Confederate reverses of late concern the residents of Richmond, Virginia, the Confederate capital. The city’s Protestant churches take turns in hosting ongoing “union prayer meetings,” services which are structured for, and open to, all persons.
The Richmond Daily Dispatch summarizes the current religious fervor thus:
Union Prayer Meetings have been held here daily, (Sundays excepted,) since the last Fast Day, alternating at churches near the centre of the city. They are very largely attended. The meetings this week are at the First Baptist Church, the numerous aisles of which are nearly filled every afternoon.
For the convenience of citizens in the eastern part of the city, meetings have been commenced among them. The first was held at Leigh Street Baptist Church last Sunday afternoon. On Tuesday afternoon, there was one at the new Trinity Church, at the foot of Church Hill. Another will be held at Leigh Street on Sunday afternoon, and a series at the Third Presbyterian Church next week.–These meetings excite a lively interest in that part of the city.
The pattern of battlefield losses followed by prayerful fervor is repeated throughout the remainder of the war.
Sources: Richmond Daily Dispatch, March 29, 1862 (link); for more information on early 19th century union prayer meetings, see “Typical Prayer Meetings”(link) from From the book The Second Evangelical Awakening in America, by J. Edwin Orr (1952) (link)
