Union Grove Baptist Church

Union Baptist Church, 2026 Source: Image courtesy of City of Raleigh

Union Grove Baptist Church took root around 1905 under the leadership of Reverend Alex A. Jones, beginning as a humble wooden sanctuary on South Saunders Street. By 1935, members like recording artist Hamp Jones who journeyed from South Carolina in search of new opportunities during the Great Depression. Jones and others found the small Baptist congregation and helped raise the wooden church that still stands today. While much of the surrounding neighborhood was erased by urban renewal in the 1960s and 1970s, Union Grove Baptist Church endured, becoming the lone surviving spiritual landmark of its community. Its doors remain open, carrying forward more than a century of faith, resilience, and fellowship in Raleigh.