Branhilda Richardson-Knowles Memorial

I am so happy to have this beautiful, small and quiet park in my neighborhood. The newly added artwork gives it even more character. A note to people visiting: Please don't litter!

Very clean, peaceful with a background noise from the beautiful silver tree. Show respect and clean up after yourself and your pets and keep your dogs on a leash.

Branhilda-Richardson Knowles Memorial Park is a cemetery but there aren't any headstones. This is a historic African-American cemetery but no one is sure where the bodies lay anymore. Hundreds of people are buried in what was once called the "Old Colored Cemetery." It is believed there may be as many as 300 bodies buried here including that of a Union soldier, the great grandfather of a city commissioner, and the daughter of a slave. Many of the people were from the Bahamas and they came to live and work in the city of Deerfield Beach. The internment's took place between 1897 and the 1950's.

After being used as a cemetery the land was sold and the headstones removed. The majority of the city commission had voted to allow 69 condo units to be built on the site despite the objections of people in the neighborhood who told them their relatives were buried there. The developer was forced to do three archeological surveys of the land which revealed bodies over 20 acres. At that point the city purchased the land from the developer for one million dollars. Another $400,000 was set aside for the design and building of a cemetery.

The city decided to name the cemetery after Branhilda-Richardson Knowles, a midwife who delivered most of the cities African-American babies in the early 20th century since Jim Crow era laws prevented them from being born in hospitals. It was these same laws that forced them to be buried here. The design of this 3.3 acre cemetery is based on Arlington National Cemetery and it has trees lined up to replace the headstones that don't exist. The cemetery is made up of three separate sections. The first part has a statue of a woman holding up a baby in honor of the memorial park's namesake. The second section has a tree of life monument that spins in the wind. This section contains a wall that has the family names of some of the people buried here. The third section is a Veterans Memorial in honor of the veterans buried here and the ones from Deerfield Beach who sacrificed their lives.

The new cemetery opened on August 24, 2019. I commend the city of Deerfield Beach for making amends for the terrible wrong that had been done to the people of color in their city. They made it so nice that it looks more like a park than a cemetery. If you didn't bother to read the signs you might not know what it was. I saw kids riding their bikes along the pathways while moms sat with their backs against the name memorial. This park is only three of the 20 acres they found bodies on so not every grave is part of the memorial. There is a sign on the empty lot next to the memorial that condos from the 450 thousand dollar range will be built there. No doubt on other unmarked graves. Still the new memorial was a step in the right direction. There is even a historic marker out front. Since Florida was a slave state every town has one of these African-America Jim Crow era cemeteries. I am always interested in what the town does with it. Ft. Lauderdale made a nice memorial for theirs similar to this while Pompano Beach leaves theirs to decay. I applaud Deerfield Beach for taking an ugly piece of their history and turning into something beautiful the community can be proud of.

This memorial park is a tribute to our veterans, to those that are buried here mostly Bahamian and African decent and most notebly Branhilda Richardson-Knowles.

Beautiful Park

Wow, so beautiful, heartfelt, nice to exercise walking through!!

Very nice 👍

Nice location

Lovely place to visit.

Family friendly

Nice park

Nice park, dogs not allowed. I completely understand why. Residents of close communities don't clean up after their dogs around the park :(