Mt. Olive Baptist Church Celebrates Black History

COURT HOUSE — Mount Olive Baptist Church, 46 E. Atlantic Ave., marked Black History Month on Sat., Feb. 26 with a special program that included prayers, singing of Negro spiritual hymns, remembrances of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela, and a special appearance of Buffalo Soldiers.
Many church members participated in the afternoon celebration of African American experiences, with prayers for those who were torn from their African homeland and brought in chains to the New World where millions were enslaved, became free, and served the nation in all wars.
Pastor Rev. William L. McClurkin joined his congregation as the Negro National Anthem was sung, and Rev. Vera then read Scripture. Willis.
Minister Willie Chaney offers a prayer for those who had gone before, and paved the way for freedom. He offered special words for those mothers and grandmothers who helped raise many in the community.
Sister Joyce Thompson gave a moving re-enactment of Rosa Parks’ day when she, after a day at work, refused to give up her bus seat to a white man, as was the law of the city at the time, and became a guiding light in the civil rights movement.
Rev. James Hatch of Wildwood told of his father, pastor at a Wildwood church, who met on one o that city’s beach with Dr. King, before he held that title, and other key persons who helped form the nucleus of the later civil rights movement.
Hatch talked of King in a personal way, and noted that he believed his work was to learn all he could, then return to the South and confront the “dragon” of segregation, which was also pervasive at the time in the North.
Sister Tina L. Hobbs retold the life story of Nelson and Winnie Mandela, of South Africa, who surmounted years of imprisonment, then went on to inspire and lead that nation from the grip of apartheid.
The church choir provided an interlude of musical history by singing spirituals “Somebody’s Knocking at Your Door,” “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” “Steal Away,” and “Wade into the Water.”
Edward E. Harshaw Sr., a teacher of history, social studies and World Culture, as well as being a Wildwood commissioner, strode to the front of the church in his regalia of a Buffalo Soldier. He was accompanied by members of the Southern Jersey chapter of Buffalo Soldiers, a motorcycle club whose main goal is to educate about African Americans’ military service during and after the Civil War.
Originally known as “Colored Troops,” Harshaw said the Buffalo Soldiers stemmed from the 180,000 Negroes enlisted in the Union Army during the Civil War. Of those, said Harshaw, 33,000 died in battle.
After the war, units were formed into the 9th and 10th Cavalry on Sept. 21, 1866. The units were responsible for civilizing the West, erecting telegraph poles and wires, and guarding gold shipments from the West.
Disbanded in 1944, Buffalo Soldiers counted 12 Congressional Medal of Honor winners among their ranks, more than any other one unit in Army history, said Harshaw.
Harshaw introduced other members of the unit, including Burgess “Butch” Hamer, a retired Middle Township police officer, and Air Force veteran.
His mother, Bernice Brunson, who played piano during the service, was introduced, and proudly wore a Buffalo Solider cap and jacket.