Bishop Richard Allen (1760-1831) Founder of Mother Bethal A.M.E. Church Philadelpia, PA.

BISHOP RICHARD ALLEN

*MOTHER BETHEL A.M.E. CHURCH (1778) PHILDELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA (c. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS)

Richard Allen, the first bishop of the A.M.E. Church, was born February 14, 1760, enslaved by a Benjamin Chew of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  At an early age, he with his father, mother and three other children, was sold into the state of Delaware, where, on a farm in the neighborhood of Dover, he was brought up. About 1777, he was converted and soon afterwards, about 1780, he began to preach. His religion was of such a genuine sort that it affected every department of his life. As a result his owner permitted prayer meetings and preaching in his house, and was converted himself. The slaveowner showed his conversion by making it possible for his slaves to become free. Accordingly Richard Allen and his brother bought their freedom for $2,000.00 continental money.

Now a free man, Richard Allen began working for himself, cutting cord wood; earning $50 (continental money) a month in a brick yard, working as a day laborer and then as a teamster hauling salt during the Revolutionary War from Rehobar, Sussex County, Delaware. During all of this time, he preached whenever he could. After he had acquired experience, he began to travel from place to place preaching. Like the apostle Paul, he worked with his hands for his own support as he preached. In the fall of 1783, he was in Wilmington, Delaware.  Later and until spring of 1784, he traveled and preached in New Jersey, after which he traveled and preached in Pennsylvania.

In February 1786, he came to Philadelphia and preached at St. George’s Methodist Church and at different places in that city where there was a large colored population. It was out of St. George’s Church that Allen and his followers marched. This was the protest and in March which caused the birth of African Methodism. “On June 6, 1831 Bishop Richard Allen died and went to heaven, to meet God.”  (For more on Richard Allen and Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church, see reseach on Slavery in Pennsylvania.)

SOURCE: MOTHER BETHEL A.M.E. CHURCH (1760-1831), FOUNDER OF MOTHER BETHAL A.M.E. CHURCH PHILADELPHIA, PA.