Founded by Virginia Baptists in 1830 as a manual labor institute for men wishing to become ministers, with instruction begun by the Rev. Edward Baptist, an 1813 graduate of Hampden–Sydney College,[7] the school was incorporated ten years later as Richmond College. After 1834, the Columbia House was the main academic building of Richmond College.[8] During the American Civil War, the entire student body formed a regiment and joined the Confederate army.