The Priority of the Silver Bluff Church and Its Promoters
In speaking of the beginning of Negro churches in the United States, those of the Baptist faith must not be forgotten. Nor must we err in thinking that the first churches of this faith were planted in the North. It is true that there were Negro Baptists in Providence, Rhode Island, as early as 1774,[1] and doubtless much earlier, but they had no church of their own. Indeed, there is absolutely no trace of Negro Baptist churches in the North prior to the nineteenth century. The oldest Negro Baptist churches, north of Mason and Dixon's Line, are the Independent or First African Baptist Church, of Boston, Massachusetts, planted in 1805; the Abysinnian, of New York City, established in 1808; and the First African, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, organized in 1809.[2]
Negro Baptist churches, unlike other Negro churches, had their beginning in the South, and at a somewhat earlier date. The first church of Negro Baptists, so far as authentic and trustworthy writings of the eighteenth century establish, was constituted at Silver Bluff,[3] on Mr. Galphin's[4]
- ↑ Benedict's History of the Baptists (edition, 1848), p. 454. Rippon's Annual Baptist Register, 1801-1802, p. 836.
- ↑ Ibid., pp. 397, 577, 620. Compare with edition 1813, Vol. II, pp. 504, 509, 515.
- ↑ See Ramsey's History of South Carolina, Vol. I, p. 158, note 19, p. 159; Steven's History of Georgia, Vol. I, pp. 255-256; Gibbes' Documentary History of American Revolution (South Carolina), Vol. I, pp. 235-236 and 158-159; Furman's History Charleston Baptist Association, p. 77; Rippon's Annual Baptist Register, 1790-1793, pp. 445, 474, 477, 541; State Papers, Indian Affairs, Vol. I, pp. 15, 32, 35, 36; Lossing's Field Book of Revolution, Vol. II, p. 484; article on Henry Lee in Appleton's Cyclopedia, Vol. X, p. 487; Light Horse Harry in Lamer's History of Ready Reference, Vol. V, pp. 32-74-5; American Cyclopedia, Vol. II, p. 378 ; N. W. Jones' History of Georgia, Vol. II, pp. 136-138; Abraham Marshall in Cathcart's Baptist Encyclopedia, Vol. II, p. 349.
- ↑ George and John Galphin, brothers, are mentioned in State Papers,
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