BNHA Mount Auburn Cemetery
Affiliations
Baltimore City Landmark
National Register of Historic Places
Interpretive Framework
Gaining Freedom for All: African American Heritage and the Struggle for Equality
Shaping a Monumental City: The City’s Growth in the 20th Century
Resource Type
Cemeteries
2614 Annapolis Rd
Baltimore, Maryland 21230
Baltimore’s Mount Auburn Cemetery is one of the first cemeteries owned and operated by African Americans. Established in 1872, the cemetery was originally known as the “City of the Dead for Colored People.” Former slaves who had found freedom through the Underground Railroad were among those buried there by Baltimore’s black families. For years it was the only burial ground for Baltimore African Americans.
Mount Auburn Cemetery is the final resting place of prominent civil rights activist Lillie Carroll Jackson; William Ashbie Hawkins, one of the first African American bishops in the African Methodist Church; and Joseph Gans, the first black lightweight boxing champion of the world. The cemetery is designated as a city landmark and was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2001.