Finally Free.

From Matagorda, Brazoria and Harris counties; from points south, east, north and west, the good word began to spread. In a divine twist of fate, some 2000 United States Colored Troops (USCT) would arrive on Galveston’s sandy shores just about the same time as US General Gordon Granger, sent there to declare in Executive Order No. 3, “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free.” It is documented that these USCT soldiers – our soldiers – were the true liberators, translating for their enslaved brothers and sisters not only their freedom, but their rights and responsibilities as citizens. The path from slavery to freedom would take the over 250,000 formerly enslaved to all parts of the Lone Star state, including to the area of Houston that would ultimately become known as Freedmen’s Town. Located in Fourth Ward, Freedmen’s Town quickly became the major hub of Black life in Houston, a thriving community built on a foundation of determination and cooperation. Residents there banded together, steadily chipping in their pennies, nickels and dimes, until finally amassing the $800 required to purchase a parcel of land that would serve as the communing place of Jubilee. Their annual observances of freedom forever bonded by a moniker of both site and intention – Emancipation Park.