Church Square

Church Square sits anchored by the Groote Kerk, its high, white gabled facade rising above the rest of the greenery. This plot served as the slave burial ground for the Dutch East India Company during the eighteenth century. In eighteen zero eight, the colonial government barred further burials here, and the space transformed into the garden square that remains today. When the bells from the church tower strike, they echo across the same ground where thousands of enslaved people were once laid to rest.