Christian Reconstruction: The American Missionary Association and Southern Blacks, 1861-1890

375 Pages·2009·6.26 MB·English

by  Joe M. Richardson

CHRISTIAN
RECONSTRUCTION

CHRISTIAN
RECONSTRUCTION
THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION
1861-1890
AND SOUTHERN BLACKS,
M.
JOE RICHARDSON
THE UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA PRESS
TUSCALOOSA
To Twyla Richardson,
my first and best teacher
The University of Alabama Press
Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487-0308
© 1986 by Joe M. Richardson
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States
Paperback printing 2008
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for
permanence and durability of the Committee on
Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the
Council on Library Resources
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Richardson, Joe Martin.
Christian reconstruction: the American Mission
ary Association and Southern Blacks, 1861-1890/
Joe M. Richardson.
p.cm.
Originally published: Athens: University of Geor
gia Press, c1986.
Includes bibliographical references (p.
and index.
ISBN 978-0-8173-5538-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) l.
American Missionary Association-History-19th
century. I. Title.
BV2360.A8R53 2009
266'.02208996073-dc22
2008024702
Contents
Preface Vll
1. A Grand Field for Missionary Labor 1
2. Wartime Expansion 15
3. AMA Common Schools Mter the War 35
4. Freedmen's Relief 55
5. Friends and Allies 69
6. Administration and Fund Collecting 85
7. Public Schools and Teacher Training 107
8. The AMA Colleges 121
9. The AMA and the Black Church 141
10. Yankee Schoolteachers 161
11. Black Teachers and Missionaries 187
12. The AMA and the White Community 211
13. The AMA and the Black Community 235
Mterword 257
Notes 263
Bibliography 323
Index 337
v

Preface
ON 3 September 1846 the Union Missionary Society, the Committee
for West Indian Missions, and the Western Evangelical Missionary So
ciety united to form the American Missionary Association as a protest
against the silence of other missionary agencies regarding slavery.1
The association leadership was staunchly antislavery. Prominent lead
ers and supporters Lewis Tappan, Simeon S. Jocelyn, Gerrit Smith,
Joshua Leavitt, George Whipple, and William Jackson were all evan
gelical abolitionists who believed that the gospel was a powerful
weapon against slavery. As a part of the Tappan wing of the antislav
ery movement, the AMA advocated political activity, insisted upon the
essentially antislavery nature of the Constitution, and was dedicated
to purging the churches of the stain of slavery. 2
In its early work the association strengthened the existing missions
of its parent societies in Africa and Jamaica and created or accepted
the care of others in Hawaii, Egypt, the Sandwich Islands, and Siam.
In 1847 it began to provide clothing for slave refugees who had fled to
Canada, and later it sent teachers and preachers among the refugees
to establish schools and churches and to administer relief. It main
tained its Canadian missions until after the Emancipation Proclama
tion. The AMA's largest activity, however, was in the United States,
preaching the gospel "free from all complicity with slavery and caste."
By the mid-1850s it had financed more than one hundred missionaries
in the Northwest and the slave states of Missouri, North Carolina, and
Kentucky.
Antislavery churches were founded in the Northwest, and in the
South the AMA began education and religious instruction "on an
avowedly antislavery basis." In Missouri, Stephen Blanchard, an
AMA worker, was indicted for circulating "incendiary" books, and the
Reverend Daniel Worth was imprisoned in North Carolina for the
vii
viii Preface
same offense. A Kansas missionary barely escaped proslavery violence
in 1856. A Kentucky mob viciously whipped an association agent and
drove another missionary, John G. Fee, out of the state. After being
disinherited by his slaveholding father for his antislavery views, Fee in
the mid-1850s moved to a small plot ofland given him by the notorious
antislavery figure Cassius M. Clay. He called his new home Berea. Fee
built a rude log cabin and organized a church and school that recog
nized no distinction of race, caste, or color. The school later became
Berea College. At different times Fee was dragged from the pulpit to
be ducked in the river, hunted through the mountains to be whipped,
and shot at in his home, but he, like other AMA agents, persisted in his
antislavery teaching.3
When the Civil War erupted, the AMA was probably more an anti
slavery than a missionary society, yet its experience, organization, and
fund-gathering capability enabled it to lead the way in providing sys
tematic relief and education for slaves escaping from Confederate
lines. It sent agents to Fortress Monroe, Virginia, in September 1861.
The number of teachers and missionaries sent to assist freedmen in
creased to 250 in 1864 and to 320 in 1865. By 1868 the AMA had 532
agents in the southern and border states. The association provided
relief, attempted to help blacks acquire land, demanded civil and polit
ical rights for former slaves, established schools and churches, and
fought for a system of public education in the South.
The first AMA schools were elementary, but from the beginning the
association planned to establish normal schools and colleges. It early
decided that blacks should eventually furnish their own teachers. No
race, AMA officials thought, should be permanently dependent upon
another race for its development. Though whites should assist, and
initially would provide leadership and teachers, blacks must eventu
ally playa major role in working out their future with their own edu
cators and leaders. As soon as the southern states began to establish
public schools, the AMA deemphasized common schools and concen
trated on graded schools, normal schools, and colleges. Although its
elementary training and relief were significant, the AMA's most last
ing contribution was the establishment of normal schools and colleges.
Association officers were motivated by religion and patriotism, and
an educated, moral, industrious black citizenry was their goal. Equal
ity before the law was "the gospel rule," the AMA concluded, and the
Preface ix
country's "political salvation" depended upon its implementation. Un
fortunately the association sometimes failed to live up to its own lofty
ideals. It failed to recognize the richness and vitality of black culture
and institutions and only belatedly to comprehend black insistence on
self-determination. Paternalism and racial prejudice were too often
present in its agents. Nevertheless, the AMA became the most signifi
cant of the many benevolent societies assisting blacks during the Civil
War and Reconstruction, and it came closer to a full recognition of
black rights and needs than did most nineteenth-century Americans.
This study is an attempt to portray the strengths and weaknesses,
successes and failures of the American Missionary Association in its
efforts to bring blacks into the mainstream of American life.
Many people assisted in the preparation of this book. I appreciate
the courtesies extended to me by the library staffs at Dillard Univer
sity, Fisk University, Talladega College, Berea College, Florida State
University, the Johns Hopkins University, the University of South
Carolina, Louisiana State University, the University of Texas, the
University of Arkansas, Yale University, Bowdoin College, the Ar
kansas Historical Commission, Syracuse University, the South Car
olina Department of Archives and History, the Alabama Department
of Archives and History, the National Archives, and the Library of
Congress.
I am especially grateful to Clifton H. Johnson, executive director of
the Amistad Research Center, New Orleans, and his efficient staff.
Cliff's encouragement and advice were invaluable. Maxine D. Jones
cheerfully shared her knowledge of and enthusiasm for the American
Missionary Association. My son, Joseph, patiently listened to stories
about the association, even when he was not interested. I have been
fortunate in having Charles East copyedit the manuscript. He also
offered advice on the use of illustrations. Portions of chapter 9 ap
peared in an article in the spring 1979 issue of Southern Studies: An
Interdisciplinary Journal of the South and are herein used with per
mission. I am indebted to Patricia Richardson, Clifton H. Johnson,
W. Augustus Low, Leslie Richardson, and Maxine D. Jones for read
ing the manuscript and giving me advice on both style and content. It
is not their fault if I sometimes failed to follow their advice.