Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial

06/06/2025

Some photos from yesterday's Juneteenth press conference at the Freedom & Remembrance Memorial site. Plenty to do this month to celebrate this important landmark for freedom in US history!

06/06/2025

Organizations from throughout the City of Peoria gathered at Freedom and Remembrance Memorial Park Thursday to announce a slate of Juneteenth celebrations.

06/06/2025

Peoria is hosting a series of events from June 7-21 to celebrate Juneteenth, featuring parades, pageants, festivals, concerts, and gatherings aimed at educating and uniting the community through mu…

06/04/2025

Peoria is preparing to celebrate Juneteenth, and events kick off with a press conference at the Freedom & Remembrance Memorial tomorrow!

Juneteenth (short for June 19th) has come to be celebrated as the day that slavery finally came to an end in the United States, once and for all. It marks the day that the Union army arrived in Galveston, TX, and issued an order freeing the enslaved people in the state.

Why is the kickoff to Peoria's events at the memorial? Because of its direct, local connection to the holiday:

In the nearby and recently rediscovered Moffatt Cemetery, many Union soldiers have their final resting place, including Nathan Ashby, who was there for the original Juneteenth while serving with the 29th US Colored Troops.

Also, it's the final resting place of long-time Pekin and Peoria resident Nance Legins-Costley, the first enslaved person Abraham Lincoln helped free, when he won her case before the Illinois Supreme Court in 1841. Costley's son, William, was also there at the original Juneteenth while serving in the 29th.

Get details on the press conference and this year's events below.

Freedom!

Joint Press Conference to Celebrate Juneteenth Events

Thursday, June 5th at 1:30 pm at Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial Park, 3917 SW Adams, Peoria, IL.

PEORIA, IL (June 2, 2025)—The Peoria Park District, in collaboration with the City of Peoria, Peoria’s Miss Juneteenth Pageant, NAACP Peoria Branch, The YANI Collective, Southside Community Center and Heritage Ensemble, invite you to a Joint Press Conference on Thursday, June 5th at 1:30 pm at Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial Park, 3917 SW Adams, Peoria, IL.

Street parking will be available on West Montana Avenue, near the corner of South Griswold Street and SW Adams Street. Please note: There are no restrooms available on-site.

This press conference will highlight several Juneteenth events organized by local partners—part of a larger tapestry of celebrations honoring Black history, culture, and community throughout Peoria. Running June 7–21, 2025, these events feature pageants, parades, festivals, and family-friendly gatherings organized by local partners and hosted at iconic Peoria venues. Together, these events serve to educate, empower, and unite our community through storytelling, music, art, and shared reflection.

Representatives from each partner organization, along with Mayor Rita Ali and President Robert L. Johnson Sr. , will be in attendance at the press conference to speak about their event and the shared significance of honoring Juneteenth in Peoria.

Event Lineup

For event details, please visit: https://peoriaparks.org/events/signature-events/peorias-juneteenth-week/

Peoria’s Miss Juneteenth Pageant
Saturday, June 7, 3:00–6:00 PM
Location: Carver Center
Organizer: Peoria’s Miss Juneteenth

Ernestine Jackson Juneteenth Freedom Parade
Saturday, June 14, 12:00 PM
Location: NAACP Peoria Branch Building
Organizer: NAACP Peoria Branch

Juneteenth Fest: Black Wall Street
Saturday, June 14, 11:00 AM–6:00 PM
Location: John H. Gwynn Jr. Park
Organizer: The YANI Collective

26th Annual Juneteenth Father’s Day Choral Celebration
Sunday, June 15, 3:00 PM–5:00 PM
Location: Illinois Central College Performing Arts Center
Organizer: Heritage Ensemble

Jubilee Day: A Juneteenth Celebration
Wednesday, June 19, 1:00–9:00 PM
Location: Glen Oak Park
Organizer: Peoria Park District

Freedom Fest 2025
Friday, June 21, 12:00–4:00 PM
Location: Trewyn Park
Organizer: Southside Community Center

On June 14, 2023, the City of Peoria officially recognized the Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial, concluding eight years of effort to ensure that those who rest still at the Old Moffatt Cemetery are “forgotten no more”.

Join us for a powerful week of celebration, reflection, and community as multiple organizations across Peoria come together to honor Juneteenth! This week-long series of events will highlight Black history, culture, and excellence through storytelling, music, art, education and unity. Peoria’s Mis...

05/16/2025

If you haven't stopped by the Freedom & Remembrance Memorial recently, come see all of the improvements! The City of Peoria Illinois - Government has upgraded the grounds, while the Peoria Park District maintains the site and helped us and the Illinois State Historical Society give the markers a touch-up. The refreshed markers were installed just this morning. The stories of our local and national forbears continue to inspire. 🇺🇸

05/16/2025

The stories connected to the Freedom & Remembrance Memorial continue! Team member Carl Adams visited Pekin recently for a new dedication. Find out the details from fellow team member Jared Olar.

Historian and author Carl Adams of Maryland, known for his research on the story of Nance Legins-Costley of Pekin, paid a visit on Tuesday this week to the downtown Pekin park named in her memory, also paying his respects at related memorials in downtown Pekin and Peoria’s southside that commemora...

04/21/2024

04/21/2024

A special day at the Illinois State Historical Society annual awards! The Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial project, video, and team were all recognized for making a significant contribution to the historical record in Illinois. We are honored and humbled, but most of all delighted at the impact of this effort and how it has led to the recognition that everyone who remains on the site of the Old Moffatt Cemetery deserves.

03/18/2024

Hello, friends of the Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial! As you might recall, project volunteer Carl Adams is the author of "Nance: Trials of the First Slave Freed by Abraham Lincoln - A True Story of Mrs. Nance Legins-Costley". Lincoln helped Legins-Costley win her freedom when he won her Illinois Supreme Court case in 1841. Through the Memorial project, it was discovered that Legins-Costley is still buried on the site of the Old Moffatt Cemetery. Want to learn more about Nance? Check out this conversation with Carl that was hosted by the The White House Historical Association!

https://vimeo.com/showcase/7334797

03/08/2024

Hello, friends of the Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial! Today we're happy to share news of another successful effort to highlight Peoria-area history that grew out of the Memorial project.

As you know, Nance Legins-Costley remains still on the site of the Old Moffatt Cemetery. She was the first African American that Abraham Lincoln helped free when he won her court case before the Illinois Supreme Court.

Nance's eldest child, Amanda, is buried at Springdale Cemetery, but the grave was unmarked - until now!

Read Amanda's story below and about the volunteer effort to see that she be recognized along with her veteran husband - just in time for the finish of Black History Month and the eve of Women’s History Month!

This story is brought to you by the Pekin Public Library and Memorial volunteer Jared Olar. Thank you!

Nance’s daughter Amanda gets a monument for her grave

By Jared L. Olar
Local History Program Coordinator, Pekin Public Library.

The final resting place of Nance Legins-Costley’s eldest child now has a monument, thanks to Freedom & Remembrance Memorial volunteers and the local chapter of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War.

Amanda E. (Costley) Lewis (1834-1900) of Pekin and Peoria was born 3 July 1834 into indentured servitude in Pekin, but the case of Bailey v. Cromwell, which Abraham Lincoln successfully argued before the Illinois Supreme Court in July 1841, secured freedom for Amanda’s mother Nance as well as Amanda’s younger siblings Eliza Jane and William Henry. Through this legal case, Nance and her three eldest children became the first African-Americans to be freed from slavery with the help of Abraham Lincoln.

Amanda grew up in Pekin, where on 24 March 1858 she married her husband Edward W. Lewis (c.1834-1907), a tobacconist, musician and music teacher, and cook. After marriage, Amanda and Edward lived for a while with Edward’s parents in St. Louis, Missouri, but soon after settled in Peoria. During the Civil War, Edward served in the 29th U.S. Colored Infantry at Camp Butler in Springfield, returning after the war to Peoria, where Amanda and Edward raised a family of five sons, Edward W. Jr., William Henry, Ambrose E., Jesse, and John Thomas, and also raised Edward’s niece Margaret whom they adopted as their daughter. In 1877, she and Edward experienced the grief of the untimely death of their son Jesse, aged only 10.

During the 1880s and 1890s, Amanda helped care for her aged parents Benjamin and Nance Costley, who had moved to Peoria about 1879 after about four decades of married life in Pekin. Amanda’s father Ben passed away in 1883, and by the late 1880s Ben’s widow Nance was living with her daughter Amanda. Nance died 6 April 1892 at the home she had shared with her daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren at 226 N. Adams St., Peoria.

Amanda herself passed away at 226 N. Adams St. on 5 Feb. 1900, dying from heart disease, dropsy and bronchitis. She was buried three days later at Springdale Cemetery in an unmarked grave in the Old Public Lots. Her husband Edward survived her by seven years and was also buried in an unmarked Old Public Lots grave at Springdale. Amanda’s legacy includes a grandson, William Cecil Lewis (1895-1934), who studied science at Bradley University and served in the U.S. Army during World War I, as well as two families of living descendants of Amanda’s third son Ambrose.

The grave of Amanda’s husband Edward remained unmarked for nearly 116 years until the local chapter of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War had a Civil War veteran’s marker placed on his grave in the Spring of 2023. Placing a stone on Edward’s grave was an initiative of the core team of volunteers who had worked to create Peoria’s Freedom & Remembrance Memorial honoring the more than 2,600 Peorians interred at the former Moffatt Cemetery near the intersection of Adams and Griswold streets. Among those buried there were Amanda’s parents Ben and Nance and her brother Leander. Acting in his then-capacity of Commander of Col. John Bryner Camp 67 of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, core team member Joseph Hutchinson worked with the Veterans Administration in Washington, D.C., which made and shipped Edward’s stone to Springdale.

After the dedication of Freedom & Remembrance Memorial and Park on 14 June 2023, the core team’s members turned their attention to placing a monument on Amanda’s unmarked grave at Springdale Cemetery. Hutchinson worked with Steve Matheny of Abel Vault & Monument in Pekin, which provided and inscribed Amanda’s monument at a very generous discount. Amanda’s monument, which also commemorates her husband Edward’s Civil War service and her mother Nance’s victorious freedom lawsuit, was placed on Amanda’s grave last week.

The F&RM volunteers have noted the fittingness of the timing that Amanda’s monument was placed just before the end of Black History Month and almost on the eve of Women’s History Month.

02/14/2024

Hello, friends of the Peoria Freedom & Remembrance Memorial. Exciting news!

We have learned that the memorial project and its supporting video will both be recognized for their contribution to the history of Illinois by the Illinois State Historical Society! Many thanks to the ISHS. It's indeed been an honor to contribute to the ever-unfolding story of the great state of Illinois and its impact on the history of our nation.

You can see the letters we received this week in this post. We'll know more after the official ceremony in April.

If you want to see the supporting documentation for the application, see the dedicated page on the website:

https://peoriafreedommemorial.org/?page_id=719

As always, we ask that you spread the story that has been uncovered in this years-long effort. History comes alive with the re-telling. Onward!