Theophilus Gould Steward: from Gouldtown to the Buffalo Soldiers

A household of readers

The National Park Service biography places Steward's birth in Gouldtown and describes winter schooling, seasonal family work, lectures at the Gouldtown Literary and Moral Improvement Society and mentorship from Rev. Joseph H. Smith. His mother Rebecca read the Bible and newspaper with her children. Steward's own 1877 memoir of Rebecca names his siblings and preserves her letters, though he openly wrote as an admiring son. That personal source lets us see the educational household behind a later public career; it is also an interpretation shaped by grief and religious purpose. See the separate Rebecca Steward story.

From Gouldtown to Reconstruction schools

Steward was ordained in 1863, served briefly in his home community, and received an AME assignment in Camden in 1864. After the Civil War, he went to Charleston, South Carolina, in May 1865. The Park Service records his work with the Army and Freedmen's Bureau in building schools and religious programs, followed by another assignment in Macon, Georgia. This journey did not sever his Gouldtown ties: Rebecca's memoir recalls her sons Theophilus and William returning home from work in the South. NPS biography; Steward, Memoirs of Mrs. Rebecca Steward.

The chaplain becomes a historian

President Benjamin Harrison appointed Steward chaplain of the 25th Infantry in 1891. The Park Service identifies him as that regiment's first African American chaplain. At Fort Missoula, he took charge of school, library and religious work as well as supporting the soldiers. His service later took him to Cuba during the Spanish-American War era and to the Philippines, where he worked in education. A chaplain's post could thus mean teaching and writing as much as conducting worship. NPS biography.

In the preface to his own The Colored Regulars in the United States Army, published in 1904, Steward says he used official reports and correspondence with participants to reconstruct Black soldiers' service. He aimed to secure their place in the history of the 1898 war. The book is a firsthand statement of his method and purpose, not a neutral account of every battle or of the broader colonial war. His perspective matters because he had seen how easily the work of Black soldiers could be omitted from public memory.

Writing Gouldtown back into the record

After retiring from the Army in 1907, Steward taught at Wilberforce University. With his brother William, he published Gouldtown, a Very Remarkable Settlement of Ancient Date in 1913. The book describes the community's land, farms, schools, trades and families from within rather than treating it as an anonymous hamlet. Its genealogical traditions still need record-by-record checking, but its account of everyday institutions is itself evidence that residents were writing their own history. The archive's Gouldtown community story examines that book in more detail.

The 1995 National Register nomination for Trinity AME names Steward among the people who emerged from Gouldtown. It describes the congregation's movement from house and barn meetings to schools and, in 1860, the surviving church. That building belongs to a continuing congregation; its historic registration does not make its interior or grounds an open museum. Steward died in Ohio in 1924. The Park Service reports his burial at Gouldtown Memorial Park, but this research did not verify public cemetery access or a grave location suitable for a map marker.

Reading the place today

Use the map's Gouldtown locality to understand where this story begins and ends. The mapped point represents the community, not Steward's childhood home, Trinity AME's entrance or his grave. Trinity AME stands on State Route 49 just east of Woodruff Road according to its National Register nomination. A visitor can study the church's published history and the community context before traveling. Do not plan an interior visit, cemetery walk or roadside stop without confirming access and a lawful place to park with the relevant steward.