1854 - The Founding of the African Baptist Association

After the arrival of Black Loyalists and refugees from the United States following the American Revolution, Baptist preachers worked among Black communities. In 1854, Richard Preston, himself a formerly enslaved man, founded the African Baptist Association, which became a central institution for Black Baptist churches in Nova Scotia. This ministry was an early example of Baptist mission efforts recognizing racial and cultural identity. Silas Rand, a Baptist missionary in Nova Scotia, described Preston’s Baptist efforts as “one of the most extensive revivals that ever swept over Cornwallis [now Kentville].”

Grant, Keith S. “‘He Is Sent to This Place, and Good Will Result to the Cause of God’: Young Richard Preston, Race, and Religion in Early-19th-Century Nova Scotia.” Acadiensis: Journal of the History of the Atlantic Region / Revue d’histoire de La Region Atlantique 53, no. 1 (2024): 8–36. https://doi.org/10.1353/aca.2024.a947469.