Cemetery's Ties to Minnesota's Anti-Slavery Movement

Elizabeth Layman
Photos courtesy of the Layman family

Martin Layman
Cemetery's original owner

We don't often associate cemeteries with political movements, but the connection between Minneapolis Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial (formerly Layman's) cemetery and the anti-slavery movement is undeniable.  The cemetery was founded in 1853 by Martin and Elizabeth Layman who were among the earliest members of the First Baptist Church of Minneapolis.  In its early days, the church's members met in Fletcher's Hall, which was owned by Dr. Hezekiah Fletcher, one of the church's founding members.  The hall was also the gathering place for abolitionists, many of them members of the church.  Nine of those early church members,  relatives of Dr. Fletcher, were among the earliest people buried in the cemetery.

The Layman family's association with the Baptist church sheds light on why their privately-owned cemetery was never segregated, something that was almost unheard of in the 1850s and 60s.  The first recorded burial of an African-American occurred in May 1867, when an infant, identified only as the baby of Mary Johnson, was buried in the cemetery.  That child was the first of perhaps as many as several hundred African-Americans to be buried in Pioneers and Soldiers Cemetery.

These include William Goodridge, an activist on the Underground Railroad, and John Cheatham, who was one of the earliest (if not the first) African-American firefighters in Minneapolis.  Slade Robinson, who founded an African-American chapter of the Masons, is buried there as are eleven veterans, both African-American and white, who served in the U.S. Colored Troops during the Civil War.