Background
John Chavis was born c. 1763 in Granville County, North Carolina, United States.
John Chavis was born c. 1763 in Granville County, North Carolina, United States.
He was sent to Princeton to study privately under President Witherspoon of the College of New Jersey, according to tradition to demonstrate whether or not a negro had the capacity to take a college education. That the test was successful, then or later, appears from a record in the manuscript Order Book of the Rockbridge County Court of 1802, which certifies to the freedom and character of the Rev. John Chavis, a black, who "as a student at Washington Academy" (the former "Liberty Hall Academy" of William Graham, now Washington and Lee University) passed successfully "through a regular course of academic studies. "
Through the influence of the Rev. Samuel Davies, a Presbyterian divine, Chavis became connected as a licentiate with the Presbyteries of Lexington and Hanover. The Hanover records state that in 1801 he was "riding as a missionary under the direction of the General Assembly. " About 1805 he migrated to North Carolina, joining in 1809 the Orange Presbytery and ministering to whites and slaves in various churches in at least three counties. He was distinguished for his dignity of manner, purity of diction, simplicity and orthodoxy in teaching. Familiar with Greek and Latin, he established a classical school, teaching sometimes at night, and prepared for college the sons of prominent whites in several counties, sometimes even boarding them with his family. Among his pupils were the subsequent United States Senator Willie P. Mangum, Gov. Charles Manly, Rev. Williams Harris, two sons of Chief Justice Henderson, and others who became lawyers, doctors, teachers, preachers, and politicians. He was respectfully received in the families of his former pupils. Advised by his Presbytery to yield to the law of 1832 prohibiting negro preaching, the old white-haired black man wrote and published a sermon, The Extent of the Atonement, which, widely sold and read, aided in the support provided for him, and for his wife after his death, by his Presbytery. Chavis died in 1838, aged about seventy-five years, a conspicuous example of merit rewarded by slave-holding whites.
He was a full-blooded negro of dark brown complexion.