Black Christianity Before the Civil War.

1701 The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG) begins missionary work among Native Americans and, later, African slaves.

1758 The first recorded black congregation organizes on the plantation of William Byrd, near Mecklenburg, Virginia.

1773 Black Baptists found a church on the plantation of George Galphin, at Silver Bluff, South Carolina; Phillis Wheatley's Poems on Various Subjects Religious and Moral is published in London.

1782 George Liele leaves for Jamaica.

1784 The first General Conference (the Christmas Conference) of the newly formed Methodist Episcopal Church forbids its members to own slaves.

1787 Absalom Jones and Richard Allen lead a small group of Africans out of Philadelphia's St. George Church; Philadelphia …