The Maryland Department of Juvenile Services was awarded a $200,000 grant to begin searching for the remains of hundreds of Black boys in the woods near the Cheltenham Youth Detention Center, the first step toward formal recognition of the boys’ deaths.
Funds will pay for a ground-penetrating radar survey and restoration of the cemetery grounds, according to the Maryland Historical Trust.
“I want to find some decent way to restore dignity to these boys and to give some level of healing to their families,” said Crystal Foretia, a former Juvenile Services researcher who helped draft the grant. The Maryland Historical Trust and Maryland Commission on African American History and Culture announced the grant on Jan. 28.
The survey should show how many boys are buried in an unkempt wooded area adjacent to the Cheltenham State Veterans Cemetery. An estimated 230 boys are buried there, according to the Maryland Historical Trust.
“That’s all necessary pre-work to do before you can restore the cemetery properly because you need to know what’s there before you’re trying to fix it,” Foretia said.
The grant comes as legislation is being considered in Annapolis to push for an independent investigation into the former House of Reformation and Instruction for Colored Children, a priority for the Black caucus.
Capital News Service has analyzed 142 death certificates from the detention center opened in the 19th century, the first juvenile detention center for Black boys below the Mason-Dixon Line. An estimated 300 Black youth died while in custody at the House of Reformation between the facility’s founding in 1870 and 1941.
The cemetery is divided into two sections and sits on land owned by the Department of Veterans and Military Families.
The first section has four identifiable headstones, though only three are legible, and was likely established in the mid- to late-19th century. The second, much larger, section from the early 20th century has eight rows of broken cinderblock markers peeking out from the ground by approximately 5 inches. Most of the markers are unidentifiable without excavation, according to the Maryland Historical Trust.
The Department of Juvenile Services is working with local historians to uncover the truth about the abuse and neglect at Cheltenham. Telephone messages and an email query to a department spokesman were not immediately returned.
The Cheltenham grant was part of $5 million awarded to 29 groups by the Commission on African American History and Culture and the Maryland Historical Trust for projects aimed at preserving African American culture and history.
“This year’s awards will assist threatened places that are often overlooked but are deeply significant to Maryland’s Black history, including cemeteries and sites associated with fraternal organizations,” said a statement from Elizabeth Hughes, director and state historic preservation officer at the Maryland Historical Trust.
–Molecule Jongwilai and Rob Wells contributed to this report. Capital News Service is a student-staffed reporting service operated by the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism.