Beaufort, South Carolina is an epicenter of African life in the South, a story of which Baptists have played a central role. During the years 1831-32 a great revival, characterized by evangelistic fervor, led many slaves to join the Baptist Church of Beaufort, a congregation founded in 1804. The slaves in Beaufort District were predominantly…
Today, United States hero and Baptist layman Robert Smalls is sent to New York on a speaking tour to raise support for the Union cause. Smalls, a former Southern slave, became the toast of the North when, four months earlier, he captured the Confederate gunboat Planter in Charleston, South Carolina, the heart of the Confederacy.…
Today is Sunday, and a new Baptist church is born. But it is not a typical Baptist church. Union troops are now firmly in control of much of South Carolina’s coastline. One island town stands out above the others: Hilton Head, one of the wealthiest of the state’s towns prior to the war. Previously home…