Killadelphia and The Boondocks writer Rodney Barnes is penning a comic about the real horrors committed at a Maryland psychiatric hospital that abused Black communities in Annapolis during the Jim Crow era. Crownsville will feature art by Elia Bonetti (Death of Wolverine: The Logan Legacy) and it is published by Oni Press. The five-part series will tell a ghost story set at the hospital, which closed in 2004.

“Crownsville is the supernatural mystery tale I’ve been dying to tell,” Barnes said. “From a childhood haunt born in a place of pain, it’s my cathartic effort I’m thankful to share with the world. I can’t wait for folks to get a look at it.”

The Crownsville Hospital was an all-Black psychiatric facility that opened early in the 20th century. For years, the hospital was known for overcrowding and neglecting patients, and there were rumors that patients were abused and put through illegal experiments.

The comic begins when someone dies at the closed, abandoned hospital, and the death is ruled a suicide. Annapolis detective Mike Simms and journalist Paul Blairare consider the death suspicious, and their investigations uncover horrors that were committed in the past. They also learn about a connection to the spirits that are trapped at Crownsville.

“Oni Press is known for publishing hair-raising horror comics and provocative stories with a strong, personal, and political point of view,” Oni Press Editor-in-Chief Sierra Hahn. “Crownsville is a remarkable piece of storytelling that sits alongside our award-winning books. Rodney’s words and Elia’s haunting art combine to tell an unrelenting and riveting story, one that is as important and it is horrifying.”

Crownsville #1 begins with a double-sized 48-page first issue with covers by Bonetti, Jason Shawn Alexander (Killadelphia co-creator), Syzmon Kudranski (The Punisher), and Andrea Sorrentino (Gideon Falls).

“The best kinds of horror stories challenge us to not only confront ghosts or monsters, but also grapple with the pain and terror we inflict on each other. Sometimes that torment lasts only moments, or, as is the case of Crownsville, it can span decades,” Oni President & Publisher Hunter Gorinson said. “Together, Rodney and Elia have zeroed in on a masterfully, deeply rendered story that can both induce spiraling, white-knuckle terror and confront the tortured past underpinning a shocking and all-too-true chapter of modern American history.”