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African-American Baptist Churches In Hanover County, Virginia, 1865-1900, Melinda Dawn Gales

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this thesis is to examine rural African-American vernacular Baptist churches built in the years following the Civil War. The case study is centered in Hanover County, Virginia, because of the county's strategic location inrelation to the capital of the Confederacy in Richmond. Due to the overwhelming number of slaves, Anglo-Americans attempted to suppress African identity by forcing slaves to attend Anglo-American churches. A number of African-American congregations were secretly organized during the time of slavery. Until the fall of Richmond in spring 1865, African-Americans were not allowed to assemble publicly without Anglo-American supervision. In the years following …