Back to Top

African-American Resources

The following African-American Resources relate to New Bern or Craven County, or are written by natives of New Bern or Craven County.

North Carolina Slave Narratives from the Library of Congress
Part 1 (Adams to Hunter) and Part 2 (Jackson to Yellerday)
New Bern is mentioned in the interviews with:

  • Allen, Martha
  • Barbour, Mary
  • Freeman, Frank
  • Harris, George W.
  • Huggins, Alex
  • Rogers, Hattie
  • Whitfield, J.W.

The Anthology of Zion Methodism with an Appendix by William Henry Davenport ("journalist and minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, was born in New Bern...")

A Brief History of the Slave Life of Rev. L.R. Ferebee, and the Battles of Life, and Four Years of His Ministerial Life by L.R. Ferebee (1882).

Defense of the Negro Race--Charges Answered. Speech of Hon. George H. White, of North Carolina, in the House of Representatives, January 29, 1901.

Digital Library on American Slavery (at UNC-Greensboro)

Episcopal Church, Commission of Home Missions to Colored People, 9th Annual Report, 1873-74

Episcopal Church, Commission of Home Missions to Colored People, 11th Annual Report, 1875-76

Fact Stranger than Fiction: Seventy-five Years of a Busy Life...by John Patterson Green, 1920. (Author was born in New Bern in 1845, first two chapters detail his life in New Bern).

A History of the Negro Baptist Churches of North Carolina by J.A. Whitted

One Hundred Years of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church by James Walker Hood (1895)

Proceedings of the Fifty-Third Annual Session of the Newbern Eastern Missionary Baptist Association of North Carolina Held with the Bethel Baptist Church Edwards, N. C. Nov. 28-30 and Dec. 1, 1918

Proceedings of the Fifty-Fourth Annual Session of the Newbern Eastern Missionary Baptist Association of North Carolina Held with the Saint Luke Baptist Church Morehead City, N.C. Oct. 16-19, 1919

Proceedings of the 58th Annual Session of the New Bern Eastern M. B. Association of North Carolina Held with Mt. Sinai Baptist Church Stonewall, N.C. October 18th to 21st, 1923

Proceedings of the 59th Annual Session of the New Bern Eastern M. B. Association of North Carolina Held with the St. Luke M.B. Church Morehead City, N.C. Oct. 16th to 19th, 1924

Recollections of My Slavery Days by William Henry Singleton (1922)

Report of the Superintendent of Negro Affairs in North Carolina (1864)

A Short Account of the Rise and Progress of the African M.E. Church in America by Christopher Rush (1866)

Sketch of the Early History of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church by James Walker Hood (1914)


Writing of John D. Whitford