The Negro's church,.

Origins of the Church

31

type of ministry. Also in New Orleans, in 1896, a minister
started a church as the result of a revival.
"In the year 1889, in Richmond, Va., for reasons presumably best known to themselves, about eighteen or twenty
members of Bethel A. M. E. Church of this city withdrew
from said church and sought to establish a church of their
own liking and control." 6 In Chicago, in 1882, a number
of members of Olivet Baptist Church withdrew by letters for
the purpose of organizing a church.l7 In Baltimore, in 1874,
two men with their brethren withdrew with their letters from
the Union Baptist Church and organized another church.18
The number of churches growing out of day-schools or attempts to furnish secular education for Negroes, usually on
the part of whites, are few. The most notable of these is the
First Congregational Church of Atlanta. In 1867 the teachers and workers in the Storr school, a Congregational enterprise, organized the church. The school building was used
as the meeting-place for a long while. "It was a church
based on fellowship and love and not race or color." Individuals interested in the founding of Atlanta University were
among its first members.19
The origin of the Ebenezer Baptist Church of Orangeburg
County, South Carolina, is an example of the rural church of
this period. This church withdrew from the Bull Swamp
Baptist Church about 1873, according to the lone eightythree-year-old survivor, John McCleod. Mr. McCleod's story
goes that during the years when the Negroes worshipped in
the white church, they sat together in the rear. Reverend
William Durham, the minister, would shake hands with the
16 Henry, Peter J., "Legal History of Leigh Street Memorial M. E. Church,"
Richmond, Va., 1931.
' Historical Sketch of Bethesda Baptist Church, Chicago, 1925.
8 "Constitution and Manual of the Macedonia Baptist Church," Baltimore,
1902.
"Original records of the First Congregational Church (Negro), Atlanta,
Ga.