Politics

Funeral for a Former Slave Takes Center Stage at Appomattox

Published

9 years ago

April 8, 2015

Rev. Alfred L. Jones III poses in front of the reconstructed slave quarters behind the McLean House on the grounds of Appomattox Court House National Historical Park in Appomattox, Va., Wednesday, April 1, 2015. Jones will deliver the eulogy for former slave Hanna Reynolds whose death will be remembered during the 150th anniversary of the Civil War’s end. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

STEVE SZKOTAK, Associated Press

APPOMATTOX, Va. (AP) — A Civil War cannonball that ripped through Hannah Reynolds’ master’s cabin made her a footnote of misfortune, the lone civilian death at the Battle of Appomattox Court House. She died a slave at 60, hours before the war to end slavery unofficially came to a close.

A century and a half later, Reynolds’ story is being rewritten: Newly discovered records show that she lingered for several days — long enough to have died a free woman.

This new historical narrative has made Reynolds, along with Confederate General Robert E. Lee and Union Gen. Ulysses Grant, one of the central figures in commemorative activities marking Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, Virginia, starting Wednesday. Friday night, a eulogy in period language will be delivered over a plain wooden coffin representing Reynolds’ remains, a 100-member gospel choir will sing spirituals and 4,600 candles will be lit to represent the slaves in Appomattox County who were emancipated by Lee’s surrender to Grant, his Union counterpart.

The Reynolds story has also inspired some soul searching in this rural county in Virginia’s tobacco belt where black and white students were taught in separate schools more than a century after Lee’s farmhouse surrender and where discussions of race are approached delicately, if not at all.

“It’s hard to bring up. It’s even harder to get an honest and open discussion of it,” said Joseph Servis, an advanced placement U.S. history teacher at Appomattox High School. His students wrote essays drawing on their own experiences, black and white, with race.

“To me, this is what history should be,” Servis said. “To challenge yourself and be a little uncomfortable and ask yourself questions you might not like the answers to.”

For some students, their experiences were all too familiar.

Melody Burke, 16, wrote of how another teacher questioned whether she was up to the class work. She was the only black student in the class and the only one who was questioned, she said.

It only strengthened her resolve, she said, to “prove to her you really don’t know me and you can’t judge a book by its cover.”

Students also visited the school-turned-museum where black students were educated, attended a panel discussion featuring students who attended classes there to learn of their experiences, and discussed the era of segregation with their elders.

Pastor Alfred L. Jones III remembers student unease about race issues when he taught history at Appomattox High. Now retired, he’s a genealogist who brought the Reynolds story to life and has worked with others in this county of 15,000 to make the legacy of the Civil War relevant through the Civil Rights movement and beyond.

The Reynolds story, he says, was “hidden in plain sight.”

Reynolds was left by her masters, Dr. Samuel Coleman and his wife, Amanda Abbitt Coleman, in their home as Union and Confederate armies headed to the fateful Battle of Appomattox Court House. It would be the final battle before Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia surrendered on April 9, 1865, effectively ending the war.

During the fighting, a Union cannonball blasted through the Coleman house, striking Reynolds and leaving a horrific wound. Two white men, a Union doctor and chaplain from Maine, looked over her in her final hours.

“Her arm was very large and fleshy and a concave wound was made corresponding to the size and shape of the ball,” wrote J.E.M. Wright, a chaplain with the 8th Maine Infantry. The Mainers tended to Reynolds and her grieving husband, Abram Reynolds.

“I think the Park Service always assumed, you took an artillery shell on April 9, you probably died that day,” said Ernie Price, the director of education and visitors services at Appomattox Court House National Historical Park. He has worked closely with local organizers on the Reynolds funeral.

The Park Service has since the war’s centennial strived to move away from battles to interpret “the war and its meanings and its legacies,” Price said.

Jones worked for months seeking out the thin paper trail left by Reynolds. The breakthrough was finding Reynolds listed on a death registry in a public library in Lynchburg with a genealogical center.

“That was just like I struck gold,” he said of the document that listed the date of her death as April 12, 1865 — not three days earlier, as was long believed.

In a rare gesture by a slaveholder, Reynolds’ death was reported by Dr. Coleman, who listed himself as “former owner.”

“I think he realized the historical significance of that,” Jones said. “Obviously it meant something to him.”

Jones would like to believe Reynolds regained consciousness over those final days to realize she would die a free person.

“I just imagine, in my mind, somebody whispering, ‘You’re free, you’re free, you’re free.'”

___

Steve Szkotak can be reached on Twitter at http://twitter.com/sszkotakap.

___

Online:

Appomattox Court House: http://www.nps.gov/apco/index.htm

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MAYOR BREED ANNOUNCES $53 MILLION FEDERAL GRANT FOR SAN FRANCISCO’S HOMELESS PROGRAMS

San Francisco, CA – Mayor London N. Breed today announced that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has awarded the city a $53.7 million grant to support efforts to renew and expand critical services and housing for people experiencing homelessness in San Francisco.

Published

5 days ago

April 20, 2024

Oakland Post

Mayor London Breed

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Wednesday, January 31, 2024

Contact: Mayor’s Office of Communications, mayorspressoffice@sfgov.org

***PRESS RELEASE***

MAYOR BREED ANNOUNCES $53 MILLION FEDERAL GRANT FOR SAN FRANCISCO’S HOMELESS PROGRAMS

HUD’s Continuum of Care grant will support the City’s range of critical services and programs, including permanent supportive housing, rapid re-housing, and improved access to housing for survivors of domestic violence

San Francisco, CA – Mayor London N. Breed today announced that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has awarded the city a $53.7 million grant to support efforts to renew and expand critical services and housing for people experiencing homelessness in San Francisco.

HUD’s Continuum of Care (CoC) program is designed to support local programs with the goal of ending homelessness for individuals, families, and Transitional Age Youth.

This funding supports the city’s ongoing efforts that have helped more than 15,000 people exit homelessness since 2018 through City programs including direct housing placements and relocation assistance. During that time San Francisco has also increased housing slots by 50%. San Francisco has the most permanent supportive housing of any county in the Bay Area, and the second most slots per capita than any city in the country.

“In San Francisco, we have worked aggressively to increase housing, shelter, and services for people experiencing homelessness, and we are building on these efforts every day,” said Mayor London Breed. “Every day our encampment outreach workers are going out to bring people indoors and our City workers are connecting people to housing and shelter. This support from the federal government is critical and will allow us to serve people in need and address encampments in our neighborhoods.”

The funding towards supporting the renewal projects in San Francisco include financial support for a mix of permanent supportive housing, rapid re-housing, and transitional housing projects. In addition, the CoC award will support Coordinated Entry projects to centralize the City’s various efforts to address homelessness. This includes $2.1 million in funding for the Coordinated Entry system to improve access to housing for youth and survivors of domestic violence.

“This is a good day for San Francisco,” said Shireen McSpadden, executive director of the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing. “HUD’s Continuum of Care funding provides vital resources to a diversity of programs and projects that have helped people to stabilize in our community. This funding is a testament to our work and the work of our nonprofit partners.”

The 2024 Continuum of Care Renewal Awards Include:

$42.2 million for 29 renewal PSH projects that serve chronically homeless, veterans, and youth
$318,000 for one new PSH project, which will provide 98 affordable homes for low-income seniors in the Richmond District
$445,00 for one Transitional Housing (TH) project serving youth
$6.4 million dedicated to four Rapid Rehousing (RRH) projects that serve families, youth, and survivors of domestic violence
$750,00 for two Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) projects
$2.1 million for three Coordinated Entry projects that serve families, youth, chronically homeless, and survivors of domestic violence

In addition, the 2023 CoC Planning Grant, now increased to $1,500,000 from $1,250,000, was also approved. Planning grants are submitted non-competitively and may be used to carry out the duties of operating a CoC, such as system evaluation and planning, monitoring, project and system performance improvement, providing trainings, partner collaborations, and conducting the PIT Count.

“We are very appreciative of HUD’s support in fulfilling our funding request for these critically important projects for San Francisco that help so many people trying to exit homelessness,” said Del Seymour, co-chair of the Local Homeless Coordinating Board. “This funding will make a real difference to people seeking services and support in their journey out of homelessness.”

In comparison to last year’s competition, this represents a $770,000 increase in funding, due to a new PSH project that was funded, an increase in some unit type Fair Market Rents (FMRs) and the larger CoC Planning Grant. In a year where more projects had to compete nationally against other communities, this represents a significant increase.

Nationally, HUD awarded nearly $3.16 billion for over 7,000 local homeless housing and service programs including new projects and renewals across the United States.

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Oakland Post: Week of April 17 – 23, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 17 – 23, 2024

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April 19, 2024

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Barbara Lee

Congresswoman Barbara Lee Issues Statement on Deaths of Humanitarian Aid Volunteers in Gaza 

On April 2, a day after an Israeli airstrike erroneously killed seven employees of World Central Kitchen (WCK), a humanitarian organization delivering aid in the Gaza Strip, a statement was release by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA-12). “This is a devastating and avoidable tragedy. My prayers go to the families and loved ones of the selfless members of the World Central Kitchen team whose lives were lost,” said Lee.

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1 week ago

April 17, 2024

Oakland Post

Congresswoman Barbara Lee

By California Black Media

“This is a devastating and avoidable tragedy. My prayers go to the families and loved ones of the selfless members of the World Central Kitchen team whose lives were lost,” said Lee.

The same day, it was confirmed by the organization that the humanitarian aid volunteers were killed in a strike carried out by Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Prior to the incident, members of the team had been travelling in two armored vehicles marked with the WCF logo and they had been coordinating their movements with the IDF. The group had successfully delivered 10 tons of humanitarian food in a deconflicted zone when its convoy was struck.

“This is not only an attack against WCK. This is an attack on humanitarian organizations showing up in the direst situations where food is being used as a weapon of war. This is unforgivable,” said Erin Gore, chief executive officer of World Central Kitchen.

The seven victims included a U.S. citizen as well as others from Australia, Poland, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Palestine.

Lee has been a vocal advocate for a ceasefire in Gaza and has supported actions by President Joe Biden to airdrop humanitarian aid in the area.

“Far too many civilians have lost their lives as a result of Benjamin Netanyahu’s reprehensible military offensive. The U.S. must join with our allies and demand an immediate, permanent ceasefire – it’s long overdue,” Lee said.