buildings along today's Black Heritage Trail® were the homes, businesses, schools and churches of a thriving black community that organized, from the nation's earliest years, to sustain those who faced local discrimination and national slavery, struggling toward the equality and freedom promised in America's documents of national liberty. Historical sites along the 1.6 mile (2.5 km) Black Heritage Trail in Beacon Hill include: Robert Gould Shaw / 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Memorial – commemorates the first African-American regiment of the United States Colored Troops during the Civil War and the officer who led the 54th Regiment until his death at the Battle of Fort Wagner in SC. This monument depicts their farewell march down Beacon Street, which was erected at the edge of Boston Common, across Beacon Street from the Massachusetts State House. Poet Robert Lowell won a Pulitzer Prize in the 20th century for his poem, "For the Union Dead," about this monument and soldiers. The regiment's heroic battle at Fort Wagner was the subject of the film Glory (1989). African Meeting House – built in 1806, the oldest standing African-American church in the country is operated as part of the Museum of African American History. Displays include speeches from well-informed orators. Built in 1806, the meeting house is the oldest surviving African-American church building in the United States; it became known as the Black Faneuil Hall during the abolitionist movement. Here Frederick Douglass gave many speeches, including his impassioned call for blacks to take up arms against the South in the American Civil War. Abiel Smith School – built in 1834, now adapted and operated as the Museum of African American History Charles Street Meeting House – built in 1807, the church had segregated seating. In the 1830s some of the members formed the First Baptist Free Church, which became Tremont Temple. It was considered to be one of the first integrated churches in America. John Coburn House – home of John Coburn, an African-American abolitionist, soldier and recruiter, who aided people on the Underground Railroad. Lewis and Harriet Hayden House – Lewis Hayden was an escaped slave, abolitionist leader, recruiter for the 54th regiment during the Civil War. Afterward, he became a Grand Master of the Prince Hall Masons and was elected as a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives. Active with the Underground Railroad, Hayden protected escaped slaves in his home, including Ellen and William