New Green Mount Cemetery tour will spotlight its Black Baltimoreans

“Stay tuned, let me do some more digging.”

Two years ago, Lashelle Bynum, a volunteer and board member of the nonprofit Baltimore Heritage, made that statement at the end of a seven-minute video about the history of Green Mount Cemetery.

Luckily, she wasn’t speaking literally.

Bynum had become intrigued by Martha Ann Atavis, long believed to be the only African American person buried in the cemetery.

Was she really the only one, Bynum wondered? And was there more Black history to unearth in the cemetery?

Through research, Bynum and Green Mount Cemetery employees uncovered the histories of more than a dozen African Americans buried in Green Mount Cemetery.

They’ve turned that work into a tour, called “Buried in Plain Sight: The Black Family Servants in Green Mount Cemetery.”

“I’m most excited about telling all of it,” Bynum said.

The two-hour tour on Aug. 15 will introduce attendees to enslaved people and free servants who were often buried within the same plots of those who had enslaved them or whom they had worked for.

Those interested in taking the tour can sign up through Baltimore Heritage. The hope is to offer the tour at least twice a year — more if there’s demand, said Baltimore Heritage Deputy Director Molly Ricks.

Baltimore Heritage also holds other tours of the cemetery, as well as walking tours across Baltimore, in Fells Point, downtown and elsewhere.

Opened in 1839, Green Mount Cemetery is known for being the resting place for many well-known folks from Baltimore. You might recognize some of them from street names, buildings and institutions across the region. Their tombstones, sculptures and mausoleums are often large and elaborate.

Elijah Bond, who patented the Quija board, Enoch Pratt, Johns Hopkins and Arunah Shepherdson Abell, founder of The Baltimore Sun, all are buried there.

If you’ve ever taken a Green Mount Cemetery tour, you might have heard a brief mention of Atavis, also known as “Patty Ann.” She’s often noted because she’s buried next to the cemetery’s first occupant.

Atavis was originally enslaved by William McCubbin, but when he died without a will, his wife sold her for $200 to John Whitridge in Baltimore, according to the Maryland State Archives. Atavis was a nurse for over 35 years for the family before she died and was placed in the Whitridge family plot in Green Mount Cemetery.

Bynum will tell Atavis’ fuller story as part of the new tour. And she will introduce Baltimoreans to Isaac Beale, Hester Turner, Patience Marsh and others she has researched. She wouldn’t share more about them — she said she is saving those stories for those who take the tours.

Bynum will minimize discussion of the families that employed or enslaved them, she said. “They had their time.”

The tours will be sprinkled with Black history facts that touch on culture and foodways.

“Black history is hitting the surface when it seems like forces are trying to take it,” Bynum said. “Our stories are being told.”

And her fascination with Baltimore extends beyond Green Mount Cemetery.

For at least 20 years, she has documented “ghost signs” faintly stained on walls above bars and hotels or in alleyways between rowhouses. She also enjoys photographing the city’s architecture and new construction.

Bynum hopes to turn her findings about Green Mount Cemetery into a lecture that she can share with a broader audience.

“It’s ongoing because I’m not finished,” Bynum said.