A Memorial Service for Archer Alexander, and celebration of his Day of Freedom will be held on Sunday, September 21st, 2025, at 1:00 pm in the St. Peter’s United Church of Christ Cemetery at 2101 Lucas and Hunt, in Normandy (St. Louis) Missouri, where his burial is recognized as a site on the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom. His story is one of over 800 sites that honors, preserves and promotes the history of resistance to enslavement through escape and flight, which continues to inspire people worldwide.
This event will include a one-act play called “Louisa” performed by actress Peggy Neely Harris which shares the life of the wife of Archer Alexander. A presentation will follow by sculptor Abraham Mohler who will share the new memorial and monument being planned at St. Peters U.C.C. Cemetery.
September is National Underground Railroad Month. Archer Alexander was the last fugitive slave captured in Missouri, and received his freedom on September 24, 1863, for his heroic services to the United States Military (Union) after informing them of a plot to destroy a local railroad bridge. He saved hundreds of lives, and a vital link conveying troops, funds and supplies for the Union Army in 1863. After risking his life, he took sixteen men from Dardenne Prairie and crossed the river at Howell’s Ferry on a dark February night, using the Underground Railroad.He was taken in at the home of abolitionist Rev. Wm. G. Eliot in St. Louis.
Archer Alexander is the icon for Emancipation as the enslaved man rising with President Abraham Lincoln on the Emancipation Memorial in Washington, D.C.’s Lincoln Park, and the ancestor of Muhammad Ali. Everyone is welcome, and the public is encouraged to bring lawn chairs. See https://archeralexander.blog/ for more information.
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