Desecration of Bethesda African cemetery destroys culture and spirituality of descendents

It wouldn’t be far-fetched to say that DC is built on top of bones–the bones of first nations people, and later, of kidnapped African citizens. One desecrated burial site around Bethesda’s River Road about a mile northwest of DC is sacred to the descendants of the interred whose remains lie beneath an apartment complex and a parking lot. Today, it’s one of the most expensive areas in Bethesda.

Descendents along with local activists have fought to preserve what’s left of Moses Macedonia African Cemetery and surrounding burial grounds for nearly a decade. Bones weren’t the only thing paved over–living black families in the River Road community were terrorized by the KKK, Montgomery County Police Department and white developer redlining tactics in the 1960s. Community displacement, separating the living from their ancestors, has magnified the indignity of desecration.

I recently spoke to Marsha-Coleman Adebayo, president of the Bethesda African Cemetery Coalition, about the spirituality at the core of this multifaceted struggle.

Note: this interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What faith did the buried people at Moses Cemetery practice?

Coleman-Adebayo: The majority of people buried in Moses were Christian, but perhaps a more accurate assumption would be that the majority of Africans who were kidnapped and brought to the U.S. were most likely Islamic or animist or practiced indigenous African religions, like Yoruba. It’s probably fair to say African people were converted to Christianity under the violence of the lash along with beatings, murder and rape. One of the first cultural insults we endured when we came here is that our own religions were not respected. There was so much violence attached to practicing one’s own religion that most African people had to succumb to practicing Christianity. They were forced into Christianity. It was important for Europeans to replace the African-centered God spirit with a European God. So religion played an important part in colonizing Africa and all areas of black world in order to repress our God.

Tell us about the spiritual meaning behind the funerary artifacts found in some of the Moses Cemetery area excavations.

Coleman-Adebayo: We’ve seen a lot of bottles come up in these excavations. Most white people see these bottles and think nothing of them. But from an African perspective, we know what they are. In African gravesites everywhere beyond Africa, in the U.S. and even England, these objects signify the light coming from heaven. It’s a way to shine the prisms and beings of God’s glory on the resting place itself. Africans on River Road didn’t have a lot of money and using bottles as funerary objects became a way of beautifying and glorifying an area. They couldn’t afford European tombstones. We’ve also seen quartz stones in nearby graveyards. We have photographs of managers and so-called archeologists working at the cemetery actually stealing the bottles and putting them on the back of trucks. These desecrators maybe did some research on the meaning of the bottles and are keeping them as souvenirs or to sell as artifacts. We don’t know.

What can you share about the little girls who were buried in the area?

Coleman_Adebayo: The little girls on River Road were kidnapped from everything they knew. They were so close to finest universities in West Africa before they were brought here to grow tobacco and used as sexual objects. We know from stories handed down to younger generations that girls as young as five years of age were rented out on weekends. Yet they had the determination that they were going to live and not die. I would have committed suicide if I had been gang raped.

Imagine the cemeteries were still intact. How would their presence be spiritually meaningful to the generations today?

Coleman-Adebayo: Those in power who have destroyed all spiritual linkages with ancestors have disconnected future generations from the past. Africans are spiritual people. Our struggle has been a spiritual struggle. The more we learn about River Road, the more we are just in awe of the strength and power and ability of our ancestors to fight back against the odds. We continue the fight so they can inspire younger generations.

BACC has witnessed bones being carted off in sacks. How do you deal with the trauma of desecration?

Coleman-Adebayo: It took us a while, as academics, to use the word ‘evil’ yet that’s what we use to describe the bones of our ancestors being trafficked. Evil isn’t just in corporations but in people who are elected officials with privilege. When I see cement trucks at the Moses Cemetery sites, it’s not just about something that happened in 1865 but something that’s happening to me today. You have to diagnose evil in order to treat it. We’ve retreated into prayer and fasting and we keep very close to our God-center so that we’re not consumed by evil, which could mean hatred and anger to the people doing this to us. If we stay close to our God center we’re able to do this work without it impacting our physical and mental health. Healing is a very important part of the message. In fact, our activism is a form of healing for young volunteers in high school and college. They’re making our society a better place.

Is there one particular spiritual verse that comes to mind when thinking about Moses Cemetery?

Coleman-Adebayo: To cut off history, to have this sense of amnesia so the oppressor can rewrite the narrative for you and just say “you were just slaves”–what does that do to the soul? One of the verses I love most in the Bible is ‘we fight not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers in high places.’ We’re clear that we’re fighting against principalities and we need them to listen to and respect the wishes of the public, especially the black public. We’re fighting a political system based on money and not humanity.

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Participate

Upcoming Bethesda African Cemetery Coalition events honor this year’s MAAFA and Juneteenth on June 18th and 19th with a march from Macedonia Baptist Church to Moses African Cemetery, a tribute to a civil war soldier buried at the site, guest speakers, music and more. For details about events and the organization, please visit BACC.

Learn more

• ‘Black bodies are not for sale’: the battle over an African American cemetery [The Guardian]
• Slavery descendants fight to memorialize a cemetery in Maryland [NPR]
• Historic Black cemetery in Bethesda can be sold, state appeals court rules [Washington Post]
• Black cemeteries are being ‘erased.’ How advocates are fighting to save them [USA Today]

Featured Image: Protestors gather in front of Macedonia Baptist Church in Bethesda, Maryland on August 12, 2020. (Courtesy of BACC)