James Henry Conyers (October 24, 1855, in South Carolina – November 29, 1935) was the first African-American person admitted to the United States Naval Academy.
James Conyers received his early education at the Avery Normal Institute in Charleston and at that time worked as a messenger in the office of the South Carolina Secretary of State.
[3] Contemporary newspapers noted favorably on Conyers, describing him as having a "complexion of about brown coffee color, with the usual curly hair of his race, and stands five feet three inches tall.
After surviving another hazing incident where nine midshipmen (including Andrew Summers Rowan) were subsequently dismissed from the Naval Academy due to their involvement, Conyers finally resigned in October 1873.
Where fellow black midshipmen Alonzo Clifton McClennan, who became a prosperous Charleston doctor, and Henry Edwin Baker, who graduated from Howard University Law School, worked as a patent examiner in the United States Patent Office, and authored a number of books and articles, became well-known after they left Annapolis, Conyers almost completely dropped out of sight.