Ever wanted to learn the art of preserving history? Curious about the stories etched in the stones of local cemeteries? Here’s your chance to dive into the fascinating world of cemetery documentation!

The Mount Zion – Female Union Band Society Cemetery is a historic cemetery located in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C.  The three-acre cemetery is composed of two roughly equal-sized halves, the Mount Zion Cemetery on the east and the Female Union Band Society Cemetery on the west, separated along a subtle north-south ridge in the center of the property.

Historically called the Old Methodist Burying Ground, the cemetery originated as a churchyard burial ground. It was established by the Montgomery Street Methodist Church in 1808, which gathered at the Montgomery Street Meeting House, formerly located on Twenty-Eighth Street between M and Olive Streets, N.W. (formerly Montgomery Street between Bridge and Olive Streets), approximately one-half mile southwest of the cemetery. The Montgomery Street Methodist Church was one of the few churches at the time that accepted white and black members, though on a segregated basis. Nearly half of the congregation consisted of former slaves and free blacks in the years leading up to 1816, when a group of 125 black members, dissatisfied with segregation, established their own congregation under the supervision of the parent church.

The congregation, now called the Mount Zion United Methodist Church and located at 1334 Twenty-Ninth Street, N.W., is thought to be the oldest black congregation in the District of Columbia, as well as the first black Methodist church in the area. The cemetery is the only remaining in D.C. used to inter a significant number of former slaves.

On October 19, 1842, a tract of land along the western border of the Old Methodist Burying Ground was sold for $250 to Joseph Mason in trust for the Female Union Band Society, a cooperative benevolent society founded in the same year by a group of free African American and Native American women. The Female Union Band Society purchased the western lot of Mount Zion to establish a secular burying ground for African Americans, which remained a prominent cemetery for the region’s African American community until 1950.

Continue reading the full history of the cemetery here.

Black Georgetown Foundation, Archaeology in the Community (AITC) & the American Society of Overseas Research (ASOR) are proud to host a free 3-day hybrid workshop on cemetery documentation.

📅 Dates: June 27, 29, & 30, 2024
📍 Location: Mount Zion – Female Union Band Society Cemetery, 2501 Mill Rd NW, Washington, D.C. 20007 & Via ZOOM

ℹ️ Open to the Public – No Prior Experience Needed! Familiarity with computers is recommended, but not required.

Program Schedule

Click on the session links below to view the schedule for each day.

Introduction to Heritage Documentation

THURSDAY, June 27, 2024

7:00 – 9:00pm EDT

Via Zoom

On-site Training at Mount Zion – Female Union Band Society Cemetery

SATURDAY, June 29, 2024

10:00am – 4:00pm EDT (Attend for as long as you wish)

2501 Mill Rd NW, Washington D.C. 20007

Data Processing

SUNDAY, June 30, 2024

1:00 – 4:00pm EDT

Via Zoom