Samuel Eli Cornish was born to free parents in Delaware in 1795. He was raised in Philadephia and New York City, and after his graduation from the Free African School in Philadelphia, he trained to become a minister. Cornish was ordained in 1822, and his first church — New Demeter Street Presbyterian Church — was the first Black Presbyterian church in New York City. Cornish was also one of the founding members of the American Missionary Association (and one of the four Black members out of twelve members total) and the American Bible Society.

In addition to his work as a minister, Cornish was also a journalist and an activist. He and his associate, John B. Russworm, started the Freedman’s Journal in 1827. It was the first newspaper of its kind, profiling the lives of free Black Americans, and was circulated in eleven states, as well as Canada, Haiti, and Europe.

Cornish eventually left Freedman’s Journal to devote himself to New York’s Free African schools, where he championed education and reform. He also wrote for The Colonization Scheme Considered, which existed to help persuade free Blacks to move to Liberia.