Diocesan Pilgrimage to Wilmington
This past weekend, 5 of St. John’s Parishioners, Sandra Rhodes, Russell and Carmen Hopkinson and David and Betty Bland joined a Diocesan pilgrimage to Wilmington to honor those that were slain or run out of town leaving their possessions as a result of the Wilmington Massacre, the only successful coup ever to occur in the United States. LuRey Umfleet who has studied and written extensively about the massacre joined us for the entire pilgrimage, providing lectures, slides and commentary throughout.
As part of the pilgrimage, we went to St. James Episcopal Church, which contributed the majority of the white supremacist leaders to the massacre; to St. Paul’s Episcopal which included African American slaves; and St. Mark’s Episcopal which separated from St. Paul’s approximately 120 years ago. We toured the Bellamy Mansion which was built by slave artisans and Craftsman and where we learned how urban slaves were housed, quite different from plantation quarters.
Our tour was part of an ongoing effort by our Diocese’s efforts to better equip us with knowledge and understanding of our slave history that our own growth would be fertilized so that our commitment and personal efforts to be a part of the full meaning of reconciliation and repair would bloom. We were all certainly changed, and you would be too.