Early history: Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site), Fredericksburg, Virginia

Click here to hear excerpts from a traditional spiritual sung as a choir processional during the 11:00 a.m. service on September 3, 2006: "Children of God,

keep on marchin',

for one of these days,

we shall be free..."

(MP3 format)

Featured voices are the Senior Choir and Men's Choir of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site), with the Rev. Ronald Cooper singing the lead

History of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site)

Early history (through 1878)

ABOUT 1803, the first Baptist Meeting House was established in Fredericksburg, Virginia. The wooden structure stood on what is now the site of the Fredericksburg railroad station. Membership in the Baptist Meeting House included many slaves and "free Negroes." On page 206 of The History of Virginia Baptists, Robert Baylor Sample describes the church as "a small but happy one."

By 1818, the congregation was looking for a place to erect a larger brick building. The current site of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site) was selected. The site had previously been the location of an office of the Bank of Virginia, but that structure had burned to the ground in a devastating fire on October 19, 1807.

Sketch of early meeting house On April 14, 1820, Horace Marshall and his wife Elizabeth, owners of the land, sold the current property for $900 to the trustees of the New Baptist Meeting House, which was described as the Shiloh Baptist Meeting House. (This transaction is recorded in the Fredericksburg Deed Book G, page 2.) How the land was used initially is not clear. The first brick church building on the site is believed to have been erected in the late 1830s or early 1840s.

THE SHILOH BAPTIST MEETING HOUSE included both white and African American members. By the late 1840s, the congregation included over 800 people. The vast majority (about 75 percent) were slaves and free blacks.

Because of the congregation's size, some members of the church began suggesting that a larger building was needed. Land for that purpose was acquired on what is now the corner of Princess Anne and Amelia streets. Plans were developed to build a new building there.

Although they had limited resources, many African American members of the congregation made pledges of financial support for the new building. According to congregational minutes dated September 28, 1855, the congregation's "colored brethren and sisters" had subscribed (or pledged) about eleven hundred dollars in financial aid for construction of the new building. There were at least 625 African American members of the congregation at that time. (To view an alphabetical list of these 625 African American members, click here.)

In 1854, tensions developed between the white and African American members of the church. These tensions caused the congregation to split along racial lines. It became clear that the new building would be for white members of the congregation, while the old building down by the riverside would be for American American members.

As a result of this split, the congregation that is now known as Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site) considers 1854 to mark its true beginning as an independent congregation, even though it wasn't technically independent quite yet.

THE WHITE MEMBERS of the congregation officially moved into their new building on September 10, 1855. In time, they took a new name: Fredericksburg Baptist Church.

The group that moved to what is now Princess Anne and Amelia streets continued to own the old Shiloh Baptist Meeting House, where the African American members of the congregation were still worshipping. George Rowe, an elder of the white congregation who was himself the owner of seven slaves, was commissioned by the Fredericksburg Baptist Church to serve as leader and overseer of what became known, temporarily, as "the African Baptist Church."

Minutes of the white congregation, dated February 3, 1856, indicate that the African Baptist Church was expected to pay for the services provided to it by elder George Rowe, even though he was technically under the direction of the pastor of the white congregation:

"Whereas we desire the coloured portion of our church to enjoy the privilege of regular public worship in the house we formerly occupied, therefore, resolved, that the esteemed Brother Elder George Rowe, who has for several months been laboring among them with much acceptance, be requested to continue these labors, and to administer the ordinances of the gospel among them, and also, in conjunction with our pastor, to attend to the order and discipline of the church so long as it may be mutually agreeable to the parities concerned, the coloured brethren being expected to make him such compensation for his services as he and they may agree upon."

MINUTES OF THE WHITE CONGREGATION, dated September 28, 1855, indicate that "it has always been our intention to give up our old house of worship to the colored portion of our church." But this wasn't done until July 30, 1857, when the deed to the property was transferred, as recorded in Fredericksburg Deed Book S, page 257.

According to the minutes of the white congregation, the property was not transferred until the African American members of the old congregation had fulfilled their "moral obligation" to "make good their pledges to aid us in paying for our new house of worship."

Initially, the white congregation seems to have considered the African Baptist Church, which occupied the old Shiloh Baptist Meeting House, as a sort of "branch" of the white church, deserving of aid and support. But in a dramatic reflection of the times, that aid was in the context of separate and unequal.

According to minutes of the white congregation dated February 3, 1856:

"Resolved, that we shall still consider our coloured brethren as a part of our church and feel it to be our duty as well as pleasure to aid them in any way we can to build up the cause of our divine master and to secure to them the peaceable occupancy of the house in which they now worship, with all the privileges as a branch of our church which the laws of our state extend to them."

MEMBERS OF what was being called the "African Baptist Church" were not happy being considered a "branch" of the white congregation. As a result, they sought a fuller degree of independence, which the white congregation agreed to grant only if the African American members agreed to "make good" the remainder of the money that they had pledged for building the new building being used by the white members at what is now the corner of Princess Anne and Amelia streets. This amounted to another five hundred dollars, beyond what had already been paid.

According to minutes of the Fredericksburg Baptist Church dated March 26, 1856:

"Whereas the colored portion of our church have applied to us for the privilege of being constituted into a separate church, and having requested us to appoint a committee to draft a constitution for that purpose, therefore, resolved that we will grant this request on condition that the coloured brethren pledge themselves by a resolution of their body to make good to us the balance of the subscription made by them towards paying for our new house of worship, say the balance of five hundred dollars."

The exact date on which an independent constitution was adopted is not clear. However, it seems to have been in place by early 1856, because on May 4, 1856, the congregation that became Fredericksburg Baptist Church officially "dismissed" from its membership all of the African Americans who had once been members of the combined body.

SHORTLY AFTER GAINING its official independence, the African American congregation began once again using the original name for its riverside building: "Shiloh Baptist." By 1858, the newly independent African American congregation was said to be prospering -- with a large membership.

George Rowe, originally appointed by the white congregation, continued to serve as "overseer" until the Emancipation Proclamation took effect at midnight on January 1, 1863.

On December 12, 1862, a few weeks before that momentous night, the Shiloh church building was badly damaged in the first Battle of Fredericksburg.

It was sometime after the Emancipation Proclamation took effect that the congregation formally appointed its first African American pastor, the Rev. George Dixon, who himself had been an active member of the congregation since at least 1854. However, because of dangers, opportunities, and uncertainties caused by the Civil War, many members of the congregation had fled north. Rev. Dixon himself spent much of the war in Washington, D.C..

During the war, 300 African Americans from Fredericksburg, meeting in a large horse stable, established a daughter church, Shiloh Baptist of Washington, D.C., which has remained until this day as a strong spiritual home for many people in the Washington area.

In 1865, after the fighting had ended, Rev. Dixon returned to Fredericksburg and began holding meetings in local homes. He organized a fund drive to repair Shiloh's building and revitalize its worship and ministry. As a result, by the late 1860s, Shiloh Baptist of Fredericksburg was again thriving. It was known as the center of life for black citizens in the area.

Rev. Dixon served Shiloh until 1878. He moved to Philadelphia, where he died on July 1, 1907.

To return to the main History page, where you will have access to information on other periods in Shiloh Old Site's history, click here

Sources for above information:

A research report on Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site) by Laura Farwell, produced by Historic Fredericksburg Foundation, Inc., dated March 2000.

A history of Fredericksburg Baptist Church, posted on its web site (recorded December 1, 2003).

Photocopies of old minutes from the original Shiloh Baptist Church (later known as Fredericksburg Baptist Church). These photocopies are available in the archives of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site).

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