20 who were enslaved and buried unknown now ‘live in spirit’ with NC church monument
The blue stone with a painted cross sits on a larger, stone monument and its meaning spans nearly a century long.
It’s a memorial resting in the McCoy Cemetery in Huntersville. Erected in 1928, it’s a symbol for enslaved persons who spent years on the McCoy farm, for whom the cemetery is named.
The monument will be the centerpiece of a Juneteenth memorial ceremony the church is hosting Monday.
The ceremony is to ensure that what happened will never be forgotten — and to make way for a better future, said Rev. Gary Edwards, of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church on Mt. Holly-Huntersville Road.
“The relevance of the whole space allows us to come into the monument to dignify those who have been here and to allow them to live in spirit,” Edwards said. “We can then continue to understand our paths and never let us forget so we don’t repeat it.”
The grandchildren of Marshall McCoy, who owned the cotton plantation, created the monument. It reads, “Uncle Jim and his wife Lizzy” and “Uncle Charles and his family,” with the two families mentioned being the former slaves who stayed on the farm after emancipation.
The monument offers a glimpse of compassion during a cruel time period, says David Fahey, a church member and historian.
“I don’t know if it’s wishful thinking or not, but we’ve seen glimmers of humanity through an inhumane system,” Fahey said.
History of site
The cemetery is on the Gar Creek Nature Preserve, nearly a mile from the church. About 20 people are buried there, with some being the children of Charles McCoy, or Uncle Charles, as he was known.
“They (McCoy family) found it important to have given great credibility to these families here,” Edwards said.
And in turn, the church found it important to give the cemetery a face-lift. The renovations included a new pathway made of gravel rock and new fencing around the monument.
“We were fixing up replacements and fencing ... and thought it was a good opportunity to increase public awareness that the cemetery was here, and try to encourage people to come appreciate it,” Fahey said. “ ... think about their legacy and the impact that they’ve had on the community since.”
One of the things Edwards is hoping to achieve with the Juneteenth ceremony is for people come and learn from the history.
“Those who would have never known about it and have been here for the first time will take away the memory of what it meant,” Edwards said.
He also wants people to know the significance of the site.
“It’s a place where when you come to it, it brings part of a serenity,” Edwards said. “Whenever I walk on this, there are chills that still go through my body. Because I have that feeling of the spirits of those who have been laid here.”
Information about ceremony
In 1949, the great-grandson of Albert McCoy gave the land to St. Mark’s.
The ceremony Monday will be the third time — including twice before Juneteenth officially became a federal holiday — the church held a service to honor the former enslaved family.
Ceremonies took place in the 1990s and 2007. Edwards says he wants to have a remembrance yearly, with prayer over the site.
“We did what was deserving and hopefully maybe once a year, we can come out especially in the summer, maybe as a church and do a morning prayer here ... just to make sure that the history of it continues,” Edwards said.
The ceremony begins at 5 p.m. at St Mark’s Episcopal Church, 8600 Mt. Holly-Huntersville Road, Huntersville. At 5:30 p.m. the ceremony will move to McCoy Cemetery, 9641 McCoy Road.
The service will be streamed on the church’s website, as well as on its YouTube page, www.youtube.com/@stmarksepiscopalnc.
This story was originally published June 19, 2023 at 6:00 AM.
