to Richmond has everyone talking! Bacon’s Rebellion has a post up arguing why “Shockoe’s a Good Spot for a Slavery Museum”.

UPDATED: The Virginian-Pilot argues the National Slavery Museum be moved to Fort Monroe in Hampton, VA.

Fredericksburg’s Free Lance Star rips into Doug Wilder today and wonders, “Are you sure you want to cut in, Richmond?”

The editorial comes after a Richmond Times-Dispatch article yesterday implying that Richmond officials want to bring the museum to “the Holy City’s trendy Shockhoe [sic] Bottom.”  After highlighting the many problems plaguing the museum project and their main source, Mr. Wilder, it suggests Fredericksburg would be better off to cut its losses. Laced with sarcasm, the article has to make Richmonders wonder if we are willing to take on a project that has been failing for several years.

UPDATE: More information from the Free Lance Star. “Richmond Del. Delores McQuinn says she’s willing to do whatever it takes to move the potential museum to Richmond.”

More trouble for the proposed National Slavery Museum in Fredericksburg has people wondering if Richmond will get an another chance to be the home of the museum. The project has been stalled for several years following a ceremonial groundbreaking service on the Fredericksburg site. It is now being reported that the nonprofit museum has not paid its real estate taxes due in November of last year. With the discovery of Lumpkin’s Jail in what is now a Shockoe Bottom parking lot, there is a renewed effort to bring the museum to Richmond. [via]

The Virginia Historical Society invites the community to attend Hidden Things Brought to Light: Finding Lumpkin’s Jail and Locating the Burial Ground for Negroes. The free event will be held this Saturday, February 28, 2009, from 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

“The goal of this conference is to provide a venue where members of the public can get accurate, historical information about Lumpkin’s Jail and the Negro Burial Ground,” said Jeffrey Ruggles, Virginia Historical Society curator of prints and photographs and author of The Unboxing of Henry Brown. “There is a lot of myth and emotion surrounding these two sites. We want people to have the correct information to start a conversation about the past and the future.”

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A major project of the Richmond City Council Slave Trail Commission, the archaeological excavation of the infamous Lumpkin’s Slave Jail, located in Richmond’s Shockoe Bottom area, has uncovered the remains of the former compound and period artifacts. The discovery includes the brick foundation, cobblestone courtyard and kitchen area.

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From a flyer being left on cars in the VCU parking lot. For more info, check out the Sacred Ground Historical Reclamation Project.

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Archaeologists from the James River Institute for Archaeology of Williamsburg will work through the summer excavating at the site of the Lumpkin’s slave jail, currently a city-owned parking lot behind Main Street Station. [via]

“I’m hoping what we will find will give us insight in how they lived not only as slaves but slave owners, so we can educate the public of how people lived in a hostile environment,” said City Councilwoman Delores L. McQuinn, chairwoman of the Richmond Slave Trail Commission.

Style Weekly is reporting that the archaeological dig at Lumpkin’s Jail, the slave auction house and nicknamed the “Devil’s Half Acre”, could resume this summer. The site is currently a parking lot behind Main Street Station.

Richmond’s Department of Parks, Recreation and Community Facilities is offering guided walks on the Slave Trail every Saturday in February at 9:30AM. The walks are led by the department’s James River Park System staff and cost $5 per person. I got up and out early this past Saturday to experience this for myself…

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While photographing pre-Civil War sites around Richmond, Shanna Merola discovered that many of the structures used during the city’s slave trade have been erased from the landscape, with few markers to indicate their historical significance. With a pinhole camera, she captured images of the Manchester Docks, Lumpkin’s Jail, and the Negro Burial Ground or, rather, the asphalt parking lots and empty fields that now cover these landmarks. Merola will exhibit her work at the Valentine Richmond History Center in a show opening Feb.1@6PM.

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