Harold Avenue Cemetery

Dec 8

Site Brief:

Founded: 1808

Location: Wantagh, NY

Additional name(s): Jackson Cemetery

Affiliate group(s): N/A

History:

The Harold Avenue Cemetery, circa 1808, is also known as the Black Jackson Cemetery. This cemetery is located west of Old Mill Road between Lawrence Place and Harold Avenue, in Wantagh. The Harold Avenue burial lot was used by Black families enslaved by the Jackson family prior to 1862, the date of the first recorded burial in the Old Burial Ground on Oakfield Avenue in Wantagh. Thomas Jackson, a white Revolutionary War veteran, deeded the property to Jeffrey Jackson, who was black, in 1808. It is probable that Jeffrey Jackson was enslaved and freed by Thomas Jackson. Many of the area's white families, in the area, were Quakers and were opposed to slavery. Former slave owners, soon after the Revolutionary War, often gave land to freedmen for their own farms. In many cases, freedmen and freedwomen took the surnames of their former masters.

Twenty-six black Jacksons, including Jeffrey, Kate, their descendants, are listed as being buried in the Harold Avenue Cemetery. The last two burials were those of Emeline Jackson, who died on February 7, 1899, and her husband, Henry Titus Jackson, who died on April 8, 1904. Their final requests were that they be buried in the Harold Avenue Cemetery in Wantagh, with their ancestors.

The white Jackson Cemetery, established in 1744, is located on the east side of Wantagh Avenue, immediately north of St. Frances de Chantal R.C. Church. This Jackson Cemetery is the final documented resting place of 63 descendants of Robert Jackson, who in December of 1643 co-founded Wantagh, along with Captain John Seaman. Others interred in the white Jackson Cemetery include Thomas Jackson.