VA HR195

Commends First Baptist Church of Williamsburg on its 250th anniversary as one of the oldest African American congregations in the United States

Church originated in 1776 when free and enslaved Black people began meeting secretly for prayer at Green Spring Plantation in James City County, later organized as Baptists in 1781 under Reverend Gowan Pamphlet, an enslaved man

Congregation moved from a carriage house on Nassau Street to a brick church in 1856, then to its current Scotland Street location in 1956; officially renamed First Baptist Church of Williamsburg in 1863

Partnership with Colonial Williamsburg Foundation in 2016 led to creation of the Let Freedom Ring Foundation, which recently discovered 62 graves of church descendants and established a memorial at the site

Directs the Clerk of the House of Delegates to present a copy of the resolution to the church