Challenges on the Emmaus Road

T. Felder Dorn

Description

While slavery and secession divided the Union during the American Civil War, they also severed the Northern and Southern dioceses of the Protestant Episcopal Church. In Challenges on the Emmaus Road, T. Felder Dorn focuses on the way Northern and Southern Episcopal bishops confronted and responded to the issues and events of their turbulent times.

Prior to the Civil War, Southern bishops were industrious in evangelizing among enslaved African Americans, but at the same time they supported the legal and social aspects of the "peculiar institution." Southern and Northern bishops parted company over the institution of slavery, not over the place of blacks in the Episcopal Church. As Southern states left the Union, Southern dioceses separated from the Episcopal Church in the United States.

The book's title was inspired by the Gospel of Luke 24:13-35 in which the resurrected Jesus Christ walked unrecognized with his disciples and discussed the events of his own crucifixion and disappearance from his tomb. Dorn perceives that scriptural episode as a metaphor for the responses of Episcopal bishops to the events of the Civil War era.

Dorn carefully summarizes the debates within the church and in secular society surrounding the important topics of the era. In doing so, he lays the groundwork for his own interpretations of church history and also provides authentic data for other church scholars to investigate such topics as faith and doctrine, evangelism, and the administrative history of one of the most important institutions in America. Dorn devotes the final chapters to the postwar reunification of the Episcopal Church and Southern bishops' involvement in establishing the Commission on Freedmen to offer help with the educational and spiritual needs of the recently emancipated slaves.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Caroline du Nord
• Alabama
• Caroline du Sud
• États confédérés d'Amérique
• Georgia
• Virginia
• United States
• Christianity
• Confederate States of America
• History of the Americas
• North Carolina
• Social sciences
• South Carolina
• Slavery
• Slave and free states
• Episcopal Church
• Carolina del Norte
• Carolina del Sur
• Estados Confederados de América
• Religión
• HISTORY
• Episcopalian

Informations

• Publié par: University of South Carolina Press
• Date de parution: 25 novembre 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781643362960
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

C HALLENGES ON THE E MMAUS R OAD
C HALLENGES ON THE E MMAUS R OAD
Episcopal Bishops Confront Slavery, Civil War, and Emancipation
T. F ELDER D ORN
T HE U NIVERSITY OF S OUTH C AROLINA P RESS
2013 University of South Carolina
Cloth edition published by the University of South Carolina Press, 2013
Ebook edition published in Columbia, South Carolina, by the University of South Carolina Press, 2022
www.uscpress.com
Manufactured in the United States of America
31 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The Library of Congress has cataloged the cloth edition as follows:
Dorn, T. Felder.
Challenges on the Emmaus Road : Episcopal bishops con front slavery, civil war, and emancipation / T. Felder Dorn.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61117-249-2 (alk. paper)
1. Episcopal Church-History-19th century. 2. Church and social problems-United States-History-19th century. 3. Christianity and politics-United States-History-19th century. 4. Church and state-United States-History-19th century. 5. United States-Church history-19th century. I. Title.
BX5882.D67 2013
283 .7309034-dc23
2013007826
Front cover illustration: Gordon, a runaway slave from Mississippi, Harper s Weekly , 4 July 1863, courtesy of the Library of Congress; St. George s Church, Fredericksburg, Va., courtesy of the Library of Congress; the Right Reverend Richard Hooker Wilmer, D.D., The Episcopate in America , by William Stevens Perry, 1895
ISBN 978-1-64336-296-0 (ebook)
Dedicated with love and affection to Sara Ruth, Ruth and Gene, Julia, Thomas and Eleanor, Kristine, Allison, and Adam
C ONTENTS
List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
P ART 1 Historical Background
The Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States: A Sketch of the Years before 1860
Slavery in the United States: A Brief History
P ART 2 Episcopal Bishops in the Antebellum Era
Preamble
Stephen Elliott of Georgia and Thomas Frederick Davis of South Carolina
William Meade and John Johns of Virginia
Thomas Atkinson of North Carolina and William Rollinson Whittingham of Maryland
A Tale of Two Bishops: An Intersectional Friendship
Bishops in the Slaves States: Their Beliefs about and Responses to Slavery in the Antebellum Period
Richmond, Virginia, 1859: Ceremony, Church Business, and an Issue Ignored
P ART 3 Secession and Church Division
Preamble
Prelude to Montgomery: Southern Bishops Confront Secession, Threat of War, and Talk of Church Division
A Separate Church for a Separate Nation: The Southern Bishops Choose Church Division
A Tale of Two Bishops Redux: A Friendship Ruptures
A Controversial Consecration and a Bishop s Death: Richard Hooker Wilmer and William Meade
Assembly under Most Afflicting Circumstances: The Northern Bishops in General Convention in 1862
Church Division Is Ratified: The First General Council of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Confederate States of America
P ART 4 Slave State Bishops and Civil War
A Tragic Ending: The Wartime Episcopate of James Hervey Otey of Tennessee
The Wartime Episcopate of Bishop Elliott of Georgia: A Chronicle of Christian Patriotism
John Johns of Virginia: A Wartime Episcopate in a Battleground State
The Impact of War on an Episcopate: Thomas Frederick Davis of South Carolina
Thomas Atkinson of North Carolina: Wartime Episcopate
Richard Hooker Wilmer of Alabama: An Episcopate Begun in Wartime
Bishops in the Confederate States in Wartime: Some General Observations
Episcopates in States Divided: Bishops in Slave States in the Union
Polk, Lay, and Quintard: The War Up Close and Personal
P ART 5 Northern Bishops and Civil War
A Tale of Two Northern Bishops: John Henry Hopkins and Alonzo Potter
Henry Benjamin Whipple of Minnesota: A Bishop Confronts War on Two Fronts as well as the Institution of Slavery and the Rights of Indians
Charles Pettit McIlvaine: The War Years between National Conventions
Overview of Issues Faced by Northern Bishops during the Civil War
P ART 6 Aftermath-The Perspective of the National Church
Confrontation in Alabama: The Bishop and the General
What Price Reunion? The Philadelphia Convention, 4-24 October 1865
Closure with Dignity
Confrontation in Alabama: The Bishop and the General, Redux
The Freedman s Commission
P ART 7 Aftermath from the Diocesan Perspective and Concluding Observations
Preamble: Two Vignettes
Aftermath in Georgia: Stephen Elliott
Aftermath in South Carolina: Thomas Frederick Davis
Aftermath in North Carolina: Thomas Atkinson
Aftermath in Virginia: John Johns
Aftermath in Former Slave States in the Union: Benjamin Bosworth Smith, William Rollinson Whittingham, Alfred Lee, and Cicero Stephens Hawks
Concluding Observations
Bibliography
Index
I LLUSTRATIONS
Maps
Episcopal jurisdictions, 1859
Episcopal churches in downtown Richmond, 1859
Polk s first command and related sites
Sherman s Atlanta Campaign, 1864
Polk s War
Minnesota Chippewa Country, 1862
Southern Minnesota, 1862 (Showing Areas of Sioux Outbreak )
Photographs
The Right Reverend William Meade, D.D .
The Right Reverend James Hervey Otey, S.T.D .
The Right Reverend Stephen Elliott, D.D .
The Right Reverend John Johns, D.D., LL.D .
The Right Reverend Thomas Frederick Davis, D.D .
The Right Reverend Thomas Atkinson, D.D., LL.D .
The Right Reverend Richard Hooker Wilmer, D.D .
The Right Reverend William Rollinson Whittingham, S.T.D., LL.D .
The Right Reverend Leonidas Polk, D.D .
The Right Reverend Henry Champlin Lay, D.D., LL.D .
The Right Reverend John Henry Hopkins, D.D., LL.D .
The Right Reverend Alonzo Potter, D.D., LL.D .
The Right Reverend Henry Benjamin Whipple, D.D .
The Right Reverend Charles Pettit McIlvaine, D.D., D.C.L., LL.D .
The Right Reverend Horatio Potter, D.D., LL.D., D.C.L .
The Right Reverend William Mercer Green, D.D .
All maps were drawn by Martin Holloway, professor of graphic design, Kean University, Union, N.J. All photographs were originally published in William Stevens Perry, The Episcopate in America (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1895).
P REFACE
This work examines the responses to the issues of their time by a cadre of Episcopal bishops whose episcopates began before or during the Civil War and continued through the war and its immediate aftermath. The issues and events of these years were the most significant of any that have occurred on American soil. The era began with slavery steadily growing toward its peak of four million human beings in bondage, continued with the secession of eleven Southern states from the American Union, encompassed a devastating civil war, and ended with emancipation and reunion.
Part 1 comprises background material, namely the history of slavery in the United States and the structure of the American Episcopal Church. Part 2 first examines the antebellum actions and official words, spoken from the pulpit or at diocesan convention, of the bishops in the states in which slavery was permitted by law in 1860. The stance of the Northern bishops on slavery, as revealed during a church convention at the end of the presecession period, then is explored.
In Part 3 , secession, a consequence of slavery and the next great issue confronted by the prelate cadre, is studied from the viewpoint of both the Northern and the Southern bishops. A major response to secession initiated by Southern bishops was division of the church. That issue, including the reaction of the Union bishops also is examined in part 3 .
Secession led to war, and the responses of bishops, South and North, to that great conflict are explored in parts 4 and 5 . These responses were largely in the form of exhortations through sermons and addresses at diocesan and national conventions, but several bishops in both sections became deeply involved in matters pertaining to the war, and the special activities of these bishops are described. In part 4 the impact of the Civil War on the work of the Southern bishops within their dioceses also is examined.
Parts 6 and 7 explore the major problems and opportunities created for the church by the Union victory and by emancipation. Civil reunion afforded the opportunity for church reunification, but the reunification process was fraught with issues, the most significant of which reached the floor of the October 1865 convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church. That convention and the rump November 1865 convention of the former Confederate Church are examined in part 6 . Discussion of the establishment of a churchwide framework to respond to the challenge to provide secular and religious instruction to the freed people concludes part 6 . How the bishops in the former slave states led that response at the diocesan level and how those bishops guided their dioceses to confront and act on other postwar issues are the topics of part 7 .
A CKNOWLEDGMENTS
The research on which the manuscript for Challenges on the Emmaus Road is based was conducted over a period of ten years. I wish first to express my appreciation for the assistance that I was given by librarians. It truly was the competent, willing, and kind help of library staff members that made it possible for me to write this book. Library staff members at all the institutions below contributed to this work.
Alexander Library at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey.
Bailey/Howe Library at the University of Vermont, with thanks to Prudence Doherty for securing materials during and after my visit.
Central Library of the Philadelphia Library System, Pennsylvania.
Delia Biddle-Pugh Library, Burlington County Historical Society, New Jersey.
Duke Divinity School Library, North Carolina, with appreciation to Roger Lloyd for his assistance.
Keller Library at General Theological Seminary, where help was received from Emily Knox, Laura Moore, Mary Robison, and the Reverend Andrew Kadel
Kenyon College