The enslavement of Africans – stretching from far into the interior of the continent to the Americas, over many centuries – destroyed millions of lives. More people than can be imagined experienced the unbearable loss of loved ones. Always they found means to bear that loss, however, by finding new loved ones, new relationships, never to replace those that had been lost, but to make life worth living.
Many generations after the end of chattel slavery in the United States, the descendants of those enslaved at Greater Smithfield began to seek out one another. They began to recover and celebrate the kinship that their ancestors had created and cherished.
In 2016, Dr. Kerri Moseley-Hobbs made her way to southwest Virginia, having traced her lineage back to the Fraction family who had been enslaved at Smithfield. There she encountered the Merry Tree.
“Your heart races when first approaching the site, and then you see the tree and…. it stopped me. I didn’t even know what it was yet, but I did stop, turned towards it, and stared at it. That’s when the Executive Director at the time, April Danner (Martin) said to me ‘Do you know what that is?’ That’s when I learned that ‘know’ had more than one meaning.”
Dr. Kerri Moseley-Hobbs
It had drawn into itself the sweat of those who had danced beneath its branches, the tears of sadness and of joy shed around its trunk. If a master had shed the blood of enslaved people there, the tree accepted that blood as a consecration. When the descendants of the enslaved returned to Smithfield the Merry Tree held traces of their ancestors.
I felt the ancestors through my bones, on my skin.
I felt –
I felt them shining on my face.
It was –
it was a spirit out of this world.– Kenard Fraction
More and more descendants traveled to Smithfield. Many had the same visceral, spiritual connection to the Merry Tree.
Shew,
that’s where I got this spirit hit me there, it did.
It really did.
My little niece was sitting on the ground by the tree crying because
it’s like the spirits came up and just
hold her
and she was so filled with joy she just started crying.It was very spiritual. It was awesome.
It was powerful.
I ain’t never had spirits like that in my life.– Irving Alonzo Fraction, Jr.
When the descendants gathered near the Merry Tree they asserted, as their ancestors had done, their ownership of that land.
I think it’s important to just walk that land.
You know my ancestors were there.
They were not able to freely walk and
just be free,
and I think it’s important for me to go there
and walk those grounds
and just to take in where my ancestors were
take in their spirit
and their strength
and their resilience in everything.– Ashley McVay
The branches of the family, like the branches of the tree, had spread in many directions, but were all fed by the same taproot.
I offered a prayer: if the tree needs to go, it can go.
Dr. Kerri Moseley-Hobbs
Beginning around 2015, the Merry Tree’s vibrancy drained away, withering more quickly than arborists could explain. When a windstorm swept through the field on May 19, 2020 around 1pm, the Merry Tree slipped away.
Moseley-Hobbs said, “When they told me, I had got so attached to the tree that I had to really focus on what it represented.”
It was like this tree knew us,
and almost was able to exhale and finally
it was okay to home and live with God now
and tell her story.
– Valerie McCullar
I think it’s almost like the tree’s roots has
reached us
and now
it doesn’t need to hold us together anymore
– Jordan Washington
Just as the Merry Tree had once gathered around itself people torn from their homes, now their scattered descendants were being gathered in.
