Beaufort County · Marker 07-37
First African Baptist Church
70 Beach City Rd.
Front inscription
This church, organized in 1862, was first located in the town of Mitchelville, a freedmen's village established on Hilton Head by the United States Army. Rev. Abraham Murchinson, its first pastor, was a former slave. The congregation numbered about 120 members when it was organized in August 1862.
Reverse inscription
The church moved to the Chaplin community after the Civil War and was renamed Goodwill Baptist Church. It moved to this site by 1898 and was renamed Cross Roads Baptist Church before retaking its original name; it is the mother church of five Beaufort County churches. The present building was built in 1966.