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 charge of a school eight miles from Nashville. His habit at this time was to walk home on Friday night to attend the meeting of the students' literary society, of which he was a member, work at his tailor's trade all day on Saturday, and walk back on Sunday morning that he might be on hand to conduct the Sabbath-school in his school-house. He was one of the original Jubilee Singers, and continued with the company until its return from its first visit to Great Britain, when he resumed his studies at Nashville.

was born in Wytheville, Virginia, in July, 1850. One of the first things he remembers was the sale of his father to a slave-trader. When five years old he lost his mother, who was also a slave, by death. After emancipation, he went to Chattanooga, Tennessee, where he worked at anything he could find to do. Part of the time he attended an American Missionary Association school, and when sufficiently advanced in his studies, began teaching school himself. But he failed to get his pay, and when he went to Fisk University the next year he was obliged to make economy one of his principal studies. He was very fond of music, and in the cantata of "Esther," in which so many of the Jubilee Singers made their début', he sang the part of Haman. When the Singers returned to America, in 1874, he remained in Edinburgh to pursue studies preparatory to entering the ministry.