Jackson Chapel First Missionary Baptist Church

Junior Mission meets.

Wilson Daily Times, 22 July 1944.

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  • Annie Alexandria — Annie Alexander. Annie Barnes Alexander died 2 November 1967 in Wilson. Per her death certificate, she was born 10 May 1886 in Wilson County to Alex Barnes and Frances Stevens; was a widow; lived at 609 Viola Street; and was buried in the Masonic Cemetery. Mary Bowden of New York City was informant.
  • Pauline Henderson
  • Rev. Fred M. Davis
  • D.M. Royall — Ossie Mae Royal.

The mission circles give thanks.

Wilson Daily Times, 16 August 1943.

In 1943, First Baptist Church hosted hundreds of delegates to the Baptist Women’s Home and Foreign Missionary convention. On behalf of the church, Nannie Barber, Nancy Wilkins, and Rev. Fred M. Davis thanked their many supporters.

Jackson Chapel First Missionary Church celebrated its 150th anniversary last month with a banquet and anniversary worship service.

As the Wilson Times noted in an August 18 article:

“U.S. Rep. G.K. Butterfield, whose grandfather, the Rev. Fred Davis, served as Jackson Chapel’s third pastor, has been a member since May 1955 and knows the church’s history by heart.

“‘I’m the oldest member in Jackson Chapel, not by age but in terms of membership. … There’s no member at Jackson Chapel who can say they’ve belonged longer than I have,’ Butterfield said. 

“The church was founded in 1872 by Andrew Joshua Jackson, who was born into slavery in Virginia and became a minister after he was freed. 

“Jackson Chapel’s congregation first met on Barnes Street, where Wilson Chapel is now, and its current location at the corner of Nash and Pender streets was built in the 1910s. While in Wilson, Booker T. Washington laid the building’s cornerstone.

“Throughout its history, the church has been a voice for East Wilson.

“‘Through the years, Jackson Chapel has been the epicenter of civic activity and spiritual activity in East Wilson,’ Butterfield said. ‘During the Depression, during the war, during the civil rights era, it was Jackson Chapel that stood tall and strong and helped lead the civil rights movement. It has been a spiritual force and a political force in Wilson County.'”

Fiftieth anniversary of First Baptist Church.

Wilson Daily Times, 18 September 1922. 

Was a memorial drinking fountain ever installed in front of the church? I do not recall ever seeing one. 

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  • “the late Rev. Jackson” — Rev. Andrew J. Jackson was founder of First Baptist Church, now known as Jackson Chapel First Missionary Baptist Church. 
  • Rev. J.A. Mebane — John Alexander Mebane, a native of Bertie County, lived in Wilson only briefly. In the 1922 Hill’s directory of the city: Mebane John A Rev (c) 308 Hackney

Rev. J.A. Mebane (1885-1974).

  • M.E. Rogers — Mary Elizabeth Rogers. 
  • John Battle — probably, John Parker Battle.
  • Henrietta Foster — Foster, who was listed as living at the rear of 308 Hackney Street in 1922, later married Rev. Mebane. Henrietta Foster Mebane died in 1950 and, though the Mebanes spent most of their married life in Tarboro, N.C., was buried in Wilson’s Rountree Cemetery. Later, her body was moved to Rest Haven Cemetery to lie beside her husband. Their daughter Grace Mebane, who died in Tarboro in 1940 at age 14, is also buried in Wilson.

Photo courtesy of Ancestry.com user Satwun.

108 years ago this month …

Jackson Chapel First Missionary Baptist Church opened its iconic brick edifice at the corner of East Nash and Pender Streets. First Missionary Baptist’s pastor Rev. Marshall A. Talley welcomed a line-up of mostly local prominent guest speakers.

Wilson Daily Times, 12 August 1913.

John F. Bruton was the keynote speaker on opening day and delivered this strange and eye-poppingly (by today’s standards) offensive homily: “One thing you people cannot afford to stop, it is your native song. When you cut that off, you cut off your right hand. I remember my old mammy as she clasped me to her withered bosom singing ‘These bones shall rise again.’ Then I was taught the meaning of immortality, ‘when I can read my title clear,’ she sang. I knew that she was going to read her title in the skies. I do not know what heaven is, but I know she is there. As for me I’ll be content to spend the first thousand years there, listening to the angels singing, with that old mammy joining in the chorus, with her hand in mine leading me to my mother. That will be heaven for me. You can’t abandon those songs! When you do, you’d just as well turn this church into a moving picture show.”

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Clipping courtesy of J. Robert Boykin III.