"R" is for Randolph, Benjamin Franklin [ca. 1820-1868]

"R" is for Randolph, Benjamin Franklin [ca. 1820-1868]. Legislator, clergyman. Randolph was born a free person of color in Kentucky, but was reared in Ohio. He was a graduate of Oberlin College, and after graduation was ordained as a Methodist clergyman. He served as a chaplain to the 26^th U.S. Colored Troops at Hilton Head and, after the war settled in Charleston. He entered politics and rose quickly through the ranks of the Republican Party. Randolph was chairman of the state Republican Party's central committee.  He represented Orangeburg County in the 1868 Constitutional Convention and in the General Assembly. On October 16^th 1868, while campaigning for Republican candidates in Abbeville County, he was gunned down as he stepped off a train in the little town of Hodges. Benjamin Franklin Randolph is buried in the Columbia Cemetery that now bears his name.