Terrel, of Clark county, Miss., at the age of 14, as office boy in his law office, gave me a still broader range of books. I think I can say that the Colonel and I really loved each other. I am not sure that I know just when I was regenerated, as my childhood prayers were often attended with refreshing seasons of love and joy. But my life was too often very un-christian, breaking out into the wildest rages of bad temper, which was followed by weeping and remorse. In 1865, however, I reached an experience of grace which so strengthened me as to fix me on the side of the people of God. I went at once to reading the scriptures in public and leading prayer meetings; notwithstanding this, I was not baptized until March, 1866, by Rev. O. D. Bowen, of Shubuta, Miss. I was ordained in the St. Louis Street Church, Mobile, December, 1868, by Revs. Charles Leavens and Philip Gambrell. I taught school for the Freedmen’s Bureau in 1867--taught various schools under our public school system. I have been pastor of the First Colored Baptist Church, Meridian, Miss., Dexter Avenue Church, Montgomery, and held various State positions. The only time I have spent at school was spent in Meharry, the medical department of the Central Tennessee College. C. O. BOOTHE. [Illustration] [Illustration: Rev. J. Q. A. Wilhite, Pastor Sixth Avenue Baptist Church, Birmingham, Ala.] PREFACE. * * * * * This effort to give substantial and favorable testimony in the interest of the men and work of the Colored Baptists of Alabama grows out of certain aims and purposes, such as: 1. The desire to produce a picture of the negro associated with the gospel under the regime of slavery. Such a picture will serve to turn our eyes upon the social, moral and religious forces of the dark times and their fruits in the negro’s life. 2. The desire to make comparisons--to compare the colored man of 1865 with the colored man of 1895. Such a comparison will help the black man himself to see whether or not he is a _growing_ man or a _waning_ man. It will also serve to show the same thing to the friend and to the foe. “Appeals to Pharaoh and to Cæsar” are not so wise as appeals to facts, which prove the negro to be man just as other races are man.