# Joseph Harden > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Joseph_Harden > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Joseph_Harden.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Harden > Source revision: 1301093670 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{Short description|African-American missionary (1824–1864)}} '''Joseph Harden''' (1824–1864) was an African American missionary whose proselytizing activity was in West Africa. Harden founded the First Baptist Church in Lagos and laid the foundation of the [Baptist Academy](/source/Baptist_Academy) in Lagos. == Life == Harden was born free to parents who had known slavery, his father was of the Methodist Faith and Harden was baptized as a Methodist before switching to the Southern Baptist Church. Upon his switch, he became a member of the Saratoga Street African Baptist Church in Baltimore.{{Cite book|last=Lindsay, Lisa A.|title=Atlantic bonds : a nineteenth-century odyssey from America to Africa|date=22 December 2016 |publisher=|isbn=978-1-4696-3113-4|location=Chapel Hill|pages=102–104, 140|oclc=967938956}} When the [Southern Baptist Convention](/source/Southern_Baptist_Convention) established a [Foreign Mission Board](/source/International_Mission_Board) to sponsor missionary activities, a mission station was to be established in China and in [West Africa](/source/West_Africa), the presence of ex-slaves in [Liberia](/source/Liberia) was thought by the Baptist to be a suitable location to convert Africans to Christianity. Harden, a member of a Baptist church in Maryland was nominated by the mission board to relocate to Liberia for missionary duties.{{Cite web|title=History Highlights|url=https://bcmd.org/about-us/history/history-highlights/|access-date=2020-08-20|archive-date=2020-09-29|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200929010321/https://bcmd.org/about-us/history/history-highlights/|url-status=dead}} Harden's initial experience with mission life in West Africa was demoralizing, his first wife and child died within a year of reaching the shores of Liberia. He took a second wife, a Liberian lady who died at childbirth. But, he was ready to endure to succeed in his endeavour. In Liberia, he befriended John Day, who was in charge of the Baptist Mission, and also spent time with a young American preacher, William Clark who was on his way to Ijaye and [James Churchill Vaughan](/source/James_Churchill_Vaughan) who later played a role in the development of the church in Lagos. Harden transferred services to Lagos in 1855, by then two Southern Baptist missionaries preceded his arrival, [Thomas Bowen](/source/Thomas_Jefferson_Bowen) and William H. Clark were in [Oyo](/source/Ijaiye), trying to make inroads with the people of Ijaye. But it was in Lagos that Harden established a mission station and house built from [bamboo](/source/bamboo) and made use of an interpreter to preach his message.{{Cite book|last=Bowen|first=T. J.|title=Central Africa. Adventures and missionary labors in several countries in the interior of Africa, from 1849 to 1856.|date=1969|publisher=Negro Universities Press|isbn=978-0-8371-1540-5|location=New York|pages=182|language=English|oclc=324231}} The station was the first in Lagos, Harden later opened a tutoring class which became Baptist Academy. He married Sarah Marsh, a saro who later played an important role in the sustenance of the [Baptist church](/source/Nigerian_Baptist_Convention) in Lagos.{{Cite web|title=Our History|url=http://thefirstbaptistchurchlagos.org/our-history/|access-date=2020-08-21|website=FBC Lagos Island|language=en-US}} ==References== {{reflist}} Category:Baptist missionaries from the United States Category:Baptist Christianity in Nigeria Category:People from colonial Nigeria Category:1824 births Category:1864 deaths Category:African-American missionaries Category:Founders of Nigerian schools and colleges Category:History of Lagos Category:African-American Baptist ministers Category:American expatriates in Nigeria Category:19th-century American Christian clergy --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Joseph Harden](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Harden) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Harden?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.