By Megan Sayles
AFRO Staff Writer
msayles@afro.com
In Prince George’s County, Md., an overgrown burial ground with more than 100 unmarked graves rests near the Cheltenham Youth Detention Center. The site is believed to hold the remains of Black children who died there 150 years ago—when the facility was known as the House of Reformation and Instruction for Colored Boys.
For decades, their final resting places were forgotten. Now, Maryland State Sen. William C. Smith (D-District 20) wants the state to restore the grounds and acknowledge the children who died there. For him, Cheltenham’s long-overlooked history underscores the need to reform how Maryland treats juvenile offenders.
“In Maryland, we charge more children as adults than any other state except for Alabama, per capita. The tragic thing is that approximately 80 percent of those cases that are automatically charged in adult court are not being sentenced in the adult system,” said Smith. “They’re either being dismissed or transferred back to the juvenile system.”
Nearly 83 percent of these children are also African American, according to the Maryland Department of Juvenile Services (DJS), though they only represent 31 percent of the state’s youth population.
Rather than receive rehabilitative services, Smith said these children are often spending unnecessary time in adult facilities, where they may encounter violence and trauma and where their development needs may go unmet.
The state senator is now proposing a bill that would revise the automatic sentencing of youth as adults in Maryland.
“When you’re in the adult system, you don’t have access to the support, treatment and services you need to get out of the justice system long-term,” said Smith.
Under current Maryland law, juveniles can be automatically charged as adults for 33 offenses. Smith’s legislation, Senate Bill 422, would repeal parts of those provisions, allowing more cases to begin in the juvenile system rather than adult court.
Sen. Smith said his proposal would eliminate all but the most serious offenses. Crimes, like first-degree murder, manslaughter, armed carjacking and certain sexual crimes, would still be eligible for adult court. His bill would also raise the age at which children can be automatically charged as adults from 14 to 16.
“This piece of legislation just makes sense because those cases are coming back to the juvenile system anyway. We’re spending dollars we could reinvest in prevention and treatment measures,” said Smith. “We’re seeing that work in Baltimore City with violence interruption and forward-thinking preventative measures.”
The bill would not only save the state an estimated $19 million, it would advance public safety, according to Smith.
“When youth who are justice-involved get a positive touchpoint or treatment that gets into the root cause of why they’re doing what they’re doing, it ultimately leads to better public safety because they’re less likely to re-offend and recidivate,” said Smith. “This is a public safety bill.”
The unequal roots of Maryland’s juvenile justice system
The concept of separating juveniles from adults in Maryland’s justice system dates back to 1830. That year, the Maryland General Assembly (MGA) formally acknowledged that children should not be placed in adult jails.
Subsequently, the state opened the House of Refuge, the first facility built exclusively for housing juvenile offenders, in 1850. But, it was only open to White children. It wouldn’t be until 1870 that the House of Reformation and Instruction for Colored Children would open its doors.
Despite the state’s efforts to separate juveniles from adults, a clear difference remained between the segregated facilities.
“After those facilities were open, particularly at the House of Reformation, the conditions were really bad. They had a system of convict leasing, and these kids were essentially slaves. They were sent out to farms in Prince George’s County. It was horrific,” said Marc Schindler, former assistant secretary and chief of staff for DJS. “The conditions at the House of Refuge were much better as far as we can tell from history.”
Schindler noted that the budget for the House of Refuge was nearly twice that of the House of Reformation and Instruction for Colored Children. Even the names of the facilities reflected the difference in how Black and White juvenile offenders were treated by the state.
“Even though they were both created to remove kids from the adult system, the House of Refuge was much more about education, whereas the House of Reformation was about training them to work in the fields,” said Schindler.
He first visited the old Cheltenham facility last July, walking the grounds with a former employee. At the end of the walking tour, the employee told Schindler about the cemetery. Up until then, he had never heard about it. Though they went looking for the graves, they were unable to locate them.
In October 2024, Schindler returned to the site with another group. This time they were armed with maps.
“I hesitate to even call it a cemetery because it’s more of a burial site, but that was the day we found it. We found three gravestones initially, but a couple 100 yards away, we saw a bunch of these old cinderblocks,” said Schindler. “As we were looking at it, we realized there were lots of them, and they were in rows five feet apart.”
Tyrone Walker, a Washington, D.C. native who was formerly incarcerated at Cheltenham, was a part of Schindler’s group that day. Schindler had invited him because he knew Walker was interested in learning more about the history of the facility.
Walker, who serves as the director of reentry services for the Georgetown Prisons and Justice Initiative, was sent to Cheltenham when he was 15 years old and spent about 30 days there. When he first arrived, the facility was overcrowded. He recalled sleeping on a mattress on the floor of his cell because there were not enough bunks.
Discovering the overgrown cemetery with Schindler years later devastated him.
“It was so sad that we had to stop and say a prayer. I left there that day deep in thought about what I had just witnessed because nobody ever talked about it during the time I was at Cheltenham,” said Walker. “It made me think about what was going on long before I got there. It made me think that this could have very well been my life—children who never even got a chance to live their life because it was taken by those whose care they were placed in.”
Nearly 120 graves have been identified so far, dating from 1888 to 1939, and more continue to be discovered.
In light of the 47th president and other lawmakers’ moves to restrict or ban curriculum related to Black history, acknowledging the history of Cheltenham and the children who died there becomes imperative, according to Schindler.
“It’s an important part of the state and the country’s history,” said Schindler. “At this moment, when at the federal level there’s an effort to disappear this information and to say that our history didn’t exist, it’s even more important now to recognize it.”
