Water flows across nine engraved names at a new memorial beside Mother Emanuel AME Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina. The outdoor courtyard opened to the public Saturday, Nov. 14, more than 11 years after nine Black worshippers were killed during a Bible study at the church. A garden for the five people who survived the racist attack is planned as a later phase. The courtyard is free to visit.
The Mother Emanuel Memorial Foundation built the memorial beside the church where the nine worshipped. The space has room to sit near the Fountain of Grace and read the names, which are carved around the edge of its shallow marble basin. Water rises from a cross-shaped opening and runs over the lettering. Two curved Fellowship Benches face each other across the courtyard. At the far side stands a separate Cross of Hope. The foundation describes that end of the courtyard as a place to pray or sit in quiet.
The people named in the fountain
The nine were the Rev. Clementa C. Pinckney, the Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Cynthia Graham Hurd, Susie Jackson, Ethel Lee Lance, the Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, Tywanza Kibwe Diop Sanders, the Rev. Daniel Lee Simmons Sr. and Myra Singleton Quarles Thompson. The foundation’s biographies preserve their names and stories. Pinckney was the church’s pastor and a South Carolina state senator. Hurd was a librarian. The Charleston County Public Library renamed the St. Andrews branch for Hurd on June 21, 2016, on what would have been her 56th birthday. She worked for the library system for 31 years and managed two branches. At one of them, the John L. Dart Library, a mural of books on the side of the building commemorates her work.
The Justice Department says the June 17, 2015 attack targeted African American parishioners at worship and Bible study. People gathered outside the church when worship services resumed that Sunday. The congregation continued to worship at Mother Emanuel in the years that the memorial was taking shape.
A courtyard beside a working church
Architect Michael Arad also worked with landscape architect Peter Walker on the National September 11 Memorial in New York. There, water descends into two square pools in the footprints of the World Trade Center towers. The Charleston design puts the names on a single, low fountain near the church door. The benches let visitors sit across from one another beside a church that is still in use. Their backs rise and curve around the basin, with a wider opening for visitors coming in from the street. Arad’s architecture firm says he was selected for the Charleston memorial in 2017. The memorial broke ground in 2023.
The brick church dates to 1891, when it replaced a building badly damaged by Charleston’s 1886 earthquake. Its congregation is much older. The National Park Service traces it to a group of free and enslaved Black worshippers organized in 1791. After South Carolina outlawed all-Black churches in 1834, the congregation met in secret. It reorganized in 1865 and adopted the name Emanuel. The present building still has its original altar, communion rail and pews.
Visiting the memorial
The entrance is at 120 Calhoun Street, next to the church at 110 Calhoun Street. The foundation lists regular hours of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. Sunday, with the site closed Mondays. Hours can change for services or special events, and guided tours carry a separate fee. The outdoor courtyard is the part visitors can see now. The planned Survivors’ Garden will honor the five people who lived through the attack.
