Charles T. Walker

“ Walker was one of the leading figures of the National Baptist Convention, and he is such to-day. For three years he was its Treasurer, and for many years was Vice President for Georgia. He is now Vice President for New York. He has attended every annual meeting since the beginning, without missing a single one. Not a partisan, not a factionist, not a stirrer up of strife among the brethren, not a division-maker, a man of peace, probably no man has a larger and more loyal following among the Negro Baptists of America than he has. ”

“ When the civil war broke out Walker followed the king to York and Oxford, and accompanied him in his campaigns. On 24 April 1642 Charles sent Walker and another herald to demand the surrender of Hull, and to proclaim Sir John Hotham traitor in case of refusal (Hist. MSS. Comm. 15th Rep. ii. 95) . About the end of September 1642 the king constituted Walker his secretary-at-war, and on 13 April 1644 he was sworn in as secretary-extraordinary to the privy council. ”

“ Walker is one of the best known colored men in this country. He ranks with Booker T. Washington in prominence, and has won this prominence through intelligence and ability. He is now Pastor of Mount Olivet Baptist Church in New York City, one of the largest and strongest churches among the colored people of the North. ”

“ Walker says that they cannot be signs of hard work or trouble, because he was told by his mother that he had a number of gray hairs in his head in his infancy. His skin is very dark, but there are many very much darker men among the colored people. He never would be taken for a great man, judging from his appearance. Not a large man in stature, without a commanding appearance, he never would be looked at for the second time when one passes him on the street and never would be taken for one of the world’s most famous preachers in any large gathering with other distinguished men. ”

“ Walker was “a young man full of life and piety, beautiful and attractive in delivery. He is an electrifying orator and waxes warm in the end. He is a great revivalist, a finished and pointed workman.”
In this same convention Rev. Walker won for himself a national reputation for his wise and conservative stand when the body had under consideration the outlawry, lynch law and other outrages of the South. He was referred to, by the leading newspapers of the country, as a strong man in a crisis. The other members of the body, almost to a man, indulged in wholesale abuse of the South ”

“ Walker caught the crowd at the outset by announcing that if any one doubted the sincerity of the promoters of the Golden Rule Meeting, their doubts would be dispelled so soon as they saw him on the platform to make an address; for, said he, so far as he knew, his race identity had never been questioned. This sally provoked great laughter and applause, because Mr. Walker is a very dark-skinned Negro, and the audience saw at once the wit and humor of his statement and appreciated it.
THE GOLDEN RULE AS AN INDIVIDUAL MOTTO.
“All men are the workmanship of the same Almighty Father. ”

“ John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, who got his knowledge of slavery while sojourning in the colony of Georgia, did not err when he denounced slavery as “the sum of all villainies.”
In such a school as this, Charles Thomas Walker received his early training. How different from the early training of such men as Henry Wilson, Abraham Lincoln, William McKinley, James A. Garfield, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, and other white men who were born to poverty. Though these men were born in humble circumstances, yet they were born to freedom. ”

“ In the Civil War, which so soon followed, and later in the service of the Khedive of Egypt, were several of Walker’s officers, and for years after his death there was no war in which one of the men trained by him in the jungles of Nicaragua did not distinguish himself. In his memoirs, the Englishman, General Charles Frederic Henningsen, writes that though he had taken part in some of the greatest battles of the Civil War he would pit a thousand men of Walker’s command against any five thousand Confederate or Union soldiers. ”

“ Walker soon became noted as a preacher in and around Augusta. Possessing a fair knowledge of the Bible, and at all times an earnest and enthusiastic speaker, the people literally crowded to hear the “boy preacher,” as the Rev. C. T. Walker, on account of his age and youthful appearance, was called for a good many years after he entered the ministry. October 1st, 1877, he was called to the pastorate of the Franklin Covenant Baptist Church, near Hephzibah, and assumed the duties of the office on the first day of January, 1878. ”

“ Walker’s home is in Augusta, Ga. He is so well thought of by the prominent people of his city that when the mayor died yesterday, he received several telegrams asking him to come and attend the funeral. He may return home to-day, but may decide to remain longer.
“Every seat in the large auditorium of the new colored church was occupied when he ascended the pulpit steps last night, and long rows of black faces looked down at him from the balcony.
“Dr. Walker is a man of perhaps forty or more. He is of medium size ”

“ This universal suggestion is the product of the force, united with persuasiveness, that one marked{182} at the outset as characteristic of Walker and his work. It comes of the large seriousness with which he thinks and works, of the true perspective through which he views his subject, wherein facts and sentiment take their due place not only in the foreground, but in their relation to a distant horizon. These risings and settings of the sun, that he loves so much, have run their course through ages ”

“ Mr. Walker was married to Miss Violet Q. Franklin, of Hephzibah, Ga. To them four children were born. Three children are dead. One son is still living—Master Jonathan Walker, a lad yet in his teens. One daughter, Mrs. Alberta Walker Hughes, left a daughter at her death, and this grandchild is pet of Dr. Walker and wife.
Dr. Walker remained in LaGrange for nearly three years. While there he was a busy, active, energetic, influential and successful pastor. It was while there that he gave promise of his future eminence as a soul-stirring, soul-saving evangelist. ”

“ Desisting for a time from his efforts, Walker occupied himself in writing an account of his exploits, in a book entitled "The War in Nicaragua." But this was far too tame work for one of his stirring disposition, and in June, 1860, he was off again, this time making Honduras the scene of his invading energy. Landing at Truxillo on the 27th, he seized that town and held it for eight weeks, at the end of which time he was ordered to leave the place by the captain of a British man-of-war. The president of Honduras was rapidly approaching with a defensive force. ”

“ In November 1655 Walker joined Charles II at Cologne, and became once more secretary of the council (Nicholas Papers, iii. 116, 138) . In the autumn of 1656 Charles got together a small army in the Netherlands, and Walker was again charged with the functions of secretary-at-war, a business which the want of money to pay the soldiers made particularly troublesome (Cal. Clarendon Papers, iii. 186, 208, 226) . His salary for the office consisted of four rations a day out of the pay allowed for reformados (Hist. MSS. Comm. 15th Rep. ii. 109) . ”

“ No man in Augusta has a deeper hold upon the whole community than Dr. Walker. His success as a pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church in this city for the past fourteen years has been phenomenal and humanly speaking it does not appear that a man can be found to take his place at this church. Aside from Tabernacle Church, all the people of Augusta, white and colored, are anxious that Dr. Walker remain in Augusta. Should he decide to accept the call to New York, Dr. Walker will leave behind him thousands of loving hearts whose prayers will follow him wherever his lot may be cast. ”

“ Thus closed the conquering career of this minor Cortez of the nineteenth century. But while Walker the president was no more, Walker the filibuster was not squelched. The passion for adventure was as strong in his mind as ever, and his brief period of power had roused in him an unquenchable thirst for rule. In consequence he made effort after effort to get back to the scene of his exploits, and rise to power again, his persistent thirst for invasion giving the United States authorities no small trouble and ending only with his death. ”

“ In some respects he is exceedingly frank: in others, no man is more reserved. He likes company and likes to talk about the things which interest him most, and there are thousands of living mortals who will testify that they have never found any man in general conversation more interesting or more entertaining than he. In Georgia, where people are always very democratic in their ways, for hours and hours great crowds of men, old and young, have considered it a privilege and an honor to be permitted to stand in some barber shop or drug store or grocery store and listen to Dr. Walker talk. ”

“ H. B. Frissell, Governor MacCorkel and others participated, and was also a reply to some strictures heaped upon the race in Carnegie Lyceum the Sunday before by A. Rev. Henry Frank. The newspapers in the metropolis and throughout the country published extracts from Dr. Walker’s address, and the speech won the orator much fame, as well as the title, “the defender of his race.” Following are extracts from
AN APPEAL TO CÆSAR.
“It is my desire to speak to you on this occasion concerning a race of people greatly misrepresented, despised, oppressed and hated ”

“ McKinley is not dead to this American nation. He is still joined to us by the past, and by the still more glorious anticipations of the future. Heaven has discussed the sins of America as Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley, our martyred Presidents, have walked the golden streets, arm in arm. Too long have we winked at crime, lawlessness and anarchy. And we must yet learn that the highest citizen is not safe so long as the life of the lowest citizen is not protected. ”

“ Ministers of all the denominations (white and colored) , professional and business men, the presidents and prominent men of the fraternal and benevolent organizations, together with the political and prominent educational leaders of the city of Augusta, will be present to join in the urgent request to Dr. Charles Thomas Walker not to alter his determination to resume his pastorate at Augusta, Ga.
“All citizens of Augusta and vicinity are invited to attend a mass meeting to be held at Tabernacle Baptist Church on Monday night, November 18, 1901. ”

“ The International Convention meets once every three years. At its last meeting, in 1899, in Atlanta, Ga., the Hon. Hoke Smith, Secretary of the Interior under Cleveland’s second administration, was elected President, and Dr. Walker was elected one of the five Vice Presidents. He was unanimously presented for this place by the colored delegates present at the meeting, and these delegates represented many different denominations. It is an honor not lightly to be esteemed for a Negro to hold an office in such an important religious body. ”

“ Walker said among other things:
“If all men would recognize the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, pledge implicit obedience to the divine law and practice the scriptural code of ethics, there would be no race problem. The race problem is born of wickedness, inflamed by modern fanatics, stimulated and encouraged by speculative, unworthy politicians. The Negro [8] is a loyal, peaceable, law-abiding citizen; among them you will find no anarchist, nihilist, liberalist, communionist or strikers; the Negro has always been found on the side of the constitution of his State and the Union ”

“ He has believed and has taught that it is the duty of every citizen to be interested in the political welfare of his city, State and country, and, in his judgment, no man is entitled to be called a good citizen who allows the vicious and corrupt to do all the voting and all the dictating, and then sits down and sighs for what is called “the better and purer days of the Republic.” ”

“ I appear in behalf of a people born in tribulation and disciplined in the hard school of slavery; opposed and persecuted, as it has been, by some of the brightest minds that ever spoke or wielded a pen, and yet defended by some of the ablest, purest and noblest men and women the earth has ever known ”

“ Walker escape? A man’s character is not evinced by the manner in which he is slandered and abused and traduced, nevertheless; but a man’s character is shown by the manner in which he accepts misrepresentation and abuse and slander. Dr. Walker has the courage which faces difficulties, braves rebuke and contumely, is not afraid of harsh names and ugly epithets; the courage that can look danger and persecution in the face and not shrink before them, brave before ridicule not less than before threatening; the rare courage which in the discharge of duty is not afraid of what men shall say. ”

“ The road to victory is often through seas, through the fire, over mountains, through floods and through flames. We must go through the world’s wild forest of tribulation, through the den of lions, over the mountains of leopards, through the fiery furnace, but we must go. ”

“ His achievements since he has been a resident of this imperial city compel admiration; they touch the finer chords of our nature. They inspire feelings akin to those we experience in listening to the grand strains of an oratorio. ”