THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, February 11, 1996 TAG: 9602100054
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: By DENISE WATSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
STEPHAN'S headstone is like many of the others in the Grove Baptist Church cemetery in Portsmouth. But Stephan has no last name. There are no sweet words of remembrance etched into the gray slab.
All that we know by reading Stephan's headstone is that he was a servant of an A.J. Wise and died Oct. 12, 1852.
``A slave's grave,'' the Rev. Melvin O. Marriner, pastor of the church, said recently.
``This,'' Marriner said looking up at the church,``was often the only place where Negroes were allowed to be buried.''
The headstone freezes a period of time as solid, as solemnly, as the stone itself. Stephan's marker is a reminder of an era many wish to forget, but the stone is there, about 30 feet from an auto parts store.
It's a history that we need to embrace, Marriner said, and the historically black church is removing some of its relics - headstones of African Americans who fought in the Civil War, 129-year-old church logs, Stephan's stone - and creating a public exhibit once some of the items have been treated and preserved. The exhibit, which is expected to be completed next month, will be at the Art Atrium in Portsmouth.
Many of the logs' pages are yellowed and crumbling, but minutes from 1867 meetings, family trees and membership rosters are still clear.
``We knew we had the books somewhere, but we didn't realize what they contained until recently,'' said Marriner, flipping through water-stained pages.
``Look at the penmanship - it's beautiful. The spelling is a little off but you can tell how they sounded out the words. This was during a time when blacks weren't supposed to know how to read and write. Look at how organized they were.''
The hidden treasures - the graves were uncovered as the church moved them for expansion - were a mild surprise for the church whose historical stature is well known. Grove Baptist Church sits on the site where founding members met in 1840, an outgrowth of Sycamore Hill Baptist Church, now known as Churchland Baptist.
``During that time,'' Marriner said, ``It was a requirement for blacks to go to church. The thinking was that a good Christian would make a good slave. that whites allowed them to set up their own church.''
A member of Sycamore Hill Baptist Church donated the building and land to the new congregation. The church received its name from the thick grove of trees surrounding the wooden building. Blacks met separately but still received the word of God from a visiting Sycamore pastor who had to preach because it was illegal for blacks to assemble without white supervision.
After the Civil War, Grove Baptist members were allowed to develop their own governing body and rules: Males had to pay 10 cents a month for missionary purposes, and women paid five. Members found guilty of adultery, fornication and ``hosting a party,'' a sin recorded in a November 1867 entry, were dismissed from the church.
``In those days, if you did something wrong, people came to church and told it,'' Marriner said. ``They kept attendance. You couldn't keep attendance today. People would say, `I'll come to church when I want to come to church!'
``Talk about unity?'' Marriner asked.
``This was unity.'' MEMO: The exhibit is expected to be completed and on display in the Art Atrium
in Portsmouth in three weeks. For more information, call the church at
484-4149. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
CHRISTOPHER REDDICK/The Virginian-Pilot
Grove Baptist Church in Portsmouth recently uncovered 129-year-old
church logs and other relics.
KEYWORDS: BLACK HISTORY MONTH by CNB