The Silver Bluff Baptist Church was founded between 1774-1775 in Beech Island, South Carolina, by several enslaved

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

s who organized under elder David George.Albert J. Raboteau,
Slave Religion: The "Invisible Institution' in the Antebellum South
', Oxford University Press, 2004, p. 139-40. The historian Albert Raboteau has identified it as the first separate black congregation in the nation, although others contend for that distinction, including the First Baptist Church in

Petersburg, Virginia Petersburg is an independent city (United States), independent city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 33,458. The Bureau of Econ ...

. After the British captured Savannah in 1778 during the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

, George and his congregation of 30 slaves went to that city, seeking freedom, which the British had promised to slaves who escaped from rebel masters. Those church members who stayed in Savannah after the end of the

evolved as the First African Baptist Church.First African Baptist Church of Savannah
''Africans in America'',

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

. George was highly influential in the early black Baptist movement. Resettling by the British with his family and other Black Loyalists in

Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...

, he founded a congregation there. George and his family chose to migrate to

Freetown Freetown is the capital and largest city of Sierra Leone. It is a major port city on the Atlantic Ocean and is located in the Western Area of the country. Freetown is Sierra Leone's major urban, economic, financial, cultural, educational and po ...

Sierra Leone Sierra Leone,)]. officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered by Liberia to the southeast and Guinea surrounds the northern half of the nation. Covering a total area of , Sierr ...

in 1792, when the British founded this new colony in West Africa. He founded a congregation and Baptist church there as well.

History

In the First Great Awakening, Great Awakening, northern

Baptist Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only ( believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compe ...

and

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...

preachers traveled around the South, converting whites and enslaved and free blacks. The Baptists especially offered roles in congregations and churches to blacks, and some men were licensed as preachers and elders. The founders of Silver Bluff Baptist Church were enslaved African Americans who were converted by the preaching of a white Baptist minister named Wait Palmer, and perhaps a slave preacher named George Leile. There were eight founders: David George and his wife; Jesse Peter (also known as Jesse Galphin); and five others. Palmer was so impressed by George's preaching that he appointed him as elder of the group. They brought in other members and started meeting about 1774–1775 at Galphin's Mill, owned by George's master George Galphin. When the British in 1778 occupied Savannah across the river, the church was disrupted. George Galphin was a Patriot and moved away from his plantation. David George and the 30 enslaved members of Silver Bluff Baptist Church went to Savannah to seek promised freedom behind the British lines. They joined with preacher George Leile and his group there. Along with thousands of other freed slaves, David George and his family evacuated with the British in 1782 after the end of the war. The Crown fulfilled its promise and transported them to freedom in Nova Scotia. George preached in Shelburne and planted another Baptist congregation. George Leile went to

Jamaica Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of His ...

with the British, where he founded a Baptist church in Kingston. In 1792 the George family migrated from Nova Scotia to the new colony of

, assisted by British abolitionists. David George was one of the founders of

and its first Baptist church. Andrew Bryan, converted in 1782, was the only one of the three earliest black Baptist preachers in Georgia to stay in Savannah. He later purchased his freedom and that of his wife. He continued preaching and converting, and in 1788 organized the First African Baptist Church of Savannah. In 1793 he bought land for a structure, which the congregation built in 1794. The church grew to have more than 400 members before Bryan's death. After the war in 1783, Jesse Peter Galphin (the name he took after he gained his freedom) led other Baptist congregants from the Silver Bluff congregation to

Augusta, Georgia Augusta ( ), officially Augusta–Richmond County, is a consolidated city-county on the central eastern border of the U.S. state of Georgia. The city lies across the Savannah River from South Carolina at the head of its navigable portion. Georgi ...

. They founded the first African Baptist church of that city. It later was known as Springfield Baptist Church. Because Jesse Peter Galphin was linked to the original Silver Bluff congregation, in 1922 the historian Walter Brooks identified Springfield Baptist Church (as they were then known in Augusta) as the oldest black Baptist church in the nation.Walter H. Brooks, "The Priority of the Silver Bluff Church and Its Promoters," ''Journal of Negro History'' (April 1922)

History

See also

Citations

Further reading