Historical State Marker Unveiled For Suffolk’s Belleville Community Founded by Freed Enslaved Man

NJG Newswire

A state historical marker approved by the Virginia Department of Historic Resources (DHR) was unveiled Wednesday, April 2 for Belleville, a self-sufficient community in the City of Suffolk with ties to the Church of God and Saints of Christ. It was founded in the late 19th century by a formerly enslaved man named William Saunders Crowdy.

The unveiling ceremony for the marker occurred at the marker’s location at 4300 Judah Lane in Suffolk (23435), at the intersection of Judah Lane and Townpoint Road.

During the unveiling, Chief Rabbi Phillip E. McNeil of the Church of God and Saints of Christ at Temple Beth El provided remarks. The marker was unveiled by members of the congregation to include descendants of William Saunders Crowdy and William H. Plummer.

The origins of the Belleville community in Suffolk can be traced to 1896, when William Saunders Crowdy, who was born in 1847 and escaped enslavement during the American Civil War, established in Kansas the Church of God and Saints of Christ. In 1903, Crowdy bought 40 acres of land in Suffolk, Virginia. The site became the international headquarters of the church in 1919, and the Belleville community developed around the church in the 1920s.

At its height, Belleville encompassed more than 700 acres and included a sacred tabernacle, farms, a school, a home for widows and orphans, stores, an electric plant, a music hall, and athletic facilities. Crowdy died in 1908. Today the Church of God and Saints of Christ is a predominantly African-American Judaic organization with members and missions in the United States, Jamaica, and Africa.

The Virginia Board of Historic Resources, which is authorized to designate new state historical markers, approved the manufacture and installation of the Belleville Community historical marker in June 2023. The marker’s sponsor, the Church of God and Saints of Christ at Temple Beth El in Suffolk, covered its manufacturing cost.

Virginia’s historical highway marker program began in 1927 with installation of the first markers along U.S. Route 1. It is considered the oldest such program in the nation. Currently there are more than 2,600 state markers, mostly maintained by the Virginia Department of Transportation, except in those localities outside of VDOT’s authority.

William Saunders Crowdy (1847-1908), who escaped enslavement during the Civil War, established the Church of God and Saints of Christ, a now predominantly African American Judaic community, in Kansas in 1896. He purchased 40 acres here in 1903 that later formed the nucleus of Belleville, which emerged in the 1920s. Expanding to more than 700 acres at its peak, this self-sufficient community featured a sacred tabernacle, farms, a school, a home for widows and orphans, stores, an electric plant, a music hall, and athletic facilities. In 1919 the site became the international headquarters of the Church of God and Saints of Christ, which has members and missions in the U.S., Jamaica, and Africa.