James Walker Hood

James Walker Hood (May 30, 1831 – October 30, 1918) was an African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church (AME Zion) bishop in North Carolina from 1872 to 1916. Born and raised in Pennsylvania, he moved to New York and became active in the AME Zion church. Well before the Emancipation Proclamation, he was an active abolitionist.

During the American Civil War he went to New Bern, North Carolina, where he preached for the church to the black people and soldiers in the area. He was very successful and became an important religious and political leader in North Carolina, becoming "one of the most significant and crucial African American religious and race leaders during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries".

By 1887 he had founded over six hundred churches in Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, and erected about five hundred church buildings. He was politically and religiously active as well, supporting education, civil rights, and the ordination of women.

Early life James Walker Hood was born in Kennett township, Chester County, Pennsylvania on May 30, 1831 From boyhood, he fought for his right to ride public transport. Between 1848 and 1863, he noted that conductors on the Pennsylvania railroads many times tried to remove him from the first class cars, but rarely succeeded. He also actively spoke against slavery.

In 1860 he was ordained deacon in the AME Zion church, an independent black denomination founded in New York. He was sent to the Nova Scotia mission in Halifax.

Move to North Carolina Clinton's sending of missionaries to North Carolina was in response to a general invitation by General Butler, who was in charge of the area at that point in the US Civil War (1861–1865). Black soldiers stationed at New Bern at that time did not have a chaplain, and Hood often preached to the troops. His position was informal and he never held a commission, but he was called "chaplain". Hood was present for attacks on New Bern by Confederate troops before the war ended, He was elected a member of the Ecumenical Conference in London in 1881, He presided over the first day of the centennial gathering of the Methodist Church in 1885 in Baltimore. However, he was strongly supported in North Carolina and beyond. He published a volume of sermons with an introduction by Atticus Green Haygood He was a strong advocate against smoking and drinking, He worked to merge black Methodist churches, supported the 1898 Spanish–American War, and worked for civil rights. in New Bern, North Carolina as well as the subsequent several lodges. By 1874, there were eighteen lodges with almost 500 members in North Carolina. He married three times. In about 1853 he married Hannah L. Ralph, who died of consumption in 1855. In about 1858 he married Sophia J. Nugent of Washington City. They had four children. In June, 1877 he married Keziah P. McKoy. They had three children.

On October 30, 1918, James Walker Hood died in Fayetteville, North Carolina.