The legacy of Benjamin Randall, founder of Free Will Baptists, is alive and well in Oneonta, New York. In 1856, the town’s Second Free Will Baptist Church was established when some members of the first Free Will congregation “believing that a more central location would foster the growth of church membership … thought it wise…
This month the First Colored Baptist Church of East St. Louis is established on Carr Island in the Mississippi River, straddling the line between Missouri and Illinois. The church is set apart from the city, reflecting the distance that yet remains among whites and blacks in much of the North. Carr Island is a local…
Today crowds line Boston’s Beacon Street in celebration of the deployment of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment. Massachusetts governor John A. Andrew presents the unit’s colors, after which the regiment parades down the street and to the waiting steamer De Molay for transport to Port Royal, South Carolina. Port Royal and environs, under Union control,…