Figures of Freedom Self-Guided History Walk through Richmond’s Shockoe Bottom Welcome to Shockoe Bottom! The Valentine First Freedom Center is dedicated to sharing the legacy of Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom and exploring the evolution of freedom of conscience. As you enjoy this walk through Richmond’s oldest neighborhood, you’ll discover brave individuals who who undertook their own struggles for freedom and helped shape America. 14 15 2 13 1 12 3 11 10 5 4 6 9 7 8 For a detailed map and more guided tours, use this QR code. 1 Valentine First 3 James River and the Kanawha 5 Castle Thunder Freedom Center Canal System CARY STREET BETWEEN 17TH 14 SOUTH 14TH STREET DOCK AND 14TH STREETS AND 18TH STREETS The history of people living in Richmond dates back thousands of years. This region is the ancestral land of the Eastern Wood- land Indians and Powhatan people. Virgin- ia’s Indigenous people relied on the Chesa- peake Bay and James River system for food, transportation, and other resources. When English colonizers arrived in the 17th century, they established a tobacco pro- cessing settlement at the base of the river’s Artist sketch of the early General Assembly Building, The falls and dug a canal parallel to the river Castle Thunder, Richmond, Va., April, 1865. Library of Valentine to provide power. Richmond’s position at Congress The first capitals of Virginia were James- the crossroads of a river, canal system, and During the Civil War, this former tobacco town and Williamsburg, but in 1780 the later the railroad, would lead to its growth warehouse was the site of the Confederate capital was moved to Richmond to evade as an industrial center in the 18th century. prison Castle Thunder. One prisoner was the British army during the Revolutionary Dr. Mary Walker. Walker did not believe War. Before the State Capitol building was 4 Henry Box in conforming to women’s gender roles constructed, the Virginia legislature met in Brown Monument or dress codes. Originally from New York, a quaint building on this spot. CANAL WALK AND DOCK STREET Walker graduated from medical school in 1855, becoming one of few women Under British rule, the Church of England physicians in the country. During the Civil was the state-sanctioned religion. In the War, she was denied an appointment as new American republic, Thomas Jefferson a military surgeon, and instead served as and James Madison championed freedom a volunteer assistant surgeon in hospi- of conscience, the idea that people should tals and the field. In 1864, be free to worship, or not to worship, in while tending to wounded whatever manner they choose. Their Stat- Union soldiers, Walker was ute for Religious Freedom was enacted into captured by Confederate law by the Virginia General Assembly at troops and brought to Castle this site on January 16, 1786. The first law Thunder as a prisoner of Dr. Mary Walker, guaranteeing absolute religious freedom in The resurrection of Henry Box Brown at Philadelphia; A. war. The Confederates used C.M. Bell, c. 1873– the nation, its language became the basis Donnelly, c. 1850., Library of Congress 1916, Library of the fact that she was wearing Congress for part of the First Amendment in the U.S. Before the Civil War, Richmond was the pants under a skirt to claim Constitution’s Bill of Rights. second-largest slave market in the nation Walker was a Union spy. She was eventual- (New Orleans was the largest). Shockoe ly released in a prisoner exchange and was While Jefferson and the founding fathers Bottom had more than 90 slave markets awarded the presidential Medal of Honor were enshrining the right to “life, freedom, within the eight-block area and it is esti- in 1866. and the pursuit of happiness,” in actuality, mated that 350,000-500,000 people were liberty has not always been an equal reality sold here between 1830-1860. 6 Tobacco Warehouses for all Americans. SOUTH 19TH AND Enslaved people participated in many forms EAST CARY STREETS 2 Axis Mundi of resistance to this brutal system, from 14 SOUTH 14TH STREET small every day acts to bold measures like Commissioned in 2015, and created by a self-emancipation. Henry “Box” Brown was local design company, Tektonics Design a 33-year-old enslaved man in Richmond Group, this sculpture is based on the axis when his pregnant wife and their three mundi, a symbol representing the place children were sold away in 1849. With little where the earth meets the sky. The spire hope of reuniting, Brown resolved to es- is forged and twisted to symbolize the cape from bondage. Brown sealed himself difficulties inherent in a diverse society’s in a box with just some water and a few blending of beliefs. biscuits, and shipped himself to a Pennsyl- vania anti-slavery society. Over the course of 27 hours he was transported to freedom, Stripping tobacco leaves in factory…, 1890s, Cook travelling 350 miles by wagon, railroad, Collection, The Valentine steamboat, and delivery wagon. After his Richmond’s tobacco industry began in incredible escape, Brown was given the the 18th century with the establishment nickname “Box.” He became a well-known of tobacco inspection warehouses and abolitionist speaker and published two its growth was reliant on forced labor. autobiographies telling his story. Enslaved workers stemmed tobacco leaves and pressed them into cakes of chewing 9 Early Quakers For Virginia’s Indigenous people, arrival of tobacco. in Richmond the colonists brought the loss of freedom, Historical Marker years of war and forced removal from their In 1865, as the Confederate army evacuat- SOUTH 20TH AND lands. Prior to the civil rights movement ed Richmond, they set fire to the ware- EAST MAIN STREETS and resulting legislation, the basic civil houses to prevent the Union army from liberties of Native People were denied to This was the site of an early accessing valuable goods. The resulting them, including the right to practice, pro- Quaker meetinghouse built in 1798. The fire spread out of control and caused the tect and preserve their religion, languages Society of Friends, or Quakers, was an destruction of more than 50 blocks. The and cultural practices. fire was finally extinguished a day later by independent religious sect whose members Union soldiers. On April 4, 1865, President experienced persecution for their beliefs. 12 Main Street Station Abraham Lincoln arrived in Richmond by The search for spiritual freedom led a group 1500 EAST MAIN STREET of Quakers to flee England and immigrate boat on the James River. Lincoln toured Main Street Station is a beautiful repre- war-torn Richmond on foot, greeted along to the United States, first settling in Penn- sylvania. Many Quakers were active in the sentation of the freedom of transporta- the way by celebratory crowds of formerly tion at the turn of the 20th century. The enslaved people newly freed. movement opposed to slavery during the 19th century. station was built in 1901 in the Beaux Arts Libby Prison Site Style. The clock tower is 110 feet tall, and 7 each clock face is 9 feet in diameter. The EAST CARY AND 10 Caratoes 100,000 square foot train shed is one of SOUTH 20TH STREETS Caterpillar Mural 1814 EAST MAIN STREET the last surviving train sheds in the country. This is the former site of Libby Today, you can still travel via Amtrak from The Richmond Mural Project created over Prison, which housed Union officers during this station. the Civil War. Crowded and exposed to the 100 murals and cemented Richmond’s elements, prisoners often suffered severe reputation as an arts destination. This red, 13 Richmond Reconciliation food shortages. In February 1864, 109 white and blue caterpillar was created by Statue Union prisoners escaped after spending Belgium artist Caratoes. Richmond’s murals NORTH 15TH AND months digging a tunnel under Cary Street. have prompted discussions about the EAST MAIN STREETS purpose and reception of public art, while 48 were recaptured and two drowned in The Richmond Reconciliation Statue, the James River, but 59 officers eventu- reminding us of the importance of artistic freedom and the power the arts to inspire. aka “Triangle,” was created in 2007 in ally reached freedom on the other side of recognition of Richmond’s role in the Union lines. Keep an eye out for more murals along the way! slave trade. Identical statues are located Virginia Holocaust Museum in Liverpool, England, and the Republic 8 of Benin in West Africa, sites forming the 2000 EAST CARY STREET 11 17th Street Farmers’ Market 100 NORTH 17TH STREET triangle of the Atlantic slave trade. Jacob Ipp (born in 1935) was a young Jewish boy living in Kaunas, Lithuania About a block up 15th Street was the when the German Nazi army occupied the first location of Richmond’s Universalist city and began the systematic persecution Unitarian Church, built in 1833. In 1862 of Jewish people, forcing his family into the minister, Rev. Alden Bosserman, was the Kovno Ghetto in 1941. Later, in 1943 arrested under suspicion of working with young Jacob and his mother escaped while abolitionists to smuggle Union soldiers in line to be deported to a concentration and enslaved individuals North. The camp. They spent 9 months hiding in Reverend and several church officials were the countryside, much of the time living imprisoned in Lumpkin’s Jail for months. underground in a potato hole. When Jacon was 12, the family immigrated to Richmond 17th Street Market, Edith Shelton, 1978, The Valentine and changed their name to Ipson. In 1997, Jay (Jacob) Ipson, along with Long before the arrival of colonizers, Native friends Mark Fetter and Al Rosenbaum, people used this area for trade.