File:N 53 138 First Congegational Church edited alt (24772201766).jpg

English: First Congregational Church (1867 est., brick church built 1914)

First Congregational Church began in 1867 when the American Missionary Association (AMA) of Albany, N.Y., established a freedman’s school in a frame building on South Street, just west of the old Governor’s Palace. It preceded the establishment of Washington School, built in 1869. Affiliated with the National Council of Congregational Churches, the AMA converted the former school building into a permanent home for a Congregational Church, with AMA missionary Rev. Fisk P. Brewer as its first pastor. In 1877, Rev. George S. Smith became the first African-American pastor.
By 1896 a larger frame church with a corner entry tower had been built at the corner of South and Manly Streets. The original building was then used as a chapel.
In 1914, this Gothic Revival brick church replaced the second frame church. It featured a two-story corner entrance tower with a belfry, a cut stone foundation, a slate roof, and stained-glass Gothic-arch windows.
Because of urban renewal in Raleigh’s south side in the early 1970s, the church was slated for demolition. The congregation broke ground for a new facility in Southeast Raleigh in 1976. Many elements of the 1912 building, including the church bell, stained-glass windows, pipe organ, pews, and pulpit furniture were incorporated into the new building.

From the Albert Barden Collection, State Archives of North Carolina, Raleigh, NC.