Fisher's Hill Preservation Project

Virginian-Pilot, The (Norfolk, VA)
June 25, 1998
Edition: FINAL
Section: FRONT
Page: A1  
PORTSMOUTH OFFICERS VOW TO UNCOVER BLACK HISTORY \Author: IDA KAY JORDAN, STAFF WRITER TH

After decades of neglect, somebody plans to take responsibility for the cemeteries where some of Portsmouth's best-known names are cut into tombstones that have been entangled in vines and overgrown with vegetation.
Members of the Minority Police Officers Association have promised to work with the city to provide continuous upkeep for the all-black cemeteries known as Fisher's Hill, Mount Calvary and Mount Olive. The cemeteries adjoin one another on a 13-acre parcel along the southern edge of Interstate 264 off Deep Creek Boulevard.
Thousands of African Americans who died in Portsmouth throughout the 19th century and up until 1960 are buried there. They include I.C. Norcom, Jeffrey Wilson, Ida Barbour and many others whose impact on the community have been memorialized by use of their names on schools and other public places.
During a program Wednesday near the cemetery entrance, the city and the association signed a ``memorandum of agreement.''
``The agreement says the city will cut the grass, enhance the lighting and put up a fence,'' said James E. Lewis Jr., president of the minority police association. ``They also will attempt to gain ownership of the property.''
In turn, the police officers will repair broken tombstones and urns, set up overturned stones and clean neglected areas.
``We are planning a directory of all the people buried here, and we would like to get it on the National Register (of historic sites),'' Lewis said.
Doctors and lawyers, bank presidents and musicians, post-Civil War city councilmen - even the man who operated the first freight ferry between Norfolk and Portsmouth - all are buried there.
During Wednesday's ceremony, Mayor James W. Holley III said his great-grandfather, John Riddick, is buried in Mount Calvary. Riddick was the first black man to serve as high constable in Portsmouth.
Some of the visible stones carry dates in the early 1800s, and old newspaper accounts have reported graves there dating as far back as the late 17th century. Only when the minority police officers get all of the tangled overgrowth cleaned out and complete their directory will anyone know the date on the oldest marker.
A plot plan for Mount Calvary showed more than 13,000 gravesites, according to City Parks Manager Tom Eaton, and old city records estimate about 6,500 in Mount Olive and another 15,000 in Fisher's Hill and in nearby Potter's Field. Nobody knows how many have been used.
The cemeteries fell onto hard times in the 1950s and, by 1960, state health officials ordered the end of burials due to deterioration of the graves already there.
Through the years, original owners of the privately held cemeteries died and apparently left no provision for perpetual care. The city owned and maintained cemeteries exclusively for white people until the 1970s, and took no responsibility for the privately developed black cemeteries despite periodic efforts by black and white leaders to get the area cleaned up.
For decades, local groups started cleaning up the graveyards, including piles of trash dumped there, but nobody ever completed the job. Nor were the cemeteries regularly maintained.
In 1987, the city agreed to start cutting the grass after getting a Circuit Court order to proceed and attempting to locate the owners' heirs. In addition, the city had to post a $50,000 bond against damage to monuments and markers.
Although the grass was getting cut in parts of the area, tombstones remained overturned or broken. Graves had fallen in. And some parts of the cemetery areas, including an unmarked Potter's Field used during the yellow fever epidemic of 1855, never were cleared completely.
Lewis said the Minority Police Officers Association will work on all of the problems.
``This is not a one-time thing with us,'' he said. ``It will be a long-term commitment, and I think we will leave a lasting impression on this city.''