The Anson Street Burying Ground: Lost Ancestors of Charleston’s Gullah Community

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "First Steps on a Long Corridor: The Gullah Geechee and the Formation of a Southern African American Landscape" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Excavations for the renovations of Charleston’s (SC) Galliard Performance Center exposed a formerly unknown African American burying ground near the corner of George and Anson streets. At least 36 individuals were interred at this cemetery during the later 18th century. Property records and artifacts directly associated with the remains suggest c. 1770-1790. The City of Charleston’s wish to determine the most appropriate location for reinterment in concert with the Gullah Society’s efforts to know better these people and their lives prompted intense bioarchaeological analyses of the individuals, including stable isotope and mDNA analyses. Results of these analyses indicate points of origin and length of tenure in Charleston for these Gullah ancestors. The Gullah Society and the City sponsored a naming ceremony and celebration of the ancestors’ lives at the time of their reburial in the yard of the Galliard Performance Center, a few yards from where they were originally rested.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• First Steps on a Long Corridor: The Gullah Geechee and the Formation of a Southern African American Landscape   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2022

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology