The African American Second Baptist Church of Hampton, Virginia was established in the months following the end of the Civil War. This week the congregation makes preparations for a celebration of January 1, 1866, the third anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, and the first since the effecting of freedom for all blacks with the Union…
Today’s Franklin, Virginia newspaper summarizes the post-war trajectory of local freedmen in Methodist and Baptist life in Staunton since the end of the war, describing an unusually cooperative arrangement between the city’s white and black Baptists. “At the recent session of the Methodist Conference in Washington, Bishop Simpson and a colored preacher, the Rev. Mr.…
Today in Texas — the lone Confederate state whose governor, Sam Houston, had resisted secession — a new Baptist congregation is birthed. The new church is the Mount Calvary Baptist Church, later known as the First Baptist Church of Richardson. The congregation is established before that of First Baptist Dallas. Church records note that members…