Thread by @TheCivilWarDoc1

Richard H. Cain passed away #OTD in 1887. Cain represented South Carolina in the US House of Representatives. He was one of six Black men to represent South Carolina in Congress during Reconstruction. Cain was also an abolitionist, newspaper editor, entrepreneur, and minister.

Cain was born to free parents on April 12, 1825, in Greenbrier County, Virginia (modern day West Virginia). He and his family moved to Gallipolis, Ohio, in 1831. Because Ohio was a free state, Cain was provided an education and learned how to read and write.

He became a licensed minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1844 and moved to Hannibal, Missouri. He left the Methodist Church in 1848 to join the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church where he became a minister and deacon.

When the Civil War broke out Cain was studying at Wilberforce University in Ohio. He and 125 other Black students at Wilberforce attempted to enlist in the Union Army but were turned away. He was then assigned to a pastorship at the Bridge Street Church in Brooklyn.

Cain was selected as a delegate to the National Convention of Colored Men in 1864 in Syracuse, New York, where he advocated for universal male suffrage.

In 1865 the AME Church sent Cain to lead Emanuel Church (Mother Emanuel) in Charleston, South Carolina. The next year he co-founded the South Carolina Leader (renamed the Missionary Record in 1868), a weekly Black newspaper in Charleston.

In 1868 he was a delegate to the South Carolina constitutional convention and was elected to the state legislature. Cain lost re-election in 1870 but was named the leader of the Charleston branch of the Republican Party.

Cain served in the US House of Representatives from 1873-75 and 1877-79. During his time in Congress he championed the Civil Rights Act of 1875 and introduced bills to fund public education.

As Democrats began to reestablish white supremacy in South Carolina, Cain became a strong supporter of Black emigration to Liberia. He became a member of the Liberian Exodus Joint Stock Steamship Company in 1877.

Cain left South Carolina for Texas in 1880 to serve as bishop of the Texas–Louisiana Conference. He helped found Paul Quinn College in Texas and served as the school's president for a time. Paul Quinn College is the oldest HBCU west of the Mississippi River.

After his stint as president of Paul Quinn College, Cain moved back to Washington and served as bishop of the AME's Mid-Atlantic and New England States district until his passing.

#TheCivilWarDoc #CivilWar #Reconstruction #BlackHistory #History #SouthCarolina #Onthisday