St. Paul's African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church
Moulton, Lavaca County, Texas
Marker Inscription
ST. PAUL’S AFRICAN METHODIST EPISCOPAL (AME) CHURCH Following the civil war and emancipation, the small but vibrant black population around Moulton began to be served by missionaries of a newly formed offshoot of the Methodist Church called the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church. In 1867, Reverend E. Hammitt became the first Black AME minister in the county, riding a large circuit that included Moulton. In 1887, the modern-day city of Moulton was laid out and founded by Samuel and William Moore. At that time, the brothers donated a plot of land to the city’s black population in the southeastern part of Moulton. On this land, the faithful erected a small one-room church. Often referred to as Moore’s chapel by many locals, the little church nourished the religious needs of the black community. Following the end of World War I, the church became the African American school for the community. More space was needed so, in 1921, the church trustees purchased land and erected a new building for the church and school. Although the space offered few amenities, the congregation flourished here for decades. In 1948, the Moulton Independent School District built a new school for the district’s black children. Due to disrepair, hurricane and flood damage, a new church was built in 1962 under the leadership of Rev. W.O. Johnson and Joseph Parker. After several more decades of faithful religious and community service, the migration to urban areas caused the membership of the church to decline. St. Paul’s AME Church reluctantly closed its doors in 2007. Although the church is no longer in operation, its 120 years of service as a spiritual beacon will remain in the hearts of the community.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
After emancipation, AME missionaries began serving the Black community around Moulton, and in 1867 Reverend E. Hammitt became the county's first Black AME minister on a wide circuit. When Moulton was founded in 1887, its founders donated land where the congregation built a modest one-room church, long known locally as Moore's Chapel. The building doubled as the community's African American school after World War I, sustaining faith and education together until the congregation finally closed its doors in 2007.
Why it matters
It embodies how the AME Church—born as an independent Black denomination—became a spiritual, educational, and civic anchor for freedpeople and their descendants across the rural South.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
When the Civil War ended and emancipation came, Black communities across Texas faced the enormous work of building free lives — and among the first institutions they claimed as their own was the church. Around Moulton, in Lavaca County, a small but vibrant Black population began, in these first years of freedom, to gather for worship on their own terms.
They were served by missionaries of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, an independent Black Methodist denomination that spread rapidly into the South as freedpeople sought a faith community they controlled themselves. For a scattered rural population, a visiting minister on a wide circuit was often the only regular link to organized worship.
This was the Reconstruction era, a time of both hope and hardship for African Americans. The institutions built then — churches above all — would carry Black communities through the difficult decades that followed, providing not only faith but leadership, education, and a measure of independence in a segregated world.
People & events
The story here begins with a circuit rider. In 1867, Reverend E. Hammitt became the first Black AME minister in the county, riding a large circuit that included Moulton — one man carrying the church to communities spread across the countryside.
The congregation got its permanent footing when the modern city of Moulton was laid out in 1887 by Samuel and William Moore. The brothers donated a plot of land to the city's Black population in the southeastern part of town, and there the faithful built a small one-room church. Locals came to call it Moore's Chapel, and it nourished the religious life of the community.
Then the little church took on a second calling. After World War I, it became the African American school for the community, joining worship and learning under one roof. Soon the space was too small, so in 1921 the trustees bought land and put up a new building for both church and school. Even with few amenities, the congregation flourished there for decades. A separate public school for the district's Black children followed in 1948, and after storm and flood damage left the old building in disrepair, a new church was raised in 1962 under Rev. W. O. Johnson and Joseph Parker.
Its place in the American story
The African Methodist Episcopal Church holds a singular place in American history as one of the first denominations founded and led entirely by Black Americans. To worship in an AME congregation was to belong to an institution that answered to no white authority — a rare and precious independence in the nineteenth-century South.
What happened at Moore's Chapel — a church that became a schoolhouse — was repeated across the rural South, and it captures a profound truth about Black life after emancipation. Where public support for Black education was grudging or absent, the church stepped in, and faith and literacy advanced together. The building that held Sunday services on the weekend held lessons during the week.
The long arc of this congregation, from its founding through more than a century of service, also traces one of the great population shifts of the twentieth century: the migration from the rural South toward the cities. As families moved away, membership thinned — the same tide that reshaped countless small Southern communities.
If you visit
It is important to know before you come that St. Paul's AME closed its doors in 2007, so this is a place to reflect rather than a congregation to join for a service. Approach it as you would any site where a community poured a century of devotion — with quiet respect.
Stand in this southeastern corner of Moulton and consider the layers of history on this modest ground: a one-room chapel, a schoolhouse, and the successive buildings that replaced them as the years and the storms took their toll. The plainness of the setting is part of the story, a reminder of how much was accomplished with how little.
Moulton is a small town in the Czech- and German-settled country of Lavaca County, and this site adds an essential chapter that those better-known heritage stops leave out — the history of the Black families who built and sustained their own spiritual and educational home here for 120 years. Take a moment to honor that endurance before you drive on.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · E. Hammitt
- · W.O. Johnson
Themes & tags
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