Deacon uncovers names of Black Catholics buried in unmarked graves at Louisville cemetery
Posted on February 27, 2024, by Loretto Community
Published by the Louisville Courier Journal on February 21, 2024
Loretto Roots Enslavement project is one of many historic studies being conducted by Catholic organizations who were involved in the system of enslavement in the early 19th century. Deacon Ned Berghausen, son of Loretto co-member Karen Cassidy and highlighted in the article below, has found significant information about families of enslaved persons who lived in Louisville before the Civil War.
St. Louis Cemetery in Louisville’s Tyler Park neighborhood serves as the final resting place for nearly 50,000 Catholics spread across 43 acres dotted with ornate sculptures and monoliths.
Family plots are scattered about the land, and the names of some of Louisville’s earliest and most prominent Catholics engraved into obelisks. Among them is James Rudd, a wealthy businessman and politician who owned more than four dozen slaves before Emancipation.
One of those former slaves led Deacon Ned Berghausen to the cemetery, and he found that during Mary Narcissa Frederick’s nearly 100 years of life, she was “loaned” by Rudd to Bishop Benedict Joseph Flaget, the first Roman Catholic bishop of Louisville.
…
Read the entire story here on Aol.com
Posted in
