Why Did John F. Kennedy Jr. Choose to Get Married on Cumberland Island? Inside the First African Baptist Church’s Rich History

NEED TO KNOW

• John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette were married on Sept. 21, 1996, at the First African Baptist Church on Cumberland Island, off the coast of Georgia

• JFK Jr. was drawn to the church after hearing a story about the community’s reaction to the assassination of his uncle, Robert Kennedy

• The church’s history on the island dates back to the late 1890s and tells a powerful story of independence and perseverance

John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette‘s wedding wasn’t the only special thing about Cumberland Island’s quaint chapel.

The couple exchanged vows at the First African Baptist Church on Cumberland Island, just off the coast of Georgia, on Sept. 21, 1996. Fans who are watching American Love Story are currently reliving the romantic nuptials. For the pair, it was all about the setting and its ties to the Kennedy family.

Before their big day, the couple held their rehearsal dinner at the Greyfield Inn, which was built in 1900, and where they also stayed.

The owner of the inn, Gogo Ferguson, previously told PEOPLE Editor at Large Liz McNeil and the late JFK Jr.’s George magazine Chief of Staff, RoseMarie Terenzio, about why the couple wanted to have their wedding on the island and in that particular church.

“One of my cousins had told him a story that when Robert Kennedy was shot, Beulah Alberty, who was the deacon of the church, came racing down to tell everyone around the island. And the entire island gathered, and they had a service in that church for Bobby,” Ferguson shared with McNeil and Terenzio in their 2024 book JFK Jr.: An Intimate Oral Biography.

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“That really meant something to him. That’s why, when I was like, ‘Couldn’t you just get married on the dunes or at the Greyfield compound?’ he insisted on the church.”

The humble, one-room church was first established in 1893 by African American residents. Per the National Park Service, some of the church’s founders were born slaves and later emancipated after the Civil War. As a community formed in this place, the modest log structure became known as both a house of worship and a community center for the tiny nook on the north end of Cumberland Island, which became known as “The Settlement.”

The Island itself was owned, in the majority, by the Carnegie family from the late 1800s through 1972, when it was made a unit of the National Park Service. Nearly four decades later, the church was rebuilt.

Over time, it was designated both to the National Register of Historic Places and as part of the Settlement Historic District.

JFK Jr. had discovered the island through an earlier girlfriend, Christina Haag (whom he dated after they both graduated from Brown University) and friendships with Carnegie descendants. Once he learned the lore connected his family to the area, he felt very endeared to it.

“Cumberland was a place where he could be carefree,” Ferguson said in an interview for the biography, noting that when he brought Bessette to visit, she “fell in love” with it.

“He was reticent to ask me to have the wedding here. He knew my family was very under the radar. Quiet. Our island — there are only like thirty-some-odd people who live here. My family opened their home as an inn — the Greyfield Inn,” Ferguson continued.

Once she and her husband, Dave, talked it over, they decided that “the only gift that we could actually give them is their privacy.”

Today, the church is available for weddings, though the NPS does not provide transportation there. Outside of a private event, the only way to see it is on the island’s Lands & Legacies Tour.

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