ALEXANDRIA, VA – Mayor Aliya Gaskins led a ribbon-cutting ceremony today at the Freedom House Museum—once the headquarters of the Franklin & Armfield slave-trading operation, one of the largest in the United States before the Civil War—joined by city officials and dignitaries to celebrate the completion of the building’s exterior restoration.
The event marked the third phase of a multi-year rehabilitation that began in March 2020, when the City of Alexandria acquired the property at the height of the pandemic. This latest phase focused on preserving the structure and ensuring the museum continues to tell, with accuracy and reverence, the story of the thousands of enslaved men, women, and children trafficked through this site to the Deep South.
A Landmark with a Painful Past
Located at 1315 Duke Street, the three-story brick townhouse is now operated by the Office of Historic Alexandria (OHA), which led the meticulous effort to stabilize, restore, and reinterpret the building in collaboration with the Division of African American History. The Freedom House Museum stands as a vital reminder of Alexandria’s role in the domestic slave trade and the human lives forever impacted by it.
“This work is about more than bricks and mortar,” said Gretchen Bulova, Director of the Office of Historic Alexandria. “It’s about ensuring that this space can continue to bear witness to the history of the domestic slave trade and to the strength of the people whose lives were forever changed here.”…