Marshall W. Taylor

Marshall W. Taylor (July 1, 1846 – September 11, 1887) was a Methodist Episcopal minister and journalist in Kentucky. He is noted for his book, Collection of Revival Hymns and Plantation Melodies published in 1882. He was also the first black editor of the Southwestern Christian Advocate, a position he held from 1884 until his death in 1887.

Early life Marshall William Taylor was born on July 1, 1846, in Lexington, Kentucky, the youngest of three children. His parents were born slaves but he was born free. His father was Samuel Boyd and his mother was Nancy Ann Boyd and she was of African and Arabian descent. His mother had some education, and was Marshall's first teacher. He also attended school in Lexington, but after his father died, his mother moved Marshall and his brothers to Louisville, Kentucky They were not allowed to attend schools in Louisville, and they moved to Ghent, Kentucky where they stayed for two years and were secretly taught by white children in the neighborhood. They then returned to Louisville before 1861 where Marshall took work as a messenger in the law firm of J. B. Kincaid and John W. Bar formed the United Brothers of Friendship in Louisville. The United Brothers was a fraternal organization similar to the Odd Fellows or the Masons. The group initially sought to help provide impoverished blacks with decent burials. During the American Civil War (1861–1865) the group expanded its mission to caring for the sick. In 1868, they received a charter and organized a state grand lodge.

Taylor also became active in education and Freedmen's schools. Taylor In 1866, Taylor moved to Breckinridge County, Kentucky where he taught schools against the opposition by local whites. In 1868, Taylor was elected president of an educational convention in Owensboro, Kentucky. He moved to New Orleans, Louisiana

Other activities He received an honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity from Central Tennessee College in Nashville in 1879. He wrote a number of small books, including a biography of Reverend George W. Downing, Life of Downey, the Negro Evangelist; a music compilation, Collection of Revival Hymns and Plantation Melodies;,

Legacy of Collection of Revival Hymns and Plantation Melodies Taylor's Collection of Revival Hymns and Plantation Melodies has been widely studied. In 1928, Newman Ivey White argued that the book was problematic because it did not distinguish black plantation hymns and white revival hymns. Later, George Pullen Jackson, who was an advocate of a later discredited theory that Negro spirituals have white origins, criticized the book for a lack of musicality in 1943, but used some of the scores from Taylor's collection as evidence for his theory. In 1979, Irene V. Jackson attempted to restore the significance of the collection in the eyes of historians with her work, and in 1988 Robin Hough added to collection, "is as interesting for its political and religious agenda as it is for its musical content." He had left his home in Indianapolis the day before and died at the home of his brother, George Taylor. His funeral was at Jackson Street, Methodist Church and he was buried at Cave Hill Cemetery in the grave next to that of his mother.