RICHMOND, Va. — Governor Glenn Youngkin announced an order for all United States flags and Virginia State Flags to be flown at half-staff on Thursday.
In a media release emailed on January 29, 2025, Younkin stated:
In accordance with the authority vested in me as Governor, I hereby order that the flags of the United States of America and the Commonwealth of Virginia be flown at half-staff in memory and respect of Henry Leander Marsh III, former Mayor of Richmond, Virginia State Senator and civil rights trailblazer.
His courage, leadership and relentless pursuit of justice have left a legacy that will continue to inspire for generations.
I hereby order that the flags on all buildings on Capitol Square and the Virginia State Capitol shall be lowered at 10:00 a.m. on January 30, 2025, and remain at half-staff until 3:00 p.m. to honor his lying in state.
Further, I hereby order that all flags in the Commonwealth shall be lowered at sunrise on Saturday, February 1, 2025, and remain at half-staff until sunset.
Flags were recently at half staff for one-month, following the death of former US President, Jimmy Carter. That flag order was in place through January 28.
OBITUARY VIA MANNING FUNERAL HOME
Henry Levander Marsh, III — civil rights attorney, longtime state senator and Richmond’s first African-American mayor — completed his incredible life journey on January 23, 2025, after 91 years, including seven decades of dedicated public service. He served 25 years on the Richmond City Council and 22 years in the Virginia State Senate.
Henry loved Richmond. He was a born-and-raised Richmonder who become active in the civil rights movement before he even graduated from high school. Despite a lifetime of diplomacy that afforded him the opportunity to engage with leaders across the United States and around the world, there was never any other place he would want to be and serve, and he would be the first to tell you that. He was Richmond’s heart when it needed him most, and the City forever held his heart in return.
While his tenure as advocate for the people of Richmond and Central Virginia was rife with accomplishment, in many ways he was most proud of the role he played as friend and mentor to multiple generations of civic and elected leadership across race, class, gender, and even political orientation. If you wanted to make a positive difference, he had time to support and nurture your interest and leverage it for the benefit of the community.
With this in mind, we ask in lieu of flowers and family gifts that you strongly consider a contribution to the Virginia Center for Inclusive Communities, an organization that embodies his timeless values and whose efforts are more sorely needed now than ever.
Born in Richmond December 10, 1933, Marsh graduated from Maggie L. Walker High School and Virginia Union University before receiving a law degree from Howard University in Washington, D.C.
In 1961, after answering the call to serve in the United States Army, Marsh joined legal giants Oliver W. Hill and Samuel W. Tucker to form law firm of Hill, Tucker and Marsh, a black-led institution that produced more than a dozen state and federal jurists and was the fulcrum of legal progress during the civil rights movement. Marsh worked on landmark cases including Quarles v. Philip Morris, the first U.S. legal case involving racial discrimination in employment.
He was a perennial adversary of Massive Resistance, the intensive response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision after which many Virginia school systems chose to close their doors rather than obey federal desegregation orders. Most of the employment discrimination and school desegregation cases that shaped the Commonwealth feature Hill, Tucker and Marsh as the plaintiff’s advocate. Few argue that the firm’s legal work profoundly transformed the Virginia legal and civic landscape.
Marsh was first elected to the Richmond City Council in 1966. Under the city’s old system of selecting a mayor, his colleagues chose him as vice mayor in 1970 and mayor in 1977 — making him the city’s first Black mayor despite an attempt by white city leaders to keep control of political power in the city by annexing part of Chesterfield County.
He served as mayor until 1982 and remained on the council until 1991, when he was elected to the Virginia Senate to represent a district that covered the city of Petersburg, Dinwiddie County and parts of Chesterfield and Prince George counties and the city of Richmond.
He retired from the state Senate in 2014 and was appointed by then-Gov. Terry McAuliffe as a commissioner of the state’s Alcoholic Beverage Control board. A longtime resident of Church Hill, he lived a few blocks from the elementary school that has been named for him since 2021.
Henry somehow managed to maintain a slender but rich personal life despite the tremendous public spotlight that followed him for more than 60 years. He was an avid tennis player and golfer, and even as those skills met their natural decline he remained a dominant bid whist enthusiast and puzzle assembler. He was a fierce Cowboys fan who eagerly awaited their return to prominence, further proof of his belief that anything was possible.
He was an avid fan of multiple genres of music, and he loved drinking it in live. Perhaps the only thing sharper than his legal acumen was his wit, which remained legendary to the very end. Marsh is survived by his three children —daughters Nadine Marsh-Carter and Sonya M. Craft and son Dwayne S. Marsh — as well as six grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. We all rejoice that he is reunited with his beloved and dedicated wife of 58 years, Diane Harris Marsh, who left us in 2020 and without whom none of this would have been possible.
SERVICES
Friday, January 31, 2025
3:00 PM – 6:00 PM
Manning Funeral Home
700 N 25th St.
Richmond, VA 23223
CELEBRATION OF LIFE
Saturday, February 01, 2025
1:00 PM
St. Paul’s Baptist Church (Creighton Campus)
4247 Creighton Rd
Richmond, VA 23223