National Civil War Chaplains Museum

Meet Lieutenant Colonel Allen Allensworth — a freedman who, in just fifty years of freedom, built a life that spanned teaching, theology, politics, and military service.

Born into slavery in Louisville, Kentucky, on April 7, 1842, Allensworth was the youngest of thirteen children. He first learned to read through a friendship with the son of his slaveholder, and he continued to pursue learning while being passed from slaveowner to slaveowner. In 1861, Allensworth seized his chance for freedom when he escaped and joined the 44th Illinois Infantry Regiment as a member of the Hospital Corps. He later traveled with a surgeon to Georgetown, Ohio, where he experienced true freedom for the first time. In 1863, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and served for two years as a captain’s steward and clerk.

After the war, Allensworth continued his education and taught in Freedmen’s Bureau schools. He attended Roger Williams University, where he received an honorary Master of Arts, and in 1871, he was ordained as a Baptist preacher. After a 15 years of preaching and political service, he returned to military service as a chaplain with the 24th Infantry Regiment in 1886. His assignments took him across the western frontier, and he became the second African American commanding officer in the U.S. Army and the first to reach the rank of lieutenant colonel. Inspired by Booker T. Washington’s Tuskegee Institute, Allensworth later helped establish a community where African Americans could live without fear of discrimination. Named in his honor, Allensworth became the first town in California to be fully founded, funded, and governed by African Americans. Chaplain Allensworth died in 1914 at age 72, but the town he helped create continued to thrive and is now preserved as Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park.

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Help the Chaplains Museum expand our collection and add new exhibits. Look for the "Donate" section at the link in our bio. 

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Join the Chaplains Museum as we unveil our latest exhibit. Last semester, the Chaplains Museum received several donations which tell the stories of two chaplains who served during one of the most harrowing landings in World War II. We will officially unveil the exhibit next week, on June 26 at 12:30pm. The reveal will be streamed live on our Instagram page, so make sure to follow the Chaplains Museum to stay up to date on this and other new additions to the museum.

Help the Chaplains Museum expand our collection and add new exhibits. Look for the "Donate" section at the link in our bio. 

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From the mission field to the battlefield and back again. James Collins Ottipoby was a missionary, an ordained minister with the Reformed Church, and the first Native American to join the Army Chaplains Corps.

Chaplain Ottipoby was a member of the Comanche people, born to a family who had converted to Christianity through the witness of missionaries from the Reformed Church. Upon reaching adulthood, he trained with the Methodist School for Pastors in Chicago and attended Hope College and Western Theological Seminary in Holland, Michigan. He graduated from Hope College in 1925 as the college’s first Native American alumnus. From there, he traveled to Thurston, Nebraska to work as a missionary at Winnebago Mission School. In 1938, Ottipoby was ordained as a minister in the Reformed Church in America.

James Ottipoby registered for the draft on February 16, 1942 and entered active service on May 3, 1943. He began his service as a First Lieutenant, and on June 2 the War Department announced his appointment to the chaplaincy as America’s first Native American chaplain. He trained at the Chaplains’ Training School at Harvard University. During the war, he served primarily in the liberation of the Philippines, including the Battle of Luzon. For his service, he was awarded the Victory Medal, the Philippine Liberation Medal with one Bronze Star, the Asiatic Pacific Theater Medal with two Bronze Stars, and the American Theater Medal. After mustering out as a Captain in 1946, Chaplain Ottipoby returned home to continue his work as a pastor.

Follow the Chaplains Museum for more stories of brave chaplains as we explore the melting pot of American culture.

Help the Chaplains Museum expand our collection and add new exhibits! Look for the "Donate" section at the link in our bio.
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