CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, Va. — A state historical marker will be dedicated this weekend for First Baptist Church Bermuda Hundred in Chester, The Virginia Department of Historic Resources (DHR) announced.
Built in the 19th century, the church located on the site a colonial-era marketplace where slave auctions were held.
The dedication and marker unveiling will be held Saturday, March 28, at 11 a.m. outside the church, located at 4603 Bermuda Hundred Road.
The invocation will be led by the church's pastor, Rev. Michael G. Stith. Richmond’s Ilu of Drums of Liberation will lead a libation ceremony and there will be a celebration dance performed by Oluremi Sa-Ra, the DHR news release says.
First Baptist Church Bermuda Hundred was formally established around 1866, with origins in present-day Chesterfield County dating to 1850.
Bermuda Hundred became one of Virginia’s official trade ports in 1691. Transatlantic slave ships brought thousands of enslaved Africans to Bermuda Hundred to be sold.
After 1750, when the demand for laborers increased in the newly settled southern Piedmont region of Virginia, Bermuda Hundred became one of the Commonwealth’s largest slave auction sites. Most enslaved Africans who disembarked there, including children, were sent to tobacco plantations, where planters profited from their labor.
The Chesterfield Historical Society of Virginia covered the cost of the marker.
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