Listen to this articleKey Takeaways:
- Maryland officials to vote on using $402,000 for a memorial to Black Revolutionary War soldiers
- Proposed memorial site would include area where Roger Taney statue once stood
- Would be first such monument on any U.S. state house grounds, according to a state archivist
- Unveiling targeted for 2026 near the 250th Battle of Brooklyn anniversary
The Board of Public Works is expected to vote Wednesday to approve about $402,000 for a memorial on the grounds of the Maryland State House honoring African American soldiers who served in the Revolutionary War.
Elaine Rice Bachmann, state archivist and secretary of Maryland State House Trust, said in a phone interview Tuesday that the memorial is expected to be the first on any of the country’s 50 state house grounds that honors Black soldiers who fought in the war.
The memorial will be built on the southeast side of the State House, near the original entrance to the historic structure when it was built — more than likely by free and enslaved Black people, according to archivists, government officials and news reports. Construction began in 1772 and was completed seven years later, with the Revolutionary War delaying work, according to the Maryland State Archives.
The memorial area is expected to include the space where there was once a statue of Supreme Court justice and segregationist Roger B. Taney, who authored the 1857 Dred Scott decision arguing that African Americans could never be U.S. citizens. Workers removed the statue in the middle of the night in 2017 following the deadly violence of the Unite the Right white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
The new memorial is the result of a collaboration between the Maryland State Archives, the state Department of General Services and the Maryland State Arts Council, with the goal of honoring the “overlooked history of the African American community in early Maryland, the majority of whom were free Blacks,” the Board of Public Works’ meeting agenda states.
“Just like their white counterparts, the Black Patriots traveled with an army that included free and enslaved women and children who were integral to its functioning. Their contributions have been overlooked in historical narratives. Their legacy is but one of the omitted chapters in the heritage of early Maryland’s extensive Black community,” the agenda states.
More than 150 African Americans in Maryland are known to have enlisted and served in the war, according to the agenda.
The State House Trust approved a concept of the memorial in 2023. Wednesday’s vote will pave the way for work to eventually begin on the State House grounds.
Most of the funding approved Wednesday will go to the state’s contracted sculptor, Branly Cadet, who has also constructed monuments of historical figures outside of Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, in Montgomery, Alabama, and in front of Philadelphia City Hall, among other places.
Bachmann said the hope is to unveil the memorial on Aug. 29, 2026, which would nearly coincide with the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Brooklyn, which was the largest battle of the Revolutionary War and one in which the Americans suffered a crushing defeat and lost an estimated 2,000 soldiers, compared to fewer than 400 British casualties.
The battle, though, featured momentous contributions from 400 Maryland soldiers, known now as the Maryland 400, who countercharged the British as they converged on retreating Americans, according to the American Battlefield Trust.
More than 250 Maryland soldiers died in the battle, but their actions helped the rest of then-General George Washington’s army safely retreat and remain intact.
