Richard Allen (14 February 1760 - 26 March 1831) was born a slave of Benjamin Chew at Germantown, Pennsylvania (now a part of Philadelphia), but his family was soon sold to Stockley Sturgis whose plantation was near Dover, Delaware.

Converted early, he joined the Methodist Society at an early age, and began evangelizing and attending services so regularly as to bring criticism from local slave owners. In response to this opposition Richard and his brothers redoubled their efforts for Stokely, whom Richard described as "unconverted..but.. what the world called a good master". This hard and pious work lead Stokley to encourage preaching amongst his slaves, and soon he was convinced that slavery was wrong, and therefore offered his slaves an opportunity to buy their freedom.

Eventually, in 1785 Richard bought his and his brothers freedom from Sturgis for $2000 each. The money, which took him five years to save, was largely earned by his support for the American Revolution. In 1799, he was the first colored minister ordained by Francis Asbury.

Long having preached amongst his

Allen's desire to build a place of worship for African Americans brought only scorn from his white church and the established African Americans of his community. Rev. Absalom Jones, along with few others however supported the move. In 1787 they formed the "Free African Society" and left St. George's Methodist Church. In 1816 Richard founded the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia and was elected its first bishop.

Allen at first supported the "back to Africa" movement, and even a scheme for emigration to Haiti, but later was convinced by the overwhelming opposition of Philadelphia’s black community to oppose the white led American Colonization Society which organized it. Allen, Jones, and James Forten were the acknowledged leaders of the free black American community of that day.

Reference

• New International Encyclopedia

External links / References