David Boles Foundation

This is the man for whom the organization is named, Reverend David Boles, Sr.

Reverend David Boles, Sr.

The David Boles Foundation is named for Reverend David Boles. He was an entrepreneur and minister from the early 1900’s through the 1950’s. He founded Canaan Missionary Baptist Church in Richmond Hill, GA, (originally on Cherry Hill Plantation, now Ford Field and River Club). He was the pastor of Bryan Neck Missionary Baptist Church during the Henry Ford Era and was pastor when Henry Ford helped to renovate the church to the existing building. He also founded Little Bryan Missionary Baptist Church in Savannah because many of his members relocated to the East Gwinnett Street area in Savannah in search of gainful employment during the Great Depression. He pastored Little Bryan and Bryan Neck simultaneously. He founded New Zion Baptist Church in Riceboro, GA. He was pastor of First African Missionary Baptist in Jones (McIntosh County) when the existing edifice was built. He also pastored Beach Hill Missionary Baptist Church in Midway, GA, and Saint Paul Missionary Baptist Church in Savannah, GA. Under his leadership, two prayer houses in the Brisbon Community were built. He owned a store in Savannah and operated a “rolling store” that served residents of Riceboro and Jones, GA, and the Burroughs Community in Chatham County, GA. He served as the treasurer for the Zion Missionary Association for decades.

Natives of Richmond Hill Plantations are Geechees

Long before cotton became king, rice ruled the low country. In Georgia, as in South Carolina, a caste of elite planters quickly established itself after Parliament removed the export duty on rice and royal policy lifted limitations on the number of land grants to individuals. Planters grabbed prime rice-growing land by the thousands of acres. Soon fewer than five percent of Georgia landholders owned twenty percent of the land – a situation the founding Trustees had hoped to prevent. The popularity of the labor intensive crop led to a heavy dependence on slave labor. Soon slaves outnumbered whites in the coastal low country. After the slaves harvested the rice, the Atlantic trade system carried it to locations as far away as South America and Europe.

Richmond Hill was predominantly slave plantations

The history of Richmond Hill goes back to the earliest days of the Georgia colony when, in 1733, General James Oglethorpe built Fort Argyle near the confluence of the Ogeechee and Canoochee Rivers to protect the western approaches to Savannah. The legalization of slavery in 1750 and the availability of highly cultivable agricultural bottom land along the Ogeechee River led to rapid settlement in lower St. Philip Parish (Bryan Neck) through the issuance of crown land grants prior to the Revolution.

Bryan Neck Missionary Baptist Church

Organized in 1869, the oldest African-American church congregation in lower Bryan County is the Bryan Neck Missionary Baptist Church. The members first gathered under a bush harbor. The first structure for the church was built in 1870. Reverend London Harris organized the church. The church was renovated and enlarged at the time the nearby Carver school was built in 1939 while Reverend David Boles, Sr. was pastor.

Ulysses Houston

Ulysses L. Houston was a pastor and state legislator in Georgia. He was elected to the Georgia State Legislature in 1868, and was an influential organizer in Savannah, Georgia's African-American community during the mid-19th century. Licensed to preach in 1855, he was the pastor of the Third African Baptist Church (later renamed the First Bryan Baptist Church) in Savannah, Georgia, a congregation of about 400, from 1861 to 1889. He was twice president of the black Baptist convention in Georgia. Houston was the third pastor of Bryan Neck Missionary Baptist Church in Richmond Hill, GA. Houston was one of the Original 33 African American legislators of the Reconstruction era in Georgia. He represented Bryan County. He was also one of the 16 freedmen church leaders who met with Union General William Tecumseh Sherman in 1865. From this meeting, Special Field Orders No. 15 (series 1865) was drafted. They were military orders issued during the American Civil War, on January 16, 1865, by General William Tecumseh Sherman. The orders provided for the confiscation of 400,000 acres of land along the Atlantic coast of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida and the dividing of it into parcels of not more than 40 acres, on which were to be settled approximately 18,000 formerly enslaved families and other black people then living in the area.

BOLES PARK IN RICHMOND HILL

Sgt. Boles was awarded the Bronze Star Medal with V Device posthumously

AN AMERICAN ODYSSEUS: THE LONG JOURNEY HOME

This book gives an account of the day that Sgt Harry Lee Boles died in Vietnam. His commander wrote his memoirs.

If you wish to contribute to the David Boles Foundation and its community engagements, scan the Venmo code. If you wish to give large contributions, we can provide IRS documentation so that you may deduct your contribution on your taxes as a charitable contribution (501(C)3). Thank you for your support.

The David Boles Foundation is seeking individual and corporate sponsorships to assist in promoting the festival.

If you wish to volunteer with the David Boles Foundation and its community engagements, you may call (912) 713-3773 for additional information.