Our USCT Veterans Return Home

Subtitle:  Moving Forward to Build Communities in Freedom
In 1867 former free and enslaved Black soldiers who were USCT veterans formed Unionville.  These men were:

John Blackwell	William Doane,	Peter Johnson,
Ennels Clayton,	William Doran	Edward Jones
Isaac Copper,	Horace Gibson	Enolds Moaney
John Copper,	Zachary Glasgow,	Frederick Pipes
Benjamin Demby,	Joseph Gooby,	Henry Roberts
Charles Demby	Joseph H. Johnson,	Matthew Roberts.

Some of these men were former slaves that had lived and worked on the Lombardy and Wye Plantations, portions of which would later become the Village of Unionville.

The formation of Unionville is widely credited to Ezekiel Cowgill and his son James, Quakers who were both abolitionists and pacifists and owned nearby Lombardy Plantation. In 1867, they carved out a section of land for these veterans and leased each of them a parcel for $1.00 a year for 30 years.  The Cowgill’s intended for these men to build a town in that their leases stipulated that they build a church and a school in their newly established community.  The first church was formed in 1871 and the St. Stephens AME Church that still stands today was built in 1892. All 18 of these USCT soldiers are buried in the cemetery behind the church with Colored Union Army headstones as their markers.