Emma Hamilton Dancing

Born in 1875 in Newberry, South Carolina, Henry Kuhns Spearman was the son of an AME minister. He attended public schools in his hometown before enrolling in the State College in Orangeburg (now South Carolina State University) and Biddle University in Charlotte, North Carolina. Spearman received a BA from Lincoln University in 1900. He received a bachelor of divinity degree from Yale in 1903.

Ordained as an AME minister in Newport, Rhode Island, in 1903, Spearman served as a pastor at churches in Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York City. He received a doctor of divinity degree from Allen University in South Carolina in 1914. In 1915, he married Elizabeth Frances Morris of Philadelphia.

Spearman served as a delegate to the AME General Conference four times, three in leadership roles. When he died, he was serving as leader of the New York Conference. Spearman died in 1928 in New York City.