ABSTRACT
Henry McNeal Turner was born of free parents in Abbeville County, South Carolina. His maternal grandfather was an African prince and is reported to have secured his freedom in this country because of his acknowledged royal blood. Turner’s early education was limited and casual, secured largely through informal instruction received from white lawyers in the court house of Abbeville, where he worked as a handyman. Turner soon left South Carolina for Baltimore and at the age of seventeen became a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. Having been licensed to preach in 1853, Turner was admitted to the Missouri Conference of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1858 and was immediately transferred to Baltimore. There Turner received further education at Trinity College and as a special student of Bishop Crimmins of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Bishop Turner was married four times, the first time in 1856 to Miss Eliza Ann Peacher of South Carolina, whose father had migrated to Liberia.
