A.M.E. Church (Newport, Rhode Island)

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1851-1853
African Methodist Episcopal Church
The first church constructed by African Americans in Newport

Like most African-American churches in Newport, the congregation’s history can be traced back to the fraternal organizations of the early nineteenth century: the African Union Society (1780), the African Benevolent Society (1808), and the Colored Union Church and Society (1823). The A.M.E. Church began meeting in a carpenter’s shop on Division Street in 1845 before moving to a rented building on Green Lane (now Tilden Avenue.)

By 1851, the A.M.E. congregation required its own building. In that year George Hazard sold William Wor, John Johnson, and James Shiloe New Town Lot 19. Wor, Johnson, and Shiloe are identified in the document as Trustees of the African Methodist Episcopal Church; the Trustees were to “cause to be built a house or place of worship for the use of the members of the African Methodist Episcopal Church” on the lot. The indenture also notes that the Trustees shall “... at all times forever herafter, permit such Ministers and Preachers belonging to said Church ... to preach and expound God’s Holy word therein.”

The A.M.E. congregation remained at Johnson Court for more than two decades. Charles Battle noted that beginning in 1858, a Miss Palmer kept a school for African-American children “on the corner of Kingston Avenue and Johnson Court.” The exact location is not known, but the church seems a logical candidate. The A.M.E. church remained at Johnson Court until 1875, when it purchased the dining room of the Ocean House on Bellevue Avenue for its estimated congregation of 350.

Sold to the McMahon family in 1883, the Johnson Court building then became a two-family residence and has remained so to the present day.
A two-story structure with a broad gable front facing Johnson Court, the church retains an exterior largely unaltered from its original construction between 1851 and 1853. Clad on the street side in clapboard, the structure’s remaining three sides are painted shingle. Although the windows have been replaced with double-pane sash the openings, cased in plain boards, appear to be original. A dormer added to the west side is of relatively recent vintage. A recent study of the building indicated that although its interior is partitioned down the middle, the building largely retains the feel of an open assembly hall. A wide staircase to the second floor, now partitioned, may provide evidence of a choir loft.

The church surely served as a focal point for African Americans in the Spruce Street/Kingston Avenue neighborhood. Its ministers and trustees lived within a block or two of the Johnson Court building. The 3 Johnson Court property has broader significance in Newport: its construction predated the Union Congregational Church on Division Street by two decades; it is thus the earliest church building in Newport built by and for African Americans.

escholar.salve.edu/fac_staff_pub/23/
From the School-Lands to Kerry Hill: Two Centuries of Urban Development at the Northern End of Newport, R.I.
James C. Garman, Salve Regina University