Marching Home: Black Military Service, Memory, and the Sacred Ground of Cedar Grove

During the Charlotte Museum of History’s “Red, White, Blue, and Black” program—held as part of its African American Heritage Festival—I attended a panel discussion titled Marching Home: Hospitality and Hope. The evening centered on the legacy of Black military service in Charlotte and the sacred responsibility of remembering those who served.

Che Abdullah leading the panel alongside Reuben Flax (green), James Lee (red), and another panelist.

What unfolded was not simply a tribute to patriotism. It was an interrogation of belonging, sacrifice, dignity, and the unfinished work of honoring Black veterans at home.

At the center of the discussion stood Cedar Grove Cemetery, a historic burial ground located off Beatties Ford Road. Founded during segregation as a cemetery for “colored” residents, Cedar Grove carries within its soil a layered history of exclusion and resilience.

Bishop Robert B. (R.B.) Bruce—one of its early founders—established the cemetery because Black Charlotteans were barred from burial in white cemeteries. Even in death, segregation persisted.

The Politics of a Headstone

Host Che Abdullah reflected on an overlooked detail: for many Black families in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, tombstone markers were not financially accessible or socially prioritized. Memorialization itself was stratified by race and class.

Yet veterans—regardless of race—were entitled to military-issued markers. For Black men, military service sometimes became the only institutional mechanism guaranteeing a permanent inscription of their existence.

A headstone, Abdullah suggested, is more than stone. It is recognition.

On Memorial Day, this once-abandoned cemetery was cleaned and restored—an act of civic remembrance, but also one of reclamation.

Reuben Flax: Service Without Illusion

Among the panelists was Reuben Flax, a three-time Purple Heart recipient. To receive a Purple Heart is to be wounded in combat or injured while aiding fellow service members. Flax's record is not ceremonial; it is embodied.

A former student of West Charlotte High School, Flax left school amid the upheaval of integration and the push to transfer students to Independence High. Shortly thereafter, he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. He was deployed to Vietnam three months before turning eighteen. He was shot once before nineteen. Shot again later.

He was inducted into the Hall of Fame for machine gunners—a distinction earned through lethal precision and survival under fire. As a teenager, many predicted he would not live to see twenty-one.

He did.

And he returned home to a country still negotiating his humanity.

“You don’t see people kicking down American doors because of people like me,” he said. It was not a boast. It was an assertion of cost.

Cedar Grove is personal for Flack because it houses veterans whose service mirrored his own—men who went overseas to fight for a democracy that did not fully extend to them at home.

“You’re not done serving,” he stated. “You never will be.”

He framed service not as an event but as a posture of life. Invoking Christ, he added, “If Jesus was humble enough to wash his servants’ feet, who in the blue cheese am I to not help somebody?”

Housing, Home, and the Return

A significant portion of the discussion centered on housing instability among veterans. The contradiction remains glaring: men and women who secured national borders often struggle to secure stable shelter upon their return.

One audience member posed a pressing question: Why do veterans risk their lives abroad only to be mistreated at home?

James Lee responded candidly. He loves Charlotte. He loves America. But love does not negate injustice. “If you took everything away that Black Americans—men and women—did,” he asked, “what would be left?”

Flack’s answer was tempered by historical realism. “Consider the times,” he said. It was the era. Yet he refused to posture as a victim. “I do my part to get my part,” he explained. He does not sit with his hands out. When people learn his history, respect follows—but he does not seek glory. Only respect.

“Don’t see me as a Black man,” he urged. “See me as a man.”

On racism, he offered a philosophy of internal governance: You cannot determine who I am. When I stand, my back is still tall.

The Work of Identification

Audience members also inquired about the process of uncovering and identifying unmarked graves within Cedar Grove. The question underscores a broader archival dilemma: how do communities recover names lost to structural neglect?

To restore a cemetery is to restore narrative continuity. It is to challenge historical erasure.

Memory as Civic Duty

The evening at the Charlotte Museum of History did not romanticize war. Instead, it illuminated the paradox of Black military service: defending a nation that has not always defended you; earning valor in uniform while navigating vulnerability in civilian life.

Cedar Grove stands as both indictment and inspiration. It indicts a segregated past that relegated Black bodies to the margins—even in burial. Yet it inspires through testimony: men like Reuben Flax, who insist on dignity without illusion, and craftsmen like James Lee, who understand that memory must be built—sometimes by hand.

The question lingering after the panel is not whether Black veterans served. They did.

The question is whether we will serve their memory with equal commitment.