We said goodbye to our company early on the morning of vacation day 10, promising to think about joining them for Christmas. The plan was to head down to Yorktown where I’d heard their American Revolution Museum was quite something….. but first, a Golden Corral buffet breakfast.

 

 

Biscuits and gravy and cheesy hashbrown casserole.

Long live the artery clogging south!

The museum?

 

 

Was everything they said it was…. and a little bit more.

 

 

A sprawling place chock full of fascinating history.

(If that’s not your thing? Leave now… I’ll try not to hold it against you.)

2019 was the 400th anniversary of the arrival in America of the first enslaved people from West Africa and the museum devoted an entire section to the subject.

 

 

Most of it was hard to read.

To view.

And to understand how seemingly otherwise good people could think this practice was just.

 

 

But though horrible, it is a part of this country’s story.

 

 

There were many free people of color during the Revolutionary era, and a large number fought alongside the patriots who would later come to own them.

A reprehensible thought.

 

 

One of the most stunning documents was this:

 

 

Seeing it in black and white gave me a chill.

 

 

And the descriptions?

 

 

Heartbreaking….

 

 

I can’t even imagine.

 

 

Even the father of our country wasn’t immune.

 

 

I certainly never read that in any school textbook.

 

 

Liberty… yes.

But not for all.