Bowen was born in Jackson County, Georgia. As a 22-year-old, he had experience in the quelling of a Native American uprising in Georgia and participated in the second Seminole War . Thereafter, he volunteered to join Texas in their independence fight against Mexico. It was during his stay in Texas that Bowen found Christ, upon his return to Georgia, he began to preaching and was soon ordained a minister. Bowen's church was affiliated with the American Baptist Mission but after a split in 1845, his allegiance shifted to the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC). In 1848, when Bowen began to map out his vision of missionary activities in the interior of West Africa, the SBC was already involved in missionary work in China, India and in Liberia but the existing mission in Liberia was not promising, the Triennial Convention's missionary effort on the West African coast sent fifteen white missionaries but nine died and the remainder returned to Boston.Bowen canvassed for a mission in the African interior of Central Africa or Western Sudan which constitutes present day Northern West Africa as a region more receptive to foreign missionaries. He had basic but limited knowledge of West Africa mostly from information he read about the activities of European explorers obtained from reference works from Penny cyclopaedia and Chamber's miscellany. Bowen also befriended W.B. Hodgson, a fellow Georgia native who had written works about the Berbers and Fulani's of Northern and Western Africa. Igboho was planned to be the starting point of his missionary work in Africa because it was close to the Fulani empire, converting the Fulani's was thought to be critical to spread Christianity in West Africa.