New Hope Church

Submitted by Jacque Otts and Brenda Kirby

New Building

Old New Hope

New Hope Church (an African-American Church) is located in the Randolph area of Bibb Co. We were taking photos of the cemetery when the pastor, Rev. Ira Sims arrived. There is an old church building next to the cemetery which was built after the original building burned somewhere around 1900. Across the road is the new building which is presently in use. The original church and cemetery were located in the woods. When Rev. Sims offered to guide us to the old New Hope Cemetery, we were so excited we forgot to finish photographing the cemetery presently in use by New Hope Church. To get to the old New Hope Cemetery, turn left on Smitherman Drive and go approximately 1.4 miles. The cemetery is in the woods on the right. There are very few remaining stones. Timber has been cut several times over years. Most of the fence has been destroyed. Stories have been told of the timber companies pushing the stones down a hill to get them out of their way. There also have been stories of people stealing the stones. Some stones were broken. Some may have been covered by leaves. The few markers we found and photographed were scattered, leaving us with the impression that at one time this was a very large cemetery.