From the Richmond Times-Dispatch, December 18, 2008.  Full article at http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/news/local/article/SLAV18_20081217-212925/155991/

Richmond slave jail’s foundation found
Melodie N. Martin, Times-Dispatch Staff Writer
Published: December 18, 2008

With young black men used as bait, dogs were trained to track and  
pursue runaway slaves in the cobblestone courtyard of a Richmond slave  
jail.

Hidden for more than a century, the courtyard of round, gray stones  
and other remnants of Lumpkin's Slave Jail lay exposed yesterday in  
the corner of a Shockoe Bottom parking lot.

Archaeologists have spent the past four months digging 8 to 15 feet  
down to uncover "an amazingly intact urban complex," which included  
brick foundation walls, said Matthew R. Laird, principal investigator  
with the James River Institute for Archaeology in Williamsburg.

The dig recovered thousands of period artifacts, including ceramics,  
glassware, bottles, a shoe and animal bones.

The discovery completes more than five years of planning. The exact  
location was identified through the use of an 1835 city survey  
map. . . .

The jail, owned by Robert Lumpkin, held slaves from 1840 until the end  
of the Civil War. Richmond was the country's largest domestic slave  
market, second only in overall trade to New Orleans, Kilpatrick said.

"The African-American story cannot be told without exploring the slave  
trade and the slave experience. That experience is also integral to  
the development of the city of Richmond, socially and  
economically," [Kathleen] Kilpatrick [executive director of the  
Virginia Department of Historic Resources] said. . . .

The cobblestone courtyard was referenced in the writings of 19th- 
century author and abolitionist Richard Henry Dana, said Philip J.  
Schwarz, a member of the Richmond Slave Trail Commission.

"The dogs would accompany the coffle [a group chained together] taking  
people south. If somebody tried to run away, they let the dogs loose,"  
Schwarz said. "It was part of the brutality."

The site will be covered with fabric and backfilled with dirt to  
protect it, said City Councilwoman Delores L. McQuinn, who heads the  
Richmond Slave Trail Commission. A tall, chain-link fence separates  
the 12,000-square-foot site from a city-owned parking lot off 15th and  
East Franklin streets.

In the meantime, McQuinn said, the groups involved in the dig will  
seek funding resources for ideas such as a genealogy center, a museum  
or a reproduction of the slave jail.

She said it was too early to discuss a developer's plans for a  
baseball stadium and condominiums in the area, but that they would  
continue to pursue their goals "not be deterred by a developer's plans."

"Richmond will speak loud and clear what they want for this particular  
area," McQuinn said.


[Note from Jurretta:  the statement that "Richmond was the country's  
largest domestic slave market, second only in overall trade to New  
Orleans" is incorrect: the interstate domestic trade flourished in the  
wake of the ending of the overseas slave trade in 1808, and from that  
time until Emancipation, New Orleans was the nation's largest slave  
market.  Richmond was also, however, a critically important site for  
the trade.]
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