[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 85 (Wednesday, May 18, 2022)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E531-E532]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




      HONORING THE LIFE AND SERVICE OF SENATOR HIRAM RHODES REVELS

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. BENNIE G. THOMPSON

                             of mississippi

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, May 18, 2022

  Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the 
life and service of Senator Hiram Rhodes Revels.
  Senator Revels was the first Black person to serve in the United 
Sates Senate, and he was the first pastor of Zion Chapel African 
Methodist Episcopal Church in Natchez.
  Senator Revels was born a free man in Fayetteville, North Carolina on 
September 27, 1827. In 1845, Senator Revels was ordained a minister in 
the African Methodist Episcopal Church after attending the Beech Grove 
Quaker Seminary in Indiana and Darke Seminary for Blacks in Ohio. At 
the beginning of the Civil War, Senator Revels established two Colored 
Troop regiments from Maryland, and in 1862, he served as Chaplin for a 
U.S. Colored Troop regiment in Vicksburg, MS and Natchez, MS. In 1863 
Senator Revels established a Freedman's school in St. Louis, MO. In 
1866 after serving churches in Louisville, KY and New Orleans, LA, 
Senator Revels settled in Natchez, MS where he became pastor of Zion 
Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1868, Senator Revels' 
first elected position was as a Natchez Alderman. In 1869, Senator

[[Page E532]]

Revels was elected to the Mississippi Legislature as a Senator. On 
January 20, 1870, the Mississippi Legislature voted to seat Senator 
Revels to fill one of two unexpired Mississippi U.S. Senate seats 
vacated by Senator Albert Brown and Senator Jefferson Davis, who 
vacated his Senate seat to serve as President of the Confederacy. 
During Reconstruction, as Mississippi was readmitted to the Union on 
February 23, 1870, Hiram Rhodes Revels took his seat on February 25, 
1870 as the first Black person to serve in the United States Senate and 
served on the Education and Labor Committee.
  At the end of his Senate term on March 3, 1871, Senator Revels chose 
to return to Mississippi to become the first President of Alcorn State 
University, formally known as Oakland College. Alcorn is the first 
landgrant school in the United States for Black students. Alcorn is 
named for Senator Revels' political supporter, Governor James Alcorn. 
Briefly, in 1873, Senator Revels was chosen as Mississippi interim 
Secretary of State after the death of John Roy Lynch. He took a hiatus 
from Alcorn in 1874 and became the pastor of a church in Holly Springs, 
MS. In 1876 he returned as President of Alcorn and retired in 1882. 
Senator Revels returned to the ministry in Holly Springs where he died 
January 16, 1901.
  Madam Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring Senator 
Hiram Rhodes Revels.

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