St. Bartholomew Episcopal is a striking example of Victorian architecture, rich with detail inside and out. It is also one of Georgia’s most historically significant African American churches, with origins reaching back to the 1830s. At that time, about 1,000 enslaved people worked the rice fields on nearby plantations.

According to the National Register of Historic Places, Episcopal religious education for enslaved people in the area began in 1832 when a white family opened instruction on their plantation. In 1845, the Ogeechee Mission was formally established when the Episcopal bishop appointed Rev. William C. Williams as the first permanent pastor to the region. Serving several plantations, Williams built chapels and schools on each, and by 1860 his congregation was the largest in the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia, black or white.

Before the Civil War, enslaved people were usually required to attend their owner’s church and rarely allowed to form their own congregations. African American Episcopal churches have always been rare in Georgia, concentrated mainly in the coastal region. The Episcopal Church was unusual in its dedication to educating enslaved people so they could read and follow the liturgy, although teaching writing was discouraged and even outlawed for a time in Colonial Georgia.

St. Bartholomew is located in the village of Burroughs, the oldest continuing Black congregation in the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia. After the Civil War, Burroughs became a settlement of formerly enslaved people who, in the 1870s and 1880s, were able to purchase the land they lived on. In 1881, St. Bartholomew’s Church in New York City donated $400 to the mission congregation for a new schoolhouse and church. The present church building was consecrated in 1896, and the parish house was completed the following year.

Through the years, St. Bartholomew has served as both a religious and educational center for its community. The congregation reached more than 400 members in the early 1900s and remains active today, though smaller in number. In 1982, the church was placed on the National Register of Historic Places, ensuring the preservation of this remarkable piece of Georgia’s African American heritage.