Black History Month: Rev. Theodore Sedgwick Wright
The Rev. Theodore Sedgwick Wright, abolitionist and minister, was the first African American to graduate from Princeton Theological Seminary, in 1828. He was the pastor of New York’s First Colored Presbyterian Church, later known as Shiloh Presbyterian Church—successor church to the current St. James Presbyterian Church in Harlem. Wright was a founding member of the American Anti-Slavery Society, and a conductor of the Underground Railroad, using his own home as a station.
The Wright Library at Princeton Theological Seminary is named after Rev. Wright. In a dedication speech at the Wright Library, Dr. Lisa Bowens, Associate Professor of New Testament said this of Wright:
“Theodore Sedgwick Wright, class of 1828, was a giant. He was a well-known abolitionist, preacher, and pastor, who was part of a group of leading abolitionists of his day that included people such as Frederick Douglass, Daniel Payne, Samuel Eli Cornish, and David Walker. Frederick Douglass called Wright one of the most intellectual and moral men in the country. . . As a participant in the Underground Railroad, as one of the founders of the American Anti-Slavery Society, as an agent of America’s first black newspaper, Freedom’s Journal, and as chair of the New York Vigilance Committee, Wright dedicated his life to the abolition of slavery and to the dismantling of the prejudice that undergirded it.”
You can find Dr. Bowen’s complete biographical reflection on Wright here:
https://ptsem.edu/about/the-quad/news/news-biographical-reflection/
And read more about Rev. Wright here:
https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/wright-theodore-sedgwick-ca-1797-1847/