06/19/2026
Happy Juneteenth!
On June 19, we commemorate the emancipation enslaved African Americans, marking the day in 1865 when Union troops arrived in Galveston, TX, to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation.
Before the Emancipation Proclamation and the passing of the 13th Amendment, and after decades of so-called "gradual emancipation," New York State abolished slavery on July 4, 1827.
To celebrate here in NYC, on July 5, between two and four thousand African Americans, including newly emancipated people, marched from St John’s Park to the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. It was known as Emancipation Day or Freedom Day. African American Samuel Hardenburgh led the procession as the Grand Marshal.
“It was a proud day in the City of New York for our people, that 5th day of July, 1827. It was a proud day for Samuel Hardenburgh, Grand Marshal, splendidly mounted, as he passed through the west gate of the Park, saluted the Mayor on the City Hall steps and then took his way down Broadway to the Battery. It was a proud day for his aids, in their dress and trappings; it was a proud day for the Societies and their officers; it was a proud day, never to be forgotten, by young lads, who first felt themselves impelled along that grand procession of liberty; which…is still ‘marching on…,’” a Black physician recounts his memory of the parade in 1828 (as quoted in "Festivals of Freedom" by Mitch Kachun, 2003).
Pictured: Scenes from Charleston's Emancipation Parade, Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, February 10, 1877; AME Zion Church, 1867.
