For more than a decade, Wayne Moore drove to work on Route 28 every day unaware he was driving right past Rose Hill Cemetery, a historic Black cemetery tucked away in an industrial part of Manassas, Virginia.
But the worst part, he says now, was that the cemetery had fallen into disrepair, and the veterans laid to rest there were all but forgotten.
Moore, 77, of Bristow, is the commander of VFW Post 7589 in Manassas. He said he was shocked when he learned about the cemetery and that it contains the graves of so many Black veterans — both marked and unmarked.
“I thought: ‘Wait a second, every year, for over 13 years, I go to the Manassas Cemetery on Memorial Day and place flags there, and you mean to tell me … we neglected this cemetery, and there’s veterans in it?’” Moore said. “That’s not going to happen anymore.”
Since then, he and other Manassas-area veterans have made it their mission to make sure Rose Hill Cemetery is properly maintained and included when Scouts place flags on veteran graves on Memorial Day, said Moore, who served four years in the Army and 30 years in the Navy.
But the veterans wanted to do more. So, to ensure the service and sacrifice of veterans interred at Rose Hill Cemetery is permanently honored, members of VFW Post 7589 and American Legion Post 10 dedicated a new commemorative marble bench there last November.
The $4,000 bench, paid for with contributions from members of both veterans groups, is inscribed: “In memory of the unknown resting here who served in the United States Armed Forces and are known but to God.”
Because of surrounding development, Rose Hill Cemetery is not easy to find. But it includes many gravestones marked with years of military service, leading the veterans to believe dozens of veterans were laid to rest there, said Jerry Martin, of Nokesville, who served in the Marine Corps for 30 years and is now VFW Post 7589’s historian.
“This is the first time veterans have done anything like this in the city of Manassas since 1889, when the Confederate veterans placed a monument in the cemetery across from the judicial center,” Martin said. “But this is for the U.S. American veterans.”
After the Civil War, federal cemeteries were open to all fallen service members, but Black people had to be buried in designated sections separate from white people. That policy continued until 1948, when President Harry Truman issued an executive order mandating the integration of the Armed Services, including federal cemeteries.
Similarly, when Rose Hill Cemetery was established in 1887, local laws required that cemeteries be separated by race. Thus, Rose Hill was run by and exclusively served the Black community. It received no public support until about a century later, in 1980, when the City of Manassas took ownership of it.
Samuel Pickett (1854-1885) was likely one of the first people buried in what would become Rose Hill Cemetery, according to the Manassas Museum.
George Butler (1853-1889) who is believed to have been a Buffalo Soldier, is also buried there. Martin said a flag placed at Butler’s gravesite indicates he served in the U.S. Army’s 9th Cavalry Regiment.
Edited for length, this article was written by Cher Muzyk, Staff Writer, Prince William Times.
This article is featured in the 2026 February issue of Checkpoint. If you're a VFW member and don't currently receive the VFW Checkpoint, please contact VFW magazine at magazine@vfw.org.