James Preston Poindexter (October 26, 1819 – February 7, 1907) was an abolitionist, civil rights activist, politician, and Baptist minister from Columbus, Ohio.

In Ohio, he continued to attend school, now privately, and to work as a barber, which again afforded him a variety of useful contacts.

[5] After giving the baccalaureate sermon before the graduating class of the State University, Louisville, Kentucky in May, 1887, he was granted an honorary Doctor of Divinity by the school.

In about 1857 he became president of the society called, "sons of protection," a position he held for 30 years,[6] a secretive African-American civil rights group associated with the Underground Railroad.

Other African-American active abolitionists in Columbus included David Jenkins, John Booker, Leslie Washington Sr, and John T. Ward and where helped by white abolitionists including Joseph Sullivant, James E. Coulter, L. G. Van Slyke, Samuel H. Smith, James M. Westwater, the Keltons, William Hanby, Phillip Doddridge, and Eli M. Pinney.

In December 1848, Poindexter played an important role in bringing Frederick Douglass to Columbus to speak at a Free Soil Party Convention.

[8] He was appointed to a four-year term as trustee of the Institute for the Blind by Ohio Governor Charles Foster.

[12] In 1887 he was appointed to a six-year term as a member of the Board of Directors of the Ohio State Forestry Bureau[6] and was reappointed twice more.