African American Members of Congress (1884)

African American Members of Congress (1884)

AP African American Studies Guide

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Topic 3.1

William Wellstood, [Five African American Members of Congress During Reconstruction] (1884)

A print of five portraits of Black men who served in the US Congress immediately following ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment during the Reconstruction era: Hiram R. Revels of Mississippi, James T. Rapier of Alabama, Blanche Kelso Bruce of Mississippi, Joseph Hayne Rainey of South Carolina, and John R. Lynch of Mississippi


Source: An engraving of five Black men who were elected to Congress during Reconstruction by William Wellstood in James G. Blaine, Twenty Years of Congress: From Lincoln to Garfield, vol. 2, Norwich, 1886, p. 304. (The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, GLC09746)

This engraving of five African American members of Congress dates from about 1884. The congressmen featured are Hiram R. Revels of Mississippi, James T. Rapier of Alabama, Blanche Kelso Bruce of Mississippi, Joseph Hayne Rainey of South Carolina, and John R. Lynch of Mississippi. They were all elected to Congress between 1870 and 1874.