Sunset Memorial Cemetery

Oct 14

Written By alanah cooper

Site Brief:

Founded: 1917

Location: Jacksonville, FL

Additional name(s): N/A

Affiliate group(s):

City of Jacksonville (COJ) Parks and Recreation Department
COJ Public Works Department

History:

Sunset Memorial Cemetery is an historic African American Cemetery in the northwest part of Duval County, Florida. Sunset Memorial Cemetery is surrounded by commercial uses along Edgewood Avenue West, Memorial Cemetery directly across Moncrief Road and a mixture of commercial, residential and institutional uses to the north. The cemetery was established in 1917 by the Memorial Cemetery Association, although it was never platted and may have been used for burials as early as 1909. The cemetery is affiliated with the Afro American Life Insurance Company, which was instrumental in fulfilling an unmet need of additional burial options for Jacksonville’s black community. The cemetery is a total of 6.25 acres in size and contains 1,125 grave markers, and it was used for burials up until the late 1990s, with the last recorded burial in 1997.

The African-Americans buried at Sunset Memorial were predominantly middle class and working class citizens, although prominent black citizens, including Abraham Lincoln Lewis, founder of the Afro American Life Insurance Company, are also buried here. The most common monuments and markers found at the cemetery include headstones of various styles (499), flat lid and curved vault lids (71), variations of pillows stones (66) and ground tablets (38). Two prominent mausoleums, the Craddock and Langley mausoleums, are situated near the main entrance of the cemetery. Other styles which are found in much less number, include bedstead, bedstead pillow, footstones and funeral plaques. Materials include predominately marble (335), concrete (235) and granite (85). There are 233 military graves including three piles of military headstones never placed. Several additional unmarked graves are also present at the cemetery due to weathering, deterioration, neglect, and vandalism that has taken place over time, although a precise number of these unmarked graves is not known.