The Constitution of the Synzygus Verein of the First German Baptist Church
First German Baptist Church, or as it was known originally, Deutsche Baptisten Kirche, was founded by members of the Ninth Street Baptist Church, though there are two very disparate stories as to how this happened. Some say that Prince Von Puttkammer convinced the German-speaking members of Ninth Street Baptist to organize themselves and create First German Baptist in 1857, while others claim that Rev. Philip W. Bickel, a missionary to Cincinnati’s German community, founded the church with the aid of Ninth Street Baptist. Either way, the Baptist theology seems not to have been very popular among the Germans of Cincinnati and it is the only German Baptist church to be founded in or around the city. The writers of The Bicentennial Guide to Greater Cincinnati: A Portrait of Two Hundred Years suggest that “perhaps the [Baptist] ban on drinking was too much at odds with German culture…”
The church completed the construction of its building on Walnut Street in 1872, and continued there with German services until World War I. Anti-German hysteria forced the church to change its name to Walnut Street Baptist and record church records in English rather than German from that point on. Many of the record books from the church’s early history, including the document pictured at the left, are available at the Archives and Rare Books Library.
Bibliographical Sources:
The Bicentennial Guide to Greater Cincinnati: A Portrait of Two Hundred Years, by Geoffrey J. Giglierano, Deborah A. Overmeyer, with Frederic L. Propas, The Cincinnati Historical Society, 1988, page 91
