The History of the Negro Church

by Carter Godwin Woodson

C. S. M.

In this work Ryland had the coöperation of Joseph Abrams, a Negro who had been licensed to preach and ordained but had been prohibited from the exercise of his gifts by the hostile legislation proscribing Negro preachers after Nat Turner's insurrection. During the days prior to this reaction Abrams had been a preacher of much success among the Negroes of the First Baptist Church. Afterward he could take no more conspicuous part in the Sunday exercises than to pray a long prayer, into which he sometimes worked a short sermon. "As he enjoyed, however, the confidence of the citizens," says a writer in the American Baptist Memorial of 1853, "he was tolerated in preaching funerals at private houses, and was sparingly invited to close the worship in the church by words of exhortation." "He was heard with far more interest than I was," said Ryland, "and on this account I should have often requested him to speak but for the fear of involving him and the church in legal trouble." Abrams died in 1854. From the same pulpit which he had once occupied, his former pastor, John Bryce, delivered to a large crowd of grieving persons within and as many more without one of the most eloquent eulogies in keeping with the life of the man. A long procession of hundreds of persons followed him to his grave, over which the people erected a beautiful monument in the form of an imposing obelisk.

So emphatically was duty of religious instruction urged in certain parts of the South, that not only sympathetic clergymen and their children but men high in official positions championed the cause of literary instruction for the Negroes that they might learn the principles of religion. One important case in evidence is that of J. B. O'Neal of South Carolina. Discussing this matter in detail, O'Neal observed that the extension of the instruction of the Negroes to the extent of learning to read the Bible would hardly do any harm. He did not believe that the Christianization of the Negroes in a slave commonwealth would tend to lift them above their masters and destroy the "legitimate distinction" in the community. General Coxe of Fluvanna County, Virginia, had all of his slaves taught to read the Bible in spite of the law and public opinion to the contrary, and so did a farmer whom Frederick Law Olmsted visited in Mississippi. Other instances here and there may be mentioned. Exactly how many other persons of the aristocratic folk of the South had the same attitude is difficult to determine; for the white people of that day, like those of the present time, often conceded privately that the Negroes should enjoy their rights, but were unwilling to suffer the stigma of being called the champions of their cause.

With this new impetus given religious instruction in many parts, however, it was very difficult to overcome the desire for the more thorough evangelization of the Negroes. There was not only a manifestation of interest here and there in the South; but during the forties and fifties there followed considerable improvement, especially through such local organizations as those in Liberty and MacIntosh counties in Georgia and in the Presbyterian synods of Kentucky, Alabama, North Carolina, and Tennessee. A few Negroes, who prior to the reaction had learned to read and write and had a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible, were sometimes employed in the more liberal portions of the South to teach the aged and the young to say prayers, repeat a little of the catechism, and to memorize hymns. Here their instruction depended entirely upon the memory. What could not be thus done for them was neglected. Literature especially adapted to this end prepared by churchmen safeguarding the interests of the slaveholding South was preferably used. Some of these works were Dr. Capers' Short Catechism for the Use of Colored Members on Trial in the Methodist Episcopal Church in South Carolina, A Catechism to be Used by Teachers in the Religious Instruction of Persons of Color in the Episcopal Church of South Carolina, John Mines' Catechism, Dr. C. C. Jones' Catechism of Scripture, Doctrine and Practice Designed for the Original Instruction of Colored People, Dr. Robert Ryland's The Scripture Catechism for Colored People, and E. T. Winkler's Notes and Questions for the Oral Instruction of Colored People with Appropriate Texts and Hymns.

SAMUEL R. WARD

CHAPTER VIII PREACHERS OF VERSATILE GENIUS

THE situation in the North was then more encouraging, though far from being ideal. During the critical period through which the Negroes were passing between 1830 and the Civil War the Negro minister had to divide his attention so as to take care of all of the varying interests of an oppressed race. Among the poor it has never been considered exceptional for a minister to work at some occupation to increase the meager income which he receives from his parishioners. We have already observed above that Andrew Bryan made himself independent as a planter, that Richard Allen at first earned his living as a teamster, and that Andrew Marshall with much business acumen maintained himself in a local express business. During the critical period from 1830 to 1860, however, the Negro minister was not only compelled sometimes thus to support himself, but often had to devote part of his time to the problems of education, abolition, colonization and the Underground Railroad.

Education for the Negro was both a test and a challenge. Few persons believed that the Negro was capable of the mental development known to the white man. The challenge to them, then, was: Show that your race has possibilities in the intellectual world, bring forth proof to uproot the argument that your race is the inferior of the other peoples. To make the challenge more concrete, can a Negro master the grammar, language, and literature of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew? Can he learn to think? Can he understand the significant things of life as expounded by mathematicians, scientists, and philosophers? A few Negroes had demonstrated here and there unusual ability in these fields; but they were not generally known or their achievements were accounted for by their racial connection with the white race in this country or with some Arabic stock of Africa, known to be Caucasian rather than Negroid.