Peter Williams, Jr.

Who was Peter Williams, Jr.?

Peter Williams, Jr. was an African-American Episcopal priest, the second ordained in the United States, and abolitionist in New York City. He supported free black emigration to Haiti, the black republic that achieved independence in 1804. Later in life he strongly opposed the American Colonization Society's efforts to relocate free blacks to a colony in Africa.

In 1808 he organized St. Philip's African Church, the second black Episcopal church in the United States. In 1827 he was a co-founder of Freedom's Journal, the first African-American owned and operated newspaper in the United States. In 1833 he founded the Phoenix Society, a mutual aid society for African Americans; that year he was also elected to the executive board of the interracial American Anti-Slavery Society.