First Sunday Lecture: Tunis Campbell: Reconstruction Politician

Dr. William Marchione shared his research about Reconstruction politician, Tunis Campbell, at the Sunday Lecture on February 10. Councilwoman Maryline Blackburn provided the introduction. Thanks go to our speakers and to all who attended this fascinating presentation on Georgia history.

Presenter: Dr. William Marchione, author of A Brief History of Smyrna, Georgia

Lecture Overview

Tunis Campbell was the highest-ranking and most influential African American politician in nineteenth-century Georgia. Born to free black parents in New Jersey in 1812, Campbell worked as an abolitionist often sharing a stage with Frederick Douglass. After the Civil War, he worked for the Freedmen's Bureau in Georgia and served as vice president of the Republican Party of Georgia. As a justice of the peace, a minister, and a politician, he worked to protect the rights of freed African Americans during Reconstruction.

The First Sunday Lecture series is sponsored by the Friends of Smyrna Library and Smyrna Library.