In the 1670s, a family from the Ghanan Fanti tribe was kidnapped and brought to Colonial America via the transatlantic slave trade. The patriarch of that family was Egya Amkwamdoh. His name was misinterpreted as “Quander,” and that has been what the family has been called ever since.
Egya had two sons, one of whom was kept in Maryland and the other sent to Virginia. Egya was freed in 1864, but others remained enslaved. Two of the females, Nancy Carter Quander and Sukey Bay, were among the spinners and cloth makers enslaved at River Farm, one of George Washington’s farms that made up the Mount Vernon estate.
The Quanders are one of the oldest families to be documented, all the way back to the early days of the slave trade. The family has been intertwined with familiar figures like George Washington, John Hanson, and Francis Scott Key.
I went to Quander Road Elementary. Quander Road (one of four streets in DC, MD, and VA named for the family) runs through my neighborhood. It is part of the 88-acre dairy farm founded in the 1870s by Charles Henry Quander after he was freed. In this part of Fairfax County, everyone is familiar with the name, if not the family’s history.
All of this is to say that Fairfax County has played witness to Black history in the US since the beginning. That history is represented in our museums, attractions, and experiences.
As the United States commemorates its 250th anniversary in 2026, we are taking a look back at stories that both predate our nation and have shaped it over the years.
17th & 18th Centuries—Pre- and Post-Revolutionary Era
The first individuals who were enslaved in America arrived in 1619 in the Hampton, VA area. Nobody can pinpoint when they entered Northern Virginia, but it was likely later in the 17th century, often associated with land grants and the development of plantations, such as Belvoir (now Fort Belvoir) and Ravensworth (now Annandale).
By the mid 1700s, the peninsulas on either side of Belvoir Plantation would come into the ownership of George Washington and George Mason, two founding fathers who fought to build a country where “all men were created equal” and entitled to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
Ironically, both men owned enslaved people until the day they died. Mason never freed his enslaved, but Washington, in his will, freed his upon the death of his wife, Martha. That still freed only about half the enslaved individuals at Mount Vernon, however. Some enslaved chose to “self-emancipate,” notably Washington’s beloved chef, Hercules Posey, who escaped and was never seen again.
Notable 17th & 18th Century Sites
George Washington’s Mount Vernon
Alexandria Black History Museum
19th Century—The Civil War Era
Schoolbooks will tell you Virginia was part of the Confederacy. And most of it was. But because of Fairfax County’s proximity to Washington, DC, it was a county divided. All the areas within the ring of forts protecting the Federal Capital stayed firmly in Union hands. This included parts of Fairfax County, where some of those forts have been well preserved.
But imagine living here at the time. While most of the county stayed within Union control, the lines shifted based on battles and skirmishes and occupations. The divide between slavery and freedom here wasn’t across state lines, but, in many cases, across property lines. And those lines shifted constantly.
Fairfax County tells the stories of Black experiences of every type during a time of both uncertainty and division. And by 1860, even though Virginia had the largest enslaved population in the US, here in Fairfax County, you’d find pockets of freedom, even in the contested parts of the county.
A young West Ford was enslaved by John Augustine Washington and his wife, Hannah. They were brother and sister-in-law to George Washington. In 1802, Hannah’s son, Bushrod Washington, assumed ownership of Mount Vernon and brought West to Mount Vernon to supervise the other enslaved people there. In her will, Hannah stipulated that West would be freed when he turned 21. Once freed, he continued to work at the estate and, in 1829, Bushrod left West 160 acres of land. West sold that and bought 214 acres nearby.
West’s land became a haven for emancipated people. It was called Gum Springs. Residents used the skills they had learned to find work at nearby Woodlawn, an estate once in the Washington family, but owned by Quakers during the Civil War era. The community thrived.
Some Black men in the region chose to fight for their freedoms by becoming part of the United States Colored Troops. Their stories are told at the National Museum of the United States Army, at monuments like the African American Civil War Memorial, and at cemeteries like Arlington National Cemetery. Some attempted to gain their freedom via escape or self-emancipation. You can find their stories across the county at Sully Historic Site, part of the Underground Railroad Network to Freedom. Also on that side of the county, you can find an Enslaved Burial Ground at Bull Run Marina.
Perhaps the most historically significant African American of the era, however, was orator and statesman, Frederick Douglass. A freedom seeker himself, he became one of the most powerful voices among abolitionists during the war. His home and life can be explored just across the river in Washington, DC.
After the war, freedom seekers struggled against society and momentum to build a world in which they could thrive. They built churches where they could worship together. They built schools to educate their children. They built graveyards to honor their loved ones in perpetuity. And they began to build the independent lives that had been denied them for so long.
Notable 19th Century Sites
Gum Springs Historical Society & Museum
National Museum of the US Army
20th & 21st Centuries—Jim Crow and Civil Rights
To this day, African Americans still struggle to dig out from the vestiges of slavery. And no region honors those victories and defeats better than DC and Northern Virginia.
From the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in DC to the Falls Church site of the first rural branch of the NAACP, or the tales of Black patriotism and valor told at the National Museum of the US Army and the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, the stories are fascinating to uncover.
Notable 20th Century Sites
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum
Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial
Northern Virginia is a region immersed in Black history with sites that stand in honor of African Americans who fought wars, both literal and cultural. Tour the many sites linked above to learn more about the history made here and follow with a meal at one of the County’s notable Black-owned restaurants (or nearby 1799 Prime in Old Town Alexandria, which is owned by a Quander).
With so many sites to see and so much complex history to contemplate, you may want to plan more than one visit to explore it all!
