Juneteenth celebration in Portsmouth: 'We have a lot to resist and a lot to renew'

PORTSMOUTH — Playing joyful anthems, The Leftist Marching Band led the Freedom March into the African Burying Ground Memorial Park to begin the annual celebration of Juneteenth.
Hundreds followed gathering in the hot sun to honor the city's Black ancestors and history, renew its vow to remember its heritage accurately, and celebrate the freedom whose fragility is better understood today than ever in recent memory.
The Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire's annual Juneteenth ceremony on Thursday, June 19 was a special one: It marked the 10th anniversary of the city's establishing the memorial park to honor the once-forgotten Black ancestors buried there and included its rededication.
The memorial park is sacred ground in Portsmouth. Dedicated in May 2015, it memorializes more 200 people of African descent who were buried in the area of Chestnut Street during the 1700s. In the 1800s, as the city grew, the site was built over and forgotten. In 2003, the burial site was uncovered during work on an infrastructure project. DNA testing confirmed the bodies found were of African descent and had been enslaved in the city. Learning the site's history, the city created a memorial to honor it.
'These are things I didn't learn in school, and I grew up here,' said Portsmouth Assistant Mayor Joanna Kelley, after listing the city's now-known Black historical moments. 'This place was on maps for hundreds of years and then it disappeared from them.'
She said it took hundreds of years to find the African Burying Ground again.
'The fall of democracy starts with erasing a map,' she said.
Kelley was joined by Sen. Maggie Hassan, Rep. Maggie Goodlander, Portsmouth Mayor Declan McEachern, BHTNH Executive Director JerriAnne Boggis and other officials as she cut a red ribbon with large gold scissors to rededicate the memorial park.
Earlier in the ceremony, Boggis welcomed those in attendance.
'This is New Hampshire. Look around you,' she said. 'Many of you have been with us this week on a sacred journey of remembering, of resistance and renewal. We have a lot to resist and a lot to renew.'
She noted how the park's 'sacred ground, the final resting place of over 200 of our ancestors, had once been built over, covered up and erased.'
'It's going to take all of us, working together, with our feet on the ground,' Boggis said. 'To create the change we want to see and the America we want to be.'
Tara Conner of South Berwick, Maine, brought her young children to the Juneteenth ceremony 'because I want to them to be really well-educated in our history so we can learn from it and do better next time.'
Leah Conte, who was also there with her family from South Berwick, said, 'I feel like it's such an important part of Portsmouth history that needs to be recognized and remembered,'
'It's important to embrace the beautiful diversity Portsmouth has and has had for a long time,' said Sandra Khin, a Portsmouth native who now lives in Los Angeles. She attended with her two kids, her mother and her sister. 'It's an important holiday celebrating the final emancipation of enslaved people and it still remains an ongoing struggle.'
Roza Anthony came to Portsmouth from Stowe, Massachusetts, with her son Dante 'because I'm raising a White man and it's my responsibility that he respects and knows our history, and has an understanding of it,' she said. 'I need him to know how to move in the world in a way that is kind, thoughtful and taking care of people.'
The Rev. Robert Thompson began the ceremony with a prayer and a traditional pouring of a libation to pay tribute to Black ancestors. He asked the crowd to imagine what it must have been like for the enslaved people in Texas who found out they'd been freed two years after the fact, after other slaves were free, on that first Juneteenth.
'America takes work … the dream of America, the idea that despite our differences, all can be one. That claim of democracy that inspires the whole world, it takes work to realize it,' he said. 'To celebrate the freedom of everyone in the nation, not just some … That's the intricacy of America.'
The Freedom March to the memorial park before the ceremony began in Kittery, crossed the Memorial Bridge and continued through the city to the park, organized by The Seacoast African American Cultural Center, Green Acre Baha'i Center of Learning, and Seacoast NAACP.
After the ceremony and park rededication, the traditional African drumming and dance group Akwaaba Ensemble took the celebration to an energetic and joyful climax. At points, Akwaaba dancers led members of the crowd in group dances with many unable to resist the beat of the drums.
In a first for the annual ceremony, a Community Dance to the viral song 'Boots On The Ground' concluded the ceremony in a synchronated dancing flash mob of community members that filled the memorial park.
'We must not be scared to wear our pride on our sleeves, on our shirts, on our hearts,' Kelley said. 'We have to be louder than the silence that is put upon us. This is not a black and white issue. It is every color in between. Our brothers and sisters are being held illegally for what? For wanting to live the American Dream.'
Hassan said her father, a veteran who fought at the Battle of the Bulge, used to ask her often 'What are you doing for freedom today?' She said these days she is often asked 'What can I do?' by citizens.
'Right now, words are the most powerful tools we have. Words matter, the Declaration of Independence matters, our voices and our votes matter. But progress is not a straight line.'
Rep. Maggie Goodlander thanked the crowd for gathering.
'You can't fake showing up and you can't fake showing up together,' Goodlander said. 'We get strength from this place. We are what we remember.'
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Juneteenth in Portsmouth: 'We have a lot to resist and a lot to renew'

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