en deeper feelings than the most polished,
but less original" and artificial discourses.[25]

Lott Cary early exhibited the power of an organizer. In 1815, William
Crane, who was a member of the First Baptist Church, felt that his
ought to use his talent among the twelve hundred Negro members of that
congregation. Consequently, he and David Roper[26] gratuitously
opened a tri-weekly night school in the gallery of the old church with
Lott Cary, Colin Teague and fifteen or twenty leading members of the
church as pupils.[27] Now Crane was able to inspire such a group to
practical missionary service, for he himself had been repeatedly urged
to become a missionary and had had close contact with Luther Rice as
one of the managers of the General Missionary Convention. But it was
left to Lott Cary to excite among the Negroes a strong interest in
behalf of Africa. The result was the formation of the Richmond African
Baptist Missionary Society in 1815. Crane was the president or
corresponding secretary.[28] This was necessary, for since the various
uprisings of Negroes[29] were making Virginia a hotbed of discontent,
the city of Richmond was wary of having Negro meetings unless they
were sponsored by white persons. Crane represented the Society in the
General Missionary Convention,[30] formed in 1814, and remained its
delegate for about twenty years.

At the first triennial session of the Convention at Philadelphia, in
May, 1817, a letter was read from the corresponding secretary of the
Richmond African Baptist Missionary Society and it was unanimously

Resolved, that the said letter be noticed on the minutes of the
Convention, and that the Board, if they find it practicable, be
advised to institute an African Mission, conformably to the
wishes of the said African Mission Society; and that the
Corresponding Secretary of the Board be requested to communicate
this resolution together with an encouraging affectionate letter
to that society.[31]

Feeling of sympathy for the African was high. Many slave-holding
Baptists felt that they owed the Negro a debt which they should
pay.[32] Moreover, the board of the Convention felt that the interest
in Foreign missions manifested by the Negro Baptists of Richmond was a
providential plan whereby the slaves brought from Africa might be
converted and returned to evangelize that continent.[33] Since,
therefore, mission work could be propagated in Africa in