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ROBERT KENNON HARGROVE, D.D., 
 
 One of the Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 
A HISTORY 
 
 OF 
 
 METHODISM IN ALABAMA 
 
 BY THE REV. ANSON WEST, D.D. 
 
 <• I 
 
 Printed for the Author, 
 
 Publishing House Methodist Episcopal Church, South, 
 
 Barbee & Smith, Agents, Nashville, Tenn. 
 
 1803. 
 
m 
 
 
 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1893, 
 
 By Anson West, 
 In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 
 
 n 
 
 PEEFACE. 
 
 Having come to the end of the task, self-imposed, of writing a History of 
 Methodism in Alabama, it is but conformity to custom to write a Preface to 
 the book. It is impossible to detail here the difficulties encountered in the 
 prosecution of the work. No traveler ever passed over the ground before. 
 Neither road nor trace existed, not even a footstep could be found, except in 
 one instance, at one point, a track of the Rev. John G. Jones, D.D., and in an- 
 other instance, at one other point, the track of the Rev. John B. McFerrin, D.D. 
 The temerity which induced the undertaking, as the way has been so ob- 
 scure and interminable, has been regretted many the time. If years enough 
 were remaining to the poor wanderer who has rambled over the ground, to 
 go again, the journey could be made to better advantage, but there is no time 
 now for further and other excursion. The work such as it is, and as it is, 
 must be stereotyped. It is with unfeigned sadness of heart, real pain, that 
 the work is resigned. It has been a work which has burdened above meas- 
 ure, and yet the end is reached and the surcease accepted with the sorrow 
 akin to the sorrow experienced upon bidding a last good-bye to fi-iends and 
 kindred dear. Much labor, no one will ever know how much, has been ex- 
 pended in getting at facts and arriving at truth, so as to give the real history 
 in every case. Days have been given to tracing very small matters in order 
 that the statements made be accurate and correct. While there may have 
 been an occasional blunder along the dark and devious way, wherever the 
 history is given it is given correctly. That the book has defects is only too 
 well known. If any one can and will write a better History, let it be done. 
 Many things in the book could have been left out, and many things out 
 could have been put in. There is room and there is material for another 
 History covering the same time traversed by this. Alabamians are neglect- 
 ful of their own history. The plan of this book is to begin with the begin- 
 ning, and write the history as it begins, develops, enlarges, and goes on, and 
 give the history everywhere in the order of time, both in the opening and 
 the progress. In the plan thus pursued, the history is given from 1808 to 
 1818. During that time there were only two appointments in the State. 
 Then the history is given from 1818 to 1832. At the close of that time the 
 Alabama Conference was organized. Then in the order of the design the 
 history is given from 1832 to 1845. Then it was that the jurisdiction of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, South, commenced. Finally, in the on-going 
 of the plan the history from 1845 to 1865 is given. Then the emancipation 
 of the slaves was consummated, and a new order of things inaugurated. 
 There this History closes. That which is written about an itinerant preacher 
 is, as a general thing, introduced where and when his work in the State ter- 
 minated. That accounts for the fact that nothing is said about many prom- 
 inent preachers. Their term of service extended beyond the time where 
 
 (3) 
 
 300J47 
 
Hisforij of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 this History closes. What is written about a layman is, generally, introduced 
 in connection with the place where he did most of his work, or in connec- 
 tion with the enterprise in which he was prominent. ^ . t 
 The works, some in print and some in manuscript, which have been of 
 service in the preparation of this History may be mentioned ^as follows: 
 
 "The General Minutes of the Methodist Episcopal Churcli. 
 \;The General Minutes of the :Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 w^Asbury's Journal." (3 Vols.) 
 
 " Dow's Works." „ -r ti- i ♦♦ 
 
 « The Historv of Alabama." (2 Vols.) By Albert James Pickett. 
 " Methodism' in Mississippi." (1 Vol.) John G. Jones. ^ 
 
 " History of Methodism in Tennessee." (3 Vols.) John B. McFernn. 
 Journal of the South Carolina Conference. 
 Journal of the Georgia Conference. 
 Advocate and Journal, 1825-1830. 
 
 Southern Christian Advocate, 1843-1852. „ „ , t r- ^ff« 
 
 Quarteriy Conference Records of Franklin, Greene, Talladega, La Fayett^^ 
 Wills Valley, and Jasper Circuits, and Greenesborough and Athens Stations. 
 Church Registers Tuskaloosa and Greenesborough Stations. 
 Manuscript Journal of the Rev. A. C. Ramsey. 
 Manuscript Journal of the Rev. E. Heam. 
 Manuscript Journal of the Rev. William Wier. 
 Manuscript Journal of the Rev. Joseph T. Curry. ^ „, , 
 
 iSIanuscript " History of Methodism in Florence." W. B. Wood. 
 " Life and Times of the Rev. John Brooks." 
 " History of Alabama." Willis Brewer. 
 
 " Public Men in Alabama." William Garrett. 
 
 "Life of Bishop Capers." W. M. Wightman. ^^ m « t^.u 
 
 - History of Clarke County, Alabama, and Its Surroundings. T. il. liali. 
 
 " Biographical Sketches of Itinerant Ministers." 
 ^History of North Alabama." Smith. 
 
 " History of Methodism in Texas." H. S. Thrall. 
 
 " History of Methodism." Stevens. 
 
 " History of Methodist Episcopal Church." Stevens. 
 
 " History of Methodism in Kentucky." Redford. „ ,r -d -ni 
 
 ...^tiaistory of the Churches of theCity of Montgomery, Alabama. I\I.P. Blue. 
 ^ Letters of the Rev. R. H. Rivers. Alabama Christian Advocate. 
 
 Letters of the Rev. John DuBois. Alabama Chnstian Advocate. 
 
 " History of Methodism in Georgia and Florida." Smith. 
 ^,-i^istory of Methodist Protestant Church." Paris. 
 ^ " Williams' History of the Methodist Protestant Church." 
 
 « History of the Methodist Protestant Church." Brown. 
 
 Stray Copies Minutes of Alabama Annual Conference Methodist Protest- 
 ant Church. 
 
 .^iiSelma: Her Institutions and Men." Hardy. 
 '" Manuscript Sketches of Preachers of Alabama Conference. 
 
 5» Baptists in Alabama." Holcombe. 
 Methodist Magazine. (6 Vols.) 
 
 Preface, 
 
 Men and women too numerous to mention have conferred special favors 
 and rendered valuable services. The favors and services have been highly 
 appreciated, and the persons who so generously assisted are thought of with 
 delight May they all attain eternal rest I Anson West. 
 
 Alabama, January 25, 1&J3, 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Alabama — Characteristics — Savage Tribes — French and Spaniards- 
 Firrit White Settlements 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Tombigbee Environments — Lorenzo and Peggy Dow 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Tombecbee Mission First Place to Which a Preacher was Sent in 
 Alabama — Matthew P. Sturdevant — Biirdge — Kennon — Ford- 
 Houston— Quinn — NoUey— Shrock — Powell— Tecumseh — War — 
 Sellers— Byrd — James — Owens— He wett— Fleming— Lott 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Noted Places— Burr Arrested— Noted Characters— Toulmin— Walk- 
 er — Ramsey — Dean — French — Easleys — Bishop George — Gil- 
 mores — Mississippi Conference 
 
 Paom 
 
 13-26 
 
 27-34 
 
 35-80 
 
 81-105 
 
 CHAPTER V. • 
 
 Along Tennessee River— First White Settlers— Hunt— Ford— Bouch- 
 er— Stringfield— Thompson— Other Noted Persons— Noted Places 
 — Methodist Societies Early— Baptists— G win n Missionary— Socie- 
 ties and Members of Flint Circuit — Richland Circuit— Brooks and 
 His Adventures 106-118 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Creek Indians Dispossessed— Settlers Enter— Hearn Reviewing and 
 Organizing — Places and Persons — Sterling C. Brown in New 
 Field— Six New Charges at Close of the Year 119-127 
 
 CHAPTER VII. . 
 
 New Appointments— Preachers— Societies— Places— Persons — Inci- 
 dents — Porter — Paine — Cotaco — Limestone — Shoal — Cahawba — 
 Stringfield— Nixon— Drake— Lambuth— Burrows — Tuskaloosa — 
 Hargrove— Buttahatchee — First Meeting House — Tombecbee — 
 Foster— Alabama Circuit— Talley — Mrs. Bledsoe— McPherson — 
 Mims— Andrew— Capel— Methodists — Baptists 128-194 
 
 (7) 
 
8 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Pages 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Jackson Circuit -Preachers, Places, and Societies— Conecuh Circuit 
 —Places and Persons— Cedar Creek Circuit— Camp Meetings- 
 Streams— Places and Persons-Franklin Circuit— Quarterly Con- 
 ferences—Places and Persons— Parsonage Problem— Camp Meet- 
 ing Revivals-PubUc Collectionts— Exhorters 195-238 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Huntsville— Preachers— Monte Sano— Annual Conference Session- 
 Indians— Church Deed 239-248 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 Mobile -Alexander Talley-Church Deed-Pensacola and Mobile 
 Attached-Death of Cook-First Society in Mobile-First Effort 
 to Build House of Worship— The Preachers— Sunday School— In- 
 dians — Bee Hive 
 
 249-264 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Territory Provided for by the South Carolina and Georgia Confer- 
 ences— Chattahoochee, Pea River, and Escambia— Camp Meetings, 
 Societies, Places, Persons, and Preachers 265-286 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Jones's Valley Circuit— Societies— Taylors and Tarrants— Lawrence 
 Circuit— Societies— Members, Persons, Preachers, and Incidents 
 —New River Circuit— Its Situation— Ledbetter 287-304 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Mississippi Conference in session at Tuskaloosa— Noted Persons— 
 Preachers— Controversy on the Mysteries of Freemasons— Three 
 Other Sessions of the Mississippi Conference at Tuskaloosa— Col- 
 ored Members at Tuskaloosa 305-333 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Marengo Circuit— Places and Preachers— Tuscumbia— A House of 
 Worship— A Session of the Tennessee Conference— Religious In- 
 fluence-Sunday School Interest— Paint Rock Circuit-Town of 
 Claiborne on the Alabama— Florence on the Tennessee— Cypress 
 Circuit— Courtland and Athens— New Philadelphia— Montgomery 
 —First Preachers— Slow Work— Greene Circuit— Greenesborough 
 —Members and Trustees 334-358 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Various Conferences Which Held Jurisdiction in Alabama— Dis- 
 tricts— Presiding Elders— Conference Boundaries 359-365 
 
 Contents. 
 
 9 
 
 Paqkb 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Missions to the Indians — School for the Creek Indians — When and 
 Where Established— By Whom Managed— What was Taught— 
 What Achieved — Commotions — Difficulties — Special Occasions- 
 Capers, Smith, Hammill, and Hill — Methodist AVomen — Discon- 
 tinued — Mission to Cherokees — The Line between Civilized and 
 Savage — Richard Neely and Richard Riley — Work Expands — 
 Misssonaries Multiply — Places — Societies — Members — Preachers 
 — Exhorters — Schools and Scholars — Character of Cherokee Chris- 
 tians — Georgia Imprisoned and Punished Men for Preaching 
 the Gospel to the Cherokee Indians 366-403 
 
 CHAPTER XVIL 
 
 Methodist Protestant Church — Agitations—Channels of Agitation 
 — Committees — Memorials — Responses — Agitation from the Be- 
 ginning Till This Secession Culminated — The Men Engaged in 
 the Revolt in Alabama — Where and When Organized — The Men 
 Who Opposed the Disruption 404-427 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Education — Institutions under Control of the Conferences in 1828 
 — Standing Committee of Tennessee Conference for Founding a 
 College — La Grange College Founded — Commissioners — Agents 
 — Trustees — Professors — Officers — Students — Incidents — Remov- 
 al 428-445 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Alabama Conference Organized — Various Sessions — Incidents — 
 Sketches— The Business and Progress from 1832 to 1845 
 
 446-461 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Cession of Territory — Talladega Mission — Quarterly Conferences — 
 Societies — Places — Preachers— Persons — Incidents — Sketches — 
 Jacksonville Circuit — Preachers and Members — Talladega and 
 Mardisville — Incidents 462-490 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 Chattahoochee Mission — Clayton Mission — Uchee Mission— Talla- 
 poosa — Trwinton and Glennville — Russell Circuit — Tuskegee — 
 Auburn — La Fayette Circuit— Randolph and Tallapoosa— Enon — 
 Settlements, Societies, Places, Preachers, and Persons in All These 
 Fields of Operation 491-515 
 
 CHAPTER XXn. 
 
 Ceded Territory — Wills Creek Mission — Leading Men — Prominent 
 Places 516-521 
 
IQ History of Methodis m in Alabama, 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. p^^^^ 
 
 Tenne=see Vallcy-Tuscumbia-Florence-La Grange-Sketches of ^^^^^^ 
 
 Noted Persons 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 Town of Marion-Preachers-Noted Members-Mount Zion-Selrna 
 -Various Societies in Dallas County-Various Societies m A\ il- 
 cox County-Camp Meeting -Norsvvorthy-CahawbaC.rcuit- 
 Woodville-Linden Circuit-Bishop Keener-Sprmg Hill Circuit ^^^^^^^ 
 
 — Demopolis 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 Walker Mission- Jasper-New Lexington-Quarterly Conferences, 
 and Places-Greene Circuit-Men and Places-Eutiiw-Greenes- 
 boroucrhStation-Conferences-Preachers-Men-Hou.es-Debt3 
 
 — \ Member Expelled Who Had Never Been Convicted-Camp 
 Meetinc^. a Noted One-Task aloosa-Noted Meeting-Noted Men 
 -Tombecbee Circuit-A Horse at the Altar-Claiborne-Gosport ^^_^^^ 
 
 — Jackson 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 Mobile-New Charges-Montgomery-Wetumpka-Sketches 578-597 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 Work among Colored People-Missionaries-Difficulties-Incidents 598-608 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 Centenary Institute-Centenary Year-Observance-Persons 609-621 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 La Grange College-Agents-Officers-Professors-Students'-Debts 
 ^ -Efforts-Removal-Opening at Florence-Change of Name... 622-6o0 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 School for Girls Projected -Trustees -Buildings -Officers -Pro- 
 
 631-6i>3 
 
 fessora 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 Crisis 1844— Action of Official Bodies in Alabama— Action of the 
 Alabama Conference 634-6o2 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 District.-? in Alabama in Bounds of Tennessee Conference-Pastoral 
 
 Charges-Sketches 653-657 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIIL 
 Bascomb Institute at Huntaville 658-660 
 
 Contents. 11 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 rAQKg 
 
 Alabama Conference Sessions from 1846 to 1863, When It Was Di- 
 vided into the Montgomery and Mobile Conferences— Mobile — Ca- 
 hawba — Tuskaloosa — Missionary Anniversaries — Missionaries — 
 Montgomery — Crawford Circuit — Greenesborough — Mil burn — 
 Neely— Marion— Cedar Bluff Ciroiit, and Thomas P. Crymes — 
 Turrentine— Talladega— Education— Jackson ville — Eutaw — Tus- 
 kegee—Selma— Bequests— Union Springs— Eufaula— Montgomery 
 — Greenesborough— Auburn— Columbus — Two Conferences 661-708 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 Ethiopia— Preachers Who Served Colored Missions— Scenes— Num- 
 ber Colored Members in Alabama 709-713 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVL 
 
 Polemics— The Methodists Had to Contend with Every Sect in the 
 State— The Attacks— The Defense— The Parties and Persons in 
 Debate — Anecdotes 714-725 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 Wesleyan University— Centenary Institute— Educational Conven- 
 tion—Oak Bowery Female Institute— Tuskegee Female College — 
 School at Talladega— Southern University— East Alabama Male 
 College 726-739 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 Methodist Protestant Church- Pastoral Charges— Preachers— Lay- 
 men— Sketches— Churches and Parsonages — Samaritan Fund — 
 Attempt at Schools— Inefficiency— Literary Work 740-7.=^f^ 
 
HISTORY OF METHODISM IN ALABAMA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 The State of Alabama: Its Geography, Indian Tribes, and 
 
 White Inhabitants. 
 
 ALABAMA lies between the thirtieth and thirty-fifth de- 
 grees of north latitude and between the eighty-fifth and 
 eighty-ninth degrees of west longitude. For situation, being 
 within these parallels of latitude and meridians of longitude, it 
 is one of the very choicest parts of the globe. Being sufficient- 
 ly distant from equator and pole to exempt it from extremes of 
 temperature, to adapt it to the greatest variety of products, and 
 to the largest measure of man's success and comfort, it is wor- 
 thy of all preference. It is a State of grand dimensions, of ex- 
 tensive territory. It has an area of fifty-two thousand, two hun- 
 dred and fifty square miles. At the most contracted point its 
 width is one hundred and fifty miles, and at the most extended 
 points its width is two hundred and five miles, and its greatest 
 length is three hundred and thirty-two miles. 
 
 Alabama has a surface diversified by mountains, hills, and 
 valleys. In the northern portion, including very nearly half 
 the State, there are mountains and high ridges, while in the 
 southern part it is more level, and the face of the country is 
 much smoother. From the northern to the southern hmit of 
 the State its surface gradually declines toward the Gulf. 
 
 •The State has a short coast line, and one of the deepest bays 
 on the Mexican Gulf. The southern border of the State is 
 fanned by the breezes of the Gulf of Mexico, and its northern 
 portion is traversed by the Appalachian Mountains. Every- 
 where throughout the wide-extended territory of this magnifi- 
 cent State, springs break forth, and streams flow on. Alabama 
 is without exception, the best-watered country in the world. 
 
 (13) 
 
14 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Tennessee River lies, like a huge serpent, across her bosom. 
 The Tallapoosa, the C9osa, the Alabama, the Cahawba, the War- 
 rior, the Tombigbee, and the Mobile Kivers run, like giants, 
 among her hills and through her valleys. The Chattahoochee 
 Eiver washes her border, and the Choctawhatchee, the Pea, the 
 Conecuh, the Sepulga, the Escambia, the Little, the Tensaw, the 
 Sipsey, the North, the Elk, the Flint, and the Paint Hock rivers, 
 with splendid creeks too numerous to mention, refresh her wide- 
 extended soil. 
 
 The soil of this State is as varied as its surface. There are 
 clay and sand, rock and gravel. There are mountains of rock, 
 ridges of sand, and plains of prairie. There are the stiff soil, 
 the loose soil, the black soil, the red soil, and the white soil. 
 These various soils are interspersd more or less in all parts of 
 the State. Much of the land is exceedingly rich, and every- 
 where it is productive, yielding abundant crops, and handsome- 
 ly remunerating the toil of the husbandman. 
 
 Throughout her territory are seen magnificent forests, where 
 the greatest number of trees abound, such as the ash, the alder, 
 the bay, the beech, the birch, the buckeye, the ce(]ar, the cherry, 
 the chestnut, the chinquapin, the china, the cypress, the elm, i\\Q 
 gum, the hickory, the holly, the juniper, the lind, the locust, the 
 magnolia, the maple, the mulberry, the myrtle, the oak, the pal- 
 metto, the persimmon, the pine, the poplar, the sassafras, the 
 sycamore, the walnut, and the willow. In every place where 
 these forest trees tower in their loftiness and stateliness there 
 grow in admirable profusion and in great variety grasses, ferns, 
 and flowers. A section of six hundred and forty acres of Ala- 
 bama woods presents in its botanical growth a scene which for 
 variety, combination, beauty, and fragrance excels any and every 
 garden which art, taste, and wealth have yet displayed. 
 
 Everywhere throughout this magnificent State bushes, trees, 
 shrubs, and vines bear in great abundance their own peculiar 
 fruits; and everywhere, for the gratification, life, and health of 
 her population, there grow in great variety such things as pears, 
 peaches, plums, apples, cherries, nuts, berries, grapes, and 
 melons. A benevolent providence has greatly enriched Al- 
 abama in the extended line of products adapted to her climate, 
 and grown in her soil for the use and benefit of man. All the 
 cereals (Indian corn, wheat, oats, barley, rye, rice, and millet) are 
 
 The State of Alabama, 
 
 15 
 
 grown here in great perfection. In the southern part of the 
 State the sugar cane grows well and yields abundantly. These 
 products, the cereals and the sugar cane, supply material for 
 food. Cotton is grown extensively, and flax and hemp will 
 grow and yield well when cultivated, and these supply material 
 for making all sorts of cloth. The indigo grows successfully. 
 The State abounds with plants noted for their medicinal prop- 
 erties. Tobacco and the poppy grow admirably, and their nar- 
 cotic properties are well understood. The Falma Christi also 
 grows well, and its medicinal nature is well attested. 
 
 The gold deposits in this State are extensive and rich. There 
 are also deposits of silver and copper. There are beds of mar- 
 ble. The coal, iron, and lime are inexhaustible. These materi- 
 als will last commensurate with time itself. 
 
 While there is not in all her borders a cave equal to the cele- 
 brated Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, and while there is not 
 within her bounds a waterfall equal to that of the world-re- 
 nowned Niagara, yet everywhere upon her mountains and in 
 her valleys and by her springs and along her streams there 
 are magnificent view^s, beautiful scenes, and lovely landscapes, 
 the whole most charming, inspiring, and elevating. ^ ^ 
 
 Her natural conditions and resources make it possible for her 
 to be, as a place of habitation for man, equal to the highest 
 ideal in the mind, and the day may soon dawn when she will fall 
 but little short of a real paradise. As a country it is equal to 
 the country to the border of which the children of Israel were 
 led by Moses, and in which they finally settled. ** For the Lord 
 thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of brooks of 
 water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and 
 hills, a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and 
 pomegranates; a land of oil-olive, and honey; a land wherein 
 thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack any- 
 thing in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills 
 thou mayest dig brass. AVhen thou hast eaten and art full, then 
 thou shalt bless the Lord thy God for the good land he hath 
 given thee." (Deut. viii. 7-10.) 
 
 Alabama was once an unbroken wilderness, abounding with 
 the indigenous and spontaneous. When, after the discovery of 
 America by Columbus, it was first traversed by men from the 
 civilized nations, it was inhabited only by beasts and birds na- 
 
16 
 
 History of Methodism iyi Alabama. 
 
 tive to the forests, and by tribes of meD of savage natures, of 
 superstitious sentiments, of rude customs, and of vulgar habits. 
 When those acquainted with the achievements of civilization 
 first visited and obtained a knowledge of the country now in- 
 cluded within the limits of Alabama, they found upon her soil 
 tribes called Coosas, Tallases, Mobilians, and Choctaws. The 
 Cherokees were at that time occupying a part of the State, 
 though they were called by the name of Chalaques. The Choc- 
 taws and Cherokees survived all attacks and adversities, but as 
 time passed and events followed different tribes were found 
 upon the soil of Alabama. Tribes went and tribes came, 
 tribes rose and tribes fell, tribes supplanted tribes and tribes 
 absorbed tribes, tribes were established and tribes were lost. 
 
 The Alabamas were driven hither and thither, from point to 
 point. Now they are on the Missouri Biver, then on the Yazoo 
 River, and finally they reach and settle on the river to which 
 they give their own name: the Alabama. The Muscogees, a mi- 
 gratory and aggressive tribe, emigrated from point to point, 
 first from Mexico to Red River, then to the Ohio River; and 
 finally, in the course of their rambling and usurpation, they sup- 
 plant the Alabamas and take possession of the country on the 
 Alabama River and on farther east. The Alabamas were al- 
 lowed by the Muscogees to return to their homes and towns on 
 the Alabama River, but in a state of subordination. From the 
 Ohio River came the Tookabatchas, and obtained a settlement on 
 the Tallapoosa River. The Tuskegees reached and obtained a 
 habitation between the Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers, immediate- 
 ly above the junction. The Ozeailles settled on the plains 
 through which runs the magnificent Hatchee Chubbee Creek, a 
 few miles above the grounds of the Tuskegees. A remnant of 
 the Natchez tribe, which escaped from the city of Natchez, on 
 the Mississippi River, settled on the Coosa River about the Tal- 
 ladega Creek. The Uchees settled on the creeks which bear 
 the same name and which empty into the Chattahoochee River. 
 The Alabamas, the Tookabatchas, the Tuskegees, the Ozeailles, 
 the Natchez, and the Uchees were dominated by the Musco- 
 gees, confederated in their government, and subordinated to 
 their laws and interests. These tribes, thus allied, were called 
 by the general name of Creeks. 
 
 In addition to the powerful Creek nation there were three 
 
 The State of Alabama. 
 
 17 
 
 other powerful Indian tribes which had at the same time 
 homes and hunting grounds in Alabama. These were the Choc- 
 taws, the Chickasaws, and the Cherokees. These tribes ha^ rec- 
 ognized boundaries, established by claim and acknowledged 
 among them. Boundaries were matters of oft-recurring dis- 
 putes, and the various tribes ever and anon trespassed upon 
 the hunting grounds of each other. 
 
 It is outside the scope of this History to treat of these tribes 
 except as citizens of the territory within Alabama. It is there- 
 fore unnecessary for the purpose of this History to give here a 
 minute description of the entire boundaries of these several In- 
 dian tribes. It is only necessary to state approximately the 
 boundaries which determined and exhibited the location of 
 these several nations in what is now Alabama. The southern 
 boundary of the Choctaw nation where it touched Alabama was 
 the thirty-first degree of north latitude, and the eastern bound- 
 ary was on the ridge dividing the waters running into the Ala- 
 bama River from those running into the Tombigbee River. 
 The present Suggsville, Choctaw Corner, McKinley, and Union 
 Town are on this ridge and along this line. This eastern line 
 of this Choctaw nation extended in a northern direction and 
 terminated where it reached the boundary of the Chickasaw and 
 Cherokee nations, somewhere near the head waters of Big Bear 
 Creek; and here, near the head waters of Big Bear Creek, com- 
 menced the northern boundary of the Choctaws: the line be- 
 tween them and the Chickasaws, which boundary crossed the 
 line of the present States of Alabama and Mississippi not more 
 than a few miles from where the west branch of the Butta- 
 hatchee River crosses the line between the two States. All that 
 part of Alabama inclosed by this boundary line here above 
 named was claimed and occupied by the Choctaws. 
 
 The northern boundary of the Choctaws was the southern 
 boundary of the Chickasaws. The southern point of the east- 
 ern boundary of the Chickasaws was about the head waters of 
 Big Bear Creek, and this boundary extended into what is now 
 the State of Tennessee and crossed the Tennessee River, pos- 
 sibly, at Muscle Shoals. There was a region touching this line 
 about the Tennessee River and the Muscle Shoals which was 
 claimed by both the Chickasaws and the Cherokees, and the 
 United States in her treaties proposed to satisfy both tribes for 
 
18 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 claims iu lands along this disputed line. All this part of Ala- 
 bama in the northwest corner inclosed by this Chickasaw bound- 
 ary here above named was claimed and occupied by this tribe. 
 
 The Cherokee boundary in Alabama ran northwest and south- 
 east, and crossing the Tennessee Eiver near the lower end of 
 Muscle Shoals, passed along near the head waters of Big Bear 
 Creek and along the ridge dividing the waters running into the 
 Tennessee Eiver from those running into the Tombigbee Biver, 
 and along to the mouth of Wills Creek, and along near the present 
 Cross Plains, on into Georgia. There were disputes about where 
 this line between the Cherokees and Creeks ran. The Chero- 
 kees claimed that this line was farther south and west than the 
 points above named, and the United States, settling the ques- 
 tion of this boundary with the Cherokees, agreed to a boundary 
 crossing the Coosa Biver at the lower end of Ten Islands and 
 running in a straight line to Flat Bock, on Big Bear Creek, 
 where the boundary intersected the Chickasaw line. Turkey 
 Town, on the Coosa Biver about eight miles above the mouth of 
 Wills Creek, was a Cherokee town; and Tallahatchee, about two 
 miles northwest of the present town of Alexandria, in Calhoun 
 XDounty, was a Creek town. All that part of Alabama north 
 and east of this line here above mentioned was the land of the 
 Cherokees. 
 
 To the Creeks belonged all the State not owned and occu- 
 pied by the Choctaws, the Chickasaws, and the Cherokees. The 
 territory of this nation extended as far north as to the pres- 
 ent Blount County, and as far west as Union Town and Suggs- 
 ville, as far south as the State of Alabama reaches on the thir- 
 ty-first degree of north latitude, and east to the limit of the 
 State, and on far out into Georgia. 
 
 It may be well to add that the Choctaws had considerable ter- 
 ritory in Mississippi, and the Chickasaws had large territory in 
 what is now the States of Mississippi and Tennessee, and the 
 territory of the Cherokees extended into Georgia, North Caro- 
 lina, and Tennessee. 
 
 Upon the establishment of the United States Government, 
 said government treated with the Indian tribes which were 
 within territory claimed by said government and in proximity 
 to the settlements of the citizens of the United States. In 1785, 
 1786, and .1790 .this ^United States Government made treaties 
 
 The State of Alabama. 
 
 19 
 
 with the Cherokees, the Choctaws, the Chickasaws, and the 
 Creeks, and in said treaties the boundaries of these tribes were 
 fixed and designated, and the boundaries thus indicated were as 
 the boundaries which are here given. (United States Statutes 
 at Large, Yol. YIL, Indian Treaties.) 
 
 Throughout the lovely lands of this magnificent Alabama 
 country these savage tribes had numerous towns, some of them 
 of large populations, of great importance, and extensive influ- 
 ence. These w^ere too numerous to mention, but a few of the 
 most noted may be named. Long Island and Nickajack on the 
 Tennessee Biver, Turkey Town and Wills Town between the 
 Coosa and Tennessee Biverswere towns of the Cherokees; Abe- 
 couchee on the Talladega Creek, Coosa, Little Tallassee, and 
 Hickory Ground on the Coosa Biver, Tallassee and Tooka- 
 batchee on the Tallapoosa Biver, Coosawda and Ecunchate on 
 the Alabama Biver, and Coweta on the Chattahoochee Biver 
 were towns of the Creeks; Cabusto on the Warrior Biver was a 
 
 Choctaw town. 
 
 Little by little these savage tribes ceded their lands to the 
 United States, and at last, by treaty, the entire claim of these 
 aborigines to Alabama soil was extinguished. Not until time 
 had brought it far into the present century was this beautiful 
 and lovely Alabama entirely free from the occupancy of savages. 
 To make the statement complete it is necessary to add that on 
 September 20, 1830, the Choctaws, by treaty, ceded to the United 
 States the entire country they owned and possessed east of the 
 Mississippi Biver. In a treaty made March 24, 1832, the Creek 
 tribe ceded to the United States all their land east of the Mis- 
 sissippi Biver. In a treaty made October 20, 1832, the Chicka- 
 saw nation ceded to the United States all the land which they 
 owned on the east side of the Mississippi Biver. In a treaty 
 made December 29, 1835, to which was attached a Supplement- 
 ary Article by treaty March 1, 1836, the Cherokee nation ceded, 
 relinquished, and conveyed to the United States all the land 
 owned, claimed, or possessed by them east of the Mississippi 
 Biver. (United States Statutes at Large, Vol. VIL, Indian 
 Treaties.) This extinguished the last claim of the Indian na- 
 tions to the land of Alabama. 
 
 In the treaty made with the Chickasaws it was stipulated 
 that they were to seek homes west of the Mississippi Biver, and 
 
20 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 certain reservations were allowed them until they removed to 
 their new country. The treaty made with the Creeks March 
 2-4, 1832, allowed ninety principal chiefs to select each one a 
 section of land, and every other head of a Creek family to select 
 one half section of land, on which they were to be permitted to 
 remain for five years, if said land was not sooner disposed of by 
 said occupants. In the treaty made with the Cherokees it was 
 stipulated and agreed that they should remove to their new 
 home west of the Mississippi Kiver within two years from the 
 ratification of said treaty. (United States Statutes at Large, 
 Vol. VII., Indian Treaties.) 
 
 By the close of 1837 the last of these tribes was removed be- 
 yond the Mississippi Kiver. Alabama is no longer menaced 
 and downtrodden by savages. It was a joyous day and the 
 consummation of a glorious achievement was reached when this 
 lovely land was redeemed from the dominion of savages. It is 
 a matter of profound regret that this goodly land was allowed 
 to remain so long under the blight and waste of savage cruelty 
 and snperstition. 
 
 So far as research and record have furnished information 
 Hernando De Soto, a native of Spain, and his troops, perhaps, 
 near a thousand strong, were the first civilized persons who ever 
 set foot on Alabama soil. A brief statement of De Soto's jour- 
 ney, and a bare naming of the path along which he went on this 
 invasion and search, and nothing more, may be attempted. De 
 Soto was an athletic man, and a bold and ambitious adventurer. 
 He thirsted for gold and longed for conquest. His expedition, 
 which was provided for on a grand scale, was gotten up to search 
 for gold and to make conquests. 
 
 About the first of July, 1540, forty-eight years after Colum- 
 bus discovered America, De Soto with his army of invasion en- 
 tered the territory of the present Alabama about where the 
 Coosa Eiver reaches the border of the State. From this point 
 he made a march across the entire territory of the State. He 
 passed over and left behind him more gold than he is reported 
 to have found and carried away, and he achieved no conquest, 
 he established no colony. He reached, with a magnificent fleet, 
 Tampa Bay, where he went ashore May 30, 1539. He had with 
 him cows and mules; horses, hogs, and hounds; bows, cannons, 
 chains, guns, handcuffs, and shields; assayists and crucibles; 
 
 The State of Alabama. 
 
 '21 
 
 priests, vestments, and sacramental flour and wine. In a word, 
 he had everything which could be conceived necessary for the 
 purposes of the expedition inaugurated. From Tampa Bay he 
 went across the country over the Ockmulgee, Oconee, and Oge- 
 chee Eivers, and on to the head waters of the Savannah Eiver, 
 and from here he went a west course until he reached tlie Oos- 
 tanaula Eiver. He marched down the west bank of this river to 
 its junction with the Etowah Eiver. From here he went down the 
 western bank of the Coosa Eiver, entering the territory of the 
 present Alabama as above stated. Of his baitings and tarry- 
 ings, conflicts and maneuvers from the time he landed at Tampa 
 Bay until he reached the country now called Alabama no note 
 is made here in this work Beaching the town of Costa, which 
 was on the west bank of the Coosa Eiver and between the pres^ 
 ent State line and the mouth of Wills Creek, where he found 
 fifteen hundred armed Indian warriors, De Soto halted and 
 sought and obtained an audience with the chief of the town. 
 His powers of strategy were called into requisition to prevent a 
 revengeful outbreak and a bloody engagement. It was the law 
 of the Indians of America to avenge all injuries and resist all 
 
 encroachments. 
 
 After tarrying at this town seven days he crossed the Coosa 
 to the eastern bank. From here he marched down the river, 
 and stopped at the end of the first day's journey at the town of 
 Talle, which was on the bank of the Coosa Eiver. He tarried 
 here two days, receiving at the hands of the savage inhabitants 
 kind treatment. Continuing down the Coosa Eiver, passing 
 many towns, villages, and fields, after a lapse of fourteen 
 days from the time he left Talle he entered with a sort of ova- 
 tion the town of Coosa, the capital of the Coosa province. This 
 town was on the eastern bank of the Coosa Eiver, and between 
 the Talladega and the Tallassehatchee Creeks. 
 
 This writer has stood on the very spot where once this large 
 and populous town of this powerful and prosperous Indian tribe 
 flourished. The Talladega and the Tallassehatchee Creeks, two 
 magnificent streams, rising a long way from each other, converge 
 and empty into the Coosa Eiver scarcely a mile apart, and here 
 between these creeks is an elevated plateau, a most beautiful 
 and admirable situation for an Indian town. Nature did her 
 utmost in fitting this place for the capital of the Coosa province. 
 
22 
 
 History of MetJwdism in Alabama. 
 
 After a sojourn at the capital of the Coosa province for twen- 
 ty-five days De Soto proceeded on his journey, keeping on the 
 east side of the Coosa River. After the lapse of twenty-nine 
 days from the time he resumed his march he reached the town 
 of Tallassee, which was in a noted bend of the Tallapoosa River 
 and on the west side of the river opposite where the Chehaw 
 Creek empties into the river. De Soto remained at Tallassee 
 twenty days. He then crossed the Tallapoosa River to the east- 
 ern side, and went down that river, passing many towns on the 
 line of his march, until he reached the Alabama River. He 
 continued down the Alabama River on the eastern side until 
 he reached about the mouth of Pine Barren Creek, and then 
 crossed to the western side of the river, and marched from there 
 down on the western side until he reached a beautiful plain and 
 a prominent bluff where a small creek with a small lake by its 
 side empties into the river. Here at this bluff on this plain 
 stood the town of Maubila. De Soto with his accompanying 
 forces entered this town, whereupon the preparations of war by 
 the Indians were discovered, and in a short interval a terrible 
 tight had commenced between the inhabitants of the town and 
 the Spanish invaders, a battle which continued with fury and 
 desperation for nine hours. The town and the camp equipage, 
 baggage, clothes, medicines, books, flour, and wine, and other 
 commodities of the Spaniards which had been brought into the 
 town on the entrance of it in the morning, were consumed by the 
 flames. Hundreds of Indians were killed. Forty-five horses 
 belonging to the Spaniards had been killed. Eighty-two Span- 
 iards were killed, and all of them that survived were wounded, 
 except the priests. De Soto himself was dejected, and his men 
 were demoralized. De Soto had moved forward on this entire 
 march from Tampa Bay with the purpose of going to Ochus, or 
 Pensacola Bay, where his fleet with supplies for his expedition 
 awaited him. But the condition of affairs after this terrible 
 battle determined him to abandon the journey to Pensacola 
 Bay, and he struck out through the country in the opposite di- 
 rection. He crossed the Warrior River at the Indian town of 
 Cabusto. A large force of armed warriors opposed his march; 
 but he pressed his way, and in spite of obstacles continued to 
 move forward. He went out of the present State of Alabama a 
 few miles northwest of the mouth of Coal Fire Creek. He con- 
 
 The State of Alabama, 
 
 23 
 
 sumed about five months in the march across Alabama Disas- 
 ter crowded on the whole of his path. He went on into Arkan^ 
 sas, returned to the Mississippi River, and finally sickened and 
 died, and his comrades put his body in a strong box and m the 
 darkness of the night dropped it into the Mississippi River. 
 The men of his expedition who were left, about three hundred 
 constructed rude boats and floated down the Mississippi and out 
 into the Gulf of Mexico, and reached the shores of Mexico. 
 
 Alabama has been discovered and traversed by men from a 
 civilized country. Men, both Indians and Europeans, have 
 been killed in cruel and bloody engagements. Men m priestly 
 orders have exercised their holy offices in the administration of 
 holy things in the territory of Alabama amidst savage sur- 
 roundings One negro, who claimed to be a Christian and one 
 Scotchman, together with a few hogs and a few cows, have been 
 left at Coosa town. The hogs and cows increased, and stocked 
 this part of the country. The Scotchman and the negro propa- 
 ^ated by Indian women. Small achievements and meager re- 
 sults indeed for such expenditure of means and such sacrifice 
 
 "^ For fifty-five and four-tenths centuries there is naught of rec- 
 ord concerning this fair land of Alabama. Through the roll of 
 these years, and the lapse of these centuries no event is chron- 
 icled by observant and ready writer. Upon all there is the seal of 
 oblivion. At length Hernando De Soto and his associates in 
 adventure spend five brief and eventful months in marching 
 through her territory, and the scribes who are with the expedi- 
 tion put to record the incidents of the journey Then, after 
 this record, there ensues a profound silence concerning this 
 State for more than a century and a half. During this time, so 
 far as can be ascertained, no civilized foot touched her soil, and 
 savages, though they may make history, never write Histories. 
 The flight of time is ever rapid, the march of men is ever slow 
 In rivalry for the Indian trade and in prosecution of rival 
 conquests, different nations made settlements in America. The 
 first settlement in Alabama by civilized man so far as any rec- 
 ord extant gives information, was made in 1702. In that year 
 the French, under the direction of a man named Bienville, built 
 a warehouse on Dauphin Island, and also erected a fort, ware- 
 house, and other public buildings at the mouth of Dog Eiver, 
 
24 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The State of Alabama, 
 
 25 
 
 and named this place Mobile. For nine years this place was 
 the seat of government of the French province of Louisana. 
 
 In 1711 the town at the mouth of Dog River was abandoned, 
 though the fort there was garrisoned and continued as a fort, 
 and a town of the same name was founded at the mouth of the 
 Mobile Eiver, and on the site of the present city of Mobile. 
 After the abandonment of the settlement at the mouth of 
 Dog Kiver, the seat of government for the province of Louisi- 
 ana was permanently established at Mobile, on Mobile River. 
 (Pickett's "History of Alabama.") It is said to be a fact 
 that the tirst marriages ever celebrated by Christian ceremonies 
 on the soil of Alabama were celebrated at the town at the mouth 
 of Dog River, and that the first child born to civilized parents 
 in the State was born at the same place. 
 
 In addition to their settlements on Dauphin Island and at 
 the mouths of Dog and Mobile Rivers, the French established 
 settlements within the present Alabama on the Coosa and Tom- 
 bigbee Rivers. In 1714 they erected Fort Toulouse at the point 
 where the Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers approach each other four 
 miles above their junction. The Tombigbee and the AVarrior 
 Rivers form a junction. About thirty-five miles by the course of 
 the river above this junction two creeks approach and empty into 
 the Tombigbee at the same place. Here at the mouths of these 
 two creeks, on the west bank of the Tombigbee River, in 1735, 
 the French erected Fort Tombigbee, and occupied the country. 
 The reign of the French in Alabama terminated in less than a 
 century. Their first settlement, as has already been seen, was 
 made in 1702, and they surrendered this country to the British 
 in 1763. This territory now embraced in Alabama fell by con- 
 quest to the Spaniards in 1781, and was'' confirmed to them by 
 treaty with Great Britain in 1783. The Spaniards occupied, in 
 a measure, this country until 1795. In that year, in a treaty 
 made between the Agent of the United States and the King of 
 Spain, all of Alabama claimed by the Spaniards lying north of 
 the thirty-first degree of north latitude was surrendered to the 
 United States. That part of the State south of this line was oc- 
 cupied by the Spaniards until 1813, and was rescued from them 
 then by military force. 
 
 In 1777 a number of French families resided at Tensaw, loca- 
 ted on the river of that name, and in that year a party of Geor- 
 
 gians settled on the Alabama River in what is now Baldwin 
 
 County. 1 • 17 1 
 
 In 1792, when the Spaniards had troops quartered m ± ort 
 Charlotte, Fort St. Stephens, and Fort Tombigbee, the largest 
 settlement in what is now Alabama was at Mobile. The next 
 largest at this time was on the Tensaw River, and the next in size 
 was, per4iaps, the one on the Tombigbee. At this time there 
 was a settlement of mixed bloods on Little River. At this pe- 
 riod a few white persons resided in the section of country trav- 
 f ersed by the Catoma and Oakfuskee Creeks, and white mec, who 
 I were traders with the Indians, or who were adventurers, or who 
 
 were fugitives, were scattered more or less over the entire State. 
 By 1796 a comparatively large number of Georgians had em- 
 igrated and settled on the Tombigbee. Travelers had become 
 sufficiently numerous to justify the erection of a ferry, and m 
 1797 a Mr. Hollinger established a ferry across the Tombigbee 
 River, and a Mr. Mims had established one across the Alaba- 
 ma River. The road from one of these ferries to the other went 
 across Nannahubba Island. This was progress. 
 
 On May 10, 1798, Mississippi Territory, which extended from 
 the Mississippi River to the Chattahoochee River, was organ- 
 ized by an act of Congress. The settlements in that part of 
 the territory now in Alabama were without laws, civil courts, or 
 
 officers until 1800. i -, • . i 
 
 As early as 1806 white men with their families settled m the 
 bend of the Tennessee River, in what is now Madison County, 
 and new settlers continued, in the years immediately following, 
 to move into this section in increased numbers. 
 
 In the years from 1702 to 1800 many white men from various 
 countries and climes took up their abode in the region now in- 
 eluded in Alabama, and married Indian women, and their de- 
 scendants continue till this day. 
 
 There were some negroes among these settlers in the years 
 mentioned. The French introduced them into this country, and 
 the American settlers brought them along with them. ^ 
 
 Here at the beginning of the nineteenth century of the Chris- 
 tian era Alabama presents a spectacle and a problem. From 
 the beginning of creation on for fifty-seven centuries, so far as 
 history <nves information, her soil has been inhabited only by 
 Indians^ only by savages. Then for a century conquest has 
 
26 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 been attempted by foreigners, and only attempted, not achieved. 
 During this time four different nations have engaged in the 
 strife, and have supplanted each other, but have not suppressed 
 the powerful savages. At the expiration of this century of ef- 
 fort at subjugation and conquest Alabama is still a wilderness, 
 thronged and crowded with savage warriors, with a few foreign- 
 ers and mixed bloods in straggling settlements here and there. 
 Notwithstanding one or two houses of worship were erected first 
 and last, and a few priests now and then erected the cross and 
 administered the Christian sacraments, there is at this period a 
 total destitution of churches, ministers, and religious ceremonies. 
 Notwithstanding Alabama is a part of a territory of the United 
 States, the magistrate is not in the land, and the law is without 
 authority and without administration. 
 
 iainwWi.feinia-r'gsai.-;«^ 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 The First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THOSE who first settled in the Tombigbee country settled 
 on the hunting grounds of the Choctaw nation, and as 
 these settlers lived on the lands of the Indians they had to sub- 
 mit to the laws of the Indians and conform more or less to sav- 
 age customs. A vast wilderness without roads, bridges, or fer- 
 ries, and filled with savages, lay between the settlements on the 
 Tombigbee and the civilized States. Not until 1805 did the 
 Choctaw nation cede to the United States that part of their ter- 
 ritory occupied by the Tombigbee settlements, and even then 
 and for many years afterward this Choctaw nation and other 
 tribes were round about them, environing them with the perils 
 and disadvantages of savage occupancy. The administration of 
 civil laws is greatly embarrassed in a frontier country, and the 
 customs of refined and civilized society are more or less ignored 
 in such a region. Civil laws and customs cannot obtain recog- 
 nition in a savage nation. But when the lands which were 
 claimed by the Indians were ceded to the United States, and the 
 Indian claims to the land were extinguished, and the Indians 
 receded from the soil, the white settlements on the Tombigbee 
 enlarged, the administration of law commenced, and civil inter- 
 ests advanced. When these settlements were sufficiently de- 
 veloped and enlarged to be heard of in the States whence the 
 settlers thereof came, and their surroundings guaranteed access 
 to them, access even under difficulties, the heralds of the cross 
 found them, and the voice of the messengers of peace was heard 
 in the wilderness. 
 
 The first Protestant preacher to preach in any part of what 
 is now Alabama claimed to be a Methodist preacher, and affili- 
 ated with the Methodists, though at the time he did this preach- 
 ing he was not in any way amenable to the Methodists, nor 
 were they responsible for him in anything whatsoever. This 
 preacher was the Eev. Lorenzo Dow. In May, 1803, Kev. Mr. 
 Dow preached to the settlers in the Tombigbee and the Tensaw 
 
28 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 settlements. This was the first preaching ever done in Alabama 
 except by Komish priests. After describing his difficult and 
 dangerous journey of about four hundred miles through the 
 Creek nation from Georgia to Tombigbee, and telling about 
 reaching the first house in a settlement on the Alabama River, 
 Mr. Dow, in his journal, says: "The company [with whom he 
 had traveled through the Creek nation] supposed that they 
 could save thirty or forty miles' travel by swimming across the 
 Alabama River and fording a swamp, which they attempted to 
 do, and got detained by rain two days; but I left them, and went 
 down the river ten miles, and stayed with a half-breed Indian, 
 who charged me a dollar and a half for the night. I then left 
 an appointment for Sunday in the Tensaw settlement, and went 
 over the Alabama by the Cut-off, to the west side of Tombiijbee, 
 through a cauebrake or swamp, seven miles, and found a thick 
 settlement, and then a scattered one seventy miles long, through 
 which I sent a string of appointments, and afterward fulfilled 
 them, and the fruit I expect to see at a future day. 
 
 "The inhabitants are mostly English, but are like sheep 
 without a shepherd. Whilst under the Spanish government, it 
 was a place of refuge for bad men; but of late, since it fell to 
 us, seems to be in a hopeful way, and there is still room for 
 great amendment. A collection was offered to me, but I did 
 not feel free to accept it; and I left the settlement, procured 
 some corn, and had not a cent left. Three of my traveling 
 companions fell in with me again, and accompanied me through 
 the Choctaw nation, to the Natchez settlement, which we reached 
 in six days and a half, being about eight hundred miles from 
 Georgia. " (Pages 163, 164. ) 
 
 In his return to the North from his second tour to the Missis- 
 sippi Mr. Dow again preached to the Tombigbee settlements. 
 In this journey he was going in the direction of Georgia, and he 
 reached the settlements on the Tombigbee December 27, 1804. 
 He tarried some days, and preached to the people. In his 
 journal he says: "We started betimes, and came to the first 
 house in the Tombigbee settlement, within four miles of Fort 
 St. Stephens, where there is but one family, but it will be a place 
 of fame in time. We had met the man of the house where we 
 stayed, who told us to call. His wife made a heavy charge. We 
 paid her, and S. M. said, 'Tell your husband never any more to 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 29 
 
 invite travelers to be welcome for his wife to extort. The river 
 was high, and swamp not fordable, which necessitated us to go 
 down the river about seventy miles to the Cut-off, which is a 
 channel from the Tombigbee to the Alabama River, about seven 
 miles from their junction, where they form the Mobile, ihe 
 island contains about sixty thousand acres, which are common y 
 overflowed by the spring flood, as Egypt is by the Nile. I held 
 meeting during the six days of tarrying in the sett ement, and 
 took my departure for Georgia, but was necessitated to keep 
 on the dividing ridge, between the streams, to prevent being 
 intercepted by' creeks. There were ferries at the above rivers. 
 In the settlement there was not a preacher of any society. 
 
 (Pages 220, 221.) ^ , . , , ' „t 
 
 No doubt Mr. Dow preached in this Tombigbee country at 
 different times as he passed through it during the years from 
 1803 to 1812, though no specific mention is made by him in his 
 Journal of his preaching there except on the two occasions 
 above given. He passed through this country at least seven 
 times of which he makes no mention. Peggy Dow, his wife, in 
 her writings, "Vicissitudes," gives an account of a trip which 
 she made with him, passing through the Tombigbee settlements 
 in November, 1811, from Natchez, Mississippi, to Milledgeville 
 Geor-ia, in which account, speaking of camping out one night 
 in the w-ilderness some forty miles from Pearl Eiver she says: 
 "Yet to consider we were in a lonely desert, uninhabited by 
 anv creature but wild beasts and savages, made me feel very 
 much alarmed, and I slept but little, while Lorenzo was quite 
 happy and composed, as he observed he had never been so well 
 pleased with his situation in traveling through this wild unfre- 
 quented part of the country before; and this was the tenth time 
 that he had passed through it, in the space of nine or t«n years! 
 (Pa-e 648.) Still giving account of the trip through tins coun- 
 try and telling of crossing the Chickasawha Kiver. by the as- 
 sistance of a pilot, late in the night, pushing or a house at 
 which to rest, Peggy says: "It was perhaps 11 o clock a n gM 
 We came to the house. The family was gone to bed, but the 
 woman got up, and although she was balf Indian, ^^e treated 
 me with more attention than many would have done that had 
 been educated among the more refined inhabitants o the earth. 
 I felt quite comfortable, and slept sweetly through the remain- 
 
30 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ing part of the night. In the morning we started again, being 
 then thirty miles from the settlements of Tombigbee. We 
 passed through some delightful country that day. About 2 or 
 3 o'clock in the afternoon we reached the first house inhab- 
 ited by white people. It made my heart rejoice to meet again 
 those that spoke a language which I understood, and above all, 
 to find some that loved the Lord. Lorenzo held several meet- 
 ings in this neighborhood that were profitable, I trust, to some." 
 (Pages 649, 650.) 
 
 Lorenzo Dow was born October 16, 1777, in Coventry, Tol- 
 land County, Connecticut. He was descended from English an- 
 cestors. He was the subject of early religious impressions. 
 Before he was four years old he, to use his own words, "mused 
 upon God, heaven, and hell." He had, under conviction for 
 sin, while in search of justification and regeneration, a long 
 struggle and a terrible agony; but at last he reached a percept 
 tible change, in which his soul "flowed out in love to God, to 
 his ways, to his people, and to all mankind." He united with a 
 Society of Methodists, being received into said Society by the 
 Rev. G. Roberts. All this occurred by the time he was fifteen 
 years old. He claimed Hope Hull as his spiritual father, thouc^h 
 he never spoke to Hull until after he had been preaching some 
 time. 
 
 He struggled hard and long against the conviction that it was 
 his duty to preach. At last, however, having reviewed the entire 
 question, he yielded to the conviction that God had called him 
 to the Christian ministry. He then sought the sanction of the 
 Methodist people to preach among them, but he met with strong 
 opposition, first from his own father, and then from the mem- 
 bers of the Church. When he had made up his mind and 
 sought to obtain a license to preach and to join the itinerancy, 
 the preachers in charge of affairs discouraged him in his under- 
 taking and persuaded him to desist; in fact, they at first sent 
 him away rejected. But still he said: « I feel the worth of souls to 
 be near my heart, and my duty still to be to preach the gospel, 
 with a determination to do so, God being my helper." He con- 
 tinued to press his claim for ministerial prerogatives, and was 
 finally admitted on trial in the traveling connection at Gran- 
 ville, September 18, 1798, and his name was printed in the Min- 
 utes, and he received a written license from Francis Asbury, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 — — ■ — 
 
 31 
 
 and was appointed junior preacher on Cambridge Circuit, Tm- 
 otliy Dewy being preacher in charge. His written hcense from 
 Bishop Asbury only authorized him to preach on the Cam- 
 bridge Circuit, to which he had been appointed; so that when 
 he left that Circuit his license was null and void. 
 
 The Conference in the bounds of which he had an appoint- 
 ment met, at the close of his first year, in New York June 19. 
 1799. He had done a full year's work, but he did not attend 
 this session of the Conference. Being in a state of health which 
 he thought threatened a speedy exit from the stage of life with- 
 out relief, he wrote to the Conference a statement of his condi- 
 tion, and asked permission to go to sea. Notwithstanding his 
 ill health and precarious tenure of life, while the other preach- 
 ers were in attendance upon the session of the Conference, he 
 was traveling from twenty-five to fifty-five miles and preaching 
 from five to six times a day. The Conference did not grant 
 him permission, as he had requested, to go to sea for his health, 
 but continued him on trial, and appointed him in charge of the 
 Essex Circuit, on the borders of Canada. Some of the appoint- 
 ments of this Circuit were in Canada. He went to the Circuit, 
 and was remarkably active, enthusiastic, and zealous for three 
 or four months; but in October, against the advice and entreaty 
 of all the preachers consulted on the subject, he left and went 
 to Europe. He consumed about twenty months in this trip to 
 Europe, preaching incessantly while on that continent return- 
 ing only in time for the session of the Conference, June 16, 
 1801 Notwithstanding one session of the Conference had in- 
 tervened in his absence, and notwithstanding he had left his 
 work without authority and against the advice of all concerned, 
 he was there and then restored to the relation to the Conference 
 which he had when he left for Europe, continued on trial, and 
 appointed junior preacher on the Duchess and Columbia Cir- 
 cuit He went also to this Circuit, but left it before the year 
 was' out, and made a tour to Georgia. At the Conference ses- 
 sion June 1, 1802, his name was dropped from the Minutes. Me 
 was no longer related in any way to an Annual Conference 
 
 At one time this man, Lorenzo Dow, wished above all things 
 to be received and assigned work as a preacher under the regu- 
 lations of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and was greatly dis- 
 satisfied because he was rejected. Then, when he was received 
 
32 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 and put to work under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Cliurch, he was greatly depressed, and because those who were 
 over him in the offices of the Church would not consent for him 
 to leave the work assigned him he was discontented, not to say 
 displeased. The Circuits to which he was sent were large, but 
 they were not sufficiently expansive to correspond with the field 
 seen m his dreams, and depicted in his fancy. They were large, 
 but in his conception they were too contracted to lay under con^ 
 tribution his indomitable energy and to guarantee work com- 
 mensurate with the requisitions laid upon him. In a word, he 
 held the conclusion that on a Circuit he was not in his "right 
 sphere." He had it in mind to " travel extensively," to " travel 
 the continent at large." Hence he was not carefd to maintain 
 the relation with the Conference which he had previously sought 
 so eagerly and at last attained with such difficulty. He now 
 utterly despised that which once he most highly prized. He 
 claimed, now that his connection with the Conference was sev- 
 ered, to be a Methodist, preaching a universal atonement and 
 a free salvation, with the continent for his field. As such he 
 traversed the land and passed through what is now Alabama, 
 and preached occasionally as he went in the Tombigbee settle^ 
 ments. 
 
 The ministry of Lorenzo Dow to the settlements on the Tom- 
 bigbee was accidental, irregular, occasional, only a sermon now 
 and then preached in passing to and fro on contingent trips 
 through the land. All the preaching he did in these settlements 
 in all the years in which he occasionally passed through this 
 wilderness was not sufficient in quantity, even under favorable 
 circumstances, to produce any perceptible results. And none 
 were reported. He had never been ordained to the ministry, 
 and he was without authority from any Church to administer 
 the sacraments or to organize Societies. He was at the time 
 he preached about the Tombigbee, and so continued all his life, 
 without any Church alliance or allegiance, though in doctrinal 
 principles he was a Methodist. While at one time he baptized, 
 by request, twelve persons in what, perhaps, is now Louisiana,' 
 he seems never to have thought at any time during his wander- 
 ing ministry of organizing a Society, or of making any effort for 
 the edification of any body of believers. He seems never to 
 have thought of the advantages of organized forces and of con- 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 33 
 
 cert of action. He was irregular and uncertain. Peggy, giv- 
 ing an account of her first meeting with him, says, "He was a 
 singular character," and he himself says that he "was mostly 
 known by the name of crazy Dow." , . ^t, + 
 
 To come to the facts in the case and the truth m the mat- 
 ter, Lorenzo Dow was inefficient. He was a force, but an mef- 
 ficient force. He was a force, but an uncertain and an unreliable 
 force. His ministry through life was of doubtful utility, was very 
 nearly, if not quite, a failure. He was not successful m any- 
 thing nor in any respect. His knowledge was limited, and 
 what he had he could not apply to useful ends. He was not a 
 wise man. While he was not crazy in the sense that he was in- 
 capable of discerning right and wrong, and was not destitute of 
 responsibility, yet in judgment he was defective, and he was 
 without that necessary element of character, tenacity of pur- 
 pose. He was restless and unsteady. He was a dreamer. He 
 was restive under restraint, visionary in all his plans, impulsive 
 in all his movements, fickle in all his undertakings, contracted 
 in his range of thought, and seems to have had but one ambi- 
 tion and that to travel at will and ramble at large. He was, 
 contradictory as it may seem, both sanguine and despondent. 
 He was at the same time unduly hopeful and painfully morbid. 
 He was always looking for some wonderful achievements where 
 there were no adequate causes or efficient means, and he was 
 so despondent and morbid that he always thought himself sick 
 and nearly at the point of death, whereas he had the power of 
 physical endurance possessed by very few men. He was, be- 
 cause of his temperament and make-up, disqualified for suc- 
 cess in life's great work. He was, as many of his breth- 
 ren believed, and as the sequel proved, incapable of mak- 
 ing a successful preacher. Jesse Lee so thought, and so 
 said, and he was right. His judgment in the case has been 
 vindicated. Jesse Lee always opposed his admission into the 
 Conference. When, after several efforts, he was finally admitted 
 on trial- "Then said S. Hutchinson to J. Lee Hhis is the crazy 
 man you have been trying to kill so much.' " But Jesse Lee 
 was no murderer. He never tried to kill the man Lorenzo Dow. 
 It was not his purpose in any wise to injure him. The Kev. Jes- 
 se Lee was a man with a Christian heart, who loved justice and 
 mercy, full of human sympathy and true love; but he was a man 
 3 
 
34 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 of sound judgment and correct discernment, and " that had un- 
 derstanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do." 
 
 The very features of Lorenzo Dow indicated his character, 
 they were both rough and delicate, and as a whole his face was 
 smooth and effeminate, while yet there were in that face the 
 very marks of indomitable energy. He parted his hair in the 
 middle, and wore it hanging down on his neck and shoulders. 
 His face was radiant with expressions of kindness. He was a 
 rough man, he was an honest, truthful, and candid man, with 
 generous impulses and kindly feelings. He had in him the im- 
 pulses imparted to him by an endowment of Christian grace. 
 He was a man of Christian experience. He was a Christian. 
 He was Lorenzo Dow. He died February 2, 1834, in George- 
 town, District of Columbia, and was buried in a graveyard then 
 near Washington, now in the city. It is said his remains were 
 taken up and reinterred in Oak Hill Cemetery, on the borders 
 of Georgetown. 
 
 Men who cannot move in the ordinary channels of the Chris- 
 tian ministry will never be efficient in the divine cause, nor very 
 successful in any good enterprise. 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 The First Woek of Methodism in Alabama (Continued). 
 
 THE South Carolina Conference began their meeting accord- 
 ing to appointment in Charleston, South Carolina, on Mon- 
 day the 28th of December, 1807, Francis Asbury, Bishop, Lewis 
 Myers, Secretary; and closed, near dark, by prayer, Satur- 
 day January 2, 1808. The dates here given are the true dates 
 of this session of this Conference, Bishop Asbury's Journal to 
 the contrary notwithstanding. The large field belonging prop- 
 erly to the South Carolina Conference and the regions far be- 
 yond it were reviewed, and the work was recast, and a list of 
 appointments, to which preachers were assigned, was made out 
 according to the demands of the times. In this list of appoints 
 ments, made at this time, there was one which hitherto had not 
 existed It was put down as one of the appointments of the 
 Oconee District, though it lay far out in the wilderness, many, 
 many leagues away from all the other appointments of the 
 Oconee District and of the South Carolina Conference. This 
 new and isolated appointment was the Tombigbee, then written 
 Tombecbee. The bishop presiding called for volunteers to go 
 to this appointment. Only one man volunteered, and he was 
 accepted, and assigned to the place. The Journal of the Con- 
 ference says: "Matthew P. Sturdevant volunteered his services 
 to Bigbee as a missionary, was received and elected to the elder- 
 ship." He was ordained elder in Bethel Church January 2, 
 1808 This appointment, made for the year 1808, stands, as the 
 official record shows, Tombecbee, Mattlmc P. Sturdevant. 
 
 And what was Tombigbee at this time when Matthew P. Stur- 
 devant was appointed to it? It was a section of country upon 
 the Tombigbee Eiver about seventy or eighty miles long, be- 
 ginning about Tensaw Lake and the junction of the Tombig- 
 bee and Alabama Rivers, and extending as far up as Fort St. 
 Stephens, and up to Faluktabunnee, four miles north of Wood's 
 Bluff sparsely settled with families of several nationalities, 
 mostly English. The farthest house west in this settlement, oc- 
 
 (35) 
 
/ 
 
 i-^ 
 
 36 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 37 
 
 cupied by English-speaking citizens, was only four miles from 
 Fort St. Stephens. On the east the settlements could not 
 have extended farther than Suggsville and Choctaw Corner, for 
 at that time the Indians had not ceded to the United States their 
 lands farther east than the Choctaw boundary. The citizens of 
 this wilderness settlement were of varied character; the society 
 was wild and wicked, and there was not much to restrain vice or 
 to encourage virtue and morality. In this section, at the time 
 Matthew P. Sturdevant wag appointed to it as a preacher, there 
 were neither churches nor preachers. Nothing was organized. 
 There was not at that time a road leading to this wilderness set- 
 tlement from any direction. Nothing more than a horse path, a 
 trail, led to that region from any quarter. The Indians, sav- 
 ages that they were, owned and occupied the country on all 
 sides. The Creek Nation was on the very border of this settle- 
 ment, and owned and hunted on all the land as far east as the 
 Oconee Kiver, thirteen days' travel, as Lorenzo Dow found it, 
 from this settlement. On the very borders of this settlement 
 west was an unbroken wilderness to the Natchez country, to 
 travel across which required six or eight days, where the Choc- 
 taw Indians roamed in savage life. Eough huts built of boards, 
 rude cabins made of logs with puncheon or dirt floors, constitu- 
 ted the homes of most of the citizens. The fields in cultivation 
 were but scanty clearings. The lands occupied were held by 
 different sorts of tenure; French reservations, British claims, 
 Spanish grants, Indian titles, " Deadenings, " and *' Settlements " 
 constituted the basis of individual land claims. How tangled 
 and precarious were rights and titles! and how conducive was 
 this tangled and precarious state to drift and change on the part 
 of these settlers! The mills were rude and few. Tools and 
 utensils were scarce. The articles of food were few, simple, and 
 coarse. The household goods in many cases were scanty, the 
 entire possessions meager. Some had come to the country with 
 no more than one ox could draw in a rolling hogshead. All had 
 brought their goods in rolling hogsheads or on packhorses. 
 The settlers themselves were adventurers. Many of them were 
 Tories and criminals who had resorted to this section as a re- 
 treat from the penalties of their crimes. Many of them had 
 come into this region to be free from law and order. There was 
 not a Society organized, or anything else done in the way of 
 
 laying the foundations of a Church. There was here and there 
 a person who had been a member of the Methodist Church, and 
 here and there a person who had been a member of some other 
 Church, where he came from, but nothing in that country in- 
 duced a renewal of Church relation or a recognition of Christian 
 worship. There had not been a Church of any name or order 
 established there at that time. Under Spanish rule the Catho- 
 lic Church, or the Church of the Pope, built and used a church 
 and parsonage at Fort St. Stephens; but both church and 
 parsonage had been abandoned, and Mr. Pickett states, in his 
 " History of Alabama/' that in 1805 " the parsonage of the old 
 Spanish church was used as a skin house " in the interest of " the 
 factory of the United States, located at St. Stephens. " In 
 1808 Josiah Jones, a Baptist, settled on Bassett's Creek, in the 
 Tombigbee country, and he found there William Cochran, a li- 
 censed Baptist preacher. The Kev. Hosea Holcombe, in his 
 "History of the Baptists in Alabama," says: "Flint Kiver, a 
 few miles northeast of Huntsville, without doubt the oldest 
 Church in Alabama, was constituted on Flint Kiver, from which 
 it takes its name, at the house of James Deaton, on the 2d of 
 October, 1808." (Page 107.) Then, telling of the organization of 
 Bassett's Creek Church, which is in the Tombigbee country, he 
 gives the following: "On the 31st of March, 1810, the breth- 
 ren, having consulted each other on the subject, concluded to 
 unite themselves together; and were constituted a Church by 
 our beloved brother James Courtney." (Page 156. ) So, according 
 to the testimony of this Baptist historian, there was not a Church 
 of any sort organized in any part of what is now the State of 
 Alabama until more than eight months after Matthew P. Stur- 
 devant had commenced his ministry in the Tombigbee country, 
 and there was not a Baptist Church organized in the Tombig- 
 bee section until two years and three months after he had com- 
 menced his ministry there, and it was not earlier than his ap. 
 pointment to and his arrival in that country that "several 
 Baptists" and "a licensed preacher" were found on the Tom- 
 bigbee. The Kev. T. H. Ball, A.M., a Baptist preacher, has 
 wdtten a History of " Clarke County, Alabama, and Its Sur- 
 roundings," in which he gives a sketch of the commencement of 
 Methodist Church work in that section of country. His account 
 is very defective, and is absolutely incorrect. He doubtless 
 
38 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 did not have the records from which to derive information on the 
 subject. He labored under misapprehensions, and he made 
 mistakes, not intentionally, but from lack of correct informa- 
 tion. He says nothing about the ministry of the Kev. Matthew 
 P. Sturdevant, the Kev. Michael Burdge, and the Rev. John W. 
 Kennon. Had the Eev. Mr. Ball possessed the records which 
 show that the Rev. Matthew P. Sturdevant was appointed to Tom- 
 bigbee, and labored there for 1808 and 1809, and that the Rev. 
 Michael Burdge was appointed there, and labored in that field 
 for 1809 and 1810, and that the Rev. John W. Kennon was ap- 
 pointed to that place, and labored there for 1810 and 1811, he 
 would have been informed more fully, and he would, no doubt, 
 have made his statements to harmonize with the facts. The 
 correction of his inaccuracies and his misstatements, which 
 crept in through imperfect knowledge of the subject and the ab- 
 sence of the records, is very necessary. Hence the allusion here 
 
 to his work. 
 
 At the time Bishop Asbury called for volunteers to preach in 
 the Tombigbee settlements, and Matthew P. Sturdevant re- 
 sponded to'' the call, a wilderness of more than four hundred 
 miles' extent, filled with savages, had to be traversed, a horse 
 path, hard to find and hard to follow, had to be traveled, rivers 
 and creeks, without ferries and without bridges, had to be 
 crossed, to reach said settlements. Then there was only an oc- 
 casional house of entertainment on the way, and that of the 
 rudest sort. Travelers on this route often lay out at night, 
 pinched by cold, drenched by rain, and were constantly in danger 
 of being scalped by savages. With this state of things exist- 
 ing and^with this prospect before him, Matthew P. Sturdevant 
 stood up by himself and volunteered to go to Tombigbee! It 
 required complete self-abnegation, perfect consecration to the 
 cause, and dauntless courage, to undertake a work thus envi- 
 roned. Sturdevant went to that country as an embassador for 
 Christ There he preached, suffered, and endured. Not many 
 of the points at which he preached in this country are now 
 known. At what particular places he found lodgings, how often 
 he was received and how often he was rejected as a minister of 
 the grace of God, and what special incidents occurred m the 
 prosecution of his divine mission on this historic ground, no 
 record, to which access is now had, attempts to tell. It is cer- 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 39 
 
 tain he traversed the broad wilderness and threaded the narrow 
 trail between the Oconee and the Tombigbee Rivers. It is cer- 
 tain he endured cold, hunger, and fatigue, and braved immi- 
 nent dangers on the way. It is certain that in the country on 
 both sides of the Tombigbee and about Lake Tensaw he 
 preached the gospel and bore the reproach of Christ. The man- 
 ifest results of this first year's work were not equal to the sac- 
 rifices he had made and the consuming labors he had performed, 
 but they were equal to the field, its capacity being judged by 
 its state and surroundings. Who breaks new land must work 
 and wait. Small is the crop gathered by the farmer the year of 
 deadening the trees and clearing away the thicket. Sturdevant 
 had little to cheer his heart and animate his faith. In what a 
 field did he labor I A field, a little slip of country in the midst 
 of savages, in which after a hard year's work and close scrutiny 
 he can find only a few, if any, whom he can report as having 
 any vital connection with the Church of God ! Not a Society 
 organized, not a member enrolled ! A field in which rudeness 
 and lewdness abound, and in which scoffers and strikers hold 
 sway! Could the surroundings of Moses as he sat down by a 
 well in the land of Midian, a stranger in a strange land, or the 
 condition of Jacob with his head pillowed on a stone m the 
 lonely way have tried the faith, the endurance, and the fidelity 
 of one more than the surroundings of Matthew P. Sturdevant 
 on Tombigbee? Not a preacher did he see from January to the 
 next December unless he happened to meet Gorham or Coch- 
 ran Baptist preachers, who pitched their tents in that wilder- 
 ness settlement perhaps some time during that very year. The 
 Rev. Josiah Randle was the presiding elder on the Oconee 
 District, in which the Tombigbee appointment was put down for 
 the year 1808, but neither Randle nor any other presiding eld- 
 er of the Oconee District of the South Carolina Conference 
 ever visited this far-off appointment. None of these presiding 
 elders of the South Carolina Conference were expected to visit 
 it Nothing could be more absurd than to expect a presiding 
 elder to make a visit to a work which lay on the other side of 
 a perilous wilderness which it took thirteen days to cross. It 
 would be much easier now in 1888 for the presiding elder on 
 the Oconee River in Georgia to attend a Quarterly Conference 
 in the mountains of Colorado than it would have been for Jo- 
 
40 
 
 Hi story of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 41 
 
 siah Kandle to have attended a Quarterly Conference on Tom- 
 bigbee in 1808. Dr. Lovick Pierce was the presiding elder of 
 the Oconee District, with Tombigbee put down in said District 
 for 1809, and he stated in a letter to the author of these pages 
 that he "was never there," and that "Los Angeles would be a 
 neighborhood place now compared with Tombecbee then." 
 
 But the first licks have been struck, the little clearing has been 
 made. The brave and zealous man has closed his first year's 
 work in this immense wilderness, and he has closed with heart 
 and hope. 
 
 A session of the South Carolina Conference of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church commenced on Monday, December 26, 1808, 
 at Liberty Chapel, Georgia, about two days' travel from Augusta. 
 A camp-meeting was held in connection with this session of the 
 Conference, and they had sermons, exhortations, songs, and 
 prayers with little intermission. On this occasion there were 
 from two to three thousand persons assembled. There were 
 tenters on the ground a hundred and fifty miles from home. 
 Of traveling and local preachers together there were present 
 about three hundred. There were present from sixty to seventy 
 preachers who belonged to the Conference. Bishop Asbury 
 presided over the business of the Conference. Bishop McKen- 
 dree was also present. At this time these two bishops were 
 traveling together, "riding in a poor thirty-dollar chaise, in 
 partnership." This style of traveling harmonized with the ca- 
 pacity of their purses, if not with the dignity of their office. Ti- 
 tles and dignities are often found associated with straitened 
 circumstances. These two bishops were of those who, being 
 "poor," were "yet making many rich." 
 
 It was to this session of this Conference, held within two 
 days' travel of Augusta, Georgia, that the Kev. Matthew P. Stur- 
 devant had to make the report of his first year's work in the 
 wilderness on Tombigbee. 
 
 See this consecrated man who is to make this report from this 
 settlement in the midst of savages! Physically he was not of 
 robust mold, but was of rather feeble form; and he had been 
 worn by travel and toil, bronzed by the sun, and roughened by 
 exposure and hardship. His equipage and attire attested the 
 fact that he had traversed the uncleared wilderness, that he had 
 been the denizen of the forest, and that he had been the associ- 
 
 ate of frontier settlers. He had no legion of souls converted to 
 God about which to tell and over which to rejoice, but he had, 
 nevertheless, a thrilling narrative to recite. He told, with the 
 calmness of a hero and with the impassioned eloquence of a 
 consecrated genius, of the perils he had met, of the buffetings, 
 privations, and sufferings he had endured, of the traveling he 
 had done, of the labors he had performed. He told, in minute 
 detail, the romantic story of how he had crossed floods, swam 
 rivers and creeks, camped in the wilderness, slept on the ground, 
 endured hunger and thirst, and heard, in unpleasant proximity, 
 the howl of the wolf, the thud and growl of the bear, the scream 
 of the panther, and the significant whoop of the savage Indian; 
 and how he had witnessed, to the vexing of his soul, the carous- 
 als of the savage tribes about him, and the no less wicked ca- 
 rousals of the American settlers to whom he tendered a message 
 of the gospel; he told also how there were brought to him nar- 
 ratives of brutal murders committed by lewd fellows among the 
 American settlers, and of captures and scalpings by the savage 
 Indians roaming hard by! Behold this man and his work! God 
 has looked upon the same. This man had a field to report all 
 his own, a field which he had consecrated to God by his tears 
 and toils, by his prayers and praises. He reported a field which 
 was to him dear and grand and full of promise for the future, 
 by reason of what it was in itself, and by reason of what he had 
 done and suffered in and for it as an embassador of the cross. 
 His sufferings and labors were a pledge, an earnest, of a future 
 harvest of good. 
 
 This appointment thus reported was continued for another 
 year, and Matthew P. Sturdevant was reappointed to it. This 
 time he is put down as missionary, with Michael Burdge as 
 preacher in charge. Bishop Asbury, speaking of what was done 
 at the session of the Conference above referred to, says: "We 
 appointed three missionaries: one for Tombigbee, one to Ash- 
 ley and Savannah and the country between, and one to labor be- 
 tween Santee and Cooper Kivers." 
 
 For the year 1809 Tombigbee had two preachers instead of one 
 as the year before. This itself was progress. This meant that 
 in the judgment of those having the oversight there were pos- 
 sibilities in that country, and the most was to be made of them. 
 This meant that more labor was to be bestowed on this field, and 
 
CI 
 
 42 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 43 
 
 that it was to be improved and enlarged as materials, facilities, 
 and opportunities authorized. Michael Burdge, an elder, who 
 could be had for the appointment, was thought a suitable person 
 to put in charge to lead in conserving and developing what had 
 been attained the year just closed. Matthew P. Sturdevant was 
 the very man for the place assigned him. He had learned much 
 of the held already, and understood the entire situation as no 
 one else could. He was the man to push the conquest in the 
 far-off and outlying regions, and he was retained here to hold 
 and extend the field in which he had, the year just closed, la- 
 bored so faithfully and endured so heroically. What had been 
 gained was to be maintained, and the conquest extended. Should 
 new settlements be established in the surrounding regions, these 
 men were to move upon them and claim them for their Lord 
 and King. Improvement and enlargement were provided for in 
 the assignment of these two preachers. These two men were to 
 work together. Where a beginning had been made was the cen- 
 ter where they were to work, and from which they were to ex- 
 tend the field as far out as settlements and souls could be found. 
 The missionary was to have a claim on and a support from funds 
 other than those contributed for quarterage. 
 
 Just about the period when Sturdevant and Burdge had had 
 time to cross the wide and perilous wilderness intervening be- 
 tween Liberty Chapel, Georgia, and the Tombigbee, and make an 
 inspection of the field assigned them, a letter was sent from said 
 field to Bishop Asbury. This letter no doubt gave an account 
 of the hazardous journey these preachers had made, and of 
 their final arrival at their destination, and of the pros- 
 pect for the year before them. Bishop Asbury makes the 
 following entry in his Journal: "1809, April 1. We came safe 
 into the'city of Philadelphia. I found letters from Savannah, 
 Tombigbee, Mississippi, Ohio, and also from the eastward." 
 These letters from Savannah, Tombigbee, and Mississippi were 
 from mission fields. Tombigbee, with its two preachers, con- 
 stituted a post, a post of dangers and of prospects, about which 
 clustered immense interests, and one which claimed the atten- 
 tion of even the aged and saintly Bishop Asbury. These 
 preachers sought the advancement of the interests involved, as 
 well as relief *from their own isolation, by communicating, by 
 letter, with the wise and experienced General Superintendent of 
 
 the Church. On through the year these two devoted men toiled 
 at their work, and they had good success. No record at hand 
 speaks of their privations and perils, of their agitations, agonies, 
 and hardships during the year, but the net result of their min- 
 istry is on record. No house of worship, stuccoed and frescoed, 
 did they have. Not one did they build. Not even a pole cabin 
 had been erected as a place of worship. The preaching had to 
 be done in the cabins of the settlers, under the trees of the for- 
 est,, and anywhere the frontier settlers could be assembled. The 
 hunter, in his hunting attire, was conspicuous in the meetings 
 on the Tombigbee. In the journey of the chase he laid down 
 his gun and game at the root of the tree, and gave audience to 
 the message delivered by the preacher sheltered by the boughs 
 of the same tree. Kude and rough was everything. The Annu- 
 al Conference was appointed to meet, and did meet, in Charles- 
 ton, South Carolina, December 23, 1809. To this Conference there 
 and then assembled Burdge and Sturdevant made official report 
 of the work of the year. While they had no houses of worship, 
 no schools of any sort, and no contributions for benevolent en- 
 terprises to report, they reported seventy-one white and fifteen 
 colored members in Society on Tombigbee. This was an en- 
 couraging advance made in two years in the wild woods. For 
 the place and times this was preeminent success. The white 
 members were equal in number to the Sanhedrin, or the great 
 Jewish Council, and the colored members numbered enough to 
 fill up from beginning to end the Apostolic College, and have 
 one in the place of Matthias, another in the place of Paul, and 
 still another in the place of Apollos, provided all were men. 
 It is history, it is a fact, not to be denied nor disguised, 
 that from its very beginning in Alabama, Methodism in said 
 State has been connected with the colored race, with African 
 slaves. The very first list of the members of the Methodist 
 Church in what is now the State of Alabama had in it the 
 names of fifteen colored persons, of fifteen slaves. Fanatics 
 may approve or deride as seemeth to them good, but it must 
 be recorded as the truth of history and in eulogy of their 
 philanthropy and fidelity to their divine mission that Stur- 
 devant and Burdge, the first Methodist preachers appointed 
 to preach in Alabama, did, instead of spending their strength 
 in a fruitless rage for emancipation, give to the slaves on 
 
44 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the Tombigbee the gospel and ordinances of the Christian 
 Church, which brought to said slaves the liberty of the sons of 
 God and which fitted them for the inheritance of the saints in 
 light. As God has ordained, the dispensations of the gospel are 
 to men of all classes and conditions. Methodism in Alabama 
 brought into the membership and fellowship of the Church 
 masters and slaves together. She commenced in the State that 
 way, and her success here has been phenomenal. God has ap- 
 proved. There was not a time from the taking in of the first 
 members in 1809 to the emancipation of the slaves in 1865 that 
 the Methodist Church in Alabama did not, under her ministry, 
 have slaves as members of her communion. Whatever may be 
 said of slavery per se, this is a matter of congratulation. 
 
 The natural limit of human endurance, as well as the legally 
 fixed limit of the term of ministerial service, disallowed the re- 
 turn of Matthew P. Sturdevant to Tombigbee after the second 
 year. Two years was then the length of ministerial service as 
 limited by law. As he was worn and exhausted by the burdens 
 and privations of the two years amidst savage surroundings, and 
 as he needed relief from the fearful strain imposed by the situ- 
 ation, it was a moral necessity as well as a legal requirement 
 that he go elsewhere. His ministry on the Tombigbee ended 
 with the close of 1809. 
 
 The financial support which Matthew P. Sturdevant received 
 during his ministry on Tombigbee was small indeed. What he 
 received from the people of that country was not worth count- 
 ing. When he was appointed to that work, there were no Soci- 
 eties there, and mauy of the inhabitants of that region were not 
 even willing to hear the gospel, and could not be expected to 
 provide the necessaries of life for those who preached it. At 
 that time the Discipline provided for making, on the Circuits 
 where congregations were established and there were those able 
 and willing to contribute, an annual and a quarterly collection 
 for raising supplies for the propagation of the gospel and for 
 making up the deficiencies of the salaries of the preachers. 
 The Discipline also further provided for voluntary contributions 
 from friends of the Church to what was called *' The Chartered 
 Fund," for the same general purposes, including as beneficiaries 
 the "superannuated and worn-out preachers and the widows 
 and orphans of preachers." Under the provisions herein enu- 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 45 
 
 merated Brother Sturdevant received something for defraying 
 his expenses while he preached the gospel on the "Bigbee" 
 Mission. On the morning of December 30, 1807, "Matthew P. 
 Sturdevant volunteered his services to Bigbee as a missionary, 
 was accepted, and elected to the eldership," and on Saturday, 
 Jauuary 2, 1808, the last day of the session of the Conference, 
 the day they " closed near dark, by prayer," the Conference 
 " Committee of Charity," in the disposition of the funds in hand 
 for deficient preachers, missionaries, and other claimants, " gave 
 to the missionary to Tombigbee $100." At the close of his first 
 year on that work, on December 30, 1808, that Conference 
 " Committee of Charity," in disposing of the funds raised and 
 set apart for deficiencies in salaries, distributed to the "mission- 
 ary to Tombigbee $80.51 J." At the close of his second and last 
 year on Tombigbee, on the morning of December 27, 1809, the 
 " Committee of Charity " which took account of receipts and de- 
 ficiencies distributed to "Matthew P. Sturdevant $74.14." These 
 items are on record in the Journal of the South Carolina Con- 
 ference, and have been taken from the official documents. At 
 the time Sturdevant was employed in preaching on the Tombig- 
 bee the Discipline, in a statute on the subject, said: "The an- 
 nual allowance of the traveling preachers shall be eighty dollars 
 and their traveling expenses." From the amounts of his de- 
 ficiencies which had to be paid oat of the funds at the Confer- 
 ences it is certain Brother Sturdevant received very little from 
 the Tombigbee settlers, and that his traveling expenses were 
 
 heavy for those times. 
 
 The Virginia Conference met at Edmund Taylor's, Caswell 
 Circuit, Granville County, North Carolina, March 1, 1805. At 
 this time and place the name of Matthew P. Sturdevant appears 
 in official recommendation to and in official recognition by the 
 Virginia Conference. Here at this time he was admitted on trial 
 into*" the traveling connection. For this year 1805 he was ap- 
 pointed junior preacher on Orange Circuit, Kichmond District, 
 with Edward Henley in charge of the Circuit, and Stith Mead, 
 presiding elder of the District. For 1806 he w^as junior 
 preacher'^on Tar Eiver Circuit, New Berne District, in North Car- 
 olina, with Samuel Garrard in charge of the Circuit, and Philip 
 Bruce, presiding elder of the District. The Virginia Confer- 
 ence met at New^Berne, North Carolina, February 2, 1807. Here 
 
46 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Matthew P. Sturdevant was received into full connection, or- 
 dained a deacon, and was for this year appointed junior preach- 
 er on Onoree Circuit, Seleuda District, South Carolina Confer- 
 ence, with W. M. Kennedy in charge of the Circuit, and Lewis 
 Myers presiding elder of the District. At the end of this Con- 
 ference year, which was the time he was first appointed to Tom- 
 bigbee, at Charleston, South Carolina, Brother Sturdevant, as has 
 already been stated, was elected and ordained an elder. He had 
 been deacon only one ecclesiastical year, and, according to regu- 
 lar course, could not have been ordained an elder before the close 
 of another year, but, as he was going a missionary to Tombigbee, 
 the Discipline provided that he might be elected and ordained 
 an elder for that work. At the expiration of his two years on 
 Tombigbee he was appointed for the year 1810 to Fayetteville, 
 North Carolina. For 1811 he was preacher in charge of the 
 Sparta Circuit, Sparta District, in Georgia, with J. B. Glenn as 
 junior preacher, and Joseph Tarpley as presiding elder of the 
 District. At the end of 1811 Sturdevant located. The Journal 
 for the day's proceedings, December 26, 1811, says: "M. P. 
 Sturdevant desired a location, which was granted." For 1813 
 he was again in the Virginia Conference, and was preacher in 
 charire of the Franklin Circuit, Yadkin District, with John C. 
 Taylor as junior preacher, and William Jean, presiding elder 
 of the District. At the end of this Conference year the Yir- 
 dnia Conference met at Norfolk February 10, 1814, and here 
 Brother Sturdevant again located. This ended his itinerant life 
 and labors. He was ^n itinerant preacher eight years in all. 
 During his itinerant ministry he preached in Virginia, North 
 Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and what afterward became 
 Alabama. His ministry extended from Orange County in Vir- 
 ginia to Tombigbee in the wilderness. In what a wide and 
 great field did this man preach the everlasting gospel ! 
 
 The Kev. Matthew Parham Sturdevant was born in North 
 Carolina, and he was quite young when he commenced preach- 
 ing. It is said that his parents were opposed to his joining the 
 Methodists. He married Miss Agnes Kent, of Halifax County, 
 Virginia, about the time he located. He and his wife had six 
 sons and five daughters, who lived to be grown, but are now (Sep- 
 tember, 1888) all dead except one daughter, Mrs. Elizabeth T. 
 Freeman, who is now sixty-eight years old and lives with her hus- 
 
 \ 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 47 
 
 band, Edwin H. Freeman, at Pearsville, Bedford County, Virgin- 
 ia. The exact time when Brother Sturdevant died has not been 
 ascertained. His obituary was written at the time of his death 
 by one of his intimate friends, AVilliam S. Murrell, of Nelson. 
 County, Virginia, but said obituary has been lost. The family 
 records were destroyed in a fire. Brother Sturdevant lived to old 
 age, and died at his own little home in Nelson County, Virginia. 
 His wife survived him several years, and died at the same home. 
 He continued to work as a local preacher as long as he lived, 
 and was very useful to the Church, especially in revival meet- 
 ings. He maintained a good name to the last, and died in the 
 faith of the gospel and in the fellowship of the Church. He 
 had charge of the poorhouse in Amherst County, Virginia, as 
 steward for a number of years, but taught a school through 
 many of the years of his life after he married and retired from 
 the work of the itinerant ministry. 
 
 From the Rev. Thomas S. Campbell, a member of the North 
 Carolina Conference, a refined, consecrated, sweet-spirited, and 
 saintly man, an able and evangelical preacher, one of long serv- 
 ice in the Church, who lived a few years in Alabama, and a 
 nephew of Alexander Sale, of precious memory, the following 
 statements concerning Matthew P. Sturdevant are here given: 
 "About the first missionary ever sent to Alabama by the Meth- 
 odists was Matthew P. Sturdevant. It so happened that he came 
 to live in my father's neighborhood in 1826. I knew him well in 
 my early years, and have heard him relate with thrilling inter- 
 est his travels, labors, hardships, trials, perils, sufferings, and 
 successes on the ' Bigbee,' as he called his mission. When the 
 bishop proposed to establish the mission, he called for volun- 
 teers, and Brother Sturdevant only of all volunteered. He was 
 full of the divine Spirit, and labored zealously. He was a man 
 of moderate intelligence, with some genius, considerable fancy, 
 burning zeal, impassioned address; wanting in energy and tact 
 in business matters, but yet of unquestioned piety. He lived 
 several years in my father's neighborhood, and within a short 
 distance of our church. He was a feeble man, unable to do 
 much work. He was never robust. His health had been greatly 
 impaired by his itinerant labors, especially the hardships of 
 Tombigbee mission. He had a large family and was very poor. 
 He had been living several years in the county. The commis- 
 
48 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 sioners of the poorhouse offered him the position of steward, 
 which he filled with fidelity for several years. He took the po- 
 sition in 1826, and was there w^hen I left and joined the Confer- 
 ence in 1831. After leaving the place of steward he left, for 
 what cause I know not, the neighborhood and county, removing 
 to Nelson County, Virginia, adjoining Amherst There he 
 died, but when I do not recollect." 
 
 Brother Sturdevant's preaching was much in the line of warn- 
 ing sinners to flee from the wrath to come. He had a strong 
 voice, was a great singer, able in prayer, and powerful in exhor- 
 tation. He w^ent through a long life without a blemish upon 
 his moral character. Consecrated in his youth, laborious and 
 useful through life, and triumphant in death, he went from his 
 sufferings here and entered into the joy of his Lord. 
 
 For 1810 the appointment stood: Tombecbee, Michael Bnrdge, 
 John W. Kennon. At the Conference held at Columbia, South 
 Carolina, at the close of this ecclesiastical year, commencing on 
 December 22, 1810, and adjourning sine die the 28th of the same 
 month, the report from Tombigbee was one hundred and two white 
 members and fourteen colored members in Society. This was an in- 
 crease for the year of thirty-one white members and a decrease of 
 one colored member. In the Journal of the South Carolina Con- 
 ference is found a record of the proceedings of the day, Decem- 
 ber 28. Among other items on record is the report of the 
 "Committee of Charity" on receipts and deficiencies, and in 
 thi^ report are the following items: "John W. Kennon, de- 
 ficient, $54.50. Eeceived $45.00." "M. Burdge, deficient, $135.00. 
 Keceived $116.00." The record, here given, of the deficiencies 
 of these preachers and the amounts which the Conference paid 
 them, shows that the Kev. John W. Kennon received for the 
 year from the denizens of Tombigbee $25.50 and his traveling 
 expenses, and that the Kev. Michael Burdge received for the 
 year from the Tombigbee settlers $25.00 and his traveling ex- 
 penses. Kennon received just the same proportion of his allow- 
 ance that Burdge did. The number of members in Society and 
 the receipts and deficiencies in salaries here given are all the 
 items reported and recorded from Tombigbee for this year. 
 The incidents of the year are all ingulfed in oblivion. This 
 year closed the ministry of Michael Burdge in Alabama. 
 He had now been two years in charge of Tombigbee, and the 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 49 
 
 law limiting the term of ministerial service contravened his re- 
 turn. 
 
 The Kev. Michael Burdge was that type of man often met wi4:h 
 and from whose career something may be learned. Ever and anon 
 improprieties marked his life. There are no documents now in 
 sight from which to ascertain when and where he was born, when 
 and where he joined the Charch, when and where he. was li- 
 censed to preach. He first appears at the session of the Confer- 
 ence held at Charleston, South Carolina, in March, 1788. Here he 
 was admitted on trial. At the close of this year he is reported as 
 received into full connection. In Charleston, in February, 1790, 
 he was ordained deacon. In Charleston, in February, 1792, he 
 was ordained elder, and located. He had traveled four years, 
 all his appointments being in South Carolina. He next appears 
 at the session of the South Carolina Conference held at Charles- 
 ton, commencing December 28, 1807, and closing sine die January 
 2, 1808. In the record of the proceedings of the day for Decem- 
 ber 30 is the following entry concerning him: "Michael Burdge 
 was recommended by a Quarterly Meeting Conference held at 
 Betterton s Meeting House, Union Circuit, but was not admitted. 
 It was voted that the presiding elder may employ him, uaing 
 caution and prudence." At the next session of the Conference, 
 held at Liberty Chapel, Georgia, beginning December 26, 1808, 
 and closing the 31st of the same month, he appears again. In the 
 proceedings of the afternoon of December 28, the Journal records 
 this item: "Michael Burdge, who was rejected last Conference, 
 was recommended by the members of a Quarterly Conference 
 held in Lincoln Circuit, November 12, 1808, and, after very much 
 having been said about his former improprieties, was admitted 
 on trial by a majority of 18 against 15." In the Journal of the 
 proceedings for December 30, is this remarkable item: " Michael 
 Burdge was called in to give some explanation relative to his 
 backsliding, a lawsuit wdiich he had wath David Kumph some 
 years ago, and to his restoration to the favor of God." This is 
 all that is now known of him up to the time he was sent to Tom- 
 bigbee. The next day he was read out to Tombigbee. This was 
 the first work assigned him upon his reception on trial in the 
 Conference. He did not attend the session of the Conference 
 at the close of his first year on Tombigbee. He made a report 
 to the Conference by letter. The session of the Conference was 
 
50 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 51 
 
 held at Charleston, South Carolina, December 23-29, 1809. The 
 Journal gives the proceedings for the morning of December 2(), 
 and says: "Brother Michael Burdge's letter was read. He is 
 continued on trial. Conference appointed Lovick Pierce and W. 
 M. Kennedy to write a letter to Brother Burdge to give him in- 
 formation according to request in his letter concerning the char- 
 acter of Angus McDonald and his relation to us." Angus Mc 
 Donald was admitted on trial in the South Carolina Conference 
 at its session in Sparta, Georgia, commencing December 29, 
 1806; was continued on trial at the next session ; and at the session 
 held at Liberty Chapel, Georgia, he was, according to the Jour- 
 nal of the Conference, on Thursday, December 29, 1808, grant- 
 ed an "honorable location." It seems that for reasons Brother 
 Burdge on the Tombigbee wished to know the character Angus 
 McDonald maintained in the estimation of the Methodists and 
 the relations he really sustained to them. Probably McDonald 
 after his location had emigrated to Tombigbee, and it was nec- 
 essary to have an accurate knowledge of his character and rela- 
 tions in order to know whether to recognize and use him as a 
 Methodist preacher in the local ranks, and hence the letter of 
 inquiry by Burdge and the letter of response by the Conference 
 through their committee. 
 
 The South Carolina Conference met at Columbia, South Caro- 
 lina, on Saturday, December 22, 1810. Michael Burdge and John 
 W. Kennon were both present all the way from Tombigbee. The 
 Journal of the Conference, making mention of the proceedings 
 of the afternoon session of December 24, 1810, says: " M. Burdge 
 was admitted into full connection." 
 
 For 1811 Michael Burdge was appointed to the Bladon Cir- 
 cuit, Camden District, with Daniel Asbury presiding elder. 
 For 1812 he was junior preacher on the Keewee Circuit, Edisto 
 District, with James Elizabeth Glenn in charge of the Circuit 
 and William M. Kennedy, presiding elder. For 1813 he was on 
 the Warren Circuit, Ogeechee District, with Elijah Byrd, help- 
 er, and Lewis Myers, presiding elder. For 1814 he served the 
 Onoree Circuit, Broad Kiver District, with West Harris, helper, 
 and Hilliard Judge, presiding elder. For 1815 his name does 
 not appear in the list of appointments. At the session of the 
 South Carolina Conference, in the afternoon of December 27 
 1814,. ae is learned from the Journal of the Conference for that 
 
 day, " M. Burdge was examined and a recommendation granted 
 him' as he wished to remove to a Conference more convenient' 
 to his family." This severed his connection with the South Caro- 
 lina Conference, and with the recommendation furnished him 
 be connected himself with the Genesee Conference. For 1816 
 and for 1817 he was on Tioga Circuit, Susquehanna District, 
 with Marmaduke Pearce, presiding elder. What a combination 
 of euphonious names is found here! For 1818 he was in charge 
 of Broome Circuit, Chenango District, with Peter Baker, helper, 
 and Charles Giles, presiding elder. This year closed his career 
 as a preacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church, at least no 
 deponent hath appeared to the contrary. It seems that during 
 this and the preceding year he was environed by difficulties, and 
 entangled by improprieties, and suspected of immoralities, and 
 harassed by ecclesiastical prosecutions, and in the end was con- 
 victed and deposed from his high office. The Genesee Confer- 
 ence held its session at Vienna, Ontario County, New York, July 
 1-8, 1819. At this session of this Conference Michael Burdge, 
 who had been a traveling preacher fourteen years, and who had 
 had the oversight of the souls of men through all these years, 
 was deposed from the Christian ministry. . The General Minutes 
 state that he was expelled, but do not state the cause of his ex- 
 pulsion. Upon inquiry made through J. M. Buckley, D.D., the 
 following information has been kindly furnished by the Rev. C. 
 AV. Winciiester, the present Secretary of the Genesee Conference: 
 
 « Batayia, N. Y., August 27, 1888. 
 
 " Mr. Anson W^est. 
 
 "Dear Sir: Your letter to the Rev. J. M. Buckley asking about 
 the Rev. Michael Burdge has been placed in my hands. I find 
 in the Journal of the Genesee Conference held at Vienna (now 
 Phelps), New York, July 1-8, the following entry: 'Voted that 
 Conference exonerat^' M. Burdge from the complaints brought 
 against him at last Conference.' That bears date July 6. Un- 
 der date of July 7, I find the following: 'In the examination of 
 character it appeared that certain charges had been alleged 
 against M. Burdge— that a committee called by the presiding 
 elder of the Chenango District had judged him guilty of im- 
 moral and imprudent conduct, and had accordingly suspended 
 him; whereupon the Conference proceeded upon his trial. Va- 
 rious papers in evidence on the case, were read. Voted that the 
 
52 
 
 Historij of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 63 
 
 charges be taken up separately. After a careful and deliberate 
 •examiaation of evidence and circumstances, voted that the evi- 
 dence is not sufficient to criminate him on the charge of immor- 
 ality; 2d, voted that he is guilty of imprudence. Conference 
 adjourned.' Under date of July 8 I find the following: 'The 
 Conference voted that Michael Burdge be divested of his minis- 
 terial authority and that he be retained as a private member.' 
 This is all the record of the case which has been preserved. 
 Just what the charges and specifications were does not appear. 
 - Yours sincerely, C. W. Winchester, 
 
 "Secretary of Genesee Conference." 
 
 On account of "his former imprudences and backsliding," 
 the men charged with settling the question of his admission into 
 the itinerant ministry had grave apprehensions that he would 
 bring reproach upon the common cause by his evil blunderings 
 in case he was admitted, and the sequel proved that the fears 
 entertained by the fifteen who voted against his- reception into 
 the Conference were only too well founded. He, the second 
 man sent to the Tombigbee, that hard and difficult field in the 
 wilderness amidst savages, was at last " divested of his ministe- 
 rial authority " upon a verdict of being " guilty of imprudence. " 
 In after years he was a preacher in the Methodist Protestant 
 Church, and was a member of the Genesee Annual Conference 
 of that Church. He represented that Conference in the General 
 Conference of the Methodist Protestant Church which met in 
 Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, May, 1838. AYhat finally became of 
 him is not now known, and there are no means of ascertaining. 
 For 1811 the appointment made was Tombecbee, John W. Ken- 
 non, John S. Ford. The Annual Conference at the close of this ec- 
 clesiastical year was held at Camden, South Carolina, December 
 21-27, 1811. To this Conference Kennon and Ford reported for 
 Tombigbee one hundred and twenty-six white members and 
 fourteen colored members. There was no change in the number 
 of colored members. AVhether these were the same colored 
 members had the previous year, or whether new members had 
 been added and some of the former members had been lost from 
 the roll by death and otherwise there are now no means of as- 
 certaining. There was a net increase for the year of twenty- 
 four white members. For the limits and surroundings of the 
 field this was a decided advance and indicated solid interests in 
 
 the work of the Church. The financial report indicated a fear- 
 ful falling off for the year. Though the contributions the year 
 before were very meager, there was for this year ^ falling-oa ot 
 more than half. The report in the Journal is " John W. Ken- 
 non deficient $75.00," " John S. Ford deficient ^60 oO. 1 ins 
 report of deficiencies shows that Kennon received from the 
 people of Tombigbee for the year $5 and his traveling expenses, 
 and that Ford received from them for the year $19.50 and us 
 traveling expenses. The Conference, out of the funds provided 
 for meeting as far as possible the deficiencies of the preacliers, 
 made up to Kennon and Ford a part of their allowance. From 
 said funds Kennon ^'received $65.00," and Ford "received 
 $50 50 " This made their receipts for the year equal. 1 his vvas 
 Kennon's second year on Tombigbee and closed his work finally 
 as a preacher in what is now Alabama. 
 
 The sketch of the Rev. John W. Kennon must be short. He 
 was recommended for admission on trial into the traveling con- 
 nection by a Quarterly Conference held at Hopewell Meeting 
 House, Sparta Circuit, in Georgia, and on the afternoon of De- 
 cember 29, 1806, at Sparta, Georgia, he was received on trial by 
 the South Carolina Conference. Here he was appointed junior 
 preacher on the Great Pee Dee Circuit, Camden District. At 
 the next session of the Conference he was continued on trial, • 
 and was appointed one of three preachers on the Onoree Circuit 
 The Annual Conference was held at Liberty Chapel, Georgia, 
 December 26-31, 1808. Here, according to the Journal, on the 
 morning of December 26, "John AV. Kennon and others were 
 examined on the subject of slavery and the Conference was sat- 
 isfied with their sentiments." On the same day was " John W. 
 Kennon admitted into full connection and elected to deacon s 
 office " Here for 1809 he was appointed to St. Mary's Circuit, 
 Oconee District. At the Conference at Charleston, South Caro- 
 lina December 23-29, 1809, at which Bishops Asbury and McKen- 
 dree were both present, on the morning of the 28th of the month 
 *' John W Kennon was nominated a missionary and elected to 
 the eldership according to our Discipline in that case." ^ Only 
 one year had he been a deacon, and, according to the Discipline, 
 he could not be elected and ordained an elder until he had been 
 a deacon two years, except in case of being appointed a mission- 
 ary The next day after his election to the "eldership, having 
 
54 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 been ordained in the meantime, he was sent forth a missionary 
 to Tombigbee, where, as has ah'eady been stated, he remained 
 two years. At the end of his term on Tombigbee he was ap- 
 pointed for the year 1812 to Claiborne Circuit, Mississippi Dis- 
 trict, Western Conference. The name of the Western Conference 
 disappeared, and the name of the Tennessee Conference came into 
 the list of Conferences. The Tennessee Conference met for the 
 first time at Fountain Head, Tennessee, near the line between 
 that State and Kentucky, November, 1812. Here John W. Ken- 
 non located. This ended his itinerant career. He settled in 
 Mississippi not far from the southern border of his last Circuit 
 which he served as preacher in charge. Here, amidst his own 
 domestic surroundings and temporal engagements, he lived a few 
 brief years and died. To the end he honored his religion. 
 
 A son of his, born a little more than a year after he left Tom- 
 bigbee, Eobert W. Kennon, became a preacher, and was admitted 
 on trial in the Mississippi Conference at the session in Natchez, 
 Mississippi, December 6, 1837. In due course of Discipline he 
 was received into full connection in the Conference, and was in- 
 ducted into the sacred orders of the Christian ministry. Serving 
 the Church in the wide field of Mississippi, Louisiana, and Tex- 
 as, in various capacities as a minister, teaching and preachino- 
 for thirty-four years, and making full proof of his ministry, he 
 died a member of the Texas Conference, January 23, 1881. 
 
 The year 1811 was the last year Tombigbee was put down in 
 connection with the South Carolina Conference. At the close 
 of this year it was transferred to the Western Conference, and 
 appeared for that year in the list of appointments of that Con- 
 ference. Now look at the sum total as it was when turned over 
 to the Western Conference. There were one hundred and forty 
 members of white and colored together. For the year the work 
 had contributed all told twenty-four dollars and fifty cents and 
 the traveling expenses of the preachers. This and nothing 
 more. 
 
 All the preachers who went to Tombigbee by appointment 
 from the South Carolina Conference previous to 1811 had to 
 thread their way through the Indian country along an Indian 
 trail from Fort Hawkins, where Macon, Georgia, now stands, to 
 Mims' Ferry, on the Alabama River. This Indian trail went by 
 Fort Mitchell, on the Chattahoochee River, nine miles below 
 
 / 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 55 
 
 Columbus, though Fort Mitchell was not there then, and by 
 what is known as Warrior Stand, and eight miles south of the 
 present city of Montgomery, and by a place called Burnt Corn 
 in Conecuh County. Not until 1811 were steps taken to open a 
 road through the wilderness traversed by said trail. In that 
 year the United States, having obtained the consent of some of 
 the chiefs of the Creek nation, cut out a road from Mims' Ferry, 
 on the Alabama River, to Fort Mitchell, on the Chattahoochee 
 River As the savages were still owners and occupants ot this 
 wilderness country from side to side, the cutting out of this road 
 did not remove the perils of the route, but only made the way 
 easier found and followed. ,o-.n ^ i rr 
 
 By the official record the appointment for 1812 stands: Tom- 
 becbee, William Houston, Isaac Quinn. This is strictly correct. 
 These men were there, and they were faithful and efficient work- 
 ers They were at Natchez and AVilkinson, on the Mississippi 
 River the year before. But there is another statement to be 
 added to make known the entire provision for the prosecution of 
 the work on Tombigbee for this year. There was sent to this 
 field for this year one other preacher, one sent as a missionary. 
 Bishop Asbury was impressed with the importance of the 
 Natchez country and the Tombigbee settlements, and he was 
 constantly searching for men for these fields. There was a lack 
 of ministerial service in these countries lying among the sav- 
 ages The bishop was on the alert, ever trying to supply that 
 lack' and at the session of the South Carolina Conference, held at 
 Camden, South Carolina, December 21-27 1811, he transferred 
 from that Conference to the Western Conference Lewis Hobbs 
 and Thomas Griffin, and put Hobbs on the Wilkinson and Griffin 
 on the Washataw Circuit, in the Natchez country^ At the same 
 time he sent forth two other members of the South Carolina 
 Conference into the wilderness toward the setting sun, not trans- 
 ferring them, bat sending them out as missionaries. These two 
 men thus sent forth for the year 1812 were Richmond Nolley 
 Rnd Drewrv Powell. The names of these two preachers do not 
 appear in the list of appointments for this year. Their names 
 are not atlached to any appointment in the connection They 
 were sent forth to a work not already organized, bounded, and 
 named; but they were sent forth with the liberty of missionaries 
 to work in the common field of the outlying Western country, 
 
66 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Nolley to exercise his ministry anywhere in the Tombigbee 
 country that he might find souls and settlements needing the 
 ministrations of the gospel, Powell to exercise his ministry any- 
 where in Mississippi. 
 
 Nolley, the missionary, was to work anywhere in the Tombig- 
 bee regions that work might be needed. He was sent forth not 
 to supply the place of Houston and Quinn, the regular ap- 
 pointees, on Tombigbee, not to supplant them, but to assist them, 
 and to supply any lack of service which might exist, and to ex- 
 tend the work wherever extension was possible. Not a single 
 item is recorded in the Journal of the Annual Conference con- 
 cerning Nolley's appointment for 1812. There is on record an 
 item of appropriation for missionaries to the Western country, 
 but the names of these missionaries are not mentioned in imme- 
 diate connection with this appropriation. In Xolley's obituary, 
 published in the General Minutes, are two or three sentences 
 which contain an item of history and throw light on some things 
 otherwise obscure: "In 1812, in compliance with a request of 
 the bishop, he went on a mission to Tombigbee. After passing 
 through the savage nations, a wilderness of three hundred and 
 fifty miles, swimming deep creeks, and lying out eleven nights, 
 he arrived at the place of destination." "The request of the 
 bishop *' referred to in these lines was made at the session of the 
 South Carolina Conference which opened December 21 and 
 closed December 27, 1811. The statements all indicate as well 
 as assert that his mission was on the Tombigbee, and there he 
 labored for the year 1812. 
 
 Powell was sent forth by the bishop with the same commis- 
 sion as was Nolley. He was to supply any service needed be- 
 yond what others were rendering in any part of Mississippi 
 Territory, which Territory by formal enactment and technical 
 assumptions extended from the Mississippi on the west to the 
 Chattahoochee River on the east. According to the Journal of 
 the South Carolina Conference, "Drewry Powell was recom- 
 mended by the Quarterly Conference held at Rehoboth Meeting 
 House, Union Circuit, November 4, 1809, and was admitted on 
 trial" by the South Carolina Conference in Charleston, South 
 Carolina, December 26, 1809. The proceedings for the annual 
 session held in Camden, South Carolina, December 21-27, 1811, 
 are on record. In the proceedings for the first day the Journal 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 57 
 
 says: "Drewry Powell, a candidate for full connection and dea- 
 con's orders, was judged unworthy of office, but admitted (by a 
 scarce majority) into full connection." In the proceedings of 
 the last day of Conference the Journal says: "The case of 
 Drewry Powell was reconsidered— his having been appointed 
 a missionary for Mississippi, he was elected to deacon's orders." 
 This record shows officially that he was appointed a missionary, 
 and that he was appointed a missionary for Mississippi, and that 
 he was appointed a missionary for Mississippi for the year 1812. 
 There is no conjecture about these points. The Conference Jour- 
 nal is authority on the subject, but there are conflicting statements 
 extant as to where he attempted to dispense the gospel during that 
 year. Some have held that he preached in Louisiana, but it is be- 
 yond doubt that he stopped with Nolley on the Tombigbee, and 
 it is reasonably certain that in that sedition he did what work he 
 
 performed for that year. 
 
 The South Carolina Conference at this time provided by ap- 
 propriation from their funds for the support and equipment of 
 these two men for the year 1812, as they had appointed them 
 missionaries for that year. In the proceedings for the day, 
 December 26, the Journal says: "Appropriated to missionaries 
 to Western country, $175.00." This appropriation was evident. 
 ly for Nolley and Powell. They were the only missionaries sent 
 to the Western country this year by the South Carolina Con- 
 ference. Hobbs and Griffin, as has already been stated, were 
 sent to the Natchez country, but not as missionaries. They were 
 transferred and assigned to Circuits already established and 
 
 named. ,.,•.!• • i: 
 
 There was for the Tombigbee for this year an increase of 
 
 forces Houston, Quinn, and Nolley, as the authentic records 
 show worked this year, 1812, on the Tombigbee, and Powell 
 certainly worked round about there. At the session of the South 
 Carolina Conference at the close of this year, and which met in 
 Charleston, December 19, 1812, Drewry Powell was present, 
 Richmond Nolley was absent. Nolley never returned to South 
 Carolina after going to Tombigbee. On receipts of annual al- 
 lowance the Conference Journal shows: *' Drewry Powell de- 
 ficient S71 00 " and that from the funds of the Conference for 
 making up said deficiency he "received S5L00." For 1813 Pow- 
 ell was on Wateree Circuit, Broad River District. He was 
 
58 
 
 History of Metliodism in Alabama. 
 
 elected elder January 15, 1814, and for 1814 he was on Little 
 Kiver Circuit, Broad Eiver District. At the session of the Con- 
 ference on December 27, 1814, the record says, " Drewry Powell 
 located." In 1818 he was found a local preacher living at or 
 near Wilson's Hill, now Montevallo, in Alabama. 
 
 At the close of the year 1812, under the ministry of Houston, 
 Quinn, Powell, and Nolley, the report from Tombigbee was one 
 hundred and ninety-seven white and fifty-four colored members, 
 an increase of seventy-one white and forty colored members. 
 The increase of colored members was a fraction over two hun- 
 dred and eighty-five per cent, and the increase of white mem- 
 bers was a fraction over fifty-six per cent. This was a very grat- 
 ifying increase, a glorious work for one year in a country which 
 had to be reached by " lying out eleven nights." 
 
 This one year closed the work of the Rev. William Houston 
 on the Tombigbee. He was admitted on trial in the Western 
 Conference at Mount Gerizim, Kentucky, in October, 1804, and 
 appointed junior preacher on Holston Charge in the Holston 
 District. For 1806 he was appointed to Lexington, in Cumber- 
 land District. At Ebenezer, NoUichuckie, in Tennessee, Sep- 
 tember, 1806, he was admitted into full connection in the Con- 
 ference, elected and ordained deacon, and appointed for the 
 next year to NoUichuckie. For 1808 he was appointed to Lex- 
 ington, Kentucky District. At Liberty Hill, Cumberland, Ten- 
 nessee, October, 1808, he was ordained an elder, and appointed 
 for the next year to Cincinnati. For 1810 he was appointed to 
 Natchez, Mississippi, and for 1811 he was appointed to Wilkin- 
 son, in the same State. For 1812, as has already been men- 
 tioned, he was on Tombigbee. At the end of this year he was 
 transferred to the Baltimore Conference, and appointed to Botte- 
 tourt, Greenbrier District. For 1814 he was appointed to 
 Buckingham, in the same District. For 1815 he was at Staun- 
 ton, and for 1816 at Buckingham again. At the end of 1816 he 
 located. In 1820 he appeared again in the Baltimore Confer- 
 ence, and again located in 1828. Judging from the appoint- 
 ments to which he was assigned and wbich he served, he was a 
 man of special attainments and of marked ability. 
 
 The Eev. Isaac Quinn preached but one year on Tombigbee. 
 He was admitted on trial in the Baltimore Conference at Balti- 
 more, in March, 1807, and was appointed to Mad Eiver, in the 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 59 
 
 Ohio District, which afterward appeared in the Western Con- 
 ference. At the end of 1808 he was admitted into full connec- 
 tion in the Western Conference, and ordained deacon. At the 
 end of 1810 he was ordained elder. He continued in connec- 
 tion with the Conference until the close of 1817, when he loca- 
 ted, having preached that year on Tazewell Circuit, in the Hol- 
 ston District. He is said to have been a man of decided talents. 
 For the year 1813 the appointment stands: Tombecbee, Rich- 
 mond Nolley, John Shrock. This was Nolley's second year on 
 this work, as he was in that country as missionary for the pre- 
 vious year, as has already been noticed. His obituary states: 
 " Here he spent two years in laboring indefatigably for the glo- 
 ry of God and the good of souls." The table in the General 
 Minutes for the year 1813 gives the same number of members 
 exactly that was reported the year before, and this not because 
 the number was exactly the same, but for the reason that the re- 
 port of the number of members not having been made, the re- 
 port of the year before was copied and published for this year. 
 There is a i-eason why the report was not made. 
 
 The General Conference held in May, 1812, gave to the bishops 
 authoi'ity to form a Conference in Mississippi any time during 
 the next four years, if in their judgment it should be expedient 
 to do so. Under this given authority the bishops decided to 
 constitute the Mississippi Conference, and accordingly appoint- 
 ed the time and place for organizing and holding its first ses- 
 sion. It was to meet November 1, 1813, in the bounds of the 
 country which it was to embrace. All the preachers who were 
 in the then territory which was to constitute said Conference 
 were notified to meet at the appointed time and place. For 
 this reason the appointments in this section were not represent- 
 ed nor reported at the session of the Tennessee Conference as 
 they had been the previous year. The bishops expected to go 
 to the place of organizing this Conference from the session of 
 the Tennessee Conference, which was to be held at Eees's Chap- 
 el, Tennessee, October 1, 1813, but when the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence met, at said time and place, they objected to the bishops' 
 attempting the contemplated journey. The difficulties and dan- 
 gers of going through the Mississippi Territory, which was at 
 that time thronged with hostile Indians engaged in the massa- ^ 
 ere of the white settlers, made it expedient for the bishops to 
 
60 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 abandon their purpose of going to the seat of the new Confer- 
 ence. Bishop Asbury is authority for the facts of the appoint- 
 ment for organizing said Conference and of the bishops' desist- 
 ing from attending the session. In his Journal for November 
 20, 1812, he says: "If we meet the Mississippi Conference, as 
 appointed, in November, 1813, we shall have gone entirely round 
 the United States in forty-two years." In his Journal where 
 he is giving account of the session of the Tennessee Conference 
 which was held October 1-6, 1813, he says: "The Tennessee 
 Conference were not willing to let the bishops go to the Mis- 
 sissippi Conference." When the bishops decided not to go to 
 Mississippi they appointed Samuel Sellers, who was at the 
 time presiding elder of the Mississippi District, to preside in 
 their absence over the new Conference. The Conference was 
 held according to previous appointment, and all the preachers 
 who were on the appointments embraced in the new Conference 
 for the year just closing were present except George A. Col- 
 bert, who located; Samuel S. Lewis, who returned to the Tennes- 
 see Conference; and Elisha Lott, who was absent for some un- 
 known reason. Something like a dozen miles east of the Mis- 
 sissippi Kiver and a dozen and a half miles south of Port Gib- 
 son there was a Methodist meeting house called Spring Hill. In 
 the community around this meeting house there lived a number 
 of Methodist families. About as far from this meeting house as 
 Bethany was from Jerusalem was the house and home of the 
 Kev. Newet Yick. Here at this private dwelling in proximity 
 to Spring Hill Meeting House was the business of the first ses- 
 sion of the Mississippi Conference transacted. From this time, 
 and for more than a decade and a half, the Tombigbee appoint- 
 ment was embraced in the Mississippi Conference. 
 
 At the time of this first session of the Mississippi Conference 
 at which the preachers from Tombigbee were present the 
 times were out of joint, and imminent perils threatened the in- 
 habitants of Tombigbee. 
 
 Tecumseh, a member of a remarkable family, a man of fine 
 physical proportions, an able statesman, a true patriot, a saga- 
 cious strategist, an eloquent advocate, a hardy and courageous 
 warrior, and an inveterate hater, was ever devoted to the inter- 
 ^ ests of the red children of the Great Spirit. He was ever op- 
 posed to his people ceding their lands to the United States. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 61 
 
 He vigorously opposed any treaty which contained an article 
 cedinc^o the American Government any lands belonging to and 
 c aW by the Indian tribes. As early as 1806 Tecumseh m 
 augurated measures for arresting the encroachments of the 
 S population upon Indian domain, and he made an energet- 
 Tc and patriotic effort to unite the Indian tribes, from the Lakes 
 on the north to the Gulf on the south, in league to prevent the 
 exte sion of the dominion of the United States over the ternto- 
 :;7L red men, and to eject the white settlers from he 
 huntinc. grounds of the free denizens of the forest. In 1810 
 and 1811 le took active measures for forming an alliance of all 
 the tribes for resisting all treaties which lool.ed to dispossessing 
 em of their native forests. He urged the P---^^;^^^^^ 
 war by the leagued tribes for the extermination of all white se - 
 ;;::s who, for L purpose of establishing tl- -^^^^^^ 
 ized society, had invaded their territory In 1811 ^^ -site^^^^^ 
 person the chiefs of the Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaw s, 
 SeXles and Creeks to lay before them his plans, and to m- 
 Sr hem to join him in holding their native forests in their 
 orpossession and under the dominion of their own primitive 
 customs. He visited the Creek chiefs upon the Tallapoosa, 
 wtre his father and mother were born and reared, and in fiery 
 Ipee'ies and with burning eloquence explained to them the ad- 
 vantages of his project and the patriotism of his mission. He 
 offSiem nhe bundle of red sticks," which was to them the 
 Sll of union for bloody war in the defense o their country 
 ZdZL. Notwithstanding some of the chiefs were cold m 
 fhpir treatment of Tecumseh and opposed to his projects, he 
 ^reat^^^^ and fired the heart of the Creek Nation, and, 
 ri he returned to his home in the region of the Lakes, m 
 due time the Creeks had on the war paint, and were m open 
 hostil ty and were engaged in a war for the extermination o all 
 S settlers in their territory, especially the settlers on Tombig- 
 bee, who were just west of them. , , . -n 
 
 On June 18, 1812, Congress passed an act declaring war with 
 Great Britain, and the formal proclamation followed the next 
 dav The Treaty of Peace which adjusted the disputes and ter- 
 minated this war between the two governments was concluded 
 Tnd signed on December 24, 1814, and ratified by the United 
 States Senate on February 18, 1815. 
 
y 
 
 62 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 63 
 
 Though the purposes of the British in their hostilities against 
 the United States, and the purposes of the Indians in their up- 
 rising and outbreak were wholly different, and the war on the 
 part of these two peoples against the United States originated 
 in entirely different causes, yet they sympathized with each 
 other and made common cause against the United States. The 
 British and the Spaniards assisted the Indians and supplied 
 them with the munitions of war. 
 
 The war with the Creek Indians and the war with Great Brit- 
 ain put the settlers on the Tombigbee in perplexing dilemmas, 
 nnder impending dangers, and fearful ordeals. South of them 
 in Florida were the Spaniards who entertained a grudge against 
 them and had no love for them. North and northwest of them, 
 and in close proximity, were the Choctaw savages. The Creek 
 Indians, a powerful tribe extending to the Oconee Biver, were 
 at their very doors, and had inaugurated a savage war against 
 them, and were engaged in the work of extermination nnder the 
 lead of powerful, sagacious, and bloodthirsty warriors. 
 
 The appearance of Tecumseh among the tribes in the South 
 land alarmed the fears of the wdiite settlers and made them ap- 
 prehensive of the worst consequences. From the time he 
 came into the Creek Nation, inciting hostilities, this tribe 
 menaced the settlers on Tombigbee with war. The spirit and 
 bearing of this tribe indicated a purpose to wage unrelenting 
 hostilities against the white population who were settled on the 
 borders of their dominions, and the attitude of other tribes was 
 by no means assuring to the white people. In this state of fear 
 and apprehension the whites provided, as best they could, 
 means of defense. Forts for refuge and protection were built at 
 different points in the settlements. Among the first, if not the 
 very first, and one of the most noted, built at this time by this 
 people, was Fort Mims. It stood a few hundred yards from 
 Lake Tensaw, a little more than a mile from Mims's Ferry, on 
 the Alabama Biver, and about two and a half miles from and 
 below the Cut-Off. The alarm produced by the stirring of the 
 spirit of war by Tecumseh caused the building of Fort Mims, 
 and from the best authority that can be ascertained this fort 
 was built while Tecumseh was passing among the towns of the 
 Creek Nation. Pickett, the Alabama historian, fixes the time 
 of Tecumseh's visit to the Creek Nation in October, 1812, and 
 
 the time of building Fort Mims in the summer of 1813, a very 
 short time before its capture by the savages, but evidently Mr. 
 Pickett made a mistake in the dates of these events. Tecumseh 
 was in the South and in the Creek Nation on his mission for 
 league and war in 1811, and Fort Mims was built, as has already 
 been stated, when he was going from Creek town to Creek town 
 delivering his fiery harangues. The evidence on these points is 
 
 very conclusive. 
 
 The first evidence introduced on the point is that connected 
 with the battle of Tippecanoe. This engagement was brought 
 on by Tecumseh's brother, the Prophet, while Tecumseh was 
 absent in the Creek Nation, and this battle occurred November 
 7 1811. The History of the United States, in giving account 
 of this engagement at Tippecanoe with the Shawnees, states 
 the fact that Tecumseh was absent at the time in the South. 
 The next testimony on the subject is taken from the " History 
 of the Indian Tribes of North America." In the biography of 
 Menawa, the Creek Chief, who was in command of the Indian 
 forces at the battle of the Horseshoe, on the Tallapoosa Biver, it 
 is said: "When Tecumseh visited the Southern Indians, about 
 the year 1811, for the purpose of endeavoring to unite them 
 with the Northern tribes in a general conspiracy against the 
 whites, the subject of this notice was the second chief of the 
 Oakf uskee towns and had acquired the name of Manawa, which 
 means The Great Warrior." The same fact that Tecumseh's vis- 
 it to the Creeks was " in 1811 " is asserted in the biography of 
 Tustennuggee Emathla, a Creek warrior, who "was born on the 
 Tallapoosa Biver," and who, though at the time " was too 
 voun- to wield the tomahawk," nevertheless " witnessed the 
 capture of Fort Mims." There is a noted fact to which allusion 
 must be made which gives conclusive testimony on the subject, 
 and fixes the time of Tecumseh's visit to the Creek Indians in 
 1811 A remarkable earthquake which occurred m 1811 took 
 place exactly on the day to produce in the minds of the su- 
 perstitious savages the impression that it was the fulfillment of 
 a threat which Tecumseh made against Tookabatchee, a Creek 
 town on the Tallapoosa Biver. In the biography of the broth- 
 er ofTecumseh, the Prophet, whose name was Tenskwantawaw, 
 there is the following statement concerning Tecumseh: "Arriv- 
 ing at Tookabatchee, a Creek town on the Tallapoosa Biver, he 
 
64 
 
 Historii of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 made liis way to the lodge of the chief called the Big Warrior. 
 He explained his object, delivered his war talk, presented a 
 bundle of sticks, gave a piece of wampum and a war hatchet, 
 all which tlie Big Warrior took. When Tecumseh, reading the 
 spirit and intention of the Big Warrior, looked him in the eye, 
 and pointing his finger toward his face, said: 'Your blood is 
 white. You have taken my talk, and the sticks, and the wam- 
 pum, and the hatchet, but you do not mean to fight. I know 
 the reason. You do not believe the Great Spirit has sent me. 
 You shall know. I leave Tookabatchee directly, and shall go 
 straight to Detroit. When I arrive there I will stamp on the 
 ground with my foot and shake down every house in Tooka- 
 batchee.' So saying, he turned and left the Big Warrior in ut- 
 ter amazement at both his manner and his threat, and pursued 
 his journey. The Indians were struck no less with his conduct 
 than was the Bi.^ Warrior, and began to dread the arrival of the 
 day when the threatened calamity would befall them. They 
 met often and talked over this matter, and counted the days 
 carefully, to know the day when Tecumseh would reach Detroit. 
 The morning they had fixed upon as the day of his arrival at 
 last came. A mighty rumbling was heard; the Indians ran out 
 of their houses; the earth began to shake; when, at last, sure 
 enough, every house in Tookabatchee was shaken down! The 
 exclamation was in every mouth: ' Tecumseh has got to Detroit.' 
 The message he had delivered to the Big Warrior was believed, 
 and many of the Indians took their rifles and prepared for the 
 war. The reader will not be surprised to learn that an earth- 
 quake had produced all this; but he will be, doubtless, that it 
 should happen on the very day on which Tecumseh arrived at 
 Detroit, and in exact fulfillment of his threat. It was the fa- 
 mous earthquake of New Madrid, on the Mississippi." (Histo- 
 ry of the Indian Tribes of North America, p. 47. ) 
 
 This remarkable event occurred in December, 1811. Eliza 
 Bryan, who resided in New Madrid, on the Mississippi Kiver, 
 and in the southeastern corner of the present state of Missouri, 
 wrote a short account of this remarkable earthquake. She 
 says: "On the 16th of December, 1811, about 2 o'clock a.m., 
 we were visited by a violent shock of an earthquake, accompan- 
 ied by a very awful noise resembling loud but distant thunder, 
 but more hoarse and vibrating, which was followed in a few 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 65 
 
 minutes by the complete saturation of the atmosphere wi h su - 
 pluls vapor, causing total darkness. The screams of the a^ 
 f Ihted inhabitants, running to and fro, not knowing where to 
 gofJr what to do; the cries of the fowls and ^-ts f e^^^^^^^^^ 
 cies- the cracking of trees falling; and the roaring of the Missis- 
 Spi the current of which was retrograde for a few minutes, 
 owTng, as is supposed, to an eruption in its bed-formed a scene 
 truly' orrible. From that time until about sunrise a number o 
 Lhter shocks occurred; at which time cue still more violent 
 than the first took place, with the same accompaniments as the. 
 first, and the terror which had been excited in every one, and 
 indeed in all animal nature was now, if possible, doubled. The 
 inhabitants fled in every direction to the country, ^upposing if 
 it can be admitted that their minds were exercised at all) that, 
 there was less danger at a distance from ^^-n -^ f ^^^^^^^^ 
 In one person, a female, the alarm was so great that she fainted 
 and could not be recovered." (Dow's Works, p. 344 ) 
 
 This and all the other historical statements on the subject- 
 a^ree, and conclusively fix the time of Tecumseh's visit to the 
 Creek Nation in 1811, and his arrival at Detroit on his return 
 from his tour South in December of that year. 
 
 That Fort Mims was built as early as the time Tecumseh was 
 going from town to town in the Creek Nation stirring up the 
 tribe to war is proven by a statement of Peggy Dow She and 
 Lorenzo, as has already been stated, passed through t^e iom- 
 bigbee settlements about the last days of November 1811 and 
 she speaks of Fort Mims, at that time on the bank of the Alaba^ 
 ma Eiver She speaks also of the earthquake, which occurred 
 just after she reached Milledgeville, Georgia on this trip, in 
 December. Speaking of leaving a cabin at which they stayed 
 the night after they departed from Saint Stephens, she says: 
 « In the morning we started very early, saw some scattering 
 houses, and at night we got to the Alabama River where we 
 staved that night. The river is beautiful, almost beyond de- 
 scription On its pleasant bank stood Fort Mims, that has 
 since been destroyed by the savage Creek Indians, with those 
 that fled to it for protection.'' (Dow's Works, p. 650. ) This is 
 testimony from an eye witness, and is emphatic and conclusive. 
 The menacing attitude of these savages continued through 
 many months. As the months passed the war spirit increased, 
 5 
 
66 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 tlie excitement became more intense, and the aspects became 
 more threatening. The Indians themselves had much to do be- 
 fore they were ready for decisive measures, for open outbreaks, 
 and for death-dealing blows. There were many of their own 
 race and tribe who were opposed to making war against the 
 Americans, and these had to be disposed of in some way. They 
 had to be allied to the cause by persuasion, or suppressed by 
 force. The whole Indian Nation was agitated. They had 
 among themselves, and against each other, whisperings, boast- 
 ings, debates, deceits, and envyings. Pride and spite, implaca- 
 bleness, maliciousness, and revenge held sway amGiig them. 
 Many who would not align themselves with the war party were 
 killed; others fled to the white settlements to escape death at the 
 hands of their own people. 
 
 It was about twenty-two months from the coming of Tecum- 
 seh on his mission until the final outbreak, when the first open 
 and regular battle was fought between the savages and the 
 whites. These twenty-two months were occupied in intensify- 
 ing the war spirit and in making preparation for the fearful 
 contest. Through all these months the war-cloud gathered, the 
 forces increased, and the depredations multiplied, until they 
 were occurring almost everywhere, and at last the culmination 
 was reached. The instances of violence committed on defense- 
 less persons became so numerous that the white settlers gath- 
 ered into their rude forts, which they had built at various 
 points for refuge and safety, and then blood and murder in fear- 
 ful measure quickly followed. There were perhaps more than 
 a dozen of these forts, all of which were filled to their utmost 
 
 capacity by refugees. 
 
 At a place, since known as Burnt Corn, about forty miles east 
 of Fort Mims, in what is now Conecuh County, in the latter 
 part of July, 1813, was fought, with detriment to the Indians, 
 and with defeat to the whites, the first battle of this bloody war. 
 Next came the attack on Fort Mims, which terminated in as 
 horrible butchery of humankind as was ever known, perhaps, 
 in the history of wars. It was an indiscriminate killing of men, 
 women, and children. There were in the fort at the time of 
 its destruction, counting all, including about seventy citizen sol- 
 diers, about four hundred persons, with an additional number 
 of about one hundred and fifty regular soldiers. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 67 
 
 When the sun was climbing up the eastern horizon August 
 30 1813 the inmates of Fort Mims were indulging m a f ee ling 
 of'secuHty, oblivious of any danger whatsoever. ^^^^^^ 
 gate was standing open, with an obstruction of «-^f '^^^^^^^^^^^ 
 way of its shutting. On previous days the inmates had been 
 alarmed by messengers bringing the report that painted and 
 a rd savages were approaching. Through the very process o^ 
 alarms the dwellers in this fort had become indifferent to 
 alarms, and they would not now believe what -y ^^^^^^^^ 
 said concerning lurking and approaching foes. On this Jy^^^ 
 soldiers were reposing in listless attitudes, some of the men 
 were engaged in games of chance, the young men and ma dens 
 were oSying themselves in dancing and jollity, the children 
 Tere romp 'ng and sporting through the fort, full of life and g^. 
 Unsuspectfng as were the refugees in the ort, danger lurked 
 very nigh them; for while they engaged in their repose games, 
 Tances and sports, there lay within less than a quarter of a 
 S of the fort, concealed by ravines, cane, and other growth 
 Teven hundred armed and painted savages fiery with rage, and 
 eacer for scalps! These savage warriors lay impatiently wait- 
 nf for the auspicious moment and the appointed signal when 
 ^h!y were to pounce upon their unsuspecting victims as devour- 
 ing adversaries. At last the hour and the signal came! These, 
 the hour and the signal, came not when 
 
 The western waves of ebbing day 
 Rolled o'er the glen their level way, 
 but thev came when the sun was at the meridian, pouring his 
 rays and Zt upon field and forest all around. Exactly at the 
 hour of meridian these painted fiends, with impetuous spin^ 
 bounded across ravine and wood, and with thundering tread and 
 dLmal yell rushed upon and into the open fort and began the 
 boS work of extermination. The inmates of the fort were 
 surprised, amazed, confused, frightened, and for the time they 
 were paralyzed! They finally tried to rally and to fight but, 
 rS how futile were their efforts! Their screams, cries, tears, 
 fnd groans were horrible! The appearance o the savages as 
 C thronged around and in the fort was absolutely paralyzing 
 to even stout hearts. The shouts with which they rent the air, 
 the hideous frowns and fiery glances which they cast upon their 
 ^ctims demonstrated that they were maddened savages, bent 
 
68 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 on barbarous deeds. Savages that they were, they knew noth- 
 ing of capitulation, they never asked for surrender, they never 
 showed any quarter. Coming so suddenly and unexpectedly 
 upon their victims, they were at once in hand-to-hand engage- 
 ment with them, and with clubs and tomahawks, in the use of 
 which they were expert, they rapidly dispatched those they en- 
 countered. With guns and bows they opened a murderous fire 
 upon the packed and huddled inmates of the fort. Soldiers, 
 and civilians, frightened women, and helpless children fell in 
 promiscuous heaps under the insatiable strokes of the enven- 
 omed host. When the savage throng showed any signs of de- 
 sisting from the bloody work, William Wetherford, who was in 
 command, cheered them on to the attack with animated and 
 fiery speeches, and they never stopped until the work of de- 
 struction was complete. In the progress of the engagement 
 they set fire to the fort, and it was finally consumed, and the 
 inmates, huddled and packed together, expired in the flames, or 
 if any escaped from the flames, it was to have their brains beat 
 out with clubs. Women were beat down and ripped open, and 
 children were slung by the heels and their brains dashed out 
 against anything solid enough to do the work, and all were 
 scalped that could be reached. From noon till 5 o'clock p.m. 
 the battle raged. Then the destruction was complete. The 
 fort and all the houses connected with it were in ruins, burn- 
 ing and smoldering, and the dead were lying around, heaps 
 upon heaps, many still frying and crackling in the burning em- 
 bers. The ground was bespattered with brains and saturated 
 with blood. All who had taken refuge in the fort and all the 
 soldiers who were there for its defense were dead except a few 
 mixed bloods who were retained as prisoners, and a few negroes 
 who were retained for slaves, and about fifteen persons who es- 
 caped during the progress of the engagement. The scene was 
 too awful and too horrible for even savage eyes and savage 
 hearts to look upon and contemplate. The destruction was 
 complete, and there was nothing left for the savages to do but to 
 retire from the devastated spot, smoke their pipes, dry the scalps 
 which they had taken, and gloat over the achievements of the 
 day. With the Indian the scalp was a trophy, and at that time 
 had a commercial value. 
 
 At the time of this awful carnage at Fort Mims a limited 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 69 
 
 party of revengeful warriors under the lead of the energetic, 
 sagacious, and cunning trickster, Josiah Francis, Tecumseh's 
 trained prophet, was prowling through the region lying between 
 the Alabama and the Tombigbee Kivers and immediately above 
 their junction, committing fearful depredations, killing and 
 scalping the settlers, exciting alarm and spreading terror every- 
 where in that quarter. The depredations and murders commit- 
 ted and the alarm excited by this party of warriors, in conjunc- 
 tion with the excitement created by the massacre of Fort Mims 
 caused the evacuation of forts, the migration of settlers, and the 
 moving to other points of defense of the military forces at com- 
 mand. A horrible panic ensued, consternation reigned. These 
 squads of painted warriors multiplied and enlarged. Anon they 
 were everywhere, with bow and club and rifle and tomahawk. 
 The forests were full of them. They gloated in blood, multi- 
 plied and accumulated scalps. Battle followed battle in quick 
 
 fiiicct^ssion. 
 
 This was the fearful state of things on the Tombigbee when 
 NoUey and Shrock ministered to that people. Evidently the 
 conditions for prosecuting the work of their ministry were not 
 very favorable. Manifestly the perils of these two preachers at 
 this time were numerous, and it is marvelous that they escaped 
 the club and the tomahawk. The presumption is that they, as 
 far as possible, acted upon the line indicated by Solomon in his 
 Proverbs: " The prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth him- 
 self '* It is also very probable that they comforted themselves 
 with the words of the Lord, the Most High: "Thou shalt not 
 be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth 
 by day." Through the weary months of this bloody year these 
 men of God had to seek the people in their forts to minister to 
 them the precepts, promises, and ordinances of the gospel. This 
 they did. A family tradition says that Uriah Simpson moved 
 from Tennessee in'lSOO, and domiciled himself and family in 
 the wilderness eight or nine miles northwest of Saint Stephens, 
 that his house was one of the preaching places of the first Meth- 
 odist preachers in that country, and that there was a fort about 
 fifteen miles northwest of Saint Stephens into which the settlers 
 of that section fled for protection; that one of the recollections 
 of Uriah Simpson's wife was that she heard Nolley preach m 
 said fort from the text, "And one of the company said unto him, 
 
70 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with 
 me " (Luke xii. 13), and that she made two shirts and gave them 
 to Nolley. 
 
 In the midst of this confusion and war these men went from 
 Tombigbee to the first session of the Mississippi Conference, 
 which has been elsewhere mentioned. On November 9, 1813, 
 just the day after the first session of the Mississippi Conference 
 adjourned, Andrew Jackson fought the noted battle of Talla- 
 dega, in which he so nearly exterminated the Creek forces who 
 were engaged in that battle, and which was about the third en- 
 gagement in which the Indians had been defeated. For a num- 
 ber of engagements at the beginning of the outbreak the In- 
 dians were victorious and the whites were defeated. 
 
 This state of war accounts for much which took place about 
 this time in the ordering of Church affairs. Not much could be 
 accomplished in the midst of such surroundings by either min- 
 isters or members of the Church. While the General Minutes 
 for this year copied the statistics of the previous year, and con- 
 sequently showed the same numbers for both years, the pre- 
 sumption, or rather the certainty, is that there was a marked 
 decrease in the number of members for this year. The proba- 
 bility is that a number of members were killed, and that others 
 fled from the country who never returned. 
 
 Kichmond Nolley's ministry on Tombigbee and in Alabama 
 terminated with the close of the first session of the Mississippi 
 Conference, November 8, 1813. He lived and worked only one 
 year after he left Tombigbee. For 1814 he was appointed to 
 Attakapas charge, which was in Louisiana, and for this year he 
 served this work, enduring many hardships and having some 
 success. At the session of the Mississippi Conference which 
 was held near Pearl Kiver, November 14, 15, 1814, he was reap- 
 pointed to Attakapas charge for the next year, but he died on 
 his way from the session of the Conference back to his Circuit. 
 He was a native of Virginia, but the date of his birth is not 
 on record. Some time in 1806, in the State of Georgia, he re- 
 ceived in his heart the regenerating power of the Christian re- 
 ligion. Some while after this, though the exact date is not 
 known, he was licensed to preach. The South Carolina Confer- 
 ence received him on trial in Charleston on the morning of De- 
 cember 30, 1807. The Conference Eecord for that day says: 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 71 
 
 "Kichmond Nolley was recommended by a Quarterly Meeting 
 Conference held in Sparta Circuit, December 6, 1807, and was 
 admitted on trial." According to the Journal of the South Car- 
 olina Conference he was received into full connection by that 
 Conference and elected to deacon's orders at the session in 
 Charleston, December 23, 1809. The Eecord for that date says: 
 " Eichmond Nolley was admitted into full connection, and elected 
 to deacon's orders." During that session of the Conference 
 he was ordained deacon. In Camden, South Carolina, on the aft- 
 ernoon of December 21, 1811, he was elected to elder's orders. 
 It was at this time, after his election and ordination to the office 
 of elder, that he went out, at the request of the bishop, as a mis- 
 sionary to Tombigbee; and this was the last session of the 
 South Carolina Conference which he ever atttended. At the end 
 of 1812 he did not attend the session of the Conference, but re- 
 mained in the Tombigbee settlements, and at the end of 1813 
 he, as has elsewhere been stated, was present at the session of 
 the Mississippi Conference. 
 
 As a man he was not eloquent, as a preacher he was not pro- 
 found, but he was consecrated, laborious, and faithful. He 
 braved all sorts of dangers, and moved on through all kinds of 
 difficulties. He never stopped for cloud or sunshine, for heat or 
 cold. He rather courted than shunned hardships and priva- 
 tions. He was noted for activity and punctuality. He not only 
 attended his appointments for preaching, but he went from 
 house to house holding religious services with the families, in- 
 structing, as opportunity afforded, the households, and giving 
 special attention to the children and slaves. It is said that he 
 was sometimes refused the privilege of praying with families 
 where he stopped for that purpose, and that in some instances 
 he was even threatened with physical castigation, but nothing 
 daunted his courage or dampened his ardor or arrested his 
 going. He never quailed in the presence of a foe. He had the 
 devotion born of moral integrity and the endurance born of the 
 conviction of the truth and merit of the cause he espoused. He 
 was solicitous about the welfare of his flock and the salvation 
 of souls. His work was preeminently that of saving the souls 
 of men. He was a man of absolute humility and of solid piety. 
 He was solemn, reverent, and earnest. He was a man of prayer. 
 He would devoutly kneel and fervently pray to Him who said: 
 
72 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 " What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye re- 
 ceive them, and ye shall have them." Even his errors were com- 
 mitted in what he esteemed the interest of the divine cause, and 
 in what he supposed to be in furtherance of sincere piety. His 
 was an austere virtue. His fasts were long and frequent. Un- 
 der the effects of these severe and too frequent fasts he was lean, 
 pale and faint. Too much must not be expected from the inflic- 
 tion of physical pain, or the mere exhaustion of the flesh. It 
 is a mistake to suppose that religion requires extremes in fast- 
 ing, or excess in penance, or in anything else. 
 
 He died on the journey from the Conference session to his 
 Circuit. After crossing the Mississippi and the Ouachita Riv- 
 ers, attended by the Rev. Thomas Griflin, his presiding elder, he 
 parted from his traveling companion and went forth alone on a 
 route which led him a more expeditious way because a more di- 
 rect course to his field of labor than the route followed by the 
 Rev. Mr. Griflin. He parted with Griffin on November 24, 1814 
 On the other side of a swollen and angry stream from 
 which he parted with Griffin, and on the afternoon of Novem- 
 ber 26, 1814, the second day after he parted with Griffin, 
 he was found, less than a mile from said stream, stretched 
 upon the ground, with eyes closed and hands folded, dead and 
 <;old. His body was taken to a house a little more than a mile 
 distant from where it was found, and the next day, November 
 27, 1814, his remains were buried, by friendly hands, near the 
 said house to which his corpse had been carried. That there be 
 no mistake, the dates here given will be repeated. Nolley left 
 Griffin on November 24, 1814; was found dead in the woods No- 
 vember 26, 1814; and was buried November 27, 1814. These 
 dates mark correctly his demise, notwithstanding in a sketch of 
 bis life published in *' Biographical Sketches of Itinerant Min- 
 isters " some events of his life are said to have occurred in the 
 spring of 1815, and his death is said to have occurred in No- 
 vember, 1815 — a mistake of one year. 
 
 It is said that in the journey of the next day after he left 
 Griffin, Nolley, in the presence of an Indian, encountered the 
 swollen and angry stream near which he was found dead, and 
 that in attempting to cross said stream he was submerged, that 
 he finally gained the bank for which he was reaching, but that 
 his horse, unable to ascend the bank where he was drifted to it, 
 
 First Work of Methodism, in Alabama. 
 
 73 
 
 returned to the side of the stream whence he started in; and 
 Nolley, leaving his horse and chattels in the care of the Indian 
 who witnessed the attempts in crossing the stream, proceeded on 
 foot toward the house two miles distant from the creek, and from 
 which he was afterward buried. It has been supposed that he 
 perished from exhaustion caused by the fasting which he im- 
 posed upon himself and the drenching which he received in 
 swimming the swollen creek. This is, of course, all suppositious. 
 Nothing is known of how or why he died. All is conjecture. 
 This much is, however, true and certain: that in the region be- 
 tween the Ouachita and Red Rivers, in the wild woods, in the 
 dismal swamp, the saintly Nolley fell and expired, and there in 
 that then wild region near where he was found dead he was 
 buried, and thence he shall rise and come to the judgment. 
 
 The Rev. John Shrock, than whom a more sanguine, erratic, 
 impulsive, excitable, and boisterous man never lived, was born 
 in South Carolina. He was of German descent, and in physical 
 mold and stature was after the fashion of the nation of his an- 
 cestors. He was a man of some gifts and of considerable power 
 as a preacher, and was a good man, but his life was marked and 
 marred by improprieties. He did ludicrous things, and was 
 guilty of improprieties involving serious consequences. The 
 first time he appeared for public consideration before an An- 
 nual Conference he appeared under the disabilities of notable 
 improprieties. The following is the first entry concerning him 
 made in the Journal of the South Carolina Conference: "John 
 Shrock was recommended by a Quarterly Meeting Conference 
 
 held in Santee Circuit, 15th of , 1810, and after much 
 
 was said in favor of his gifts and usefulness, there appeared 
 some impropriety in his conduct relative to matrimonial engage- 
 ments, which induced the Conference not to admit him." This 
 entry was made in the Journal for the first day of the Confer- 
 ence session, December 22, 1810. Two days later, Monday, De- 
 cember 24, the Journal records the following item: "Brother 
 Daniel Asbury motioned that John Shrock's case be reconsid- 
 ered, and it was carried— and after much opposition was admit- 
 ted on trial by a small majority." The South Carolina Confer- 
 ence met in Charleston, December 19, 1812. The Record for 
 that day says: "John Shrock admitted into full connection, and 
 elected deacon." He was also ordained deacon at this time. 
 
74 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 75 
 
 This closed his connection with the South Carolina Conference, 
 for having been appointed to Tombigbee, in January, 1813, im- 
 mediately after the adjournment of the Conference, he, in com- 
 pany with John I. E. Byrd, who was going to Wilkinson Cir- 
 cuit in the Natchez country, left his native State and set out for 
 his distant appointment in the outlying wilderness. These two 
 young men, Shrock and Byrd, at this eminently dangerous pe- 
 riod when the Creek chiefs and prophets were posting from 
 town to town throughout their nation, inspiring the purpose to 
 destroy, to kill, and cause to perish all the settlers of Tombig- 
 bee, both old and young, women and children, and when roam- 
 ing clans, armed with gleaming tomahawks and scalping knives, 
 everywhere lurked and thirsted for blood, passed through the 
 entire Creek Nation! It took strong limbs and high courage to 
 tread alone and unarmed that long and dangerous way across 
 that savage land. The only music which regaled the dauntless 
 embassadors of the Son of God on this journey was the music 
 made by the sighing winds, and that music which accompanied 
 the war dances of the revengeful savages. On the way they 
 were often chilled by the frosty breezes of the season, and time 
 and again they had hard work to keep themselves "above the 
 foaming tide " of the swollen streams which swept across their 
 path. But they were equal to the task, and in spite of perils, 
 hardships, and sufferings reached their environed fields of la- 
 bor in good order. Shrock served the Tombigbee work but one 
 year, and his last appointment was Kapides Circuit, Louisiana 
 District. Sometime in this year 1814, the year he served the 
 Bapides Circuit, he married a woman who lived in the bounds 
 of said Circuit, and at the close of the Conference year, after 
 being elected to elder's orders, located. Here ended forever his 
 itinerant ministry. There was no bishop present at the Con- 
 ference at which he was elected elder, and he was not ordained 
 to that office until about two years after. For many years he 
 was an active and zealous local preacher. Sometime between 
 the beginning of 1840 and 1845 he removed to Texas, then a Be- 
 public, and died. 
 
 The appointment for 1814 was Tombecbee: John I. E. Byrd, 
 Peter James. Neither of these preachers was eligible at this 
 time to elder's orders. Byrd was not quite twenty-three years 
 old at the time he was appointed to Tombigbee, and he had 
 
 
 only been a deacon one y*^ar. Peter James was about twenty- 
 four years old, and had just been admitted on trial by the in- 
 formally constituted Mississippi Conference, and was not el- 
 igible even to deacon's orders. The dread and danger still con- 
 tinned in the Tombigbee settlements. The war raged in all its 
 fury. The painted warriors, armed with club and tomahawk, 
 bow and gun, still pursued their bloody work, bent on exter- 
 mination. Not until August 9 of this year was the war party 
 conquered. On that day the war chiefs surrendered to the of- 
 ficer commanding the United States forces, and signed a treaty 
 of peace. This, of course, brought relief but not quiet. Byrd 
 and James, amidst imminent dangers and under great embar- 
 rassments, prosecuted the work of their ministry, and had, for 
 the circumstances, good success. The decrease of the previous 
 year had been more than overcome. The statistics gave the 
 number of members at the close of the year at two hundred 
 and sixty-nine white and seventy-nine colored. This was sev- 
 enty-two white and twenty-five colored members more than had 
 ever been reported before. 
 
 The Bev. John I. E. Byrd, who was named for Ira Ellis, a 
 noted Methodist preacher, was a native of South Carolina, and 
 was born May 15, 1791. When a boy, and after his father's 
 death, he was put to the trade of a shoe maker. When between 
 nineteen and twenty years of age he received the regenerating 
 grace which made him a child of God and an heir of glory. In 
 a few months after this he was inducted into the ministry. The 
 following item is found in the Journal of the South Carolina 
 Conference for December 22, 1810: *' John I. E. Byrd was rec- 
 ommended by a Quarterly Conference held in Great Pee Dee 
 Circuit, December 8, 1810, and was admitted on trial." Then 
 in the same Journal for December 19, 1812, is found this item: 
 " J. I. E. Byrd admitted into fall connection and elected dea- 
 con." Here closed his connection with the South Carolina Con- 
 ference after his ordination to the office of deacon. He was 
 appointed for 1813 to the Wilkinson Circuit, in the Natchez 
 country. Henceforth he exercised his ministry in that section^ 
 only he served Tombigbee one year. He was a preacher for 
 about sixty years, but more than half of these years he was not 
 effective. He was sometimes local, sometimes without an ap- 
 pointment, sometimes supernumerary, and sometimes superan- 
 
76 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 11 
 
 nuated. He died at the village of Black Hawk, Mississippi, 
 April 6, 1871. 
 
 The Kev. Peter James was born in Pennsylvania in 1789, and 
 in 1800 his father moved with him to Natchez. He grew to 
 manhood in Mississippi. When about twenty-four years of age 
 he was received into the Mississippi Conference, and appointed 
 to Tombigbee for 1814. He was local occasionally, bat be- 
 longed to the Mississippi Conference most of the time from the 
 beginning of his ministry till the close of his life. While he 
 had only limited advantages, meager attainments, and ordinary 
 ability, he was a man of integrity and of exemplary piety, and 
 his life was marked with a degree of usefulness. He died in 
 Holmes County, Mississippi, March 18, 1869. 
 
 Tombecbee, John S. Ford, 'Thomas Oirens. So stood this ap- 
 pointment for 1815. In the obituary of Ford, published in the 
 General Minutes, it is said: "He was appointed in 1814 to the 
 Tombigbee Circuit." The Conference at which he was appoint- 
 ed this time to Tombigbee met November 14, 1814, and this put 
 him on that work for 1815. At this time Ford was an elder 
 elect, having been elected to that office a year previous, but was 
 not ordained, having failed of ordination to this office because 
 no bishop had been present at the Conference. At the end of 
 this year 1815, in the month of October, he was ordained an 
 elder. Thomas Owens had been on trial only one" year, and, con- 
 sequently, was not eligible even to deacon's orders. As Ford 
 was on Tombigbee in 1811, this was the second time he served 
 that work. 
 
 A new era had now dawned. Remarkable events had just 
 passed. The wars had just ceased. The Creek Indians and 
 Great Britain had signed treaties of peace. The settlers on 
 Tombigbee had a measure of quiet, and they were prosecuting 
 their peaceable pursuits, and were endeavoring to repair their 
 losses and rebuild their fortunes. These settlers, however, were 
 not by any means in a paradisiacal state, though new settlers, 
 eager for a possession in that land of promise, were flowing like 
 a stream into the country. The gore with which the land had 
 been drenched was hardly gone from view, the wounded were 
 hardly healed, the ashes of the burned cabins had scarcely disap- 
 peared, the rude looms and primitive spinning wheels had not 
 been rebuilt and operated long enough to replenish the scanty 
 
 wardrobes, the scattered and depleted herds had not been re- 
 gathered and restore.d, and the fields had not yet yielded their 
 accustomed supplies. The lamentations which had been bo 
 long and so loud had only partially subsided, and hope had only 
 
 partially revived. 
 
 But these two preachers wrought at their ministry, and at the 
 end of the year reported the results of their labor. The report 
 of the numbers in Society gave two hundred and eighty-seven 
 white and seventy-six colored members, an increase of eighteen 
 white members and a decrease of three colored members. 
 
 The Rev. John S. Ford was born in South Carolina, February 
 6, 1790. He was baptized when an infant, and when about thir- 
 teen years of age he received from God, through Christ, by faith, 
 incomparable peace and inexpressible joy. Immediately upon 
 the attainment of this blessed estate, and in the year 1805, he 
 united with the Methodist Episcopal Church. He believed and 
 approved, without any mental or moral reservation, the doc- 
 trines and rules of this Church. Yielding to a conviction which 
 impressed and impelled him, he accepted a license to preach, 
 and entered upon the itinerant ministry peculiar to his Church. 
 The same Quarterly Conference which licensed him to preach 
 recommended him to the Annual Conference for admission on 
 trial in the traveling connection. His license bore date Novem- 
 ber 3, 1809. The Quarterly Conference devoted two days to its 
 business. An entry in the Journal of the South Carolina Con- 
 ference for the afternoon of December 26, 1809, says: *' John S. 
 Ford was recommended by the Quarterly Meeting Conference, 
 held at Moore's Meeting House, Union Circuit, November 4, 
 1809, and was admitted on trial." At the end of his first year 
 in the Conference, and more than a month before he was twen- 
 ty-one, on December 28, 1810, he was appointed missionary to 
 Tombigbee, and elected and ordained deacon. The Journal of 
 the South Carolina Conference for that date says: "John S. 
 Ford, Missionary, elected to Deacon's office." He was not eligi- 
 ble to reception into full connection, and he remained on trial, 
 but, as the law provided in such case, as a missionary he was 
 elected and ordained deacon. This explains all the records on the 
 subject, even those which are conflicting. For 1816 he was at 
 Nollichuckee, in the Holston District, Tennessee Conference. 
 At the -session of the Tennessee Conference at Franklin com- 
 
78 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 mencing October 20, 1816, Ford was not present, but he made 
 there at that time a most singular request ^ud a blundering ap- 
 plication. He sent to the Conference a letter in which he ap- 
 plied for a letter of dismissal from the Conference. His re- 
 quest was granted. On the assembling of the South Carolina 
 Conference at Columbia, December 25, 1816, just two months 
 and five days after he had obtained a dismissal from the Ten- 
 nessee Conference, he presented his letter of dismissal from the 
 Tennessee Conference for admission to and recognition in the 
 South Carolina Conference. Here he found out the blunder he 
 had made. He had really been dismissed upon his own appli- 
 cation from the traveling connection. Instead of obtaining a 
 letter of recommendation for recognition by the South Carolina 
 Conference, he had been dismissed from the traveling connec- 
 tion. The Journal of the Conference says: " John S. Ford, who 
 went a Missionary from this Conference to the West some years 
 ago, having injudiciously applied by letter to the last Tennessee 
 Conference for a dismission, which was granted, supposing that 
 it would be a sufficient recommendation for his entrance into 
 this Conference, offered himself for readmission here, but was 
 objected to. This Conference, however, having confidence in 
 Brother Ford, and believing him to have erred mostly through 
 ignorance and not intentionally, received him in character with 
 the approbation of the superintendents." At the end of 1818 
 he located, but was finally re-admitted to the traveling connec- 
 tion. For many long years under physical infirmities, he held a 
 superannuated relation in the Conference. When he died he 
 was a member of the South Georgia Conference. He died in 
 the city of Macon, Georgia, November 9, 1871. 
 
 Though he was not profound nor eloquent, yet he was an im- 
 pressive preacher. He held in high regard and preached earnest- 
 ly the distinguishing doctrines of the Methodists. The univer- 
 sality of the atonement was his favorite theme. He gloried in 
 the truth that Jesus Christ died for all men. 
 
 Tombecbee, Ashley Hewett, Alexander Fleming, This was the 
 record for this appointment for the year 1816.' Through some 
 cause, possibly the division of the Circuit and the formation of 
 the Chickasaw Circuit, afterward called Chickasahay, the mem- 
 bership on Tombigbee decreased this year one hundred and 
 thirty-seven white members and thirty-six colored members. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 79 
 
 The Mississippi Conference met at William Foster's, October 
 10, 1816. Here Hewett and Fleming reported the year's work 
 from Tombigbee. Ashley Hewett had received on the work for 
 his support $60, and Alexander Fleming had received on the 
 work for his support $80. Ashley Hewett reported raised as 
 "Conference Collection on Tombigbee $29.81^." The Confer- 
 ence "Committee of Appropriation" paid Hewett "$40," and 
 Fleming " $20," and " Fleming's two children $48." The entire 
 collection from Tombigbee for the year was " $169.81J." 
 
 The Eev. " Ashley Hewitt was recommended by the members 
 of a Quarterly Conference held in Onoree Circuit, November 
 18, 1810," and was admitted on trial by the South Carolina Con- 
 ference, in Charleston, South Carolina, December 22, 1810. In 
 Charleston, South Carolina, December 19, 1812, he was" admitted 
 into full connection, and elected deacon." He was also ordained 
 a deacon at the session of this Conference. At Milledgeville, 
 Georgia, December 24, 1814, he was " elected to elder's orders," 
 and he was ordained to said office on a subsequent day of the 
 session of said Conference. At the session of the Conference 
 held in Charleston, December 23-28, 1815, in response to a call 
 for volunteers to go to the destitute regions toward the setting 
 sun, Hewett volunteered, and was transferred from his native 
 State and Conference, and was appointed, as above stated, to 
 Tombigbee. The journey from his native State to Tombigbee 
 through the Indian country was made in perilous times. On 
 this journey his courage was often put to the test, and his life 
 was in jeopardy. 
 
 It is said that in stature he was tall and lean ; that he had blue 
 eyes, and hair of light color, a fair complexion, a mouth large 
 enough to indicate a fluent speaker, and that he had a pleasant 
 countenance. He was a quiet, sedate, matter-of-fact man, pos- 
 sessing a sound judgment, medium attainments, and moderate 
 abilities. He had neither genius nor fancy. As a preacher he 
 had but little or no variety, and was almost entirely destitute of 
 emotion and of action. For the year 1830 he served the War- 
 ren Circuit, in the Bayou Pierre District, and at the session of 
 the Mississippi Conference which met at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, 
 November 24, 1830, he located. 
 
 Alexander Fleming was admitted on trial by the Tennessee 
 Conference at its session at Bethlehem Meeting House, in Wil- 
 
80 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 8on County, Tennessee, October 20, 1815, and was appointed for 
 the year following to Tombigbee. He was or had been married. 
 He had two children. For 1817 he was appointed to Kapides 
 Circuit, in the Louisiana District, and at the end of the year 
 discontinued. He did not live long after this. 
 
 For 1817 the appointment stood: Tombecbee, Elisha Lott. At 
 the end of this year the report of the members in Society gives 
 Tombigbee two hundred and thirty-three white and ninety-live 
 colored members, an increase for the year of eighty-three white 
 and of fifty-five colored members, a very fine increase indeed. 
 
 The Kev. Elisha Lott was received into the Tennessee Con- 
 ference on trial at Fountain Head, November 1, 1812, and was 
 appointed to Amite Circuit, Mississippi, and for 1814 he was on 
 Wilkinson Circuit, in the same State. At the end of 1814 he 
 was received into full connection in the Mississippi Conference, 
 and elected to deacon's orders. For 1815 he was on Kapides 
 Circuit, in Louisiana. At the session of the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence at Bethlehem Meeting House, Wilson County, Tennessee, 
 in November, 1815, he was ordained deacon. It appears that 
 he was carried through the form of being received into full con- 
 nection in the Tennessee Conference, though the same thing had 
 been done at the Mississippi Conference, held near Pearl River, 
 beginning November 14, 1814. At the Mississippi Conference 
 Bt Midway, in November, 1817, he was elected and ordained elder, 
 and he located. For 1826 he appears again in the Mississippi 
 Conference, and at the end of 1827 he again located. This ter- 
 minated his itinerant ministry in the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. He lived a local preacher in the State of Mississippi 
 from the close of 1827 until the latter part of 1836, when, for 
 Bome reason, he, in a rude and peevish way, surrendered his 
 credentials to the Quarterly Conference of which he was a mem- 
 ber, and soon after united with the Methodist Protestant Church, 
 in which Church he held the position of a preacher, and in 
 which he lived and labored until the end of his natural life. 
 He lived io be An old man, and died in Madison County, Missis- 
 sippi 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The First Work of Methodism in Alabama (Continued). 
 
 AT this juncture in this historic narrative the geographical 
 limits, the men and women who composed the congrega- 
 tions and membership of the Tombigbee charge during the first 
 decade thereof, and some miscellaneous items claim specific at- 
 tention. A most difficult task, and one which in the nature of 
 the case will be very imperfectly performed, is hereby present- 
 ed and attempted. Nothing can be gathered in this field beyond 
 a mere gleaning. But few transactions of that time were ever 
 put to record, tradition has perpetuated but little, and conse- 
 quently most of the ofiicial acts and of the personal reminis- 
 cences have been forgotten and are forever lost. 
 
 That tract of land which the Choctaw Indians had previous 
 to this date ceded to the United States, while east and west it 
 extended from the line of the Creek Nation a few miles east of 
 the Tombigbee Eiver to the Mississippi Eiver, was in width, 
 north and south, at the Tombigbee Eiver, on an air line, just 
 sixty-eight miles. By any route which could be traveled it was 
 probably eighty or more miles from one side to the other. The 
 southern boundary of this ceded territory was the thirty-first 
 parallel of latitude, and was ten miles south of the junction of 
 the Tombigbee and Alabama Eivers, and the northern boundary 
 was at the mouth of Faluktabunnee Creek, four miles north of 
 a noted bluff known as Wood's Bluff. Within these lines north 
 and south, and within a few miles east and west of the Tombig- 
 bee Eiver were found all the purely white settlers of that time. 
 Many were the inducements to settlers to pitch their habitations 
 about the river, and up to 1808, the settlers having yielded to 
 these inducements, very few families resided more than a dozen 
 miles away from some part of the river. The entire area occu- 
 pied at that date by these settlers was less than a thousand 
 square miles, and the whole number of inhabitants living at that 
 time in the Tombigbee settlements was estimated at from eight 
 hundred to a thousand. There was not more than an average of 
 6 ^^^^ 
 
82 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 one family for every four square miles. There were at this date 
 a few families settled on the Chickasahay Eiver, which river is, 
 at different points, on an air line, from twenty-five to thirty-five 
 miles west of the Tombigbee Kiver. There were but few places 
 of note in all these settlements in this year of grace 1808. Lake 
 Tensaw was a point of some significance seven or eight miles 
 east of the Tombigbee and Alabama junction, and Fort Stod- 
 dart was a military post four or five miles southwest of said 
 junction. Mcintosh Bluff was the center of a community and 
 the name of a point on the Tombigbee. Wakefield was at that 
 time a little village and the seat of justice, and was in the re- 
 gion of Mcintosh Bluff. Wakefield was in Section Thirty-five, 
 Township Five, north, Kange One, east. Saint Stephens, on the 
 bank of the Tombigbee, was at that time a place, but was then 
 noted only for being the emporium of the Indian trade, the 
 whole business of which was under the supervision of one man. 
 Wood's Bluff, sometimes called Easley's Station, was thirty-one 
 miles from Saint Stephens, and almost due north of it. 
 
 For the first year of this first regularly appointed Methodist 
 ministry to this country, the year 1808, the preaching was evi- 
 dently confined to the territory in the immediate vicinity of the 
 Tombigbee Kiver. Brother Sturdevant may possibly have 
 made a single visit in the year 1808 to the families residing on 
 Chickasahay River, but it is evident that he confined his minis- 
 try during that year within the lines and the area above de- 
 scribed on the Tombigbee River. At any private house, or em- 
 bowered spot, or place of public resort, within the lines and the 
 area above named, that he could get permission to exercise his 
 ministry and persons to listen to his message, did Mr. Sturde- 
 vant, with impassioned eloquence, proclaim the word of life. At 
 Wood's Bluff, at different places round about Saint Stephens, 
 at Wakefield, at Fort Stoddart, at Lake Tensaw, were probably 
 found the points for preaching the gospel this first year of re- 
 ligious work in that region. Evidently Mr. Sturdevant came in 
 contact with all the citizens within the limits of his field of op- 
 erations, and associated with them more or less, as was to them 
 agreeable. It was impossible for him to traverse that land as 
 he did again and again, from end to end and from side to side, 
 and not meet at some time, in some way, nearly the entire popu- 
 lation. It would have been comparatively a small matter for 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 83 
 
 him to have visited every family in the bounds of his work, and 
 it is altogether probable that he did visit every family that would 
 receive him. That whole population knew Mr. Sturdevant as a 
 Methodist preacher, as an embassador representing the court of 
 heaven, and praying them in Christ's stead to be reconciled to 
 God. It was impossible for a Methodist preacher to be in that 
 country a year, and any of the inhabitants thereof not to hear of 
 and see him, and to be also for some reason interested in the 
 fact that he was there. The advent of a preacher in that land to 
 preach to that people was an occasion, and at that time was such 
 an occasion as had not hitherto been. It was an event of no or- 
 dinary meaning. It was an event which could not be ignored, 
 an event which commanded attention and demanded considera- 
 tion. Did a preacher's presence and influence mean good to the 
 country, or did they mean evil? These were questions which 
 had to be settled. If for no other reason the novelty of a 
 preacher in that country, going up and down in it, would excite 
 curiosity, intensify interest, and cause no little inquiry and gos- 
 sip. The presence of Mr. Sturdevant as a preacher furnished, 
 no doubt, the theme of conversation in all the cabins and at all 
 the gatherings in that isolated section. Wherever the inhab- 
 itants met for work and business, or for sport and frolic, 
 they talked of the new thing under the sun, the Methodist 
 preacher who had come into their midst. At their house rais- 
 ings, log rollings, quiltings, shooting matches, and dances, they 
 talked, derisively it may be in some instances, but they talked, 
 promiscuously and intently, about the preacher then among 
 them. They discussed his personal appearance, his speech, his 
 conduct, his motives, and his mission to their country, and the 
 possible success he would attain, and the probable effects of his 
 ministry upon their country in general and their habits and 
 pleasures in particular. Various and conflicting opinions were 
 expressed. All this tended to give publicity to his ministry, and 
 to make some sort of impression on the minds of the population. 
 Among the men living in that country in that first year of 
 Mr. Sturdevant's ministry may be mentioned: Samuel Mims, 
 John Linder, Thomas Byrne, Benjamin Steadham, Moses Stead- 
 ham, William H. Hargrove, Joseph Bates, John Hinson, Nich- 
 olas Perkins, Thomas Malone, Peter Malone, Edmund P. Gaines, 
 George S. Gaines, Harry Toulmiu, Thomas Kimbell, Ransom 
 
Si 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 85 
 
 Kimbell, Hiram MouDger, Samson Mounger, Nathan Blackwell, 
 John Brewer, George Brewer, Eobert Caller, John Caller, James 
 Caller, Henry Atchison, James Powell, John Powell, Daniel 
 Johnson, Joseph Wheat, Solomon Wheat, Thomas Bassett, 
 John McGrew, William McGrew, Tandy Walker, Kichard Hawk- 
 ins, Edwin Lewis, John Baker, James Morgan, Randall P. West, 
 James McGoffin, AYilliam Coate, W^illiam Murrell, Abner Turn- 
 er, William Easley, AVarham Easley. Many others might be 
 named. 
 
 These men here named lived in different parts of that tract of 
 country on the Tombigbee. Many of them were never Method- 
 ists. A large number of them were grossly worldly and ex- 
 tremely wicked, and could no more be impressed with the obli- 
 gations and benefits of the Christian religion than could the 
 beasts of the forest in which they lived, but possibly they all 
 saw Mr. Sturdevant, and perhaps heard him preach, and some 
 few of them were favorably impressed and proj^erly influenced 
 by his ministry. 
 
 Samuel Mims whom Mr. Slurdevant found on Lake Tensaw 
 when first he came to that region, was what is known in history 
 as an " Indian countryman." He was once a pack-horseman and 
 a trader in the Indian nations. He had been a resident on Lake 
 Tensaw many years. He was a wealthy man. He was the 
 founder and proprietor of Mims's Ferry, on the Alabama River. 
 Fort Mims was named for him and enclosed his residence. It 
 is in evidence that he cared very little for Mr. Sturdevant and 
 his ministry. Like many others found at that time in that land, 
 he had resided by choice too long in the Indian country, he had 
 associated too intimately with savage life, he had conformed too 
 closely to the manners and customs of barbarous tribes, to 
 have any special appreciation of the Christian religion. Not to 
 speak of worse things, his house was "a resort of mirth," a 
 noted place where fiddlers and dancers oft assembled, and spent 
 their time moving in measured step to the sound of musical in- 
 struments. This " the most spacious " house in the country at 
 that time Mr. Sturdevant did not fail to find, but he did not suc- 
 ceed in making it a house of prayer. He was unable to exor- 
 cise the dancing spirit. The young folks were dancing in that 
 very same house the day that Wetherford and his savage war- 
 riors burned it to the ground and massacred its inmates. 
 
 AVlien in penetrating his field of labor in the remote and iso- 
 lated settlements on the Tombigbee Mr. Sturdevant reached he 
 little town of Wakefield, then tlie seat of justice for that Dis- 
 trict, he found residing there Nicholas Perkins, a young layer 
 from Tennessee, who at the first court held at that new seat o 
 justice "was admitted to the practice of Attorney General of 
 the Court;" Thomas Malone, then the Clerk of the Court: Theo- 
 dore Brightwell, then Sheriff of Washington County; and Harry 
 ToulmiiC Judge of the Superior Court. There were a few oth- 
 ers residing there. Seven miles from there lived John Hmson^ 
 The tastes, habits, and character of a man are often learned 
 by the history of incidents. The circumstances whicn lead to 
 a man's connection with certain events indicate what he was and 
 how he stood related to certain questions and principles. As 
 to whether a man was allied to certain parties, interests, and 
 principles may be correctly ascertained by a knowledge of his 
 allegiance to other parties, interests, and principles. Accepting 
 these criteria, the social type and moral character of Perkins, Ma- 
 lone Brightwell, and Hinson may be ascertained by their con- 
 nection with a remarkable incident which occurred about one 
 year before Mr. Sturdevant reached the country. 
 
 In January, 1807, Aaron Burr, ex-Vice-president of the Uni- 
 ted States, having been suspected of treasonable purposes, or of 
 "Crimes of High Misdemeanors," was arrested and carried a 
 prisoner to the town of Washington, then the capital of Missis- 
 8 ppi Territory. Before the Superior Court, convened in that 
 town February 3, 1807, Burr appeared upon his own recogni- 
 .an"; to answer according to the finding of the Grand Jury im- 
 paneled in the case. For three days the court w-as occupied 
 ^ counter-motions and counter-rulings and imlefinite action 
 Burr attending each day on his recognizance. On the opening 
 ff the court o^ the fourth day of its session i was found that 
 Burr had absconded. For some days, and until he could make 
 preparations to depart from that immediate section, his friends 
 concealed him. Then donning a dress which would serve to 
 disguise him, pantaloons of coarse texture and copperas color, 
 a coat of co;rse material and in style what w-e would ca 1 a 
 "round-about," a slouch and weather-beaten hat, and mounting 
 himself upon a fleet and superb horse, and securing one Major 
 Ash ey as a traveling companion and guide, he plunged mto the 
 
86 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in AJahama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 87 
 
 wilderness toward the Tombigbee. About ten o'clock at night, 
 on the 28th of February, the same month in which the Court at 
 AVashington in the Natchez District had dallied with him, he 
 rode into the little town of Wakefield. At that hour a light was 
 burning in a cabin which stood in the limits of that village, a 
 light which was fed by pinewood, commonly called "lightwood." 
 By that light in that cabin sat two young men, Perkins and Ma- 
 lone, the attorney and clerk above named, engaged in a game of 
 backgammon. That light in that cabin at that hour attracted, 
 illured, and betrayed Burr. He and his traveling companion 
 rode to the door of the cabin where flamed the light and where 
 plied the young men the game of chance, and inquired for the 
 tavern, and then for the road to Col. John Hinson's. When the 
 inquiries had been answered, and the tavern and road asked for 
 indicated, the two travelers proceeded on their way, not to the 
 tavern, but to the house of Hinson, which they reached, though 
 uncertain paths and dangerous streams were encountered, in 
 as short time as fleet horses could pass over seven miles. 
 Here these two travelers tarried for the remainder of the ni<>-ht 
 although Mr. Hinson was absent from home. They stabled and 
 fed their horses, a negro assisting Mr. Ashley in the task, se- 
 cured supper for themselves, Mrs. Hinson preparing it, and oc- 
 cupied the kitchen. Perkins detected in the man so plainly 
 dressed and so superbly mounted Aaron Burr, who was ad- 
 vertised and described in a proclamation made by the civil 
 authorities for his arrest. The game of chance which had been 
 so fascinating as to engage these two young men until such a 
 late hour at night was instantly abandoned. Perkins at once 
 decided to follow the strange travelers and have the suspected 
 man arrested, and having engaged Brightwell, the sheriff", in the 
 proposed arrest, in the quickest conceivable time he and Brio-ht- 
 well were mounted and on the road to Hinson's. Perkins and 
 Brightwell reached Hinson's in a very short time after the two 
 travelers had arrived. Perkins, however, did not go to the house, 
 but remained in the woods at a short distance for concealment. 
 Brightwell, the sheriff, went to the house and interrogated and 
 investigated the two travelers as best he could, but did not re- 
 turn to inform Perkins of the result of his investigations, as he 
 had engaged to do. Perkins, finally despairing of the return of 
 Brightwell, put out with all possible speed for Fort Stoddart to 
 
 report to the Commandant there his confident opinion that he 
 had detected Aaron Burr, the man for whose arrest a handsome 
 reward was offered. He reached the fort by daylight, having 
 paddled part of the way down the river in a canoe, and by sun- 
 up he was returning upon the way toward Hinson's with Cap- 
 tain Edmund P. Gaines and a posse of soldiers in search for the 
 traveler supposed to be Burr. After getting breakfast and in- 
 quiring the way to Pensacola, and the delivery of many polite 
 expressions of appreciation of the kindness and entertainment 
 he had received. Burr bade Mrs. Hinson farewell, and he and his 
 traveling companion set off, going toward the Carson Ferry on 
 the Tombigbee. About two miles from the home of Colonel 
 Hinson, and about two or three hours' ride from Fort Stoddart in 
 Eange One, west. Township Four, north, Section Thirty-six, and 
 about four miles west of Tombigbee Kiver, the posse of soldiers 
 under Captain Gaines met the strangers. Mr. Perkins's suspi- 
 cions were confirmed. The man in the coarse attire, with flash- 
 ing eyes and engaging address, was Aaron Burr. Captain Gaines 
 took him in custody and carried him prisoner to Fort Stoddart. 
 In course of time, arrangements having been completed for the 
 journey, Perkins took charge of the prisoner, conveyed him to 
 Kichmond, and delivered him to the United States authorities. 
 In due course Burr was tried for treason, and acquitted. 
 
 At that time there was a wolf-pen standing near the spot where 
 Burr was arrested by Gaines. Since that a Methodist Church 
 has stood near that spot. A combination met in that place. A 
 wolf- pen, the capture of Aaron Burr, and a Methodist church! 
 That is historic ground, if not classic. 
 
 While Mr. Malone, the man so fond of the game of backgam- 
 mon, might not by any religious inclinations which he had be 
 attracted'^to Mr. Sturdevant, there was one element of attraction, 
 one ground of friendship between them. They were natives of the 
 same State. They were both from that State whose natural prod- 
 ucts and commercial staples were tar, hoop-poles and huckleber- 
 ries. Such would inevitably attract them to each other, and 
 stick and bind them close together. Many of the citizens of 
 that Tombigbee country would have a special interest in Mr. 
 Sturdevant, for many of them were from North Carolina. 
 
 It is certain that in passing about Wakefield in the discharge 
 of the duties of his ministry, Mr. Sturdevant met Hon. Harry 
 
llistonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Toulmm, who has been mentioned above as residing there at 
 that time, but it is pretty certain tliat Judge Toulmin never gave 
 more than a casual notice to Mr. Stuidevant's preaching, and 
 that he never allied himself in any way with Methodism. Jud-e 
 loulmm was born in England, and when a very young man en- 
 tered the ministry, and was for a time in charge of a Unitarian 
 congregation. He very soon, however, came to America, seek- 
 mg greater freedom in the expression of his opinions than he 
 was allowed in his native land. He was at one time President 
 of Transylvania University, Lexington, Kentucky, and at another 
 time he was Secretary of State of Kentucky. He was a man of 
 considerable learning and ability. Judge Toulmin, while in 
 Kentucky, was active in disseminating his Socinian doctrines 
 and was successful in proselyting to his theories some men of 
 high position and of respectable influence in the orthodox 
 Churches. He used his talents and position on this behalf. It 
 seems that he was by turns preacher, teacher, politician, lawyer 
 and office holder. He came to Tombigbee, by appointment of 
 the President of the United States, as Judge of the Superior 
 Court established there by the General Government. As he had 
 been a Unitarian preacher in the past, and was then occupied 
 with civil affairs and allied with those who were clothed with 
 military titles and charged with military duties, it is evident he 
 was not preoccupied by Methodism, nor prepossessed in its fa 
 vor. In his amiable disposition he may have made himself 
 agreeable to Mr. Sturdevant, and may have delighted and enter 
 tamed him with his social conversation, but he never acceded to 
 any propositions for alliance with him in Church interests. 
 
 Edmund P. Gaines was the son-in-law of Judge Toulmin and 
 was at the time of Mr. Sturdevant's ministry captain in com 
 mand of the United States forces at Fort Stoddart, and was the 
 officer who arrested Aaron Burr, as has already been stated 
 Mr. Sturdevant no doubt tendered to this captain of a band of 
 United States troops an offer of rank and heritage at the court 
 of heaven, but was not successful in enlisting him in the cause 
 of his Church. 
 
 At this same time Mr. George S. Gaines, a brother of Ed 
 mund P. Gaines, was at Saint Stephens in charge of the United 
 States trading house which had been established there for the 
 exchange of commodities with the Indians. He had with him 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 89 
 
 a man who assisted as clerk, and one who handled and took care 
 of the skins which were purchased in the transactions of the 
 business, and also one who acted as interpreter. Mr. Gaines 
 went to Saint Stephens in 1805, and remained there a number of 
 years. Whether Mr. Sturdevant and Mr. Gaines found anything 
 to attract each to the other, or to cause them to associate with 
 any special interest is very questionable. No doubt Mr. Stur- 
 devant approached Mr. Gaines in a way and interrogated him 
 sufficiently to ascertain the estimate in which he, the man who 
 was using the parsonage of the old Spanish Church as a Tvare- 
 house in which to store the skins purchased from the savages of 
 the forest, held the dispensation of the gospel which he ten- 
 dered to the citizens of that country. From all the light pos- 
 sessed on the subject the conclusion is reached that Mr. Gaines 
 had no Methodistic proclivities, neither had his clerk, nor his 
 man of the skins, nor his interpreter. Mr. Sturdevant could not 
 help being interested in them all. 
 
 These three men, Harry Toulmin, Edmund P. Gaines, and 
 George S. Gaines, Mr. Sturdevant had in his field but not in his 
 fold, in his Circuit but not in his class, and nearly all their de- 
 scendants who belong to the Church, so far as known, are Epis- 
 copalians. 
 
 Those men who sought residence where savage modes of life 
 prevailed, and who had been long associated with barbarous 
 tribes and wild adventurers, would not be easy victims of re- 
 ligious truth nor ready adherents of the gospel ministry. Such 
 men were Nathan Blackwell, Hiram Mounger, and John McGrew. 
 Blackwell moved to the Tombigbee and settled among the In- 
 dians in 1790, and Mounger in 1791, and McGrew somewhere 
 about the same time. McGrew obtained possession of a tract 
 of land on the east side of the Tombigbee, where he resided for 
 many years, and where he was when Mr. Sturdevant brought 
 the message of salvation to that region. In a treaty made be- 
 tween the United States and the Choctaw Indians November 
 16, 1805, there is an article which gives a part of the history of 
 this man: "Art. IV. The Mingoes, chiefs and warriors of the 
 Choctaws, certify that a tract of land not exceeding fifteen hun- 
 dred acres, situated between the Tombigbee Kiver and Jack- 
 son's Creek, the front or river line extending down the river 
 from a blazed white oak standing on the left bank of the Tom- 
 
90 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 91 
 
 bigbee near the head of the shoal, next above Hobukentoopa, 
 and claimed by John McGrew, was in fact granted to the said 
 McGrevv by Opiomingo Hesnitta and others many years ago, 
 and they respectfully request the Government of the United 
 States to establish the claim of the said McGrew to the said 
 fifteen hundred acres." (United States Statutes at Large, Indian 
 Treaties, Vol. VII, p. 99. ) 
 
 One part of Mr. Sturdevant's work in that country was to 
 study the character and traits of the adventurers whom he found 
 there and the necessary adjustments of the gospel to their cases. 
 
 Among all the men whom Mr. Sturdevant found in that coun- 
 try there was none of more conspicuous character than Tandy 
 "W alker, none in whom Mr. Sturdevant was more intensely in- 
 terested. Mr. AValker's grandmother's maiden name was Nancy 
 Tandy. That was the origin of his given name, Tandy. He 
 was by birth a Virginian, by nature and experience a back- 
 woodsman, by trade a blacksmith, and by acquired knowledge 
 of the Indian language a medium of communication between 
 the English-speaking and the Indian-speaking people. For all 
 these reasons Mr. Sturdevant would be interested in him. He 
 emigrated to Tombigbee by or before the summer of 1803. 
 Some have said that he went to the Tombigbee in 1801. He 
 was noted for courage, generosity, and honesty. The United 
 States Government was exceedingly anxious to civilize the In- 
 dians and improve their condition, and to this end endeavored 
 to introduce pnong them implements of husbandry. In some 
 of the treaties made with the Indian tribes the Federal Gov- 
 ernment stipulated to furnish them blacksmiths. In connection 
 with the trading house established at Saint Stephens for the ben- 
 efit of the Choctaw Indians the government established a black- 
 smith shop, and for a time employed Tandy Walker to do the 
 work of the shop. In the first half of this century nothing of 
 a temporal and physical nature was of more importance to an 
 itinerant preacher than a horse. While a horse is, under cer- 
 tain environments, a vain thing for safety, yet the horse has 
 rendered invaluable service in ministerial work in these United 
 States. To the comfort of the traveler and his horse nothing is 
 more essential than horseshoes and horseshoe nails. There- 
 fore, to Mr. Sturdevant, Tandy Walker, the blacksmith, was an 
 important and invaluable citizen in the coiintry where he found 
 
 him. Tandy Walker was, no doubt, the man who, from time to 
 time, shod the horse of the first Methodist preacher who went 
 to and fro in that environed settlement. It has been stated 
 above that this blacksmith was a conspicuous character. He 
 was summoned to serve on the juries of his country, and was 
 employed and sent on most delicate and complicated missions. 
 He was sent on expeditions in which caution, daring, endurance, 
 insight, and wisdom were all in requisition. In 1812, upon the 
 suggestion of Mrs. Gaines, the wife of George S. Gaines, the 
 Government Agent, and upon the promptings of his own noble 
 and generous impulses, Tandy Walker went to the Falls of the 
 Black AVarrior Kiver, about where Tuskaloosa now stands, to 
 rescue or ransom a Mrs. Crawley who had been captured in 
 Tennessee and brought to that place by a party of Creek war- 
 riors who had been on a visit to Tecumseh on the Lakes. This 
 business Mr. Walker transacted with success. In 1813 he went 
 on some perilous expeditions for inspecting the situation and 
 ascertaining the movements of the Creek forces which be- 
 leaguered the white settlements. 
 
 Though Tandy Walker could never be induced to join the 
 Church himself, members of his household were in the com- 
 munion of the ISIethodist Episcopal Church. His wife, whose 
 maiden name was Mary Mays, was one of the Methodists of the 
 Tombigbee Circuit, and his daughter, Sarah Newstep, who was 
 born at the old town of Saint Stephens, on Tombigbee Eiver, No- 
 vember 8, 1803, and who in 1820 married Caswell Eeynolds, and 
 who lived many years near New Berne, Alabama, and who has 
 died this year 1890, was baptized and received into the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church in the year 1815, at one of the appoint- 
 ments on the Tombecbee Circuit, near Coffeeville, Clark County, 
 Alabama, by the Kev. Samuel Sellers, then presiding elder. 
 This woman was a member of the Methodist Church in Ala- 
 bama for three-quarters of a century. She was full of faith and 
 
 good works. 
 
 Southeast of the present town of New Berne and in Town- 
 ship eighteen and Kange six is a noted prairie marked on the 
 maps as Walker's Prairie, and said to have been so called for 
 Tandy Walker, and not far from that prairie, on the west side 
 of it, Tandy Walker died in about 1842. His grave is there till 
 this day. 
 
92 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 93 
 
 Kandall P. West, a native of England, a relative of a noted 
 family of England, a man at one time of extensive commercial 
 engagements, and a member of the Church of England, settled 
 in Washington County, near Saint Stephens, about the year 1800, 
 and was there until some time after Mr. Sturdevant's ministry 
 in that section terminated. His granddaughter. Miss Marsilla 
 Sexton, married Dr. Thomas O. Summers. His daughter, Miss 
 Jane West, who married Mr. Sexton, and who was the mother of 
 Dr. Summers' wife, was a Methodist, and a member at Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, as early as 1831. 
 
 The population found by Mr. Sturdevant in the Tombigbee 
 country when first he went to it were more inclined to sylvan 
 sports and border rufhanism than to religious worship and to 
 Christian decorum, and at the end of the first year he had not 
 a member to report, and it seems, from the figures found on 
 record, that not even his traveling expenses had been paid by 
 the people whom he served. 
 
 The next year, the year 1809, Sturdevant and his colleague in 
 the ministry enlarged the Tombecbee Mission. They extended 
 it to the Chickasahay Biver, which was from five to ten miles 
 beyond the present line of Alabama, and where they found a 
 few families which became noted in the work of Methodism. 
 This year and the years immediately following there moved 
 into the bounds of what was then the Tombecbee charge men 
 and women who were more favorably inclined toward the Chris- 
 tian religion than were those who settled there from one to 
 three decades earlier. In this year, 1809, Sturdevant and Burdge 
 had a preaching place and organized a Society on the Chicka- 
 sahay in the neighborhood of the present town of Winchester, 
 eight or ten miles west of the present line of Alabama. A Mr. 
 Webber, a Mrs. Patton, William Ramsey, and his wife Eliza- 
 beth were original members of this Society. There is, at this 
 date, no information as to who besides these, if any, belonged 
 to that Society at its organization. Ramsey's cabin was a lodg- 
 ing place for the preachers when they were in that part of the 
 Mission. Ramsey and his wife were leading spirits in the 
 Methodist Church in the Chickasahay country during their 
 lives, and Ramsey was a class leader for many years. 
 
 A short sketch of William Ramsey at this point is eminently 
 proper, as he was among the very first members of the Tombig- 
 
 bee Mission, and was in style a type o£ the men of that day m 
 that country, and as his history will give a correct idea of the 
 hardships encountered in that region at the time of the mtrc 
 duction of Methodism there. 
 
 The incidents of a country are in accord with the state of so- 
 ciety in which they transpire. The original state and the suc- 
 ceeding events of a country are inseparably connected. Th^ 
 original environment gives form and complexion to all forth- 
 coming events. The environment is the very so«ce and cause 
 of the events which follow each other in the lapse of time. The 
 character of grievances which occur gives rise to the modes of 
 redress adopted. All events and all performances a'^e charac- 
 terized by the state and style of things which give them birth. 
 No one will be guilty of the improprieties of excessive devo- 
 tion to refined habits when refined habits are unknown. As 
 ^vas inevitable, the style of Church work and the effects of he 
 gospel in the Tombigbee region, at the time of the mtroduct on 
 of Methodism there, were in exact keeping with the state of the 
 people and the style of the times. These things premised, the 
 life of William Kamsey has its significance, and a sketch of him 
 
 will not fail to ba of interest. , , , , o i 
 
 This William Ramsey was born in Mecklenburg County, 
 North Carolina, July 2V, 1770. He lived awhile in Jackson 
 County, Georgia, where two of his children were born. In 1808 
 he movU to the Chickasahay Eiver. The little caravan of which 
 he was the head, as it passed from Jackson County, Georgia, to 
 he Chickasahay Eiver, consisted of himself on foot, his wife 
 mounted on a horse, with her child Andrew not more than two 
 and a half years'old. seated behind her, and her baby, Abiezer 
 cti-ke then less than four months old, i» j-' l-'P. ^-ah, a 
 ne-ro girl, on foot, and two pack horses loaded with what house- 
 ohl goods and camp equipage they could carry. Whether 
 here was a dog in the company tradition has not recorded. 
 This little band found nearly the whole way infested with In- 
 dians, and themselves exposed to dangers and depredations, and 
 their pro-ress often retarded by streams that were not fordable, 
 and that were without bridges and without femes _ 
 
 The trip made by this caravan was commenced m January, 
 and the Chickasahay was reached and the trip ended February 
 01 1803 None can refuse to pause and view the unique scene 
 
94: 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 of this woman, mounted on a horse, with her helpless offsprinc^ 
 packed about her, making this trip across more than half the 
 fetate ot Georgia and across the entire State of Alabama, with 
 menacing sa.;ages hanging on nearly every step, and swollen 
 streams, bridgeless and ferry less, encountered every day! 
 Ihough she was not adorned with the attire of a queen, nor at- 
 tended by the retinue of an empress, yet ^schylus in his sub- 
 iimest conceptions and wildest creations never apprehended and 
 presented a picture which would surpass in engaging interest 
 this real picture of this woman making this perilous and fa- 
 tiguing journey. 
 
 The wife and children dismounted, and Mr. Eamsey unloaded 
 his pack horses on the Chickasahay Eiver near what was then 
 the Choctaw boundary line, and near what is now the town of 
 TVaynesborough. Here he built his first cabin, made his first 
 clearing, and raised his first crop, all done in the year 1808. When 
 he reached the Chickasahay Kiver his entire estate consisted of 
 three horses, the baggage which two pack horses had conveyed 
 ^ere, the negro girl, Dinah, and twenty-one dollars in cash. 
 Tn ^^"^ "^^^l^^^ provisions, house, nor field. One of the horses 
 fell off the river bluff and was drowned; another was stolen by 
 the Indians, and was never recovered. When Mr. Bamsey had 
 halted on the spot wJiere he intended to build his cabin and 
 make his clearing, and had looked around him, he found that 
 he had but few neighbors, and that they, like himself, were 
 newly arrived. He also found that there was but little in that 
 land on which to subsist, except the spontaneous products of 
 the country. To get even seed corn he had to return to Saint 
 Stephens, on the Tombigbee Eiver, and pay four dollars a bushel 
 tor It. Other provisions were alike scarce and at exorbitant 
 prices. But time and allotted space would fail to tell of build 
 ing the cabin, clearing the field, planting the corn, making 
 benches, stools, and chairs, securing the spinning wheel con 
 structmg the rude loom, the slow process of picking the seed 
 out of the cotton, spinning, spooling, reeling, dyeing, sizing 
 warping and sleiding thread, weaving cloth, and obtaining other 
 household necessities. Confronted as he was by such scarcity 
 of provisions at such exorbitant prices, by the heavy losses he 
 had sustained, and by such meager resources, the question is- 
 How did he and his household manage to subsist? Stinted and 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 95 
 
 oppressed, sad and discouraged, he and his wife often wished 
 they were back in Georgia, whence they came. 
 
 At the end of 1808 Mr. Eamsey sold his improvements (he 
 did not own the land) and moved down the Chickasahay, and 
 built a cabin, and opened a new clearing on the identical spot 
 now occupied by the town of Winchester. He felled the first 
 tree ever felled at the town of Winchester. Here he lived when 
 Sturdevant and Burdge found him. 
 
 For about three years he lived in this vicinity. He then 
 moved still lower down the Chickasahay to where the present 
 town of Leakesville is situated, and in the immediate vicinity of 
 what was then Bethel Church. At Bethel he and his wife held 
 their membership for a series of years. Mr. Eamsey lived 
 at many different places in this same community. He finally 
 moved from the neighborhood of Bethel Church to a place 
 west of Pascagoula Eiver, in what is now Jackson County, near 
 what was called Fairley's Ferry, and in a community of honest, 
 industrious, hospitable, and mostly pious families. His plan 
 was to locate on a spot, build a cabin, clear a field, then sell the 
 improvements; hence his many moves. About 1820 he moved 
 again, and settled a new place in the pine woods on the banks 
 of Eed Creek, and about twenty miles from the place whence he 
 moved. Through all the years in which he resided on the banks 
 of Eed Creek he w^as an invalid, unable to even feed himself. 
 He died at his home, July 19, 1833. He was a man of great in- 
 dustry, of uncommon energy, and of economical habits. His 
 continual roving from place to place, though done in an effort 
 to improve his financial condition, subjected him to many vicis- 
 situdes, and prevented any great acquisition of wealth. Through 
 his great industry and close economy he was always able to live 
 on his own resources, dispense a befitting hospitality, and main- 
 tain a measure of usefulness. He was a man of unquestioned 
 integrity, and was much esteemed by his neighbors. As a 
 Christian he was full of faith and good deeds, and had a pro- 
 found experience of divine things. His patience under suffer- 
 ing was beautiful. His death was peaceful and triumphant. 
 He was buried at his home on the banks of Eed Creek. His 
 wife died June 8, 1836, and was buried by his side. From thence 
 they shall rise to the judgment 
 
 The baby, Abiezer Clarke, who was brought on horseback by 
 
96 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 97 
 
 his mother, Mrs. Elizabeth Eamsey, to Chickasahay, when less 
 than four months old, will appear farther on in these pages as 
 a Methodist preacher, and as one who rendered long and ef- 
 ficient service in Alabama. 
 
 The Bethel Meeting House, already mentioned, was two miles 
 west of the Chickasahay Eiver, and about two miles below the 
 present town of Leakesville, was built of logs, and was the first 
 house of worship, so far as any records show, which was ever 
 built on the Tombigbee Mission. A Society was formed at that 
 place in the house of John McEae, probably in 1809, and the 
 house was built some time before 1812. John McEae and his 
 wife, his two daughters and his two sisters, William Martin, 
 and Daniel Mcintosh, and possibly others, were original mem- 
 bers of the Society at Bethel. John McEae was a leading 
 citizen, the duke of the county in which he lived, and was for 
 a long time a class leader. He was honored with a seat in the 
 Legislative bodies of the State. The Society at Bethel was a 
 flourishing one for many long years. The session of the Mis- 
 sissippi Conference was held there commencing December 5, 
 1822. 
 
 By 1810 there had gathered on Bassett's Creek east of the 
 Tombigbee Eiver, about fifteen miles from the junction of said 
 creek and river, a considerable settlement, called Bassett's Creek 
 Settlement. As early as the date here given the Methodists had 
 in that community a preaching place and an organized Society. 
 By 1810 John Dean had pitched his tent and had erected his 
 home and altar in this community, and here in Section fourteen. 
 Township seven, and Eange three, west, he, at his first oppor- 
 tunity, made an entry of land. His entry is marked and named 
 on the old maps of the State. This Mr. John Dean was a 
 Methodist, and the members of his family were Methodists. 
 He was kind, generous, hospitable, and religious. It was at his 
 house on or near Bassett's Creek that the Methodist preachers 
 in charge of the Tombigbee Mission in that early day received 
 a cheerful welcome, found an agreeable home, and had fur- 
 nished to them whatever was necessary to their comfort. It was 
 at his house that the Eev. John S. Ford, at the close of a jour- 
 ney of eleven days through the Creek Nation, spent his first 
 night on the Tombigbee Mission, and rested his weary limbs. 
 It was in that neigborhood in which Mr. Dean lived that Mr. 
 
 Ford, the first Friday after his arrival there, attended a fast day 
 service, and preached his first sermon on that Mission. 
 
 Ireland, though first discovered by pirates, first inhabited by 
 exiles and outiaws, and first ruled by fire worshipers, and 
 though her people have ever been turbulent and seditious, and 
 though she has ever been cursed by cupidity, despotism, igno- 
 rance, popery, and poverty, has produced not a few Methodist 
 preachers of note and worth. In the northeast of Ireland there 
 is a county called Antrim. In this C9unty, just north of Lough 
 Neagh, on the river Main, is a place called Eandalstown. In 
 this town, in the year 1766, was born one John French, who be- 
 came conspicuous in Methodism in the Tombigbee country. 
 Somewhere about the first of this nineteenth century this John 
 French left the land of bogs and mountains, of lakes and shores, 
 of verdure and famine, of contrasts and conflicts, and came to 
 America, a land bounteous, large, and free. It seems that he 
 took up his abode with the conservative and steady people of 
 North Carolina. Here in America he met with the Methodists, 
 and through their influence he soon fell under deep distress on 
 account of sin, was led to inquire wherewith he should draw 
 near to God, and what he should bring to gain his grace. Un- 
 der the process of evangelical conviction he tested the great- 
 ness of redeeming power, obtained the justifying grace, and 
 felt his willing heart all taken up by love divine. From that time 
 around the altars of the Church he poured forth his strains of 
 triumph, and proclaimed his glorious hope of a righteous 
 crown. He maintained that God's children, favored with his 
 peculiar smile, and with all his blessings blessed, had a right 
 to shout, *and often, transported on the wings of love to realms 
 of ineffable delight, did his impulsive soul break forth with 
 ascriptions of praise and with loud hallelujahs. 
 
 He was convicted of a divine commission to preach the gos- 
 pel, and his brethren were persuaded that he had gifts, grace, 
 and promise of usefulness for the work, and consequently he 
 was, by the process in such' case provided, inducted into the 
 Christian ministry. At the session of the Virginia Conference 
 at Edmund Taylor's, Caswell Circuit, North Carolina, March 1, 
 1805 John French was admitted on trial into the traveling con- 
 nection. He was admitted in the class with Matthew P. Stur- 
 devant. At the session of the Virginia Conference at New 
 7 
 
98 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Berne, North Caroliua, February 2, 1807, lie was admitted into 
 fall connection, and ordained deacon. At the session of this 
 Conference held at Tarborough, North Carolina, February 1, 
 1809, he was ordained elder. At the session of the Conference 
 at Kaleigh, North Carolina, February 7, 1811, he was granted a 
 location at his own request. This ended his itinerant work. 
 He had an honorable standing in his Conference while he was 
 connected with it. He filled important Circuits, and had suc- 
 cess in all the charges he served. 
 
 He married a woman of good traits and of Christian charac- 
 ter about the time he located. His marriage induced his loca- 
 tion. 
 
 In 1811, the year of his location, he moved to the Tombigbee 
 settlements. He was at that time clothed with all the functions 
 of the Christian ministry, was naturally endowed with liberal 
 gifts, and had qualifications attained by large experience and 
 extensive observation. He was, therefore, prepared to preach 
 the gospel, administer the sacraments, and give counsel in plan- 
 ning and executing the work of the Church; hence his advent 
 into the Tombigbee country was a blessing to Methodism in that 
 region. 
 
 He reached that country just on the eve of perilous times. A 
 few short months after Mr. French reached the Tombigbee set- 
 tlements, and in the same year, Tecumseh was in the Creek Na- 
 tion, and the Creek War was projecting its dark lineaments over 
 the land. The plot was thickening, the elements were brewing, 
 the portents were increasing. He scarcely had time to build 
 himself a rude shelter before he had to help erect forts for the 
 protection of the settlers; he scarcely had time to adjust his 
 ministerial armor after his journey through the wilderness be- 
 fore he had to don the military garb. During this terrible 
 Creek War he acted in the capacity of soldier and preacher. 
 He bore the weapons carnal and spiritual at the same time. He 
 made a valiant soldier as well as a zealous and laborious preach- 
 er. He discharged all the duties devolving upon him in the 
 campaign as a soldier, and preached to the people asseml)led 
 in the different forts in the settlements as opportunity ofi'ered. 
 He died in 1840. His wife, Sarah, a Virginian by birth, died 
 in the sixty-ninth year of her age, September 5, 1848. 
 
 On the east bank of the Tombigbee Eiver at Wood's Bluff, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 99 
 
 and in an admirable natural position for defense, was a fort 
 called Fort Easley, and so named from a family by the name of 
 Easley living in the immediate vicinity. William Easley, who, 
 at the opening of Mr. Sturdevant's ministry in that country, had 
 several grown sons and citizens of the same vicinity, moved to 
 the Tombigbee at least a decade before the beginning of this 
 century. A number of these Easleys became Methodists. Some 
 persons have supposed that when the Easleys first moved to the 
 Tombigbee they carried with them to that country certificates of 
 membership in the Methodist Church, but this is clearly a mis- 
 take. At the time William Easley settled in that country among 
 the savages and Spaniards there was no use for certificates of 
 membership in the Methodist Church there, and Mr. Easley 
 carried with him to that land neither certificate nor member- 
 ship. But some of the members of this large family attached 
 themselves to the Methodist Episcopal Church during the very 
 first years of the Methodist ministry in that section. In this 
 fort bearing their name the Easleys took refuge, and their neigh- 
 bors and others also gathered there. In 1813 a camp-meeting 
 was held in this fort. Here all the services of a camp-meeting 
 were had, even the class - meeting or love -feast on Sunday 
 morning. Those who occupied other forts in adjacent sections 
 attended this camp-meeting. While the divine services were 
 carried on, armed men were stationed around on picket lines to 
 watch and guard against surprises and attacks from the prowl- 
 ing and murderous savages. This camp-meeting, held amidst 
 the strifes and tumults of a savage war, was conducted by Nol- 
 ley and Shrock, who were the preachers assigned to the charge 
 for that year, and by French, the local preacher and the enlist- 
 ed militia soldier. These preachers and people worked for God 
 and worshiped him like the builders of the walls of Jerusa- 
 lem in the time of Nehemiah, armed "with their swords, their 
 spears, and their bows.'* ' ' 
 
 The war terminated disastrously to the Creek savages. As a 
 condition of the Treaty of Peace they ceded all their land from 
 the western boundary as far east as the Coosa Eiver. This 
 treaty was made August 9, 1814. The war was over, and Mr. 
 French laid aside the soldier's armor, and gave himself to the 
 peaceable pursuits so agreeable to him, a^id so befitting his min- 
 isterial calling. In 1815 he settled in Barlow's Bend of the Ala- 
 
100 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 bama Kiver, five or six miles from the present Gainestown. 
 Here he lived until his days on earth were ended. In 1819 he 
 built in his community a house for worship, which was ever 
 known as French's Chapel. He did much for the cause of 
 Methodism in all the surrounding country. Many amusing an- 
 ecdotes have been told of him. Numerous were his puns and 
 blunders. He was, nevertheless, a great revivalist, and a w4se 
 and judicious manipulator of protracted meetings. He under- 
 stood the processes for the attainment of the best results. Mr. 
 French wholly followed the Lord, and maintained an untar- 
 nished Christian character to the end of his earthly career. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Owens was the junior preacher on the Tom- 
 bigbee Charge in 1815, and then again in 1818. He was born in 
 South Carolina, January 8, 1787. When but a child he went 
 with his parents to the Natchez country, where he grew to man- 
 hood. When a young man, and before his attainment of the 
 Christian religion, he was boisterous, wild, and wicked. His 
 first year in the itinerant ministry was 1814, and was in connec- 
 tion with the Mississippi Conference. His effective ministry 
 covered not more than a dozen years. For many, many years 
 he was on the superannuated list. He was a small man, with a 
 lean, bony face, a prominent forehead, and keen eyes. He was 
 eccentric, humorous, and facetious. He was, even in old age, 
 Avanting in gravity. Through his life he enacted many ridicu- . 
 lous scenes, and was the subject of many amusing anecdotes. 
 He was full of levity, and enjoyed the ludicrous when it was at 
 the expense of others; but when it was at his expense he did not 
 relish it. One incident which occurred in the second year of 
 his ministry, and his first year on the Tombigbee Charge, will 
 serve as an illustration of the latter part of this statement. 
 When this incident occurred he was about twenty-eight years 
 old, and was an unmarried man. He had an appointment on 
 one occasion for preaching at night at the residence of Mr. Wil- 
 liam Ramsey, which was just on the opposite side of the Chick- 
 asahay River from Bethel Church. The time came, the congre- 
 gation assembled, the services were held, the sermon was 
 preached, the congregation was dismissed, and they dispersed 
 and went to their homes. Brother Owens rerAained at Brother 
 Ramsey's for the night. So did two young ladies, Miss Margaret 
 McRae and her sister, Miss Jane McRae. Brother Ramsey's 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 101 
 
 house had but two rooms. One of these rooms was occupied 
 for the night by the Misses McRae, and the other by the family 
 and the preacher. Brother Owens declined to occupy the bed 
 which was set apart for his use, and would not be satisfied with 
 anything but a pallet on the floor before the fire, and so he was 
 accommodated. During the night a heavy gust of wind swept 
 down the chimney, carrying the accumulated soot into the room, 
 and depositing a thick covering of it on the preacher and his 
 pallet. Oblivion* of the coming and going of the wind, and un- 
 conscious of the coat with which he and his pallet before the 
 fire were covered, and it not being one of his times to rise up a 
 rrreat while before day, and depart into a solitary place and pray, 
 he continued to recline and roll upon his bed until after the 
 morning sun had dispelled the darkness of the night. The soot 
 was well rubbed in and pretty firmly set by this time, and Broth- 
 er Owens was quite as black as the sable sons of Africas clime. 
 Finally his host aroused him from his slumbers, invited him to 
 arise from his chosen pallet, and requested him to behold nis 
 face in the glass. He arose, and looked into the glass, and, it 
 is likely, lie never did forget what manner of looking man he 
 was that morning. He went to a washstand in the yard, where 
 with water and soap he commenced a process of cleansing. 
 Just as he was beginning the work of scrubbing the Misses 
 McRae walked out, surveyed the scene, and took in the situa- 
 tion A preacher's dignity and this preacher's plight were in- 
 congruous. The scene was ludicrous, and was too much for any 
 ruler's of etiquette, and was too much for any common serious- 
 ness Let rhetoricians say what they may about the purposes 
 of raising a laugh, and let them say what they may about the 
 ofiices of ridicule in the improvement of morals and the refine- 
 ment of manners; let moralists say what they may about laugh- 
 ing at one's misfortunes being a species of ridicule, and let them 
 say what they may about ridicule being a violation of the law 
 of love it was impossible to suppress laughter while looking at 
 that preacher covered with soot and scrubbing with water and 
 soap The provocation was enough, ,and the young ladies and 
 the members of the family laughed, they laughed involuntarily 
 and heartily. This was to Brother Owens a terrible ordeal. 
 The scrubbing, cleansing process irritated the surface no little, 
 and irritated that within fully as much. The laughing caused 
 
102 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 by his predicament and done at his expense intensified the irri- 
 tation under which he was smarting. This ordeal tested his 
 grace and manifested his temper. For once in his life his lev- 
 ity was overcome, his facetiousness forsook him, and he became 
 severely grave, he became grave almost to rage. Under that 
 process lie was austere enough to have satisfied the demand of 
 an ascetic. The scrubbing was finally finished, the laughing 
 ended, and Brother Owens recovered his equanimity. No doubt 
 he set this occurrence down as one of the felicities of the itin- 
 erancy in a new country. 
 
 Brother Owens was of a nervous temperament, but he was as 
 fearless as a lion. His effort in preaching was to stir the emo- 
 tions rather than to enlighten the intellect. His reproofs and 
 admonitions were made with great directness. He never court- 
 ed the applause of the irreligious. His custom was to invite 
 penitents to the altar after preaching. From the time of his ad- 
 mission into the itinerant ministry until his death he was a 
 member of the Mississippi Conference. He maintained a good 
 name until the end, and died in the State of Mississippi, July 1, 
 1868, exclaiming with his expiring breath: "My way to heaven 
 is as straight as a line." 
 
 In 1816 the Eev. Jolm Gilmore, then about forty years old, 
 and the Rev. Elijah Gilmore, a younger brother, with their fam- 
 ilies, moved from Tennessee to the Tombigbee country. The 
 Rev. John Gilmore stopped in the neighborhood of Wood's 
 Blutf, and the Rev. Elijah Gilmore stopped in the neighborhood 
 of what was afterward called Grove Hill. 
 
 The Rev. John Gilmore joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church in 1800, and was licensed to preach in 1813. So soon as 
 he settled on the Tombigbee he began to preach as a local 
 preacher to the people in his immediate vicinity. The largest 
 part of his ministry was given as a local preacher to the Tom- 
 bigbee Circuit, he remaining in that region in that capacity 
 about twenty years. He was ordained a deacon by Bishop 
 Enoch George, at Suggsville, Alabama, in November, 1819. In 
 January, 1837, in the city of Mobile, he joineU the Alabama 
 Conference, and thenceforward continued in the itinerant min- 
 istry until his death, in November, 1844. He trained all who 
 were under his control in the doctrines and usages of Metho- 
 dism. In his death he was peaceful, assured, and triumphant. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 103 
 
 It is not known when nor where the Rev. Elijah Gilmore was 
 licensed to preach. It was, however, some time before he moved 
 to the Tombigbee region. So soon as he could congregate the 
 few white settlers he found in the new community m which he 
 had located, he commenced preaching to them. In due course 
 of events there was a School-house built about two miles east of 
 the present town of Grove Hill. Here the Rev. Elijah Gdmore 
 established a regular appointment for preaching, and here wac 
 established what became one of the regular appointments of the 
 Tombi"-bee Circuit, and one which continued until 18bU. iHib 
 place was named for John Spinks, who was among the early set- 
 tlers in that community, and who lived in the neighborhood un- 
 til his death. The Rev. Joseph T. Curry, who was one of the 
 preachers on the Tombigbee Circuit in 1843, made an entry in 
 his Journal concerning John Spinks which may be given here 
 in connection with this account of the origin of this apix)int- 
 ment bearing so long his name. "December, Sunday, 3, 1843. 
 I attended the funeral of a beloved brother, John Spinks, over 
 whom the Church and friends greatly lament; his house has 
 ever been the Methodist preacher's home; both saints and sin- 
 ners mourn his exit." Brother Elijah Gilmore lived and la- 
 bored as a Methodist preacher in the neighborhood of bpinks 
 Chapel for a number of years, and finally moved and settled near 
 Shubuta, Mississippi, where he afterward died, a very old man. 
 There came to the Tombigbee with these two preachers, John 
 and Elijah Gilmore, their mother, Mrs. Gilmore, and four broth- 
 ers the widow and sons of the Rsv. Humphrey Gilmore, whom 
 Bishop Asbury set apart for the office of a deacon, at Augusta, 
 Georgia, December 30, 1801. The members of this family were 
 all Methodists, instructed in the doctrines and trained m the 
 usages thereof. Stephen, the youngest of the sons, and who was 
 seventeeti years old, when he came to the neighborhood of what 
 was afterward called Spinks' Chapel, became a preacher. Here 
 is a verbatim copy of his license: "Stephen Gilmore is hereby 
 authorized to Preach as A Local Preacher in the Methodist E. 
 Church so long as his conduct accord with the word of God. 
 Signed in behalf of the Conference held for Marengo Circuit 
 20th September, 1828. Ebenezer Hearn, P. E." He was set 
 apart to the office of a deacon by Bishop Beverly Waugh, in 
 Mobile, Alabama, December 19, 1841. 
 
104 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Some further history of the organization of the Mississippi 
 Conference is necessary in order to a full and intelligent under- 
 standing of the subject. The name of the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence does not appear in the Discipline until 1816, nor in the 
 General Minutes until the appointments are given for 1817, and 
 yet previous to this there were held three sessions of the Missis- 
 sippi Conference, three sessions which never had proper of- 
 ficial recognition. The first session of this Conference was held, 
 as has been stated elsewhere, in November, 1813; the second ses- 
 sion was held in November, 1814; and the third session was held 
 in November, 1815. The General Conference, at the session in 
 May, 1812, authorized the bishops — there were only two of 
 them, Asbury and McKendree — to organize a Conference in 
 Mississippi any time during the next four years, if in their 
 judgment it should be expedient. Under this authority and the 
 emergencies of the case, the bishops, in the latter end of 1812, 
 decided to constitute the Mississippi Conference, and appointed 
 the time and place, November 1, 1813, and Spring Hill, Jeffer- 
 son County, Mississippi Territory, for its first session and for 
 its formal organization. When the appointed time came the 
 bishops could not, on account of the hostilities of the Creek In- 
 dians, attend. The preachers, however, who were to constitute 
 the Conference and had been notified of the time for its organi- 
 zation met and organized and transacted the- business properly 
 coming before them on the occasion. They held the three ses- 
 sions already mentioned without any bishop; and so, though 
 these sessions were held by appointment, by authority, and by 
 legal enactment, and though the regular business of an Annual 
 Conference was all scrupulously transacted, preachers being re- 
 ceived on trial and into full corfnection, and elected to deacon's 
 and elder's orders, and superannuated, and located as in other 
 Annual Conferences, these sessions of this Conference' were all 
 treated as irregular, and the proceedings thereof were reported 
 and printed in the General Minutes as business transacted by 
 the Tennessee Conference. The boundaries of the Mississippi 
 Conference were for the first time determined and named by the 
 General Conference at the session in May, 1816. Then for the 
 first time the name and boundaries of this Annual Conference 
 appeared in the Discipline, and the first session under this of- 
 ficial provision was held at William Foster's, a few miles north 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 105 
 
 of the city of Natchez, beginning October H), 1816, with Bishop 
 Eobert E. Koberts presiding, at least the latter part of the ses- 
 Henceforth the name and proceedings of the Mississip- 
 
 sion. 
 
 pi Conference appeared in the General Minutes. Now all was 
 established and regular. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 The First Work of Methodism in Alabama (Continued). 
 
 '"FIHAT section of Alabama joining tlie State of Tennessee 
 I and lying along the Tennessee Kiver next claims attention 
 in the order of the beginning of the work of Methodism in the 
 State. 
 
 It is a fact which appears in the history that the various In- 
 dian tribes claimed all the land they could about the borders of 
 their several boundaries, and that these tribes ceded to the Unit- 
 ed States any and every part of their lands grudgingly. They 
 never ceded any portion of their lands until emergencies aris- 
 ing absolutely compelled them to do so. No white settlements, 
 properly so called, were ever made in any section of the country 
 until the lands were ceded to the United States, and the In- 
 dian titles were extinguished. White men settled among the 
 Indians nearly everywhere before cessions of land were made, 
 but in all such cases they submitted to the customs and modes 
 of Indian life. Therefore the date of the beginning of white 
 settlements in every place is the same as the date of the cession 
 of the land by the Indians to the United States. This is exact- 
 ly true concerning the beginning of the white settlements in 
 that part of Alabama along the Tennessee Kiver. The cession 
 of the land and the extinction of the Indian titles in that im- 
 mediate section was complicated and retarded by conflicting^ 
 claims. The boundary line between the Cherokee and the 
 Chickasaw Indians was a subject of dispute with these tribes, 
 and they claimed the same territory about the head waters of 
 Duck and Elk Eivers, and along the Tennessee Eiver from the 
 Chickasaw Island in that river which is just above what is now 
 called Whitesburg, and what was as early as 1805 and as late as 
 1818 called Ditto's Landing, down to the lower end of Muscle 
 Shoals. From the treaties made by these tribes with the Unit- 
 ed States it is shown that the Chickasaws and the Cherokees 
 each ceded and received compensation for the same tract of 
 
 country. 
 
 (106) 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 107 
 
 In a treaty concluded in the Chickasaw country, July 23, 
 1805, between the United States and the Chickasaw Indians, the 
 Chickasaws ceded to the United States the tract of country in- 
 cluded in the following boundary: " Beginning on the left bank 
 of Ohio, where the present Indian boundary adjoins the same, 
 thence down the left bank of Ohio to the Tennessee Kiver, 
 thence up the main channel of Tennessee to the mouth of Duck 
 Kiver; thence up the left bank of Duck Kiver to the Columbian 
 highway or road leading from Nashville to Natchez, thence 
 along the said road to the ridge dividing the waters running into 
 Duck Kiver from those running into Buffalo Kiver, thence east- 
 wardly along the said ridge to the great ridge dividing the wa- 
 ters running into the main Tennessee Kiver from those running 
 into Buffalo Kiver near the main source of Buffalo Kiver, 
 thence in a direct line to the Great Tennessee Kiver near the 
 Chickasaw old fields or eastern point of the Chickasaw claim on 
 that river; thence northwardly to the great ridge dividing the 
 waters running into the Tennessee from those running into 
 Cumberland Kiver, so as to include all the waters running into 
 Elk Kiver, thence along the top of the said great ridge to the 
 l^lace of beginning." 
 
 In a treaty concluded at the city of Washington between 
 the United States and the Cherokee Nation of Indians on Jan- 
 uary 7, 1806, the Cherokees relinquished "to the United States 
 all right, title, interest, and claim, which they have or ever had 
 to all that tract of country which lies to the northward of the 
 river Tennessee and westward of a line to be run from the up- 
 per part of the Chickasaw old fields, at the upper point of an 
 island, called Chickasaw Island, on said river, to the most east- 
 erly head waters pf that branch of said Tennessee Kiver called 
 Duck Kiver, excepting the two following described tracts— viz.: 
 one tract bounded southerly on the said Tennesse Kiver, at a 
 place called the Muscle Shoals, westerly by a creek called Te 
 Kee-ta-noeh or Cyprus Creek, and easterly by Chu-wa-lee, or 
 Elk Kiver or Creek, and northerly by a line to be drawn from 
 a point on said Elk Kiver ten miles on a direct line from its 
 mouth or junction with Tennessee Kiver, to a point on the said 
 Cyprus Creek, ten miles on a direct line from its junction with 
 the Tennessee Kiver. The other tract is to be two miles in 
 width on the north side of Tennessee Kiver, and to extend north- 
 
108 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 109 
 
 erly from that river three miles, and bounded as follows, viz.: 
 Beginning at the mouth of Spring Creek, and running up said 
 creek three miles on a straight line, thence westerly two miles 
 at right angles with the general course. of said creek, thence 
 southerly on a line parallel with the .general course of said 
 creek to the Tennessee Eiver, thence up said river by its waters 
 to the beginning; which first reserved tract is to be considered 
 the common property of the Cherokees who now live on the 
 same; including John D. Chesholm, Au-tow-we and Cheh 
 Chuh, and the other reserved tract, on which Moses Melton now 
 lives, is to be considered the property of said Melton and of 
 Charles Hicks, in equal shares." 
 
 The land ceded and bounded in the treaty made with the 
 Chickasaws, July 23, 1805, covered a part of the same tract em- 
 braced in the land ceded and bounded in the treaty made with 
 the Cherokees, January 7, 1806. That part of the tract of land 
 ceded and bounded in the said treaty with the Chickasaws 
 which lay in Alabama was in the form of a triangle, and where 
 it terminated at the Chickasaw Island, in the Tennessee River 
 just above what was then called Ditto's Landing, it was about 
 four miles wide, and at the Tennessee State line was about thir- 
 ty miles wide. The tract of land ceded and bounded by the 
 Cherokees, January 7, 1806, went to the same line east and to 
 the same point at Chickasaw Island of the tract ceded by the 
 Chickasaws, but extended further down the Tennessee River 
 than did the tract ceded by the Chickasaws. It extended to the 
 lower end of Muscle Shoals, except two small reservations 
 named. It took from July 23, 1805, till May 22, 1807, to make 
 and ratify the treaties necessary to entirely extinguish the In- 
 dian titles to that triangular tract of land out of which, Decem- 
 ber 13, 1808, the County of Madison was by legal enactment 
 and authority constituted. Upon the establishment of these 
 treaties that section of the country was open to white settlers, 
 and about the time these treaties bear date white men began to 
 venture into that region. It was just about the time these 
 treaties were made, somewhere from 1805 to 1807, that John 
 Hunt took up his abode and built a log cabin at the magnificent 
 spring ten miles from Ditto's Landing. Henceforth that spring 
 was called Hunt's Spring. Ditto's Landing was so called from 
 a white man by the name of Ditto who lived at that point 
 
 among the Indians, a regular Indian Countryman, and wlio 
 went among them previous to any cession of that territory to 
 
 the United States. , -r j- „ 
 
 About the time the treaty with the Cherokee Indians was 
 ratified in 1807, a small number of immigrants from t>outh Car- 
 olina with John Ford as the recognized leader of the little band 
 took 'up their abode in that triangular-shaped territory which 
 had its terminal point, as has already been stated, at Chickasaw 
 Island. AVhen this little company of immigrants had pitched 
 their tents in this territory so recently ceded t« the United 
 States they found they were literally in the dismal wilds o 
 America, where no laws existed, and where no government had 
 jurisdiction. Civilization, even in its smallest beginnings and 
 rudest forms, had not so much as laid a preemption on that 
 soil The little tract of land, though released from Indian 
 claims, was closely environed by savages While it was the cen- 
 ter of a beautiful region, with gushing springs refreshing 
 streams, and fertile soil, it was, nevertheless, at that time, an in- 
 hospitable land. It was a dismal solitude. There was nothing 
 to gratify a reasonable ambition, nothing to encourage religious 
 devotion, or to contribute to religious enjoyment. There was 
 nothing upon which to expend religious energies. Depreda- 
 tions were common, and called for unremitting vigilance and 
 vigorous defense. John Ford's ancestors were Methodists, and 
 he and his wife had joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in 
 South Carolina, and were pious and zealous Christians They, 
 and others of this little company of adventurers, longed for re- 
 ligions immunities and Christian associations. Oppressed by 
 isolation, harassed by depredations, and thirsting tor better re 
 ligious facilities, they resolved not to remain in that land; and 
 60 at the end of one year, they took their journey from thence, 
 ai^d went into the Natchez country. In that then far western 
 land Mr. Ford searched him out a location on Pearl Eiver. 
 where he made his abode till his earthly pilgrimage was ended. 
 H7and his family became noted in Methodism At some time 
 1^ his life when is not known, he was licensed to preach, and 
 L was for a great number of years a local preacher. It was at 
 Jolui Ford's, on Pearl Kiver. that the second informal session 
 nf he Mississippi Conference was held, beginning November 14, 
 IsS Jr was a^ Ford's Meeting House, Pearl Eiver, Missis- 
 
 .( 
 
 ■I 
 
110 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 sippi State, the Mississippi Conference held its session begin- 
 ning October 29, 1818. 
 
 This band of immigrants left the land on the Tennessee, but 
 soon others came. In the year 1808, Joshua Boucher, with his 
 young family, and John Stringfield, with his wife and children, 
 moved to that territory, which was that very year organized into 
 a county, and named Madison. Mr. Boucher had joined the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church in Kentucky in 1806, and was a 
 zealous Christian. Mr. Stringfield and his wife, Sarah, and his 
 son, Thomas, who was twelve years old when they came to this 
 section, had all joined the Methodist Episcopal Church previous 
 to their coming to their new abode, and they were all pious. 
 John Stringfield and his wife both died in this county, Mr. 
 Stringfield in 1822, and his wife in 1828. Though the inhabit- 
 ants were few, and the organized Methodist Classes were small, 
 yet, here in this wild region, Joshua Boucher filled the position 
 of class leader and of exhorter, and here in 1811 he was li- 
 censed to preach. In 1809, Daniel Thompson, a local preacher 
 of great popularity, and a professional teacher of rare attain- 
 ments and of profound scholarship, came to Madison County. 
 He died in the county at an advanced age, and was buried at 
 Beech Grove Church, near the State line. But space woidd fail 
 to tell of Bibb and Brandon and Cabaniss and Eldridge and 
 Harris and Lanier and Manning and McDonald and Moore 
 and Pope and Powers and Reedy and Roper and Strong and 
 Steger and Weaver and Winston, and others who had become 
 residents of the county by the close of 1810. By the latter part 
 of 1809 it was assumed that there were citizens enough in tlie 
 county to justify the holding of courts in the county. Accord- 
 ingly, the Legislative Council and House of Representatives of 
 the Mississippi Territory, in general assembly convened, did, on 
 December 23, 1809, pass an act directing courts to be held, and 
 a convenient place to be selected for establishing public build- 
 ings in the County of Madison. The next year, 1810, the place 
 was selected, and the town was laid out and named Twickenham, 
 as the legislative act required. The place selected was at the 
 spring where John Hunt had previously erected his cabin. The 
 Legislative Council and House of Representatives of Mississippi 
 Territory, in general assembly convened, passed, November 25» 
 1811, an act changing the name of Twickenham to that of 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Huntsville, and on December 9, 1811, they passed an act to in- 
 corporate said town. 
 
 Methodism was present at the dawning of things in Madison 
 County. The very first white persons who touched the soil em- 
 braced in Madison County were Methodists. Before any courts 
 were established in the county Methodist Societies were organ- 
 ized, Methodist class leaders were appointed, Methodist exhort- 
 ers were licensed, Methodist services were being held, and 
 Methodist work was going on. As early as 1811, if not earlier, 
 Methodist Quarterly Conferences were held, and Methodist 
 preachers were licensed in the county. 
 
 The Baptists were there equally early. They were there at 
 the beginning of things, and they were strong and numerous 
 for the number of inhabitants in the county at the time. On 
 Flint River, north-east of Hunt's Spring, at the house of James 
 Deaton, October 2, 1808, they constituted a Church with eleven 
 or twelve members, which Church they named Flint River. 
 This was the first Baptist Church in the county. Others soon 
 followed. Though in the beginning, in all the Tennessee Yalley, 
 the Baptists were strong, they have not, up to this date, pros- 
 pered much in that part of Alabama. There has been a special 
 cause for this. At the risk of anticipating the events of his- 
 tory, it may be said in this connection that the Baptists in Ala- 
 bama, at one time, had among themselves dissensions and divis- 
 ions of a serious nature, and that in their final issue these 
 dissensions and divisions resulted in great damage to their in- 
 terests in all that part of the State known as the Tennessee Val- 
 ley. The doctrine of Calvinism held by the Baptists as a de- 
 nomination led to confusion in their administration and to strife 
 in their councils. The logical sequence of Calvinism is Antino- 
 mianism. A large number of the ministers and members of the 
 Baptist Church were out and out Antinomians, and as such were 
 opposed to all benevolent enterprises, and to all efforts for the 
 dissemination of the gospel. An Antinomian is an antimission- 
 ary. There were others among the Baptists who in the face of 
 the Calvinistic doctrine of foreordination and fatality which 
 they held, and in defiance of all the logic involved in their doc- 
 trine, insisted on making an effort to disseminate the gospel, 
 and these, in 1823, formed the State Convention, the objects of 
 which were to aid in domestic and foreign missions, and the edu- 
 
112 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 113 
 
 cation of young men who were called to the ministry." At once 
 an issue arose, and a contest ensued. The Antinomian party were 
 irreconcilably opposed to the work for which the Convention had 
 been organized. Many of the ministers and churches delivered 
 their opinions on these points, acrimonious speeches were made, 
 and angry debates took place in their associational meetings. 
 Human language is too poor to describe some of the scenes 
 which were enacted in not a few of their Associations. In some 
 instances preachers were arraigned by Churches for persisting 
 in having a Sunday-school, and for joining missionary societies, 
 and in some instances churches set up in Associations to them- 
 selves in order to separate themselves from those allied to the 
 cause of Missions and other benevolent institutions. The Eev. 
 William Crutcher, of Madison County, was at the head of the 
 antieffort men of the time, and his associates and followers in 
 that section constituted the large majority of the Baptist fra- 
 ternity. These statements concerning the Baptists are not 
 prompted by any unfriendly feeling. They are in accord with 
 the facts of history, and are authorized by the Baptist historian. 
 The strong opposition to benevolent enterprises and Christian 
 effort originating with and maintained by these Baptists, these 
 Antinomians, in that section, affected that whole country. It 
 was potent for evil. As a poison it infected the whole popula- 
 tion. Consequently, throughout the Tennessee Valley there has 
 not been that liberality in supporting the enterprises of the 
 Church which duty and interest required. The Methodists of 
 the Tennessee Yalley have never been distracted by any dissen- 
 sions of their own. They have been singularly free from strifes 
 and division among themselves, and they have ever had a nu- 
 merous following and a large membership. While they have 
 been Arminians, and have avowed opposition to Antinomianism, 
 yet they have been so environed by this hostility to benevolent 
 institutions in Church work that, compared with the luxuriant 
 products and the wealth possessed in that country, the financial 
 contributions made there by the Methodists to the support of 
 the ministry and the various enterprises of the Church have 
 up to this date (1889) been exceedingly meager. That grace of 
 liberality which the Word of God so authoritatively enjoins 
 and so repeatedly commends has been suppressed, dwarfed, by 
 the insidious influence of that Antinomianism which distracted 
 
 and divided the Baptist Church, and impeded her progress in 
 
 that region. , , , , _ ., . tj;ii 
 
 The sesBion of the Western Conference, held at Liberty Hill, 
 where Green Hill lived, in Williamson County, Tennessee, Oc- 
 tober 1-7, 1808, touched closely a historic paragraph in the in- 
 troductio; of Methodism in the "great bend" of the Tennessee 
 Kiver. A camp-meeting was held in connection with this ses- 
 sion of the Conference, and the preachers were entertained and 
 lodged in the tents. Bishop Asbury presided over the business 
 of the Conference, and preached three times during the session 
 Attention is called to the fact that this session of the Conference 
 commenced on Saturday, the first day of October, the day befo e 
 the Flint Eiver Baptist Church, north-east of Hunt s Spring, was 
 constituted, and that said session ended on Friday the seventh 
 day of October, more than two mouths before the County of 
 Madison was by official act, constituted and named, and more 
 than fourteen months before the legislative act was passed di- 
 recting courts to be held in said connty. These statements are 
 made to show forth still further that the Methodists were m that 
 section at the very first, at the origin and organization of affairs 
 It was at this session of the Western Conference that the first 
 Methodist preacher, in the regular ministerial work was sent to 
 the settlers in the " great bend " of the Tennessee Riv-er. This 
 appointment was made at the date above given, but it must W 
 borne in mind that it was made for the Conference year, 1809 
 At the end of the list of the appointments for the Cumberland 
 District are found these words: " James Gwinn, Missionary 
 This was the man who was to preach that year to the new set- 
 tlers in the "great bend" of the noble Tennessee, and this was 
 the capacity in which he was to minister to that Peoge. He 
 was a missionary to bear to that people glad tidings He filled 
 his appointment, operated in the field designed by his appoint- 
 ment had good success, and at the end of the Conference year, 
 September 30, 1809, reported for the statistical table one hun- 
 dred and seventy-five white and four colored members, and a 
 pastoral charge which heretofore had not existed, an appoint- 
 ment named Flint. This pastoral charge was on Flint River, 
 and lav partly in Madison County, Alabama, and partly in 
 Franklin County, Tennessee. It extended from Chickasaw 
 Island, in the Tennessee Kiver. to about where McMmnviUe, in 
 8 
 
lU 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 the State of Tennessee, is now situated. So the , first regular 
 itinerant work in this river bend was done by the Kev. James 
 Gwinn, beginning in October, 1808. 
 
 The Kev. James Gwinn was born in 1769. He went to Ten- 
 nessee in 1788, and there, that year, when in the Cumberland 
 Circuit, in the bounds of which he lived, there were only fifty- 
 nine white and four colored members, he joined the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church. He, though very young, had married before 
 he joined the Church. When or where he was licensed to 
 preach is to this present generation unknown. The first record 
 now extant of his ministry is found in connection with the West- 
 ern Conference. The Western Conference held its session at 
 Station Camp, in the Wilderness, on or near the Cumberland 
 Eiver, in Tennessee, October 2-5, 1802. It appears that Station 
 Camp was not very far from where the present town of Gallatin 
 is situated. Bishop Asbury reached the seat of this Conference 
 on the day of the beginning of the session after the Con- 
 ference had proceeded to business, going there on horseback 
 from Virginia, by way of Knoxville, Tennessee, along narrow 
 trails, and over rugged mountains, camping out at night. 
 He was suffering intensely with rheumatism, and though he 
 had preached many times on the way thither, he was too 
 unwell to preach during the session of the Conference. He, 
 however, presided in the Conference, ordained those present 
 for ordination, and made the appointments of the preach- 
 ers for the next year. At this session of the Conference 
 the Kev. James Gwinn was received as a preacher on 
 trial, and given an appointment. From this time until his 
 death, in 1841, he served with more or less regularity in 
 the itinerant ministry. For a few years of the time he was 
 local, and a few years of the time, when connected with the 
 Conference, he was without an appointment. He organized Mis- 
 sions and Circuits, thereby laying the foundations in some 
 places, and seven years of his ministry he was in the office of 
 presiding elder. He lived in Nashville many years, serving the 
 Church in various capacities in and about that then small town. 
 He was at the time of his death, which occurred near Vicks- 
 burg, Mississippi, August 3, 1841, a member of the Mississippi 
 Conference. He labored in Alabama only one year, beginning 
 his work October 7, 1808, and closing it September 30, 1809. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 115 
 
 Physically Mr. Gwinn was neither a dwarf nor a weakling. 
 He was tall, large, and strong. Mentally he was well endowed, 
 having an active and a discerning mind. He was a man of gen- 
 erous impulses, of an indomitable spirit, and of easy and pleas- 
 ant manners. He was in his measure a patriot and a philan- 
 thropist. As a preacher what he lacked in systematic and log- 
 ical arrangement he more than made up by warmth, ardor, and 
 impetuosity. In song and prayer and exhortation he was sweet, 
 fervent, and mighty. He had a native and wild eloquence which 
 gave him power over the masses. He received many into the 
 Church during his ministry, and he secured the affection and 
 retained the respect of those to whom he preached. His faith 
 was abiding, and his death was peaceful. 
 
 The Flint Circuit continued to increase in membership. At 
 the close of 1817 there were on that work six hundred white 
 and forty-five colored members. There are no means of ascer- 
 taining what proportion of these members were in Alabama and 
 what proportion were in Tennessee. Information as to the 
 places where and the dates when Societies were organized in the 
 " big bend *' of the Tennessee Kiver is quite meager. Shiloh, 
 which was about two miles from what is now Brownsboro, a sta- 
 tion on the Memphis and Charleston Kailroad, was one of the 
 oldest preaching places in that region. A Society was formed 
 there at a private house in the very beginning. At Hunt's Spring 
 a Society was organized at the first. At the very beginning a 
 Society was organized five or six miles west of Hunt's Spring, 
 in the neighborhood where Jordan's Camp Ground was after- 
 ward established. At Ford's Chapel, a dozen or more miles 
 north-west from Huntsville, a preaching place was established and 
 a Society was organized as early as 1815. Blue Spring, about 
 four miles from Huntsville, was organized in the very early days. 
 McGhee's Camp Ground, two miles south of the Tennessee State 
 line, on the road now leading from Huntsville to Fayetteville, was 
 established and a Society organized as early as 1816. At a very 
 early date there was a Society organized two and a half miles 
 from Ditto's Landing, and afterward a house of worship was 
 erected there and called Lebanon. Organizations are still kept up 
 at Shiloh, Hunt's Spring, Ford's Chapel, and Lebanon. Hunt's 
 Spring changed in name to Huntsville, and Lebanon changed its 
 location a short distance. It is impossible to mention all who in 
 
116 
 
 History of Methodism in Ahbama. 
 
 that early day were members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 and prominent in the cause. Some names have already been 
 mentioned. At Shiloh were Dayid Thompson, John W Hew- 
 lett, Thomas King, Joel Tatum, Augustus Hewlett andJohn 
 W Hamner; at Hunt's Spring were the Brandons, Mrs. i)unn, 
 and Mrs. Ewing; in the neighborhood where Jordan's Gamp 
 Ground was afterward established were William Lamer, Robert 
 Lanford, James Bibb, William Bibb, Loyd Aday, James Pol- 
 lard, Batt Jordan, James Sharp, William Blake; at Blue Spring 
 was Eichard Harris. Judging from the oldest deeds on record, 
 these Societies all worshiped in private houses until 1820 and 
 1821 as no houses of worship were built previous to said dates. 
 The preachers who served the Flint Circuit after its organiza- 
 tion by the Kev. James Gwinn up to the close of 1817, were Jed- 
 ediah McMinn, John Phipps, Thomas Stilwell, Davnd Goodner, 
 Zachariah Witten, John McClure, Valentine D. Barry John 
 Cragg, Moses Ashworth, Hugh McPhaill, James Farris. Learn- 
 er Blackman and Thomas L. Douglass were the presiding elders. 
 ■Until about 1818 Flint Circuit was the only pastoral charge 
 which reached into that part of what is now Alabama and known 
 as the Tennessee Valley. Elk Circuit never reached what is 
 now Alabama. It was confined to the State of Tennessee. 
 There were no white settlers about the mouth of the Elk Eiver 
 and about the Muscle Shoals on the Tennessee River to preach 
 to before 1817. It was not until the making of a treaty Sep- 
 tember 20 1816, that the Chickasaws relinquished all right or 
 title to the lands on the north side of the Tennessee River, and 
 all claim to territory on the south side of said river, and east o 
 a line commencing at the mouth of Caney Creek, running up said 
 creek to its source, thence a due south course to the ndge path or 
 commonly called Gaines's road.along said road south-westwardly 
 Zl point on the Tombigbee Eiver, well known by the name of 
 Se Cotton Gin Port, and down the west bank of the Tombigbee to 
 the Choctaw boundary." In 1818 the Eichland Circuit was ex- 
 tended across the Tennessee State line into the Alabama Terri- 
 tory and preaching places were established at private hoiises 
 about the Muscle Shoals. This was the second charge which was 
 e^nded into that part of the Territory of Alabama, and this 
 was the year in which it was done. There were none in that 
 ^art of the Tennessee Valley to preach to until about the year 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 117 
 
 1818. As authority for these statements here made may be given 
 one who was on the ground at the time, the Eev. John Brooks. 
 From " The Life and Times of the Kev. John Brooks" is given 
 the following: "In 1818 I joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. From this time I felt a constant impression to call 
 sinners to repentance. In the month of May I went to a quar- 
 terly meeting on Bradshaw Creek, Giles County, on purpose to 
 see Thomas L. Douglass, and have a private interview with 
 him. ... I laid before him my feelings. ... He then advised 
 me to travel the balance of the year with the Kev. John Seaton 
 and Hartwell H. Brown, who were then traveling Kichland Cir- 
 cuit. . . . Some time in June I joined Messrs. Seaton and 
 Brown. They received me kindly. I traveled first with one 
 and then the other. Richland Circuit that year embraced the 
 territory lying west of Giles County, extending to the Muscle 
 Shoals on Tennessee Kiver. It took us six weeks to get round; 
 we had but little rest and much hard traveling and labor. As 
 the territorial part of our circuit [that part of it which was in 
 Alabama] was a wilderness and just filling up, the oldest settlers 
 perhaps had not been there more than a year, we had much 
 trouble in this new part with the fierce, ranting Calvinists, who 
 were doing all they could to distract and destroy the Societies 
 in this section. Indeed this was their steady work everywhere, 
 and always had been. We sometimes were assailed by them in 
 a very unbecoming manner. ... I recollect near the mouth 
 of Blue Water, near the Muscle Shoals, after Brother Brown 
 had preached one day at a brother's house, and the congrega- 
 tion had been dismissed, an aged man who was on a visit 
 to see the landlord rose up and attacked us in a rough manner, 
 and went on at some length, neither of us making any reply, 
 till the man of the house broke into his conversation by asking 
 us all if we would not like after dinner to go a fishing, to 
 which we all agreed. I took Brother Brown out and told him 
 I wanted him to paddle the canoe, and told him my reasons, to 
 which he agreed. It was not long till we were on the water. 
 Brother B. paddled the little craft; our landlord stood in the 
 bow with his gig; our assailant and myself sat near the middle 
 on two boards. I soon introduced the subject of his assault on 
 VIS. At this he very willingly went to the matter. Instantly 
 we were in close, deathlike action. It was not long till he was 
 
118 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 BO fired that he talked very loud, and soon seemed to get very 
 angry. I minded neither of these, but kept close to him, send- 
 ing home darts every moment. He finally turned to the bow- 
 man and asked him to make for shore; he wanted to get away 
 from me. I looked around at Brother B., and gave him the 
 wink. I then told my friend we were not going to land; this 
 was my time; he had publicly, at the house, assailed us uncalled 
 for, and as he was fond of water fighting, I hoped he would not 
 flinch now, but let us have a final naval action. He answered 
 that he would talk to no such man. I asked him what had caused 
 BO sudden a change in his mind; he was very fond of talking to 
 me at the house. He said he did not know me then. I told 
 him what he had learned of me was from talking, and to pre- 
 vent him from getting into similar disgrace I would talk. At 
 last he ofiered to pay me if I would let him alone. I told him 
 I had no pay for such work; I wanted him to know that here- 
 after he should treat Methodist preachers differently. He said 
 he wanted to go to land. I told him we would go; I looked at 
 Brother B., he tacked the canoe to land. We went. Our friend 
 was very silent all night, and next morning till we left him." 
 (Pages 28-32.) 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 The First Work of Methodism in Alabama (Continued). 
 
 IN a treaty of capitulation, made and concluded at Fort Jack- 
 son iust above the junction of the Coosa and the Tallapoosa 
 Rivers ' August 9, 1814, between Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson 
 of the United States of America, and the chiefs, deputies, and 
 warriors of the Creek Nation, there was ceded to the United 
 States all the territory belonging to the Creek Nation lying west 
 and south and south-eastwardly of a line beginning at a point 
 on the eastern bank of the Coosa River, where the south bound- 
 ftrv line of the Cherokee Nation crossed the same, running from 
 thence down the said Coosa with its eastern bank to a point one 
 S "bovlthe mouth of Cedar Creek, at Fort Williams thence 
 east two miles, thence south two miles, thence west to the east- 
 em bank of the said Coosa River, thence down the eastern baiik 
 thereof, to a point opposite the upper end of the Falk jMJ «" 
 tumpka, thence east from a true meridian line to a point due 
 north of the mouth of Of uschee, thence south by a l^ke meridian 
 line to the mouth of Ofuschee on the south side of the Talla- 
 poosa River, thence up the same to a point where a direct course 
 will cross the same at the distance of ten miles from the mouth 
 thereof, thence a direct line to the mouth of Summochico Creek, 
 which empties into the Chattahoochee River on the east side 
 thereof below the town of Euf aula, thence east from a true me- 
 ridian line to a point intersecting the line dividing the lands 
 claimed by the Creek Nation from those claimed by the State of 
 
 ^ The boundaries of the Creek Nation have been given in these 
 pages so often that the reader can fully understand without any 
 repetition of the boundary lines what portion of the present 
 Stete of Alabama was ceded by this treaty of August 9, 1814 
 TWb extinction of Indian titles opened up all the land described 
 by the lines of boundary named in the treaty to occupancy by 
 white men, and very soon white settlerB were located here and 
 there on the newly acquired soiL 
 
120 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 In April, 1818, the Rev. Thomas Logan Douglass, the presid- 
 ing elder of the Nashville District, of the Tennessee Conference, 
 removed the Rev. Ebenezer Heam from the Flint Circuit, to 
 which he had been assigned for that year, and sent him forth to 
 preach and organize Societies in that part of Alabama so recent- 
 ly taken from the Creek Indians by the treaty of capitulation 
 made by them with the United States. Ditto's Landing was the 
 lowest point of the Flint Circuit, and from this point Brother 
 Heam set out for his new field. Crossing the Tennessee River 
 at Ditto's Landing, and going due south, he passed through a 
 portion of country about fifteen miles wide which still belonged 
 to the Cherokee Indians. On the mountain about fifteen miles 
 south of Ditto's Landing, late in the afternoon of the day he 
 left Flint Circuit, he reached a cabin occupied by a white man. 
 Here he found a welcome, and here, with this Indian country- 
 man and his family, he spent the night, and here he offered his 
 first evening sacrifice of prayer and praise in the wilderness. 
 At daylight the next morning he proceeded on his way, going 
 due south. Fifteen miles brought him to the home of Joseph 
 H. Mead. Mr. Mead and his family were from Virginia. Here 
 Brother Heam took breakfast. Five miles more brought him 
 to Bear-meat Cabin, which place now bears the name of Blounts- 
 ville, which has been the permanent seat of justice for Blount 
 County since 1820. Here he found a number of white settlers, 
 some of whom had been members of the Church in the coun- 
 tries whence they came. Some were Methodists, some were 
 Baptists, and others were Stonites. Here he preached his first 
 sermon in this new and unorganized field, and here he left an 
 appointment for the next month, and here was established one 
 of the regular appointments of the Mission. From Bear-meat 
 Cabin he went to where the present city of Birmingham is situ- 
 ated, finding small settlements in the valleys along the route. 
 At the place where Birmingham is located and in the vicinity 
 thereof he found a comparatively large settlement of whites. 
 Among the settlers of this locality were a number of Metho- 
 dists. In 1817 the Rev. David Owen came from Tennessee, and 
 built a house and established a home about one-fourth of a mile 
 north-east of the Court-house now in Birmingham. This private 
 residence of the Rev. David Owen Brother Heara used as a 
 preaching place and house of worship. Here he established a 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 121 
 
 regular appointment for preaching, here he deposited his few 
 goods, and here he had a preacher's home. In 1816 Thomas 
 Owen, the son of the Rev. David Owen, settled near the spot 
 where the South and North and the Alabama and Chatta- 
 nooga Railroads now cross each other in Birmingham. His 
 wife was a Methodist. Nancy Saddler and Margaret Prude, 
 the wife of John Prude, were among the Methodists whom 
 Brother Heam found in Jones's Valley, they having moved 
 there in 1817. Nancy Saddler died in 1828, and Margaret 
 Prude died in 1853. In 1823 the Rev. David Owen moved from 
 Jones's Valley to Russellville, Franklin County, Alabama, where 
 he remained until his death. His grave is on the old mihtoy 
 road near Russellville. The Owens, the Prudes, the Saddlers, 
 and the McAdorys, all related by marriage or otherwise, have 
 been quite numerous and have been leading Methodists m 
 Jones's Valley from the beginning. Perhaps Methodism m this 
 valley is indebted to none more than to Sister Margaret Prude. 
 She was a woman of energy, character, and piety. ^ 
 
 From Jones's Valley Brother Heam went to Roupe s Valley, 
 where he found a small settlement, and from thence to Hill s 
 Settlement, the place now called Scottsville, and from thence to 
 the Falls of Cahawba River, the place where Centerville, the 
 county site of Bibb, now stands. From thence he went north- 
 east, and on Sunday he attended a love-feast and a sacramental 
 service at the residence of Obed Lovelady near Wilson s Hill, 
 the place now known as Montevallo. The meeting at which 
 the services were held had been appointed by local elders who 
 residrd in that community, and the sacrament was administered 
 by these local elders. Brother Heam at that time had not even 
 been ordained a deacon. He says: "Here I organized the first 
 Society I formed on my Mission, and here I had my first quar- 
 terly meeting." The place where this Society was organized, 
 and this Quarterly Meeting was held, was about one mile south 
 of the present town of Montevallo. In this community, near 
 Wilson's Hill, Brother Hearn found four local Methodist preach- 
 ers They were the Rev. Joseph D. Lee, the Rev. Drury Pow- 
 ell 'the Rev. Joseph Walker, and the Rev. Joshua West, M.D. 
 Lee Powell, and Walker were from Georgia, and West was 
 from Tennessee. In a former chapter of this History the Rev 
 Drury Powell has been noticed. When Brother Hearn married 
 
122 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alahamu, 
 
 123 
 
 he married Miss Mary Walker, the daughter of the Kev. Joseph 
 
 "Walker. 
 
 The Kev. Joshua West, M.D., is entitled to a more extended 
 notice. He was born in Eockingham County, in the Colony of 
 Virginia, North America, in the year 1771. While yet very 
 young his parents, moving, carried him with them to Green 
 Kiver County, Virginia. Events occurred here which gave di- 
 rection to his whole after life, auspicious events which became his 
 inspiration and his delight through all after years. A Methodist 
 preacher, in the fulfillment of his divine commission to go into 
 all the world and preach the gospel to every creature, passed 
 along and asked permission to preach in his father's house. 
 The permission asked was given, and the preacher in pursuance 
 of his Heaven-appointed work preached. Young Joshua was 
 convicted under the sermon, and at the second appointment, 
 just one month from the first, he did what, up to that time, he 
 had never seen any one do: joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. His mother and his sister joined at the same time. 
 He joined as a seeker of religion, and subsequently he was jus- 
 tified and regenerated. Of the Society organized in his father's 
 house he was appointed class leader, and he was also author- 
 ized to hold meetings for prayer and exhortation. Not long aft- 
 er he commenced to exercise in public he fell under a strange 
 and formidable temptation. He was harassed with the appre- 
 hension, the fearful foreboding, that he would apostatize. A 
 terrible struggle ensued. In his distress he sought relief at the 
 throne of grace, he cried unto the Lord for the deliverance of 
 his soul. In the terrible struggle with this temptation, and the 
 agonizing effort for relief from the sharp arrows of the mighty 
 adversary, he became prostrate and unconscious, and so remained 
 for hours; but eventually he recovered his consciousness, and is- 
 sued into the light of deliverance from the dark temptation. It 
 was a life-long deliverance. Never more did that temptation re- 
 turn upon him. Rich attainments made in Christian grace and 
 great victories achieved in Christian conflicts make one stable 
 in the divine cause and active in the divine service. 
 
 The following is a verbatim copy of Brother West's license 
 to preach: "This may Certify to whom it may Concern that 
 Joshua West is permitted as a local Preacher In the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church. Given under my hand this 17th day Oct. 
 
 1792. Bennet Maxey, E. M. E. C." Bennet Maxey, whose 
 name is signed to this license, was for the year this license bears 
 date the preacher in charge of Bottetourt Circuit, in Virginia. 
 
 In 1793 Brother West was married to Hannah Prentice, who 
 lived with him in the holy estate of matrimony for nearly sixty 
 years- and in 1794 he moved to Sevier County, Tennessee, where 
 he remained until the latter part of 1816, when he removed to 
 the Territory of Alabama. 
 
 Brother West's license to preach, his credentials to the or- 
 ders of deacon and elder, and his certificate to Bishop Asbury 
 with his own signature certifying to his belief of and his love 
 for the Methodist doctrine and discipline, and his willingness 
 to rule and be governed by the same, are in hand at this mo- 
 ment, and they are all in a good state of preservation, clean and 
 
 legible. ^ ^ m t 
 
 His parchment shows that he was set apart for the office of a 
 
 deacon by the imposition of Francis Asbury's hands, and that 
 this was done at Bethel, Kentucky, the Seventh day of October, 
 in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred. The 
 parchment bears the name and signature of Francis Asbury, and 
 the seal set to the parchment has in it the bishop's initials, F. 
 A and the words containing his motto: " Study to show thyself 
 approved to God." The credential given him as an elder shows 
 that he was set apart for that office by the imposition of Fran- 
 cis Asbury's hands, and that this was done the Twentieth day of 
 October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred 
 and thirteen, and said credential bears the signature and seal of 
 Bishop Asbury. This parchment fails to tell where this ordina- 
 tion took place, but Bishop Asbury, for the day this parchment 
 bears date, says in his Journal, Volume III., page 357: "I 
 preached at Ohaver's on Wednesday, and ordained Joshua West 
 an elder." Ohaver's was in Sevier County, Tennessee, which 
 county adjoined South Carolina. Bishop Asbury was en route 
 from the session of the Tennessee Conference, which had been 
 held at Eeese's, to South Carolina. It was at the very time he 
 had expected to be on his way to Mississippi. 
 
 In 1811 Joshua West was authorized as the civil law directed 
 to practice medicine, and he made a skillful and useful physi- 
 cian, and being a man of great energy and integrity he con- 
 Btan'tly maintained a remunerative practice. 
 
124 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Coming to Alabama in the latter part of 1816, he spent the 
 remainder of his life near Montevallo, except a few brief years 
 spent at Centerville, Bibb County, Alabama. 
 
 He followed the lessons of thrift, and the dictates of justice 
 and equity. He persistently eschewed debt, and scrupulously 
 avoided litigation. He was not ambitious of things of a worldly 
 nature. He never aspired to civil rank and political distinc- 
 tion. He persistently refused the honors and emoluments of 
 office which his fellow-citizens repeatedly endeavored to thrust 
 
 upon him. 
 
 On all proper occasions Dr. West asserted with much em- 
 phasis his earnest acceptance of the doctrines of Methodism. 
 He desired engraved on his tombstone a statement that he firmly 
 believed the distinctive doctrines of Methodism, believed them 
 to be of divine origin and authority, was ardently devoted to 
 these doctrines, and that he died in the assurance that they 
 were in accord with the divine mind. Being free from all per- 
 nicious tendencies and all heretical opinions, he was a Christian 
 of steady purpose and of exemplary conduct. He entered into 
 the gates of righteousness, and praised the Lord. He was a 
 man of prayer and of piety. 
 
 In Christian labors he was abundant. His zeal and energy 
 were exerted in the cause of religion under the auspices of 
 Methodism. Soon after he came to Alabama, he, assisted by 
 Lovelady, Lee, Powell, Walker, and others, established a 
 Camp Ground in the community, about one mile from what is 
 now Montevallo. Camp-meetings were held at this place for 
 some years. At these meetings he rendered his assistance 
 and bestowed his hospitality. After this Camp Ground was 
 abandoned, another, named Ebenezer for the Kev. Ebenezer 
 Heam, was established through Dr. West's influence and with 
 his assistance, about five miles north of the present town of 
 Montevallo. But it is impossible to review here all the work he 
 did or recount all the organizations established through his in- 
 fluence. He preached much. His desire and effort was to be 
 useful as a preacher. He was happy when preaching and ad- 
 ministering the sacraments of the Church. He often officiated 
 in the administration of the Lord's Supper, and he had the 
 pleasure of baptizing very many persons. It is said that though 
 he baptized a large number of persons he never immersed one. 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alahama, 
 
 12& 
 
 He officiated at a great many funerals. Perhaps no one man 
 has done more for Methodism in Shelby County than Dr. 
 Joshua West. He was a preacher sixty-seven years, two months, 
 and twenty-one days. From the day he joined the Church in 
 Virginia until his death in Alabama there was never a charge 
 against his moral character. ' . 
 
 He brought up a family of eleven children, five sons and six 
 daughters. Two or three of his grandsons have made preachers. 
 The Kev. Elbert A. West, once a member of the Conference m 
 Alabama, and who died some years ago, was his grandson. Ihe 
 Kev. Samuel P. West, now a member of the North Alabama 
 Conference, is another of his grandsons. ^^ ^^ ^^ ^ . 
 
 Dr West died at his home near Montevallo, Shelby County, 
 Alabama, January 8, 1860. He was buried, accojdi^g to his 
 own expressed desire, by the side of his wife, who had preceded 
 him to the grave a few years, in a grave-yard in the country not 
 
 far from Montevallo. . , , x- t ^\. 
 
 The narrative which was arrested by the introduction of the 
 name and biography of the Kev. Joshua West is here re- 
 sumed. From Wilson's Hill Brother Heam went up the val- 
 ey to Catawla Town, on Canoe Creek. This Catawla Town 
 was the place at which was fixed, by a vote of the qualified 
 electors of Saint Clair County, polled on the first Monday and 
 the day following in August, 1821, the permanent seat of justice 
 for Saint Clair County, and has since been called AshviUe. In 
 the valley between Wilson's Hill and Catawla Town, Brother 
 Hearn established several preaching places, but at what par- 
 ticular points is not now known. He established a preaching 
 place at Catawla Town, and from this place he went to a cove 
 which from that time has been called Bristow's Cove, so named 
 for a local preacher by the name of Bristow who settled there. 
 At the house of this local preacher in this cove Brother Hearn 
 established a preaching place. From this cove he returned to 
 Bear-meat Cabin. He had now made a round, set his stakes, 
 and in some measure formed a Circuit; a Circuit, however, 
 which was to be enlarged as further explorations were made 
 
 On his second round he found on Cedar Mountain Brother 
 Frank Self, one of the numerous Selfs who have been Metho- 
 dists in that section of country. On his third round he went to 
 the town of Tuskaloosa. Speaking'of Tuskaloosa as it then was, 
 
126 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 he says: " The buildings, with two exceptions, were board shan- 
 ties; the two exceptions were log cabins." In one of these log 
 cabins, which was the tavern, he preached. On his fourth 
 round he penetrated the country as far as where Greenesbo rough 
 and Marion are situated. He preached in that section, and found 
 some benevolent as well as some eccentric persons. This round 
 closed his work for the year. He had spent five months in mak- 
 ing a survey of the country and in organizing Church work. 
 He had broken ground, and had laid the foundations. 
 
 At the session of the Tennessee Annual Conference held at 
 Nashville, Tennessee, beginning October 1, 1818, there were re- 
 ported six appointments with a membership aggregating eight 
 hundred and fifty-seven which hitherto had not existed, and 
 which had been formed in the Alabama Territory during that 
 Conference year just then closing. The six appointments were 
 Tiiskaloosa, Cahawba, Cotaco, Limestone, Shoal, and Butche- 
 hatche. Tuskaloosa and Cahawba embraced the territory ex- 
 plored and the membership gathered by the Rev. Ebenezer 
 Hearn. Limestone embraced Limestone County, and Cotaco 
 was in the County of that name, and in the Counties of Law- 
 rence and Franklin. Shoal was on Shoal Creek and the Mus- 
 cle Shoals and the region thereabout. Limestone and Cotaco 
 were both formed during 1818, the former by the Rev. Sterling 
 C. Brown, a young man employed by the presiding elder, the 
 latter by some one not now known. The Societies which con- 
 stituted the Shoal charge had been organized that year, 1818, 
 by the Rev. Hartwell H. Brown and the Rev. John Brooks, two 
 young men who were employed by the presiding elder, and the 
 Rev. John Seaton, who was on the Richland Circuit. 
 
 These six new pastoral charges had been organized that year 
 under the planning and direction of the presiding elder of the 
 Nashville District, the Rev. Thomas L. Douglass, who was a man 
 of pleasing manners, dignified bearing, and solemn demeanor; 
 a man of accurate knowledge, exact habits, administrative abili- 
 ty, and evangelical faith; an able minister of the New Testa- 
 ment. He understood the mission of the Church, and the na- 
 ture of the work to be done under her auspices, and he adapted 
 his methods and agencies to the exigencies of the case in 
 hand. The Rev. John Brooks, who knew Brother Douglass well, 
 said of him: "Take him altogether, he was the best presiding 
 
 First Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 127 
 
 elder I ever saw. He was a deep and strong divine. He was 
 hard to excel in the pulpit. In his administration of the Disci- 
 pline^ I have never seen his equal. Middle Tennessee, at the 
 time he came, needed just such a man. No man ever contribu- 
 ted so much to the sound popularity of the Methodist Church 
 in this portion of the State as did Thomas L. Douglass." 
 
CHAPTEK YIL 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work of 
 
 Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 FOK tlie year 1819 three Conferences — the Tennessee, the 
 Mississippi, and the South Carolina — furnished preachers 
 for Alabama. 
 
 The following appointnaents for that year are found in con- 
 nection with the Tennessee Conference: 
 
 Tennessee District, Thomas D. Porter, P. E. 
 Flint Kiver, Robert Paine. 
 Cotaco, Abraham Still. 
 Limestone, Joshua Boucher, Sr. 
 Cahawba, Thomas Stringfield. 
 Tuskaloosa, John Kesterson. 
 Shoal, Robert Hooper. 
 Butchehatche, Ebenezer Heani. 
 
 These appointments were altogether in Alabama, except that 
 a part of the Flint Circuit was in the State of Tennessee, and 
 the Butchehatche charge, which was to be organized, was to ex- 
 tend beyond the line of Alabama into the State of Mississippi, 
 about the Cotton Gin Port and below. 
 
 For the year 1819 there was one appointment in Alabama in 
 connection with the Mississippi Conference, as follows: 
 Tombecbee, Thomas Griffin, John Murrow. 
 
 Thomas Griffin was also for that year the presiding elder of 
 the District which included the Tombecbee Circuit. 
 
 At the end of the list of the appointments of the South Car- 
 olina Conference, for the year 1819, is the following: 
 
 Alexander Talley, Missionary to Alabama Territory. 
 • At the beginning of the year 1819 there were in Alabama, 
 eleven itinerant preachers, and that many or more local preach- 
 ers and about sixteen hundred members. That was the year Al- 
 abama was admitted into the Union as a State. 
 
 The net increase in the membership in all parts of the State 
 (128) 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Worh 129 
 
 for the Conference year 1819 was, in round numbers, about 
 
 eight hundred. 
 
 The Tennessee River District, on which the Rev. Thomas D. 
 Porter was that year presiding elder, was a new District, in the 
 first year of its existence, and extended from the Tennessee 
 State line on the north to a line running from the junrtion of the 
 Coosa River and Hatchett Creek to the source of the Mulberry 
 Creek and to the junction of the Cahawba and the Alabama 
 Rivers, and to the junction of the Tombigbee and the Warrior 
 Rivers on the south, and from Flint River, AYills Creek, and 
 Coosa River on the east to the upper Tombigbee River on the 
 west. This District occupied the same territory for 1820, and 
 was served that year by the same presiding elder. The year 1821 
 the District was changed in its boundary, and did not extend 
 south of the Tennessee River, and Mr. Porter served it that year. 
 This closed his work in Alabama. For 1822 he was supernumer- 
 ary, and at the close of that Conference year he located. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas D. Porter was a native of Virginia. He was 
 admitted on trial in the Western Conference, at its session in 
 Cincinnati, Ohio, beginning October 1, 1811. After locating, 
 he secured a home some twenty miles south of Nashville, w^here 
 he lived amidst plenty and popularity until 1837. In that year 
 he made a visit to the Republic of Texas, and while on that 
 visit and among strangers he died of yellow fever. He was a 
 man of good talents, and he was a successful preacher. 
 
 The Conference year for 1819 was the first year of the itiner- 
 ant ministry of the Rev. Robert Paine, and the Flint Circuit 
 was his first appointment in that ministry. In order to a cor- 
 rect understanding of dates, however, it is necessary to state 
 that the Conference at which he was received on trial met at 
 Nashville, Tennessee, October 1, 1818. 
 
 For 1820 the Flint Circuit was served by William McMahon 
 and Hartwell H. Brown. For 1821 it was served by Thomas 
 Stringfield, William McMahon, supernumerary. For 1822 the 
 preacher on this Circuit was Wiley B. Peck, W^illiam McMahon^ 
 presiding elder. At the end of 1822 the Flint Circuit was 
 changed in name to that of Madison, and the District in which it 
 was embraced was changed from the name of Tennessee to that 
 of Huntsville. For 1823 the preachers on the Madison Circuit 
 were Lewis S. Marshall, James W. Allen. 
 9 
 
130 
 
 Ilistorif of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 This closed Lewis S. Marshall's work in Alabama. He was 
 received on trial in the Tennessee Conference at Nashville, Oc- 
 tober, 1818, and was received into full connection, and elected 
 and ordained a deacon at the session of the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence at Hopkins ville, Kentucky, October, 1820; he was ordained 
 an elder at the close of his year on the Madison Circuit, at the 
 session of the Tennessee Conference at Huntsville, Alabama, be- 
 ginning November 26, 1823. For the year 1824 he was on New 
 Eiver Circuit, and at the end of that year he located. He reen- 
 tered the Holston Conference at the close of 1833, and again lo- 
 cated at the close of 1838. He reentered the itinerancy, and ap- 
 peared for the year 1845 in the Kentucky Conference; and in 
 September, 1845, he transferred from the Kentucky to the Tex- 
 as Conference; then he fell into the East Texas Conference; and 
 in March, 1847, he transferred from that to the Arkansas Con- 
 ference; and when the "Wachita Conference was organized, in 
 1854, he fell into that Conference, in which he remained until 
 his death, in 18G2. He was in charge of the Wachita Circuit at 
 the time of his death. He seems to have been a man of more 
 than ordinary attainments and ability. 
 
 For 1824 the preachers on Madison Circuit were Andrew 
 Jackson Crawford and Thomas A. Strain; for 1825, Ellison Tay- 
 lor and Samuel K. Davidson. This closed the ministry of Elli- 
 son Taylor on Madison Circuit and his earthly career, the state- 
 ment in the General Minutes which shows that he was appoint- 
 ed to the Madison Circuit for the Conference year 1826 to the 
 contrary notwithstanding. All can be explained. At the close 
 of his year's work on Madison Circuit he went to the session of 
 the Conference which met at Shelbyville, Tennessee, November 
 10, 1825. During the session of the Conference he was at- 
 tacked w4th fever, from which he died. At the adjournment of 
 the Conference he was still alive, with the possibility of recov- 
 ery, and so he was assigned to the Madison Circuit again, for 
 the Conference year 1826, with Isaac W. Sullivan and Samuel 
 R. Davidson, assistants, but a short time after the adjournment 
 of the Conference his attack of fever terminated fatally, and the 
 Circuit for that year, 1826, was served by Sullivan and David- 
 son. As Taylor died a short time after the adjournment of the 
 Conference at Shelbyville, in November, 1825, his obituary w^as 
 presented at the Conference at the close of 1826, though he 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 131 
 
 really died in November, 1825. He was a native of South Car- 
 olina. He entered the itinerant ministry on trial in the Ten- 
 nessee Conference, in October, 1819, and in due course was ad- 
 vanced to membership in the Conference and to orders in the 
 ministry. He was a man of pleasant bearing, superior talents, 
 and personal influence. He had the sweet enjoyments and the 
 consoling assurances of the Christian religion in his last illness 
 and in the final issue. 
 
 At the end of the year 1826 Isaac W. Sullivan located. He 
 had traveled four years, and had received deacon's orders. 
 
 For 1827 the preachers for Madison Circuit were Ambrose F. 
 Driskill and Alexander L. P. Green; for 1828, T. M. King and 
 Lorenzo D. Overall; for 1829, Alexander L. P. Green and Green- 
 ville T. Henderson; for 1830, Greenville T. Henderson and 
 George W. Morris; for 1831, Elisha Dodson and Greene Malone; 
 for 1832, Samuel Gilliland and John W. Hanner. 
 
 The membership on this Circuit from 1819 to 1832 was, in 
 point of numbers, somewhat fluctuating. Some years there was 
 an increase in numbers, and other years there was a decrease. 
 The lowest number of white members on this work for any one 
 year, in the period above named, was five hundred and ten, and 
 the highest number was one thousand and twenty-six. The low- 
 est number of colored members, any one year of that period, was 
 thirty-three, and the highest number was one hundred and eighty. 
 
 The County of Cotaco w^as established and bounded by an act 
 of the Legislative Council and House of Representatives of the 
 Alabama Territory, in general assembly convened, February 4, 
 
 1818. 
 
 The Legislature of Alabama, in general assembly convened, 
 on June 14, 1821, passed an act, that from and after that date 
 the County of Cotaco should be known and called by the name 
 of Morgan. 
 
 The Cotaco Circuit was formed the same year that Cotaco 
 County was established, and existed by that name two years. 
 It appeared in the General Minutes for the Conference years 
 1819 and 1820, and the name of Cotaco then gave place to the 
 name of Franklin. This Cotaco Circuit embraced what was 
 then Cotaco and Lawrence Counties, and it was extended into 
 Franklin County on the change of the name from Cotaco to 
 Franklin Circuit. 
 
132 
 
 History of Methodisjn in AJahama. 
 
 The Eev. Abraham Still was the first preacher on the Cotaco 
 Circuit, and that Circuit was the first and last pastoral charge 
 served by him in Alabama. He was succeeded in 1820 by the 
 Eev. Thomas Madden, and this Cotaco Circuit was the first, 
 though by no means the last, charge served in the State of Ala- 
 bama by the Rev. Thomas Madden. 
 
 The Rev. Abraham Still was in due course admitted to mem- 
 bership in the Tennessee Conference, and ordained deacon and 
 elder. He was elected and ordained elder at Huntsville, Alaba- 
 ma, November, 1823. He was at the organization of the Holston 
 Conference, just one year after this, as one of the members of 
 that body, and at the end of one more year he located. Reen- 
 tering the Holston Conference at the close of the year 1832, he 
 then filled appointments in that Conference for four years, and 
 transferred to the Missouri Conference, where he filled missions 
 for eight years, and was then placed on the superannuated list 
 by the Missouri Conference. Here he disappeared from the 
 General Minutes, and no statement was made as to how he 
 
 went out. 
 
 On February 6, 1818, the Legislative Council and House of 
 Representatives of the Alabama Territory fixed the boundaries 
 and established the County of Limestone, and in the latter part 
 of the summer of the same year Sterling C. Brown, as already 
 stated, under the employment and instructions of the presiding 
 elder, the Rev. Thomas L. Douglass, formed the Limestone Cir- 
 cuit. The name of the preacher on this Circuit for 1819 has 
 already been given. For 1820 it was served by Thomas 
 Stringfield; for 1821, by Lewis S. Marshall; for 1822, by Coleman 
 Harwell and Robert Boyd. This was the first and last ministe- 
 rial service rendered in Alabama by Harwell and Boyd. Har- 
 well was admitted on trial in the South Carolina Conference at 
 the close of 1807, and into full connection and ordained deacon 
 at the close of 1809, and he was ordained elder and located at 
 the close of 1811. He was re-admitted into the itinerancy by 
 the Tennessee Conference at the close of 1821, and appointed to 
 Limestone Circuit, and he located again at the close of 1823. 
 
 The Rev. Robert Boyd was received on trial by the Tennes- 
 see Conference at the time he was appointed to the Limestone 
 Circuit, and he was discontinued at the close of his second year. 
 
 The preachers on the Limestone Circuit for 1823 were Elli- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 133 
 
 son Taylor and Joseph W. Camp. This was Camp's first and 
 last year. He had just been received as a preacher on trial, and 
 was discontinued at the close of the year. 
 
 For 1824 the preachers on that Circuit were Joshua Boucher 
 and Ellison Taylor; for 1825, Gilbert D. Taylor and Arthur 
 McClure. 
 
 This year's work on the Limestone Circuit terminated the 
 earthly career of the Rev. Arthur McClure. He was a native 
 of East Tennessee, having been born there February 16, 1801. 
 September 29, 1821, he was licensed to preach, and, in a class of 
 thirty -nine, was received on trial into the Tennessee Conference, 
 October, 1822, and appointed to the New River Circuit; at the 
 close of that Conference year he was appointed to Jackson Cir- 
 cuit, which was in Jackson County, Alabama; at the end of that 
 year he was admitted into full connection in the Conference, and 
 ordained deacon and appointed to Limestone Circuit, where he 
 died September 26, 1825. His life was short. Brief but bril- 
 liant was his ministry. He acquired knowledge rapidly, made 
 what he acquired available, and worked with will and wisdom. 
 He was a man of great endurance, acceptability, and usefulness; 
 but neither his endurance, acceptability, usefulness, nor the 
 skill of physicians could withstand that violent fever which 
 took hold of him that fatal day in September, 1825, and he 
 
 passed to 
 
 " The undiscovered country, from whose bourne 
 
 No traveler returns." 
 
 It is said that " he reviewed, on his dying bed, with heartfelt sat- 
 isfaction, the truth of the doctrines which he had taught, and 
 on which he now rested the eternal interests of his soul," and 
 that he "departed in glorious triumph." 
 
 The preachers on the Limestone Circuit for 1826 were James 
 McFerrin and James W. Allen ; for 1827, James McFerrin and 
 Samuel R. Davidson; for 1828, Joshua Boucher and A. L. P. 
 Green; for 1829, Thomas M. King, Green M. Rodgers, and 
 James W. Allen, supernumerary; for 1830, Wilson L. McAllis- 
 ter and John B. McFerrin; for 1831, Wilson L. McAllister and 
 William M. McFerrin; for 1832, Samuel R. Davidson and Wil- 
 liam P. Rowles. 
 
 This closed the work of the Rev. Samuel R. Davidson in Ala- 
 bama. He wa^ received on trial in the Tennessee Conference 
 
134 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 135 
 
 {\i 
 
 at the close of 1824, and remained twelve years in the itinerant 
 ministry, four of which years were given to the work in Alaba- 
 ma. He maintained a good character and did acceptable work. 
 The Kev. William P. Rowles was admitted on trial in the Ten- 
 nessee Conference at the close of 1831, so that the Limestone 
 Circuit was the first appointment he received, and he located at 
 the close of 1835. He was, during two years of his ministry, 
 connected with the Missions and Schools for the Cherokees. 
 He joined the Church, and was licensed to preach in Alabama. 
 He was a man of superior native ability and of eminent profes- 
 sional attainments, but he seems to have been unstable in the 
 pursuits of life. He was a physician, and -before he commenced 
 preaching he was engaged in the work of his profession, and 
 after he located he turned his attention to the profession of law. 
 The fluctuations in the numbers in Society on the Limestone 
 Circuit, for the fourteen or fifteen years included from the for- 
 mation'of said Circuit in 1818 to the close of 1832, show the par- 
 ticular impress of the different administrations under which the 
 work was carried on, and, moreover, indicate the instability of 
 the populace of the country. In the number of colored mem- 
 bers on the Circuit, increase and decrease were alternately re- 
 curring. At the close of 1818 there were twenty-four colored 
 members on the Circuit, at the close of 1819 there were nineteen, 
 at the close of 1821 there were forty-four, at the close of 1822 
 there were thirty-four. Thus the fluctuation continued from 
 year to year. At the close of 1832 there were one hundred and 
 fifty-eight colored members. 
 
 Of the white members on the Circuit there was a steady in- 
 crease every year from 1818, when there were two hundred and 
 thirty-two, until the close of 1822, when there were four hun- 
 dred and three. The next year there was a net decrease of sev- 
 en, and the next year, under the ministry of the Rev. Joshua 
 Boucher and the Rev. Ellison Taylor, there was a net increase 
 of two hundred and four. In 1825, under the ministry of the 
 Rev. Gilbert D. Taylor and the Rev. Arthur McClure, there was 
 a net increase of four hundred and seventeen. There was re- 
 ported for that year in Society on the Limestone Circuit one 
 thousand and seventeen white members. That was one of the 
 years of an extraordinary religious excitement in that pastoral 
 charge, in which the Circuit was in a blaze of retival glory from 
 
 end to end and from side to side. The next year there was a 
 net decrease of two hundred and forty-two white members in 
 that Circuit, and at the close of 1832 there were only six bun- 
 dred and fifty-two white members, where seven years before 
 there were one thousand and seventeen. 
 
 Evidently there were unstable souls in that section, and there 
 was vacillation thereabout in the administration of the affairs of 
 Zion But unstable souls resided in every part of the btate, 
 and a vacillating administration prevailed everywhere. Large 
 numbers of persons were constantly before the Church, now to 
 be applauded, then to be denounced; now to be applauded for 
 their supposed purpose of reformation, then to be denounced for 
 their supposed apostasy. Many received in the summer and au- 
 tumn were discontinued before the following spring had passed. 
 Many persons joined the Church annually, some oftener. One 
 administration received, the next expelled. In some instances 
 the same administration inducted into the Church and deposed 
 from it the same persons repeatedly. This instability of the 
 would-be adherents of the divine cause, and this infelicitous and 
 inharmonious administration in the admission of persons to 
 membership in the Church of God has been highly prejudicial 
 to the cause of religion. False sentiments prevail concerning 
 the confidence which the Church should repose in the unstable 
 and unprincipled persons who make a show of adopting the holy 
 precepts of the gospel. It is thought by not a few that the 
 Church should receive and confide in all who offer to join her 
 ranks, though they make and break their vows seventy times 
 seven This sentiment is unscriptural, and any administration 
 which accords with it is fearfully damaging. It is true that 
 « not every sin willingly committed after justification is the sm 
 against the Holy Ghost, and unpardonable." It is equally true 
 that " the grant of repentance is not to be denied to such as fall 
 into sin after justification." It is, moreover, true that "they 
 are to be condemned who say they can no more sm as long as 
 they live here, or deny the place of forgiveness to such as truly 
 repent " But these mysterious and sublime truths do not con- 
 stitute a basis for the conclusion that the Church should take 
 into her fold those who never repent, those who have no hxed 
 "desire to flee from the wrath to come, and to be saved from 
 their sins " those who have no moral integrity. The induction 
 
136 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 of the unstable into the Church should be as strenuously guard- 
 ed against as the introduction of heretics. It is useless to pro- 
 nounce maledictions upon others, however much they merit it, 
 while encomiums are heaped upon those who are without stabil- 
 ity in everything except their fickleness, and who are without 
 persistence in everything except their stratagems in getting into 
 the Church, and who have no uniformity of life except in their 
 inconsistencies. This class of persons are odious. Their very 
 pretensions are impious. An ecclesiastical body should adopt 
 wise and salutary measures for the administration of her atfairs 
 and persistently enforce them. She should not dally with those 
 who are unprincipled. She should not allow her communion 
 distracted and her name sullied by affiliation with the unstable 
 elements of society. 
 
 The original preaching places in Limestone County, to name 
 them alphabetically, were Athens, Bethlehem, Cambridge, 
 Cokesbury, Lebanon, and Pettusville. The town of Mooresville 
 is as old as Limestone County, having been incorporated by an 
 Act of the Legislative Council and House of Representatives of 
 the Alabama Territory November 16, 1818, but the Methodists 
 have never had a house of worship at that place. They have 
 preached there for years, but have not accomplished anything. 
 Athens is as old as Limestone County, and has been the perma- 
 nent seat of justice of that county since December 3, 1819. 
 Bethlehem was about ten miles south-west of Athens, and Leb- 
 anon was about ten miles north-west. Cambridge, about six 
 miles east of Athens, is as old a preaching place as there 
 is in the county. A Society was organized and a Camp-ground 
 w^as established there in the very beginning. Cambridge was 
 the center of Methodist gatherings for Limestone County. 
 There Quarterly Meetings and Camp-meetings were held, and 
 there men were licensed to preach. It was there on that conse- 
 crated spot in the month of October, 1825, that John Berry Mc- 
 Ferrin was licensed to preach. Cokesbury was located on what 
 has long been known as Nubbin Bidge, something less than 
 three miles from the eastern boundary of Limestone County. 
 It was named for Bishops Coke and Asbury, and the name was 
 doubtless given by Methodists there from the Atlantic States 
 who loved and admired those two bishops. 
 
 James Bibb, Edward Patterson, John Pollard, and John P. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 137 
 
 Horton were local preachers in the bounds of the Limestone 
 Circuit in 1830. At the close of that year James Bibb was 
 elected to elder's orders, and the others here named were at the 
 same time elected to deacon's orders. 
 
 The official rcords show that the Shoal Circuit and the itin- 
 erant ministry of the Rev. Thomas Hooper were co-etaneous. 
 Shoal Circuit was the field assigned the Rev. Thomas Hooper 
 for 1819. That Circuit was the last charge he served in Alaba- 
 ma. For some reason, not now known, he failed to obtain orders 
 in the ministry, and he located at the close of 1822. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Hooper was succeeded on the Shoal Circuit 
 by the Rev. Thomas Stillwell, who was admitted on trial in the 
 Western Conference at the end of 1807, and who advanced to 
 membership in the Conference and to elder's orders, and at the 
 end of 1812 located; and who was re-admitted at the end of 1819, 
 and located again at the end of 1823; and whose work in Alaba- 
 ma opened and clored with 1820 and with the Shoal Circuit. 
 
 After the Rev. Thomas Stillwell came the Rev. John Cragg 
 and the Rev. Alson J. Waters for 1821. The Rev. Alson J. 
 Waters had just been received on trial in the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence, and was discontinued at the close of the year. The Rev. 
 John Cragg was received on trial by the Western Conference 
 at the close of the Conference year 1807. In due course he 
 was admitted into full connection and ordained deacon and 
 elder. For the year 1815 he was on Flint Circuit, and for 1821 
 on Shoal Circuit, so that two years of his ministry were given 
 to Alabama. From 1825 till 1840 he was a member of the Hol- 
 ston Conference. He was thirty-three years an itinerant 
 preacher, and twenty-eight of these years he was effective. 
 This was a long service, and he filled many important appoint- 
 ments. He died in 1840. 
 
 The Rev. Joshua Boucher was the senior preacher on the 
 Shoal Circuit for 1822, and the Rev. James Edmiston, who had 
 just been admitted on trial by the Tennessee Conference, and 
 who was discontinued at the end of the year, was his colleague. 
 
 The Rev. Elias Tidwell and the Rev. Coleman Harwell were 
 the preachers on the Shoal Circuit for 1823. That was the last 
 year's service in Alabama by that man, the Rev. Coleman Har- 
 well. Another man of the same name and of the same family 
 has been noticed on a previous page. This Brother Harwell 
 
i:)H 
 
 JUtitort/ of MrlluKliHm in Ahihitwa. 
 
 now <inKH«'mK Hltnul/ion wiim ii mini <»f /.«'h1 uihI ruN^liiy. h <onH©- 
 crHtiHi nna laborioUH ChriHtinti. H<' «li«'<l <'f couMtimptinu mn- 
 Muinplioii whi«-h wfiH, cl.,til)tl.«HH, MuporindtimMl l)y ilio oxpoHnnm 
 mi.l l.nnlHl.ipM immIuhmI iti tlio work of bin miniHiry. Jlo wum 
 l,.,rn in North Ciin.liiui. Muy 10, IHOO, ynmA tho C\n\rvh in 
 1H17; wuH lir«nH«Ml to ptviirh in IH'2(); and whh lulinittnd on trial 
 in tlin TnntH'MHi'o (Jonfnntncp, ftn<l iippointiMl. im Iihh nirnmly 
 hvMU HtntiMl, to Hhonl Circuit for \Wy Ho diiMJ .July 5, IKJO. 
 Hill lifo WfiK Hhort, but liin work wum woll done, an<l hin oxit wm4 
 
 pottcnftil find Imppy. 
 
 For Hhofd (Urc-uit tlio promdinrn wnrn. for 1H'21, Anldi^y Ij. 
 llo/'/<4; for 1825, .I«r<itniuli .Im'kMoti, Imhuc V. Enoclm; for 1H20, 
 Jcmiah Hrowdi^r, William H. Ilollynian. 
 
 Tlio Uev. .bmiah Un.wd^r wan adniilt«t(| on trial l»y tlirt T«m- 
 IM.MMi-o (V.nfrninc.^ l»nKinnin« Ooti.hnr 1, IHI'J, and ho locatrd 
 at tho HOHHion of tho (Innf^nmro ludd in th" latti^r part of 1H27. 
 
 Thf Ilov. ThonniH I'aynn and th« H<'V. .John \\ Ford wnro 
 th© |>mic'h«r» appointed to Hlu.al Circuit for IH27. Tho Itnv. 
 John F. Ford had junt 1mm. n adnjittcd into tho Tcnn.'MMi'o Con- 
 fnronco on trial. Thi« wan \m lant ymr in Alalmfna. Jlo lo- 
 c!fit<Ml at tlj" KoHttion of tho 'IVinnriHHoo (Jonft^runco h«ld thu lutter 
 
 jrnrt of 1H2:^ 
 
 Tho pri'aclMrn ai)point«d to Hhoal dircuit woro, for 1H2H, VXmn 
 Tidwidl, .iimnph Millor; for IH2U. ThoniaH I'ayno, William K 
 Fottnr. Thin waM tho hint work (.f tlm llnv. TlH.maM I'ayno itt 
 Alabama. 11 Ih lirHt uppointm«uit in thn (!<,nf«Mvnc« wan for 
 1827, ftn<l h«i loctttted nt tho woHnion of thn (!onf«uiincn hold in 
 Novonjbor, \WM. TIiIh njipointmonfc for 1821) wan th^ llr»t and 
 the lant work of tho Uov. William K. Fottitr in Alftbama. Um 
 had jtmt b^tm admitt*'d on trial in th« Ctmfyroneo, and Im lo- 
 cat<ul in Kovi<mbi«r, 18!J4. 
 
 The li©v. Charl«« Hibloy artd tho Tlov. Thoman T/oyd wore ap- 
 fwinted to Hhoal Cinmit for 18;H). That wan tho bo^infiitiK of 
 Hibloy'u minintry, nnd aftor n. trial of thn'o yoar» in tho itincjf- 
 uncy h« wttn (liHC(»ntinttnd. 
 
 For 18*U tho appointmont roadM-. Hhoal, (iilbort D. Taylor, 
 Honry 0. j4«htfoot. Tho Unv. Hwiry 0. Li^htfo^.t wan on 
 trial f(»r that yoar, and wan diH<;oTjtinuod at tho imd thuroof. 
 
 Th« appointmont for 18:12 wax: Hhoal, V^U^v Hurnum, Htith 
 M. Harwell Tho Itov. FtHor Ibirnum (donfid hi« two yoarw on 
 
 The J'Jnhnijniinil and Adnmrnnnil of the Work 
 
 trial with tho year 18:12. and wan diMcotttinmid at tho on(l thorn, 
 of; and tho Jlnv. Htith M. llarwoll oIoh.mI Ium Jirnt yoar on trial 
 tliat yi'ar, and wan diMiMintinm^d at itn expiration. 
 
 Tlio Hhoal ('ircuit wan troatnd aw an inforior appointniont. 
 Heldomdid it havo othor than itioxporionood mon to admiuiHtor 
 itH alTairn and dinpotmo the gcmpol to itH i)ooplo. 
 
 At tho ohmo of I8lli thoro word roportod on Hhoal (5irenittw<i 
 liundn'il and twcnty^nino whito and thr«*ti eolonnl mmnbors. 
 At tho (doHo of 1h:J2 thoro woro roportod four hundred and 
 thirty whito and buty-Mix oolorod nuunbori* in Maid C'lrotiit. 
 Thoro had boon tho muw fluotmitiium in tho momborKJiip of 
 thiMOirouit during tlo* poriod from 18|1) to lH:i2 nn found in 
 othor CHrcuitH. For iuMtanoo, in IH.'JO thoro woro two Inindrod 
 and ol^(ht mon^ whit© mondiorn than thoro woro in i8:i2. 
 
 At tho timi» of it« or^^ratiization tho (Jahawba (Jirtniit waH om 
 
 of lirHt importanco. FroaohorH of nativo ability, and Momo who 
 
 att/iinod to oniinonoo, i*orvod it from timo in tinm. Aw haN aU 
 
 roady boon rolabd, tho Uov. Fln^no/or lb-am did, in tho yoar 
 
 IHIH. (.ri^ani/o tho HooiotioH which at tho lirf^t conntiitJtod tho 
 
 mombor»hii) «»f tluit Cirotiit. Tho Drnt yoar of itn oxintonoo m 
 
 a Circuit wan 181'J, and tho Uov. ThonuiM HtrinKhold wan ap- 
 
 pointed to it for that yoar, thcmgh ho wont to anothor hold bo- 
 
 foro tho ymr chmod. Jlrothor Moarn, who had boon appointed 
 
 to <»rKHni'/o a w«»rk on tho Jbdohehatch©, h(*arin« rumors o! 
 
 deprodatiouM oommitiod by panMini^ Indianw in tho Held a»- 
 
 mj^nod him, (h^dinod to otdor Maid hold in tho beKinnin^ «»f tho 
 
 yoar. nnd joined HtriuKliold in hin C-ircuit. Uy an arran^o- 
 
 mont reluctantly Manctionod by tho proMidin« ehlor. the Uov. 
 
 Thomas D. Tortor, UnMhor HtriuKliold wont, afb'r <he yoar 
 
 had <'onMidorably advanoml, and tho doprodationn alludod to 
 
 had Htd)Hidod, to tho Uutohohatcho, and Jtoarn romained and 
 
 Horvod tho Cahawba (/Irctnt without Htrint/ftidd tho romaindor 
 
 ol the year. It Im a fact woll attoNt^^l that Htrin^lhdd and 
 
 Hoarn worvod tho Cahawba Circuit tot/othor a part of tho year 
 
 IHIO, and that HtriuKJiohl inwb^ad nf I learn toiled at tho or^au- 
 ization of H(MiotioH on Uutohohalfdjo that yoar. 
 
 For 1820 tho Uov. Morodith llonnoau was appoinbd to Cahaw- 
 
 ba Circuit- 
 In tho MiMMiMMtppi Cotiformie© tor 1821 thor© ap|)oared a new 
 District. It wan tho ('ahawba Diwtrlot, and axtindod from tit© 
 
uo 
 
 History of Methodism in AJahnma. 
 
 bead waters of Mulberry Creek on the south to the Tennessee 
 Kiver on the north, and was constituted of the Cahawba, Frank- 
 lin, Marion, and Tuskaloosa Circuits. Cahawba Circuit lay 
 along the Cahawba Valley, and the Franklin Circuit was just 
 south of the Tennessee Kiver in the counties of Franklin, Law- 
 rence, and Morgan. For this year, 1821, the Eev. Thomas Nixon 
 was the piesiding elder of this new District, and he was also the 
 preacher in charge of the Cahawba Circuit. This was the last and 
 the second year of Nixon's ministry in Alabama. The year be- 
 fore he was preacher in charge of the Alabama Circuit. While 
 on the Caiiawba District and Circuit in 1821, Nixon fell under 
 some evil occurrence in which he was finally, after due process, 
 expelled from the connection. So the case is reported in the Gen- 
 eral Minutes, Volume L, page 398. He furnished late in life, as 
 given by Dr. McFerrin in his " History of Methodism in Tennes- 
 see," Volume XL, pages 202-205, a statement concerning himself, 
 in which he gave a catalogue of the appointments which he served 
 in his ministry, beginning with his admission into the Tennes- 
 see Conference on trial in the latter part of 1812, and closing 
 with 183G; but in this statement, as it is published, he studious- 
 ly avoided any allusion to his being presiding elder of the Ca- 
 hawba District and preacher in charge of the Cahawba Circuit. 
 His own statement concerning his ministry, in view of the facts 
 of the case, is destitute of the elements of truth. It is not to 
 be supposed that the Cahawba Circuit advanced or improved 
 any that year. There was no report made of that circuit for 
 that year, 1821. The statistics were copied verbatim from the 
 Minutes of the previous year. 
 
 Mr. Nixon was finally restored to the ministry, and at the 
 close of 1832 he was, through some process, re-admitted to the 
 Mississippi Conference. He located at the close of 1836, and 
 was asrain re-admitted into the same Conference at the close 
 of 1866, and died a member of the Mississippi Conference in 
 1872. 
 
 At the session of the Mississippi Conference held at Wash- 
 ington, Mississippi, beginning December 7, 1821, in assigning the 
 preachers to the pastoral charges for 1822, the Eev. John C. 
 Burruss was assigned to the Cahawba District as presiding eld- 
 er, and the Eev. Benjamin M. Drake and the Eev. John E. Lam- 
 buth were assigned to the Cahawba Circuit as preachers, assist- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 141 
 
 ant and junior. This was the first and the last appointment 
 filled by the Eev. John C. Burruss as a traveling preacher m 
 Alabama. He had resided for a time, and exercised his minis- 
 try in a local capacity, in Lawrence and Franklin Counties, 
 Alabama. He started as a preacher in the Virginia Conference, 
 havincT been received on trial in that Conference in February, 
 1814 Ind received into full connection in the same Conference 
 in January, 1816. He located at the same time he was received 
 into full connection. He was a member of the Mississippi Con- 
 ference from the beginning of 1822 to the close of 1835, except 
 the years 1830 and 1831, when he was in the local ranks ihe 
 last pastoral charge he served was New Orleans m 1835. He 
 was the brother of the wife of the Eev. Alexander Sale. 
 
 The Cahawba Circuit was the first and the last charge served 
 in Alabama by the Eev. Benjamin M. Drake. When he was 
 appointed to that work he had just reached his majority was 
 not yet in full connection in the Conference, and he had just 
 come through from Kentucky in. company with his colleague, 
 the Eev. John Eussell Lambuth. These two men, Drake and 
 Lambuth, left the Kentucky Conference for the Mississippi 
 Conference at the instance and solicitation of Bishop George. 
 In their journey from Kentucky to the seat of the Mississippi 
 Conference Bishop George joined them at Nashville, Tennessee, 
 and traveled with them on horseback to Washington. Drake was 
 born in Eobeson County, North Carolina, September 11, 1800, and 
 was carried when a child by his parents to Muhlenburg County, 
 Kentucky, where, when about eighteen years old, he received the 
 spirit of adoption, was justified from all his sins, and called to 
 separate himself to the work of the ministry. His heart was 
 filled with joy and his mouth with praise. He was soon 
 licensed to preach, and was put to work. He was received on 
 trial into the Annual Conference in October, 1820, and appoint- 
 ed for the following Conference year to the Fountain Head Cir- 
 cuit, which was then in the newly organized Kentucky Con- 
 ference. At the Mississippi Conference at the close of the 
 Conference year 1822 he was admitted into full connection in 
 the Conference, and in the course of time was admitted to full 
 orders in the ministry. In 1852 the degree of D.D. was con- 
 ferred on him by Centenary College. He was elected to and 
 served in every General Conference held from 1828 to 18o8. 
 
Ii2 
 
 nistonj of Methodism in Alahama, 
 
 He died in Mississippi, May 8, 18G0. He had an enviable rep- 
 utation, one " upon which a shadow never fell.'* 
 
 In the year 1822, while Drake and Lambuth served that Ca- 
 hawba Circuit, there was added to it a Society of which it is prop- 
 er to speak particularly. Parallel with the Coosa Eiver, and 
 from eight to ten miles west thereof, there is a small stream 
 about fifteen miles long called Wolf Creek. This creek is in 
 Saint Clair County, and it forms a junction with Kelly's Creek 
 just at the south-western line of the county. Just seven years 
 after General Jackson had released from Indian title and occu- 
 pancy this fair section bordered by the beautiful Coosa, an ar- 
 dent and impulsive man from East Tennessee by the name of 
 Abel Gilliland unloaded his goods and pitched his tent on the 
 banks of this AYolf Creek. This man Gilliland was a Methodist, 
 devout, impetuous, and zealous. By his prayers and his songs 
 he consecrated to God the spot where he pitched his tent. 
 He soon erected him a cabin and consecrated that to the service 
 of God as well as to his own use as a habitation. He was in the 
 wilderness where roamed the wolf, the bear and the panther, the 
 fox and the deer, and where the priest of God was not heard 
 and the sacrifice of religion was not offered. The nearest 
 preaching place to his new habitation was twenty-five miles or 
 more away. He commenced a local ministry, gathered the scat- 
 tered inhabitants in the region, and informed them of his pur- 
 pose to introduce the Christian religion among them and secure 
 for the community the means of grace for edification in divine 
 things. When he had completed the rude preparations es- 
 teemed necessary to the work anticipated, and he had enlisted 
 the attention of his pioneer neighbors in his purposes, Brother 
 Gilliland went to one of the appointments of the Kev. Mr. 
 Drake in the Cahawba Valley, and engaged Mr. Drake, who had 
 charge of the Cahawba Circuit, to go to his house and there es- 
 tablish a preaching place and organize a Society. Mr. Drake 
 went and preached and organized a Society in the frontier cab- 
 in of Abel Gilliland. Soon a humble house of worship was 
 erected near Mr. Gilliland's residence, and from that day till 
 1886 Gilliland's Chapel was occupied by a Methodist Society, 
 and there the word of God was preached and the sacraments 
 duly administered. In 1886 that sacred place was sold and the 
 Society moved to Eden. Eden is a little village on Wolf Creek, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 143 
 
 about three miles from the spot where so long stood Gilliland's 
 Chapel. Mr. Gilliland lived only about five years after he set- 
 tled on Wolf Creek, but his works lived after him, and from 
 that place he will go up to the judgment with the hosts who 
 have lived, labored, and died in that community. 
 
 The preachers for Cahawba Circuit for 1823 were Thomas 
 Owens, John Patton; for 1824, Edmund Pearson, James Nich- 
 olson; for 1825, Hugh A. McPhail, John G.Lee; for 1826, John 
 Booth, Benjamin A. Houghton. 
 
 The Mississippi Conference met at Midway, Mississippi Terri- 
 tory, November 7, 1817. There and then two men, and only 
 two— John Booth and Wiley Ledbetter— were admitted on 
 trial into the Conference. At the session of the Conference at 
 Washington, Mississippi, November 17, 1819, the same two men 
 were admitted into full connection in the Conference and or- 
 dained deacons. At the session of the Conference at the same 
 place December 7, 1821, these two men with two others, John, 
 Seaton and Ebenezer Hearn, who in the transfer of appoint- 
 ments had been transferred from the Tennessee to the Missis- 
 sippi Conference, were ordained elders. At the Conference ses- 
 sion held at John McRae's, on Chickasawhay Kiver, Mississippi, 
 December 5, 1822, the Eev. John Booth located, and at the 
 Conference at Washington, Mississippi, December 8, 1825, he 
 was re-admitted to the Conference, and at the session of the 
 Conference held at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, December 14, 1826, 
 he again located. This terminated his itinerant career. Just 
 two years of his itinerant ministry were given to Alabama: 
 1822 to Conecuh Circuit and 1826 to Cahawba Circuit. The 
 other years were given to appointments in the bounds of Mis- 
 
 sissi[)pi. 
 
 For 1827 there was only one preacher appointed to the Ca- 
 hawba Circuit: Eugene V. LeVert. For 1828 the preachers for 
 that Circuit were Joseph McDowell, Daniel H. Norwood; for 
 1829, David Harkey ; for 1830, David Harkey, Daniel Sears. 
 
 The Pvev. Daniel Sears had just been admitted on trial in 
 the Conference, and this his first appointment was his last in 
 Alabama. The year 1831 he had an appointment in Missis- 
 sippi, and in arranging the appointments for 1832, preparatory 
 to the organization of the Alabama Conference, he went into 
 the Mississippi Conference. 
 
144 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 145 
 
 For 1831 the preachers for Cahavvba Circuit were Leroy Mas- 
 sengale, Jacob Segrest; for 1832, Johu Foust, Stephen Herrin. 
 
 The formation of the Circuits in the series of years now 
 under consideration was governed by the order and relations of 
 the settlements made in the country, and the settlements fol- 
 lowed naturally the course of the streams and the valleys,^ and 
 were limited by the ridges and mountains which separated the 
 valleys. The Cahawba Circuit in its general course in the di- 
 rection of its length was from north-east to south-west, and for 
 the term of ten years, or from the close of 1818 until the for- 
 mation of the Oakmulgee Circuit at the close of 1828, its 
 boundaries were as follows: The Coosa River, from the mouth 
 of Wills Creek co the mouth of Hatchett Creek; a parallel line 
 from the mouth of Hatchett Creek to the head waters of Mul- 
 berry Creek, the Mulberry Creek to its mouth; the Alabama 
 Eiver from the mouth of Mulberry Creek to the mouth of the 
 Cahawba River, the head waters of the creeks running into the 
 Cahawba River on the west and north side of that river along 
 its entire course, and then the head waters of the creeks run- 
 ning into the Coosa River on the west and north side of that 
 river up to Wills Creek. The Cahawba Circuit at that time 
 extended to the Alabama Circuit on the south-east, and to the 
 Tuskaloosa and Jones's Yalley Circuits on the west and north, 
 and was from thirty to fifty miles wide, and was about one 
 hundred and fifty miles long. At that time the Coosa River 
 was the western boundary of the lands of the Creek Indians, 
 and that tribe of Indians occupied the country just across the 
 river from the Cahawba Circuit, and the Cherokee Indians 
 were then occupying the lands just across Wills Creek from 
 this Circuit. Marengo Circuit was formed at the close of 1825, 
 and joined the Cahawba Circuit on the south-west. 
 
 During the term of years from 1818 to 1832 the work in hand 
 on the Cahawba Circuit, many impediments and some adverse 
 occurrences hereafter to be noticed to the contrary, advanced 
 satisfactorily. As inhabitants moved into that portion of the 
 country which that Circuit traversed Societies were multiplied 
 and the membership increased in numbers. Though it is im- 
 possible to give at this date a perfect list of the appointments 
 on that Circuit during the series of years now under review, 
 yet some of the more prominent appointments can be named. 
 
 I 
 
 On Canoe Creek, at Catawla Town, afterward called Ashville, 
 an appointment was established and a Society organized in 
 1818. This is still a preaching place, and there is still a So- 
 ciety. 
 
 At Liberty Chapel, a union house so called, five miles from 
 Ashville on the Cahawba road, a preaching place for the Meth- 
 odists was established in the beginning of their work, and there 
 they had a Society in the outset of their administration. Of 
 late years their Society there has waned. A union house for 
 worship is the product of weakness, the precursor of division, 
 the guarantee of strife, the forerunner of decline and decay. 
 
 Highland, a place still farther down the Cahawba Valley, 
 was from the first a preaching place, and still continues. 
 
 Ebenezer, about five miles north of what is now Montevallo, 
 was among the very first places where a Society was organized 
 and a Camp-ground established. There prosperity existed for 
 
 long years. 
 
 Near the present Montevallo was a central and leading ap- 
 pointment, where in 1818 a Quarterly Conference and a Camp- 
 meeting were held. Round about Montevallo Methodism has 
 been strong and influential through all the years that have 
 elapsed. 
 
 The first itinerant preacher who ever invaded the country, 
 the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn, preached on his first coming at the 
 Falls of Cahawba, since called Centerville. Up to this time,, 
 however, religion has not prospered at Centerville. The very 
 first item known to be on record concerning the introduction of 
 Methodist preaching at Centerville is coupled with the state- 
 ment that at that time there was living there an apostate 
 Methodist preacher who never reformed and who was never re- 
 claimed. The probabilities are that the presence and influence 
 of that apostate preacher planted the seeds of infidelity and re- 
 tarded the progress of the divine cause at that place. There 
 has never been a place where a Methodist preacher apostatized 
 or fell into any grievous sin but that the cause of Methodism 
 languished there so long as the sin or apostasy was remembered. 
 No Church has ever prospered under the oversight or within 
 the influence of a man who committed sin during his ministry. 
 The sin of a preacher pollutes the land and disgraces the 
 cause of righteousness. 
 10 
 
s 
 
 146 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 14:7 
 
 Seven or eight miles east of the Cahawba River and six 
 miles north of the Alabama River, in or near Section thirty- 
 five, Township eighteen, Range ten, east, is a spot which may 
 be called sacred, a spot on which, about the middle of the third 
 decade of the present century, a house for divine worship was 
 erected by a Methodist Society. From the first to the last the 
 place was known as Childer's Chapel. There for a fifth of a 
 century or more divine worship, with its hallowed influences 
 and immortal results was maintained, and there many dead in- 
 terred remain and await the resurrection day. At this date it 
 is impossible to recall and record every name which was on the 
 roll of that Society at its organization. A few names are still 
 unforgotten, and they go to record on this page: George Chil- 
 ders, Elizabeth Childers, Noel Pitts, Caroline Pinson, and Mrs. 
 Jordan. These were all members of firmness of purpose and 
 strength of character. Childers and Pitts were members of 
 that Society at that place through all the years of its existence. 
 George Childers was the man for whom the place was named. 
 He was a man of excellent traits of character, of deep piety, of 
 preeminence, and of commanding influence. He was a worthy 
 leader. His power and influence were recognized. Elizabeth 
 Childers was the wife of George Childers, and in her maturer 
 years was familiarly called "Aunt Betsy." She was a woman 
 of great firmness, usefulness, and religious devotion. She uni- 
 formly went from the service of the holy communion filled with 
 the divine grace and sensible of the heavenly benediction, and 
 with audible shouts she gave vent to her emotions and praise to 
 her Redeemer. All this was fitting. Angels shout, and why 
 should not the redeemed of earth praise God with heart and 
 voice when they have before them the emblems of their Sav- 
 iour's dying love, and are inspired by so many demonstrations 
 of his resurrection power? 
 
 In 1829 and 1830, while the Rev. David Harkey was on the 
 Cahawba Circuit, a house of worship was built in Saint Clair 
 County, on Broken Arrow Creek, five or six miles from the 
 junction of said creek with the Coosa River, and called Hark- 
 ey's Chapel, for the preacher in charge of the Circuit. Till 
 this day the Methodists worship there, and the place is still 
 known as Harkey's Chapel, though the log house built when 
 Harkey was there has given place to a house made of better 
 
 material, and there is now a railroad town there called Broken 
 Arrow. 
 
 The last year of Harkey's ministry on the Cahawba Circuit, 
 w^hen Sears was his colleague on the work, a Society which had 
 been organized at Bethlehem secured a deed to a tract of land 
 containing six and a half acres in Section twenty-eight. 
 Township nineteen. Range sixteen, east, and erected on it a 
 house of worship. The deed was made by John W. Kidd and 
 Ann P. Kidd, his wife. The Trustees to whom this deed was 
 made were William W. Harper, Isaac Brinker, Benjamin 
 Hudgins, George B. Nash, and Samuel New. The deed bears 
 date June 16, 1830, and is in the handwriting of Judge Leonard 
 Tarrant. The persons whose names are given in this deed were 
 all members of the Society at Bethlehem, and were persons of 
 stability and worth. John W. Kidd was in his day a pillar in 
 this Society. This Bethlehem Church stands on a lovely spot 
 in a magnificent grove in which there is a very superior spring 
 of never failing water. Bethlehem Church is at the village 
 now called Harpersville, in Shelby County. When Camp-meet- 
 ings were the order of the day, Bethlehem was one of the noted 
 Camp-grounds. Though Camp-meetings have been long aban- 
 doned at that place, yet there is still there a flourishing Society 
 and a large and intelligent congregation. 
 
 The above appointments, ten in number, were of central im- 
 portance on the Cahawba Circuit. Doubtless there were in the 
 extensive territory included in that Circuit other places where 
 preaching was had and Societies existed, for in those days nu- 
 merous appointments were considered a means of grace and a 
 matter of commendation, and preachers commonly had twenty 
 and thirty Societies and preaching places under their oversight, 
 but the particulars concerning such other places and Societies 
 are not now in hand. 
 
 The Tuskaloosa Circuit and the itinerant ministry of the Rev. 
 John Kesterson were coeval. Both appeared first for the year 
 1819, and they appeared together for that year. While the Rev. 
 Ebenezer Hearn explored the country and organized the Socie- 
 ties which at the first constituted the Tuskaloosa Circuit in 
 1818, yet it first appears in the General Minutes for 1819, and 
 the Rev. John Kesterson was the preacher appointed to it for 
 that year. He had just been received on trial by the Tennessee 
 
148 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Conference at its session in Nashville, beginning October 1, 
 1818. He was received into full connection at the close of 1820, 
 and elected to deacon's orders, though not ordained at that time. 
 At the close of 1823 he was ordained elder, and at the close of 
 1824 he located. After living as a local preacher in the terri- 
 tory embraced in the Memphis Conference at its organization 
 for eighteen years, he was re-admitted to the itinerant work by 
 the Memphis Conference at the close of 1842, and again lo- 
 cated at the close of 1847. When he died is not known. He 
 gave about eleven years of his life to the itinerant ministry. 
 He was a man of moderate ability. His importance m the his- 
 tory of Methodism in Alabama is found alone m the fact that 
 he was the first preacher on the Tuskaloosa Circuit after its 
 formation. He served in Alabama only one year. He was the 
 predecessor on the Tuskaloosa Circuit of the Eev. Robert 
 
 r^riine 
 
 The Rev. Robert Paine was on the Tuskaloosa Circuit for 
 1820 having been appointed to that Circuit at the session of 
 the Tennessee Conference held at Nashville, beginning Octo- 
 ber 1, 1819. These dates and statements are correct in every 
 
 For 1821 the Tuskaloosa Circuit appears in the General Min- 
 utes without a preacher. The Marion Circuit, which lay in and 
 around Marion County north-west of Tuskaloosa, also appears 
 in the General Minutes without a preacher for that year. At 
 the end of the list of the appointments of the South Carolina 
 Conference for 1821 are found these words: "Missionaries to 
 the Mississippi Conference, Zach. Williams, Barnabas Pipkin." 
 These two missionaries from the South Carolina Conference to 
 the Missisippi Conference served the two Circuits which were 
 left without preachers. The Rev. Zachariah Williams was the 
 preacher on the Tuskaloosa Circuit for that year 1821, and the 
 Rev. Barnabas Pipkin was the preacher on the Marion Circuit 
 
 ""The^ preachers on the Tuskaloosa Circuit for 1822 were Sam- 
 uel Patton, Eugene V. LeVert; for lf2.^ Samuel Patton, Wil- 
 liam M. Curtiss; for 1824 Francis R. Cheatham, Thomas C. 
 
 Th^Rev. Thomas C. Brown had just been admitted on trial 
 in the Mississippi Conference, and that was his last year in Al- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 149 
 
 abama. At the close of 1826 he located; at the close of 1829 he 
 was re-admitted, and again located at the close of one year. 
 
 For 1825 the preachers on the Tuskaloosa Circuit were Rob- 
 ert L. Walker, John O. T. Hawkins; for 1826 Hugh A. McPhail, 
 Thomas Burpo; for 1827 Thomas Clinton, Moses Perry. 
 
 This was the last year of the ministry of the Rev. Thomas 
 Clinton in Alabama. Perhaps no man ever had a harder life 
 than had Thomas Clinton, and yet, perhaps, no man was ever 
 more religious, devoted, and happy than he through his whole 
 Christian career. Ere he had passed five summers the dark 
 sliadow of orphanage fell upon him, his father and mother dy- 
 ing of yellow fever and being buried in the same grave, and he 
 was brought up from his infancy without a known living kins- 
 man in the world. He was of Irish descent, and was born in 
 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, January, 1793. Before his father 
 and mother were taken off by the yellow fever they had joined 
 the Methodists, and had dedicated the infant son to God in 
 holy baptism. On January 2, 1808, the last day of the session 
 of the South Carolina Conference, six men were ordained dea- 
 cons and five men were ordained elders in the old Bethel 
 Church in the city of Charleston. South Carolina. The Rev. 
 Matthew P. Sturdevant, the first Methodist preacher ever sent 
 to Alabama, was one of the men there and then ordained an 
 elder. On that historic day Thomas Clinton, through youthful 
 curiosity, wandered into the old Bethel Church, heard the ordi- 
 nation sermon, and witnessed the ordination ceremonies, and 
 was awakened to an interest in the great gospel theme which 
 offers salvation to every man, and formed resolutions which 
 finally eventuated in his justification, regeneration, sanctifica- 
 tion, and in his assumption of the prerogatives and duties of the 
 Christian ministry. At the session of the South Carolina Con- 
 ference held in Charleston January, 1820, when he was just 
 twenty-seven years old, he was admitted on trial in the Confer- 
 ence, and volunteered to go as a missionary in the bounds of 
 the Mississippi Conference. At the end of the list of the ap- 
 pointments of the South Carolina Conference for that year 1820 
 are these words: "Missionaries to Mississippi, Nicholas Mcln- 
 tyre, Thomas Clinton." At the end of the list of appointments 
 of the Mississippi Conference for that same year are found the 
 words: " Tombecbee, N. Mclntyre, J. Clinton." The " J " is an 
 
150 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 error. It was evidently intended for a T. These two men 
 were the same men sent as missionaries from South Carolina to 
 the Mississippi Conference. There is one other item of histo- 
 ry in connection with the case. While Mclntyre and Clinton 
 had been assigned by the bishop to Tombecbee Circuit and the 
 appointments were published officially and correctly, yet when 
 they arrived in the field the emergencies of the case induced 
 Thomas Grifiin, the presiding elder of the Alabama District, to 
 change Thomas Clinton from the Tombecbee to tshe Alabama 
 Circuit. So that Clinton that year served the Alabama Circuit 
 with Thomas Nixon instead of Tombecbee Circuit with Nicho- 
 las Mclntyre. Five years of his ministry, the years 1820, 1821, 
 1822, 1826, and 1827, were given to the work in Alabama, and 
 the pastoral charges which he served in the State in addition to 
 those already given were the Conecuh and the Marion Circuits. 
 He was twice on the Alabama Circuit. In January, 1828, just 
 after he had closed his year's work on the Tuskaloosa Circuit, 
 he was married. His wife, an educated and a pious woman, was a 
 Miss A. L. Hanna, and was the sister of Miss Elizabeth Hanua, 
 whom the Eev. Barnabas Pipkin first wedded. The children of 
 the Rev. Thomas Clinton were ten in number, and these chil- 
 dren were an honor to him and their mother, though sad be- 
 reavements came to the fond parents through the early demise 
 of a number of these loved ones. One of the sons was a Meth- 
 odist preacher, and one of the daughters was the wife of a 
 Methodist preacher. The Rev. Thomas Clinton, like Zaccheus 
 of New Testament fame, was little of stature, weighing usually 
 one hundred and ten pounds. He had the complexion and the 
 features characteristic of the Irish nation, and yet his features 
 were sufficiently unique to be peculiarly his own. He had a fair 
 complexion, cheek bones sufficiently prominent to give to his 
 face in the general outline an oval form, and a nose of sufficient 
 dimensions to prevent its being lost sight of, if not of sufficient 
 length to create wonder and merriment. He was of an earnest 
 nature and of an indomitable courage, and, notwithstanding he 
 was physically small, he was capable of untold endurance, and 
 was a man of commanding personal influence. He was indus- 
 trious and studious, and he made himself a theologian of more 
 than ordinary attainments. During his active ministry he 
 served Circuits, Districts, and Missions—Missions to the colored 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 151 
 
 people. He was of cheerful spirit, of strict integrity, and of 
 eminent piety. He died in the faith in his eighty-third year 
 October 28, 1875, at the residence of the Rev. Barnabas Pipkin, 
 and was buried in his own family cemetery in St. Helena Par- 
 ish, Louisiana. 
 
 The preachers on the Tuskaloosa Circuit were, for 1828 Blan- 
 ton P. Box; for 1829 Eugene Y. LeVert, Leroy Massengale ; for 
 1830 Mark Westmoreland; for 1831 Nathan Hopkins, William 
 Wier; for 1832 Eugene V. LeVert. Jacob Matthews. 
 
 The Tuskaloosa or Black Warrior River, rising in the mountains 
 ten or fifteen miles south of the Tennessee River, and forming 
 a junction with the Tombigbee River, and having its general 
 course from north-east to south-west, is, following its meander- 
 ings, about two hundred and seventy-five miles in length. The 
 Tuskaloosa Circuit at its organization and for four years there- 
 after had open to it the whole country of from forty to sixty 
 miles in width along the entire course of this river. Murphree's 
 Valley, Jones's Valley, Roupe's Valley, and all that section low- 
 er down between Sipsey River and the head waters of the creeks 
 flowing east into the Cahawba River were embraced in the Tus- 
 kaloosa Circuit for the years 1819-1822 inclusive. Societies 
 were formed at various points in that territory, some sooner, 
 
 some later. 
 
 Here and now, as it indicates the state of the country and 
 the character of the people at that day, may be related an inci- 
 dent which occurred at a point first embraced in the Tuskaloo- 
 sa Circuit, and with which one man, who afterward had a long 
 residence in the State of Alabama, was incidentally connected. 
 
 On November 10, 1819, a man, who lacked twenty-four days 
 of being twenty-four years old, and who had made with one Miss 
 Elizabeth King a marriage engagement which was to be con- 
 summated at some unnamed time in the future, left Sandymush, 
 in Buncombe County, North Carolina, and at the close of twelve 
 days from the time of starting, having passed, on horseback, 
 through the Cherokee Nation, stopped on Village Creek, in Ala- 
 bama. Here, in a population numerous for so new a settlement, 
 that young man found two persons whom he had known in 
 Buncombe, whence he and they had come. These two persons 
 were Mr. Thomas Holmes and Mrs. Margaret Prude. Upon the 
 solicitation and recommendation of these two acquaintances 
 
152 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 this young man secured a list of pupils, supplanting a teacher 
 in the community by the name of Andrew Moore, and on the 
 first Monday in December, 1819, opened a school in a house 
 near Brown's Spring. Brown's Spring, which is now in the 
 city of Birmingham, was so called for Judge John Brown, who 
 first settled at that spring and was living there when that 
 young man taught that school. That school was opened a few 
 days before the County of Jefferson was constituted by legisla- 
 tive enactment, and there was then neither city nor town any- 
 where in that section. The place at which the seat of justice 
 was afterward established and named Ely ton and incorporated 
 as a town, was then known as Frog Level Race Ground. The 
 race track was the principal thing there at that date, and horse 
 racing was the chief business carried on there at that time. 
 That young man had a large school, and many of his pupils 
 w^ere grown young men, some of them being as old as he. 
 Among the young men enrolled as pupils and in actual at- 
 tendance upon the school w^ere Jacob Brooks, Washington 
 Burford, Thomas Cawley, Gersham Kelley, Moses Kelley, 
 Allen Killough, David Killough, James Killough, Peter Law- 
 ley, James McAdory, David Prude, Jonathan Prude. One 
 of the many races had at the Frog Level Eace Ground 
 came off about the close of the first month of the school. 
 The occasion was anticipated with deepest interest. Intense 
 excitement was created by the coming event. The jockey 
 clubs and sporting fraternities were all busy and active. All 
 who at any time ever participated in horse racing were in- 
 tensely interested in that occasion. Few there were who were 
 not going to witness and participate in the sport of that day. 
 None were more completely absorbed by the anticipated events 
 than the young men and boys in the school near Brown's Spring. 
 They were going to the races, of course. That was a foregone 
 conclusion. They expected to take part in the contests of the 
 day. But an issue which was not anticipated, was made. The even- 
 ing before the races, the teacher delivered to his school a lecture 
 on horse-racing. In that lecture he denounced the sport of the 
 race-course as an unmitigated evil. He maintained that attend- 
 ance upon and participation in such sports were fraught with 
 all manner of bad consequences. He closed his lecture with 
 the announcement that the pupils would not be permitted to 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 153 
 
 attend the races the next day on penalty of expulsion from the 
 school, and added the suggestion that if any were determined 
 to attend they would as well take their books and apparatus 
 home that evening. That announcement had not been antici- 
 pated by the pupils, and they were amazed. After the lecture 
 closed and the school was dismissed for the day, the young men, 
 twelve or thirteen in number, held a consultation to decide 
 what action they would take and what course to pursue in the 
 premises. As a result of their consultation they waited on the 
 teacher, and demanded that he reverse his decision and retract 
 his announcement. David Killough, the senior among them, 
 acted as their spokesman. They offered as reasons in the prem- 
 ises their desires, their rights, and their interests. They per- 
 sonally desired to go to the races, they had an inherent right, 
 which no man could take from them, to go, and there were in- 
 terests with their friends who were to be engaged in the bets 
 and sports of the day which demanded that they should be in 
 attendance. They plead, they entreated, they demanded. The 
 teacher was inflexible. He listened, but yielded not. His de- 
 cision was adhered to, his announcement reiterated. The 
 young men were irritated and indignant. They were on the 
 verge of resentment. But, notwithstanding their desires, their 
 rights, their interests, and their indignation, they returned next 
 day to school. They took special pains, however, to show to 
 the teacher their anger. The people gathered in throngs at the 
 race ground, bets were made, the stakes in which all interest 
 centered were deposited, the preparations were completed, and 
 the races came off just after noon. Scarcely had the contesting 
 steeds cleared the posts when one of them flew the track and 
 threw the rider, knocking him breathless, though not killino- 
 him, as it happened. The other steed was carried through 
 to the end of the course, and the purse claimed and demand- 
 ed. Those in charge of the steed which flew the track de- 
 clined to surrender the stakes. A row ensued. Fighting was 
 the order of the hour. There were thirty or forty men in actual 
 collision. Fingers, fists, knives, sticks, and teeth were the 
 weapons used in the fray, and they were freely used. Abdomens 
 were cut, cheeks were bruised, ears were bitten, eyes were 
 gouged, features were mutilated, fingers and jawbones were 
 broken, muscles were lacerated, noses were smashed, scalps were 
 
154 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 gashed. There was much blood, and many wounds, but no one, 
 wonderful as it is, was killed. That scene of carousal depicts 
 the state of the country as the preachers who served the Tuska- 
 loosa Circuit then found it. Frog Level Race Ground and the 
 school-house near Brown's Spring were in sufficient proximity 
 for those at the school-house to hear the clatter of the racers' 
 hoofs and the tumult of the throng who participated in the 
 revel and the riot of the day. The young meu at the school- 
 house heard the noise and the uproar at the race ground, and 
 could well conjecture what was going on, though they knew not 
 the specific causes nor the actual results. They were greatly 
 agitated, but not one of them left for the scene of the carousal. 
 The teacher asserted his authority and restrained those under 
 his tuition. The man who held this reign and rule against the 
 race-course and a sporting population was not then a professing 
 Christian, but he was subsequently regenerated by the power 
 of the Holy Ghost in that very school-house in which he opened 
 and maintained that sharp contest against horse-racing. That 
 man who inaugurated that testimony for the right and fol- 
 lowed his convictions of duty was none other than Reuben 
 Philips. That stand for order and morality made for him a 
 fast and strong friend in the person of the Rev. David Owen, a 
 local preacher who lived near the school-house. Mr. Philips at 
 that time remained in Jones's Valley only a few months, and 
 did not return there to live any more until 1844. 
 
 In that community on Village Creek round about Brown's 
 Spring and Frog Level Race Ground was one of the preaching 
 places belonging to the Tuskaloosa Circuit from the very begin- 
 
 ning. 
 
 The combined movements of State and Church and individ- 
 uals produce events and make history. On February 7, 1818, 
 the Territory of Alabama, in Legislative Council assembled, did 
 by enactment constitute the County of Tuskaloosa. In the 
 months of that same year, Dudley Hargrove, a licensed local 
 preacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church, at the head of his 
 family, including all his grown sons except Benjamin, the sec- 
 ond son, emigrated from Hancock County, Georgia, and pitched 
 his tent in the then wilderness by a big spring, one of the sources 
 of Big Sandy Creek, in what is Section thirty-five. Township 
 twenty-two south. Range eight west, a few miles south-east of 
 
DANIEL JONES HAllGROVE, 
 
 FIFTY YEARS A CLASS LEADER AND STEWARD. 
 
 (irA) 
 
The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 155 
 
 the present town of Tuskaloosa, Alabama. Soon after Hargrove 
 had pitched his tent hard by the* head waters of Big Sandy 
 Creek a Soicety was organized in that commuDity. That So- 
 ciety has continued till now, 1889, though the meeting houses in 
 which that Society has assembled from time to time to worship 
 have been at different places in the community at different times. 
 At one time the meeting house stood right near the place first 
 settled by Dudley Hargrove. The house now in use is, perhaps, 
 three miles from the spot originally occupied, and is named Pleas- 
 ant Hill, sometimes called Hargrove's. 
 
 The Eev. Dudley Hargrove was really the patriarch of that 
 Society, organized at or near the place of his first settlement in 
 Alabama, and his eldest son, Daniel J. Hargrove, was the first 
 class-leader there. That Society has always been an appoint- 
 ment of the Tuskaloosa Circuit, or whatever Circuit took its 
 place. 
 
 One of the first preaching places established in that section 
 of the country was established by Dudley Hargrove at the house 
 of John A. Goodson, not far from Hill's Creek, and in the edge 
 of what is now Bibb County. 
 
 By an incident in his life the Kev. Dudley Hargrove became 
 an historic character. In 1819, while he lived on Big Sandy 
 Creek, and was a member of the Society near him, he was rec- 
 ommended by the Quarterly Conference of the Tuskaloosa Cir- 
 cuit to the Tennessee Annual Conference, to be held at Nash- 
 ville, Tennesse, October 1, 1819, as a suitable person to be elect- 
 ed and ordained a local deacon. In the order of the regular 
 business of that session of the Tennessee Conference that rec- 
 ommendation from the Tuskaloosa Circuit was presented, and 
 the question, "Shall Dudley Hargrove be elected and or- 
 dained a deacon?" was before the Church in official form and 
 for official decision. At the same time and place at which Har- 
 grove's case was pending there was presented a recommendation 
 from Shoal Circuit of the Kev. Gilbert D. Taylor for admission 
 on trial into the traveling connection, and the question, " Shall 
 Gilbert D. Taylor be admitted on trial into the Conference?'' 
 was officially before that body for official decision. Each of 
 these men was possessed of an unblemished character so far as 
 his general conduct was concerned, and each had endowments 
 and attainments sufficient to qualify him for the position he 
 
156 
 
 History of Methodism in Alahaina, 
 
 sought, but it was a fact, and the fact was made known, that each 
 of these men was a slave-ho!der. The discussion of the ques- 
 tions, " Shall Hargrove be elected and ordained a deacon? " and 
 "Shall Taylor be admitted on trial into the Conference?" 
 turned upon their being slave-holders and upon their obligation 
 to emancipate the persons held in slavery by them. From its 
 organization in the latter part of 1812 until the session in which 
 the acts now under consideration were passed, and even down to 
 a later date, the Tennessee Conference was pronounced in its 
 position on the subject of slavery as it existed in the United 
 States, and a number of its leading members were bitterly op- 
 posed to slave-traders and slave-owners holding office in the 
 Church, or exercising the prerogatives of the ministry. The 
 presentation of these men for position and office in the Metho- 
 dist ministry made an issue and inaugurated a conflict. The 
 contest was sharply defined, and went on in earnest. The dis- 
 cussion was warm, excited, and vehement. Every phase of the 
 subject was touched by those engaged in the debate. The Con- 
 ference decided by a majority of at least three not to elect Har- 
 grove to deacon's orders, and not to admit Taylor on trial into 
 the traveling connection because they were slave-holders. A 
 protest against the action of the Conference in the premises was 
 presented and put to record, signed by sixteen of the members. 
 The following is the protest: 
 
 " Be it remembered that, whereas the Tennessee Annual Con- 
 ference, held in Nashville, October 1, 1819, have taken a course 
 in their decisions relative to the admission of preachers on trial 
 in the traveling connection, and in the election of local preach- 
 ers to ordination, which goes to fix the "principle that no man, 
 even in those States where the law does not admit of emancipa- 
 tion, shall be admitted On trial or ordained to the office of dea- 
 con or elder, if it is understood that he is the owner of a slave or 
 slaves. That this course is taken is not to be denied, and it is 
 avoiredly designed to fix the principle already mentioned. Sever- 
 al cases might be mentioned, but it is deemed unnecessary to in- 
 stance any except the case of Dr. Gilbert D. Taylor, proposed 
 for admission, and Dudley Hargrove, recommended for ordina- 
 tion. We deprecate the course taken as oppressively severe in 
 itself and ruinous in its consequences, and we disapprove of the 
 principle as contrary to and in violation of the order and disci- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 157 
 
 pline of our Church. We therefore do most solemnly, and in 
 the fear of God, as members of this Conference, enter our pro- 
 test against the proceedings of the Conference — as it relates to 
 the above-mentioned course and principle. 
 
 Thomas L. Douglass, Ebenezer Hearn, 
 Thomas D. Porter, Timothy Carpenter, 
 William McMahon, Thomas Stringfield, 
 Benjamin Malone, Benjamin Edge, 
 Lewis Garrett, Joshua Boucher, 
 
 Barnabas McHenry, William Hartt, 
 William Allgood, John Johnson, 
 William Stribling, Henry B. Bascom." 
 From the history of Dudley Hargrove's application for dea- 
 con's orders, and the absolute refusal to confer on him said or- 
 ders because he was a slave-holder, it is clearly learned and ful- 
 ly demonstrated that from the very time of planting Methodism 
 in Alabama the adherents of said cause in said State were 
 touched by the existence of slavery and involved in the agita- 
 tion about emancipation, and that amid the angry contentions 
 and bitter disputes which arose on the subject some were de- 
 prived of their rights and suffered injuries. From the same 
 case it is also learned that the Lord, the righteous Judge, will 
 avenge his chosen ones, and will redress the wrongs they suffer. 
 He, sooner or later, compensates for the wrongs inflicted. He 
 will, under the on-going of his wonderful providence, see that 
 justice is doiae to his servant who has been cheated of his rights 
 and deprived of his prerogatives. In a most signal manner God 
 rebuked the acts which had been committed against Hargrove 
 and Taylor. In the case of Taylor, the Tennessee Conference, 
 five years after its action against him, corrected the wrong by 
 admitting him to the ministry which he so humbly sought, and 
 which he so admirably adorned and so successfully filled. Dud- 
 ley Hargrove, who died about 1823, did not live long enough to 
 receive at the hands of the Tennessee Conference a correction 
 of the untoward act, did not live long enough to receive in his 
 own person the justice and redress due him in the case, but 
 there was at last a most signal manifestation of divine provi- 
 dence rectifying the wrong and compensating the injury which 
 he suffered. A little more than sixty-two years after Dudley 
 Hargrove was refused deacon's orders because he was a slave-. 
 
158 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 holder, and in the very city of Nashville, Tennessee, where the 
 act of refusing the orders was done, his son's son, the Kev. Rob- 
 ert Kennon Hargrove, was ordained a bishop, in the light of the 
 sun and in the presence of the representatives of nearly a mil- 
 lion of Methodists. God, who ever keeps covenant with his 
 chosen ones, never forgot that case, and he dealt with the case 
 on the principle on which he dealt with Solomon in his aposta- 
 sy, when, still remembering his covenant with his servant Da- 
 vid, he said: "I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and 
 will give it to thy servant. Notwithstanding, in thy days I will 
 not do it for David thy father's sake: but I will rend it out of 
 the hand of thy son. Howbeit I will not rend away all the 
 kingdom; but will give one tribe to thy son for David my 
 servant's sake, and for Jerusalem's sake which I have chosen." 
 (1 Kings xi. 11-13.) 
 
 On December 19, 1820, the State of Alabama, by legislative 
 enactment, constituted and bounded the County known and dis- 
 tinguished by the name of Pickens. Near the same time Dud- 
 ley Hargrove, with his son, Daniel Hargrove, left the neighbor- 
 hood of Lye Branch Church and settled in Pickens County, 
 near Bear Creek, which empties into Lubbub Creek, Section 
 five. Township twenty, Range thirteen, west, twenty or twen- 
 ty-five miles north-west of the town of Tuskaloosa. These 
 two men, father and son, settled homes here within one mile 
 and a half of each other. Immediately upon settlement in that 
 locality these men had a Methodist Society organized, which 
 has been perpetuated to this year (1889), and has ever been 
 known as Hargrove's Church. Dudley Hargrove died at his 
 home in Pickens County in 1823. A large piece of timber 
 which was being used in the erection of a gin -house on his 
 farm, accidentally fell on him and killed him. Daniel Har- 
 grove remained on the place he first settled in Pickens County 
 until his death in 1869. For a half century he served the 
 Methodist Church in Alabama, filling the offices of class leader, 
 steward, and trustee. He was a devout and useful Christian. 
 Dudley Hargrove was a cousin of Bishop McKendree, and the 
 grandfather of Bishop Robert Kennon Hargrove, as has been 
 stated in another place. Daniel Hargove, here mentioned, was 
 the father of Bishop Hargrove. 
 
 At a place afterward known as Hard wick's Shelter the Rev. 
 
! 
 
 MRS. D. J. HARGROVE 
 {N/e Laodicea Braktley), 
 
 SIXTY-SEVEN YEARS A METHODIST. 
 
 (\nS) 
 
The Enlargement and Advayicement of the Work. 159 
 
 ?" 
 
 Ebenezer Hearn preached in 1818, and from that time on the 
 Methodists had a Society there, and it was one of the appoint- 
 ments of the Tuskaloosa Circuit for many years. The place 
 known as Hardwick's Shelter is about two miles west of south 
 of Tuskaloosa and about fourteen or fifteen miles from that 
 town and not more than four furlongs from the village of Car- 
 thage. A man by the name of Harper was appointed class- 
 leader. Other prominent members were Mrs. Hardwick, a 
 very excellent lady, and a Mrs. Toosan, a widow, of whom it 
 was said that " it never rained or snowed hard enough to pre- 
 vent her going to church." Alfred Massengale, father of the 
 Rev. Leroy Massengale, was a member at Hardwick's Shelter. 
 A Society called Center was organized by 1820, if not sooner, 
 and still exists, 1889, and is about ten miles south of the 
 town of Tuskaloosa, and has always been one of the appoint- 
 ments on the Tuskaloosa Circuit. Mrs. Tutt and Mrs. Clem- 
 ents, two widows and elect ladies, a son of Mrs. Clements, and 
 Leonard Rush, who was a class-leader, were members at the 
 organization of that Society. During the twenties Robert Mar- 
 tin, a man who came from South Carolina to Tuskaloosa 
 County, Alabama, in 1818, and who was a prominent citizen, a 
 useful and pious man, and who passed to his reward through a 
 peaceful death May 5, 1840, was a class-leader at Center. 
 Here at Center in the fall of 1827, while attending a class- 
 meeting, William B. Neal, who was for long years a member of 
 the Alabama Conference, was convei-ted, and here he and his 
 father, David C. Neal, and other members of the family at this 
 time joined the Church. About the same time Benjamin Ros- 
 ser, Jr., was converted at a Camp-meeting held on Rum Creek, 
 about three miles south of Tuskaloosa, and joined the Church 
 at Center. He has been a leading member there through all 
 the years since. At this time (1889), he still lives. 
 
 There was a Methodist Meeting-house in Jasper County, 
 Georgia, called Purity. By 1820 a number of the members of 
 the Society at that place had emigrated and joined themselves 
 in a community about twelve miles from Tuskaloosa, Alabama, 
 and east of south from that place. A Society was organized in 
 that community, and the place of worship fixed on Bunche's 
 Creek. The associations of the old Church whence these new set- 
 tlers came were still fresh in their memories, and the aflPections 
 
 I 
 
 it 
 
160 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 of these persons still entwined about the sacred place where 
 formerly they had sung the songs of Zion and offered the sac- 
 rifices of praise, and which place they had so recently left, and 
 so they did what was most natural for them to do— they named 
 the place of the meeting of their new Society on Bunche's 
 Creek Purity. Purity Church was, from its organization to its 
 discontinuance, one of" the appointments of the Tuskaloosa 
 Circuit. Among the members of that Society at the date of its 
 naming may be mentioned as prominent, Benjamin Kosser, 
 Sirmon Lane, Philip Pless, Joshua B. Shackleford, and a Mrs. 
 Morrow. Lane was the first class-leader of the Society, and 
 Rosser was appointed class-leader in 1821. Nimrod Hendrick 
 was a member of that Society, and he was through life a man 
 of usefulness, and he met death with a triumphant faith. 
 
 This Society at Purity was blessed with a most remarkable 
 revival in 1826, and a new house of worship was built that 
 year. That second house was erected about one mile from the 
 site on which stood the first one. That revival, so remarkable, 
 commenced in the conversion of a Mrs. Phillips and her hus- 
 band one night in a public service appointed and conducted by 
 Benjamin Rosser, one of the class-leaders, at the residence of 
 Mr. Phillips. The next day was the regular time for preaching 
 at Purity, and the Eev. Joshua Boucher, a nephew of the Rev. 
 Joshua Boucher who was so long a member of the Tennessee 
 Conference, and that year the preacher stationed at the town of 
 Tuskaloosa, preached and invited mourners to the altar, and a 
 large number accepted the invitation. Ere the meeting closed 
 there were nearly one hundred conversions. Purity Church as 
 an organization is extinct, and the place as a place of worship 
 has been abandoned, but there at that sacred spot in the old 
 church-yard repose the remains of many men and women who 
 acted well their part in the drama of life, and who await the 
 resurrection morning and the revelation of the last day. 
 
 Benjamin Rosser was born in Johnson County, North Caro- 
 lina, in 1785. About 1800 he removed to Jasper County, 
 GeoWia, where in 1811, under the ministry of Lovick Pierce 
 and Charles W. Kennon, he obtained religion, joined the 
 Church, and was appointed class-leader, which position he 
 filled for long years. In 1820 he removed to Alabama, as has 
 already been intimated. On September 24, 1847, he was given 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 161 
 
 a license to exhort, which was renewed until July 28, 1866. He 
 was a useful man, and died July 20, 1873, in Tuskaloosa 
 County, Alabama. 
 
 In 1820 a Society was organized within the bounds of the 
 then Tuakaloosa Circuit in the house of Aaron Murphree. In 
 process of time that Society built an humble house of worship, 
 and called the place Ebenezer. The place thus named and con- 
 secrated is on the old thoroughfare in Murphree's Yalley, four- 
 teen or fifteen miles south-east from Blountsville. A chapter 
 might be devoted to that Society, did space permit. Murphree, 
 Ellis, Bynum, Hallmark, Foust are names which have been, 
 through all the years, familiar and of honor in that community 
 and surrounding country. There lived in the neighborhood of 
 Ebenezer, in the very first years of its existence, two local 
 preachers, Peter Foust and William McDonald, who witnessed 
 the outpouring of the Spirit and numerous conversions in that 
 Society. Of the members of that Society who in its early his- 
 tory entered the Methodist ministry may be named Jesse Ellis, 
 John Foust, William Foust, David Foust, Daniel Easley, and 
 Cummings Hallmark. Jesse Ellis and John Foust gave them- 
 selves to the itinerant work; the others remained in the local 
 ministry, where they labored long and efliciently. It is not in- 
 tended to convey the idea that all these here named were mem- 
 bers of that Society at its organization, for some of them were 
 not at that time in the Church. 
 
 In the latter part of 1820 a Society was organized a little low- 
 er down Murphree's Valley and called Shiloh. That Society 
 has ever flourished, and still exists, 1889. Shiloh is at the place 
 known in the United States mail service as Chepultepec. Blake- 
 ly. Box, Cornelius, Hallmark, Murphree, Rennohave been famil- 
 iar names in the membership of that long-lived Society. 
 
 Not earlier than 1819 nor later than 1822, a Society was or- 
 ganized at the house of John Blackburn, probably by the Rev. 
 Daniel Monaghan. Then a house was built in the neighbor- 
 hood which was used for a school -house and a preaching place, 
 and there for some time that Society had its place of meeting. 
 Afterward a church was built, and it was named Mount Zion. 
 That Society exists until this day, 1889. That Mount Zion is 
 eight miles north-west of the town of Marion. To what Cir- 
 cuit it belonged at its organization is not certainly known, but 
 11 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 It 
 
 I 
 
 ! II 
 id 
 
 11 
 
 ■.ft' 
 
162 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 it is very probable that it belonged to the Tuskaloosa Circuit 
 until the Brush Creek Circuit was formed. Prominent among 
 its first members were John Blackburn, who is said to have 
 been its first steward, and his wife; James Boyles, who is said 
 to have been its first class-leader, and his wife; Mrs. Elizabeth 
 Eichardson, and Mrs. Ellen Lyles. This Society will come in 
 view again at a later day. 
 
 About eighteen miles east of the town of Tuskaloosa and on 
 the rd&d leading to Jones's Valley and about two miles from 
 what is now known as Clements Station on the Alabama and 
 Chattanooga railroad was one of the Societies of the Tuskaloosa 
 Circuit That Society was organized in 1821 or 1822, and was 
 called Hopewell. The leading men there were Frederick 
 Ray, the father of the Rev. Anderson Ray, once an active 
 preacher in the South Carolina and Georgia Conferences; 
 John Eads, John Collins, John Cameron, the father of the 
 Rev. J. D. Cameron, D.D., and the Rev. AVilliam E. Cam- 
 eron, and the Rev. Thomas Cameron, itinerant preachers; Mi- 
 chael Ashford, and a man by the name of Chappell. It is said 
 that Chappell moved from there to Texas, and settled the place 
 called Chappell Hill It is said that Leonard Rush, mentioned 
 in another Society, was at one time a member at Hopewell, 
 and that he was the father of the Rev. John G. Rush who was 
 once a preacher in Alabama. That Society at Hopewell, some- 
 times called Hurricane, in the first decade of its existence was 
 large in membership, and quite prosperous in all that pertains to 
 spirituality. In that day there was a Camp-ground there at 
 which large congregations assembled and great spiritual har- 
 vests were reaped. The first decline that Society ever knew was 
 caused by the emigration of its members, and the decline was 
 so great that the Society almost reached the point of desertion 
 and extinction. It was afterward visited by a revival This 
 Society will be mentioned again on a future page. 
 
 Sometime between 1820 and 1825 a Church called Asbury was 
 organized about twenty-two miles south of the town of Tuska- 
 loosa. It is said that William Kennon, a brother to the Rev. 
 Robert L. and the Rev. Charles W. Kennon, was the leading 
 spirit at that Society. That was one of the Societies of the 
 Tuskaloosa Circuit. 
 
 The town of Tuskaloosa was one of the appointments on the 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 163 
 
 Tuskaloosa Circuit from 1818 to 1825, when it was made a Sta- 
 tion. From 1819 to 1831 other Societies, of which there is no 
 particular account, were organized about the Black Warrior 
 and the Sipsey Rivers and attached to the Tuskaloosa Circuit. 
 
 In the territory first traversed by the Tuskaloosa Circuit the 
 growth of the Church was constant and rapid. In the member- 
 ship in that section there was not that fluctuation and instabili- 
 ty which was in some other regions of the State. Within the 
 territory open to the preachers of the Tuskaloosa Circuit at the 
 beginning of 1819 there were only eighty-six white members, 
 and at the close of 1832, when the first session of the Alabama 
 Conference was held, there were in that same territory seven- 
 teen hundred and seventy-nine white members and six hundred 
 and ninety colored members. What in 1819 was one Circuit 
 was in 1832 four Circuits and one Station. 
 
 Buttahatchee was named in the appointments for 1819 with 
 the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn as preacher. That appointment was 
 made for a section of country through the center of which 
 flowed the Buttahatchee River. The w^ork was without form 
 and void. The country was to be penetrated and inspected, 
 and, if possible. Societies were to be organized, and a Circuit 
 formed. On a previous page has been narrated how and why 
 the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn did not enter that field for that year, 
 notwithstanding he was appointed to do so; and how the Rev. 
 Thomas Stringfield did penetrate that section after the year had 
 considerably advanced. It seems that Stringfield liad good 
 success in his efforts, and that he organized the work, for at the 
 end of the year there were reported from that appointment to 
 the Conference, not by the name of Buttahatchee, but by the 
 name of Marion, seventy-two white members. 
 
 For 1820, the Rev. Ebenezer HeaVn was again appointed to 
 that work, then called Marion. What was then Marion Coun- 
 ty, Alabama, gave name to the appointment, and the Circuit 
 took in anywhere round about that county and extended to the 
 Tombigbee River in the State of Mississippi, and from Cotton 
 Gin Port, on the Tombigbee River, down to the Sipsey River. 
 Brother Hearn, describing the condition of the Circuit as it 
 then was, says: "For a distance of more than one hundred 
 miles from Cotton Gin Port down the Tombigbee there was not 
 a preaching house; so I had to preach in private houses or in 
 
164 
 
 BistoV'j r)f Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 165 
 
 the woods, either of which was iiDpleasant. So I determined 
 to make an effort to secure churches, if they were small ones; 
 so I gathered as many men as I could, and with axes, wedges, 
 and f° ows, we went to a high hill near the mouth of Coal Fire 
 Creek, cleared out a place, cut logs, made boards, and built a 
 house, twenty by twenty-four feet, made a rough pulpit, and 
 made one door, but as we could not get any planks we were con- 
 tent to have a dirt floor; they called the church Ebenezer, that 
 being my Christian name; and here we did raise our Ebenezer. 
 We went on securing houses of worship as we could." AVhat 
 measure of success was achieved in building houses of wor- 
 ship in addition to the one on Coal Fire is not recorded. The 
 labors of the year were closed with a Camp-meeting, and the 
 statement is left on record that they "had a glorious work" on 
 the whole Circuit. One hundred and forty-two white members 
 and five colored members were reported to the Annual Confer- 
 ence on the Circuit. 
 
 In the General Minutes for 1821 the Marion Circuit is left as 
 an appointment without a preacher. This was in accord with 
 an act of the South Carolina Conference for the same year. 
 For that year the South Carolina Conference sent two " Mis- 
 sionaries to the Mississippi Conference, Zachariali Williams, 
 Barnabas Pipkin." Williams, as has been stated elsewhere, 
 took charge of Tuskaloosa Circuit, and Pipkin took charge of 
 and served the Marion Circuit. 
 
 For 1822 the preachers appointed to Marion Circuit were 
 Thomas Clinton, Benjamin F. Lidden; and for 1823 Wiley Led- 
 
 better, John G. Lee. 
 
 That Marion Circuit was the first and the last work served in 
 Alabama by Wiley Ledbetter. He was admitted on trial in the 
 Mississippi Conference in November, 1817, and into full con- 
 nection in that Conference in November, 1819, and he located 
 in December, 1825. After he located he made his home in Per- 
 ry County, Mississippi. The Rev. A. C. Ramsey, once a mem- 
 ber of the Alabama Conference, and who knew Ledbetter well, 
 says of him, in a manuscript of his own Life and Times: 
 "Wiley Ledbetter was in 1821 a distinguished preacher of the 
 Mississippi Conference, a man of great force and power, but 
 who, for some cause, I know not what, finally fell. The last 
 time I saw him was at his home in Perry County, and at a wed- 
 
 ding in his neighborhood, where I was called on to marry a Mr. 
 Reed to a Miss Myers, in 1836. He had entirely given up relig- 
 ion, and was trying to embrace infidelity. I remonstrated with 
 him; referred him to what he once was; the good that he had 
 tried to accomplish, and in which no doubt he had succeeded, 
 referred to his preaching to me when I was a little boy, but all 
 to no effect. A few years afterward I heard he died." (Page 61. ) 
 
 How sad it is to think of those " who leave the paths of up- 
 rightness, to walk in the ways of darkness! " 
 
 The preachers on Marion Circuit for 1824 were Thomas 
 Owens, Thomas S. Abernathy; for 1825, Peyton S. Graves; for 
 1826, Thomas E. Ledbetter, Isaac V. Enochs; for 1827, Leroy 
 Massengale. There is clear testimony that the Rev. Jesse Mize 
 was for that year in c-harge of the Marion Circuit, and the Rev. 
 Leroy Massengale was his colleague, though the General Min- 
 utes show only Massengale appointed to the Circuit for that 
 year. The Rev. Jesse Mize was, as it appears, a local preacher 
 put in charge of the Circuit by the presiding elder. 
 
 The appointment for 1828 was: Marion, Moses Perry. 
 
 The Marion Circuit was the second charge served by the Rev, 
 Moses Perry as an itinerant preacher, and the first and last 
 served by him in Alabama. He wound up his year's labor on 
 that appointment and attended the session of the Mississippi 
 Conference which commenced at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, Decem- 
 ber 25, 1828, when he was received into full connection in the 
 Conference and ordained deacon. He then left the State of 
 Alabama, and he never returned to it. From that time till No- 
 vember, 1841, he had appointments in connection with the Mis- 
 sion to the Choctaw Indians. He then located. He was some- 
 thing of a scholar, and was a teacher as well as a preacher. 
 He married an Indian. 
 
 For 1829 the preachers for the Marion Circuit were, Felix 
 Wood, Blanton P. Box. Wood and Box had just been admitted 
 on trial in the Conference, and Wood discontinued at the end 
 of the year. 
 
 The appointment for 1830 was, Marion, Lewis S. Turner. 
 That closed Turner's work in Alabama. He located in Decem- 
 ber, 1833. 
 
 Preston Cooper was the preacher on Marion Circuit for 1831, 
 and that was his first and last year in Alabama. He joined the 
 
 I 
 
 
166 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 MethodisL Episcopal Church, and was licensed to preach in Ma- 
 rengo County, Alabama, in 1828. He was received on trial in 
 the Mississippi Conference at the session which commenced in 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, December 25, 1828, and received into 
 fall connection at the session at Tuskaloosa, commencing No- 
 vember 24, 1830, and was elected deacon at that time, though 
 not ordained then because no Bishop was present; and he locat- 
 ed in December, 1837. He was a presiding elder two years in 
 the Mississippi Conference, after the Alabama Conference was 
 
 organized. 
 
 For 1832 the Marion Circuit and Columbus, Mississippi, were 
 put together and called Columbus and Marion, and Nathan 
 Hopkins and Anthony S. Dickinson were the preachers appoint- 
 ed thereto. 
 
 During the years from 1819 to 1832 the membership in the 
 territory embraced in what was first called Buttahatchee, and 
 then Marion increased steadily and satisfactorily. In that time 
 the numbers increased from seventy-two white members to 
 eight hundred and thirty-six white and ninety-six colored mem- 
 bers. The largest increase was in that part of the Circuit 
 which lay in the State of Mississippi, and nearly all the colored 
 members were in that part of the Circuit. 
 
 For the years from 1818 to 1832 the Tombigbee Circuit comes 
 
 into view again. 
 
 Tombecbee, John McLendon, Thomas Owens. That was the 
 order of the appointments made for that Circuit for the year 
 1818. The appointment of Thomas Owens was made at the ses- 
 sion of the Mississippi Conference held at Midway, Mississippi, 
 commencing November 7, 1817, and John McLendon received 
 the appointment at the session of the South Carolina Conference 
 held at Augusta, Georgia, commencing January 27, 1818. The 
 same Bishop appointed both of these preachers to Tombigbee, 
 though he appointed Owens junior preacher at Midway, in No- 
 vember, 1817, and McLendon preacher in charge at Augusta, in 
 January, 1818. McLendon was an elder and Owens was only 
 a deacon, and the elder was put in charge of the Circuit and 
 the deacon was put on as junior preacher. At the end of the year 
 there were reported three hundred and seventy white and nine- 
 ty-three colored members, which was an increase of thirty -seven 
 white members and a decrease of three colored members. 
 
 Jlie Enlargement and Advancement of the Worh, 167 
 
 That one year's service on the Tombigbee Circuit was the 
 only service rendered by the Rev. John McLendon in Alabama. 
 At the session of the South Carolina Conference, which was 
 held at Fayetteville, North Carolina, January 12-19, 1814, he 
 was admitted on trial in the traveling connection; and at the ses- 
 sion of the Conference at Charleston, South Carolina, commenc- 
 ing December 23, 1815, he was admitted into full connection 
 and ordained deacon. As the Journal of the Conference 
 shows, the session of the South Carolina Conference " was ap- 
 pointed to be held at Louisville, Georgia, January 27, 1818, 
 but was held in Augusta, Georgia, having been removed from 
 Louisville with the consent of tlie Conference." At that ses- 
 sion of the Conference the Eev. John McLendon was ordained 
 an elder, transferred to the Mississippi Conference, and appoint- 
 ed, as above stated, to the Tombigbee Circuit. The last ap- 
 pointments which he served as an itinerant preacher were in 
 the State of Mississippi. He located at the session of the Mis- 
 sissippi Conference held at Midway, Mississippi, commencing 
 November 17, 1820. 
 
 As already stated in another place in this chapter, the preach- 
 ers for Tombecbee Circuit for 1819 were Thomas Grifiin and 
 John Murrow. That was Murrow's only year in Alabama. He 
 was admitted on trial in the South Carolina Conference at the 
 same time the Rev. John McLendon was admitted, and followed 
 McLendon on the Tombecbee Circuit in 1819, and at the end of 
 the year returned to the South Carolina Conference, and locat- 
 ed at the close of 1824. 
 
 In the General Minutes for 1820 the appointments stand: 
 Tombecbee, Nicholas Mclntyre, J. Clinton. It should have 
 been Thomas Clinton, instead of J. Clinton, and while Thom- 
 as Clinton was appointed by the Bishop to the Tombigbee Cir- 
 cuit, yet when the field had been surveyed the presiding elder 
 changed him to the Alabama Circuit, and Mclntyre served the 
 Tombigbee Circuit that year alone. 
 
 The preachers for Tombecbee Circuit were for 1821 Meri- 
 dith Renneau; for 1822, Zachariah Williams, John Patton; for 
 1823, Henry P. Cook; for 1824, John R. Lambuth; for 1825, 
 Zachariah Williams. 
 
 With the year 1825 the name of Zachariah Williams disap- 
 apears from the roll of preachers of the Methodist Episcopal 
 
168 
 
 Hisfonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 169 
 
 Church. How he was disposed of is not stated in the General 
 Minutes. He started as a preacher in the South Carolina Con- 
 ference. The South Carolina Conference held a session at 
 Charleston, South Carolina, commencing December 23, 1815. 
 In the Journal for that session of the Conference is an entry 
 for December 28, as follows: "Zachariah Williams was duly 
 recommended by a Quarterly Conference of Keewee Circuit, 
 and admitted on trial." He was admitted into full connection 
 at Augusta, Georgia, in January, 1818, and ordained deacon. 
 He was ordained an elder at Charleston, South Carolina, Janu- 
 ary, 1820. The Journal of the South Carolina Conference, for 
 the session held at Columbia, South Carolina, commencing Jan- 
 uary 11, 1821, shows that charges were made against Zachariah 
 Williams by Hartwell Spain, January 15, 1821, and that a com- 
 mittee was appointed consisting of Nicholas Talley, Henry 
 Bass, and Allen Turner, to which said charges were referred, 
 and that on the next day, January 16, the committee re>)orted 
 his case: "The result of which was that they judge that he 
 should 1. Be reproved by the President before the Conference; 
 2. That he should be deprived of his parchment as elder until 
 our next Annual Conference. The first punishment was adopt- 
 ed, and the second did not pass. He was called in and re- 
 proved accordingly." From that session of the Conference he 
 was sent a missionary to the Mississippi Conference, and as 
 such missionary he took charge of Tuskaloosa Circuit. It ap- 
 pears therefore that he came to the Tuskaloosa Circuit, Ala- 
 bama, just fresh from a trial and reprimand on charges, the 
 nature of which is not now known. He united with the Meth- 
 odist Protestant Church, and was for many long years a preach- 
 er in the Alabama Conference of that Church, and finally, in 
 1856, he joined the Baptists in Alabama; and became a preach- 
 er among them, and for many years lived in comparative ob- 
 scurity in an out-of-the-way part of the State, on the borders of 
 Conecuh and Covington Counties. 
 
 The appointment for 1826 stands: Tombecbee, John G. Lee. 
 The Eev. John G. Lee was admitted on trial in the Mississippi 
 Conference at the close of 1822, and he located at the close of 
 
 1827. 
 
 For 1827: Tombecbee, Henry J. Brown. 
 
 For 1828: Tombecbee, Anderson G. McDaniel, Lewis S.Tur- 
 
 ner. When these two men, McDaniel and Turner, received that 
 appointment they had been on trial just one year, and at the 
 end of that year's work on Tombecbee McDaniel was discontin- 
 ued. 
 
 The preachers on Tombecbee were for 1829, Lewis S. Tur- 
 ner; for 1830 Daniel Monaghan; for 1831 Joshua Peavy; for 
 1832 Job Foster. 
 
 The Tombecbee Circuit for the year 1832 was the last ap- 
 pointment served by the Kev. Job Foster which was all in- 
 cluded in the State of Alabama. For 1833 and 1834 he served 
 the Chickasawhay Circuit, which, though it was then included in 
 the Alabama Conference, was all in the State of Mississippi, ex- 
 cept one appointment. One Society, then on that Circuit, called 
 Providence, and in which William Godfrey, a prominent man 
 and a pious Christian, was the leading member, and at which 
 large congregations assembled, was in Washington County, Al- 
 abama. At the end of 1834 Foster located, but was again a 
 member of the Alabama Conference for the years 1837 and 
 1838, and for those years served again the Chickasawhay Circuit. 
 At the close of 1838 he again located, and that terminated his 
 itinerant career. He was first received on trial in the Missis- 
 sippi Conference in December, 1829, and he had just been re- 
 ceived into full connection by the Mississippi Conference and 
 ordained deacon, November, 1831, when he was appointed to the 
 Tombecbee Circuit. 
 
 Some of those who were intimately associated with the Kev. 
 Job Foster regarded him a good man, and they have reported 
 him as punctual and faithful in the work of the ministry. He 
 is said to have been " impulsive and eccentric.'* His excitable 
 and erratic nature led him into grotesque attitudes and be- 
 trayed him into ludicrous utterances. Two or three incidents 
 in his life may suffice for an insight to his erratic nature and a 
 knowledge of his odd ways. It was a custom with him to sit 
 flat on the ground and talk with himself when in his religious 
 moods. It was also a remarkable fact that others were never 
 swept into the torrent of his ecstasies. When he was excited 
 others were calm. When he was in his sublimest raptures oth- 
 ers were in their deepest depression and thickest gloom. When 
 he was in charge of the Tombigbee Circuit he had a Camp- 
 meeting at or near Suggsville, wijich was one of the appoint- 
 
 !l 
 
 i 
 
170 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ments on that Circuit. At one of the services of the occasion 
 he seated himself on the straw in front of the altar and talked 
 to himself. While in that attitude he was borne away with rap- 
 turous delight, and he made the air ring and the hills echo with 
 his shouts. He shouted, he laughed, he talked. As usual, 
 he was the only one at that hour apparently happy. While 
 he was pouring forth the expressions of his overmastering joy 
 he said, " I will bet I die shouting," and as quick as thought he 
 added, "if it were lawful to bet." Some persons in the con- 
 gregation of irreligious proclivities circulated an exaggerated 
 statement of what he said. They reported that Foster said: 
 " I'll bet my horse I'll die shouting." There was no need of ex- 
 aggerating the account, for the performance was ridiculous 
 enough in its verity. For he did say, "I will bet I die shout- 
 ing," and added as an afterthought, " if it were lawful to bet." 
 At the close of Foster's year on the Tombigbee Circuit, on 
 November 27, 1832, the Alabama Conference met in its first 
 session at the town of Tuskaloosa, Alabama, Bishop James Os- 
 good Andrew presiding. The last convocation of that session 
 of the Conference was reached. It was at night. The purpose 
 of the convocation at that hour was to administer the Lord's 
 Supper, and announce the assignment of the preachers to the 
 several charges for the next year. Bishop Andrew officiated in 
 the administration of the sacrament. Profound quiet pre- 
 vailed for a time, and the entire audience was reverent and sol- 
 emn. Suddenly Foster was seized with a spasip of excitement, 
 so "happy," as he called it, that he could neither contain nor re- 
 strain himself. With a spasmodic lunge he threw his arms 
 around the Rev. A. C. Ramsey, a small and feeble young man, 
 and one of the preachers who had just been admitted on trial 
 into the Conference, who was sitting near him, and hugged him 
 with such a furious and death-like grip that it seemed that he 
 would literally squeeze the life out of him before he could extri- 
 cate himself. When Ramsey had finally broken his grasp and 
 crawled outof hisembrace, Foster, as quick as lightning, rose tohis 
 feet and dashed up the aisle with an agility which was amazing, 
 and with antics which were alarming, and with a medley of utter- 
 ances which, but for the improprieties of the whole perform- 
 ance, might have been amusing. As he flew back and forth, up 
 and down the aisle, from thfe altar to the door, some of the 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 171 
 
 young men who were seated in the back part of the audience 
 said: " We will have to put side lines on that fellow to hold him 
 in his place, and to keep him from killing himself and others." 
 
 When the appointments were announced for the ensuing 
 year, the year 1833, Foster was readout to the Chickasawhay Cir- 
 cuit. During the year he held a Camp-meeting on his Circuit on 
 or near Red Creek. The Rev. Paul F. Sterns, then serving 
 what was called Mobile Mission, and who was a very quiet man 
 and who even in his greatest ecstasies was calm and composed, 
 attended that Camp-meeting. One night while the meeting was 
 going on Foster was seated in his favorite position flat on the 
 ground in Sister Ramsey's tent, and all at once he sprang up 
 from the ground, and went dashing over the tent, knocking over 
 chairs, and pushing the individuals with whom he came in con- 
 tact hither and thither. Finally in his furious course he ap- 
 proached the Rev. Paul F. Sterns, and grasped him rather vio- 
 lently, and then letting go his grasp on him he laid his hands 
 on his head, and with vociferous voice and in a tone of exclama- 
 tion he said: "Brother Saul, receive thy sight." All this he did 
 while every one in the tent and on the campus was perfectly 
 quiet and without any excess of emotion. 
 
 This erratic man, the Rev. Job Foster, finally moved to Tex- 
 as, and at last, it is said, upon credible testimony, he hanged 
 himself. His erratic nature held sway over him, and at last his 
 life terminated by suicide! 
 
 In the list of appointments appeared a new pastoral charge. 
 It did not appear in the list for 1819, but it was surveyed and 
 its outline established that year, and was on record for 1820. 
 It was called Alabama, and the territory which it occupied was 
 on the Alabama River, having its first and leading appoint- 
 ments about the mouths of Pine Woods Creek, Autauga Creek, 
 Catoma Creek, and Swift Creek, and in its general outlines, 
 extending as far up the river as its termination at the junction 
 of the Coosa and the Tallapoosa Rivers, and up the Coosa 
 River to the Coosa Falls or Wetumpka, and as far down the 
 river as to the place known as Benton, and extending out from 
 the river on both sides. 
 
 That Alabama Circuit was surveyed and outlined by the Rev. 
 Alexander Talley, a Missionary to the Alabama Territory from 
 the Soath Carolina Conference for the year 1819. That the 
 
 II 
 
 I 
 
 b 
 
172 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 173 
 
 Eev. Alexander Talley was sent to the Alabama Territory by 
 the South Carolina Conference as Missionary for the year 1819, 
 and that he worked that year in the field thenceforward occu- 
 pied by the Alabama Circuit, is certified by numerous indubita- 
 ble witnesses, and these facts are established beyond all ques- 
 tion, and that notwithstanding it is stated in his memoir, pub- 
 lished in the General Minutes, that he was sent to Mobile for 
 1819. The statements in his memoir are altogether unreliable, 
 as will appear fully when the real facts in the case transpire. 
 
 It is impossible at this stage of matters to give with absolute 
 certainty the name of the Methodist who first settled in the 
 bounds of what was for many years the Alabama Circuit, but it 
 is a fact that Mrs. Martha Lee Bledsoe, if not the first Metho- 
 dist reaching that fair and beautiful region, was, nevertheless, 
 in the advance of Methodist emigrants to that section. She 
 took up her abode on the sunset side of the Coosa Kiver, a 
 mile or so from Fort Jackson, in August, 1815. That was just 
 one year after a treaty had been made and concluded between 
 Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson, on behalf of the United States of 
 America, and the chiefs, deputies, and warriors of the Creek 
 Nation, extinguishing the Indian title thereto and ceding the 
 region of country about the Alabama Eiver and further out to 
 the United States Government, and it was while the United 
 States troops were stationed on the line which bounded the 
 ceded territory, superintending the removal of the Indians 
 across the said line. That boundary line has been given on a 
 preceding page in Chapter VI. 
 
 A slight detail in biography and incident will narrate how 
 Mrs. Martha Lee Bledsoe was led to emigrate to the section of 
 country which was once traversed by the Alabama Circuit. 
 Her maiden name v/as Wilder. She was born in the Colony of 
 Virginia in 1770. Her father, William Wilder, who served 
 through the seven years of the Eevolutionary War between the 
 United Colopies and Great Britain, moved, after the close of 
 that war, to that section of Georgia now included in Wilkes 
 County. When a young lady she married B. H. House, who 
 in a few years after marriage died, leaving her with four chil- 
 dren, two sons and two daughters. A few years after the death 
 of her first husband she married J. Bledsoe, of Kentucky, who 
 died about one year after marriage, leaving her by this mar- 
 
 riage one daughter. When the war between the United States 
 and Great Britain, and the war between the United States and 
 the Creek Indians commenced, the two sons of Mrs. Bledsoe, 
 Jacob P. House and William H. House, enlisted in the military 
 service, and they were employed in the campaign against the 
 Creek Indians and the British. Being a widow and her two 
 sons being in the army, Mrs. Bledsoe moved from Georgia to 
 Winchester, Tennessee, where then lived her married daughter. 
 When the time of service for which they had enlisted expired, 
 her t^vo sons were honorably discharged from the army. They 
 were mustered out of service at Fort Jackson. Instead of re- 
 turning to tiieir former home, they took up their abode on the 
 soil they had helped to redeem from savage occupanc}^ and 
 went into business across the river from where they were dis- 
 charged from the military service. They built for themselves 
 a storehouse on the opposite side of the Coosa River from 
 Fort Jackson and about one mile from the fort, and supplying 
 themselves with a stock of goods, which they had transported 
 from Fort Claiborne on the Alabama River on pole boats, they 
 opened a traffic with the Indians and also with the United 
 States soldiers who were stationed at the fort a mile away. 
 Wlien her sons were settled at that point Mrs. Bledsoe sot her 
 face to go into that land to sojourn with them, and in the month 
 of August, 1815, having passed over the intervening country 
 between Winchester, Tennessee, and that spot, she took up her 
 abode at the place of her sons' business, on the very line which 
 divided the ceded territory from that still owned and still to be 
 occupied by the Indians. Afterward she moved from that 
 place and settled a home in the pine woods, about twelve miles 
 from where the town of AVashington was established, and in 
 the bounds once included in what was established as Autauga 
 County she lived until her death in 1832. She died sud- 
 denly near Big Island, on the Coosa River. Mrs. Bledsoe was 
 renewed in her heart in her childhood under the AVesleyan 
 ministry, and she was an earnest and faithful member of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church until her death. For a half cen- 
 tury or more she walked in the ways of the Lord. She at- 
 tended upon the class-meetings and love-feasts. She was at 
 the first Camp-meeting held at the noted Camp-ground at 
 Graves's Ferry, on the Alabama River, five miles below the 
 
 
 ■V : 
 
 .i1 J. 
 
 % 
 
174 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 to^n of AYasbington. When she lived at the place a mile or so 
 from Fort Jackson she resorted to the fort to hear the Chaplain 
 to the soldiers preach. Two of her daughters and one of her 
 sons were Methodists, while one of her sons was an Episcopa- 
 lian, and her youngest daughter, Mrs. C. M. Brown, who in this 
 year (1889) is still living, has been for long years a Presbyterian. 
 
 Evidently Mrs. Bledsoe and her children were among the 
 very first settlers in that fascinating region from Fort Jackson 
 to the Holy Ground, after the extinction of the Indian titles to 
 the land thereabouts. It is a tradition that Jacob P. House, 
 the son of Mrs. Bledsoe by her first husband, raised the first 
 crop of corn ever raised by a white man in what was at one 
 time Autauga County, after the cession of that territory by the 
 Indians to the United States Government. 
 
 The County of Autauga was constituted and named by en- 
 actment of the Legislative Council and House of Representa- 
 tives of the Alabama Territory in General Assembly convened, 
 on November 21, 1818, with the following boundaries: "Be- 
 ginning on the Alabama River at the mouth of the Lower Mul- 
 berry Creek, thence running up the main stream thereof to its 
 source, thence in a direct line to the north bank of the Coosa 
 River opposite the upper end of Proctor's Island, thence down 
 the Coosa to its junction with the Tallapoosa River, thence 
 dow^n the Alabama to the beginning." Upon the formation of 
 Autauga County, Montgomery County was cod fined to the op- 
 posite side of the Alabama River, and at that time it included 
 "what was afterward constituted Lowndes County. 
 
 The first emigrants to Autauga County aggregated at one 
 place in sufficient numbers to make a village or town, and being 
 patriotic admirers of the Father of his country, they named the 
 town Washington, and the said town was incorporated by an 
 Act of the Legislature of Alabama passed December 14, 1820. 
 The act of incorporation defined the limits and designated the 
 location of the town as follows: "And bo it further enacted, 
 That all that part of fraction thirty-three, in Township seven- 
 teen, and Range sixteen, lying west of the Autauga Creek, and 
 north-west of the Alabama River, be, and the same shall consti- 
 tute the corporation limits of the town of Washington." 
 
 At a point below the town of Washington and in the County 
 of Autauga, is a noted bend of the Alabama River, which at the 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 175 
 
 beginning of the incoming of emigrants to that part of Alabama 
 was settled by a number of Dutch and Dutch descendants, and 
 has since and on that account been called Dutch Bend. 
 
 In 1819 Seaborn Mims took up his abode just around the 
 point on the Alabama River where begins the noted Dutch 
 Bend, and jast far enough around the point to be on the 
 west bank of the river, and there he laid out a town 
 and named it Yernon. That town attained sufficient impor- 
 tance to be incorporated, and on December 8, 1821, it was 
 enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
 State of Alabama in General Assembly convened, "That all 
 that part of fractions thirty-five and thirty-six, west of Alabama 
 River, in Township seventeen, and Range fourteen, be, and the 
 same constitute the corporate limits of the town of Y'ernon." 
 
 Econachaca, an Indian town, familiarly known as Holy 
 Ground, and which was on the Alabama River just opposite the 
 Dutch Bend, in wdiat was in 1819 Montgomery County, and 
 what is now in 1889 Lowndes County, and w here on December 
 23, 1813, as history records, a decisive battle was fought between 
 the United States troops under the lead of General Claiborne 
 and the Creek warriors under the lead of Weatherford, was the 
 center of a community which was commenced at as early a day 
 as the settlements at Washington and in Dutch Bend. 
 
 These settlements herein named were noted places in the 
 then Counties of Autauga and Montgomery at which in recon- 
 noitering the territory to be embraced in the Alabama Circuit 
 Methodist preaching places were established. 
 
 At the first the people were assembled in private houses and 
 under forest trees to listen to the preaching of the gospel and 
 to join in the divine worship; and though the Rev. Alexander 
 Talley worked as a missionary in that region during the year 
 1819, it appears that little was accomplished in organizing So- 
 cieties and in erecting houses of worship before 1820. 
 
 Near the site of the Holy Ground, where was fought the fa- 
 mous battle in which General Claiborne achieved a complete 
 victory, and Weatherford, the Indian warrior, displayed unsur- 
 passed chivalry, a Methodist church was erected as early as 
 1820; and by that same date a Society was organized and a log 
 cabin was erected for a church in Dutch Bend, about three 
 miles from Y'^ernon. That church was named Asbury. 
 
17G 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Wasliiiigton was one of the preacliiDg places at the first. 
 Tbroiii^li 1819 and 1820, and on into 1821, the Methodists 
 preached in Washington in private houses, usually in the house 
 of Major James Howard. A house was built and fiuished in 1821 
 for an Academy and a church conjointly. In a year or more 
 the place was abandoned as a place for a school and the house 
 was henceforward used exclusively as a Methodist church. 
 
 The first Camp-ground established in Autauga County was at 
 or near Graves's Ferry, a few miles from the town of AVashing- 
 ton, down the Alabama Eiver, and was known as Graves's 
 Camp-ground, so called for William Graves, who had a ferry on 
 the river. Camp-meetings were beld there for many years, and 
 great numbers of men and women were turned from sin to holi- 
 ness at that sacred spot who made noble workers and noted 
 saints. The first Camp-meeting was held there in the latter 
 half of the year 1820, and the Eev. Thomas Nixon, the Eev. 
 Thomas Clinton, the Eev. Eli Terry, the Eev. Peyton Bibb, 
 and others, did the preaching on that occasion. Among those 
 who at that time and place received th6 regenerating power of 
 the Holy Ghost were two men who became itinerant preachers, 
 Peyton S. Graves and AVilliam Alexander. Peyton S. Graves, 
 though he did not maintain a reputable character through life, 
 became notorious in the ranks of Methodism in that section of 
 Alabama. 
 
 One of the most thrilling scenes ever disclosed in the new 
 settlements on the Alabama Eiver was witnessed at a brook on 
 the way between Graves's Camp-ground and the beautiful little 
 town of Vernon. It was in the month of August in the year 
 1822. A Camp-meeting, which had been attended with divine 
 power and unction, had, on the morning on which said scene 
 occurred, closed with the usual songs, prayers, good-bye greet- 
 ings, and benediction; and the crowds who had attended the de- 
 lightful services of the occasion were, with mingled feelings of 
 sadness and of joy, wending their way homeward. They were 
 sad on account of leaving the sacred place and the holy services, 
 and of separating from friends of kindred minds, and they were 
 joyous on account of the anointing they had received from the 
 Holy One. Two men who lived at Yernon, John Du Bois and 
 AVilliam McPherson, journeyed together, Du Bois on foot, Mc- 
 Pherson on horseback. Peyton S. Graves, one of the three 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 177 
 
 traveling preachers on the Alabama Circuit for that year, had, 
 by his preaching on the occasion, arrested the attention of these 
 two men and had riveted upon their consciences divine convic- 
 tion. Du Bois had been a penitent at the altar, and in his feelings 
 had oscillated betwen despair and hope. He had passed through 
 all the stages of a true repentance, and on the morning of the 
 adjournment of the meeting, he got a deep insight into evangel- 
 ical truth, and had his soul regaled with divine grace. As he 
 and his immediate companion journeyed he descanted on his 
 new-found joys. The meanwhile McPherson was pensive and 
 sad, he was overwhelmed with the magnitude of his guilt and 
 the enormity of his sins. In the moods here detailed these two 
 companions reached the brook which meandered across the road 
 on which they journeyed, and there they halted to give drink to 
 the steed which McPherson rode. While the animal was 
 quenching his thirst with the water of the brook there fell instant- 
 ly upon Du Bois a divine influence which was overpowering and 
 inexpressible, and instantaneously with this baptism upon Du 
 Bois McPherson felt the regenerating work of the Holy Ghost 
 in his heart. Instantly McPherson leaped from his horse, and 
 uttered his joy in a loud tone, literally yelled and ran like a 
 wild Indian. This bestowment of heavenly joy upon these two- 
 men arrested the march of the journeying crowds. They halt-^ 
 ed upon the spot and joined Du Bois and McPherson in shout-^ 
 ing their triumphs and in praising God, and many more were 
 there and then regenerated. The memory of that hour still 
 abides, for there is, at least, one who yet abides on these mortal 
 shores and who still maintains the Christian faith who was a. 
 participant in the transactions of that hour. William McPher^ 
 son, at this date, January 2, 1890, still lives, and through all the 
 long period of more than sixty-seven years which have now in- 
 tervened since his conversion at the brook he has maintained a 
 spotless character and has been a pillar in the Church of God. 
 Since 1835 he has resided at what is now known as Fayetteville, 
 in Talladega County, Alabama, and he has done much for 
 Methodism in the country where he has lived. John Du Bois 
 was long a local preacher in Alabama. 
 
 The town of Vernon, though there was never any house of 
 worship there, early became a center of religious influence and 
 of Methodist usages. The Eev. Alexander Talley located at the 
 12 
 
178 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 179 
 
 end of the year 1819, entered upon the study and practice of 
 medicine, and made his home at Yernon, and as a local preach- 
 er exerted a powerful influence there and throughout the Ala- 
 bama Circuit which he surveyed and organized. Much of the 
 time from the close of 1819 to the close of 1825, while he was in 
 the capacity of a local preacher, Dr. Talley made the house of 
 Mr. Seaborn Mims his home. The home of Mr. Mims, a sort of 
 inn for the entertainment of boarders and travelers, was, in 1821, 
 blessed with a special visit from the divine presence from which 
 a grand revival ensued. In that year, 1821, Mrs. Mims, the 
 wife of Seaborn Mims, a woman of strength and honor, and 
 whose worth was " far above rubies," became deeply concerned 
 upon the subject of religion, and in due process she emerged 
 from the burden of guilt and the sorrows of sin. Suddenly her 
 sighing was made to cease and her joy to abound. Her ecstasy 
 was so intense that she could not restrain herself, and she made 
 the entire premises to resound with her shouts. Her conver- 
 sion and her exclamations of joy were a surprise to all the in- 
 mates, a promiscuous company, of the house. Her conversion 
 made a deep impression upon all who knew her, and her reli- 
 gious influence permeated the whole town and the surrounding 
 country. A revival inundated the whole community, and near- 
 ly the entire population was ere long converted. Preachers 
 and class-leaders were overwhelmed with work, and saving pow- 
 er was everywhere felt and seen. A number of the Mimses were 
 converted. Mr. Seaborn Mims was one of the grandest work- 
 ers in the Methodist ranks who ever lived in the State of Ala- 
 bama. 
 
 It was at the house of Mr. Seaborn Mims, in the town of 
 Yernon, that an incident occurred with Bishop Eoberts which 
 has had many, many versions. Said incident shall be related 
 here by John Du Bois, who was present and witnessed the whole 
 affair: "Late one evening in December, 1822, after the busy in- 
 mates of our pleasant home had come in from their labors, a 
 venerable stranger rode up and asked to be entertained for the 
 night He was kindly received by Mr. Mims, our generous 
 host, and was soon seated before a glowing fire, which threw its 
 cheerful light and radiant heat over all around. The tall and 
 commanding figure of the stranger, his elegant manners and 
 pleasant and dignified conversation, inspired every one with a 
 
 desire to know who he was. Tea was soon announced, and after 
 a good supper, Mr. Mims proffered to show him to his room that 
 he might retire early, and take a good night's rest. It was our 
 class-meeting night, and Mr. Mims so announced to him by way 
 of courtesy. He said he was not much fatigued, that he was re- 
 freshed by his supper, and that it would be his pleasure to go 
 with us. 
 
 "Arnold Campbell, a local preacher, was our class-leader. He 
 was a young man, but zealous in all good works. Our place of 
 meeting was in the Academy. After the leader had discharged 
 his duty to each member of the class, he then addressed him- 
 self to the visitor, whose response was so full, simple, and elo- 
 quent, that we were all deeply impressed, and still more anxious 
 to know the stranger; but the conventional code and primitive 
 modesty of our society would not allow us to be very inquisi- 
 tive under any circumstances, and especially to strangers. 
 
 " When we reached the inn, on our return from the services, 
 Mr. Mims again offered to conduct him to his room, but he re- 
 plied: 'Before retiring let us have prayers.' The Book was 
 handed, an appropriate lesson read, and then followed such a 
 prayer as we have seldom heard. By this time curiosity was 
 at its height. Brother Campbell and some others went with him 
 to his room. Without further ceremony Brother Campbell 
 asked him if he would preach for him the next day, promising 
 to secure for him a congregation. He said: * How do you know 
 that I am a preacher? I guess you would like to know who I 
 am. I am Kobert K. Eoberts.' So, by entertaining a stranger, 
 we had the honor of entertaining a live Bishop unawares. 
 
 " He consented to preach, and did so the next day, very much 
 to the edification and spiritual profit of the people, and took his 
 leave to the regions far beyond, expressing himself as much 
 pleased with his sojourn ainong us, as we were delighted and 
 profited by his visit.'* 
 
 About two miles from what was then the town of Montgomery, 
 and west of south from that town, a Society, which was thence- 
 forward in the Alabama Circuit, was organized in the year 1821, 
 and a log house was erected and dedicated to divine worship, 
 and the place was known as "Mills and Westcott Meeting 
 House." The sobriquet will be explained when it is stated that 
 Flora Mills and Eliza Westcott were members of the Society 
 
 t 
 I 
 
180 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 181 
 
 there. Mrs. Flora Mills was from North Carolina, and settled 
 at Alabama Town, which was a little way west of what was 
 Montgomery, after its name was changed from Philadelphia to 
 Montgomery, and she settled there previous to April, 1819. 
 Thomas Hatchett was at the head of that little band of Chris- 
 tians who worshiped at the "Mills and Westcott Meeting 
 House," and Kachel Hatchett and Susannah Nichols had their 
 names'enrolled among that faithful few. In that log house they 
 kept the charge of the Lord, and offered their sacrifices and 
 sweet incense continually. There the pure word of God was 
 preached, and the sacraments duly administered. How many 
 and who were baptized in that unpretentious house is not now 
 known, but it is known that W. K. Westcott, now, in 1890, liv- 
 ing in the city of Montgomery, was baptized there. Like all 
 things earthly, that log house decayed, and by the beginning of 
 1828 it was so dilapidated that it was no longer a suitable place 
 for divine service. In that year, 1828, Thomas Hatchett, in his 
 liberality and enterprise, built a. new house, designed to serve 
 the Society in place of the old one, but by the time he had the 
 new house ready for occupancy and sought the execution of the 
 deed to the lot on which the house was erected, a number of the 
 Society had turned Reformers and had joined the Protestant 
 Methodists, and the man who owned the lot deeded lot and 
 house to the new organization, and left Mr. Hatchett and those 
 who adhered to the doctrines and polity of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church to seek a place of worship at another locality. 
 
 Francis M. Gilmer, with his family, moved from Oglethorpe 
 County, Georgia, to Alabama Territory, in January, 1819, and 
 settled in Montgomery County, a little way west of Of ucshee, 
 or, as it is put down on the maps, Oakfuskee Creek, then the 
 line of the Creek Nation, and about twenty miles south-east of 
 what was then the town of Philadelphia, what was afterward in- 
 corporated as the town of Montgomery. He and his wife were 
 Methodists, having joined the Church in 1808. From the time 
 he settled at that new home he had preaching in his house 
 whenever a preacher passed that way. The passing of preach- 
 ers through that community was, for many years, uncertain and 
 irregular. No Methodist church was built in that neighbor- 
 hood until after 1830. In 1828, the Rev. James H. Mellard, 
 then the preacher on the Alabama Circuit, preached a sermon 
 
 at the house of Brother Gilmer, and baptized two of his sons, 
 George N. and John. Some time between 18o0 and 1835 a 
 church was built a few miles from the residence of Brother 
 Gilmer at which he and his family from that time held mem- 
 bership. 
 
 Benajah S. Bibb, Thomas Jarrett, Abner McGhee, and William 
 Taylor moved to Montgomery County, Alabama, and located 
 homes and domiciled themselves between Catoma and Pintlala 
 Creeks about the year 1822. William Taylor's place was eight 
 miles from the town of Montgomery, and exactly south of that 
 town, and in Township fifteen and Range eighteen. Benajah S. 
 Bibb's place was five or six miles south-west of the town of 
 Montgomery, and in Township fifteen and Range seventeen. 
 Abner McGhee possessed himself of a large body of land, and 
 his place, perhaps, became central to the community, and on his 
 land and near the Federal Road and about ten miles south-west 
 of the town of Montgomery, a church was built, so soon as it 
 could be conveniently done after these men had fixed their hab- 
 itations, and the place was called Hope Hull, after the great 
 Methodist man of that name in Georgia. This Hope Hull 
 Church was one of the appointments on the Alabama Circuit, 
 but only for a few years, as the membership of that Society re- 
 volted the Methodist Episcopal Church, and joined the Reform- 
 ers. 
 
 By 1823, perhaps before that, a Camp-ground was established 
 near Montgomery at which great and efficient sermons were 
 preached, at which the presence and power of God were mani- 
 fested, and at which grand results were achieved. As . early as 
 the establishment of the Camp-ground here mentioned a 
 preaching place was established by the Methodists at the town 
 of Coosauda, which was at that time, perhaps, a larger place 
 than Monto-omery. At Wetumpka also there were Methodists 
 living at that early date, and grand times were had there. The 
 times were pleasant thereabout, and conversions were constant- 
 ly occurring. 
 
 Rocky Mount, in Section eight. Township seventeen. Range 
 seventeen, became a center of social and literary interest at an 
 early day. There an academy was erected and maintained for 
 the instruction of the children of the country. An act of the 
 Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Alabama, 
 
 II 
 
s 
 
 182 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 183 
 
 establishing the Kocky Mount Academy in Autauga County and 
 constituting the Trustees thereof a body corporate, was passed 
 and approved January 12, 1827. John G. Graham, Malcolm 
 Smith, Jacob Whetstone, William Hall, Littleton Eeese, Zach- 
 ariah T. Watkins, and Peyton Bibb were the Trustees named in 
 the act of incorporation. John G. Graham and Malcolm Smith 
 were firm Presbyterians. Jacob Whetstone was a local preach- 
 er in the Methodist Episcopal Church, firm, tried, true. Pey- 
 ton Bibb was a Methodist, and a local preacher. 
 
 All these places above named were in the Alabama Circuit. 
 
 Whatever may have been lacking in the Alabama Circuit in 
 the first decade of its existence in the way of houses of worship 
 and of organized charities, there was not lacking gospel truth 
 preached in fervency; and the Methodists there in that day had 
 vital religion, inward holiness, in the heart power and joy di- 
 vine. As indicative of what they held as a doctrine and expe- 
 rienced as a personal attainment there may be given here the 
 obituary of one who died in that Circuit in 1826: 
 
 " Died in Washington, Autauga County, Alabama, on the 21st 
 December last, Mrs. Elizabeth Kush, wife of Captain Charles 
 G. Kush, in the thirty-ninth year of her age. 
 
 « By the death of Mrs. Eush, a blank is left in the neighbor- 
 hood, which will not easily be filled; and though the friend who 
 pens this is, in general, opposed to obituary plaudits, yet there 
 was something so peculiarly affecting in the closing scene of 
 this excellent woman's life, that justice to her fellow mortals 
 demands it should be made public. In early life she became a 
 member of the Lutheran Church in South Carolina, her native 
 State, but without experiencing the power of religion otherwise 
 than as a moral restraint upon her actions. The pious precepts, 
 however, which she had received from her father, and the cor- 
 rect example of an excellent mother, had implanted in her mind 
 the seeds of virtue, and fixed in her heart those pure and 
 amiable qualities which constituted her a dutiful and loving 
 wife, a kind and affectionate mother, an obliging and charitable 
 neighbor, and to all outward appearance a good and faithful 
 Christian. But, possessed as she was, of so many engaging 
 qualities, she was still a stranger to the efficacy of the blood of 
 Christ as exhibited in the knowledge of sins forgiven. 
 
 "After her removal to Alabama, she remained for some years 
 
 like a sheep strayed from the fold, having no members of the 
 same Church with whom to associate. But finding her faith 
 declining, and her practice less restrained than formerly, she be- 
 came satisfied of the necessity of being united with the visible 
 Church on earth, to enable her to claim a seat among the Church 
 of the First Born in heaven. Under such impressions she con- 
 nected herself with the Methodist Episcopal Church in Washing- 
 ton, and again partook at the table of the Lord. But still she 
 was a stranger to the knowledge of pardoning grace. But thank 
 the Lord, he was not unmindful of his promise, after near two 
 weeks from the birth of her child, of most excruciating pain, 
 from which only by the skill and constant attention of her phy- 
 sician, Dr. Withers, she obtained occasional intervals, her 
 prayers and those of her pious friends were at length an- 
 swered; her soul was comforted, her fears dissipated, and 
 her pains assuaged; she shouted victory aloud, and gave glory 
 to God. Then opened a scene of holy transport, mingled with 
 heavenly consolation to her believing husband and friends, 
 which it is impossible for pen to describe or imagination to 
 conceive. Believed, as it were, from pain, while in the very 
 agonies of death, her soul was strong in the Lord. All the 
 powers of her mind revived, and better preaching was seldom if 
 
 ever heard. 
 
 " Having been for some days persuaded that her dissolution 
 was at hand, she had devoted all the time her severe sufferings 
 would allow to wrestling with God, being determined not to 
 give up till she was blessed with the evidence of her accept- 
 ance. When that was obtained a calm serenity possessed her 
 soul, and she seemed anxiously to desire that every member 
 of her family and all her neighbors should be able to feel that 
 happiness and calm resignation which she felt; and with a 
 view of impressing her dying charge more deeply upon them, 
 after requesting to hear prayer, she called her husband and 
 children, brothers, sisters, servants, and neighbors separately to 
 her bedside, and warned them by the torment she had suffered 
 to flee from the wrath to come; to begin early to prepare to 
 meet their God; that religion would afford them a happy life 
 and a triumphantly glorious and happy death. Her address to 
 the physician was peculiarly interesting. She thanked him for 
 his unremitted attention; expressed her belief that some of the 
 
 . '. 
 
18^ 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 most important days of her life were, under God, owing to his 
 skill and assiduity, and besought him to get religion, to seek 
 for that jewel of great price, that all-important acquisition, 
 which will not only give happiness in this life, but eternal en- 
 joyment in heaven. And while in the act of thus exhorting her 
 friends to seek their soul's salvation, her spirit took its peace- 
 ful flight, and is now, we trust, in the realms of immortal bliss. 
 Such is the death of the righteous, may mine be like hers! " 
 
 Of those who were prominent and valiant as Methodists in 
 the Alabama Circuit, and who came to the country at an early 
 day, may be mentioned, in addition to those whose names have 
 already been given: The Eev. Moses Andrew, the Kev. Pey- 
 ton Bibb, the Eev. Britton Capel, the Kev. Arnold Campbell, 
 the Eev. James H. Mellard, the Eev. Eli Terry, the Eev. Wil- 
 liam Terry, Mrs. Ashley, Jesse Box, Emanuel Golson, Wil- 
 liam Graves, Bruner Harris, William Hester, Mark Howard, 
 James Howard, Joseph W. Houck, Lewis Houser, William 
 Keener, Thomas C. Ledbetter, Thomas E. Ledbetter, Marshal 
 Mims, Shadrack Mims, David Mims, Eudolph Murph, Elijah 
 Myers, James Mitchell, James E. Nicholson, Stephen Pierce, 
 Charles G. Eush, Thomas Smith, George Stoudenmire, Benjamin 
 Taylor, Henry Webster, Henry Whetstone, Stephen White. 
 
 Others there were, whose names are not given, who came 
 among the very first, and who were persons of prominence and 
 piety. The names here given are put down alphabetically, and 
 not in the order of the time of said persons coming to the 
 country, nor in the order of the time of their attaching them- 
 selves to the Church. 
 
 Andrew, Capel, and Mellard had been members of the South 
 Carolina Conference and influential men in the itinerant ranks, 
 but they had located, and then had emigrated to Alabama. 
 Perhaps Mellard was the last of the three to take up his abode 
 in the beautiful land of Alabama, and he is said to have come 
 to the State by 1821. He preached in Montgomery, August 
 
 26, 1821. 
 
 The Eev. Moses Andrew was born in Georgia, and was for 
 four years, or from December, 1808, till December, 1812, an itin- 
 erant preacher in the pastoral work, during which time he was 
 ordained deacon and elder. He came to Alabama in 1820. In 
 1823 he was a citizen of the town of Montgomery. In 1826 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 185 
 
 and 1827 he lived at or near the town of Coosauda. He lived, 
 first and last^ in various places in that section of Alabama. He 
 was a physician as well as a local preacher, following his pro- 
 fession while he lived in Alabama. He was a popular physi- 
 cian and an eminent preacher. He was a successful champion 
 of the divine cause. He was a zealous and an able defender of 
 the doctrines and polity of the Methodist Episcopal Church to 
 the day of his death. He resisted with all his power and influ- 
 ence the disruption of the Church, inaugurated, fostered, and 
 consummated by the Eeformers or the Protestant Metho- 
 dists. He was a kinsman of Bishop James O. Andrew. He 
 was something above medium height and of consumptive 
 mold. He died and was buried near where the town of Haynes- 
 ville now is, in 1834. He died of consumption in his forty- 
 fourth year. 
 
 The Eev. Britton Capel came to Alabama in company with 
 William Graves, the father of the Eev. Peyton Smith Graves, 
 in perhaps the latter part of 1817. Capel settled seven or 
 eight miles south of the Alabama Eiver and two or three miles 
 west of Pintlala Creek, and in the bounds of what was then 
 Montgomery County, and in the bounds of Lowndes Coun- 
 ty when that county was organized. For eleven years he was 
 an itinerant preacher. He was received on trial in the South 
 Carolina Conference in January, 1799, and was received into 
 full connection in that Conference and ordained deacon in Jan- 
 uary, 1801, and was ordained elder in January, 1803. In 1805 
 and 1806 he was presiding elder of the Selueda District, with 
 Charleston as one of the pastoral charges in the District, and in 
 1807, 1808, and 1809 he was presiding elder of the Ogeechee 
 District, with Augusta as one of the pastoral charges of the 
 District. At the Conference in December, 1809, he located. He 
 was a local preacher in the Alabama Circuit eight or ten years. 
 The Eev. John Du Bois, who knew him in Alabama, and heard 
 him preach in the Alabama Circuit, says: 
 
 " Eev. Britton Capel was a preacher of the primitive type, 
 but a man of moving powers. He was not exactly ubiquitous, 
 but was a sort of ecclesiastical wanderer, that went about sow- 
 ing the seeds of kindness and gospel truth, with the eloquence 
 of a pious soul. 
 
 " His advent into a neighborhood was hailed with delight by 
 
 {:■ 
 
186 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 all good persons, and was to them the harbinger of a spiritual 
 feast. His visits were never long, but their impressions were 
 deep and lasting. At the family altar, in the social circle, and 
 along the dusty highway, he labored to do good and honor the 
 Master. His manners were pleasant and simple, his life consist- 
 ent and pure. As a faithful servant he found peace in the vine- 
 yard of the Lord, and delighted in the sanctuary of the Most 
 High. The pulpit seemed to be his native element; and though 
 simplicity marked his efforts, the genius of eloquence possessed 
 
 him." 
 
 More will be said of him hereafter in another connection. 
 Graves who came with Capel to Alabama settled on the Ala- 
 bama River a few miles below the town of Washington and es- 
 tablished a ferry on that river which was called by his name. 
 As stated in another connection the first Camp-ground estab- 
 lished in Autauga County was established near his place in the 
 latter part of 1820 and named Graves's Camp-ground. 
 
 The Rev. Peyton Bibb, and his brother who was the Govern- 
 or of the Alabama Territory, and the first Governor of the 
 State of Alabama, moved to Alabama when it was a Territory, 
 and they settled in the vicinity of Coosauda town. 
 
 Mark Howard moved to the section now embraced in Autau- 
 ga County before the county was made, and while Alabama was 
 a Territory Leonidas Howard, the son of Mark Howard, who 
 lives now near Mulberry, Autauga County, Alabama, and in the 
 same neighborhood in which he has lived more than seventy 
 years, and who was born in Georgia September 13, 1816, recol- 
 lects being baptized in Autauga County, Alabama, in 1820, by 
 the Rev. Alexander Talley, and recollects seeing his father bap- 
 tized the same day by the same preacher. The son was bap- 
 tized by sprinkling, the father was baptized by immersion. 
 
 James Howard moved to the town of Washington in January, 
 1818, and joined the Church there in 1821. James E. Nicholson, 
 William Hester, and Stephen Pierce moved to the town of 
 Washington about the same time James Howard did, and they 
 and their wives were members of the Church there. Thomas 
 Smith moved to that section of country in January, 1818. 
 
 The Mims brothers, all except Seaborn, moved to the vicinity 
 of Yernon in 1820. John Du Bois, Thomas C. Ledbetter, 
 Thomas E. Ledbetter, and Joseph W. Houck took up abode at 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 187 
 
 Vernon and vicinity in January, 1821. William McPherson 
 came in 1822. 
 
 The Methodist and Baptist Churches were co-etaneous in that 
 section of the country, and the Baptists there were the most 
 persistent antagonists with which the Methodists had to con- 
 tend. In the month of January, 1819, the Rev. Alexander Tal- 
 ley reached the Alabama River, when and where he commenced 
 his ministry to the settlers thereabout. History asserts that 
 "Elim," a Baptist church, was "nearly six miles" from the 
 town of Montgomery, and north-east from the town, and that it 
 was the " first Christian Church " established in " Montgomery 
 County," and, moreover, that it was constituted "June 19, 1819, 
 by a Presbytery consisting of the Rev. James McLemore, and 
 Electius Thompson." The Baptist historian also states that 
 the "Alabama Baptist Association was constituted December 
 13, 1819, of four churches, Antioch, Bethel, Elim, and Reho- 
 both, all of Montgomery County," and that " in 1820 Union and 
 Swift Creek churches, in Autauga " County " were received " 
 into the Association. The data here furnished show that the 
 Rev. Alexander Talley, the Methodist preacher, was at work in 
 that region a few months before any Baptist Church was or- 
 ganized therein, and that in the outline of their work the two 
 Churches, the Methodists and the Baptists, commenced their 
 operations and planted their organizations there about the same 
 time. 
 
 The Rev. L. C. Davis was the first Moderator of the "Alabama 
 Baptist Association," and he presided over its deliberations two 
 of its annual sessions in succession. The style of the men who 
 at that time composed that Association may be known by the 
 style of the man chosen as their Moderator, and the style of 
 Moderator may be gathered from the appellation given him; he 
 was commonly called " Club Axe Davis." 
 
 The Baptists in that day and in that section, as well as in 
 other sections, boasted of their ignorance, and set forth said 
 ignorance as the evidence of their Christian merit, and as an 
 evidence that they were in the apostolic succession, and that as 
 preachers they had a divine call, and belonged to a scriptural 
 ministry. They proscribed learning and set a premium upon 
 illiteracy. They interpreted Paul's words, "Let every man 
 abide in the same calling wherein he was called," as meaning: 
 
188 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Let every man who is called of God to preach who was not edu- 
 cated before his call remain uneducated. They insisted with 
 no little pertinacity that whom God called to preach he would 
 qualify for the work of the ministry, and that without educa- 
 tion, without reading, and without study. They maintained 
 with a tenacity worthy of a better cause than one founded in 
 ignorance that the preacher called of God would have nothing 
 to do but to open his mouth and God would fill it wnth suitable 
 words. It was a common occurrence in that time and country 
 for Baptist preachers in their public harangues in the pulpit to 
 boast that they were not "college bred." They have been 
 known to assert in the delivery of their sermons that they had 
 " never swallowed a dictionary," or as they pronounced it a 
 "dixonary." They have been known commonly to announce 
 to their audience that they "did not know where or what their 
 text for the hour was, nor what they were going to say 
 about it, that they would speak as the Lord directed them." 
 The truth of the declaration that they did not know what they 
 were going to say in the interpretation of the text was usually 
 demonstrated, but it was not always manifest that the Lord 
 guided them in what they said. 
 
 The Baptists were Calvinists, Fatalists, Antinomians. They 
 stated in their creeds and asserted in their pulpits, not in very 
 scholarly terms, nor in very elegant diction, nor in very elevated 
 style, but in very positive words, that God did, from all eterni- 
 ty, by his determinate counsel and foreknowledge, and that 
 without any reference to contingencies and conditions, fore-dr- 
 dain whatsoever comes to pass; and that God did, by a decree 
 by him made before the foundations of the world were laid, and 
 made according to his eternal and immutable purpose, predesti- 
 nate a certain and definite number of persons to everlasting 
 life, and fore-ordain and reprobate a certain and definite number 
 to everlasting death ; and that the elect have been redeemed by 
 Christ, and will be irresistibly and effectually called, and, that 
 having been given in covenant to the Son by the Father from 
 eternity, they cannot totally and finally fall away; and that the 
 reprobate, left out of the eternal covenant of grace, are not re- 
 deemed by Christ, and nothing can be done for their salvation. 
 With the doctrines of divine sovereignty, human bondage, lim- 
 ited atonement, absolute decrees, irresistible grace, personal and 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 189 
 
 predetermined election and reprobation the Baptists fought 
 most valiantly against the establishment of Methodism. They 
 fought with a zeal which indicated that they earnestly desired 
 to contribute to the consummation of the decrees so absolute in 
 their nature and so ancient in their origin. These Baptists have 
 been known to occupy the hours allotted to the public services 
 of the Sabbath in trying to prove that from eternity it had been 
 predetermined just how, where, and when every one should be 
 born and should die. They would harangue interminably to 
 show that the very time and manner of one's death were fixed 
 from before all worlds, and that no course of conduct and no 
 fortuitous circumstances would or could have anything to do in 
 the termination of life. They would caricature the doctrines of 
 Arminianism, and ridicule the experiences and denounce the 
 professions of Methodists. They opposed and denounced the 
 class-meetings, the love-feasts, and the prayer meetings held by 
 the Methodists, and also their custom of holding divine services 
 at night. They charged that the class-meetings and love-feasts 
 were held for inquisitorial and dissolute purposes, and that night 
 services were occasions for carrying forward works of darkness 
 and committing deeds of evil. One of the worst offenses, as they 
 esteemed it, which they charged against the Methodists was that 
 they had made a Bible of their own, and one to suit themselves 
 and with which to vindicate their many heresies. The basis 
 for this charge was that Mr. Wesley had made and published a 
 translation of the New Testament. For this act these Baptists 
 fulminated their anathemas against the Methodists, and sus- 
 tained their denunciations with the words of Revelation: "For 
 I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy 
 of this book. If any man shall add unto these things, God shall 
 add unto him the plagues that are written in this book; and if 
 any man shall take away from the words of the book of this 
 prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, 
 and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written 
 in this book." 
 
 Those Baptists claimed to be, in some sense, the successors 
 of John the Baptist, and they were persistent in anathematiz- 
 ing the followers of Mr. Wesley because they presumed to bap- 
 tize persons by a mode other than immersion, and because they 
 would confer baptism on children. They declared that immer- 
 
190 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 sion only is baptism, and that they considered "infant baptism 
 the most damnable " of all heresies, and that it has done more 
 to " corrupt the Church of God, and make it a den of robbers, 
 than all other inventions of the wicked one ! " They asserted that 
 there were none like the Methodists who had sold themselves to 
 work wickedness and commit abominations in the sight of the 
 Lord; and they attributed to the Methodists the characteristics 
 of the woman seen in the Apocalyptic vision upon whose " fore- 
 head was a name written. Mystery, Babylon the great, the 
 mother of harlots and abominations of the earth." Many of 
 these Antinomians would not attend any of the services of the 
 Methodists lest they might thereby partake of the grievous 
 crime of bidding them God speed. 
 
 The preachers on the Alabama Circuit were: 1820, Thomas 
 Nixon, Thomas Clinton; 1821, Nicholas Mclntyre; 1822, Mere- 
 dith Renneau, Nicholas T. Snead, Peyton S. Graves. This year 
 and this appointment closed the work of the Eev. Meredith 
 Renneau in Alabama; and also closed the itinerant ministry of 
 the Rev. Nicholas T. Snead. Mr. Renneau had served one year 
 on the Cahawba Circuit, and one year on the Tombecbee Cir- 
 cuit. For two years he filled appointments in the State of 
 Mississippi, and then located at the close of 1824. Mr. Snead 
 was two years on trial and both years was in Alabama. He was 
 discontinued at the end of his year on the Alabama Circuit. 
 He was never in full connection in the Conference. 
 
 But to proceed with the preachers on the Alabama Circuit; 
 they were: 1823, Joshua Boucher, Eugene V. LeVert; 1824, 
 Samuel Patton, Richard Pipkin. 
 
 This closed the last and the third year of the Rev. Samuel 
 Patton in Alabama. For 1822 and 1823 he was in charge of 
 the Tuskaloosa Circuit. While he served the Tuskaloosa Cir- 
 cuit he was a single man. At the close of his term there in- 
 stead of going to the session of the Mississippi Conference 
 which met at Natchez, Mississippi, December 25, 1823, he went 
 in the month of November to Sullivan County, Tennessee, 
 where on the 27th of that month he consummated an engage- 
 ment which he had with Miss Nancy Morrison, and entered into 
 the holy bonds of matrimony. He reached his field of labor so 
 soon as he could after the announcement of the appointment 
 and commenced his ministry on the Alabama Circuit. He and 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 191 
 
 his wife boarded for the year with Sister Ledbetter at the town 
 of Washington, Autauga County, and he moved around the Cir- 
 cuit with his accustomed zeal and success. 
 
 At the close of the year's work Brother Patton repaired to 
 the town of Tuskaloosa, Tuskaloosa County, Alabama, where 
 the Mississippi Conference assembled December 22, 1824, 
 Bishop Joshua Soule presiding. At that session of the Confer- 
 ence he was ordained an elder by Bishop Soule, and he located 
 for the purpose, though it was a little irregular, of going to the 
 Holston Conference. He reentered the itinerant ministry at 
 the Holston Conference at the close of 1825. His official rela- 
 tions to Alabama Methodism commenced and terminated in the 
 bounds of the Tuskaloosa Circuit. His ministry in Alabama 
 was laborious and efficient. In the Holston Conference his 
 ministry was long and useful. He was a leader in Israel, a 
 good and great man. 
 
 In the house of Sister Ledbetter, at the town of Washington, 
 Autauga County, Alabama, on September 19, 1824, was born to 
 the Rev. Samuel Patton and Nancy Patton their first child, a 
 son, and to the boy they gave the name of James Otterbein. 
 He was named Otterbein for William Otterbein, the native 
 German, the profound scholar, the able divine, the eloquent 
 preacher, and the founder of the Church known as the "United 
 Brethren in Christ." This James Otterbein Patton, born at 
 the junction of the Alabama River and the Autauga Creek, and 
 brought up in the Holston country, has long been a consistent 
 Methodist and a useful man. He still lives, and is at present 
 and has been for years a citizen of his native State. 
 
 Preachers for Alabama Circuit were: 1825, Marcus C. Hen- 
 derson, James Nicholson. Henderson located at the close of 
 1825. He was admitted on trial in the Mississippi Conference 
 at the close of 1822. He was on Jones's Yalley Circuit for 1824. 
 
 For Alabama Circuit: 1826, Thomas Clinton, John O. T. 
 Hawkins. This was the second and the last year of Hawkins in 
 Alabama. The year before this he was on the Tuskaloosa Cir- 
 cuit, and after 1826 he passed out of Alabama into the State of 
 Mississippi. 
 
 Preachers on the Alabama Circuit were: 1827, Hugh Mc- 
 Phail, James A. Hughes; 1828, James H. Mellard, Peyton S. 
 Graves. 
 
s 
 
 192 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 193 
 
 The year 1828 and the work od the Alabama Circuit for that 
 year closed the ministerial labors of the Kev. Peyton S. Graves, 
 in connection with the Methodist Episcopal Church. It was at 
 Graves's Camp-ground in the bounds of the Alabama Circuit, 
 and under the ministrations of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 in 1820, as has been stated on a previous page, that Peyton 
 Smith Graves professed the attainment of religion and was re- 
 ceived into the Church; and it was on the Alabama Circuit in 
 1828 that he closed the work of the ministry in the Church 
 under whose auspices he was inducted into the Christian re- 
 ligion. How sad one feels as the history of that gifted man 
 passes in review! December 25, 1828, the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence met at Tuskaloosa, Alabama. The General Minutes for 
 that session of the Conference contains the following record: 
 "Who have been expelled from the connection this year? 
 Peyton S. Graves." Falsehood and fraud were the charges 
 formulated against him. To these charges he did not respond, 
 but while they were pending he joined the party known as the 
 "Eeformers." Nevertheless the Mississippi Annual Confer- 
 ence, to which he belonged, and to which he was properly 
 amenable at the time the charges were instituted against him, 
 proceeded, as of legal right and of ecclesiastical duty, with the 
 investigation of said charges, and expelled him from the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church. The Keformers gave him shield and 
 shelter, and he became an earnest and active advocate of the 
 (laims of that party, and a zealous persecutor of the Methodist 
 
 Episcopal Church. 
 
 Preachers on the Alabama Circuit were: 1829, Joseph Mc- 
 Dowell, Nathan Hopkins; 1830, James A. Hughes, David Bar- 
 On July 2, 1830, the Rev. James A. Hughes, writing from 
 Autauga County, Alabama, then in the bounds of his Circuit, 
 stated: "We have received above one hundred members since 
 our last Conference." Truly their labors were blessed of God 
 and crowned with success. 
 
 The Rev. James A. Hughes was a native of Tennessee, joined 
 the Church in Alabama, and was received on trial in the Mis- 
 sissippi Conference, and was appointed to the Alabama Cir- 
 cuit for 1827, when in the nineteenth year of his age. He was 
 then two years on the Conecuh Circuit, then back again on the 
 
 Alabama Circuit in the twenty-third year of his age. His last 
 appointment was Washington, Mississippi, for 1831. That year 
 he died. He was ordained an elder at the close of his last year 
 on the Alabama Circuit. He was modest in his bearing, dili- 
 gent in his work, patient in his sufferings, and triumphant in 
 his death. 
 
 The preachers on the Alabama Circuit were: 1831, Benjamin 
 r. Coxe, Francis H. Jones. 
 
 That was the first and last year of the Rev. Benjamin F. 
 Coxe in Alabama. He was admitted on trial in the Mississippi 
 Conference at the close of 1828, and he located at the close of 
 1832, having been ordained an elder at the same time. 
 
 The preachers for the Alabama Circuit were: 1832, Daniel 
 D. Brewer, Paul F. Stearnes. 
 
 That was the last year the Rev. Daniel D. Brewer was in 
 Alabama. He was on the Marengo Circuit in 1830. Pie was 
 born in North Carolina, what year is not known, and was 
 brought into the kingdom of light in Louisiana in the year 
 1827. At the close of 1828 he was admitted on trial in the 
 Mississippi Conference. He died in the bounds of the Rapides 
 Circuit, Louisiana District, in 1833. His talents were not of 
 brilliant order, his ministry was limited to five brief years, but 
 he was preeminently successful, and had many seals to his min- 
 istry. Though the illness which terminated his life was pro- 
 tracted and severe, his death was peaceful and triumphant. 
 
 Previous to 1832 there was no provision for giving in the 
 General Minutes any financial statistics. Previous to that pe- 
 riod there was no published item which showed the permanent 
 results achieved, or indicated the real progress made by the 
 Church, except what was given in answer to the thirteenth ques- 
 tion: "What numbers are in Society?" At the session of the 
 Mississippi Conference held at Midway, commencing November 
 17, 1820, the first report of the members in Society in the Ala- 
 bama Circuit was made, and the report showed that there were 
 two hundred and fifty-five white and twenty-one colored mem- 
 bers in that Circuit at that date. The report made at the ses- 
 sion of the Conference held at John McRea's, Chickasawhay 
 River, December 5, 1822, shows that at that time there were in 
 the bounds of the Alabama Circuit, thirteen hundred and nine- 
 ty-four white and eighty-four colored members. That was the 
 13 
 
194 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 largest number of white members ever reported on that Circuit, 
 though not the largest number of colored members. For the 
 next year, the year 1823, there were reported on that Circuit 
 only six huudred and thirty-nine white and one hundred and 
 thirty-eight colored members. The increase for 1822 was un- 
 precedented, and the decrease following the next year was, per- 
 haps, unparalleled. The special influences which contributed 
 to the unusual increase the one year and the extraordinary de- 
 crease the other year, are at this date unknown. Perhaps they 
 were not apparent causes. Without tracing all the fluctuations 
 of the membership in all the intervening years, suffice it to state 
 that at the close of 1832 there were five hundred and ten white 
 and one hundred and eighty-six colored members in the Ala- 
 bama Circuit. 
 
 CHAPTEE yill. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work of 
 
 Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 FOR 1820 no new pastoral charges were organized in Alaba- 
 ma, and only two were organized for 1821. These two new 
 Circuits for that year were Jackson and Conecuh. The Jackson 
 Circuit, so named because it occupied the County of Jackson, 
 Alabama, was in the extreme northern part of the State, and the 
 Conecuh Circuit was in the extreme southern part of the State, 
 just above the line of Florida. Jackson Circuit was in the Ten- 
 nessee District in the Tennessee Conference, and the Conecuh 
 Circuit was in the Alabama District in the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence. 
 
 While the Jackson Circuit was in the list of appointments for 
 1821, no preacher of the Conference was appointed to it for that 
 year, and the data are not at hand to ascertain who served it. 
 No doubt it was supplied and served in some way, either by a 
 local preacher or by an itinerant preacher in proximity to it, 
 under the direction of the presiding elder. At the end of that 
 year, as the statistics show, there were one hundred and fifty 
 white members in its bounds. 
 
 For 1822 Elias Tidwell and Richard Neely were appointed to 
 Jackson, and at the end of the year they reported to the Annual 
 Conference two hundred and thirty-one white members under 
 their jurisdiction. 
 
 Thomas A. Young and Greenberry Garrett were assigned to 
 Jackson Circuit for 1823. At the end of that year there were 
 three hundred and fourteen white and twenty colored members 
 in Society on that Circuit. That year closed the ministerial 
 work of the Rev. Thomas A. Young in Alabama. He was a 
 preacher of some ability, but, having married, he located at the 
 close of 1826, and went into seclusion. 
 
 For 1824 the appointments read: Jackson, James McFerrin, 
 Arthur McClure. That was the first year of the itinerant min- 
 istry of the Rev. James McFerrin. He had been living, as a 
 
 (195) 
 
196 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 local preacher, one or two years at or near Belle Fontte, and m the 
 bounds of the Jackson Circuit; and he and those of his family 
 who then had membership in the Church held their member- 
 ship in the Jackson Circuit. This James McFerrin was the fa- 
 ther of the Eev. John Berry McFerrin, who afterward filled so 
 many prominent places in the Church. 
 
 For 1825 the appointments read: Jackson, James McFerrin, 
 Alexander L. P. Green. That was the lirst appointment received 
 by the Eev. A. L. P. Green as an itinerant preacher. That year 
 there were in the Jackson Circuit those destined to bo historic 
 men: James McFerrin, A. L. P. Green, John B. McFerrin. 
 John B. McFerrin was then a young man, under his majority, 
 livincr with his father at or near Belle Fontte, and having his 
 ChuiTh membership in one of the Societies of the Jackson Cir- 
 cuit, under the pastoral oversight of his father. That year he 
 was licensed to preach. 
 
 The next year, 1826, the appointments were: Jackson, George 
 W Morris, Alexander L. P. Green. In 1825 the membership in- 
 creased from four hundred and five white and thirty colored to 
 seven hundred and thirty-two white and thirty colored members. 
 For 1826 there were only eight white and thirty-two colored 
 members more than there were the year before. 
 
 For 1827 the following were the appointments: Jackson, 
 Thomas M. King, James E. Brown, Eichard Neely, Sup. That 
 was King s first and last appointment as an itinerant preacher. 
 
 The preachers for Jackson Circuit for 1828 were: George W. 
 Morris, Samuel E. Davidson, Sup.; 1829, Jacob Ellinger; 1830, 
 Nathan S. Johnson, Isaac H. Harris. 
 
 The Jackson Circuit was the first and the last work in Alaba- 
 ma committed to the Eev. Nathan S. Johnson and the Eev. 
 Isaac H. Harris. Johnson was admitted on trial into the Ken- 
 tucky Conference at the close of 1826, and Harris had just 
 been received on trial in the Tennessee Conference when he was 
 appointed to the Jackson Circuit. After 1830 these two men 
 had appointments in the bounds of the State of Tennessee, and 
 they both located at the close of 1834 
 
 The preachers for Jackson Circuit were: 1831, Hiram M. 
 Glass, Asbury Davidson; 1832, Elisha J. Dodson, Eobert 
 
 Gregory. 
 
 The Jackson Circuit was the last appointment served in Ala- 
 
 TJie Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 197 
 
 bama by the Eev. Elisha J. Dodson. He w^as a native of North 
 Carolina. He was carried by his father in the days of his child- 
 hood to Kentucky. He was trained, under his parents, in the 
 Calvinistic doctrines, but he was led away from the doctrines in 
 which he was early trained by Camp-meeting influences with 
 which he came in contact under the auspices of Methodism. 
 About the time he reached his majority, while attending a Camp- 
 meeting, he experienced in his own heart the saving power of 
 the gospe), and soon after joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. When about thirty years of age he w\as licensed to 
 l^reach, and for ten years he was a local preacher, a part of 
 which time he lived in Madison County, Alabama. In Decem- 
 ber, 1828, when he only lacked till March 31, 1829, of being 
 forty-one years old, he was admitted on trial in the Tennessee 
 Conference. He served as an itinerant preacher in Alabama 
 four years; two years he was on the Lawrence Circuit, one year 
 on the Madison Circuit, and, as above stated, one year on the 
 Jackson Circuit. The other appointments which he filled were 
 in the State of Tennessee. He died while serving the Bedford 
 Circuit, July 29, 1812. As a minister of the gospel he was able, 
 zealous, and successful. As a man he was amiable and cheer- 
 ful. When the final issue came upon him he expressed resig- 
 nation to the will of God, and readiness to live or die. He 
 joined the throng who live and reign with Christ on shores 
 immortal. 
 
 The Eev. Eobert Gregory closed his w^ork in Alabama at the 
 end of a term of two years, 1832, 1833, on the Jackson Circuit. 
 He was on the Lawrence Circuit the year before he went to the 
 Jackson Circuit. He was admitted on trial in the Tennessee 
 Conference at the close of 1829, and continued in the itinerant 
 ministry until the close of 1844, and was a part of the time in 
 the Arkansas and the Memphis Conferences. He was presiding 
 elder for a few years in Arkansas. 
 
 At the close of 1832 there were in the bounds of the Jackson 
 Circuit five hundred and twenty-five white and thirty-eight col- 
 ored members. 
 
 Belle Fontte, Bolivar, Doran's Cove, Maynard's Cove, Steven- 
 son, and Blue Spring, east of Santa Creek, were central in the 
 Jackson Circuit. 
 
 While the Conecuh Circuit appeared in the list of appoint- 
 
•■■ 
 
 198 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 199 
 
 ments for the first time for 1821, having been pat down as an 
 appointment at the session of the Mississippi Conference com- 
 mencing November 17, 1820, it had been previously surveyed 
 prepara'tory to its organization, and it was reported then to have 
 two hundred and sixty-eight white and fifty colored members 
 
 within its bounds. 
 
 At its first organization the Conecuh Circuit embraced nearly 
 all Conecuh County, and a very large part of Monroe County, 
 and extended, if not at first, afterward into Baldwin County, and 
 irto Butler County. The central points at which Societies were 
 organized in the beginning of the work on that Circuit were 
 Sardis, at or near Bellville, Claiborne, Mount Zion, and a Soci- 
 ety in Burnt Corn neighborhood, afterward called Puryearville. 
 In after years Monroeville, Khode's Church, on Eandon's Creek, 
 Henderson's Church, near Mount Pleasant, all three in Monroe 
 County, Davis's Church, near Montgomery Hill in Baldwin 
 County, Thick Woods, about one mile west of the present town 
 of Evergreen in Conecuh County, and Concord, in the Forks of 
 Sepulga, were appointments on the Conecuh Circuit. 
 
 The'Society in the neighborhood of Burnt Corn w^as near the 
 line of Monroe and Conecuh Counties, and Isaac Betts, George 
 AVatson, and Mrs. Puryear were leading members there. The 
 Ptev. James King was a member there from the beginning of 
 1821 to perhaps 1834 
 
 On the road leading from Pine Orchard to Claiborne, and 
 
 passing between Limestone and Flat Creeks was Mount Zion. 
 
 There Is only a scrap of the history of Mount Zion preserved, 
 
 and that shows that the first house of worship built there became 
 
 a rendezvous for hogs, and became infested with fleas, and that 
 
 the last religious service held in that house was held in 1835, 
 
 and consisted of a single prayer offered, under great difficulties, 
 
 by the preacher in charge of the Circuit, for the edification of 
 
 three devout members of his flock, and that an effort to cleanse 
 
 the house of the Lord by fire resulted in its reduction to ashes. 
 
 The scrap of history is given here from the manuscript of the 
 
 Kev. A. C. Eamsey with slight emendation: "There stood an 
 
 old church on the road leading from Pine Orchard to Claiborne 
 
 called * Mount Zion,' which was dilapidated, almost forsaken; 
 
 hogs had been sleeping under it for months, probably for years. 
 
 OiTone of my rounds I was accompanied by old Brother Nathan 
 
 Sirmon. On the day which I was to preach at Mount Zion he 
 and I rode up to the place and hitched our horses near the 
 church. By the time we had dismounted and removed our sad- 
 dles the horses began to stamp and move about, but to this we 
 gave no particular concern. Two women, who with Brother 
 Sirmon and me, constituted the entire congregation of the day, 
 were sitting in the door of the church, and as we approached the 
 door in which they were sitting they said to us, *If you do not 
 mind you will get fieas on you; there are lots of them here.' 
 This warning induced a survey of the situation, and the fact 
 was revealed that we were already literally covered with the 
 agile insects. My buffalo -rug and my saddle-bags, each end of 
 which was covered with bear-skin, which I had on my arm, 
 furnished ample concealment for innumerable of these pestifer- 
 ous creatures. So soon as the true situation had transpired I 
 said to Brother Sirmon, * Let us leave here.* He replied, * O 
 no, not until we have prayers. We must not let the devil run 
 us off with fleas.' I yielded to his sentiment, and we had a 
 prayer, which was offered while fighting and scratching. The 
 prayer over, we left the infested place, as soon as we could. 
 Brother Sirmon and I took to the woods, and under cover of 
 the forest growth we knocked off and killed many of the an- 
 noying creatures which had secreted themselves in our clothes 
 and had crowded our saddle-bags, saddle-blankets, and buffalo- 
 ruo- though it took at least a week to get entirely rid of the 
 troublesome creatures. We spent the night in the community 
 Avith Brother Stacy. I did not leave another appointment at 
 that Meeting-house, but moved the preaching place to Brother 
 Stacy's residence. The citizens undertook finally to destroy 
 the fleas at the Meeting-house, and they succeeded effectually. 
 The house was a little distance from the ground. They scat- 
 tered a considerable quantity of pine straw under the house 
 and set it afire. The flames burned up the old house, fleas, 
 and all." The Rev. A. C. Ramsey, from whom the above nar- 
 rative has been secured, was the preacher in charge of the 
 Conecuh Circuit at the time the incidents here recorded took 
 place, which was in the year 1835. 
 
 Claiborne was the most aspiring place in the Conecuh Cir- 
 cuit. Twice in the first decade of its existence as a Society did 
 Claiborne attempt to be a Station and have a preacher all its 
 
200 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 201 
 
 own, once io 1827, and again in 1830, but it did not succeed in 
 this attempt but a year at a time, before 18-10. 
 
 About the time the preachers for the Conecuh Circuit for 
 1822 reached the work, the Methodists had a royal day in 
 Claiborne. Bishop Enoch George, on his way from Washing- 
 ton, Mississippi, where he had held the session of the Missis- 
 sippi Conference, to Augusta, Georgia, where he was to hold 
 the South Carolina Conference, made his advent in the town of 
 Claiborne, and there tarried and preached and administered the 
 affairs of the Church committed to his hands; in testimony 
 whereof is the following credential: "KNOW ALL MEN BY 
 THESE PKESENTS, That I, Enoch George, one of the Bish- 
 ops of the Methodist Episcopal Church in America, under the 
 protection of ALMIGHTY GOD, and with a single eye to his 
 Glory, by the imposition of my hands and prayer (being assist- 
 ed by the Elders present) have this day set apart Lewis Pipkin 
 for the office of an Elder in the said Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, a man whom I judge to be well qualified for that work: 
 And I do hereby recommend him to all whom it may concern, 
 as a proper person to administer the Sacraments and Ordi- 
 nances, and to feed the flock of Christ. IN TESTIMONY 
 WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and seal, this 1st 
 day of January, in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight 
 hundred and twenty-two. Enoch George. 
 
 " Claiborne, Alabama." 
 
 Bishop George passed through Claiborne a number of times 
 on his way to and from the Conferences over which he presided. 
 
 The Church at or near Bellville was called Sardis, and was 
 one of the strongest Societies belonging to the Conecuh Circuit. 
 In that Church in 1822 Bishop Enoch George set apart the 
 Rev. James King, a local preacher, for the office of an elder in 
 the Church of God. It is evident, therefore, that on one occa- 
 sion Bishop George favored the Church at Bellville with his 
 presence and ministry, and may have done so on more than one 
 occasion. 
 
 For nearly a quarter of a century or more Lewis Pipkin, a 
 local preacher, and a farmer by secular occupation, was a lead- 
 ing and an influential member at Sardis. Perhaps, he was a 
 member at its organization. It is probable that he gathered 
 the first Methodist Class ever formed at that place. 
 
 I 
 
 The Rev. Lewis Pipkin was born in Wayne County, North 
 Carolina, 1777. He removed from his native State to South 
 Carolina, but at what date is not accurately given. From South 
 Carolina he moved to Alabama, and settled, as has already been 
 intimated, at what was afterward called Bellville, but in what 
 year is not reliably stated, probably in 1816, certainly before 
 1822. The year 1846 found him a citizen, with the privileges of 
 a citizen, of what was then Ouachita and what is now Nevada 
 County, Arkansas. In that county and State, and in the last 
 months of 1864 or the first months of 1865 he died. His body 
 sleeps in the grave-yard at Mount Vernon Church in the county 
 and State above given. 
 
 It cannot be stated authoritatively at what time Brother Pip- 
 kin joined the Church, or at what time he was licensed to 
 preach. He was set apart for the office of a deacon by Bishop 
 Francis Asbury at Columbia, South Carolina, December 25, 1810. 
 His parchment for a deacon, given him by Bishop Asbury, and 
 now in hand, is authority for this statement. As already stated 
 he was ordained an elder by Bishop George at Claiborne, Ala- 
 bama, January 1, 1822. 
 
 In his mature years the Rev. Lewis Pipkin was in height 
 five feet ten inches, with erect form, and weighing about one 
 hundred and seventy pounds. He had blue eyes, fair complex- 
 ion, light brown hair, and a prominent forehead. He was of 
 sanguine temperament He was not given to despondency, but 
 was always hopeful and cheerful. He was affable without levity, 
 and dignified and serious without moroseness. He was as meek 
 as Moses, as pathetic as Jeremiah, as devout as Cornelius, and as 
 rapturous as Paul. 
 
 Throughout his long life, even in his old age, when he was 
 blind and had to be led to the grove by another, he had his reg- 
 ular hours for secret prayer. It was no uncommon thing for 
 him to be overcome in the public worship with emotion, and for 
 his hearty shouts to attest the joy which filled his soul. Often 
 he would break forth in singing the sacred songs w^hich expressed 
 his love for Jesus, and which gave vent to his blissful anticipa- 
 tions. It was no uncommon thing for him to stand and exhort 
 and entreat sinners in persuasive tones and with eyes suffused 
 with tears. 
 
 His style as a preacher was plain and succinct. His manner 
 
202 
 
 History of Metliodism in Alabama. 
 
 was deeply earnest, and his preaching was truly edifyiog. He 
 was familiar with the Scriptures, and understood the literature, 
 doctrines, and polity of the Church. 
 
 He was abundant in labors as a local preacher in the bounds 
 of the Conecuh Circuit throughout the years he lived at Bell- 
 ville, and his personal and ministerial influence was extensive 
 and salutary. His character was admired, and his example was 
 
 commended. 
 
 The Eev. Barnabas Pipkin and the Eev. Stephen Pipkin, once 
 members of the Mississippi Conference, were his brothers. 
 
 In his twenty-second year Lewis Pipkin married Miss Fari- 
 bey Beasley, a woman worthy of him, an honor and a help to 
 him. She was industrious and discreet. Her personal charac- 
 ter was lovely, and her Christian life a benediction. In the dy- 
 ing moment her faith and peace abounded, and words of praise 
 to'^God were on her lips. She died in 1856, and her mortal 
 body rests in the grave-yard of Mount Yernon Church in Arkan- 
 sas. Brother and Sister Pipkin brought up ten children of 
 their own, four sons and six daughters; and every one of them 
 joined the Methodist Church, and honored their parents and 
 their Church, and lived lives devoted to God. There is a con- 
 siderable tribe of the descendants of this household in Arkan- 
 sas and Texas; they are Methodists, and of the tribe a number 
 of preachers have been raised up— men of piety and of 
 
 influence. 
 
 In the neighborhood which has long been known as Forks of 
 Sepulga, at an early day, a Methodist Society was organized, 
 and by or before 1830 a house of worship was built in that 
 neighborhood in the north-eastern corner of Conecuh County, 
 and in Section twenty-six, Township eight, Eange eleven, and 
 one mile from Sepulga Post-office, and within one-half mile of 
 the residence of Nathan Sirmon, and named Concord. That 
 Church still exists, 1890, and still bears the name of Concord. 
 Nathan Sirmon, Joshua Calloway, and John Sirmon were promi- 
 nent men and members of that Society at its organization. 
 Nathan Sirmon was class-leader. Joshua Calloway and John 
 Sirmon were local preachers. 
 
 The Kev. Joshua Calloway was a holy man, and a zealous and 
 useful preacher. He often attended his appointments under in- 
 conveniences and with much fatigue, even going on foot ten and 
 
 Mj^ jj ilg j 
 
 TJie Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 203 
 
 m — - 
 
 fifteen miles. His descendants are still in the country, and 
 members of the Church at Concord. 
 
 Nathan Sirmon was a man of humble deportment, and amiable 
 disposition, who sympathized with the poor and administered to 
 the relief of the distressed. For forty-four years he was a mem- 
 ber of the Church, thirty years a class-leader, and for twenty 
 years claimed and enjoyed the special blessing of sanctification, 
 and lived a sanctified life. He was noted for integrity and pi- 
 ety. Throughout the days of his last sickness on earth he was 
 in ecstasies of joy, and on April 16, 1850, in the sixty-fourth 
 year of his age, at his home near Concord Church, he fell 
 asleep in Jesus. 
 
 The Rev. John Sirmon was the son of Nathan Sirmon, and 
 was one of the most noted men in the Forks of Sepulga. He 
 was a preacher of remarkable spiritual power. He had a good 
 report of them that were without. The descendants of Nathan 
 and John Sirmon are still in the land, and members of the 
 Methodist Church. 
 
 John Wright, Sheldrick Kendrick, James Wright, Allen Page, 
 and William Russell were leading members at Concord. John 
 Wright and his wife, the father and mother of the Rev. David 
 J. Wright now, 1890, a member of the Alabama Conference, 
 joined the Church at Concord in 1830. At the house of John 
 Wright the preachers of the Conecuh Circuit used to rest and 
 have their wants supplied and their washing done. The bless- 
 ings of God have been upon Concord, and upon the descendants 
 of those who first constituted its membership. 
 
 The first preacher ever appointed to Conecuh Circuit was 
 Thomas Clinton; and at the close of his year there he reported 
 two hundred and sixty white and one hundred and fifteen col- 
 ored members; sixty-five colored members more than were re- 
 ported to be there the year before, and eight white members 
 less. 
 
 The preachers for that Circuit for 1822 were John Booth, 
 Francis R. Cheatham. The members reported at the end of 
 that year were four hundred and twenty-one white and nineteen 
 colored, a very remarkable decrease in colored members. 
 
 The appointments for 1823 were: Conecuh, Barnabas Pipkin, 
 Sup., Elijah B. McKay. At the session of the Conference at the 
 close of that year the number of members reported for Conecuh 
 
204 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Circuit were three hundred and twenty-eight whites and eighty- 
 two colored. The Kev. Elijah B. McKay had just been admit- 
 ted on trial in the Conference when he was appointed to the 
 Conecuh Circuit, and that was the last work he served in the 
 bounds of the State of Alabama. He filled appointments in the 
 States of Mississippi and Louisiana. 
 
 For 1824: Conecuh, Zachariah Williams, Eobert L. Walker; 
 1825: John Cotton, Samuel Davis. 
 
 The Eev. Samuel Davis had just been admitted on trial in 
 the Conference when he was appointed to the Conecuh Circuit, 
 and he was discontinued at the end of the year. 
 
 The preachers for Conecuh Circuit for 1826 were: William 
 Spruill, Eichard H. Herbert. 
 
 The Conecuh Circuit and the year 1826 closed the work of the 
 Eev. Eichard H. Herbert in Alabama. At the close of 1829, 
 having attained deacon's and elder's orders, he located. 
 
 For 1827: Conecuh, Eobert L. Walker, Lewis Turner; 1828: 
 Conecuh, Henry J. Brown, James A. Hughes; 1829: Conecuh, 
 James A. Hughes, John A. Cotton. 
 
 The following letters, put in print by the Christian Advocate, 
 and Journal and Zion's Herald, transmit to this generation an 
 account of the state of religion in the Conecuh Circuit at the 
 
 dates which they bear: 
 
 "Claiborne, Alabama, June 22, 1829. 
 
 " Notwithstanding I prefer hearing to speaking, I think duty 
 calls me in thje present instance to say a little in behalf of the 
 cause of God. As I am much cheered and strengthened by the 
 good news you send us of the work of God in other places, so I 
 trust others may be refreshed by learning what he is doing for 
 us on Conecuh Circuit. Almost every appointment in the Cir- 
 cuit has been favored with an outpouring of the Spirit within 
 the last three months. One hundred and fifty have joined on 
 probation, many of whom profess to have found the pearl of 
 great price, and the others seem struggling after liberty, while 
 several backsliders have been reclaimed. Glory be to God for 
 his goodness unto the children of men. 
 
 ^ " James A. Hughes." 
 
 "Conecuh Circuit, S. Alabama, July 22, 1829. 
 **Messrs. Editors:— The dawn of what we trust will prove a 
 bright day has arisen on us. Two hundred and thirty have 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 205 
 
 been added to the Churches since the beginning of this year, 
 which is a wonderful accession compared with any former pe- 
 riod. The congregations are uncommonly numerous and atten- 
 tive. A general interest is manifested on the subject of religion. 
 It is the theme of conversation in almost every circle. It is 
 rare to see two persons together, whether of a religious or irre- 
 ligious character, but what this is the topic of discourse. The 
 professors, too, are much stirred up; and within my knowledge 
 several backsliders have been reclaimed. 
 " Yours Fraternally, W. A. Stewart." 
 
 For 1830 the appointments were: Conecuh, John A. Cotton, 
 Blanton P. Box. The following letter, put in print and pre- 
 served to the present, is the sole item which has come to hand 
 concerning the work in that Circuit for that year: 
 
 " Bellville, Alabama, July 14, 1830. 
 "The Lord is doing wonders for us here. Last Sabbath I 
 preached at Bellville to a large and attentive congregation, and 
 the Lord made bare his arm in the awakening and conversion 
 of souls. Two professed to find peace in believing. Twelve 
 joined class as seekers. May they soon find. 
 
 " J. A. Cotton.*' 
 
 The last appointment received in Alabama by the Eev. John 
 A. Cotton and by the Eev. Blanton Powell Box was the Cone- 
 cuh Circuit for 1830. Both these preachers were then on trial 
 in the Conference for the third year. At the close of that year 
 Cotton was received into full connection and ordained deacon, 
 and Box was discontinued. Box was brought np in humble 
 circumstances, and knew from his youth what it was to contend 
 with adversity. He lived for many years in the bounds of the 
 Conecuh Circuit as a local preacher, and was, for a time at 
 least, the Eecording Steward of the Circuit. He was an effi- 
 cient local preacher and an influential citizen of Conecuh 
 County, though he became embarrassed financially, and that, as 
 a matter of course, involved his influence. He finally moved to 
 the State of Arkansas, and died in Camden, Arkansas, March 
 21, 1851, in the forty-ninth year of his age. When told that he 
 must die, his reply was: "All is right! I am not taken by sur- 
 prise. I am ready to live or die." He was a native of South 
 Carolina, and he obtained a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ 
 
20G 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 in the State of Indiana, entered the ministry in Alabama, and 
 Lis body rests in the soil of Arkansas. 
 
 The Eev. John A. Cotton was for the three years succeeding 
 the last year he was on the Conecuh Circuit, appointed to serve 
 Circuits in the bounds of the State of Mississippi. At the ses- 
 sion of the Conference which met at Natchez, Mississippi, No- 
 vember 13, 1833, he was, for breach of the seventh Command- 
 ment committed by him, deprived of his ministerial office. In 
 the course of two years he was, through some process, restored 
 to the ministry and again admitted into the Mississippi Con- 
 ference on trial, and given an appointment in the State of Mis- 
 sissippi, but at the end of one year he was discontinued. His 
 light went out in uncleanness. 
 
 The Kev. John Cotton who was one of the preachers on the 
 Conecuh Circuit for 1825 must not be confounded with the 
 Eev. John A. Cotton whose fall from his ministry is here re- 
 lated; they were different men. 
 
 The preachers on the Conecuh Circuit for 1831 were : Thomas 
 Burpo and William Howie; and for 1832, Joshua Peavy and 
 Charles McCleod. 
 
 The number of members on the Conecuh Circuit at the close 
 of 1832 was five hundred and seventy-nine white and two hun- 
 dred and seven colored. 
 
 The Kev. Joshua Peavy was born in Brunswick County, 
 North Carolina, July 3, 1784. In January, 1818, he pitched his 
 tent in the County of Monroe, in the Alabama Territory. He 
 pitched his tent in that part of Monroe County which was, by 
 an act of the Legislative Council and House of Eepresentatives 
 of the Alabama Territory, passed February 13, 1818, made 
 Conecuh County. He brought with him to Alabama Territory 
 a wife and five daughters, and his eldest son was born in the 
 very same month that Conecuh County was constituted. The 
 Eev. Joshua Peavy and his family were in Conecuh County 
 nearly three years before any regular preacher was appointed 
 to the Conecuh Circuit. It is not known when or where he was 
 licensed to preach. It is said that he commenced preaching in 
 South Carolina. He was ordained deacon by Bishop Enoch 
 
 George at some point in Alabama, 11, 1821. He was 
 
 received on trial in the Mississippi Conference at the session 
 bef^inning December 25, 1828, and he was appointed for 1829 to 
 
 ■MHMII 
 
 Tlie Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 207 
 
 the Cedar Creek Circuit. At the end of 1829 he was discon- 
 tinued, and again received on trial in the Conference in No- 
 vember, 1830, and for 1831 was appointed to the Tombecbee 
 Circuit, and he was again discontinued at the session of the 
 Alabama Conference beginning November 27, 1832. That was 
 the first session of the Alabama Conference, and the last itin- 
 erant work of the Eev. Joshua Peavy. He was an elder elect 
 when he was received on trial in the Conference in November, 
 1830, and he was ordained an elder by Bishop John Emory, in 
 the city of Montgomery, Alabama, December 13, 1833. After 
 severing his connection with the Conference, which he did on 
 account of impaired health, he continued to reside in Conecuh 
 County until some time after 1835. He finally moved to AVil- 
 cox County, and settled on Gravel Creek near Mount Carmel, 
 or Gravel Creek Church. There he had his home until his 
 death. He died January 5, 1852. The Eev. A. C. Eamsey 
 preached his funeral from the text: "I have fought a good 
 fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: hence- 
 forth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which 
 the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and 
 not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing." 
 (2 Tim. iv. 7, 8.) 
 
 The Eev. Joshua Peavy was of very dark complexion, and in 
 his youth was destitute of educational facilities. It was said 
 that when he commenced preaching he commenced to educate 
 himself, and that as he was scarcely able to read he then com- 
 menced the study of the spelling book. His knowledge of the 
 science of language was ever defective. There were many 
 inaccuracies in his speech. But he was endowed with ex- 
 traordinary mental powers. He had the power of appli- 
 cation and of investigation. He had a retentive mind and a 
 thirst for knowledge. While he knew nothing of the elegance 
 of diction, and while his knowledge of his mother- tongue was 
 imperfect, yet by diligence in the acquisition of knowledge, he 
 became one of the most thorough divines in the section of 
 country in which he lived. It was generally conceded that he 
 had a thorough knowledge of the Bible, and he was considered 
 a lucid and an edifying preacher. He made extensive acquisi- 
 tions in Methodist literature. He read and in some measure 
 mastered Wesley's Sermons, Fletcher's Checks, Clarke's Com- 
 
203 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 mentaries, and Watson's Institutes. By those who associated 
 with him he was esteemed a first rate commentator. His 
 method o£ unfolding and enforcing the Scriptures was instruct- 
 ive and convincing. He made his statemeuts in concise form, 
 and his reasoning was convincing. He elucidated his themes 
 and established his propositions. He was a doctrinal preacher, 
 and had a fondness for contests and combats on controverted 
 points of doctrine. He was in the arena, and whenever the 
 doctrines which he had espoused were apsailed he engaged in 
 their defense, and he was a champion whose shield was never 
 broken, and whose cause never suffered. When he drew a 
 l^nce he transfixed his enemy. He was a master in polemics. 
 The following occurrence may serve to indicate the alacrity 
 with which he met heretics, and the zeal with which he en- 
 gaged in driving away erroneous doctrines: In 1835, while 
 Peavy still resided in Conecuh County, a preacher who was dis- 
 seminating the doctrines of Universalism, and who had previ- 
 ously resided in the North, made his advent in the community 
 of Bellville, and at once obtained permission to preach in the 
 Baptist Church in that vicinity. He advertised as extensively 
 as the facilities at his command would enable him to do, that at 
 the coming appointment he would preach on the subject of 
 Dives and Lazarus, and that the time would be devoted mainly 
 to an exposition of the language: "And in hell he lifted up his 
 eyes, being in torments." The day for the sermon arrived, the 
 people assembled, and the preacher performed his task in his 
 own way. He did, no doubt, the best he could in the defense 
 of Universalism. The Rev. Joshua Peavy made one of the 
 congregation, and heard the sermon, the purpose of which was 
 to prove that the rich man was only in the grave and not in 
 hell, a place of eternal punishment, and that Hades means only 
 the grave and Gehenna means no more than the valley on the 
 borders of Jerusalem. When the Universalist ended his ser- 
 mon the Rev. Joshua Peavy announced to the congregation 
 that he would preach on the same theme two weeks from that 
 day, and that he would refute the doctrines which had been an- 
 nounced by the Universalist preacher. He invited all the con- 
 gregation to be present to hear what he would have to say on 
 the subject, and especially requested the Universalist preacher 
 to attend and hear the sermon which would demolish his foun- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 209 
 
 dations. The news of what was to be, spread rapidly, and 
 when the day for the delivery of the sermon arrived, there was 
 a vast concourse of persons assembled — such a multitude that 
 the Methodist Church which stood near the town of Bellville, 
 where the sermon was to be preached, though it was a large 
 frame building, could not contain the congregation. Such an 
 assembly had not been seen in that section for years, if ever. 
 Seats were improvised and arranged in the grove under thi9 
 shade of the trees for the multitude, and Brother Peavy pro- 
 ceeded with the service, and delivered his sermon in the expo- 
 sition of the Scriptures descriptive of the character and fate of 
 Dives and Lazarus, and the Scriptures which pertain to the ex- 
 istence of a state of future retribution. He had selected every 
 passage and incident in the Bible which pertained to the sub- 
 ject of a future state of retribution. He had prepared himself 
 thoroughly for the work of the day. He read and commented 
 upon every passage and incident bearing on the subject in hand, 
 and then presented a powerful argument on the subject drawn 
 from the nature of God, from the nature of the divine law, 
 from the nature of sin, and from the character of the wicked. 
 For two hours he held his vast audience in silent and profound 
 attention. The Universalist preacher who had delivered the 
 sermon which Peavy was refuting was present, took notes of 
 the discourse, and afterward published in a newspaper of Uni- 
 versalist faith a reply to Peavy's sermon, but no further notice 
 was taken of the matter. The Universalist preacher soon quit 
 preaching and took up another calling. While Universalism 
 had a few adherents in that section of the State, especially 
 about Burnt Corn, the cause never prospered there from the 
 day the Rev. Joshua Peavy gave it such a refutation. 
 
 That man, the Rev. Joshua Peavy, was one of the pioneers of 
 Alabama, and as a Methodist preacher he worked in Alabama a 
 third of a century. Two of his sons, the Rev. William N. 
 Peavy and the Rev. John W. Peavy, were once members of the 
 Alabama Conference and worked in the regular pastorate for a 
 number of years. Two of his grandsons, the Rev. Joshua S. 
 Peavy and the Rev. John R. Peavy, are now members of the 
 Alabama Conference. His sons and his grandsons attained 
 good rank as preachers. 
 
 In 1821 a work was done which, though the result was a little 
 14 
 
210 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 delayed, eventuated in the organization of the Cedar Creek Cir- 
 cuit. At that time there was a section of country between the 
 Alabama, the Cahawba, the Conecuh, the Tombecbee, and the 
 Tuskaloosa Circuits, which was outside of all these pastoral 
 charges and unoccupied by any. Into that unoccupied section 
 of country, in 1821, the presiding elder of the Alabama District, 
 the Rev. Thomas Griffin, upon whose borders it lay, extended 
 his labors, and, with such of his assistant preachers as could be 
 commanded for the work, he held a number of meetings. A 
 few paragraphs from a report of that work made by the Rev. 
 Thomas Griffin, and which paragraphs are still extant, may be 
 given here. They will furnish the best information which can 
 be given concerning the state of the country, and the character 
 and difficulties of the work of that day: • 
 
 " On the 2nd of August we commenced a Camp Meeting on 
 the banks of the Alabama River, thirty miles below the town of 
 Cahawba, the seat of government for this State. From the pau- 
 city of the inhabitants, and the affliction many were suffering 
 from a prevailing fever, there were not many that attended this 
 meeting. Some disorder was witnessed; but he that command- 
 ed the boisterous winds to be still, appeared in our behalf, and, 
 before the exercises closed, some were brought, as we have rea- 
 son to believe, to the knowledge of the truth. 
 
 "August 10th, another meeting began thirty miles above Ca- 
 hawba, on the bank of the above-mentioned river. A numerous 
 concourse of people attended, and much good was done. On 
 Tuesday morning, I requested all who had obtained an evidence 
 of their conversion to God, to come forward to the altar, when 
 thirty-seven presented themselves. The two last Meetings were 
 held in a forest, and the Indians were fishing in the river, while 
 we were preaching and praying; the bears were ravaging the 
 corn-fields, and the wolves and tigers were howling and scream- 
 ing in the very woods in the neighborhood of our meeting. 
 
 "These accounts may seem unimportant to those who are ac- 
 customed to more numerous congregations, and who have the 
 privilege of assembling in convenient houses; but to us, who are 
 struggling with many difficulties in this newly settled conntry, 
 it is highly gratifying, and fills us with a pleasing hope of yet 
 seeing the desert blossom as the rose,'' 
 
 The work of penetrating that section by the divine embassa- 
 
 liHiiiaiiaM 
 
 The Enlargement a nd Advancement of the Work, 211 
 
 dors and of gathering a membership therein went on, and at the 
 session of the Annual Conference held at John McRae's, Chick- 
 asawhay River, December 5, 1822, the Cedar Creek Circuit was 
 incorporated in the list of appointments for the ensuing year. 
 
 There is a large stream which has its source in the region of 
 Fort Deposit, and has a length, including its meanderings, of 
 from fifty to seventy-five miles, and forms a junction with the 
 Alabama River about six miles south of the mouth of the Ca- 
 hawba River, and the once town of Cahawba and capital of the 
 State of Alabama. It is called Cedar Creek, and for that stream 
 the Cedar Creek Circuit was named. At its first organization, 
 and it may be said as long as it had a name and an existence, 
 the Cedar Creek Circuit covered a vast scope of country. It ex- 
 tended from Big Swamp Creek to Flat Creek, and from the 
 Alabama River to the head waters of Pigeon Creek. There were 
 appointments belonging to that Circuit in the Counties of But- 
 ler, Dallas, Lowndes, Monroe, and Wilcox. 
 
 Shady Grove was the name of one of the oldest Churches in 
 the Cedar Creek Circuit. That Church was at its first location 
 about three miles west of what is now Camden, the seat of jus- 
 tice for Wilcox County. It was afterward moved about one 
 mile east from where it was first established. 
 
 In 1816 William Hobbs and Benjamin Dunn emigrated to Al- 
 abama and settled in or near the confines of what has long been 
 known as Possom Bend. Others also settled there at that early 
 date. Hobbs and Dunn, together with several members of their 
 families, were active and devoted Methodists. Hobbs and Dunn 
 were Class Leaders and exhorters. These two men held Class 
 Meetings and other meetings for religious services with such as 
 could be assembled for the purpose. For some time after these 
 men established themselves in that section there were no reg- 
 ular preachers in the country, and these men had to hold their 
 services for several years in private residences. Occasionally a 
 preacher would pass through the country and preach for them. 
 In 1822 Hobbs and Dunn, with the help of a few others, built 
 a house of worship. It was a very common house, built of poles. 
 That was Shady Grove. About that time Glover, Williamson, 
 and Holly, with large families, and others also, became citizens 
 of that community, and became members of the Church at 
 Shady Grove. About 1826 a neat house, built of hewed logs, 
 

 f^m^miii^si^mm^ 
 
 212 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 I 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 213 
 
 was erected in lieu of the one made of poles. The hewed-log 
 house was located about one mile east of the first one, but took 
 the place of the house built of poles, and was called Shady Grove. 
 
 About the time the new church was built or a very short 
 while after a numerous family by the name of Stearns located 
 in the community of Shady Grove. They were all Methodists. 
 The Eev. Paul F. Stearns was a local preacher who worked 
 there for a number of years. He was living in that neigh- 
 borhood when he was recommended to the Annual Conference 
 for admission into the traveling connection. 
 
 Just about the time the new house was built John Hollis, who 
 was a member of that Society, and who married a Miss Glover, 
 who was also a member, was licensed to preach, and he preached 
 in that section as a local preacher for ten or twelve years, then 
 moved west. He was a useful man, and died in the faith. 
 
 In the very early history of Shady Grove the Blues, the Ca- 
 pells, the Dannellys, and the Hawkinses came in and were mem- 
 bers there. There were, perhaps, two Camp-meetings held at 
 Shady Grove, but the Camp-ground for that neighborhood, and 
 at which the Camp-meetings were held from the first, was three 
 miles north of the present town of Camden, and on the Alaba- 
 ma Kiver, and was known as the Glover Camp-ground. Meet- 
 ings were held there with vast crowds at times, and with grand 
 results. 
 
 Shady Grove flourisiied all through its history, and until 
 about 1850, when it was abandoned, the membership then remov- 
 ing to the town of Camden. 
 
 Ebenezer, in Section sixteen, Township eleven, Range ten, 
 and at the place afterward known as Oak Ridge, or Oak Hill, in 
 the County of Wilcox, was one of the earliest Societies estab- 
 lished in the Cedar Creek Circuit. The second house built by 
 the Society there was ready for displacement by the year 1832. 
 
 Mount Carmel, on or near Gravelly Creek, usually called 
 Gravel Creek Church, and about eight miles south of the pres- 
 ent town of Camden, was organized in the very first years of the 
 Cedar Creek Circuit. For many long years there was at that 
 place a log house. Dr. John Harrington, Israel Davis, and Ed- 
 ward Warren and their families were prominent members in 
 that Society. That Society still exists, 1890, and is more than 
 three score years old. It has sent out a number of preachers. 
 
 Union Church, on the Tallachee Creek, in Section five. Town- 
 ship ten. Range seven, and nearly or quite in sight of the line 
 between the Counties of Monroe and Wilcox and on the road 
 leading from Mrs. McCant's Entry to the Bell's Landing Post- 
 office, was one of the Churches early established in the Cedar 
 Creek Circuit. Like nearly all the other churches in that sec- 
 tion its first house of worship was built of logs. 
 
 Providence, a small Society, with a little log house, about two 
 miles west of what was once called Warrenton, in Dallas Coun- 
 ty, was one of the preaching places, in the early times, in the 
 Cedar Creek Circuit. 
 
 Pleasant Hill, also in Dallas County, was one of the appoint- 
 ments of that Circuit. 
 
 On the opposite side of the Alabama River from the town of 
 Cahawba and a league or so away in a south-east direction, was 
 organized and provided with a house of worship one of the So- 
 cieties which for many years belonged to the Cedar Creek Cir- 
 cuit. That Society was organized, possibly, as early as the first 
 part of 1822, and was certainly domiciled in its own house of 
 worship before the last part of 1824 It was in the neighbor- 
 hood of that Society that the Rev. Joseph Walker, a local 
 preacher, and who previously lived near Montevallo, and was 
 the father of the Rev. Robert L. Walker, and the father of the 
 wife of the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn, settled by at least 1822. It 
 was in the neighborhood of that Society that the Rev. Ebenezer 
 Hearn and Miss Mary Walker married November 7, 1822, and 
 it was in the neighborhood of that Church that the Rev. Eben- 
 ezer Hearn had his home for twelve years beginning in 1825. 
 
 By an act of the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
 State of Alabama passed December 18, 1821, the town of Butts- 
 ville was made the permanent seat of justice in and for the 
 County of Butler; and by an act of the Senate and House of 
 Representatives of the State passed December 28, 1822, the 
 name of Buttsville was changed to that of Greenville. Not 
 more than twenty days prior to the Legislative act changing the 
 name of Buttsville to that of Greenville, the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence had for the first time announced the name of the Cedar 
 Creek Circuit and had appointed two preachers to it, and Green- 
 ville early became one of the appoiatments of that Circuit, and 
 continued for a number of years connected therewith. 
 
mmmMm ^mx 
 
 214 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Another of the churches of the Cedar Creek Circuit, and one 
 that was organized in the first years of the existence of said Cir- 
 cuit, and which was commonly called McFarland's, was on the 
 Federal Koad several miles from Fort Deposit. In the latter 
 part of 1819 James McFarland, for whom the church here under 
 consideration was named, accompanied by his wife and other 
 members of his family moved from Richmond County, North 
 Carolina to Alabama, and settled on the Federal Road where 
 said church was afterward organized. It is not possible at this 
 date to tell who were members of the Society at McFarland's, 
 but it is a fact that Mrs. Flora McFarland, the wife of James 
 McFarland, and who came with her husband from North Caro- 
 lina at the date above given, joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church in her adopted State in 1825, and was a member at the 
 Church bearing her husband's name for about twenty-six years, 
 and that she was a woman of uniform piety and of strict integ- 
 rity, and that in her last hours she was calm and her last words 
 were words of assurance. 
 
 The Cedar Creek Circuit for its first year had two preachers: 
 Armstrong I. Blackburn and Edmund Pearson. The Rev. Arm- 
 strong I. Blackburn was admitted on trial in the Conference in 
 December, 1821, and was discontinued at the end of the year on 
 the Cedar Creek Circuit. 
 
 The appointments were for 1824: Cedar Creek, Joshua Boucher; 
 for 1825: Cedar Creek, Joshua Boucher, Thomas E. Ledbetter; 
 for 1826: Cedar Creek, Benjamin Dulany, Le Roy Massengale; 
 for 1827: Cedar Creek, Benjamin Dulany, William H. Turnley. 
 
 The year 1827 closed the connection of the Rev. Benjamin 
 Dulany with the Methodist Episcopal Church. The record re- 
 ports him as locating at the end of his work on the Cedar Creek 
 Circuit at the close of 1827. He left the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church and joined the Reformers. 
 
 The Rev. William H. Turnley had just been received on trial 
 in the Conference when he was appointed to the Cedar Creek 
 Circuit, and that Circuit was the only appointment he ever had 
 in Alabama. He continued in the itinerant work about eleven 
 years and then located. He filled important works in Missis- 
 sippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas. He was presiding elder two 
 years. He was a member^of the Arkansas Conference at the 
 time he obtained a location. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 215 
 
 The appointment was for 1828: Cedar Creek, Jephthah Hughes. 
 He had just been admitted into the Conference in full connec- 
 tion. The year 1827 he was on the Saint Clair Circuit, the only 
 year that work had existed. The year 1828 closed his work in 
 Alabama. He obtained a location of the Arkansas Conference 
 at the close of 1838. 
 
 The appointments were for 1829: Cedar Creek, Joshua Peavy ; 
 for 1830: Cedar Creek, Le Roy Massengale; for 1831: Cedar 
 Creek, Daniel Monaghon, J. Matthews; for 1832: Cedar Creek, 
 Daniel B. Barlow, John Jackson. 
 
 At the end of the first year there were reported on the Cedar 
 Creek Circuit three hundred and nineteen white and one hun- 
 dred and twelve colored members. At the close of 1829 there 
 were on that Circuit five hundred and seventy-three white and 
 one hundred and eighty colored members. At the close of 1832 
 there were on the Circuit four hundred and thirty-one white and 
 two hundred and fifty-seven colored members. It is very doubt- 
 ful if the membership increased as rapidly as did the population. 
 In another place will be stated the probable cause operating 
 against the increase of Methodist strength in that Circuit. 
 
 For the first time the Franklin Circuit appeared in the list of 
 the appointments for 1821, and for that and the two years next 
 succeeding embraced the Counties of Franklin, Lawrence, and 
 Morgan. At the expiration of 1823 the Lawrence Circuit was 
 formed, and it occupied Morgan County and a part of Law- 
 rence. 
 
 At the time the Franklin Circuit was first formed the country 
 was new and sparsely settled, but there were in its bounds five 
 incorporated towns, then bearing the following names: Court- 
 land, Moulton, Ococopaso, Russellville, and Somerville. 
 
 The first preacher appointed to the Franklin Circuit was the 
 Rev. Nicholas T. Snead, a man who had just been admitted on 
 trial in the Mississippi Conference. For 1822 the Rev. Barna- 
 bas Pipkin, and for 1823 the Rev. Peyton S. Graves, and the 
 Rev. John R. Lambuth were the preachers who served that Cir- 
 cuit. For 1824, the year following the reduction of the territo- 
 ry embraced in that Circuit in the manner already indicated, the 
 preacher was the Rev. Benjamin F. Liddon. 
 
 The following is an exact record of the proceedings of the first 
 Quarterly Conference for that Circuit for that year: 
 
216 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 " The First Quarterly Meeting for Franklin Circuit was held 
 at Tuscumbia, on Saturday, the 13 March, 1824. Present: Al- 
 exander Sale, P. E. Benjamin F. Liddon, A. P. David Owen, 
 L. E. James Smith, L. P. William Smith, C. L. John Hale, 
 C. L. Kichard Thompson, C. L. W. S. Jones, Std. Question, 
 Are there any complaints or appeals? Ans. None. Are there 
 any Licenses to be renewed or granted? Ans. None. Ordered 
 by the Quarterly Meeting Conference that John Harvey be ap- 
 pointed Steward for Franklin Circuit. 
 
 Alexander Sale, P. E. 
 
 William S. Jones, Secty. Quarterage $10. 12 J 
 
 Paid Alexander Sale S4.31J 
 
 Paid Be. R Liddon $5.81i." 
 
 The place here mentioned at which that Quarterly Confer- 
 ence was held was, by an act of the Senate and House of Kep- 
 resentatives of the State of Alabama, passed December 20, 1820, 
 incorporated as the town of Ococopaso, and by an act of the 
 Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Alabama, 
 passed June 14, 1821, the name was "altered to that of Big 
 Spring," and by an act of the Senate and House of Representa- 
 tives of the State of Alabama, passed December 31, 1822, the name 
 was "changed to that of Tuscumbia," which name it has since held. 
 
 As early as 1823 the Methodists held worship at Tuscumbia 
 in a small school-house, built of logs, and that school-house was 
 used by all denominations for some time. The Methodists used 
 it until the close of 1827, when they went into a brick church 
 which they had erected. Tuscumbia continued as one of the ap- 
 pointments of the Franklin Circuit until 1828, when it was set 
 off to itself, and given a preacher. It continued as a Station 
 until the close of 1840, when it fell back again into the Frank- 
 lin Circuit. 
 
 David Owen, local elder, mentioned in the Minutes of the 
 Quarterly Conference for Franklin Circuit at Tuscumbia, March 
 13, 1824, was the same David Owen mentioned in a previous 
 chapter as living, in 1818, on Village Creek, at or near where 
 Birmingham now stands. His name appeared on the Minutes 
 of the Quarterly Conference held at Russellville, May 16, 1829, 
 for the last time. That was the last Quarterly Conference he 
 ever attended. Russellville was his home at that time, and his 
 body was buried near that village when he died. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Worki 21? 
 
 > 
 
 I 
 
 James Smith, mentioned as a local preacher, and as present 
 at the Quarterly Conference for Franklin Circuit, at Tuscumbia, 
 March 13, 1824, did, in due course, advance to elder's orders, 
 and did continue through long years a local preacher. The last 
 Quarterly Conference he ever attended was held at Mount 
 Pleasant, December 25, 1852. In a short time thereafter he 
 was taken sick, and, lingering about ten days, died. His funer- 
 al services were conducted by the Rev. A. G. Copeland. The 
 Rev. James Smith was an earnest, pious Christian, and a zeal- 
 ous and laborious preacher. His Church loved him, and all 
 who knew him respected him. He had his name on the Church 
 Register at Mount Pleasant, a Society established at first 
 through his influence. In the latter years of his life it was a 
 Society with a large membership and a commodious house of 
 worship. That Society still exists. "The Third Quarterly 
 Meeting for Franklin Circuit was held at the Camp Meeting 
 near James Smith's, on Saturday, the 11 September, 1824." 
 Since then many a Quarterly Conference has been held there. 
 Mount Pleasant is about ten miles east of Russellville on the 
 road leading to Moulton, and in the vicinity of a little village 
 called Newburgh, and at this time is near the line of Colbert, 
 Franklin, and Lawrence Counties. It is now, perhaps, in Col- 
 bert County. In Smith's time it was in Franklin County. 
 Newburgh is now in Franklin County. 
 
 Through all the history of the Franklin and Russell's Valley 
 Circuits included in all the years from 1820 to 1870 run the life 
 and labors of William S. Jones, the man who was Secretary of 
 the Quarterly Conference held for the Franklin Circuit, at Tus- 
 cumbia, March 13, 1824, and Secretary of most of the Quarter- 
 ly Conferences for that Circuit from that time on. About 1820, 
 as tradition has it, and ere he had yet reached a quarter of a 
 century in years, William S. Jones settled in Russell's Valley, in 
 which Valley he lived until his demise January 30, 1870. Some 
 time previous to 1827, the ejiact year is not now known, a house 
 of worship was built in Russell's Valley which was known in the 
 official records as " Jones's Meeting House." The Minutes of 
 the Quarterly Conference held for the Franklin Circuit, Febru- 
 ary 9, 1828, contains the following item of business transacted: 
 "David Owen, William S. Jones, W. R. Saddler, John W. 
 Harris, S. Sale, S. B. White, Manson Jones, Aaron Day, and 
 
218 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Augustus Saddler appointed Trustees for Jones's Meeting 
 House, (Russell's Valley); and also for a Meeting House con- 
 templated to be built in Russell ville." Some time previous to 
 1830 there was a Camp Ground established, on the place of Wil- 
 liam S. Jones, near Russellville, at which many great Meetings 
 were held and at which many souls were convicted and justified. 
 In after years that Camp Ground was removed three miles from 
 its original site. 
 
 There is a tradition to the effect that William S. Jones was 
 brought into the kingdom of grace under the ministry of the 
 Rev. Thomas Madden, in the year 1820, when the Cotaco Cir- 
 cuit held preemption right to all Cotaco, Lawrence, and Frank- 
 lin Counties. In the earliest Church Record for that section 
 now extant is found the name of William S. Jones; and that 
 Record shows that he was then a steward of the Church, and 
 that same Record extending on into the years following shows 
 that he remained in the office of steward for more than forty- 
 six years. 
 
 To William S. Jones belonged idiosyncrasies, and individual- 
 ity. He was inflexible, and pious. In both personal and offi- 
 cial duty he was prompt, punctual, and faithful. He prayed in 
 private and in public, and had his own family altar. He was fa- 
 miliar with the doctrines and with the songs of his Church. 
 He was obedient to the discipline of the Church, attended upon 
 her ordinances, and supported her institutions. For the preach- 
 er who served his Circuit and for the preacher's family, when 
 one he had, William S. Jones furnished, in his own house, bed^ 
 board, and books; and the preacher's horse he had curried, fed, 
 and watered at his own expense. 
 
 The Rev. R. H. Rivers, D.D., the son-in-law of Mr. Jones, 
 makes the following statements concerning him: "He was a 
 man of generous hospitality. He loved most of all the society 
 of the preachers. Bishops, Presiding Elders, and his own Cir- 
 cuit preachers were always received with a most cordial welcome, 
 and ministered unto as lovingly as if they had been angels of 
 mercy. He often recurred with pleasure to the dignified Soule, 
 the sweet spirited Roberts, the eccentric Faris, the zealous 
 James McFerrin, the poetic Madden, and the imperial Mc- 
 
 Mahon." 
 
 " During his last illness, and but a short time before he died, 
 
 HMBMBtBiWB^awS! 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 219 
 
 he asked his old friend. Brother Harris, to write to my wife and 
 say to her: * I am dying. I shall never leave this bed until I am 
 borne from it by kind friends. I am very happy. I shall see 
 you no more on earth, but I hope to meet you in heaven.' 
 While he was dictating this message tears of joy gushed from 
 his eyes, and words of praise fell from his lips." 
 
 His wife preceded him to the grave six years. She was a wom- 
 an of great worth; intelligent, and pious, and in every way 
 worthy of her husband. 
 
 At Kitty Casky School-house, which was on the west side of 
 Town Creek, and about four miles from its junction with the 
 Tennessee River, a Quarterly Conference was held May 29, 1824, 
 at which were present, beside the preachers in charge of the Cir- 
 cuit, Samuel B. White, local elder, David Hodges, local dea- 
 con, Henry Davis, local preacher, John Harvey, local preach- 
 er and steward, John F. Johnson, William R. Saddler, and 
 Christopher Hammons, class leaders. 
 
 John Harvey, who afterward attained to elder's orders, and 
 who continued a member of the Quarterly Conference of the 
 Franklin Circuit until 1831, and who was a native Virgin- 
 ian, and a Revolutionary soldier, and who was naturally endowed 
 with the gifts of oratory, and was talented, and pious, had his 
 membership at Kitty Casky at the time of the Quarterly Con- 
 ference above mentioned, and he died at that place afterward. 
 
 Samuel B. White, who was at the Quarterly Conference at 
 Kitty Casky, May 29, 1824, lived in Russell's Valley, and held 
 his membership in the Societies in the vicinity in which he re- 
 sided. For more than a quarter of a century, except for a short 
 interval, "his name appeared in the Quarterly Conference Rec- 
 ords as a local elder in the Circuit in the bounds of which he 
 lived. His life was marked by some untoward events whereby 
 his usefulness was arrested and circumscribed, and his peace 
 greatly disturbed. In 1830 he had some trouble with Manson 
 Jones in a case of debt, which case went into arbitration. In 
 1838 his character as a local elder was passed by the Quarter- 
 ly Conference with a qualification which indicated dereliction of 
 duty on his part. At Russellville, December 21, 1840, he was 
 convicted of grave charges, by a Committee of investigation, 
 and suspended from the ministry until the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence next ensuing. The charges were made against him by 
 
 / 
 
mfmmmmm'stem^etSissaexssimiai 
 
 220 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Brothers Jones and Hudson. The Committee of investigation 
 consisted of Alexander Sale, James Smith, and F. C. Spraggins, 
 presided over by Joshua Boucher. The Quarterly Conference 
 met at La Grange, January 9, 1841, and by it S. B. White was 
 tried on the charges for which he had been suspended, and by 
 that Quarterly Conference, upon said charges, he was expelled 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church. The Quarterly Conference 
 which tried and expelled him was presided over by the then pre- 
 siding elder of the District, Eobert L. Andrews; and the mem- 
 bers present and participating in the business of the body were: 
 Joshua Boucher, preacher in charge of the Circuit, William H. 
 Wilkes, junior preacher, Alexander Sale, F. C. Spraggins, 
 James Smith, and K. H. Rivers, local elders, Robert Paine, 
 President La Grange College, William R. Nicholson, local 
 preacher, William S. Jones, and John W. Harris, stewards, and 
 William Hudson, class leader. That was, beyond all doubt, a 
 body of able men. They were men capable of weighing testimo- 
 ny, and of rendering a just verdict At a Quarterly Conference 
 held March 23, 1844, at Mount Pleasant, a Church already men- 
 tioned, presided over by the then presiding elder of the Dis- 
 trict, A. F. Driskill, and composed of the following members: 
 John A. Jones, preacher in charge of the Circuit, William R. 
 Hodges, junior preacher, James Smith, F. C. Spraggins, and 
 Isaac N. Mullens, local elders, John F. Richardson, William 
 Hudson, and William S. Jones, stewards, and C. Tomkins, class 
 leader, Samuel B. White presented from the Society of which 
 he was a member a recommendation which set forth that he was 
 a suitable person to be licensed to preach; and after due exam- 
 ination of his gifts, grace, and usefulness he was given a license. 
 At the next session of the Tennessee Conference, upon the rec- 
 ommendation of the Quarterly Conference, his ordination pa- 
 pers were restored to him. He met a tragic end. A horse ran 
 away with him, and a fatal event ensued. He was killed. 
 
 William R. Saddler, who, as a class leader, was present a 
 member of the Quarterly Conference held at Kitty Casky 
 School-house, May 29, 1824, and who attended the Quarterly 
 Conference of the Franklin Circuit from time to time as a mem- 
 ber thereof, being a class leader, until as late as the close of 
 1836, had his membership at Jones's Meeting House, in Rus- 
 sell's Valley, and was a Trustee of that Meeting House. He was 
 
 i 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 221 
 
 one of the talented, pious, and influential members of th^ 
 Church in the community in which he lived. The members of 
 his household were noted for their intelligence, and their influ- 
 ence. 
 
 At the Third Quarterly Conference for the Franklin Circuit 
 for the year, held at the Camp Meeting near James Smith's, on 
 Saturday, September 11, 1824, Ned, a colored man, applied to 
 have his license as an exhorter renewed, and the application 
 was granted, and his license was renewed. 
 
 James P. Warrington, an exhorter, who had been convicted 
 of a charge of Sabbath breaking presented an appeal to the 
 Quarterly Conference held for the Circuit at Tuscumbia, No- 
 vember 13, 1824, and after hearing the case the Quarterly Con- 
 ference reversed the decision of the court below, and acquitted 
 him of the charge, and then passed his character and renewed 
 his license. 
 
 Kitty Casky School-house was superseded by Harvey's Meet- 
 ing House, the latter place being about two miles from the for- 
 mer. At a Quarterly Conference convened at Harvey's Meet- 
 ing House, April 2, 1825, a new name was entered on the roll 
 of official members of the Franklin Circuit, and the new name 
 was recorded in the Minutes of that Quarterly Conference, and 
 the fact was stated that the person bearing the name was pres- 
 ent in his official capacity. The name and person: "Turner 
 Saunders, Local Deacon." On the official roll and in the ap- 
 proved and recorded Minutes of the Franklin Circuit the min- 
 isterial grade of Turner Saunders was designated as that of 
 " Local Deacon " until May, 1828, when his name was put on 
 the Record as a " Local Elder." He was elected an elder pos- 
 sibly two years before he was ordained to that office. He was 
 born in Brunswick County, Virginia, January 3, 1782, and was 
 married to Miss Frances Dunn, his first wife, in his native State 
 and County, before he was eighteen years old. He was renewed 
 in heart, and joined the Church in his native State. In 1808 he 
 moved to Tennessee and settled at or near the place now called 
 Franklin. From there he moved to Lawrence County, Ala- 
 bama, as indicated by the Records above alluded to, about the 
 first of 1825. He was licensed to preach about 1813, or 1814. 
 At Ebenezer, a church six miles north-west of the town of 
 Courtland, and which existed from 1828, or earlier, till 1840, 
 
222 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the Kev. Turner Saunders held his membership. At one time 
 Alexander Sale, local elder, Mrs. Sarah C. Sale, Miss Mary F. 
 Sale, Miss Susannah Sale, Turner Saunders, local elder, James 
 E. Saunders, Claiborne W. Saunders, Mrs. Henrietta M. Saun- 
 ders, Mrs. Mary F. Saunders, Mrs. Eliza Saunders, William 
 Jones, Alexander Jones, Mrs. Cynthia Jones, Miss Martha 
 Jones, Miss Judith Jones, Mrs. Jane Jones, William E. Doty, 
 Mrs. Lucy Doty, William Garrett, John Garrett, Mrs. Nancy 
 Garrett, Mrs. Martha Garrett, William McGregor, Mrs. Eliz- 
 abeth McGregor, William W. Harper, George W. Foster, Mrs. 
 Sarah J. Foster, John Scruggs, Mrs. Elizabeth Scruggs, Mrs. 
 Maria McFerrin, Mrs. Mary D. Butler, Miss Mary E. Millwater, 
 and others were members at Ebenezer. 
 
 The Kev. Turner Saunders did great work for Methodism in 
 the section of Alabama in which he lived. He was a leader in 
 the educational interests of the State. Physically he was of 
 medium size, of noble form, erect, and well proportioned. He 
 had a manly countenance, and was of commanding presence. 
 In mood he was solemn, in habit taciturn, and in bearing dig- 
 nified. He never indulged in wit and jokes. He was cultured 
 and refined. He was firm, energetic, and systematic. He nev- 
 er faltered at opposition, and increased difficulties gave new im- 
 pulses to his energies. He was honest. While he was not im- 
 pulsive, he was generous, and benevolent. He contributed of 
 his means to benevolent purposes with method and motive. As 
 a preacher his manner was calm, his style simple. He was a 
 strong preacher, an able defender of the doctrines of his 
 Chi.rch. An incident of his life, when he was in the vigor of 
 his manhood, may illustrate and exhibit his capacity as a 
 preacher. While he lived at Franklin, Tennessee, a preacher 
 by the name of Streeter, a man of considerable education, and 
 an impressive, and eloquent speaker, and who advocated the doc- 
 irinal system known as Universalism^ opened his ministry in the 
 town of Franklin. With methods so plausible and doctrines so 
 congenial to human nature he made a favorable impression 
 upon the community. A religious revolution was imminent 
 He finally challenged any whom it might concern to a public 
 debate on the doctrines which he emphasized in his Creed. 
 Upon consultation the Methodists selected as their champion to 
 defend their doctrines against the attacks of the Universalist, 
 
 SSS^miSS^^^s^iiW,, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work 223 
 
 the Kev. Turner Saunders. The debate was agreed to, and the 
 day was appointed when the people might assemble to witness 
 the polemics. A vast throng assembled on the day. There 
 were present some from Nashville and Columbia. The debate 
 continued three days. Saunders vindicated divine truth, de, 
 molished the heresies of his antagonist, and arrested the revolt 
 from evangelical doctrines. At the conclusion of the debate a 
 document on which a subscription had been obtained for the 
 purpose of securing the ministerial services of the Universalist, 
 and on which some of the new converts had previously put down 
 as much as two hundred dollars apiece, was torn up in the 
 presence of the public assembly, and the Kev. Mr. Streeter de- 
 parted for other fields, and from thence-forth was never seen in 
 the town of Franklin. That triumphant vindication of Evan- 
 gelical Christianity stands in proof of the superior ability of 
 the Kev. Turner Saunders, and is sufficient eulogy upon his 
 worth as a preacher of the gospel. 
 
 He accumulated an ample fortune, and provided himself and 
 household with an elegant home, where all things which could 
 contribute to taste and comfort were furnished and enjoyed, and 
 at which guests were entertained with generous liberality. 
 
 He preached for about forty years, and was accustomed 
 through all his Christian life to attend the Class-meetings of 
 his Society. He died at the age of seventy-two, in the town of 
 Aberdeen, Mississippi. His descendants have been Methodists. 
 They have moved in elegant society, and some of them have 
 filled places of honor and trust. 
 
 The Minutes of the Quarterly Conference for the Franklin 
 Circuit at which the name of " Turner Saunders, Local Preach- 
 er," first appeared contain this item: "Present, Freeman Fitz- 
 gerald, Class Leader." This is the first time that his name ap- 
 pears on the Kecord. He became an active and useful man in 
 that Circuit. At the Quarterly Conference held at Spring 
 Creek Camp Ground, (Mount Carmel) which was on Spring 
 Creek about six miles south-east from Tuscumbia, August 25, 
 1826, "Freeman Fitzgerald was recommended to the District 
 Conference for License to preach." That process was accord- 
 ing to the then provision of the law of the Church. The Dis- 
 trict Conference to which he was recommended granted him the 
 license asked for, and at the Quarterly Conference held for the 
 
224 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Circuit January 20, 1827, " Freeman Fitzgerald, Local Preach, 
 er " is set down as present. The next year he was appointed 
 by the Quarterly Conference one of the Trustees for Courtland 
 Meeting House. He lived two or three miles a little north of 
 west from the town of Courtland. At the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence held at the Camp Ground near Eussellville, October 2, 
 1830, "he was recommended to the Annual Conference for 
 Deacon's orders." The last entry concerning him is found in 
 the Minutes of the first Quarterly Conference for Franklin Cir^ 
 cult for the year held at Mount Zion, February 19, 1831: " >\ il- 
 liam Jones was appointed Circuit Steward in place of Brother 
 Fitzgerald, who has removed." He moved to West Florida. 
 He died in Yirginia. He was a man of wealth; a good man, 
 and true, and highly respected, but not particularly gifted. 
 
 Most remarkable is the Record of the Franklin Circuit on the 
 subject of a Parsonage for that Circuit. The enterprise of se- 
 curing a Parsonage for the Circuit was inaugurated at an early 
 day. ""in the project of improvising a Parsonage the official 
 members, in Quarterly Conference assembled, exercised them- 
 selves plentifully in adopting motions, passing resolutions, and 
 in appointing, replacing, and abolishing Committees. They 
 certainly did strive for the mastery in discussing the matter, 
 but they never did reach the goal. Judging from their numer- 
 ous enactments there must have been some powerful incentive 
 which impelled them, and at the same time there must have 
 been some potent influence which impeded all progress, and 
 ^vhich thwarted all designs, and which prevented every measure 
 of success in the premises. They made vigorous efforts m the 
 iv-ay of resolutions and appointments, they were versatile m the 
 invention of agencies, they were shifty in marshahng forces, 
 but they made feeble contributions, they were not prolific of 
 crifts. Were the wealth of the members of the Circuit judged 
 by the contributions made to the worthy enterprise, the conclu- 
 sion would be inevitable that their surplus was not great. If in 
 the interest of the enterprise, they in privation and self-denial, 
 imposed on themselves a regimen which stinted them to the ex- 
 treme of endurance, then the margin ior self-denial with them 
 
 was not large. 
 
 At the Quarterly 'Conference for the Circuit held at the Camp 
 Ground near James Smith's, August .20, 1825: ^ The business of 
 
 ^tssi^>ms^,s„^&..^60.-->=n^^^ 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 225 
 
 building a Parsonage on Franklin Circuit was taken up, and 
 Alexander Sale, Freeman Fitzgerald, Samuel B. White, William 
 S. Jones, and David Hodges were appointed a Committee to 
 carry the same into effect." 
 
 Nothing further is heard on the subject until the Quarterly 
 Conference held at Spring Creek Camp Ground, October 25, 
 1828, when it was " Ordered by this Conference, that the Circuit 
 Stewards, be a Committee to carry into effect the building of a 
 Parsonage on the Franklin Circuit according to our Discipline, 
 and that William S. Jones be Chairman of said Committee." 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held at Mountain Spring Camp 
 Ground, which Camp Ground was on the point of the mountain 
 five miles from Courtland, July 25, 1829, the following action 
 was had: " Eesolved that the Committee appointed at the last 
 Quarterly Conference for 1828 to prepare a Parsonage, be dis- 
 missed, and F. Fitzgerald, E. D. Sims, Robert Fenner, Alexan- 
 der Sledge, and B. C. Burnett, be appointed in their stead." 
 Not a line is on record to indicate that any work was done by 
 that new Committee. 
 
 No further interest is evinced on the subject until the Quar- 
 terly Conference held at La Grange, January 21, 1832. " The 
 Conference then appointed A. Sale, R. A. Baker, W. Garrett, 
 W. S. Jones, and W. R. Saddler as a Committee to take into con- 
 sideration the expediency and practicability of building a Par- 
 sonage on Franklin Circuit, and the Committee reported. That 
 in their opinion it was both expedient and practicable; which 
 report was received by the Conference. On motion it was or- 
 dered that the same Committee, open subscription, for the pur- 
 pose of raising funds to build the House, and that they receive 
 proposals for sites, &c, and report the same to the next Quar- 
 terly Meeting Conference to be held at Courtland on 30 March 
 next." 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held at Russellville, September 
 1-3, 1832, the following action was had: "On motion ordered 
 that the Committee appointed to raise funds to build a Parson- 
 age, be allowed until next Conference to make their report, 
 and that Drury Mays take the place of W. Garrett, resigned." 
 
 The next action had on the subject was at the Quarterly Con- 
 ference held at Courtland, April 14, 1833: "On motion ordered 
 that the Committee appointed to raise funds to build a Parson- 
 15 
 
226 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 age be discharged from further duty on that subject, and any 
 moneys raised for that purpose be returned to the Donors." 
 That was an abandonment of the enterprise. 
 
 But at a Quarterly Conference held at La Grange, February 
 18, 1837, the enterprise was revived: "On motion of Brother 
 Sale, it was Kesolved that a Committee of five be appointed to 
 take into consideration the propriety of establishing a Parson- 
 age on Franklin Circuit; when the following persons were ap- 
 pointed, as said Committee: James E. Saunders, A. Sale, W. S. 
 Jones, John T. Richardson, and R. R. Corban." 
 
 " The report of the Committee on the business of Parsonage 
 being called for, it was found that a part of the Committee were 
 absent, therefore the report was not forthcoming, but the Com- 
 mittee was continued, and requested to report to the next Quar- 
 terly Meeting." This is the recorded action of the Quarterly 
 Conference held at Courtland, May 20, 1837. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference was held at Mountain Spring 
 Camp Ground, July 29-31, 1837. On the first day, " The Com- 
 mittee on Parsonage reported, which was ordered to lie on the 
 table." On Monday, the last day of the session, the Record 
 ^ays : " The report on the Parsonage, which was laid on the 
 table at the last sitting, was taken up and accepted, which is as 
 .follows: 'The Committee on Parsonage instruct me to report, 
 that it is expedient to establish a Parsonage on Franklin Cir- 
 , cuit, but beg leave to be discharged from considering the Loca- 
 tion of the same.* Signed, James E. Saunders, Chairman. 
 The Quarterly Meeting Conference then resolved itself into a 
 Committee of the whole on the subject of Parsonage, and do 
 make thee following location; To wit: That La Grange be and 
 -: the same is hereby selected as the most eligible site for the Lo- 
 , cation of the Parsonage House on Franklin Circuit. Re- 
 ; solved that the following persons be a Committee to carry into 
 : practical effect the resolutions of this Conference in reference 
 I to the Parsonage: Robert Paine, James E. Saunders, J. T. 
 •Richardson, R. A. Baker, R. R. Corban, William Garrett, and 
 Robert Fenner." 
 
 At a Quarterly Conference held at Ebenezer, December 23, 
 1837, the following was adopted: "On motion the Committee on 
 Parsonage was ordered to furnish the Parsonage House with 
 such furniture as in their estimation is contemplated by the 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Worh 227 
 
 word of our Discipline. On motion the Committee on Parson- 
 age is also appointed Trustees for the Parsonage House." 
 
 " The Committee appointed at the fourth Quarterly Meeting 
 for 1837 made a report, through their Chairman, R. Fenner, 
 and marked, ' R. R. Corban Deed, for Parsonage,' and begged 
 to be taken as said report, which by vote of the Conference was 
 received. On motion. Resolved that Brothers D. S. Goodloe, 
 J. T. Richardson, and S. B. White take said report (or Deed) 
 and arrange the same for legal authentication. On motion. Re- 
 solved that a Committee of seven persons be appointed to raise 
 the necessary amount to pay the expense of purchasing the 
 Parsonage on Franklin Circuit, including the amount expended 
 for 'Heavy Furniture' for said House; whereupon A. Sale, 
 James Smith, R. Clark, D. S. Goodloe, S. B. White, J. C. Hicks, 
 and A. G. Lewis were appointed as said Committee." This is 
 the action on the subject by the Quarterly Conference held at 
 the classic town of La Grange, March 10, 1838. 
 
 The most tangible report of any which had yet appeared was 
 made at the Quarterly Conference held at Mountain Spring 
 Camp Ground, August 10, 1838; and said report indicated, as 
 did preceding reports on the subject, that in matters involving a 
 small sum of money for divine purposes, even great men will 
 wrestle as if involved in a Herculean task. But to give a re- 
 markable instance and by it an exact definition of aggregation, 
 here is the report: "Alexander Sale, Chairman of the Commit- 
 tee on Parsonage, reported that the following sums had been ob- 
 tained in subscriptions; (To wit,) Alexander Sale $186, James 
 Smith $27, Richard C. Clark $120, D. S. Goodloe $20, A. G. 
 Lewis $14, making in the whole $367." 
 
 Upon the receipt of this report aggregating $367 in subscrip- 
 tion, not in cash, from the entire Circuit, the following was adopt- 
 ed: "Resolved that the several members of said Committee pay 
 the said moneys, so collected, to the Committee for the Purchase 
 of the Parsonage House, and that the several collectors proceed 
 promptly to collect and pay over the same by the 15 September 
 next." Then came another item in the problematical enterprise 
 as follows: "Robert Fenner from the Committee on Parsonage, 
 reported the purchase by himself of Furniture for the same to 
 the amount of $22.38 and by Brother Mullens to the amount of 
 $23.75 which said sums are ordered to be paid out of the moneys 
 
228 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 collected as above stated. Whereas, the subscriptions obtained 
 for the Parsonage are deficient to the amount of some $75, Ke- 
 solved that said Committee be requested to obtain additional 
 subscriptions to supply said deficiency, and, furthermore, to 
 raise ^0 still due to Brother James C. Watkins from the Cir- 
 cuit for the Board of Brother Ferguson." 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held at La Grange, December 15, 
 1838, the following was adopted: "Kesolved That the Commit- 
 tee appointed to raise funds to pay for the Parsonage, be re- 
 quired to report to the next Quarterly Meqting Conference.'* 
 The resolution was adopted, but the Committee did not report 
 as required. 
 
 The next item on record on the subject is in the Minutes for 
 the Quarterly Conference held at Kussellville, September 7, 1839: 
 " It was communicated to this Conference, that there is a defi- 
 ciency in the amount of funds, heretofore collected, to pay for 
 the Paisonage, and contingent expenses, and the Conference 
 Piesolved, to instruct the Committee, heretofore appointed to 
 raise funds to defray said expenses, to renew their exertions 
 to raise funds to meet said deficiency, and that William Hudson 
 and Davis Gurley be appointed to fill the places of A. G. Lewis 
 and John C. Hicks removed." 
 
 When everything had been vanquished except carefulness 
 md covetousness, and it had been demonstrated that the Latin 
 proverb, " Labor omnia vincit " is false, something like a funeral 
 dirge is heard in the item found in the Minutes for the Quarter- 
 ly Conference held at Mount Pleasant, August 8, 184.0, and reads 
 as follows: "It being made known to the Conference, that there 
 is yet a deficiency of S140 or more in the amount raised to pay 
 for the Parsonage on Franklin Circuit: On motion, it is ordered 
 by the Conference, that a Committee, composed of Brothers Al- 
 exander Sale, K. C. Clark, William Hudson, James Smith, Davis 
 Gurley, S. B. White, and John Wheeler, be requested to use their 
 best exertions to raise funds to meet the deficiency; and that 
 Brother K. C. Clark be authorized to rent out the Parsonage 
 until our Preacher may want the same." 
 
 Festoons and bonfires were never in requisition in any of the 
 stages of the long continued enterprise. After many written re- 
 ports had been presented and many Committees had been ap- 
 pointed, and enough had been put on record concerning the 
 
 »MaK««WS;«ffiffltt*«iJ^wmi3S3^Effi.^^ 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 229 
 
 matter to make the basis of a good sized volume, the finale was 
 reached in action on a verbal report made to the Quarterly Con- 
 ference held for Franklin Circuit at the town of Tuscumbia, 
 June 12, 1841: "A report (verbal) being sent to this Conference, 
 that the Parsonage, on this Circuit, is sold, It is requested by 
 this Conference, that the same Committee who sold the Parson- 
 age, sell the Furniture also." 
 
 To a reflecting mind that chapter in the history of the Parson- 
 age enterprise on Franklin Circuit is suggestive. It introduces 
 to the thoughts things which have affinity, and contrariety, and 
 which are conglomerate. Who in the presence of that chapter 
 could keep from thinking of mind and mammon, of inadequacy 
 and invention, of personal parsimoniousness and ecclesiastical 
 penury, of pertinacity and pusillanimity, of sparseness and 
 splendor, of force and failure? Men will, in official capacity, 
 inaugurate measures for the consummation of which, as indi- 
 viduals, they will not work. Men will be liberal in the adoption 
 of resolutions concerning ecclesiastical affairs and then grudg- 
 ingly contribute of their means to further the ends contemplated 
 by the resolutions. To some persons it is easier to' say. Lord, 
 Lord, than to do the will of God. " There is that withholdeth 
 more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." 
 
 Tinkers' School-house was on the west side of Town Creek 
 and about seven miles from the Tennessee Eiver, and not far 
 from where what used to be called the Tuscumbia and Decatur 
 Bail Road crosses Town Creek. 
 
 "The first Quarterly Conference for Franklin Circuit was 
 held at Tinkers' School House, January 21, 1826. Present: 
 AVilliam McMahon, P. E., Finch P. Scruggs, A. P., John B. Mc- 
 Ferrin, J. P., Alex Sale, L. E., David Hodges, L. P., John Har- 
 vey, L. E., James Smith, L. P., John F. Johnson, Exh., Jacob 
 Smith, C. L., B. C. Burnett, C. L. Are there any Complaints or 
 Appeals? None. The next Conference to be held at Tuscumbia, 
 1 & 2 April next. 
 
 Alex. Sale, Sect. William McMahox, P. E. 
 
 Quarterage $31.56^. Paid Bro. McMahon S6. 
 
 Public Collection $09.00. Paid Bro. Scruggs 817.81^ 
 
 Paid Bro. McFerrin $15.25. 
 Elements $1.50." 
 
 The above is the Record of the entire proceedings of that 
 
230 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Quarterly Conference. That was the first Quarterly Conference 
 ever attended by the Kev. John B. McFerrin as an itinerant 
 preacher, and the Quarterage mentioned in the Eecord as paid 
 to him was the first quarterage he ever received as a preacher. 
 
 At a place about, to only approximate course and distance, east 
 of and two miles from the noble stream called Town Creek, and 
 about southwest of and five miles from the little town of Court- 
 land, on a point of the mountain is a bold Spring, the never-fail- 
 ing waters of which are ever clear and cool. Just below this 
 Spring, at the base of the mountain, is a plateau. The combi- 
 nations of mountain and valley, of fountain and forest make it a 
 lovely place. The place was named Mountain Spring. A most 
 elegant and suitable place it was for a Camp Ground. Its nat- 
 ural advantages were unsurpassed. Its surroundings were well 
 calculated to broaden, elevate, and refine. It was the very place, 
 with its uplifted peaks and outlying plains, its living fountains 
 and verdant groves, to induce holy meditation and to prompt 
 genuine eloquence. 
 
 The Methodists settled in the fertile and lovely regions round 
 about decided to erect a Camp Ground at that place, and they did. 
 
 The first item found in the annals of the Church concerning 
 Mountain Spring is in the Miuutes of the Quarterly Conference 
 for Franklin Circuit held at Tuscumbia, April 1, 1826, and is as 
 follows: "The next Quarterly Meeting to be held at Mountain 
 Spring, Sth June, next, at which time there is to be also a Camp- 
 meeting." As the Quarterly Meeting and the Camp-meeting re- 
 ferred to here as in anticipation were the first of either ever held 
 at that place, and as from the recorded proceedings of the Quar- 
 terly Conference it is ascertained who were there in official ca- 
 pacity and what was done by the official body on that occasion, 
 it is proper to give here the said proceedings entire: 
 
 "The third Quarterly Conference for Franklin Circuit was 
 held at Mountain Spring Camp Ground, June 10, 1826. Pres- 
 ent: William McMahon, P. E., F. P. Scruggs, A. P., J. B. Mc- 
 Ferrin, J. P., Alex. Sale, L. E., James Smith, L. P., Martin W. 
 Eichardson, C. L., Turner Saunders, L. D., David Hodges, L. P., 
 Eichard Thompson, Exh., Laban Jones, C. L., Alex. McCullock, 
 C. L., F. Fitzgerald, St., John Southerland, Jr., C. L., John F. 
 Johnson, C. L., B. C. Burnett, C. L., Jacob Smith, C. L., W. S. 
 Jones. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work 231 
 
 Are there any Complaints or Appeals? None. Are there any 
 Licenses to be renewed? Bro. Eich'd Thompson, an Exhorter, 
 applied. — Granted. The next Quarterly Meeting is to be held 
 at Spring Creek Camp Ground, August 24, next. 
 
 TuKNEB Saunders, Sect. William McMahon, P. E. 
 
 Quarterage S4:3.12J. 
 
 Public Collection $100.00. Paid Bro. McMahon, SS.lSi. 
 
 Paid Bro. Scruggs, $30.18|. J. B. McFerrin, SSLSIJ." 
 
 Many of the men who were members of the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence were Tenters at the Camp-meeting. It must have been a 
 large congregation at the Camp-meeting as it was a very large 
 public collection for that day and country. 
 
 The Second Quarterly Conference ever held at Mountain 
 Spring Camp Ground was held there for Franklin Circuit, June 
 9, 1827, and at the same time a Camp-meeting was held, the 
 second ever held at the place. The particulars of that Camp- 
 meeting have perished, except as to what preachers were in at- 
 tendance. They were William McMahon, P. E., F. P. Scruggs, 
 A. P., J. W. Jones, J. P., John Hanie, L. E., James Smith, L. P. 
 
 The third Quarterly Conference ever held at Mountain 
 Spring Camp Ground was held for the Franklin Circuit July 
 26, 1828, and at the same time a Camp-meeting was held there 
 with grand results, as the communication of an eye-witness tes- 
 tifies. Here is the communication: 
 
 " COURTLAND, ALABAMA, AugUSt 10, 1828. 
 
 Dear Brethren:—! rejoice to be privileged to direct a small 
 rivulet into that stream of religious information which flows 
 through your paper, fertilizing the vineyard of the Lord. 
 
 At a Camp-meeting just held in this neighborhood, at the 
 Mountain Spring Camp Ground, in the District of the Eev. 
 William McMahon, and in the Circuit under charge of the Eev. 
 James McFerrin, the Lord was pleased to manifest his power 
 and goodness in a most signal manner. About 150 souls pro- 
 fessed to find peace with God, and 182 joined the Church. 
 * Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, goodwill tomen! ' 
 All circumstances considered, I have never witnessed such a 
 meeting before, although accustomed to attend Camp-meetings 
 for more than twenty years, some in Virginia, some in Tennes- 
 see, and some in this State. The attending congregation was 
 comparatively small, averaging, perhaps, 1,500. The number of 
 
232 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 preachers was also comparatively small, and among these but 
 few much celebrated for what the world calls learning. Unusual 
 plainness characterized the sermons delivered on this occasion. 
 Ko attempts were made atjine or embdlished discourses. Each 
 minister who rose to fill the sacred desk seemed deeply impressed 
 with a sense of his awfully respousible station. The glory of God 
 and the salvation of souls was the prevailing object. God owned 
 • and blessed their labors. His power knew no distinctions, but, 
 like a mighty, rushing wind, sweeping everything in its course, 
 it bore down before it the rich and the poor, the learned and the 
 unlearned. But although no class was exempted, the work 
 abounded, for the most part, among the wealthy and well in- 
 formed. The youth, male and female, the hope and pride of our 
 country, with minds richly stored with intellectual treasures ob- 
 tained in the best Seminaries of learning, regardless of expense, 
 and whose persons were decorated with every thing that the 
 fashionable world deems tasty or desirable — these, with com- 
 mon consent, thronged our altar during the greater part of our 
 meeting, which lasted eight days. 
 
 Never, perhaps, in America, before, did any altar contain a 
 greater fund of moral worth, or a larger amount of costly cloth- 
 ing and splendid jewelry. But in the anguish of their souls, 
 on account of their sins, these were all forgotten, and literally 
 mingled with the dust. The character of the conversions was 
 pleasiug beyond measure. They were liicidj 'powerful, and co}ifi- 
 derit, in an unusual degree. Almost every convert immediately 
 became a preacher, and exerted himself in strains of persuasive 
 eloquence to bring his friends to God. The whole congregation 
 was literally awed into solemn reverence. No voice was lifted 
 in opposition to the work. The most perfect good order pre- 
 vailed throughout; so much so, that not even a reproof was 
 heard from the pulpit during the occasion. The glory be as- 
 cribed to our blessed Lord and Master, now and ever. Amen. 
 Yours in Christ, T. Saunders." 
 
 The account given of that meeting by the presiding elder, 
 the Eev. William McMahon, is interesting: " Our Camp-meet- 
 ing at the Mountain Spring, in the Franklin Circuit, beginning 
 on the 24 July, exceeded all the rest. This was decidedly the 
 best meeting that I have ever had on the District. It lasted 
 eight days, and at the close we numbered 150 who professed 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 233 
 
 Justification by faith in Christ, and received 182 members on 
 trial in the Society. The flower and pride of the Courtland 
 Yalley were brought into the covenant of saving grace at this 
 meeting. Many who move in the first circles in society were 
 willing to sacrifice all their distinctions, worldly honors, pleas- 
 ures, and prospects, at the foot of the cross, and learn of him 
 who is meek and lowly in heart, that they might find rest to their 
 troubled souls. Indeed, all distinctions and gradations of rank 
 in society seemed here to be forgotten, while age and talents, 
 youth and beauty, the rich and the poor, the bond and free, 
 seemed to mingle complacently together at a throne of grace, to 
 which they found free access by faith in the name of Jesus. 
 The glory of God rested on the congregation by night and by 
 day, while every interest seemed to be forgotten but that of the 
 soul. But I need not attempt a description, for pen, ink, and 
 paper will never tell the glory of that meeting. 
 
 The holy flame has been spreading through all the regions 
 round about ever since, and many souls have since found the 
 Lord, who received their convictions there. We have another 
 appointed on the same Circuit, to commence on the 16th inst. 
 to which hundreds are looking with deep and prayerful interest, 
 that God may crown it with his holy presence, and save many 
 sinners. 
 
 My sheet is full, and so is my heart. Tours in the best of 
 bonds. October 1, 1828. William McMahon.'* 
 
 The year 1828 was a grand and glorious year on the Franklin 
 Circuit throughout. The next Quarterly Conference for the 
 Circuit after the one at Mountain Spring at which the Camp- 
 meeting was held, the account of which has just been given, was 
 held at Spring Creek Camp Ground, October 25, 1828, and a 
 Camp-meeting was also held fhere at the same time, an account 
 of which will be given in this connection. 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held at Spring Creek Camp 
 Ground, October 25, 1828, *' Stephen M. Norris, and William M. 
 McFerrin were recommended to the District Conference as 
 proper persons to obtain Licenses to Preach, and also to be rec- 
 ommended to the Annual Conference as suitable persons for the 
 Itinerancy." McFerrin was granted a license to preach, recom- 
 mended to the Annual Conference and was admitted on trial. 
 
 That Camp-meeting was a time of heavenly visitation. A dis- 
 
N 
 
 i 
 
 234 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 235 
 
 pensation of the fullness of the grace of God was given, and 
 many believed and were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, 
 and given an earnest of a heavenly inheritance, of a purchased 
 possession. Here is a most thrilling account: 
 
 " HuNTsviLLE, November 4, 1828. 
 Ml/ Much Esteemed Brethren: — "I wrote you some time since 
 that the Lord was doing great things for us on some parts of 
 the Huntsville District, since which I have seen a letter in the 
 Christian AdvocatCj written by my worthy friend and brother. 
 Rev. T. Saunders, in which he gives a more detailed account of 
 the Mountain Spring Camp-meeting than I could do in the 
 hasty sketch which I wrote on the same subject. I have a few 
 days since returned from another Camp-meeting which I held 
 on the same Circuit at Spring Creek, about fourteen miles from 
 the Mountain Spring Camp Ground, where we had another 
 signal manifestation of Jehovah's power, and willingness to for- 
 give iniquity, transgression, and sin. This meeting commenced 
 on Thursday, 23d of October, and lasted until the next Tues- 
 day in the afternoon. The congregations were not as large as 
 they would have been, but for another Camp-meeting which 
 was held by the Presbyterians at the same time at La Grange, 
 about four miles from ours; but our congregations were quite 
 respectable as to numbers, and very serious, attentive, and much 
 engaged in prayer throughout the whole meeting; and such was 
 the orderly behavior of the congregation, which was very large 
 on the Sabbath, that there was no reproof given, either in the 
 pulpit, or in any other way during the meeting. Indeed, where 
 the good sense and taste of an enlightened community, under a 
 powerful influence of divine grace, become deeply interested in 
 favor of religion, we need no guards, the congregations will 
 want no reproofs, nor will it ever be found necessary in such 
 circumstances to exclude the holy Sabbath out of our Camp- 
 meeting arrangements. Our Sacrament on Sunday night was 
 interesting beyond any description that I can give of it. More 
 than 500 whites, and a large number of blacks received the 
 Holy Communion, while they contemplated with holy i)leasure, 
 and with shouts and tears of joy, the great object of this holy 
 institution. It would be useless for me to attempt to give in de- 
 tail all the interesting circumstances of this meeting. Many 
 will long remember the days and nights which they spent at the 
 
 Spring Creek Camp-meeting. I left the sacred spot on Tues- 
 day about twelve o'clock. At that time 150 persons had pro- 
 fessed religion, and 147 had joined the Church as members on 
 trial. A young man who lives in Courtland, who left there aft- 
 er I did, informed me that three more had joined, making in 
 all 150. This blessed work continues to prevail among the first 
 ranks of society. The Lord in his tender mercy is permitting 
 many * camels to pass through the needle's eye,' in the Court- 
 land Valley. Never have I seen such a work as this before. 
 More than 1,000 souls have embraced religion in this rich and 
 beautiful valley in the last six months, and more than 800 
 of that number have joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 More than 400 joined at three Camp-meetings, all held on the 
 Franklin Circuit, not more than fifteen miles apart. Decatur, 
 Courtland, Tuscumbia, and Florence, are all in a flame. There 
 seems to be but little interest felt, or subject talked of, but that 
 of religion. I believe there is scarcely a family in Tuscumbia 
 that has not been visited by the revival in the conversion of 
 some of its members. I do not believe there were ten persons 
 of mature age at our last Camp-meeting who were not either 
 converted, or deeply engaged in the great work of their salva- 
 tion. It may be truly said that Zion's ' light has come, and the 
 glory of the Lord hath risen ' upon the valley. 
 
 William McMahon." 
 
 Frederick G. Ferguson and Robert A. Baker appeared for the 
 first time that either of them ever appeared in official capacity, 
 Ferguson as an exhorter. Baker as a class leader, in the Quar- 
 terly Conference for Franklin Circuit held at Mountain Spring 
 Camp Ground, July 25, 1829. 
 
 The Church in that country about that time began to branch 
 out a little beyond the ordinary routine business. At that 
 Quarterly Conference, held July 25, 1829, the following action 
 was taken and put on record: *'0n motion Resolved, That this 
 Quarterly Meeting Conference form itself into a Bible, Tract, 
 and Sunday School Union Society of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, in conformity with the plan of the * Parent Society ' in 
 New York, as suggested in the Christian Advocate and Journal; 
 and appointed E. D. Sims, Robert Fenner, and AV. S. Jones a 
 Committee to draft a Constitution." 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference for the Franklin Circuit held at 
 
236 
 
 Ilistonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Spring Creek Camp Ground October 24, 1829, "Hiram M. 
 Glass, Frederick G. Ferguson, and Francis H. Jones were rec- 
 ommended to the District Conference for Licenses to Preach, 
 and to be recommended to the Annual Conference as suitable 
 persons for the Itinerancy." They were all three licensed to 
 preach and were admitted on trial in the Tennessee Conference 
 at its session at Huntsville, Alabama, November 19, 1829. 
 
 For a long while it was a general if not universal custom with 
 the Methodists to secure money for the salaries of the preach- 
 ers by public as well as private solicitations. For some reason 
 the public collection for securing ministerial compensation in- 
 curred the displeasure of the people, and the custom was dis- 
 continued. At a Quarterly Conference held for Franklin Cir- 
 cuit at Mount Zion, February 13, 1830, an ofScial deliverance on 
 this subject was made and put on record: "On motion, Ee- 
 solved. That this Conference pledge themselves to make nse of 
 all Lawful exertions to collect Quarterage from our respective 
 Societies, so as to pay our preachers without resorting to public 
 collections in our Large Congregations." 
 
 About the same time there developed an evil tendency which 
 had to be checked among the class of workers known as Exhort- 
 ers. On the part of human kind there is a disposition to usurp 
 prerogatives. The Exhorters of the Church under the prompt- 
 ings of this disposition and the leadings of this tendency as- 
 sumed the prerogatives of preachers, and the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence held for the Franklin Circuit at tlio Camp Ground near 
 Kussellville, October 2, 1830, adopted a Eesolution limiting the 
 prerogatives and defining the special work of an exhorter: " Re- 
 solved, That it is the opinion of this Conference that no Exhort- 
 er should make an appointment to preach, nor take a particu- 
 lar passage of Scripture as a Text at any appointment he 
 may have; but may quote as many passages of Scripture as he 
 may deem proper, to comment on, or support and prove any doc- 
 trine he may advance." 
 
 Probably this deliverance of the Quarterly Conference terri- 
 fied the Exhorters, and served to hold them in proper bounds, 
 but notwithstanding the manifest purpose of the Resolution it 
 certainly did give large liberty to the Exhorters in the state- 
 ment, exposition, and proof of doctrines, and in comment on the 
 Scriptures. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 237 
 
 The Rev. Rufus Ledbetter preached one year in Alabama. 
 For 1825 he was the preacher in charge of the Franklin Circuit, 
 and for his services that year he received as quarterage $109.00, 
 and for traveling expenses S7.75. He was admitted on trial in 
 the Tennessee Conference in November, 1821, and at the close 
 of 1825 he transferred to the Virginia Conference, where he 
 preached six or eight years, and then located. He afterward re- 
 turned as a citizen to Tennessee, where he died during the war 
 between the States. Physically, he was a good specimen. He 
 was a devoted Christian, an able preacher, and in labors abun- 
 dant. He was the brother of the Rev. Wiley Ledbetter, who 
 was for some time a member of the Tennessee Conference. He 
 was the son of the Rev. Charles Ledbetter, who was once a 
 traveling preacher in Virginia and North Carolina, having been 
 admitted into the traveling connection in the latter part of 1793, 
 and having continued in that connection until the first part of 
 
 1799. 
 
 The preachers on the Franklin Circuit for 1826 were, Finch 
 P. Scruggs, John B. McFerrin, Alexander Sale, Sup.; for 1827, 
 Finch P. Scruggs, John W. Jones; for 1828, James McFerrin, 
 Green M. Rogers; for 1829, James McFerrin, Wesley Deskins. 
 
 The Rev. Wesley Deskins was born in Tennessee, July 7, 
 1806; entered the traveling connection in the close of 1826; and 
 died in Warren, Tennessee, October 3, 1830. The words of sal- 
 vation and victory were on his tongue in the dying hour! 
 
 For Franklin Circuit for 1830, James W. Paris, William E. 
 Doughty; for 1831, Samuel Gilliland, James W. Paris. 
 
 The Rev. James W. Paris gave three years of his itinerant 
 ministry to Alabama, and rendered some service in the State as 
 a local preacher. He was destitute of the graces acquired by 
 education and he was naturally eccentric, but withal he pos- 
 sessed rare gifts as an orator, and was a chosen vessel of God. 
 He was a man of solemn tone and awful mien. As an orator he 
 swept all the chords of the human soul. He touched the emo- 
 tions and excited the sensibilities. He swayed the vast throngs 
 of a Camp-meeting as absolutely as the storm sways the trees 
 of the forest. He could depict in awful grandeur "the dismal 
 situation waste and wild" of one finally despoiled of divine 
 bliss because here he stood as a barren tree in the Lord's vine- 
 yard. 
 
238 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 He was first admitted on trial in the Tennessee Conference in 
 October, 1816, and served the Flint Kiver Circuit for 1817, and 
 at the session of the Conference at the end of that year discon- 
 tinued. At the session of the Conference at Huntsville, No- 
 vember, 1829, he was again admitted on trial and continued in 
 the itinerant work until his death in 1832. His last charge was 
 the Wesley Circuit in West Tennessee. 
 
CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 EEY. THOMAS STRINGFIELD. 
 
 (239) 
 
 The Enlargement and Adtancement of the Work of Meth- 
 odism IN Alabama. 
 
 XT^NTSVILLE was for a dozen years or more one of tlie 
 1 JL appointments of the Circuit in the bounds of which it was 
 situated, and for the most of that time the Methodists in that 
 place were without a church, and worshiped in rooms impro- 
 vised for the occasion; they were sometimes the rooms of pri- 
 vate residences, and sometimes the rooms in common public 
 use. The first deed made to a lot on which to erect a church 
 for the use and benefit of the Methodists at the town of Hilnts- 
 ville bears date August 20, 1820, and was made, indefinite as it 
 may seem, to the " Huntsville Church." The lot named in that 
 deed was on West Clinton Street, and it was eventually sold by 
 the Methodists to the Primitive Baptists, and at last said lot 
 was abandoned by the Baptists, and is now, 1890, vacant, and 
 has been for many years. 
 
 At the close of 1821, Huntsville was made a Station, and the 
 Kev. Thomas Madden was assigned to it for 1822, but for rea- 
 ons now unknown the appointments for Huntsville and Nash« 
 ville were, after they were announced in the session of the Con- 
 ference, readjusted, and the Rev. Thomas Madden went to 
 Nashville and the Rev. Thonaas Stringfield went to Huntsville, 
 and so as a matter of fact the Rev. Thomas Stringfield served 
 the Huntsville Station for the year 1822. He was also sent to 
 Huntsville Station for the year 1823, and served it that year, 
 making his pastorate there two years which was then the full 
 time allowed by the law of limitation. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Stringfield was bom in Kentucky in 1796, 
 and in 1804, in his native State, he was born into the kingdom 
 of God, and united himself with the Church. In 1808 his fa- 
 ther moved to Alabama, and settled on the Tennessee River, in 
 Madison County. In 1813, though then but a youth, he joined 
 the volunteer forces of General Andrew Jackson and helped to 
 subdue the hostile Indians on the soil of Alabama. In that 
 campaign, while on guard, he was shot by an ambushed savage, 
 Xe (239) 
 
240 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 and henceforth he carried on his forehead a scar which told how 
 near he came to death at the hands of a Creek warrior. While 
 a soldier, as well as during his whole life, he maintained his 
 Christian integrity. He went through the whole campaign 
 without a blot upon his moral character. 
 
 He was, after his return from the campaign against the Creek 
 Indians, licensed to preach in Madison County, Alabama, and 
 was admitted into the Tennessee Conference on trial in Octo- 
 ber, 1816. Five years of his ministry were given to Alabama. 
 While in Huntsville, Alabama, as a preacher, he commenced the 
 publication of a periodical called Western Arminian and Chris- 
 tian Instructor, of which he was the Editor. That periodical 
 was his own personal property, and under the title here given 
 he continued it for about three years. Then the property rights 
 in it were transferred to the Holston Conference, and the name 
 of the paper was changed to that of the Holston Conference 
 Messenger. Under its new name and management he was 
 elected and continued Editor. 
 
 Shortly after the Arminian and Instructor was commenced 
 at Huntsville, Alabama, it was removed to Knoxville, Tennes- 
 see, and it continued to be published at that place until it was 
 changed to the Holston Conference Messenger. The Messen- 
 ger was published at Knoxville. 
 
 The Arminian and Instructor was filled with matter on mis- 
 cellaneous subjects, such as biographical sketches, revival and 
 missionary intelligence, and literary themes, but the real pur- 
 pose of that periodical and that of its successor, the Messenger, 
 was to defend Methodist doctrines, Methodist polity, and Meth- 
 odist usages against the attacks of inveterate enemies. During 
 the time the Kev. Thomas Stringfield edited these periodicals at 
 Knoxville, Tennessee, he was engaged in an acrimonious con- 
 troversy with a set of pugnacious ecclesiastics, a troop of un- 
 scrupulous Calvinists, who imagined that their sole business in 
 life was to obliterate Methodism, and that they could accomplish 
 their assigned task in a very short time. 
 
 The Kev. Thomas Stringfield was a coherent thinker, a logic- 
 al reasoner, a cool debater, a courageous advocate, a profound 
 theologian, a cogent preacher, and an intelligible and impress- 
 ive writer. He was a ready champion, an inflexible antago- 
 nist He was in himself a host, and unconquerable. He 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 241 
 
 repelled and swept from the Holston country the ecclesiastical 
 gladiators who set themselves so fiercely upon Methodism. He 
 instructed the population in the large and interesting field in 
 which he exercised his ministry and circulated his periodicals 
 in Arminian doctrines and in evangelical methods, and he took 
 the field for Methodism. While others, by their labors, con- 
 tributed to achieve a victory for Methodism against Calvinists 
 and other antagonists, the Eev. Thomas Stringfield, who grew 
 to manhood and who was licensed to preach in Alabama, was 
 the champion leader in the great contest and the chief agent in 
 the signal victory. 
 
 He was a laborious preacher and a versatile writer. He trav- 
 eled and preached constantly over an extended region of country, 
 and he wrote and published numerous sermons, doctrinal essays, 
 and miscellaneous addresses. He was active in the inauguratiou 
 and advancement of literary and moral institutions. At one 
 time he was Agent for the Holston Conference Seminary, and at 
 another time for the American Bible Society. 
 
 The General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 assembled in Cincinnati, Ohio, in May, 1836, by official action, di- 
 rected the establishment of a new paper which should bear the 
 name of South-Western Christian Advocate, and which should 
 be published at Nashville, Tennessee. For Editor of the pro- 
 spective organ the General Conference elected the Rev. Thomas 
 Stringfield. In due course the paper ordered and provided for 
 was issued, and during the quadrennium ending at the session 
 of the General Conference held in 1840, the Rev. Thomas String- 
 field controlled the general make-up of that periodical, and filled 
 its columns with editorial, contributed, and selected matter; 
 and under the editorial management of that gifted and pious 
 man of God the paper secured the confidence of that section of 
 the Church for whose benefit it was instituted, and attained a 
 degree of merit unusual in so short a time. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Stringfield was called to legislate for the 
 Church as well as to disseminate, defend, and establish her doc- 
 trines. He was an honored delegate to the General Conference 
 of 1844, and punctually did he discharge his duties and faithful- 
 ly did he meet his obligations on that memorable occasion. 
 Through all that ordeal he sustained himself, and his cause. 
 
 Twice was he suitably and happily married, and he brought 
 
l^-l 
 
 242 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 243 
 
 up a family of children who have honored him and honored 
 themselves, and have been a blessing to the Church. One of his 
 sons was a preacher, and another occupied a seat in the highest 
 councils of his Church. One of his daughters, Mrs. Butler, who 
 inherited his mental endowments, is now, in the year 1890, and 
 has been for several years. Editor of the Woman's Missionary 
 Advocate. 
 
 The extraordinary intellectual endowments which he pos- 
 sessed, the abundant labors which he performed, the swiftness 
 with which, as a messenger of light, he sped the divine cause, 
 the profuse expenditures of money which he made in the dis- 
 semination of evangelical doctrines, entitled the Eev. Thomas 
 Striugfield to appreciation and eulogy, but above all other 
 things for which he was eminent and for which he was worthy 
 of admiration was his moral excellence. His veneration of the 
 Divine Being, his love of the divine law, and his devotion to the 
 divine service were unsurpassed. 
 
 He was the first preacher stationed at Huntsville, and Hunts- 
 ville Station was the last charge he served in Alabama. 
 
 He died June 12, 1858, and his body rests on the banks of the 
 Holston River, in East Tennessee. 
 
 The preacher stationed at Huntsville for 1824 was the Eev. 
 Wiley B. Peck. He was a man of good ability and of more than 
 ordinary attainments. He was admitted on trial in the Tennes- 
 f ee Conference in October, 1820, was transferred to the Missouri 
 Conference in November, 1825, and located at the close of the 
 Conference year for 1826. He deserted the Church of his first 
 choice and cast his lot with the Protestant Episcopal Church, 
 where he read prayers and expatiated on apostolic succession. 
 
 The Rev. John M. Holland was stationed at Huntsville for the 
 years 1825 and 1826, and at the end of his pastoral term there he 
 married a most excellent young lady of that place. 
 
 The Huntsville Station was served in 1827 by the Rev. James 
 Rowe, and in 1828 by the Rev. James \Y. Allen, and again in 
 1829 by the Rev. James Rowe. 
 
 The Rev. James Rowe entered the ministry in the State of 
 Ohio. He was received in the Ohio Conference on trial in Sep- 
 tember, 1822, and he was received into full connection, ordained 
 deacon, and located at the session of the Ohio Conference in 
 September, 1824. At the session of the Tennessee Conference 
 
 beginning November 28, 1826, he was re-admitted to the travel- 
 ing connection. He located again in November, 1830. Hence- 
 forth, till his death, which occurred about 1870, he was a local 
 preacher. He died in Athens, Alabama, and was buried in the 
 cemetery at that place. He was a good preacher. He was of 
 commanding presence, tall, strong, and well made. He was sen- 
 timental and sanguine, imaginative and impulsive, eccentric and 
 energetic He was opposed to war, and the use of whisky, and 
 
 tobacco. 
 
 About the close of his ministry in the Huntsville Station he 
 married a young lady of native gifts and rare accomplishments; 
 a lady well fitted for and suited to teaching, and he turned his 
 attention to the profession of a pedagogue. He conceived the 
 idea of establishing a school on the top of the mountains, exalt- 
 ed above the ordinary hills, and which should on account of its 
 situation attract the school-girls of the country from far and 
 near. Monte Sano seventeen hundred feet above the sea level, 
 and more than a thousand feet above the public square of the 
 city of Huntsville furnished the site in accord with his concep- 
 tion, and on that lofty eminence he erected a suitable school- 
 building, and there, for a number of years, and until the death 
 of his charming, and accomplished wife, he conducted a superior 
 school. The following communication contains a scrap of histo- 
 ry on this subject: 
 
 "Monte Sano Female Academy. 
 
 This institution, within the bounds of our charge, and at 
 which we preach regularly every two weeks, has been favored 
 with the visitations of divine grace. Ten of the students have 
 recently been made the happy subjects of i^ardoniug mercy; 
 and all the rest seem to be deeply and powerfully awakened to 
 a sense of their lost and undone condition by reason of sin. O, 
 may the great Head of the Church carry on his work among 
 
 them ! 
 
 This institution was established by the Rev. James Rowe, for- 
 merly a traveling preacher in the Tennessee Conference. At 
 our last annual session a dispensation was granted him for the 
 purpose of attending to some pecuniary business; since which 
 time he has procured land, and erected suitable buildings on the 
 above named mountain for the location of a permanent institu- 
 
 I," 
 
244 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 I 
 
 tioD for female education. For the information of our friends 
 abroad, I would say, * This location combines peculiar and nu- 
 merous advantages.' It is highly elevated, perhaps 1,800 feet 
 above the surrounding plain, and affords one of the most delight- 
 ful prospects in the western country. The air is salubrious. 
 There is a chalybeate spring within one mile of the institution, 
 to which many resort in the summer season for the benefit of 
 their health. The purest of fresh water is in abundance. Ex- 
 perience evinces that this situation ie very healthy, indeed. 
 The retired situation of the academy ig very favorable to study 
 and improvement. It is only three and a half miles from Hunts- 
 ville. 
 
 ' It is proposed to teach in this institution Botany, Natural 
 and Moral Philosophy, the Elements of Geometry, Chemistry, 
 and Astronomy.' * Terms of tuition and board moderate.' 
 
 Huntsville, Alabama, September 15, 1830. Alpha.'* 
 
 The Kev. William P. Kendrick was the preacher at Hunts- 
 ville for 1830. That was the last year of his itinerant ministry 
 in Alabama. The year before he was stationed at Florence. 
 The most of his itinerant work was done in East Tennessee, and 
 in the bounds of what was at one time the Holston Conference. 
 It seems that he was rather vacillating in his attachments to 
 the itinerant ministry. He was admitted on trial in the Ten- 
 nessee Conference in October, 1820, and in due course he was 
 admitted into full connection in the same Conference, and or- 
 dained deacon and elder. In October, 1825, being then a 
 member of the Holston Conference, he located; in November, 
 1827, he was re-admitted to the Holston Conference, and in No- 
 vember, 1828, he again located; and immediately he was re-ad- 
 mitted to the Tennessee Conference, and for 1829 was appointed 
 to Florence Station, and then to the Huntsville Station for 1830; 
 for 1831 he was left without an appointment, and in November 
 of that year he once more located. That was his last and final 
 location. "How to perform that which is good, I find not. 
 For the good that I would, I do not." 
 
 Notwithstanding his vacillation in the pastoral work, he was 
 admired and applauded by the masses who flocked to his min- 
 istry. He was a man of pleasant bearing and attractive man- 
 ners. He was a magnificent declaimer, and a logical reasoner. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 245 
 
 His appeals from the pulpit were irresistible. He was a man 
 of marked talents, and was famous as a pulpit orator. After 
 his final location he became engrossed in secular affairs and 
 very much devoted to politics. When the war between the 
 States began he had passed beyond the age for military service, 
 but he went out with the Confederate forces as a chaplain, and 
 while engaged in that service he died. Notwithstanding his 
 vacillations and the vicissitudes of his life he died while engaged 
 in the work of the ministry. He died while he held a commis- 
 sion as chaplain to the Confederate soldiers. 
 
 The appointments for 1831 included the following: Hunts- 
 ville, John B. McFerrin. For 1832 : Huntsville, Ashley B. Eoszel. 
 
 During the ten years beginning with 1822 and closing with 
 1832 there was in the Huntsville Station an increase of white 
 members from sixty-one to one hundred and twenty-seven, and 
 a decrease of colored members from two hundred and thirteen 
 to fifty-six. 
 
 The Tennessee Conference held its annual session at Hunts- 
 ville, Alabama, beginning November 26, 1823. That was an 
 event in the history of the place, an event distinctive, extraordi- 
 nary, and to the Methodists there, intelligent and refined as 
 they were, delightful, and entertaining. That was the first ses- 
 sion of an Annual Conference ever held at the place. At that 
 Conference there were two Bishops, William McKendree and 
 Enoch George, and more than sixty preachers present. A let- 
 ter bearing date December 1, 1823, and written at Huntsville 
 by Bishop McKendree still survives the ravages of time. 
 
 The presence of one noted individual, though neither a Bish- 
 op nor a Priest, and though not numbered among kings or 
 scholars, created peculiar interest and gave occasion for special 
 record. POLLY SMITH, a Cherokee Indian, who had been 
 inducted into the Christian religion by a change of nature and 
 an experience of grace, and who was a member of a Methodist 
 Society organized and kept up at Richard Riley's, in the Cher- 
 okee Nation, twelve miles south of Fort Deposit, was at that first 
 session of an Annual Conference at Huntsville; and was there 
 on a special mission; on a mission in which were involved the 
 issues of holy living. 
 
 About twelve months before the Conference convened at 
 Huntsville, this Polly Smith found in the Nation a piece of 
 
246 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 calico. She did not, as she could have done, conceal the goods 
 and apply it to her own use, but she carried it to the nearest 
 trading house to which she lived, and inquired of the proprie- 
 tor if he had sold such goods, and if so, to whom. The mer- 
 chant informed her that he had sold to some Creek Indians a 
 piece of goods precisely like the piece she had found. She 
 kept the goods with care and inquired diligently for the owner; 
 but having failed to find the proper owners of the calico, she 
 went to the town of Huntsville, arriving there at the time of the 
 session of the Conference, and laid the case before the Kev. 
 William McMahon, the presiding elder, and sought his decis- 
 ion as to the disposition she should make of the property. 
 Than this neither legend, nor fiction, nor history can furnish a 
 sublimer example of Christian integrity, virtue, and faith. 
 That woman was a trophy from the depths of the forest, from 
 the land of the heathen, and she and the ethical questions which 
 she presented for solution magnified the occasion and intensi- 
 fied the interest in the business of the Conference. 
 
 At that Conference the following persons were ordained 
 deacons in the Methodist Church, on Clinton Street, by Bishop 
 Enoch George: Kufus Ledbetter, John Seay, Jacob S. Hearn, 
 Thomas A. Young, German Baker, Finch P. Scruggs, James G. 
 H. Speer, Abraham Overall, Nathaniel E. Jarrett, John Kains, 
 John Kice, John Kelly, Kichard Neeley, Nathan L. Norvell, 
 William Patton, Thomas J. Brown, George Horn, David B. 
 Cumming, and William B. Carpenter. 
 
 The following were on the same occasion, though at a differ- 
 ent hour, elected and ordained elders: Kobert Paine, John 
 Brooks, John Kesterson, Hartwell H. Brown, Abraham Still, 
 Lewis S. Marshall, Thomas Madden, Ellison Taylor. 
 
 At that session of the Conference nine delegates were elected 
 to the General Conference. 
 
 At a meeting held for the purpose, in the town of Huntsville, 
 April 26, 1829, a Society was organized with the constitutional 
 designation: "The Huntsville Sunday School, auxiliary to the 
 * Sunday School Union,' and the Huntsville Bible and Tract So- 
 ciety, auxiliary to the Bible and Tract Societies of the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church." The following persons were elected 
 as the officers of the Society: John M. Taylor, President; 
 James Kowe, Vice-president; B. M. Lowe, Treasurer; E. P. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 247 
 
 Smith, Kecording Secretary; C. K Clifton, Corresponding Sec- 
 retary; K B. Purdom, David Moore, Thomas Brandon, John 
 Kinkle, Joseph Ward— Managers. 
 
 This item, thought at the time worthy of record, gives the 
 names of a few men in Huntsville who at that day participated 
 in the affairs of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and it indi- 
 cates the stage which had been reached there at that period in 
 the development of Christian benevolence and Church enter- 
 prise. Though there had been a degree of tardiness in organi- 
 zing that Society, such organization having been provided for 
 by the general Church ten years previous to that date, yet at 
 last there was organized benevolence and provision for active 
 cooperation in the dissemination of revealed truth and the ex- 
 tension of the kingdom of God among men. 
 
 Another session of the Tennessee Conference was held at 
 Huntsville, Alabama, beginning November 19, 1829. It was a 
 grand occasion. The town was in prosperous condition, the 
 Methodists there were in pleasant mood, the meteorological con- 
 dition of the atmosphere was good, the concourse was large, and 
 notable visitors were present. Everything was conducive to the 
 pleasure and success of the occasion, except the indisposition of 
 the Bishop, the Eev. Kobert E. Eoberts, who was to preside 
 over the deliberations of the body. He was so indisposed he 
 did not reach Huntsville until the Conference had disposed of 
 a large part of the business; and even after he had arrived at 
 the seat of the Conference he could preside over the body only 
 occasionally. The preachers whom he ordained elders had to 
 meet him in his room in a private house for the ordination serv- 
 ice. The Eev. Eobert Paine was elected president of the Con- 
 ference in the absence of the Bishop. 
 
 The interest of the occasion concentered in the Missionary 
 Anniversary. The following statement is given from a commu- 
 nication to the Corresponding Secretary of the Missionary So- 
 ciety of the Methodist Episcopal Church: " The second anniver- 
 sary of the Tennessee Conference Missionary Society was held 
 on the 23 of November last, in the Methodist Church in Hunts- 
 ville, Alabama. The meeting was opened by Bishop Eoberts 
 by reading the fortieth chapter of Isaiah, singing, and prayer. 
 The president, then taking the chair, called for the reading of 
 the report of the board of managers, which was accordingly 
 
248 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 done by the Eev. Thomas L. Douglass, in which it evidently ap- 
 peared that the missionary cause still continues to prevail with 
 amazing rapidity, so that wonders are everywhere wrought 
 among the heathen in the name of Jesus. 
 
 The collection from the congregation at the Anniversary 
 amounted to $100-a sufficient sum to support a missionary for 
 tiie term of one year." 
 
 A noted visitor in the person of an Indian Chief was at that 
 anniversary, as the following from the communication already 
 quoted from shows: "The interest of the meeting was greatly 
 increased by the presence of several of the Cherokee converts 
 and also by the pleasing account of the extraordinary work of 
 religion m the Choctaw nation, given by Colonel G. Lafleur, 
 chiet of the northwestern district of that nation." 
 
 The communication from which the above quotations are 
 made was written by the Eev. John M. Holland, and it bears 
 date January, 1830. 
 
 Turtle Fields, a Cherokee Indian, was received into full con- 
 nection in the Annual Conference and ordained deacon by Bish- 
 op Eoberts at that session of the Conference, and Young Wolfe, 
 another Cherokee Indian, was admitted on trial. 
 
 Savages upon whom the light of the Lord had come and upon 
 whom his glory had arisen through the instrumentality of the 
 ministers of the Methodist Episcopal Church gathered them- 
 selves together at the beautiful town of Huntsville, and their 
 feet pressed the aisles and their voices resounded through the 
 auditorium of the neat sanctuary which the Methodists'" there 
 had dedicated to divine worship. Savages now bearing forth 
 tidings of peace entered the courts of the Lord. Princes from 
 a savage land brought their gifts and praises to the Kedeemer 
 of nations. Such an incident was thrilling, and thereby the 
 faith of the people of God was strengthened, their zeal intensi- 
 fied, their liberality enlarged, and their joy increased. 
 
 On March 7, 1832, William H. Powers and wife did, in con- 
 sideration of the sum of seven hundred and fifty dollars, sell 
 and convey to David Moore, William Cain, Joseph L. Clark, 
 John M. Taylor, and Charles P. Smith Trustees, for the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church, Lot No. 30, situated on Kandolph and 
 Green Streets. On that Lot since then has stood the Church of 
 the Methodists of Huntsville. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work op 
 
 Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THE first mention ever made of Mobile in the ecclesiastical 
 records of Methodism is found in the list of appointments 
 made for the Mississippi Conference at its session at Washing- 
 ton, Mississippi, December, 1821. The last appointment in that 
 list is: "Alexander Talley, Missionary to Pensacola, Mobile, 
 Blakely, and adjoining country." 
 
 The first Methodist preacher ever appointed to Mobile was 
 the Kev. Alexander Talley, though it is by no means probable 
 that he was the first one who ever visited the place. It is quite 
 certain that the preachers on the Tombecbee and the Chickasaw- 
 hay Circuits visited Mobile before the Kev. Alexander Talley was 
 ever appointed to the place, although they never established any 
 Societies there. In the memoir of the Eev. Alexander Talley, 
 published in the General Minutes, it is stated that in " 1819, he 
 was appointed a Missionary to Mobile." This is a mistake. 
 For the year 1819, the South Carolina Conference appointed 
 *' Alexander Talley, Missionary to Alabama Territory," and that 
 year he organized, as has been stated in another place, the Ala- 
 bama Circuit, the chief appointments of which were about 
 where the Pine Woods, Autauga, Cotoma, and Swift Creeks 
 form their junctions with the Alabama River. At the close of 
 1819 he located, and made his home at Vernon, on the Alabama 
 River, at the upper point of Dutch Bend, and in the bounds of 
 the Alabama Circuit. Here he administered medicine, and ex- 
 ercised the functions of a local preacher. In December, 1821, 
 he was re-admitted to the traveling connection in the Mississippi 
 Conference, and was appointed, for 1822, " Missionary to Pensa- 
 cola, Mobile, Blakely, and adjoining country." At the end of 
 the Conference year 1822 he again located, and then returned to 
 the occupation of administering medicine to the sick in his old 
 field of practice on the Alabama River. He again lived at Ver- 
 non, and at that place he remained, engaged in the administra- 
 
 (249) 
 
250 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 tion of medicine, and in the exercise of the functions of a local 
 preacher, until December, 1825, when he was again re-admitted 
 into the Mississippi Conference, and appointed presiding elder 
 of the Louisiana District. That ended his work in Alabama; 
 henceforth his appointments were beyond the limits of the 
 State. 
 
 No authentic record now accessible states where or when the 
 Rev. Alexander Talley was born. He had six brothers, three, at 
 least, of whom were Methodist preachers. The Rev. Nicholas 
 Talley, his brother, who was for a long time an itinerant preach- 
 er, was born near Richmond, Virginia, and his brother the Rev. 
 John Wesley Talley, who was for a long time a traveling preach- 
 er in his native State, was born near Greensborough, Georgia; 
 but where the Rev. William S. Talley, another brother, and who 
 was once a member of the South Carolina Conference, and who 
 died in Greene County, Georgia, was born, is unknown. Prob- 
 ably Alexander and William S. were born in Virginia. 
 
 "Alexander Talley was recommended by a Quarterly Confer- 
 ence held at Walker's Meeting House for Appalachee Circuit, 
 December 9, 1809," as a suitable person to be admitted on trial 
 in the traveling connection. Walker's Meeting House was 
 probably in Greene County, Georgia, as the Talleys lived in that 
 County, and as the Appalachee Circuit embraced that and other 
 Counties. On December 26, 1809, he was " admitted on trial " 
 by the South Carolina Conference. In December, 1811, he was 
 admitted into fall connection in the Conference, and ordained 
 deacon. January 15, 1814, at Fayetteville, North Carolina, he 
 was elected elder, and the next day, Sunday, was ordained. 
 
 He was appointed in charge of Missions, Circuits, Stations, 
 and Districts. He filled the prominent places, such as Charles- 
 ton Station, and Edisto District in the South Carolina Confer- 
 ence, and the Louisiana District in the Mississippi Conference. 
 While he was not as elegant and eloquent as some others in 
 the pulpit, yet he was a popular and successful preacher. His 
 piety was commanding and impressive. 
 
 One at whose father's house he made his home for weeks at a 
 time in Autauga County, Alabama, where he did his first work 
 in Alabama as an itinerant preacher and his last work as a local 
 preacher, says of him: " He was rather below the ordinary stat- 
 ure, being about five feet seven inches high, with full chest, and 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 251 
 
 weighing about one hundred and forty pounds. His hair was 
 black, and he was of a bilious temperament. He had a custom 
 when not engaged in conversation of walking back and forth 
 across the floor, and whistling between his teeth, with an ab- 
 stracted air, as if engaged in meditation. He gained the respect 
 and confidence of the children wherever he went. I recollect 
 well how I was in constant dread of being expelled from the 
 Church by him for wearing a ruffled collar around my neck when 
 I went to the house of God." 
 
 He found favor with the children and the adult population as 
 well. His influence was marked and wholesome. 
 
 He was a man of strong Christian character, and of more than 
 ordinary mental ability. He had a clear apprehension of what- 
 ever subject engaged his attention, and he was a steady devotee 
 of the cause he espoused. He was capable of thoroughly ana- 
 lyzing a subject, and of writing out and setting forth his 
 thoughts in clear and cogent composition. In December, 1827, 
 he was appointed to the Choctaw Mission, which at that time 
 was situated in the Choctaw Nation within the chartered limits 
 of the State of Mississippi. When the Choctaws were removed 
 west of the Mississippi River the Mission to them was continued 
 in their new home, and the Rev. Alexander Talley remained Su- 
 perintendent of that work until the close of 1834 A letter writ- 
 ten by him when he first took charge of the Mission to the Choc- 
 taws, the contents of which are of interest in themselves, will 
 give some idea of his mental and moral qualities. He wrote a 
 number of letters concerning the Choctaw Mission of merit and 
 interest which are still extant, but they are too long for insertion 
 in this History. The letter here quoted was addressed to the 
 Rev. John Emory, Corresponding Secretary of the Missionary 
 Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 
 " Choctaw Nation, April 2, 1828. 
 
 Dear Sir: — It has become my duty to communicate an account 
 of the state of the mission among this people. It is known to 
 many of our distant friends, that the Methodist Missionary So- 
 ciety has not had a laborer in this mission for two or three 
 years; and from the short time that I have been on this service, 
 it cannot be expected that I have many subjects of joy and re- 
 joicing to communicate. 
 
 I commenced my labor about the middle of January last, and 
 
252 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 although much hindered by excessiye rains. I have visited all 
 the Chiefs and many of the most influential men in the nation 
 If the":-*"'t' through most of the important settlm 2 
 
 ces I shXr/ ''T'"'^'T °^ f"«'^'i«WP °«"^ i"B-e me suc- 
 cess, I shall certainly succeed. My reception has been flattering 
 
 everywhere and particularly so by the Chiefs and the Unite! 
 
 stranLrsT^H "' '' " ""' *° "^ '^^'''^^ *'>''* ^^ -^o -e 
 heartf r fi' '^°°^-«*'"g P^^^' °f g^ace upon their own 
 
 hear 8, can justly appreciate the only well founded hope of sue 
 cess m a Missionary. Their wishes for the success of^eve y e ! 
 fort to cmhze this people is no doubt sincere, and from the mor- 
 alizing influence of Christianity much is expected. But it is 
 not to be expected that the principal object of a Christian Mis- 
 lonary's hope should be recognized by them. Nothing les" 
 than a supernatural power changing the hearts of this people 
 can ever change their habits. But this aid is promised toTei 
 vent prayer, and I doubt not but that we are affectionately re- 
 membered by the Church in every part of our country ^ 
 
 I have found it difficult to obtain an interpreter, and even 
 now am not certain that I have succeeded. But in such circum 
 stances as have yet occurred to cast a shade upon my prospects 
 I have found an almighty hand to lean upon; consequentWhen 
 my way appeared obstructed I have felt assured that the ob- 
 struction would be removed, or in some way sanctified to my 
 good, or the furtherance of my work.-Could I paint the con 
 dition of this people in its true colors, I should certainly excite 
 
 t: 7oir ffel le^at ^^1 ^ -''. ^^ ^^^^ 
 +1.0 A \ t- f ^ ' ^ ^^^ ^^^*^' I Passed a house in 
 
 On ZtlZ^fir V"'' ^"''' surrounded by painted poles. 
 On the tops of the poles were cloths waving in the wind like 
 flags and near them, bent to the ground with their heads 
 shrouded in their blankets, were the relatives uttering the mos 
 piteous lamentations. Here I learned the value of^ChrisTan 
 hope Never shall I forget the sensations produced by th S 
 sight of this kind that I witnessed. 
 
 I must communicate the painful circumstance that whatever 
 inay have been the prospects of our former Missionary among 
 this people, that but very little fruit is now apparent. 
 
 Most Respectfully your obedient Servant, 
 
 Alexander Talley." 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 253 
 
 He was true to the Methodist Episcopal Church and the min- 
 istry thereof till the day of his death. Whatever may have been 
 his views on the questions which agitated the Church in his 
 time, he was no disruptionist. 
 
 This consecrated man of God who spent so much of his time 
 in frontier and missionary work in Alabama and among the In- 
 dians, the Eev. Alexander Talley, M.D., died of cholera, at 
 Vicksburg, Mississippi, in the summer of 1835. Among his last 
 words, uttered in peace, resignation, and triumph, were: "My 
 work is done." 
 
 Perhaps no Missionary ever had a harder field than was " Pen- 
 sacola. Mobile, Blakely, and adjoining country " in 1822, and no 
 work was ever more fruitless than was the work of that year in 
 that field. Not a member was reported in the entire Mission, 
 and the appointment was discontinued at the end of the year, 
 and Mobile did not appear again until the close of 1824 
 
 While in 1823 and 1824, as in the past years, there was not a 
 Methodist in the city of Mobile, and while for those two years 
 no preacher was appointed to further the interests of Metho- 
 dism in that city, yet the presiding elder of the Alabama Dis- 
 trict, the Rev. Nicholas Mclntyre, had the place under his juris- 
 diction, and he kept a vigilant eye upon it, and constantly 
 sought to get a foothold there for the Methodists, and finally a 
 lot was secured in the place on which to build a house of wor- 
 ship for the use of the members of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. The deed to said lot was made May 10, 1824, and was 
 made to the following Trustees: John McCrae, John H. Mallory, 
 John Graves, Sr., William Godfrey and James Wilson. These 
 Trustees were Methodists, but they did not live in Mobile. 
 They were members of the Church on the Chickasawhay Circuit. 
 John McCrae lived on the Chickasawhay River, in the State of 
 Mississippi, forty or fifty miles from Mobile, and held his mem- 
 bership at Bethel, near his home, and William Godfrey lived in 
 Washington County, Alabama, forty or fifty miles from Mobile, 
 and held his membership at Providence, which was near his 
 home. These men in the Chickasawhay Circuit were made 
 Trustees for the lot in Mobile, because there were no men in 
 Mobile then who were Methodists. 
 
 A review of the condition of things at Pensacola may help to 
 a correct understanding of the situation at Mobile at the date 
 
254 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 now under consideration. For the year 1824 Mobile was left, as 
 has already been stated, without a preacher. For that year the 
 Eev. Henry P. Cook was appointed to Pensacola Mission, and at 
 the end of the year he reported thirty-seven white and forty-sev- 
 en colored members in the Mission. Some of these, possibly all 
 of them, were in the country from thirty to fifty miles north of 
 the town of Pensacola. For 1825 the appointment reads: "Mo- 
 bile and Pensacola Mission, Henry P. Cook." During the year 
 the saintly Cook died of yellow fever at Pensacola, and at the 
 session of the Conference ensuing thirty-seven white and forty- 
 seven colored members were reported in connection with the 
 Mission. These were the same thirty-seven white and forty-sev- 
 en colored members which were reported the preceding year 
 when Mobile was not in the Mission, and the report harmonizes 
 with the fact that at the close of 1825 there was no Methodist 
 Society in Mobile. The town of Pensacola itself at that date 
 had very little in it, and it was then abandoned by the Mississip- 
 pi Conference, and for 1826 was left without a preacher. The 
 South Carolina Conference took Pensacola under its supervis- 
 ion, and appointed the Eev. Charles Hardy to Pensacola Mis- 
 sion for the Conference year 1827. After being there eleven 
 months the Eev. Charles Hardy gave a very gloomy account of 
 the moral condition of Pensacola, but reported a Sunday School 
 of from twenty-five to forty scholars, and that the frame of a 
 church had been raised, and that the work of completing the 
 house was in progress. The following account will show the con- 
 dition of matters in Pensacola at a little later date: 
 
 " Pensacola, August 6, 1828. 
 Dear Brother:— As to Pensacola we cannot say there seems 
 to be much religion there, though we have a Sabbath School in 
 operation, attended by from fifteen to thirty scholars, and I 
 would think, with a little more perseverance in the teachers, 
 and punctual attendance by the scholars, it would be attended with 
 much good. Our congregations are tolerable in size, serious, and 
 attentive during divine service, yet there does not seem to be 
 that tenderness and feeling manifest among them that I could 
 wish to see. I fear they are not sufficiently attentive to prayer, 
 neither in their closets nor church, consequently they are not 
 so well prepared to receive the word to profit thereby. 
 
 We have been making efforts for something more than a 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 255 
 
 year to have a church built, and have succeeded in getting a 
 very good one built, and have it now in occupancy, though it is 
 not entirely completed, nor is it yet paid for, which I fear will 
 involve us in difiiculties, though our embarrassments would not 
 have been great, if at all, had it not been for a loss of money 
 that we had collected, about $351. This money has been de- 
 tained by . I forbear to mention names or circumstances, 
 
 hut it is a fact; or, I would rather say, it is probable we shall 
 lose it. With this exception these people have been friendly, 
 and many of them have been very liberal in their contributions 
 toward our building, for which they are entitled to our best af- 
 fections; and I pray the Lord to bless them with spiritual as 
 well as temporal blessings. Ours is the first church of any 
 Protestant denomination that has ever been attempted to be 
 built in this place, nor have they ever had a stationed minister 
 by any Protestant order but by us, nor by us until latterly; con- 
 sequently they have not been often alarmed by the thunderings 
 from Mount Sinai, nor have they attended to that law that is 
 perfect, converting the soul, but many of them have indulged 
 themselves in iniquity without reproof or disapprobation from 
 others. It would pain your heart to walk the streets here on 
 Sunday evenings, and hear the colored people dancing, singing, 
 and playing on their musical instruments, and those in author- 
 ity are not careful to suppress such practices. Surely, me- 
 thinks, here is great need of the gospel to conduct these poor 
 people out of the prison of sin, and disgrace of wickedness, to 
 usefulness in society, and the happiness of religion. 
 
 Yours most affectionately, Josiah Evaxs." 
 
 The Eev. Josiah Evans, at the time of writing the above, was 
 the v)residing elder of the Tallahassee District, South Carolina 
 Conference, and Pensacola Mission was one of the pastoral 
 charges in the District, and the Eev. Isaac Boring was the 
 preacher in charge of Pensacola. 
 
 Notwithstanding Talley and Cook exercised a vigorous min- 
 istry in the city of Mobile and dispensed a glorious gospel to 
 that people, and notwithstanding the Eev. Samuel Sellers, the 
 Eev. Thomas Griffin, and the Eev. Nicholas Mclntyre, presid- 
 ing elders of the District first called the Mississippi and then 
 the Alabama, through a series of years beginning with 1813, de- 
 voted much attention to the city of Mobile, yet not until in the 
 17 
 
256 
 
 Hisionj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 year 1826 was a Methodist Society organized in that city, and 
 not until in the year 1820 was any tangible outlay, or effective 
 effort made to build a house of worship in the place for the use 
 of the Methodists, except that a lot on which to build such 
 house had been acquired, as has already been mentioned, and, 
 perhaps, the foundations of a house of worship had been laid. 
 
 The Eev. John Kussell Lambuth was the preacher for "Mo- 
 bile Mission" for 1826 and 1827. In addition to the other em- 
 barrassments under which he prosecuted his ministry in that 
 place, he engaged in the management of a literary school a 
 part of the time. Here is subjoined a communication which 
 gives the history of the time in which it was written: 
 
 " Mobile Mission, Mobile, August 29, 1827. 
 
 I have tried to labor with this people this summer as much 
 as I did in the winter season, though under greater disadvan- 
 tages; for the greater part removed some short distance from 
 the city, and but few having conveniences for traveling, they 
 could not attend church in the city; therefore I preached at two 
 places in the country, and occasionally in the city. The con- 
 gregations have been generally large for the season of the year, 
 and our prayer meetings in the week have been generally well 
 attended, I think I have seen recently some very favorable 
 omens, particularly on the last Sabbath. We had an uncom- 
 monly large congregation, while I was attempting to expose the 
 sin of ingratitude, and prove, that unless we rendered to God 
 that which was his, we should certainly be guilty of that crime, 
 the Spirit of the Lord attended the word, and carried convic- 
 tion to many hearts. There appeared to be an uncommon ten- 
 derness among the people. I hope that our labors here will be 
 like bread cast upon the waters, that may be seen after many 
 days. 
 
 This summer I have had charge of a school, which consisted 
 of nearly fifty scholars, among whom I have labored, to teach 
 them the fear of God, and show them the awful consequences of 
 sin; and I feel thankful to God that my labor has not been in 
 vain. I see a great change in the conduct of many, and several 
 have affirmed that they desire religion above everything in this 
 life. They are fond of reading the Scriptures, and not unfre- 
 quently do some of them, when they have a recess from their 
 studies, retire with the Bible in their hands, and read to each 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 257 
 
 other. I hope, with the rising generation, the cause of God 
 will be more abundantly advanced than it has ever been in this 
 part of his vineyard. I fear that, as ministers, we too much neg- 
 lect this part of our duty, viz., the instructing of children from 
 place to place. I know, for my own part, that herein I have 
 been too remiss; but I am resolved to be more diligent. What 
 numbers of children there are, particularly in newly settled 
 States, that are destitute of religious instruction because their 
 parents are not sufficiently interested in these things to teach 
 them, or ask others to do so. I hope, in this part of the Lord's 
 vineyard, to see that Scripture fultilled— 'out of the mouths of 
 babes and sucklings, shall my name be praised! ' 
 
 May the Lord make bare his arm, and save this highly fa- 
 vored people is the prayer of his feeble servant, 
 
 John E. Lambuth." 
 
 A letter from Bishop Joshua Soule dated Baltimore, March 
 20, 1827, contains the following item: 
 
 "The Mission at Mobile is in a flourishing condition, and 
 would have been returned a Station, independent of the funds 
 of the Society, the present year, but for the extraordinary exer- 
 tions of the infant Society, and the citizens in general, to finish 
 the house of worship; an object of great importance to the suc- 
 cess of the work in all populous places. This object is now 
 nearly accomplished, without the burden of a debt. The con- 
 gregation has a regular and commodious place of worship, and 
 strangers visiting the place by land or sea, are directed to it as 
 a temple of devotion equally free for the citizen and the so- 
 journer. The prudence, perseverance, and zeal of the Mission- 
 ary on this Station, are worthy of imitation and praise." 
 
 Yet one other communication is given here. It is the very 
 
 essence of history in its items: 
 
 " Mobile, January 1, 1828. 
 
 Dear Brethren:— For two years past I have been laboring to 
 ad'P.nce the Redeemer's cause in this city, and thanks be to God 
 that my labors have not been altogether in vain. In the com- 
 mencement there were many things to discourage; no Society 
 had been formed, and we had no house of worship in the city. 
 (I mean a Methodist church.) There was a house of that kind 
 contemplated, and some exertions had been made by my worthy 
 predecessor, who fell in the field of action, viz., the zealous H. 
 
258 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 P. Cook, who now rests in Abraham's bosom. His memory will 
 ever be sweet to me and hundreds of others in the bounds of the 
 Mississippi Conference. By the assistance of one or more per- 
 sons in this city, a sum was raised by subscription, that we 
 thought would justify an attempt to build a church. In the 
 early part of the tirst year, the house was so far completed that 
 we occupied it. Soon after the opening of the church, I at- 
 tempted to form a small Society, consisting of six or eight mem- 
 bers; and before the close of the first year, there were about 
 twenty persons who attached themselves to the Church. I was 
 appointed to this city for another year, which has just expired. 
 During the past year we had galleries erected in the church, for 
 the rccommodation of a larger congregation than could at firs't be 
 seated in it. The congregations have been large and attentive; 
 and there are at this time about forty-seven white and ninety 
 colcred members of Society in this city. Yours, etc., 
 
 John E. Lambuth." 
 The two years spent by the Eev. John Kussell Lambuth in 
 charge of Mobile Mission were to him and his flock glorious and 
 successful years, and they terminated his itinerant labors in Ala- 
 bama except as he worked under the employment of his pre- 
 siding elders. At the end of his pastoral term in Mobile he 
 located. 
 
 He was received on trial in the Kentucky Conference, at Lex- 
 ington, in September, 1821, and immediately went to the session 
 of the Mississippi Conference at Washington, Mississippi, De- 
 cember, 1821, and for the year 1822 was appointed to Cahlwba 
 Circuit in Alabama. After that he served the Franklin Circuit 
 and the Tombecbee Circuit in Alabama, and the Attakapas Cir- 
 cuit in Louisiana one year each. Somewhere about the time he 
 finished his ministry in Mobile and located he married a Miss 
 Kirkpatrick, and then for a short time he lived in Clarke County, 
 Alabama, in the bounds of the Tombecbee Circuit; and then he 
 moved to Greene County, Alabama, and settled between the 
 Tombigbee and Warrior Kivers about eight miles from Demop- 
 olis and about two miles from Forkland, and near enough to 
 Ebenezer Church to affiliate with the membership thereof. The 
 Greene Circuit was first placed in the list of appoint- 
 ments for 1831, with Eobert L. Kennon presiding elder, and 
 Ealph G. Christopher preacher in charge. The very first Quar- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 259 
 
 terly Conference held for that new Circuit was held at Ebenezer, 
 March 12, 1831. The presiding elder and the preacher in 
 charge were both present, and John E. Lambuth, L. E., Eeuben 
 Mason, L. D., Benjamin Williams, C. L., William Eaney, C. L., 
 and Duncan McPhail, C. L., were present. John E. Lambuth 
 was the Secretary of that Quarterly Conference, and was also at 
 that time elected Eecording Steward of the Circuit. He lived 
 in that community as a local preacher until 1840 at least, when 
 he moved to Madison County, Mississippi. While living in Al- 
 abama he was quite active, and effective as a local preacher, and 
 was when needed employed by his presiding elders as a supply 
 on pastoral charges. 
 
 His son, John W. Lambuth, who was a long time Missionary 
 to China, and is now, 1890, Missionary to Japan, was born in 
 Greene County, Alabama, between ^he Tombigbee and Warrior 
 Eivers, about two miles from Forkland. Alabama is, therefore, 
 the native land of one of the most faithful and efficient Mission- 
 aries ever sent out by the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 
 About twenty years of the life and ministry of the Eev. John 
 E. Lambuth were given to Alabama. He was a zealous i)reacher, 
 and a gentle, meek, and cheerful Christian. 
 
 In November, 1853, he was re-admitted to the Mississippi Con- 
 ference, and was appointed for the ensuing year to Jackson Sta- 
 tion. He continued a member of the Annual Conference, some- 
 times effective, and sometimes not, until his death, which oc- 
 curred November 6, 1864. With words of praise to God on his 
 lips, he laid down his body and his charge. 
 
 For the two years 1828 and 1829 the Eev. Thomas Burpo was 
 the preacher for "Mobile Mission." Notwithstanding there 
 was on October 21, 1827, a most destructive fire at Mobile, the 
 damage being estimated at upwards of one million of dollars, 
 between two and three hundred houses having been burnt, yet 
 it seems that for 1828 there was reasonable financial prosperi- 
 ty in the place, and it seems that Burpo succeeded admirably 
 and the Society prospered greatly under his administration the 
 first year, but the last year there was a decrease in the number 
 of white members from fifty-three to thirty. The colored mem- 
 bers increased from ninety-four to one hundred and fifty-five. 
 That decrease in the white membership originated in the dis- 
 ruption produced by those called Eeformers. The Eeformers 
 
2G0 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 distracted and tore asunder the JMetbodist Episcopal Church in 
 many places, and that very year 1829 the Annual Conference of 
 the Alabama District of the Methodist Protestant Church was 
 organized. Under the lead of the Kev. Peyton S. Graves, a 
 great agitator, and a refugee from a sentence of expulsion by 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, and who went to Mobile as 
 the agent of the Eeformers, twenty-three out of fifty-three 
 white members in the place went otf to the disruptionists. 
 Ihat of course greatly weakened the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, and dispirited the faithful little band which was left. 
 The agitators that they were, the Eeformers, so-called, never 
 did anything in Mobile. Twenty-eight years after this defection 
 here told of, the Methodist Protestant Church in Annual Con- 
 ference assembled: '^Besolved, That Mobile be made a Mission 
 to be called Mobile Mission." 
 
 The following communications bearing their own dates re- 
 hearse the history of the times to which they belong: 
 
 "Mobile, March 3, 1828. 
 ''Ber. and Dear Sirs :-lt becomes my duty to lay before you 
 the state of this Mission. Although I may not have as pleasing 
 intelligence to communicate as you receive from many mission- 
 ary stations which are under the control of our Superintendents 
 yet encouraged by him who despiseth not the day of small 
 things, and who looks with complacency upon the feeblest exer- 
 tions of his servants to promote his cause, I will give you a 
 simple and brief relation of our state at present. ^ I was ap- 
 pointed to this place at our last Annual Conference, and arrived 
 here on the 3d of January. I had peculiar sensations of mind 
 on receiving this appointment, arising from a sense of the im- 
 portance of the work and the great responsibility of my station. 
 And I do confess that those feelings were much augmented when 
 I arrived, to see the importance of my charge, which far sur- 
 passed my previous expectations. I found upwards of forty 
 whites m Society and more than that number of colored people, 
 who, by the indefatigable labor and good economy of my worthy 
 predecessor, were enjoying a large portion of peace and tranquil- 
 hty. I commenced my labors on the first Sabbath in January 
 and have continued them ever since. I am truly gratified to see 
 the number that attend church: three times on the Lord's day 
 we generally have large and attentive congregations. Serious- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 261 
 
 ness is often seen upon many countenances, and not unfre- 
 quently under the administration of the word the hearts of 
 some are touched, while tears of penitence are seen to flow down 
 their cheeks, bespeaking to us that our labor is not in vam. 
 We have our class-meetings regularly every week, and can truly 
 say they have been blessed in a peculiar manner. Such is the 
 interest felt in these meetings by the members of Society, that 
 they apDear to be impatient for the evening to arrive, when they 
 almost unanimously meet, looking with anxious desire and fer- 
 vent prayer for a rich and heavenly repast; and, thanks be to 
 God we are not often disappointed. Our first Quarterly Meet- 
 ing was held on the second Saturday and Sunday in February. 
 The congregation was unusually large. The Sacrament was ad- 
 ministered to a great number of communicants. It was truly, 
 for this place, a pleasing scene to see everything like sectarian 
 feeling laid aside, while Christians of different denominations 
 surrounded the board of the Lord, meekly kneeling on their 
 knees and there receiving those sacred emblems of the broken 
 body 'and sl>ed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. While viewing 
 this scene my heart felt the sacred flame of love to God and my 
 brethren. Truly this place felt awful— it was none other than 
 the house of God and the gate of heaven. The prospect of re- 
 ligion wears a more favorable aspect in this place than it has at 
 any former period. There have been considerable accessions to 
 the Church recently, some of whom are young men of promising 
 talents It is my earnest prayer to God, while he is visiting 
 many parts of the world with the rays of the Sun of righteous- 
 ness that in these regions and shadows of death light may 
 
 • ' „^ Thomas Burpo." 
 
 spring up. 
 
 " Mobile, July y, Ib^b. 
 "Notwithstanding vice and immorality prevail in this city to 
 an alarming extent, yet there are some souls who have not de- 
 filed their garments; whose cry, both by example and precept, is, 
 ^ who will rise up with us against the evil doers? ' AVith pleas- 
 ing sensations we have beheld the increase of religious excite- 
 ment during the last winter and spring. The number that 
 crowded the house of God, the attention paid to the word, and 
 the seriousness that frequently rested on the people, conspired 
 to encourage us to believe, that the sound of our Master's feet 
 was behind us, and that he would crown our feeble labor with 
 
262 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 success. Our hopes have been realized in some measure— God's 
 people have been edified, and some have been added to the 
 Church. The prospect at this time is not so flattering, owing 
 to the scattered state of society. More than half the members 
 of the Church have left this place for some healthier clime; not- 
 withstanding, there is still an extensive field for ministerial la- 
 bor. 
 
 " The prospect is truly pleasing among the colored people. It 
 IS an affecting scene to witness the vast number of those poor 
 offcasts of men, bending their course to the house of God every 
 Sabbath evening (being an hour which we have set apart to 
 preach to them,) with their dejected countenances, fixing their 
 eyes on the speaker, listening with earnest solicitude to the 
 words of endless life. It does my soul good to administer the 
 words of consolation to those degraded and suffering sons of 
 Africa. 
 
 " It is truly gratifying to our feelings to inform you, that our 
 church, the foundation of which was laid three years ago, has 
 been completed this spring, with the exception of a little paint- 
 ing of the inside work. Many of the citizens of this place have 
 merited our gratitude and respect, for that generous liberality 
 which they have exercised in defraying the expense which such 
 a building must necessarily incur. The completion of the 
 church must be attributed to their liberal contributions; there 
 are, however, some demands for expenses incurred before the 
 present year, but not very considerable. 
 
 "Our Sabbath-school has been in as flourishing a state this 
 year as at any time since its commencement. We have not as 
 yet been able to form ourselves auxiliary to our own parent in- 
 stitution, but believe we shall be able to do so the next year. 
 We think the cause of God is gradually gaining strength, and 
 we look forward with anticipation, when the great head of the 
 church shall cause our desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose. 
 
 Thomas Burpo." 
 The Kev. Kobert L. Walker was the preacher in charge of 
 Mobile, it still a Mission, for 1830. He reported the work dur- 
 ing the year to the Corresponding Secretary of the Mission- 
 ary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, but there were 
 few events of special import to relate. As was then customary, 
 in the summer many of the citizens of the place repaired to the 
 
 TJie Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 263 
 
 country outside the city and to various parts of the United 
 States in search of health and pleasure. That, for the time, de- 
 pleted the congregation, and depressed the spirits of those who 
 had to maintJ&in the cause. In the midst of this condition of 
 things the preacher reported: "We have peace and love among 
 ourselves." It is common in Zion, when all are too inactive to 
 produce friction and too dead to create antagonisms, to make a 
 virtue of boasting of "peace and love among ourselves." A 
 state of "peace and harmony" is in some instances the har- 
 binirer of death, and in other instances it is the residuum of a 
 defunct Church. But in this case reported of his flock in Mo- 
 bile by the Kev. Kobert L. Walker the "peace and love" did 
 not originate in the absence of aggressive measures and the 
 want of a purpose adequate to positive achievements, did not 
 arise from inactivity, nor from any absence of agitations and an- 
 tagonisms. The a2:itations and antagonisms from without were 
 enough to prevent any stagnation. There was no room for leth- 
 argy. The Reformers created bitter strife. That united in the 
 bonds of love and the fellowship of peace the adherents of the 
 policy of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The "peace and love 
 among themselves" originated in the common cause which they 
 espoused. They maintained the mastery in peace and purity. 
 
 The Kev. Benjamin A. Houghton was the preacher for Mobile 
 Mission for 1831, and it appears that there was regained in the 
 number of members during that year about the number which 
 had been lost in preceding years. At the end of the year he re- 
 ported the membership at fifty-nine white and one hundred and 
 ninety-eight colored. He served the Church in Alabama as an 
 itinerant about five years. The other years of his ministry were 
 spent in the State of Mississippi. 
 
 " Mobile Mission, Kobert D. Smith." That was the style of 
 the appointment for 1832, and at the end of that year the mem- 
 bership in that place consisted of sixty-one white and three 
 hundred colored persons. At the close of .1832 the charge in 
 Mobile was for the first time in its history thrown upon its own 
 resources and left w^ithout an appropriation from the Mission- 
 ary Society. The Methodists of Mobile ought to be pre-emi- 
 nently favorable to Missionary work, for the reason that there 
 the cause was sustained by the Missionary Society for many 
 consecutive years. 
 
264 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Kev. Eobert D. Smith was a native of Pennsylvania. Un- 
 der the ministry of the Eev. Barnabas Pipkin he was brought to 
 God and his grace and into the communion of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church at William Hunter's, in Wilkinson Obunty, Missis- 
 ippi, when only a few days past twenty-two years of age. AVhen a 
 little more than twenty-four he was licensed to preach, and when 
 about twenty-five years and two months old he was received on 
 trial in the Mississippi Conference. He was about twenty-nine 
 years old when he was appointed to Mobile, and he was a single 
 man during his ministry there. He gave only two years of his 
 ministry to Alabama. He was stationed in the city of Mont- 
 gomery, Alabama, the year before he was in Mobile. He was a 
 scholar and a teacher, a holy and a useful man. He preached 
 to white, and red, and black. He died in Madison Parish, 
 Louisiana, May 16, 1845, in his forty-third year. There was 
 nothing to dispute his passage to the skies, and he passed out 
 from these mundane shores in holy triumph. 
 
 The first official mention made of the Sunday-school in Mo- 
 bile, which is now extant, was made by the Eev. Thomas Burpo, 
 on July 9, 1828. The time when it was organized is not there 
 mentioned, but it is spoken of as having been in existence for 
 some while. The facts known seem to indicate that so soon as 
 the house of worship for the use of the Methodists was suf- 
 ficiently advanced to admit of occupancy, though in an unfin- 
 ished condition, a Sunday-school was organized in it. Then, in 
 that case, it was organized in 1826, for it was in that year the 
 church was first occupied for preaching and the organization of 
 a Society of members. The Eev. John AV. Lambuth, the son of 
 the Eev. John E. Lambuth, is authority for the statement: 
 "The Sabbath-school in the first Methodist Church in Mobile 
 was composed of white persons, negroes, and Indians." The 
 Kev. Henry D. Moore, D.D., is authority for the statement: 
 "Dugo McVoy, the Superintendent of the first Methodist Sun- 
 day-school organized in Mobile, in addition to his other duties, 
 taught a class of whites; and John Latoureth had charge of a 
 class of Indians, and Mrs. S. Eedwood a class of blacks." 
 
 The first Church organized in Mobile acquired early in its his- 
 tory the sobriquet of " Bee-hive," an appellation of praise ex- 
 pressive of the character of the congregation as industrious and 
 harmonious workers in benevolent and Christian enterprises. 
 
 CHAPTEE XL 
 
 The Enlaegement and Advancement of the Work of Meth- 
 odism IN Alabama. 
 
 THE line which marked the boundary of the territory ceded 
 to the United States by the Creek Indians in the Treaty of 
 capitulation made between General Andrew Jackson and the 
 chiefs, deputies, and warriors of the Creek Nation, August 9, 
 1814, after it left the Coosa Eiver and crossed the Tallapoosa 
 Eiver, followed the Oakfuschee Creek to a distance of ten miles 
 from the mouth thereof, thence a direct line to the junction of 
 Summochico Creek and the Chattahoochee Eiver, thence east 
 from a true meridian line to a point which intersected the line 
 then dividing the lands claimed by the Creek Nation from 
 those owned by the State of Georgia. That line runs about one 
 mile west of the present town of Union Springs, and about two 
 miles north-east of the present town of Clayton, and goes out of 
 Alabama about one mile above the present town of Fort Gaines. 
 Soon after the ratification of that Treaty of capitulation, and 
 the designated line was run and described, the Indians were re- 
 moved from the ceded territory. Quickly settlements of civil- 
 ized men were established therein. That part of that ceded 
 territory which was in Alabama was properly within the bounds 
 of the Mississippi Conference, but at the time the white settle- 
 ments opened up in the newly ceded country the Mississippi 
 Conference was not able to supply with preachers all the terri- 
 tory included in her chartered limits. All that region that is now, 
 in 1890, embraced in the counties of Coffee, Covington, Cren- 
 shaw, Dale, Geneva, and Pike, and nearly all of Henry County, a 
 large part of Barbour County, a part of Bullock County, a part of 
 Butler County, a part of Conecuh County, and a part of Montgom- 
 ery County, was in the newly ceded and newly settled lands, and 
 unoccupied by the operations of the Mississippi Conference. All 
 this region, therefore, fell under the supervision of the South 
 Carolina Conference from the time of its settlement until 1830, 
 and from then under the supervision of the Georgia Conference 
 
 (265) 
 
26G 
 
 IHstonj of Methodism in AJahama, 
 
 until the close of 1832. The South Carolina Conference reached 
 that territory by approaches to it from her own side of the field, 
 and in connection with similar settlements in her own bounds! 
 The first effort made by the South Carolina Conference to oc- 
 cupy that region was made in 1822. The appointment which 
 anticipated the cultivation of that section was made in these 
 words following: "John I. Triggs, Missionary to Early County 
 and the adjoining settlements." 
 
 That Missionary to "Early County and adjoining settlements" 
 found his field of labor and formed his Mission in the settle- 
 ments on both sides of the Chattahoochee Eiver, on the Georgia 
 side and on the Alabama side. The Rev. Allen Turner, presid- 
 ing elder of the Oconee District, South Carolina Conference, 
 in a letter bearing date November 29, 1822, says: "I will just 
 add, by way of conclusion, that Bishop George requested me to 
 take some oversight of the Early Mission. Accordingly I was 
 there in June last, and held a Quarterly Meeting. The coun- 
 try, both on the Early side of the Chattahoochee Eiver, and 
 also on the Alabama side (and the late Circuit formed by our 
 Missionary includes both sides) is tolerably thickly settled by 
 many respectable citizens. We had a gracious time at our 
 Quarterly Meeting. Within the bounds of this missionary sta- 
 tion nearly two hundred have joined our Society, and great 
 numbers have been converted." 
 
 For 1823 the appointment to "Early County and adjoining 
 settlements " gave place to Chattahoochee Mission, and John L 
 Triggs, and John Slade were appointed thereto. The followin.o- 
 valuable communication, addressed to the Rev. James O. Ant 
 drew, gives the history of the Chattahoochee Mission and that 
 part of Alabama in which it was located in 1823: 
 
 " Chattahoochee Mission, June 11, 1823. 
 "Dear Brother :—ThTo\xgh the goodness of our blessed Saviour 
 myself and my colleague are in good health, preaching the gos- 
 pel of Christ in the uncultivated woods of Georgia, Alabama, 
 and West Florida, and gathering into the fold of our Adorable 
 Redeemer, the scattered and lost sheep of the house of Israel. 
 
 " Since Conference the work of the Lord has not advanced so 
 rapidly as it did some time before. Yet, thanks be to God, the 
 .members that were joined in Society last year are generally 
 steady. Eighteen or twenty have professed conversion, and be- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 267 
 
 tween thirty and forty have joined Society. In some places our 
 prospects are gloomy, congregations small, the people seem har- 
 dened in wickedness. In others the congregations increase, the 
 people weep, and we are encouraged to hope for better times. 
 On Sunday, May 18, when I had finished my sermon and was 
 about to sing, a man rose from his seat and said that he felt 
 horribly, and begged the congregation to pray for him Has 
 produced considerable excitement among the people, and many 
 came forward weeping and desiring our prayers. Since that 
 time ten have joined Society in that place. This was where I 
 had but little success last year. At another place a certamMrs. 
 B joined Society; her husband on hearing this grew very angry 
 and bid her pack up and begone, declaring if she said a word 
 he would beat her. He became so sullen that he refused to eat 
 for two days, cursing both preachers and people, wishing them 
 all in hell together. On the evening of the second day, his 
 brother (who was as wicked as himself, but not so much op- 
 posed to religion) remonstrated with him for his conduct to- 
 ward his wife, saying that he would better cut her throat if he 
 could not allow her liberty of conscience. This reached his 
 heart, so that he went home, begged his wife's pardon, and sent 
 for some of the Society to pray for him. They gathered and 
 prayed for him nearly all night. He has since very much re- 
 formed, and his wife has found peace to her soul. 
 
 " When I was at Conference I was highly delighted at the 
 Sabbath-school institutions, and earnestly wished to introduce 
 them where I might be appointed to labor. Since I have re- 
 turned to my Station I have got four in operation; two of them 
 are very promising; the children learn fast, and the teachers ap- 
 pear to take an interest in this labor of love; but we are m dif- 
 Acuities in consequence of the scarcity of books m this part of 
 
 the country. -i • at • 
 
 "In consequence o! a disease which prevails much in this 
 country among horses, my colleague lost his the first time he 
 went around his Circuit, and my own horse has become so poor 
 that I fear I shall lose him. Blindness soon succeeds to the at- 
 tack Though, by parting with all his money, and pledging his 
 credit for the remainder, my colleague bought him another 
 horse, yet through the warmth of the weather, excessive rides, 
 and other difficulties peculiar to the country, our horses are both 
 
268 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 blind; but, supported by grace, and animated with the prospect 
 of promoting the happiness of our fellow-men, we persevere, 
 sometimes riding and sometimes walking over the bogs and 
 through the mud, singing: 
 
 *In hope of that immortal crown, 
 
 We now the cross sustain ; 
 And gladly wander up and down, 
 And smile at toil and pain.' 
 
 "I hope, my dear brother, you do not forget to pray for us, 
 who labor in this wilderness, for I am sure none need the 
 prayers of God's people more than your humble servant, 
 
 John I. Teiggs." 
 The first item in the itinerant ministry of the Kev. John I. 
 Triggs was a recommendation of him to the Annual Conference 
 as a suitable person to be admitted on trial in the traveling con- 
 nection made by the Oconee District, October 20, 1820.'' The 
 South Carolina Conference being in session at Columbia, admit- 
 ted him on trial in the Conference, on that recommendation on 
 January 15, 1821, and at that session of the Conference sent 
 him forth an accredited licentiate to proclaim the acceptable 
 year of the Lord to the inhabitants of Lappahee. Prior to that 
 time Lappahee was unknown in the list of ecclesiastical appoint- 
 ments, and subsequent to that year never again appeared. At the 
 end of his first year, he was appointed, as has already been stated, 
 " Missionary to Early County and the adjoining settlements." 
 
 The Eev. John L Triggs was the first itinerant Methodist 
 preacher who preached in Henry County, Alabama. He entered 
 on his work there in February, 1822, and continued in that field 
 until February, 1824 When he entered upon his work in that 
 field and commenced the organization of the Chattahoochee Mis- 
 sion he had been only one year on trial in the Annual Confer- 
 ence, and he had not attained to orders in the ministry, and con- 
 sequently he was not authorized to administer the Sacraments. 
 His ministry was confined to making proclamation of divine am- 
 nesty to sinners through Jesus Christ. He announced to the 
 people the terms of reconciliation to the divine government. 
 
 The South Carolina Conference commenced a session at Sa 
 vannah, Georgia, February 20, 1823. In the presence of that as- 
 sembled Conference appeared the Rev. John I. Triggs from the 
 Mission field of "Early County and ihe adjoining settlements " 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 269 
 
 It was the end of his first year on that Mission. He had come 
 from the field to make report, and to be invested with qualifica- 
 tions for further aggressions and conquests. If an itemized state- 
 ment of his report could be recalled it would be found to con- 
 tain an account of privations and hardships endured in an inhos- 
 pitable clime; a list of members gathered to the number of one 
 hundred and eighty-two white and fifty-nine colored persons; 
 and a deficiency in his annual stipend. On Monday morning, 
 February 24, 1823, in the Conference assembled, " It was moved 
 that Brothers Hammell, Mason, and Triggs, Missionaries, be re- 
 ferred to the Treasurer of the Missionary Committee for their 
 
 deficiencies." 
 
 At that session of the Conference the Eev. John I. Triggs was 
 received into full connection, and elected and ordained deacon. 
 He was returned for the year 1823 to the charge he had just or- 
 ganized, called the Chattahoochee Mission, with John Slade as 
 his colleague. He was ordained elder January 15, 1826, and at 
 Camden, South Carolina, February 8, 1828, he located on ac- 
 count of temporal embarrassments. 
 
 The Rev. John Slade preached in Alabama only one year. 
 When he was appointed to the Chattahoochee Mission in Feb- 
 ruary, 1823, he had just been admitted on trial in the South Car- 
 olina Conference. In January, 1830, he located under the pres- 
 sure of broken health. He afterward reentered the traveling 
 connection in the Florida Conference, in which he died in 1854. 
 He was a native of South Carolina, and was about thirty years 
 old when he preached in Alabama. He was physically strong, 
 well proportioned, and tall, with a face striking, and pleasant. 
 He was gifted in singing. He was " a plain, honest, good man, a 
 faithful, earnest, laborious preacher, a Methodist, and a Chris- 
 tian, without fear and reproach. His death was peace and assur- 
 ance by the blood of Jesus." 
 
 In 1823, under the ministry of Triggs and Slade, the Chatta- 
 hoochee Mission had an increase of one hundred and ten mem- 
 bers; and in 1824, under the ministry of the Rev. James Tabor 
 and the Rev. Isaac Sewell, two preachers who had just closed 
 their first year on trial in the Conference and were without or- 
 dination, there was an increase in the membership on the Mis- 
 sion, but not so large as the increase of the year before. Sewell 
 located in January, 1826, and Tabor in January, 1827. 
 
270 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 At the session of the South Carolina Conference held at Fay- 
 etteville, North Carolina, in January, 1825, a new District was 
 made for that year and was as follows: 
 
 " Tallahassee District, 
 Josiah Evans, Presiding Elder. 
 Tallahassee Mission, Josiah Evans.. 
 Early Mission, Morgan C. Turrentine. 
 Chattahoochee, John L. Jerry." 
 The Chattahoochee appointment was now a Circuit, and was 
 mostly on the Alabama side of the Chattahoochee Kiver, the 
 Early Mission taking the Georgia side. That year, 1825, under 
 the ministry of the Eev. John L. Jerry, there was a large in- 
 crease in the number of members. The white members in- 
 creased one hundred and the colored members increased six. 
 
 At the time the Kev. John L. Jerry was on the Chattahoochee 
 Circuit in Alabama he was a single man, and was about thirty- 
 two years old, and had been preaching seven or eight years. 
 He was a native of Fayetteville, North Carolina. His father 
 was one of the soldiers who joined with and accompanied Gen- 
 eral La Fayette against the enemies of the United Colonies in 
 the struggle for independence. Like his sire, the son was brave 
 and patriotic. When he was a Missionary in Saint Augustine 
 in 1827 a Eomish Priest, impelled by a spirit of intolerance, 
 threatened to inflict penalties upon him if he persisted in 
 preaching at that place. The man whose sire had helped to 
 achieve independence for the United States was not to be ter- 
 rorized and silenced by the intolerant vassal of the Pope, and 
 the Kev. John L. Jerry pointed to the American flag, which then 
 waved over Saint Augustine, and said to the threatening Priest: 
 "jVo inquisition ivhere that flag waves!" He was a man of suc- 
 cess. He was a man of faith and piety. He married an excel- 
 lent woman in Florida in 1827. He died suddenly of congestion 
 of the brain in the summer of 1859. He was a member of the 
 Florida Conference at the time of his death. 
 
 For 1826 the Tallahassee District was enlarged by the addi- 
 tion of three more Missions, two of which were new, and one 
 of which was in Alabama, namely, the Pea Kiver Mission. The 
 Kev. Josiah Evans was continued on the District as presiding 
 elder, in fact, he was on the District four years in succession, 
 beginning with 1825. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 271 
 
 The Chattahoochee Circuit was now nearly or quite all in Ala- 
 bama, and for 1826 the preacher on it was the Kev. James Stock- 
 dale, and the preacher on the Pea Kiver Mission was the Kev. 
 Daniel G. McDaniel. The Chattahoochee Circuit extended from 
 the Chattahoochee Kiver to the Choctawhatchee Kiver and there- 
 about, and from the Florida line to the Indian boundary and 
 the head waters of the Choctawhatchee Kiver. The Pea Kiver 
 Mission embraced the region anywhere between the Choctaw- 
 hatchee and the Conecuh Kivers that souls and settlements could 
 be found, and extended the entire length of Pea Kiver and across 
 to the head waters of Line Creek. One statement, published June 
 3, 1826, said: "Pea Kiver Mission embraces several counties in 
 the south-east part of Alabama, containing a numerous and in- 
 creasing population." 
 
 Some of the difficulties under which the preachers and people 
 labored at that date in that section of Alabama and Florida are 
 recited in a communication from the pen of the Kev. Josiah 
 Evans, the presiding elder. His communication containing the 
 statement concerning the impediments to the successful prose- 
 cution of the work of the gospel was written at Tallahassee, 
 Florida, and bears date March 20, 1826. After describing the 
 boundaries of his District, which, according to his testimony, 
 extended from Saint Augustine, in the Territory of Florida, to 
 Line Creek, in the State of Alabama, and which was about four 
 hundred and seventy miles long and one hundred and thirty 
 miles wide, he recited as follows: "I have to lament one ob- 
 struction, which I think is an almost insurmountable barrier in 
 the way of the religious and civil improvement of this country: 
 that is, the unsold state of the lands. Although Government; 
 has reserved a quarter-section in every Township, for the pur- 
 pose of promoting literary institutions, these quarter-sections 
 cannot be disposed of to advantage because the other lands are 
 not sold. I know of but one class of persons that the present 
 state of the lands seems to suit, and that class is no advantage 
 or honor to any country. Until this difficulty is removed by the 
 sale of the lands, our religious as well as our temporal affairs 
 will continue in a fluctuating state; until this difficulty is re- 
 moved we shall not be able to establish permanent Societies or 
 build houses of any consequence for the purpose of divine wor- 
 ship; the people do not, they cannot feel that interest in im- 
 18 
 
272 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 provement, in erecting churches and seminaries of learning 
 which they otherwise would feel were they the owners of the 
 soil; although their will is good, the prospect is too precarious." 
 
 Notwithstanding the uncertain tenure of real estate, the so- 
 cial inconveniences, and the temporal stringencies of things 
 which prevailed everywhere in that region, and notwithstand- 
 ing the settlers had but little money to contribute and but little 
 time to devote toward building churches and establishing semi- 
 naries of learning because of the extra burdens of paying for 
 their lands and clearing away the forest and putting their 
 fields in a state of cultivation, and notwithstanding the imprac- 
 ticability of collecting large congregations because of sparse- 
 ness of population, yet the work of the Lord prospered in a good 
 measure, and that very wilderness rejoiced in the Saviour of 
 men and in the Lord of glory. 
 
 In a letter to the Corresponding Secretary of the Missionary 
 Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, written at Talla- 
 hassee, October 18, 1826, the Kev. Josiah Evans, the presiding 
 elder, reports: "Our Camp-meeting in the Pea Kiver Mission 
 was truly a good time. The number that attended the meeting 
 was but few; but the people behaved with great decorum, and 
 manifested much attention to the word preached. We did not 
 suppose that there were more than one hundred and fifty per- 
 sons that attended the meeting at any one time; and out of that 
 number there were twenty-one that professed to be converted 
 during the meeting. I would suppose that near one-fourth part 
 of the non-professors that attended the meeting were converted. 
 It may not be amiss (for the encouragement of the aged sinner) 
 to mention the conversion of an old man, in the seventy-third 
 year of his age, who had been literally blind fifteen years. This 
 man manifested signs of penitence at the commencement of the 
 meeting. He seemed to be almost in despair. But on the third 
 day of the meeting he realized that it is possible for a man to 
 be born when he is old. His change was quite visible. He was 
 exceedingly happy, and exhorted all around him to draw near 
 the Lord; for, said he, I, an old sinner, have obtained mercy, 
 and so may any of you. To make use of his own language — * I 
 have been in the dark fifteen years, I have not been able to see 
 my way, nor have I seen the sun; but now, glory to God, I can 
 see my way to heaven as well as any of you! ' But this rare in- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 273 
 
 stance of late conversion should not encourage others to put off 
 the concerns of their souls to a late period of life; for how very 
 few live to this age! " 
 
 The Eev. James Stockdale never served any work in Alaba- 
 ma but the Chattahoochee Circuit, and at the end of his year 
 on that Circuit he reported a decrease of eighty-eight white 
 and fifteen colored members. 
 
 Pea Kiver Mission at the end of the first year of its existence 
 reported one hundred and four white and twenty-one colored 
 members, and the Missionary who served that year, the Eev. 
 Daniel G. McDaniel, received from the Missionary Society for 
 his services fifty dollars. That was the only year that the Kev. 
 Daniel G. McDaniel preached in Alabama. He was thirty-five 
 years old when he was on the Pea Kiver Mission. He was a na- 
 tive of Georgetown, District of Columbia. He was converted 
 in the Light Street Church, Baltimore, Maryland, in 1811, and 
 was admitted on trial in the South Carolina Conference, in 
 January, 1821; and died a member of the South Carolina Con- 
 ference in 1853. He was a man of energy, firmness, and sound 
 judgment, a good preacher, and a holy man. He was true in 
 all the relations of life. The last testimony of himself was: 
 "My life has been one of constant toil, but of no merit; I trust 
 alone in the merits of Christ, my Saviour." So died the man 
 who organized the Pea Kiver Mission. 
 
 The appointments for 1827: Chattahoochee, Elisha Calloway, 
 Jesse Boring; Pea Kiver Mission, John C. Wright. 
 
 That year the Chattahochee Circuit, which was then, all, or 
 nearly all, in Alabama, had a further decrease in the member- 
 ship; the white members decreased thirty-four and the colored 
 members decreased six. The two men on that Circuit that year, 
 Elisha Calloway, and Jesse Boring, were prominent in Alabama 
 Methodism in after years. That Chattahoochee Circuit was the 
 first work ever served by the Kev. Jesse Boring. He actually 
 commenced his itinerant ministry in Alabama, though, at the 
 time he was on trial in the South Carolina Conference. 
 
 During the year 1827 the Pea Kiver Mission was blessed with 
 divine visitations, and prospered. The small Societies which 
 had been formed the year before, and which was the year of be- 
 ginning in that section, were greatly strengthened during 1827, 
 and other societies were organized during that year. Awaken- 
 
274 
 
 liistunj oj Metliodisfn in Alahatna. 
 
 iiigs prevailed generally, and one hundnjd and seventy-three 
 joined the Church during the year, and there was a net increaae 
 of over one hundred and fifteen white and fourteen colored mem- 
 bers. Five meeting houHes were built during that year, and 
 there were twenty-one preaching places on the Mission. The 
 charge at the end of that year passed off the Missionary list, 
 and was constituted a Circuit. It was invested with the ])rer()g- 
 ative and (diar^ed with the duty of taking care of itself, and for 
 1828 the llev. John C. Wright was again ap[)ointed to s(;rve it as 
 a preacher. JJuring that year there was a net increase of ninety- 
 five white and twenty colored members. 
 
 The liav. Jolm C. Wright was only a deacon when appoint(;d 
 to the Van Jliver Mission. At the end of his first year (m that 
 charge he was (jlected to elder's orders, but was not ordained 
 becrause he was not present at the session of thc^ (yonf<'ren(!e. At 
 the encl of his two years on Pea liivcT, and at the close of 1828, 
 he located. 
 
 The preacher for the ('haitahoocheo (circuit for 1828 was the 
 R*jv. Jeremiah Norman. During the yt'ar ih(*ro was a decniase 
 of fourtifen colored members on that C'ircuit and a uai increase 
 of fifty-two white membtjrs. The Hoy. Jeremiah Norman made 
 upon the (.'hattalioo<:hee (/ir(;uit an impreHsion, and by the in- 
 habiiarits then-of he was n;mend)(inMl, though he was then^ only 
 one year. He was noted for his piety, talents, and homely f(?a- 
 turcfs. It was commonly s/iid that he was onc^ of the ugliest men 
 and one of the ablest preachers on the Am(?rican Continetii. He 
 never married He entered the itinerant ministry in Janimry, 
 1825, and continued in it until his death, which occurred in \Ki\). 
 In 18^}() and 18'U he waH on the list of the HUperannuate<i or 
 worn-out preachers. At the session of the (Georgia ('onfc^rence 
 htild at EnUmUni, in Dectemher, 18'{8, he was placed again on 
 the list of the superannuated or worn-out preachers, and hefore 
 the n«?xt fteHsion of the (conference, his soul was released from 
 the wo*5»4 of earth, and taken up wh<?re the mind never falters, 
 ftnd where lonelinesH never comu», and where (hijoctiun never 
 moleMtl*. 
 
 For lH2iJ th« TftllfthaHH^e District Utul a new presiding elder, 
 the lU^y. ZficcheuM Dowling, and he wan the presiding elder on 
 that District for fotjr years in MUccoHHi(»n, (^losing with |8;J2. 
 Far 182'J the pKiu-h^T on (Chattahoochee (Jircuit was the Itev. 
 
 21ie Enlargement and Advancement of the Work 275 
 
 William Steagall, and the preacher for that year on the Pea 
 lliver Circuit was Vardy Woolly. The net increase on the 
 Chattahoochee Circuit for that year was fifty-nine white and six 
 colored members, and the net increase on the Pea River Circuit 
 was fifty-nine white and ten colored members. 
 
 The llev. William Steagall had been received into full con- 
 nection and ordained deacon at the session at which he was 
 api)ointed to the Chattahoochee Circuit; and the liev. Vardy 
 Woolly had been admitted to full connection in the Conference 
 and ordained deacon at the same time. Woolly located at the 
 close of 18:J2, and Steagall at the close of 1834. 
 
 For 1830 the following appointments were made in Alabama 
 by the South Carolina Conference: 
 
 ChattahoochtHi, llobert Williams, William N. Sears. 
 Pea Kivor, Mahlon Btnlell, George Collier. 
 Escambia Mission, AVilliam Culverhouse. 
 
 The net increase for the year on the Chattahoochee Circuit 
 was thirty-s»»ven white and eiglit colored nu»nd>ers. The net in- 
 cn^ase on the Pea Uiver Circuit for the year was seventy-eight 
 white and thirty-six colored nunnbors. 
 
 The Escambia Mission as an appointnuMit filled up the vacant 
 territory IxMweiMi the Pea lliver Circuit tilled by the South Car- 
 olina ('onftM-ence and th(» appoint nuMits filled by the Mississippi 
 (^/onf(»rence. A communication, which is still extant, writttMi by 
 the llev. William Culvt^-lumse, who siTved it in the tirst yt»ur 
 of its <^xist(Uic(s and addressed to the ('orrespoiuliug Secretary 
 of the Missiimary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 indicates the territory occtipitnl by that Mission at the tin\e of 
 its organi/ation, and some of the particular points at whioli 
 preaching places were (established, and the success which at- 
 tended tlu» work tlu^ lirsi y»>ar. The following is the communi- 
 cation: 
 
 "Escambia MissiiUi, December 10. 1830. 
 
 "/iVr. Sir: 1 Iuum^ b«M>n apprised that my duty as a Missionary 
 reipjirt^s that I should tninsmit to you cpmrterly, informatiim 
 n^lativi* to the state of this Mission. In tins resptvt t confess 
 1 have ln>en faulty; but I solicit your forbeanuuMs as I have 
 been (Migaged in a great work, and will now endeavi^r to givt^ 
 you a succinct and ctuupnOuMisive view of what haB boon done 
 ihrougiiout the year. 
 
276 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 217 
 
 "After a pleasant and safe journey from Conference, I arrived 
 on my mission ground in good time, and after a few days' rest 
 set out in order to arrange my appointments: part of them I 
 made on the east, and part on the west side of the Escambia, or 
 Conecuh Kiver, in the following order: commencing in Alabama, 
 Butler County— across the Conecuh in said county— down to 
 Montezuma, or Falls of Conecuh, in Covington County, and 
 through Conecuh County into Florida, to within twenty-six 
 miles of Pensacola; then returning on the west side by Fort 
 Crawford and Brooklyn across the Sepulgah— on the waters of 
 Pigeon Creek— into Butler County again. This route formed a 
 three weeks' Circuit, and contained seventeen appointments; 
 three of them were given me from the Mississippi Conference,' 
 two from Pensacola Mission, and one from Pea Kiver Circuit! 
 Within the bounds of my Mission I found one hundred and ten 
 members; I have, during the year, taken on trial sixty-eight, 
 making in all one hundred and seventy-eight members. Ke- 
 cently my Mission has been enlarged, so as to form a four 
 weeks' Circuit, and now extends down to the Escambia Bay. 
 
 "A Camp-meeting was held for this Mission on 4th to 8th No- 
 vember, at a new Camp-ground, whereon twelve large and com- 
 modious tents were built. It is situated on the waters of Con- 
 ecuh, near Brooklyn. The congregations were good and ap- 
 peared remarkably attentive to the preaching of the word. 
 Much good was done, and ten were received as probationers 
 among us. Also, we have commenced a church edifice, at the 
 same place, of forty by thirty feet, which we expect will' be fin- 
 ished the ensuing winter. There is also a probability of two 
 others being shortly built within the Mission. 
 
 "Notwithstanding strong prejudices, which existed among 
 some of the people, against Missions and Missionaries, when I 
 first came among them, the major part of them have received 
 me very kindly; and some who would not come to hear me 
 preach in the commencement of the year, now come out, and ap- 
 pear to give great attention to the word. I think there is con- 
 siderable religious excitement prevailing all round my Mission; 
 and notwithstanding the ' reform ' excitement has prevailed very 
 much near our borders, there is nothing of it within the bounds 
 of this Mission; we are all sailors of the old ship, and feel per- 
 fectly satisfied with her chart; and while we are passing on the 
 
 ocean of time we have peace and harmony abounding among us. 
 Dear brother, pray for us, that the Lord may prosper his work 
 in this part of his moral vineyard, to the glory of his great name, 
 and the salvation of these people. Yours, Respectfully, 
 
 William Culverhouse." 
 At the anniversary meeting of the Georgia Conference Mis- 
 sionary Society held at Macon, Georgia, on Monday evening, 
 January 10, 1831, and which was the time of the session of the 
 Georgia Conference at the close of the ecclesiastical year for 
 1830, the following official statement was made: 
 
 " The Escambia Mission lies principally in Butler, Conecuh, 
 and Covington Counties, Alabama, but includes a small part of 
 Florida. The Rev. William Culverhouse, the Missionary sent 
 there, states that he has twenty appointments, and two hundred 
 and twelve members in Society, eighty-four of whom he has re- 
 ceived on probation during the last year, and he thinks there is 
 much religious excitement among the people." 
 
 The appointments made in Alabama by the Georgia Confer- 
 ence for 1831 were: 
 
 Chattahoochee, Mahlou BedelL 
 Pea River, John Sale. 
 Escambia Mission, William N. Sears. 
 The growth in the Chattahoochee Circuit was exceedingly 
 slow for a number of years. For the year 1831 the net increase 
 on that Circuit was hardly enough to justify mentioning. Three 
 white and four colored members was the limit of the increase. 
 The Pea River Circuit had abundant success that year. The 
 net increase was one hundred and seventy-seven white and for- 
 ty-one colored members. For that year the Escambia Mission 
 reported a decrease of seven white members and an increase of 
 fifty-five colored members. 
 
 For 1832, the last year the Georgia Conference supplied the 
 lack in Alabama, the following appointments were made under 
 the jurisdiction of the Georgia Conference: 
 
 Chattahoochee, AVilliam Culverhouse, James W. Honeycui 
 Pea River, John Sale, William C. Crawford. 
 Escambia Mission, George W. Collier. 
 
 The decrease on the Chattahoochee Circuit for 1832 was dis- 
 couraging. There was a clear loss of fifty-three white and thir- 
 ty-se\^n colored members. The Pea River Circuit had a net 
 
 ■i1 
 
278 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 279 
 
 gain of one hundred and six white members, but a clear loss of 
 forty-one colored members. The Escambia Mission had good 
 success for that year. Fifty-six white and forty-two colored 
 members was the limit of increase. The decade and a year wit- 
 nessed great growth in the region of Alabama covered by the 
 Chattahoochee and Pea Kiver Circuits, and the Escambia Mis- 
 sion. At the close of 1832, in these three pastoral charges, then 
 served by five preachers and one presiding elder, there were 
 thirteen hundred and forty white and two hundred and seven 
 colored members. That was no mean achievement made in elev- 
 en years in a new and spai-sely settled country, and by a Church 
 under the ban of public sentiment. God smote his enemies, 
 and gave a heritage to his servants. The Methodists by the riv- 
 ers Chattahoochee, Choctawhatchee, Pea, Conecuh, and Escam- 
 bia had occasion to praise God for his loving-kindness and his 
 truth, as he had magnified his word and his name among them. 
 Henry County was constituted December 13, 1819; Pike Coun. 
 ty December 18, 1821; Covington County December 18, 1821; 
 Dale County December 22, 1824; Coffee County December 29* 
 1841; Geneva County December 26, 1868. 
 
 The first emigrants to south-east Alabama settled along the 
 several rivers and about the head waters of the numerous streams 
 which flow through and water that part of the State. About 
 the sources of the rivers and creeks were living springs which 
 offered comfort and convenience to the settlers who had the 
 choice of the country before them. At various points on Chat- 
 tahoochee, Choctawhatchee, Pea, and Conecuh Kivers emigrants 
 concentrated in sufficient numbers to constitute communities 
 more or less strong. In Township one, Kange thirty, and in 
 Township one, Kange twenty-nine, and in Township two, Range 
 twenty-eight, in the lower end of Henry County, on and about 
 the Chattahoochee River and the creeks thereabout which form 
 a junction with the river, there were, at an early day, groups 
 of families which made a strong community for a new country. 
 Round about the junction of the Omussee and the Chattahoochee 
 was another settlement which early formed an interesting com- 
 munity. By officers and commissioners, appointed by law for 
 the purpose, a site was selected in Township four, and Range 
 twenty-nine, near the Chattahoochee River, and by enactment 
 of the Legislature of Alabama, approved December 20, 1828, 
 
 that site was established the permanent seat of justice in Henry 
 County, and named Columbia. Within Townships seven and 
 eight, Range twenty-nine, and Townships seven and eight. Range 
 tw'enty-eight, in the north-east corner of Henry County, reach- 
 ing from the Chattahoochee River across the Abbe Creeks, prongs 
 of the Omussee, settlements were established at a very early 
 day. About the sources of the Choctawhatchee and the Pea 
 Rivers were early settlements made, in tlie midst of which, in 
 due time, the villages of Louisville and Clayton sprang up. 
 About the sources of the Conecuh River settlements were early 
 established, one of wliich was known as China Grove, and in one 
 of which Aberfoil became a village. Along down the rivers, 
 ever and anon, were settlements in the midst of which sprang 
 up the villages of Monticello, Montezuma, Dalesville, and Ge- 
 neva. About the place where the present town of Ozark is sit- 
 uated there was a good settlement at an early day, and there was 
 a settlement also quite early in Townships seven and eight. Range 
 
 twenty-seven. 
 
 Within the first decade of Methodist preaching in that part 
 of Alabama, a Society was formed and a church was built in the 
 neighborhood on the Chattahoochee River a few miles south of 
 what was long called Woodville, now called Gordon. At a place 
 higher up the Chattahoochee River, going toward the place 
 known as Franklin, was a Meeting House called Chitty's. About 
 five miles and a little north of east from the present town of Abbe- 
 ville there was a Methodist church named Ehenezer, called Gam- 
 ble's Meeting House. On the east side of the (^loctawhatchee 
 River, in Township nine, Range twenty-seven, there is a large 
 natural pond called White Pond. Between that place and the 
 present town of Clayton, and on an air line about ten miles east 
 of the present town of Louisville, and three or four miles south- 
 east of what was then the line of the Creek Indian Nation, a 
 Society was organized and a church was built in 1822, and called 
 New Hope. New Hope Society and church, though the original 
 members and house have passed away, continue till this day, 
 1890. The Rev. John I. Triggs preached there the year the So- 
 ciety was organized, and for years it was one of the Societies of 
 the Chattahoochee Circuit. The first members of New Hope 
 established a Camp-ground there, and it was called after the 
 church. At the Camp-meetings held there most signal displays 
 
280 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 281 
 
 of the divine presence aad power were witnessed. The mem- 
 bers of that Society held class-meetings and love-feasts from 
 the very lirst, and the class-meetings and love-feasts rendered 
 good service in laying the foundations for enlarging and per- 
 petuating Methodism in that community. Many opinions were 
 entertained and many reports were circulated detrimental to the 
 Methodists by those averse to their doctrines and customs. For 
 their class-meetings and love-feasts they were often abused and 
 sometimes slandered. Holding their meetings with closed doors 
 created prejudice, and gave pretext for many slanderous reports. 
 In the community of New Hope was a family of numerous mem- 
 bers by the name of Bush, and another family, related to the 
 first by marriage, by the name of Thomas, all inclined to the 
 doctrines and usages of the Baptists. Mrs. Mary Bush, im- 
 pelled by a woman's curiosity, became exceedingly anxious to 
 know the peculiarities of the services held with closed doors. 
 So she decided to run the blockade, if possible, and see for her- 
 self what was done. The first opportunity she had she presented 
 herself at the door of New Hope church for admission to the 
 love-feast. The door-keeper for the occasion asked her the 
 question: "Are you friendly to the cause?" She answered: 
 " Yes," but, in an undertone, she said to herself as she passed 
 into the church, for the door-keeper let her in, " I do not care 
 for you or your cause either so I get in." She was captured by 
 the service, and was so powerfully impressed with the divine 
 presence that she joined the Society before she came out of the 
 house. Ever after she was a host in the Methodist cause, and 
 through her infiuence her son-in-law, Thomas, was converted 
 from his Baptist notions and made a zealous Methodist. Largely 
 through the influence of the two families, Bush and Thomas, New 
 Hope church was perpetuated and strengthened. Many earnest 
 consecrated men of God have proclaimed from the pulpit of New 
 Hope church the gospel of the everlasting kingdom, and many 
 souls have sought and found pardon at her altar, and the bodies 
 of many of her pious dead rest in the cemetery awaiting the 
 resurrection morning, and many honored names are still on her 
 roll. In the neighborhood of the present town of Louisville 
 and in what was then Pike County, a Methodist Society was es- 
 tablished and a church was built as early as 1822, so tradition 
 says. Tradition is not very accurate. In the south-east part of 
 
 Dale County, in the very beginning of Methodist work in that 
 section, a church was built, called Whitehurst's Meeting House. 
 Tradition is confident in the assertion that in 1828 a church was 
 built one or two miles from the present town of Ozark, and called 
 Claybank. Other preaching places were established through that 
 section during the first years of Methodist preaching therein 
 than those above named, and in the after years still many other 
 Societies were organized and preaching places established in 
 
 that region. 
 
 As nauies familiar in Methodist circles, and the names of per- 
 sons who were Methodists, and who were in that region as pio- 
 neers and in the first decades of Methodist work there, may be 
 mentioned: Baker, Birch, Cassady, Cruse, Chitty, Corbett, Dow- 
 ling, Dawkins, Gamble, Gilpin, Grantham, Grace, Lawrence, 
 Lucus, McDonald, McLendon, Messick, Miller, Mixon, Norton, 
 Owens, Peacock, Pittman, Shanks, Stokes, Skipper, Whitehurst, 
 Windham, Williams, Weatherby, Wright. 
 
 If tradition may be relied on, though some statements con- 
 cerning the matter are known to be incorrect, about the time the 
 Eev. John I. Triggs was preaching as " Missionary to Early 
 County and adjoining settlements," Jesse Birch, a local preacher, 
 erected himself a habitation in the neighborhood of the present 
 town of Louisville, which, now in Barbour County, was at that 
 time in Pike County. Tradition also states as a fact that about 
 that same time John McDonald, some of whose descendants have 
 been preachers, and his family, and the family of his brother- 
 in-law, and the Eev. Jesse Birch and his family formed a Society 
 and built for themselves a Meeting House in the community in 
 which they lived near Louisville. 
 
 The Rev. "Dempsey Dowling was recommended by the Dis- 
 trict Conference of Pee Dee District for the office of elder, and 
 was elected " by the South Carolina Conference in session at 
 Augusta, Georgia, Tuesday morning, February 26, 1822. Some 
 time after that, perhaps, in the early part of 1826, he entered 
 abode in Dale County, Alabama, in which county he resided 
 until his death, in 1865. He joined the Methodist Protestant 
 Church as early as 1845. He was of the strict type of Meth- 
 odists. He was of that class who reproved sin in word as well 
 . in life. He was as severe as the Judgment. In rebuking per- 
 sons for sin he had the perseverance of endless patience. In 
 
282 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the lines of Christian doctrine, experience, and life to which he 
 gave special attention he was well advanced and thoroughly es- 
 tablished. He was the patriarch and leader of the numerous 
 tribe of Dowlings in the Methodist ranks in the section of the 
 State where he lived and died. He was buried, as was his wife, 
 who preceded him to the grave five or six years, at Clay bank 
 Meeting House, one or two miles from the present town of Ozark. 
 So far as is now known, the first preacher in south-east Ala- 
 bama to enter the itinerant ministry was the Kev. Daniel Mc- 
 Donald. At the time he was recommended for admission on 
 trial in the Conference he was a citizen of Alabama and a 
 member of the Church in the bounds of the Chattahoochee Cir- 
 cuit. "Daniel McDonald was recommended by the Chatta- 
 hoochee Circuit Quarterly Conference and admitted " on trial 
 by the South Carolina Conference in session at Camden, South 
 Carolina, February 11, 1828. In due course, as provided by 
 Discipline, he was admitted into full connection in the Confer- 
 ence, and advanced to deacon's and elder's orders. At the 
 close of 1832 he was transferred to the Alabama Conference, as 
 that Conference then had charge of the territory in which was 
 located his home and in which his kindred resided. At the ses- 
 sion of the Conference at Tuskaloosa, in December, 1835, he 
 located, and henceforward made his home in Clarke County, 
 Alabama. His mortal remains rest in that county. While a 
 local preacher he had an appointment on Dog River, possibly 
 under the direction of the presiding elder of the District, and 
 while filling an engagement at that place, an adversary, one 
 Wilson, set and baited a trap for him. He was allured by the 
 bait and entangled by the trap, and his adversary, who was on 
 watch, had, perhaps, not all he wished, but enough for his pur- 
 pose, and so the preacher was put upon his trial for immorality, 
 and was expelled from the Church. Who puts his feet in gins 
 and snares is overthrown in a moment. An ill-advised step, 
 taken under the allurements of an improvised and well-ar- 
 ranged temptation, though it proceeded no further than an ap- 
 proach to another's couch and the giving a single kiss, cost that 
 man his ministry and his Church immunities. How necessary 
 it is that every thought should be brought in subjection to the 
 divine will! "Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth . 
 take heed lest he fall." 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 283 
 
 In the first years of Methodist work on the Chattahoochee 
 and Pea River charges a group of kindred by the name of 
 Shanks settled in the vicinity of the present town of Louisville 
 then in the bounds of Pike County, since 1832 in the bounds of 
 Barbour County. That family came from South Carolina. 
 The ancestors of the family, and the older children of the 
 household, were acquainted with Bishop Asbury. One member 
 of the family, born in South Carolina, in 1808, bore the name 
 of the Bishop. In the assemblage of Methodist names found 
 at that early day in that section of Alabama none was more 
 illustrious than that of Shanks. Not to mention the sisters, 
 who were women of piety, and gifted in song, three brothers, 
 James, William, and Asbury H., were Methodist preachers 
 Along toward the fifties, or in the fifties, the exact date is not 
 now recollected, William Shanks withdrew from the Meth- 
 odists, and, by an immersion in water, allied himself to the 
 Baptists; and for a number of years he resided on the road be- 
 tween the towns of Louisville and Troy, and was the Pastor ^f^ 
 Baptist Church, possibly Churches, in the vicinity m which he 
 resided That defection of William Shanks, that abandoning 
 the faith in which he had been brought up, in which he had 
 been brought to a saving knowledge of God, and m which he 
 had so long lived and preached, created q^J^e a sensation 
 among the Methodists. It annoyed and scandalized the Meth- 
 odists not a little. Their displeasure was in the exact measure 
 of their former appreciation, was in the ratio of the large in- 
 fluence which he had exerted among them. Whatever the 
 influence and the motives which caused him to abandon the 
 Church in which he entered upon his Christian and ministerial 
 career and ally himself with the denomination which rejected 
 and required him to repudiate his whole religious profession 
 and life the Methodists never excused him. They regretted his 
 course as long as they recollected his career. Such defections 
 are not likely to serve the general cause of Christianity. 
 
 James Shanks was a man of extraordinary force, and a man 
 of admirable consistency of character. He was renewed by 
 divine grace October 11, 1829, and was licensed io preach 
 March 1832. In connection with renewal of heart he received 
 an overwhelming ecstasy which almost without intermission 
 and with but little abatement continued for two years, and at 
 
284 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the time of his death he said, in the review of his life, he was, 
 though he was in agonies, the agonies of death, happier than at 
 any former period of his Christian experience. In December, 
 1833, he was received into the Alabama Conference on trial' 
 and in due course was admitted into full connection, and to 
 ministerial orders; for some reason he was one year longer than 
 the ordinary time in reaching elder's orders, and he continued 
 in the Alabama Conference until the close of 1847, when, on 
 account of the physical infirmities of his wife, he located. 
 During his connection with the Alabama Conference his ap- 
 pointments were all in the southern part of the State, and be- 
 tween the Chattahoochee and Alabama Kivers. For a number 
 of years he served the Choctawhatchee, Pea Eiver, and Clayton 
 charges, and was consequently in the section of Alabama where 
 he resided before he ever entered the itinerant ministry. Some 
 time after he located he moved to Clarke County, Mississippi, 
 and in December, 1869, he was re-admitted to the itinerant min- 
 istry. He was a member of the Mississippi Conference at the 
 time of his death. He was a local preacher from 1847 till the 
 close of 1869. This is correct, the statement in his obituary to 
 the contrary notwithstanding. For half a century he was a 
 preacher in the Methodist ranks, and his ministry was crowned 
 with results commensurate with its length. He brought to 
 Christ and added to the Church many souls. In the State of 
 Mississippi, October 4, 1878, he fell on sleep. He went out in 
 great physical pain, and in great spiritual ecstasy. He lacked 
 forty-five days of being eighty years old when he departed this 
 life. 
 
 In the vicinity in which he lived, the vicinity of Louisville 
 Alabama, Asbury H. Shanks, younger by ten years than his 
 brother James, was reclaimed by the gospel, renewed by the 
 Spirit, and under process provided was inducted into the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church, and was possibly the second preacher 
 m south-east Alabama who joined the itinerant ranks He was 
 renewed by divine grace April 7, 1829, and was licensed to 
 preach July 16, 1831. The Georgia Conference being in ses- 
 sion at Augusta, Georgia, on Monday morning, January 9 
 1832, the Rev. Zaccheus Dowling, the presiding elder of the 
 Tallahassee District, presented Asbury H. Shanks as a suitable 
 person to be admitted into the Conference on trial The Con 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 285 
 
 ference considered the case, and after proper inquiries made 
 and due reflection had he was admitted. He was a preacher 
 from the Alabama part of the Tallahassee District, and at the 
 end of the Conference year he was continued on trial, and in 
 that relation he was transferred to the Alabama Conference, 
 which Conference just then held its first session. In the ar- 
 rangement of the ecclesiastical year the Alabama Conference 
 met a little more than a month before the Georgia Conference. 
 In due course he was admitted into full connection in the Ala- 
 bama Conference, and into the orders of the ministry. He 
 filled many of the chief appointments in the Church. He was 
 appointed to Circuits, Stations, and Districts. He was a man 
 of extraordinary ability, of exemplary piety, and of sterling in- 
 tegrity. He was a theologian of no mean attainments, a de- 
 fender of the faith, and a preacher of remarkable power. His 
 ministry was somewhat impaired by physical ills, and for a 
 time he was superannuated, and for a time local. He was 
 honored while living and lamented when dead. He died, tri- 
 umphing in the faith of Jesus Christ, with immortality in view, 
 October 20, 1868, in Rusk, Texas, where he was buried. He 
 was a memj3er of the East Texas Conference at the time of his 
 
 death. 
 
 At Milledgeville, Georgia, December 23, 1814, a man who 
 was then within thirty days of his majority and who was recom- 
 mended from Brunswick Circuit was admitted on trial by the 
 South Carolina Conference. The years passed, the processes 
 provided by law went on, and he was received into full connec- 
 tion in the Annual Conference, and he was ordained deacon, 
 by Bishop Enoch George, at Columbia, South Carolina, De- 
 cember 29, 1816, and elder, by Bishop K R. Roberts, at Cam- 
 den, South Carolina, December 27, 1818; and at the session of 
 the Conference at which he was ordained elder, which closed 
 December 30, 1818, he located. In February, 1819, he married, 
 and for three years he lived in North Carolina where he had 
 married. In February, 1822, he was re-admitted into the An- 
 nual Conference, and held membership and filled appointments 
 therein until the session of the Conference at Milledgeville, 
 Georgia, January 12-20, 1826, when he again located, hence- 
 forth to be a local elder. After that last location he lived two 
 years in South Carolina. In the first part of the year 1828, 
 
 Ji 
 
History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 that man, with his family, left his native State for the newly 
 found paradise, the land of Alabama. He crossed just over 
 what was then the line of the Creek Indian Nation, and just 
 into the edge of what was then Pike County, and settled, where 
 he continued until 1835, near the present town of Clayton, Ala- 
 bama. He was then in the bounds of or in proximity to the 
 Chattahoochee Circuit, and he was quite an acquisition to the 
 young and struggling Church in that newly settled section on 
 the borders of the Indian tribes. That man was none other 
 than the Kev. John W. Norton, the brother of the Kev. James 
 Norton, who in 1813, by official appointment, traveled with 
 Bishop McKendree. Than the Kev. John W. Norton none was 
 more genial and generous, dignified and diligent. He was wise, 
 discriminating, and conservative in counsel, discreet, and edify- 
 ing in conversation. His life imparted to those with whom he 
 was associated a benediction, and his death, though a happy 
 release to him, inflicted an irreparable loss upon those he left 
 behind. He founded and fostered Churches in the neighbor- 
 hoods in which he lived. He was a man of but few tears, but 
 he was a man of solid piety, true benevolence, and of spotless 
 character. 
 
 ''A 
 
 i: 
 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work of 
 
 Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THE Jones's Valley Circuit first appeared for the year 1823. 
 Previous to that date it had been in and a part of the 
 Tuskaloosa Circuit. Blountsville, Ebenezer, and Shiloh, places 
 which have already been mentioned in connection with the 
 Tuskaloosa Circuit, and Cunningham's Creek, Cedar Mountain, 
 Bethlehem, Bethel, and Lebanon were leading preaching places 
 in Jones's Yalley Circuit when it was first made. 
 
 In Township sixteen, Eange two, west, on the head waters of 
 Cunningham's Creek, a branch of the Black Warrior, lived 
 James Cunningham, an Irishman, and the man for whom the 
 creek was named. In the residence of that Irishman the 
 pioneer Methodist preacher commenced proclaiming the gospel 
 as early as 1818, and there a Society was organized as early as 
 1819, and following close upon the organization of that Society 
 a log church, eighteen by twenty feet, was built, near the resi- 
 dence of Cunningham, in which that Society worshiped for 
 eighteen years. At that church James Cunningham, Jesse 
 Pitts, William Carson, Goldsmith W. Hewett, and others, held 
 membership. That church was superseded in 1837, by a log 
 house, a mile away, across the little valley, and named Smith's; 
 Chapel, at which an organization is still, 1890, kept up. 
 
 The church called Cedar Mountain, which was at the moun- 
 tain of that name, and which was twenty or twenty odd miles 
 north-east of where the city of Birmingham now stands, was or- 
 ganized in 1819, when the Rev. John Kesterson was in charge 
 of the work, and before the Jones's Valley Circuit was made, 
 and continued as a place of worship until 1826, when it was 
 superseded by a new church three miles away from it called 
 Shiloh. The charter members at Cedar Mountain were the Rev. 
 Perry Tunnel and wife, the Rev. James Johnson and wife, Fran- 
 cis Self and wife, George Taylor and wife. Upon the abandon- 
 ment of the place at Cedar Mountain and the oi^anization at 
 19 (287) 
 
288 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Shiloli in 1826, George Taylor and wife, the Rev. William 
 Taylor and wife, Isaac Taylor, Jonathan Moreland and 
 wife, and Jacob Wear and wife were transferred to Shiloh, and 
 at the opening of the church at Shiloh, Mary Taylor, Catherine 
 Taylor, and Harris Taylor joined as members. In that county 
 and among Methodists the Taylors were distinguished. 
 
 In 1817, the year Alabama was made a Territory, George 
 Taylor, a man of frontier tastes, and of religious instincts and 
 Christian experience as well, with his family, came to the Ter- 
 ritory, and took up his abode in proximity to the Cedar crowned 
 mountain. He had four sons, Casper, William, ' Isaac, and 
 Harris. Tradition says that the Rev. James Axley, a man 
 noted for oddities, eccentricities, sterling virtues, solid piety, 
 and extraordinary power, baptized the four sons here named on 
 the same occasion, and that in eloquence, earnestness, and faith 
 he prayed that the four sons might be called to preach. How 
 near the prayer was answered can be apprehended when it is 
 stated that three of them were made preachers and preached 
 much, and Casper, the oldest of the four, admitted that he was 
 called to preach, and while he was never licensed to preach he 
 did much work in the Church and was quite useful. The boys 
 were all under their majority when they came with their father 
 to the Territory of Alabama, except, perhaps, Casper. 
 
 William Taylor was licensed to preach by the Quarterly Con- 
 ference of the Tuskaloosa Circuit upon a recommendation 
 from the Society at Cedar Mountain. On a small tombstone 
 erected at his grave in the graveyard at Taylor's Chapel, in 
 Section eight, Township sixteen. Range one, west, are engraved 
 the following words: "Rev. William Taylor, born August 3, 
 1799, embraced religion at twenty-one years of age, soon 
 thereafter commenced to preach the unsearchable riches of 
 Christ, and continued to do so until his decease which took 
 place December 14, 1867." He was an able preacher, a man of 
 more than ordinary powers of intellect, and through all the 
 country round about the section in which he lived he preached 
 much and well. He maintained a good name and was loved by 
 the people among whom he exercised his ministry. 
 
 Isaac Taylor was licensed to preach by the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence of the Jones's Valley Circuit upon a recommendation of 
 the Society at Cedar Mountain in 1824. On a stout marble 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 289 
 
 slab at his grave, which is beside the grave of his brother Wil- 
 liam, is found the following inscription: "In memory of Rev. 
 Isaac Taylor, who was born January 27, 1802, died May 5, 1874 
 He was a minister of the gospel fifty years, and died in the 
 hope and consolation of the same." In the dying day, in con- 
 versation with one of his best friends, in allusion to his creden- 
 tials, he said: "These papers I have never dishonored. In the 
 pulpit I have never uttered a word which I would rescind." 
 
 The event of his life brought a dark shadow and deep trouble. 
 The event occurred about 1832. He then had a wife and six 
 children, the youngest child then drawing its nourishment from 
 its mother's breast. After the evening twilight and before the 
 morning dawn the woman who had plighted him her faith and 
 love, to live with him in the holy estate of matrimony, disap- 
 peared. Where she was gone and how she went were unsolved 
 mysteries of the case. There was a sensation, a sensation in the 
 circle of kindred, in the Methodist ranks, and in all the sur- 
 rounding country. He lived at the head waters of the Cahawba 
 River, and a couple of miles, perhaps, from Shiloh church. The 
 event gratified the sensation loving propensities of the commu- 
 nity for one whole generation. It was an event which gratified 
 his enemies, and the enemies of Methodism and religion, and 
 was sufficiently fraught with untoward influence to satisfy their 
 evil designs. It was an occasion suited to the gratification of 
 their malice, and they made the most of it; it was a vein in a 
 mine suited to their purposes, and they worked it for all it was 
 worth. It was an opportunity for mischief, and malice reveled, 
 and Satan was happy. It was an occasion, it was a matter of 
 gossip, and a matter for inspection. Ominous conjectures were 
 indulged, and grave suspicions were created. Soon it was sus- 
 pected and whispered about that the Rev. Isaac Taylor had 
 killed the woman whom he had wedded, and whom he had 
 pledged himself to love, comfort, honor and keep; soon he was 
 charged with the crime; soon testimony to the fact was conjured 
 up; the little domestic disputes of the household were, arrayed; 
 the unnaturalness of a woman leaving six of her own children, 
 and, especially, an infant in her arms, was portrayed; the sup- 
 posed lethargy of the husband in hunting for the missing wife 
 was descanted on; and, finally, to cap the climax, bones found in 
 some hollow stump, or cave, or gorge in the forest in the neigh- 
 
290 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 borhood of the home of the family were exhibited as human 
 bones, and as the bones of her who had so mysteriously disap- 
 peared; the excitement was intense, especially among the Church 
 members; soon he was arrested and bound over to appear at the 
 Court-house of Jefferson County before the proper court to 
 answer to the charge and for the crime of uxoricide; with his 
 witnesses he appeared in the town of Elyton, according to his 
 bond, to answer the finding of th© grand jury in the case, but 
 after all the sensation, excitement, and preliminary proceedings 
 in legal prosecution the case never reached the ordeal, the 
 grandjury never made a bill of indictment, and the man of the 
 missing wife went free. In the course of time a report was added 
 to the case which perpetuated th© sensation, and added another 
 theory to the one of uxoricide as a solution of the mystery. It 
 was reported that a man who moved from Murphree's Valley, Ala- 
 bama, to Texas, and who knew the Eev. Isaac Taylor and his wife 
 intimately in Alabama, was one day in a store in a town in which 
 he traded in Texas, and a man and woman walked into the store 
 and when he caught the sight of the woman looking her full in 
 the face he recognized her as the missing wife of the Kev. Isaac 
 Taylor, and he saw that she recognized him. Without speaking 
 a word she and the man with her, immediately retired from the 
 store, and disappeared. Then the theory which solved the mys- 
 tery was elopement; a story was now added to the case which 
 described her departure with some man who had resided near 
 her home but in Blount County, going through the obscure re- 
 gions and mountain fastnesses of Alabama along some deserted 
 Indian trail until beyond where she was known, and on by New 
 Orleans and out into the Kepublic of Texas: the story ran that 
 she was disguised by dressing in man's attire. That was the 
 last story in the mysterious affair. Her oldest child, who was 
 eleven years old at the time of her disappearance, recollects the 
 last day she was at home. He recollects that on that day he and 
 his mother were in the field dropping corn, and that his mother 
 went to the house to nurse the baby and that he went with her, 
 and he recollects that while she was nursing the baby he saw a 
 sad expression cover his mother's face; that night he went to 
 bed, and next morning he was awakened by his father's voice 
 calling his mother as though she were missing: she never an- 
 swered, she never returned. The day which will reveal all se- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 291 
 
 crets will reveal the secrets and explain the mysteries of that 
 -case. 
 
 That occurrence crippled the influence of the Eev. Isaac Tay- 
 lor, and damaged Methodism in the country where it was known, 
 though the conviction was established that he was an innocent 
 man. He retained his ministry, and maintained the faith, and 
 died exulting in the consolation of the gospel. 
 
 Harris Taylor was the first class leader at Shiloh, was only twen- 
 ty years old when appointed to that oflice. He was licensed to 
 preach by the Quarterly Conference of Jones's Valley Circuit 
 upon a recommendation from the Society at Shiloh in 1829. He 
 moved to Benton County, now called Calhoun, where he died. 
 He was buried in the graveyard at the Methodist Church at the 
 town of Alexandria. He was exceedingly popular through Benton 
 and Talladega Counties. The following is copied from a large 
 marble slab placed by his friends on his grave: "Rev. Harris 
 Taylor died August 22, 1852, in his forty-sixth year. As a min- 
 ister of the gospel he was one of the most faithful and talented 
 members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Bold in 
 preaching Bible truth, able in its defense, yet humble in mind, 
 meek and quiet in spirit; a worthy citizen, a good neighbor, an 
 affectionate husband, a kind father, a humane master, and a 
 faithful friend; one who practiced religion in life, and enjoyed 
 its happy effects in death. All that knew him reverenced and 
 loved him." 
 
 The Eev. Walter Houston McDaniel preached the funeral of 
 the Eev. Harris Taylor at a Camp-ground near the town of Al- 
 exandria. In the sermon he pronounced a very high, not to say 
 extravagant, eulogy on Taylor. He said: "As far as the eagle, 
 which sits on the summit of the mountain and soars above the 
 clouds excels the wren which sits on the housetop, so far did 
 Taylor excel in greatness, wisdom, and oratory Webster, Clay, 
 and Calhoun. Taylor lived on earth and communed with men 
 and communed with God, he lived on earth and had a home in 
 heaven." At that point in the eulogy the audience broke out in 
 a wild burst of shouting, and a singular light broke forth above 
 the altar. 
 
 Beyond doubt the four sons of George Taylor were men of 
 extraordinary gifts and power, and it is equally certain that 
 God's ear was attent unto the prayer which the Eev. James Ax- 
 
292 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ley made for them at their baptism, and in answer to that prayer 
 the Lord God remembered them for good, and upon them put 
 his blessing forever, and with the gifts of the Holy Spirit they 
 were endowed, and extraordinary manifestations attended them. 
 Elijah Self, who died this year, 1890, joined the Church at 
 Shiloh the year the Society was organized there, and had his 
 membership there at that one place for sixty-four years, and 
 during that time was class leader and local preacher. In 1827 
 he married Catherine Taylor, who was and still is a member at 
 Shiloh, and the sister of the Taylors above named. The Kev. 
 Elijah Self was the father of the Kev. Nathaniel H. Self, who for 
 long years has been an itinerant preacher in Alabama. The 
 Selfs came to the neighborhood of Cedar Mountain in 1817. 
 
 In 1819, before Jefferson County was established and before 
 the town of Elyton was ever thought of, the Eev. James Tarrant, 
 who was born in the Colony of Virginia, and who was a Captain 
 in the service of the United Colonies in the war for independence, 
 and who lived awhile in South Carolina, and who possessed deep 
 piety and fixed religious principles, settled on a creek in Ala^ 
 bama, about eight miles west of the present city of Birming- 
 ham and about four miles from the old town of Jonesboro. He 
 brought with him to his new home in Alabama a young negro 
 whose name was Adam, and who was noted for his religious ex- 
 cellence. In 1820 the Kev. James Tarrant caused to be erected 
 near his residence a house for divine worship. That house of 
 worship was made of logs, and the logs out of which it was made 
 were cut and hauled by Adam, the negro, the slave. That house 
 of worship was named Bethlehem. Till this present time, 1890, 
 it is known as Bethlehem, and a preaching place is still main- 
 tained there with a flourishing Society, a frame building havings 
 superseded the log house. 
 
 The Kev. James Tarrant died in the thirties, afhis home, and 
 was buried on his own premises, a few hundred yards from 
 Bethlehem church; and Adam, the negi-o, died in the eighties. 
 The master and the slave were both good men, true Methodists^ 
 and useful Christians. Some time before Adam died he said to a 
 friend and brother who had known him long and well: "For 
 sixty years I have not told an untruth, and for forty years a drop 
 of liquor has not gone in my mouth." There was a noble ex- 
 ample of integrity and of sobriety. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 293 
 
 William Saddler and his wife Nancy Saddler lived near Beth- 
 lehem and held their membership there. It is said that Mrs. 
 Martha Rutledge, a member at that place, was the first person 
 ever buried at Bethlehem. From the first, Bethlehem was one 
 of the centers of Methodism, and there Camp-meetings were held, 
 and the Methodist hosts of the surrounding country assembled. 
 Grand times were witnessed at that place. 
 
 There were many worthy members at Bethlehem at the first, 
 many worthy of mention, among them the Browns, but of all 
 the men of Jones's Valley Circuit and of Bethlehem Society, 
 there was not one more honest, true, clean, and worthy than 
 James Kutledge. He was in the country among the first. For 
 many years he was class leader and steward at Bethlehem, and 
 he did much to advance the spirituality of the membership, and 
 to support the temporal interests of the Society. His descend- 
 ants are still there. 
 
 Bethel was at or near Nabor's Spring on the HuntsviUe or 
 Tennessee road, and about seven miles north-east of the town of 
 Elyton. That Church was organized before 1825, and a Camp- 
 ground which was kept up many, many years was established 
 there in the beginning. Bethel was one of the largest and 
 strongest Societies in the county of Jefferson, and it continued 
 and flourished until the Federal soldiers burnt the house of wor- 
 ship during the war between the States. Edley Hamilton and 
 his wife Jane Hamilton were pillars in the Church at Bethel. 
 John Hewitt and John Burford were there, and Vanzant was a 
 name there not to be forgotten. 
 
 Lebanon was about six miles north-east of Blountsville, and 
 it has been claimed that it was at Lebanon that the Kev. Ebe- 
 nezer Hearn preached his first sermon south of the Tennessee 
 Valley but Mr. Hearn in his written Journal now in hand says 
 that at Bearmeat Cabin he preached his first sermon as a Mis- 
 sionary. Lebanon, now, in 1890, is still in existence as a preach- 
 ing place, with a pretty good Society. 
 
 At the close of 1823 there were in the Jones s Valley Circuit 
 five hundred and twenty-five white and twenty-six colored mem- 
 bers and at the close of 1832 there were in the territory at first 
 embraced in that Circuit seven hundred and eighty white and 
 one hundred and sixteen colored members. That was not a large 
 increase for a decade of years. Many of the members were un- 
 
294: 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabajna. 
 
 cultured, untrained, and unstable. Some years marked an in- 
 crease and some years a decrease. There was fluctuation, like 
 the tide they would flow in and then flow out. The largest num- 
 ber of white members reported any year during the decade was 
 at the close of 1826, when there were eight hundred and fifty- 
 three. The largest number of colored members during the dec- 
 ade was at the close of 1831, when there were two hundred and 
 fifty-eight. 
 
 The preachers on the Jones's Valley Circuit were: 1823, Francis 
 R Cheatham, Daniel McLeod; 1824, Marcus C. Henderson, John 
 Collier; 1825, Edmond Pearson, Thomas Burpo; 1826, John Pat- 
 ton, Orsamus L. Nash; 1827, Thomas E. Ledbetter, Isaac V. 
 Enochs; 1828, Benjamin A. Houghton, LeKoy Masseugale; 1829, 
 Kichard Pipkin, Benjamin B. Smith; 1830, Joseph McDowell, 
 Francis Jones; 1831, Jesse Ellis, Cornelius McLeod; 1832, John 
 Cotton, Lanson Jones. 
 
 The Lawrence Circuit, which embraced a part of Lawrence 
 County and all of Morgan County, first appeared for 1824 
 
 In the latter part of 1818, and a few days after the Cotaco Cir- 
 cuit had for the first time been announced among the ap- 
 pointments of the Tennessee Conference, the Rev. Ebenezer 
 Hearn, in going south, passed through Gandy's Cove, which is 
 in the southern part of Morgan County, it was then Cotaco 
 County, and he called together a few of the settlers in that 
 Cove, and the afternoon of the day preached them a ser- 
 mon. After spending the night in a one-room cabin, with two 
 old folks, a man and his wife, Hearn moved on to his destina- 
 tion. From that day the Methodists have had preaching in that 
 Cove, and there in the beginning of the work a log house, which 
 stood for a long time, was erected, and was known as Gandy's 
 Cove Meeting House. It was one of the appointments of the 
 Lawrence Circuit. Familiar names in the membership of that 
 Society were: Bain, Cook, Gandy, Key, McGlathory andTurney. 
 In the time of the very first preaching in that country a So- 
 ciety was established at Center Springs, which was some five to 
 seven miles north-east, perhaps, from Somerville, and till this 
 time, 1890, that Society continues. A log house was built and a 
 Camp-ground was established there in the beginning. Large 
 assemblies have often met there at Camp-meetings, and scores 
 have been adopted into the heavenly family on that sacred spot 
 
 The Enlargement and Advan cement of the Work, 295 
 
 Among the original members of that Society were the names of 
 Blackwell, Maxwell, Reed, Sharp, and Troup. About 1832 the 
 names of Garrison and Lyle were found on the Register of that 
 Society. That was one of the prominent places in the Lawrence 
 
 Circuit. 
 
 A church, made of logs and with twelve corners to it, was 
 erected at an early day on the mountain eight or ten miles west 
 of Somerville. It was known as the Twelve Corner Meeting 
 House, taking its name from its peculiar structure. McClana- 
 han, Price, Strain, and Thompson were names prominent in the 
 early membership of that Society, and it was one of the leading 
 places on the Lawrence Circuit. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas A. Strain, who was received on trial in the 
 Tennessee Conference in the latter part of 1823, and who was 
 received into full connection in the Conference, and ordained 
 deacon, and located in November, 1825, and who was re-admitted 
 to the Tennessee Conference in November, 1827, and who again 
 located in December, 1828, and who was ever after till his death 
 a local preacher, and who for 1824 was on the Madison Circuit, 
 and who was the other two years of his itinerant ministry, the 
 years 1825 and 1828, on the Lawrence Circuit, lived through the 
 years of his local ministry in the bounds of the Lawrence Cir- 
 cuit and in the neighborhood of Twelve Corners, and held his 
 membership in the Society at that place. He was a man of deep 
 piety, of extraordinary endowments, and in pulpit power and 
 efiiciency he was without a peer in all the country in which he 
 resided and preached. 
 
 One of the very first Churches organized in the bounds of the 
 Lawrence Circuit, and organized before the Lawrence Circuit was 
 ever named, was in Lawrence County, and was near where, after 
 it was organized, there sprang up a village called Oakville, and 
 which was in Section sixteen, Township seven. Range nine. The 
 Meeting House, like all the houses for religious worship first built 
 in the country, was built of logs. There was a Camp-ground at 
 the place. The old church near Oakville produced a number of 
 men and women of piety and talents. 
 
 One individual who was among the first members of that So- 
 ciety may be mentioned here. Sallie Reedy, whose parents 
 were from North Carolina, and who was born in Madison 
 County, Alabama, during the first decade of this century, and 
 
296 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 who, when a girl scarcely in her teens, living in Morgan Coun- 
 ty, then called Cotaco County, was, under the ministry of the 
 Eev. Thomas Madden, inducted into a genuine Christian ex- 
 perience, was a member at the Log Meeting House near where 
 sprang up the village of Oakville. About the time she reached 
 womanhood she married Captain James Barbee, who was a 
 United States soldier in the war of 1812. Eight children were 
 the product of this marriage, three daughters and five sons. 
 Four of the sons were called to the high vocation of Christian 
 ministers. James D. Barbee, now, 1890, a member of the Ten- 
 nessee Conference, and a Doctor of Divinity, and the Agent of 
 the Publishing House of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South, is one of the sons, and the Eev. S. W. Barbee, now, 
 1890; a member of the Montana Conference, is another one of the 
 sous. Captain Barbee never made any profession of religion, 
 and was, so far as is known, without any religious creed. The 
 wife was a devout, cheerful, and hopeful Christian. She was 
 a woman of strong faith. She had a clear apprehension of the 
 dispensations of grace and providence. She was rich in grace, 
 though she and her family were poor in this world's goods. 
 One of her neighbors who had neglected the mental culture 
 and religious training of his children, and who had lived with- 
 out the fear and worship of God, and who drove and worked 
 everybody and everything about him for the accumulation of 
 wealth, and who had succeeded in possessing himself of *' miles 
 of land, scores of slaves, and coffers laden with gold," and who 
 was far on the last decline of life, said to her: "Mrs. Barbee, 
 we have lived neighbors for a long time, and each of us has 
 brought up a large family of children. I have given my attention 
 and labor to the making of money, while you have looked after 
 the religious education of your children. I have outstripped 
 you in money making, but you have achieved a success of which 
 any mother may well be proud. I acknowledge my mistake." 
 The acknowledgment could not correct the mistake. ** There 
 is that maketh himself rich, yet hath nothing; there is that 
 maketh himself poor, yet hath great riches." 
 
 When Mrs. Sallie Barbee found that her sons were called by 
 God to the sacred office of the ministry her soul was filled with 
 a special ecstasy. When, too infirm to follow the active duties 
 of life, she waited on the shore for exit to her home in the 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 297 
 
 skies she consecrated her children every day to God in prayer. 
 Her work is perpetuated in her children. They are to her a 
 crown and an honor. 
 
 Miss Polly Eeedy, a sister of Mrs. Barbee, married Mr. Elry 
 West, and she and her husband were members of the Society 
 near Oakville. J. B. West, now, 1890, a Doctor of Divinity, 
 and a member of the Tennessee Conference, is the son of Mrs. 
 Polly and Mr. Elry West It is said that Mr. Elry West was a 
 man of strictest honesty. That he might be sure not to obtain 
 an article for less than its real value he would never purchase 
 
 anything at auction. 
 
 In the famous Crowd-about Yalley a Society was organized 
 as early as the Lawrence Circuit, and there were in that valley 
 families who made the membership of that Society by the 
 name of Clark, Dickens, Freeman, Hewlett, and Turrentine. 
 Men of prominence and eminence sprang from the Society. 
 
 Chestnut Grove was one of the earliest plants of Methodism 
 in Morgan County. Lile, Miner, Kimble, Johnson, Stephenson, 
 and Grizzard were familiar names, and Sikes and Crompton 
 were men of education, property, devotion, and influence. 
 
 Wolf Town, in Lawrence County, was an old center of 
 Methodism established as early as 1830. There the Putmans 
 held their membership. The Putman family was a family of 
 
 preachers. 
 
 The first regular Methodist preaching in the town of Deca- 
 tur, in Morgan County, on the Tennessee Eiver, was done by 
 the Eev. Alexander Sale and the Eev. John B. McFerrin in 
 the year 1827, and for years it was an appointment in the 
 Lawrence Circuit. 
 
 Summer Seat Camp-ground, five or six miles from Decatur, 
 and near the present town of Trinity, was established in 1827, 
 and was one of the famous Camp-grounds in the bounds of the 
 
 Lawrence Circuit. 
 
 In March, 1830, C. A. Welch, from Kentucky, settled in 
 Somerville, the seat of justice of Morgan County, since the 
 county was made, and of Cataco before it was Morgan. Up to 
 that time there had never been a Methodist Society in the town. 
 Immediately upon the coming of Brother Welch, the Eev. 
 Elisha J. Dodson, then the preacher in charge of Lawrence 
 Circuit, with F. G. Ferguson as junior preacher, established a 
 
298 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 preaching place and organized a Society at Somerville. They 
 preached and worshiped in the Court-house. C. A. Welch, 
 Eliza Welch, John T. Eather, Tunstill Banks, John P. Mosely, 
 afterward a local preacher, Robert Francis, and his wife, Mrs. 
 Martha T. Goff, and Rachel Campbell, were the members of 
 the Society organized at first in Somerville. 
 
 There were other preaching places on the Lawrence Circuit 
 previous to 1832. Notwithstanding much of the country in the 
 Lawrence Circuit was rugged and full of mountains, it was a 
 desirable region, and a good work. It had a large membership, 
 and less fluctuation in the number than almost any Circuit in 
 the same region of country. At the close of the first year after 
 it was set off from the Franklin Circuit it reported five hundred 
 and fifty-two white and sixty colored members, and the smallest 
 number that was reported on it any year to the close of 1832 
 was five hundred and thirty-three white and fifty colored mem- 
 bers. At the close of 1832 it had six hundred and fifty-three 
 white and eighty-nine colored members. There was never any 
 general liberality on the Circuit in supporting the gospel, ex- 
 cept in maintaining Camp-meetings. 
 
 The preachers appointed to the Lawrence Circuit for 1824 
 were Daniel De Yinne, and Thomas Burpo. The Rev. Daniel 
 De Vinne did not serve that Circuit more than three months. 
 He went to the General Conference which met at Baltimore, 
 May 1, 1824, and was transferred to the New York Conference, 
 and at its session which met June 1, 1824, was appointed to 
 Sullivan Circuit, in the State of New York. At a session of the 
 Mississippi Conference held at the town of AVashington, Mis- 
 sissippi, beginning November 17, 1819, the Rev. Daniel De 
 Yinne was received into the Conference on trial, and he was 
 the only one received on trial at that session. At another ses- 
 sion of the Mississippi Conference held at the same place, be- 
 ginning December 7, 1821, he was received into full connection 
 and ordained deacon; and at still another session of that Con- 
 ference held at Natchez, Mississippi, beginning December 25, 
 1823, he was ordained an elder. For 1820 and 1821 he was ap- 
 pointed to the Attakapas Circuit in the Louisiana District, and 
 for 1822 he was on the Amite Circuit, and for 1823 on the 
 Claiborne Circuit in the Mississippi District. At the end of 
 his work on the Lawrence Circuit, which closed, as above 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 299 
 
 stated, about the end of March, 1824, having done hard work on 
 all his appointments in the Mississippi Conference, he left for 
 the State of New York, by way of the General Conference at 
 Baltimore, Maryland, and made the whole trip of more than 
 two thousand miles on horseback. He got out of the woods and 
 away from the frontier. 
 
 While an infant, his parents brought him to America from 
 Ireland, where he was born February 1, 1793. He was converted 
 in the city of Albany, in the State of New York, January 2, 
 1810, and five days thereafter joined his destinies with the 
 Methodists. Swayed by a holy passion, impelled by impulse, and 
 fired with the Missionary zeal, he conceived the idea of leaving 
 the State which had nourished him from the cradle to man- 
 hood, and of going, in person, to the people on the lower Missis- 
 sippi River, to devote himself to their welfare in laboring for 
 their salvation. Prompted by the impulse and following the 
 idea he left the State of New York in 1818, and made his way 
 to Louisiana, where, applying himself to the first thing which 
 came to hand in his line, he commenced his work by organizing 
 a Sunday-school among the African slaves which were found m 
 that section of the United States. Impediments in the way of 
 that work soon appeared, and abandoning his chosen occupa- 
 tion and leaving his selected place of operation he made his 
 way to another point of the country. For the time being, he 
 labored, as best he could, in the work of religion. He was, in the 
 midst of the passing events, licensed to preach in that country 
 where the Mississippi River washes the shores of Louisiana and 
 Mississippi States, in the year 1819. He was received into the 
 Mississippi Conference and clothed with the functions of the •. 
 ministry as elsewhere stated. In the land in which he com- 
 menced his itinerant career he did a vast amount of hard work. 
 He rode long distances, braved numerous dangers, endured 
 hard fare preached incessantly, and received poor pay. He 
 was uncompromisingly opposed to slavery, to African slavery 
 as it existed in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. His sen- 
 timents on that subject were antagonistic to the sentiments of 
 the people of those States, and among whom he had cast his 
 lot and in the interest of whom he had purposed to work. Im- 
 pelled by the same impulses which had moved him in the past, 
 he finally, as stated on another page, returned to the State . 
 
300 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 which had nourished him in his infancy, childhood, and youth. 
 He was a single man while in the sunny South. He married 
 after his return to New York. After a long life and a noble 
 career his body rests in the soil of the State wherein he grew 
 to manhood. He died in Morrisania, New York, February 10, 
 1883. Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, where he entered 
 upon his ministerial career and where he worked so faithfully, 
 have an interest in the Kev. Daniel De Vinne, cherish his 
 memory, and acknowledge the debt of gratitude due to him 
 from them. 
 
 Here may be recited a single incident as it will indicate what 
 was the state of the country and what were the habits of the 
 pious down South at the time the Rev. Daniel De Vinne was 
 exercising his ministry therein. On the adjoinment sine die of 
 the session of the Mississippi Conference held at John Mc- 
 Rea's, on Chickasawhay River, beginning December 5, 1822, 
 the preachers left in groups, going to their appointments in 
 different directions. One group of ten or more preachers, with 
 one fair and beautiful bride, the wife of one of the preachers, 
 all mounted on horseback, set off from the seat of the Confer- 
 ence westward. The country over which they were to pass be- 
 tween John McRae's Meeting House on the Chickasawhay and 
 the Midway Meeting House west of the Amite River was 
 mostly wild and drear. It took that company four of those 
 December days to make the trip. The second night out on the 
 journey the ten or more preachers and the one bride occupied 
 one small room of the double cabin of a cattle tender. In that 
 small room, where was quartered, for the night, that itinerant 
 company, there was only one bed, and it a very scanty affair. 
 The third night was spent in a settlement on the Tangipahoa 
 River. The company had dwindled to seven preachers and the 
 bride. They divided out into two companies of four each, and 
 put up for the night each company at a house. The Rev. 
 Daniel De Vinne, the Rev. William Winans, the Rev. Ebenezer 
 Hearn, and his bride stopped at one house. After the baggage 
 was deposited and the horses were provided for, De Vinne, 
 Winans, and Hearn, in the twilight of the evening, went to the 
 grove as the most suitable place they could obtain in which to 
 offer their evening prayers and engage in their secret devo- 
 tions. Near an old road, which had fallen into disuse, they 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 301 
 
 found, as they supposed, the conditions adequate to the retire- 
 ment which they desired, and separating a little way from each 
 other they got them down in a worshiping posture and com- 
 posed themselves for the service which was to please the divine 
 Master and improve their own graces. They had not more 
 than commenced their silent prayers when they were very un- 
 ceremoniously interrupted. A man on horseback, proceeding 
 along the old abandoned road, came unexpectedly upon them. 
 The horseman espied De Vinne a little way from the road in 
 his attitude of devotion, and in a hurried, a tremulous, and an 
 excited tone which indicated great consternation, he exclaimed: 
 "Whoa!" and he immediately asked: "What are you doing 
 there?" Winans, who was in a different direction a short dis- 
 tance from De Vinne, and who seemed to be in a communica- 
 tive mood, and in the spirit of imparting information, answered 
 the man's inquiry, and said: "We are offering prayers." The 
 frightened horseman, not nnderstanding the announcement made 
 by Winans, inquired: "Did you say you are hunting calves?" 
 Then De Vinne, in a tone which indicated that his soul was 
 filled with mingled feelings of displeasure and commiseration, 
 addressed the man this inquiry: "Did you never see any 
 one pray?" To that interrogatory the frightened man an- 
 swered: "Never in that fix," and then, quickly reining his 
 horse round, and with masculine vigor applying to him the 
 whip, he galloped down the old road at full speed the way from 
 which he came, as if flying from impending danger, leaving 
 the disturbed preachers to regain their repose and continue 
 their devotions as best they could. The religious had been 
 turned into the ridiculous, and it was exceedingly difficult to 
 be sweet, reverent, and devotional under such circumstances. 
 
 The preachers on the Lawrence Circuit were: 1825, George 
 W. Morris, Thomas A. Strain; 1826, Barton Brown, Benjamin 
 S. Clardy; 1827, Alexander Sale, John B. McFerrin; 1828, 
 Thomas A. Strain, George W. Bewley; 1829, Ambrose F. Dris- 
 kill, Elisha J. Dodson; 1830, Elisha J. Dodson, Frederick G. 
 Ferguson; 1831, George W. Morris, Robert Gregory; 1832, 
 George W. Morris, Robert C. Jones. 
 
 The New River Circuit first appeared in the list of the ap- 
 pointments for 1824 It was organized just one year before 
 the county of Fayette, Alabama, was established, and the 
 
302 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 principal part of the Circuit lay in what constituted that county 
 when it was tirst established, though the Circuit extended some- 
 what into the counties adjoining to Fayette County, and the 
 Circuit possibly may have had a few appointments in the State 
 of Mississippi. The Territory occupied by the New Kiver Cir- 
 cuit had formerly been in the Marion Circuit. 
 
 The preachers on the New River Circuit were: 1824, John G. 
 Lee, Daniel H. Williams; 1825, John Collier, Thomas S. Aber- 
 nathy; 1826, Eugene V. Le Yert, Henry J. Brown; 1827, 
 Thomas Burpo; 1828, Thomas E. Ledbetter, John Collier; 
 1829, Henry J. Brown; 1830, Nathan Hopkins, Benjamin B. 
 Smith; 1831, Mark Westmoreland; 1832, Griffin E. Christopher, 
 Sidney S. Squires. 
 
 The New Eiver Circuit was the last appointment to which 
 the Rev. Thomas E. Ledbetter was assigned by the Conference 
 in Alabama, but there are indications that he did not serve that 
 work, but that for the year he was assigned to it, the year 1828, 
 he lived in Tuskaloosa, and had charge of Tuskaloosa Station 
 and the Methodist interests of that town that year, and that 
 notwithstanding the Rev. William Spruill was read out to that 
 Station for that year. The following communications are au- 
 thority for the view here expressed: 
 
 " Tuskaloosa, Alabama, August 5, 1828. 
 
 "To the Editors Christian Advocate and Journal. 
 
 "Dear Brethren: Religion is spreading its happy influence over 
 some part of the State, to a considerable extent. I attended a 
 Quarterly Meeting about thirty miles distant from this place, 
 some five days since, where six professed to have obtained re- 
 ligion, and about ten or twelve more appeared to be earnestly 
 seeking its enjoyment. I also attended a Camp-meeting the 
 week following in Monroe County, Mississippi, where I beheld 
 some signal evidences of God's mercy and love, in the reclaim- 
 ing of blacksliders, and the conversion of unregenerate persons. 
 
 *' In Tuskaloosa we have,^I think, some omen of a revival. The 
 members of the Society appear to be generally much engaged, 
 and great peace and love dwell among us. The congregations 
 are large, serious, and attentive. Thomas E. Ledbetter." 
 
 " Tuskaloosa, Alabama, October 1, 1828. 
 
 "To the Editors of the Christian Advocate and Journal. 
 
 "Dear Brethren: The Sims Female Academy, in Tuskaloosa, 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 303 
 
 Alabama, is just finished. It is situated in an eligible part of 
 the town, and from the health of the inhabitants (a population 
 between 2,000 and 3,000) the past year, it may be considered 
 healthy. There is a*commodious building with six rooms, two 
 of them quite spacious, one in the upper story and the other in 
 the lower, for the academical exercises. The other part of the 
 building is intended for the accommodation of the students that 
 may wish to board within the institution. The Trustees wish, 
 through the medium of your paper, to open a door for the ap- 
 plication of a suitable governess to take charge of the institu- 
 tion. We want a lady well qualified to teach the several branches 
 of female literature. Any person feeling adequate to take 
 charge of the academy, can apply by stating her mode of con- 
 ducting a school, and various branches she is capable of teach- 
 ing, etc. ; every attention will be paid to such application if di- 
 rected to the Trustees of Sims Female Academy. 
 
 Thomas E. Ledbetter, Secretary Board of Trustees." 
 Thomas E. Ledbetter came with his father and mother, 
 Thomas C. Ledbetter and his wife, from South Carolina to the 
 Dutch Settlement on the Alabama River, in the State of Alaba- 
 ma, arriving there in January, 1821. He joined interest with a 
 farmer in Dutch Bend, on his arrival there, and followed the 
 plow until the latter part of 1823. He was licensed to preach on 
 the Alabama Circuit, in Autauga County, in Alabama, in 1823, 
 the Rev. Nicholas Mclntyre being the presiding elder, and the 
 Rev. Joshua Boucher, and the Rev. Eugene V. Le Yert being the 
 preachers on the Circuit at the time; and he was recommended 
 by the Quarterly Conference of the Alabama Circuit to the Mis- 
 sissippi Annual Conference as a suitable person to be admitted 
 on trial in the traveling connection; and on that recommenda- 
 tion he was admitted at Natchez, Mississippi, December 25, 1823. 
 His appointment for 1824, the first he had, was the Tombecbee 
 Circuit. At the session of the Conference held at Washington, 
 Mississippi, beginning December 8, 1825, he was admitted into 
 full connection, and ordained a deacon. At the session held at 
 the same place, December 20-27, 1827, he was elected and or- 
 dained an elder. At the Conference at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, 
 beginning December 25, 1828, he then being in Tuskaloosa, in 
 charge of affairs, as stated above, Thomas E. Ledbetter located. 
 That ended his itinerant work in Alabama. In course of time 
 20 
 
fe 
 
 304 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 he, with his mother, returned to South Carolina. At the ses- 
 sion of the Conference which met at Lincolnton, North Caroli- 
 na, January 30, 1833, he was re-admitted into the traveling con- 
 nection by the South Carolina Conference, and in that Confer- 
 ence he continued, on the effective list, until January, 1853, 
 when he located, and terminated his itinerant ministry. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 The Enlakgement and Advancement of the Work of 
 
 Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THE Mississippi Conference met, according to' previous ap- 
 pointment, at Taskaloosa, Tuskaloosa County, Alabama, De- 
 cember 22, 1824. That was the first session of an Annual Con- 
 ference ever held in that town, and up to that date Tuskaloosa 
 had been one of the appointments on the Tuskaloosa Circuit, 
 but at the close of that session the list of the appointments for 
 the year 1825 was announced and the last appointment in the 
 list was: Tuskaloosa Station, AVilliam M. Curtis. The town was 
 then capable of entertaining the Conference, and they assumed 
 the responsibility of supporting a preacher for themselves, and 
 from that time to the present Tuskaloosa has been a Station. 
 
 The Methodists commenced preaching in Tuskaloosa in 1818, 
 when there were only a few board shanties and one or two log 
 cabins at the place. 
 
 Oii the morning of October 24, 1818, on the east of Deep 
 Creek, in the south-east corner of the State of Virginia, there 
 was a'completed family outfit for a long, lonely journey to the 
 west. The outfit consisted of three vehicles, a carriage, cart, 
 and wagon, and the horses necessary to draw them, and a tent 
 and fixtures. The family by whom and for whom the outfit was 
 provided consisted of one man, his wife, two children, the eldest 
 less than four years old, and the mother-in-law. So far as is 
 now known, there were none others with that household. The 
 only additional attendant was the much appreciated and ever 
 faithful dog! Everything to be transported was in the vehicles 
 properly stored. About noon of the day above named that fam- 
 ily with reins in hand rolled their wheels and started for the 
 west. Passing over the road which led by Suffolk, Lyr^chburg, 
 Abingdon, Knoxville, and Kingston, and through the Cherokee 
 Indian Nation, and through Jones's Yalley, and enduring, by 
 the way, many vexations caused by mud and mire, rocks and 
 hills the antics of unruly teams, the upsetting of vehicles, the 
 
 (305) 
 
306 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 breaking of axles and bolts, hames and traces, tires and tongues, 
 and the fearful looking for of robberies and savage depreda- 
 tions, and by scarcity of food for man and beast, the emigrant 
 family, on December 26, 1818, finally reached the town of°Tus- 
 kaloosa, in the Territory of Alabama, and there took up abode. 
 The man at the head of that family and in charge of its eifects 
 was the Rev. John Owen, a local elder. At Tuskaloosa he and 
 his became members of the first Methodist Society organized at 
 that place. That local elder, with his family, reached Tuska- 
 loosa about the time the Eev. John Kesterson, the first preach- 
 er appointed to the Tuskaloosa Circuit, .was making his second 
 round on that work. Owen has been a familiar and honored 
 name on the Eegister of the Methodist Episcopal Church in 
 Tusjvaloosa from the very beginning of Christianity in that town. 
 The Eev. John Owen, of whom mention is here made, was a 
 member of the Methodist Church in Tuskaloosa for thirty years, 
 having died there in the faith, February 6, 1849. By the close 
 of 1820, his father and mother, who were Methodists, and four 
 of his brothers, three of whom were Methodists, and two of 
 whom were preachers, had followed him to Tuskaloosa, and had 
 become members then of that Society. His father, Eichardson 
 Owen, died in Tuskaloosa, July 24, 1821, and his mother, Sarah 
 Owen, died in the faith, at the residence of another one of her 
 sons, Judge Thomas Owen, in Tuskaloosa, January 13, 1836, 
 having been a member of the Society in Tuskaloosa for fifteen 
 years. 
 
 At the session of the Virginia Conference held at Edmund 
 Taylor's, Caswell Circuit, North Carolina, March 1, 1805, these 
 three brothers, William Owen, John Owen, and Eichardson 
 Owen, were admitted on trial in the traveling connection. At 
 the close of two years they were all three admitted into full 
 connection in the Conference, and ordained deacons. At the 
 session of the Virginia Conference in February, 1808, Eichard- 
 son Owen located. At the session of the Conference in Febru- 
 ary, 1809, William Owen and John Owen were ordained elders. 
 In Feb/uary, 1810, William Owen located, and in February, 
 1812, John Owen located. These men, local preachers, then 
 moved to Tuskaloosa, Alabama, and became members and local 
 preachers there as before detailed. The Eev. William Owen 
 died May 14, 1845. The Eev. John Owen married Ann K 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Worh 307 
 
 Sylvester, September 9, 1813. He carried, as has already been 
 stated, his mother-in-law, who by second marriage had become 
 Mrs. Frances Nemmo, with him to Tuskaloosa. She died m 
 great Christian peace in the town of Tuskaloosa, January 15, 
 1833, in the fifty-ninth year of her age, having been fourteen 
 years a member of the Church in Tuskaloosa. 
 
 The Eev. John Owen was at one time engaged in the practice 
 of medicine, but he gave to it less attention than to other pur- 
 suits. He was devoted to the cause of religion, and gave much 
 time and attention to the interests of the Church, preaching as 
 occasion offered. He tented at the Camp-meetings, which were 
 numerous in his day, and with great liberality extended hospi- 
 tality and entertainment to the multitudes attending such 
 meetings. He was a liberal contributor to the funds for build- 
 ing the house of worship for the Methodists in Tuskaloosa. 
 
 Judge Thomas Owen, his brother, was also a useful and de- 
 voted man in the Methodist Church. He was in Tuskaloosa as 
 early as the close of 1820, and a member of the Church there. 
 In 1831 he appears on the records as the Eecording Steward 
 for Tuskaloosa. Station, and as one of the Trustees of the Church, 
 and also a member of the Building Committee, which was ap- 
 pointed July 18, 1831. He died January 19, 1859, and was bur- 
 ied in the cemetery in the town of Tuskaloosa. A plain mar- 
 ble slab, with nothing on it but his name, marks the place where 
 repose his mortal remains. 
 
 The wives of the Owen brothers were members of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church in Tuskaloosa in the very first years of 
 Methodism in the place. Ann K. Owen, the wife of the Eev. 
 John Owen, was a member when she came to the place, and 
 continued a member there until her death. She died in Tuska- 
 loosa, June 30, 1865, in her sixty-ninth year. Thomas Owen 
 and Hopson Owen were brothers and married sisters. Thomas 
 Owen and Dolly Williams married in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, 
 Friday, May 20, 1823, and Hopson Owen and Agnes AVilliams 
 married in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, Tuesday, March 23, 1830. 
 Their wives were the daughters of the Honorable Marmaduke 
 Williams, a native of North Carolina, and a man of representa- 
 tive position and influence, once a member of Congress from his 
 native State. Dolly Owen, the wife of Thomas Owen, and Agues 
 Owen, the wife of Hopson Owen, had their names on the Church 
 
aaa HW gjLi - giysgai 
 
 308 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Eegister in Tiiskaloosa among the first, and for a long while. 
 Dolly Owen was born May 17, 1805, and died March 29, 1882, 
 and her sister, Agnes Owen, a little younger, died five or six 
 years after she did. They were members of great worth and 
 extensive influence. 
 
 In the beautiful spring time of 1819, while the Eev. John 
 Kesterson was making his faithful rounds on the extensive cir- 
 cuit of Tuskaloosa, the Eev. Eobert Lewis Kennon, a local eld- 
 er and an M.D., and who knew by experience what work on a 
 large circuit meant, reached, with his little family, and took up 
 abode at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, and became a member of the 
 infant Methodist Society at that place. He was an acquisition 
 to that Society. He was a sweet-spirited Christian, an attract- 
 ive man, and a great power for good. He engaged in the ad- 
 ministration of medicine and in the duties of a local preacher 
 at and about Tuskaloosa until the close of 1824. He was an 
 efficient local preacher during the years he remained in that 
 capacity. He will receive further consideration on a future 
 page. 
 
 In 1822, a man of family in the thirty-ninth year of his age, 
 and of a large frame, robust health, great physical endurance, 
 and indomitable energy, took up abode at Tuskaloosa, Alabama. 
 He was a native of Caswell County, North Carolina, and he en- 
 tered the nuptial bonds in Elbert County, Georgia, in 1811. 
 His native county, in the time of his youth, was noted for a 
 numerous tribe of the peculiar people called Methodists, and 
 the county in the State in which he assumed the marriage vows 
 was even then a stronghold of the Methodists, and he became 
 affiliated, by marriage, with a prominent Methodist family, Miss 
 Sarah Banks being his affianced. He was a member of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, strongly attached thereto, and 
 thoroughly devoted to the interests thereof. That man was 
 Edward Sims. Through life, and even till his death, which oc- 
 curred August 4, 1840, he was faithful to the cause of Metho- 
 dism. His wife was a member of the Methodist Society at Tus- 
 kaloosa from the time she became a citizen of that place in 1822 
 till her death. She survived her husband a number of years. 
 Her mother, Mrs. Eachel Banks, deposited with the Methodist 
 Society in Tuskaloosa a certificate of her membership, Septem- 
 ber 2, 1831, and was a member there for nearly or quite twenty 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 309 
 
 years. Edward Sims did much for Methodism in Tuskaloosa. 
 He was a public-spirited man. He had wealth, and he spent it 
 not only in the cultivation, entertainment, and enjoyment of re- 
 fined and cultured society, but he devoted his wealth to the 
 advancement of education and religion. By October 1, 1828, 
 he had erected, complete from foundation to dome, in an eligi- 
 ble part of the town of Tuskaloosa, a two-story brick building 
 with six rooms, some of them quite capacious, and turned it 
 over to a Board of Trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 for school purposes. It was called " The Sims Female Acad- 
 emy." That school was not popular with the masses, because 
 it was under the auspices of the Methodists, and the Methodists 
 were not numerous enough at that day to give it the patronage 
 which it needed and deserved, and the established success which 
 its friends desired for it. At that time Tuskaloosa had not 
 more than two or three thousand inhabitants in all, and then the 
 Methodists had not more than ten thousand white members in 
 the State of Alabama. Mr. Sims continued his liberal contri- 
 butions to the cause of education to the end of his earthly pil- 
 grimage. His advocacy of liberal education did much to form a 
 proper sentiment on the subject. He was one of the best friends 
 Tuskaloosa Methodism ever had. 
 
 At the close of an overland journey of forty-six days, on April 
 19, 1819, the Eev. Samuel M. Meek, M.D., a local deacon in the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, reached Tuskaloosa, Alabama. 
 For more than a quarter of a century he took a prominent part, 
 though, perhaps, not always the wisest part, in the affairs of 
 Methodism in Alabama. He was for a few years a member of 
 the South Carolina Conference, having been received on trial in 
 that Conference at its session at Columbia, December 22-28, 
 1810. For 1811 he was on the Apalachee Circuit, in Georgia; 
 for 1812 he was on the Milledgeville Station, in Georgia; for 
 1813, having been ordained a deacon, he was on the Charleston 
 Station, South Carolina, as one of three preachers. On May 
 19, 1813, he married Miss Anna Aradella McDowell. At the 
 session of the Conference at Fayetteville, North Carolina, Jan- 
 uary 12-19, 1814, he located, and went immediately to Columbia, 
 South Carolina, where he engaged in the practice of medicine 
 until he left for Tuskaloosa, Alabama. He was born in Lau- 
 rens District, South Carolina, August 20, 1786. His parents 
 
310 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 TJie Enlargement and Advancement of the Worl\ 311 
 
 were among the first Methodists where they lived. He attained 
 a Christian experience at an Annual Conference in his native 
 State. Having espoused the cause of the Keformers, so-called, 
 he withdrew from the Methodist Episcopal Church in Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, immediately after the adjournment of the Con- 
 vention which met November 12, 1828, and which drew up "Ar- 
 . tides of Association " for the "Associated Methodist Churches," 
 and he was present at, and was a member of, the first Annual 
 .Conference under the Conventional Articles, held, a short while 
 after his withdrawal from the Methodist Episcopal Church, at 
 Eocky Mount, Autauga County, Alabama. Thus it is seen that 
 he severed his connection with the Church of his fathers and of 
 his early manhood, and cast his lot with the Methodist Protes- 
 tant Cliurch. He was a champion of the cause which antago- 
 nized the Episcopal form of Church government. He died in 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, May 27, 1846, and was buried in the cem- 
 etery in that city. On his tombstone it is stated: "He was 
 for thirty-five years a minister of the gospel, and practiced what 
 he preached. Allured to brighter worlds and led the way." 
 He was a conscientious and benevolent Christian. Though 
 brusque in his manner, he was a man of tenderness and sympa- 
 thy. Energy and industry characterized him all through life. 
 His sun went down undimmed. He educated his children, and 
 his posterity honor him. His wife survived him a few years, 
 and died in Tuskaloosa, June 13, 1853. He was the father of 
 the distinguished AJexander B. Meek, and of Samuel M. Meek, 
 Esq., long a citizen of Columbus, Mississippi, and of Benjamin 
 Franklin Meek, A.M., LL.D., long one of the professors of the 
 University of Alabama, and long a superintendent of Methodist 
 Sunday-schools. 
 
 Mrs. Jane Sexton, who has been mentioned in another place, 
 and who was the daughter of Eandall P. West, and the mother- 
 in-law of the Eev. Thomas O. Summers, D.D., and who was born 
 two miles south of old Saint Stephens, on the Tombigbee Eiver, 
 April 15, 1805, was a member of the Methodist Society at Tus- 
 kaloosa as early as 1825, and continued a member there most of 
 the time from then till her death, March 6, 1861. Her daugh- 
 ter, Miss Virginia Sexton, a young lady who was much esteemed 
 by the Methodist Society in Tuskaloosa, and who was for a 
 number of years and at the time of her death, which occurred 
 
 I 
 
 March, 1848, a member of the Church there, was born in Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, September 30, 1825. 
 
 Alfred Battle and his wife, Millicent Battle, entered upon 
 membership in the Methodist Episcopal Church at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, in October, 1828. From that time till the end of life 
 they had their membership in the Church of their choice, and 
 nearly all the while in the town of Tuskaloosa. For many 
 years, indeed, until near the time of his death, Alfred Battle 
 was possessed of considerable wealth, and he generously con- 
 tributed his means in support of the institutions and enterprises 
 of the Church in which he held membership. He was a man of 
 piety, and as a layman he worked in all the departments of the 
 Church with diligence and efiiciency. He maintained the faith, 
 attained a good name, and his memory is sacred. Eeverses 
 came to him, and near the end of his life he lost everything he 
 had in the way of an estate. His valuable plantation had not 
 passed out of his hands at the time of his death, but it was un- 
 der liabilities to the full extent of its value. He died on his 
 plantation, eighteen or twenty miles south of Tuskaloosa, in 
 January, 1877. 
 
 As early as 1824 a young man and a young woman, who were 
 husband and wife, and who were destined to be prominent in 
 Methodist circles in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, during most of the 
 remainder of their earthly pilgrimage, took up permanent resi- 
 dence at that place. That man, then about twenty-three years 
 of age, was Henry W. Collier, and that woman was Mary Ann 
 Collier. They had married in North Carolina. That woman, 
 previous to marriage, was Miss Mary Ann Battle. She was the 
 sister of Alfred Battle, and she was the equal in excellence and 
 merit of her noble brother and her honored husband. In Au- 
 gust, 1829, Mary Ann Collier and in November following Henry 
 W. Collier joined the Methodist Episcopal Church at Tuska- 
 loosa, and from then till their earthly career ended they were 
 Methodists at that place, and through all that time they hon- 
 ored and served the Church while the Church honored and 
 blessed them. Henry W. Collier was born in 1801, in the south- 
 ern part of Virginia, not far from the line between that State 
 and the State of North Carolina. He had received a classical 
 education, and had passed a course of training in legal lore and 
 had been admitted to the legal profession before he became a 
 
312 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 citizen of Tuskaloosa, Alabama. In less than five years from 
 the time he became a citizen of Tuskaloosa he was one of the 
 Eepresentatives from Tuskaloosa County in the General Assem- 
 bly of Alabama, and before he was thirty years old he was 
 ^ elected to a judicial position, and by the time he was thirty-five 
 years old he had reached the Supreme Bench, and was soon 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama, and finally he 
 was, for four years, Governor of the State. He had a legal 
 mind, and was a master in legal science. He was a statesman, 
 a competent and a faithful public servant. As a judge he was 
 affable, patient, and dignified. His very presence and his de- 
 meanor gave assurance of a clear and a correct rendering and 
 exposition of law and of a just decision in the litigation pend- 
 ing. He was industrious in the prosecution of the work as- 
 signed him, and he was faithful in the administration of the 
 public trusts committed to his care, and his devotion to the State 
 did not surpass his devotion to the Church, and his services in 
 the management of civil affairs did not impair or limit his serv- 
 ices in the advancement of the divine cause. His religion was 
 thoroughly implanted and firmly established. His personal 
 character was beautiful ; in his heart he was devout, and in his 
 life and conduct he was considerate and upright. He was a 
 man of faith and of prayer. He maintained religious worship 
 in his house, and he led in the public services of the great con- 
 gregation when occasion required and opportunity offered. He 
 was a member of one of the classes organized by the preacher, 
 and he attended the Class-meetings regularly. He was one of 
 the most liberal contributors to the financial support of the 
 ministers of the gospel and the enterprises of the Church. 
 His name and contributions were on record in constituting 
 and setting forward the work of the benevolent Societies of the 
 Church. He dispensed a simple, generous, and elegant hospi- 
 tality. His house was the home of the wayfaring preachers of 
 the gospel. At the house of Henry W. Collier the preacher 
 who visited Tuskaloosa found a home and a welcome. He had 
 the honor, as he esteemed it, of entertaining Bishops Soule and 
 Capers, and Dr. Bascorab and other noted worthies of the 
 Church. His wife joined him in giving to all Methodist preach- 
 ers who passed that way a generous and Christian^hospitality. 
 His eminent abilities and his steady piety fitted him for and 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 313 
 
 made him a wise counselor in the affairs of the Church of his 
 choice. Ere he had reached old age he was called by the Mas- 
 ter to the Elysian beyond the river of death. He died August 
 28, 1855. 
 
 There was advent of no mean significance to Tuskaloosa, Ala- 
 bama, and to Methodism thereat in 1821. A man, then about 
 twenty-four years of age, who had been married about three years, 
 a man of handsome features, of well-proportioned limbs and 
 body, of cheerful spirits, of affable manners, of culture and in- 
 telligence, of high rank and of royal bearing, came to that place 
 at that time. He came from the State of Georgia, and his cho- 
 sen occupation was that of a merchant. Than that man, who 
 was none other than Benjamin B. Fontaine, there was not, in 
 all the ranks of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Tuskaloosa, 
 during all the years of his affiliation therewith, one truer to the 
 principles espoused, or purer in the life assumed, or more efli- 
 cient in the labors rendered. In 1831 his name appears on the 
 records of the Church as a Steward, a Trustee, and a member 
 of a Building Committee; and his name is the first in the list 
 of paying members belonging to a Tract Society which was or- 
 ganized February 23, 1831, and called the " Tuskaloosa Tract 
 Society, auxiliary to the Tract Society of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, New York." For a decade or more of years he 
 was the Sunday-school Superintendent of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church at Tuskaloosa. For the work of that position he 
 had special adaptation, and to it he was thoroughly consecrated. 
 The work which he did in the Sunday-school was marvelous 
 and lasting. He was possessed of a melodious voice, and it 
 was fascinating and enrapturing to hear him sing the songs of 
 Zion. He took great pleasure in Camp-meetings and in revival 
 occasions, and at such meetings he would sing and shout with 
 ecstacy, and in the very rapture of divine things he would slap 
 together his hands and make the greatest demonstrations of 
 his feelings. He died in Mobile in 1851. 
 
 Dennis Dent became a citizen of Tuskaloosa County, Ala- 
 bama, at an early day, and engaged in farming, and he grew 
 quite rich. According to the Church Register he and his wife, 
 Martha Dent, were received as members of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church in Tuskaloosa January 1, 1831, but the manner of 
 receiving them is not stated, and the indications are that they 
 
3U 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 were members before that date at some other Society in the 
 country, and on that day removed their membership to the town 
 of Tuskaloosa. In the Eegister for 1831 Dennis Dent is desig- 
 nated as a class leader, and his name is entered in the Eegister 
 July 18, 1831, the same day a Building Committee was appoint- 
 ed, as one of the Trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 in Tuskaloosa. He and his wife were members in Tuskaloosa 
 continually from January, 1831, if not earlier, till they moved 
 to Mobile, about 1850. He was in public life for many years. 
 He was a Colonel of Volunteers in the United States service in 
 the war with the Indians in Florida in 1836. He was a mem- 
 ber of the Senate of Alabama from the county of Tuskaloosa 
 from 1838 to 1850. In politics he was a "Whig and a popular 
 man. 
 
 Catharine Comegys, who came to Tuskaloosa at a very early 
 day, and who had her membership with the Methodists in that 
 place, died in the faith February 3, 1831. Edward F. Come- 
 gys, who was, perhaps, her son, became a citizen of the town of 
 Tuskaloosa among the very first settlers there, and his name ap- 
 pears on the Church Eegister for 1831, while a letter with his 
 name appears on record asking permission, as a probationer, to 
 withdraw from the Church; this is not understood, for his name 
 continues, and the record shows that on July 18, 1831, he was 
 appointed Trustee for the Methodist Episcopal Church in Tus- 
 kaloosa. He may have withdrawn the request after it was 
 granted and continued his membership. His name appeared 
 on the roll all along as a member of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church at Tuskaloosa until October 22, 1844, when he withdrew 
 his name, and for some reason, now unknown, joined the Prot- 
 estant Episcopal Church. Associations of long standing are 
 sometimes terminated for frivolous reasons. 
 
 George Curling was long a member of the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church at the town of Tuskaloosa. In 1831 he was one of 
 the Trustees of the Church, and a member of the Tract Society 
 organized at that place. His tombstone has the following in- 
 scription: 
 
 " George Curling, born in Charleston, South Carolina, August 
 5, 1785; died in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, April 15, 1860. For fifty 
 years he was a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 filling the offices of Steward and Class Leader.'* His wife; 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 315 
 
 Mrs. Ann Curling, became a member of the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church at Tuskaloosa at the same date that he did. She 
 continued a member there till her death. She was born in the 
 city of Charleston, South Carolina, February 11, 1790, and she 
 died in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in great peace March 1, 1847. 
 Eachel A. Curling, the daughter of George and Ann Curling, 
 and who became the wife of the Eev. James M. Wells, was born 
 in Tuskaloosa June 27, 1831, and joined the Church of her fa- 
 ther and mother October 26, 1838, when she was between seven 
 and eight years of age. Other daughters of these parents be- 
 came members there also. 
 
 At an early day, perhaps about 1822, Charles Drish and his 
 wife came to Tuskaloosa, Alabama, and were members of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church there for some years. Mrs. Drish, 
 according to the Eegister, died in faith October 4, 1835, and 
 Charles Drish, according to a private Journal of the olden time, 
 died August 14, 1837, at Blount Springs. The supposition is 
 that he went to the Springs in search of health, but found re- 
 lease from an earthly state. 
 
 Mrs. Maria Dyer, the wife of Otis Dyer, became an inhabitant 
 of Tuskaloosa, Alabama, by or before 1819, and at an early day 
 united with the Methodist Episcopal Church at that place, and 
 continued a member there until about the middle of the cen- 
 tury. She was one of the most pious, useful, and influential wom- 
 en in the city of oaks. She was one of the fairest and noblest in 
 the land. She was a zealous worker and an acknowledged leader 
 in the Methodist hosts. She led the clans and bore rule in the 
 courts of Zion, not by imperial authority, not by virtue of crest- 
 ed helmets, not by selected words of glowing complaisance, but 
 by her meekness and patience, by her wisdom and worth. She 
 laid gifts on the altar-, and served her generation. She was 
 plumed with the bright glories of her own godlike deeds. She 
 possessed inherent strength and goodness. Her heart glowed with 
 love, and her face was radiant with the outlines of virtue. She 
 had charms all her own. Her benevolence was unrestrained 
 and unlimited. She heard and responded to the importunate 
 call from the poor for relief, and, by her beneficence, by her un- 
 wasting alms, she hushed the clamor of the destitute. While 
 no one* chiseled her name in marble, while no one fixed her 
 •fame in monumental piles, while no one in verse or hymn or 
 solemn strain sang her praises, she was blessed many times by 
 
316 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the poor whom she relieved, by the sorrowing whom she con- 
 soled, and she lives in the radiance of the truth which she 
 maintained, and she shines in her own effulgence, and in the 
 undying glory of her own immortal deeds. She maintained 
 and advanced the spirituality of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 m Tuskaloosa, as well as aided its finances and material inter- 
 ests. She was the espirt de corps of that congregation. 
 
 Edward H. Moore was a member of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church at Tuskaloosa at an early day. He was licensed to 
 preach by the Quarterly Conference of the Tuskaloosa Station, 
 and was recommended by the same Quarterly Conference to 
 the Annual Conference as a suitable person to be admitted on 
 trial in the traveling connection, and he was received on trial 
 by the Alabama Conference at the session at which it was or- 
 ganized in Tuskaloosa, according to a private journal now in 
 hand, December 12, 1832. During the years he belonged to 
 the Annual Conference he filled good Circuits, and he located 
 at the session of the Alabama Conference at Tuskaloosa, Janu- 
 ary 1-8, 1840. 
 
 In 1827 William B. Neal was regenerated at a meeting in 
 Tuskaloosa County, Alabama, and joined the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church. In 1830 he moved to the town of Tuskaloosa, 
 and put in his membership there. In 1831 he was appointed 
 class leader. At the last Quarterly Conference for Tuskaloosa 
 Station for 1833 he was licensed to preach, and recommended 
 to the Annual Conference for admittance on trial in the travel- 
 ing connection, and at the session of the Conference at 
 Montgomery, December 11, 1833, he was admitted. He died, 
 a member of the Alabama Conference, at Auburn, Alabama, 
 January 5, 1889. 
 
 The Eev. Nathaniel H. Harris, a local deacon, became a citi- 
 zen of Tuskaloosa sometime before the middle of the year 1829, 
 and was a local deacon in the Methodist Episcopal Church in 
 that town from the time of his first coming until, at least, into 
 the year 1833. He was a classical scholar, and teaching was 
 his business while he was in Tuskaloosa. He preached on Sun- 
 days when he could get a Methodist congregation. He was the 
 Secretary of the Tract Society organized in Tuskaloosa, Feb- 
 ruary 23, 1831. He maintained a good name. He was highly 
 respected and sincerely loved. 
 
 The Rev. John W. S. Napier was also a local deacon in the 
 
 The Enlargement atid Advancement of the Work, 
 
 317 
 
 Methodist Episcopal Church at Tuskaloosa for some while. 
 He engaged in the occupation of teaching. He moved away 
 and carried his certificate of membership with him in the first 
 part of 1832. Mary J. Napier, his wife, was also a member of 
 the same Church, and carried her certificate with her when she 
 went. 
 
 The name of James Guild, M.D., was entered on the Church 
 Register, and he was accounted one of the members of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church at the beautiful town of Tus- 
 kaloosa; but in 1831 he claimed, in a written statement, to be 
 only a probationer, having, as he stated, never been admitted 
 into full membership; and he asked permission to withdraw all 
 connection with the Church, as he said, in writing over his own 
 signature, after a scrutinizing examination of his own heart, 
 and upon the belief that he was unworthy of being admitted or of 
 continuing in any Church, and deeming such a course beneficial 
 to him and possibly advantageous to the Church. The request 
 was granted, and his letter containing his statement and con- 
 veying his request was put upon record by the preacher in 
 charge who received it. In October, 1832, he joined again on 
 probation, and after the expiration of his term of probation, on 
 May 6, 1833, he was received into full membership, and hence- 
 forward, to the end of his earthly pilgrimage, he was a Meth- 
 odist. He died in Tuskaloosa, in 1886. He was a citizen of 
 Tuskaloosa about sixty-five years. Sometime after he estab- 
 lished bis home in the city since renowned for its numerous 
 and majestic oaks, he married Miss Mary Williams, the daugh- 
 ter of the Honorable Marmaduke Williams, and they made the 
 journey of life together, one preceding the other to " the undis- 
 covered country, from whose bourn no traveler returns " only a 
 few brief years. Mrs. Mary Guild joined the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church in Tuskaloosa, in September, 1831, and through 
 the years following she retained her membership. The chil- 
 dren of James and Mary Guild became members of the Church 
 to which they themselves belonged. Some of the children at- 
 tained professional eminence. Dr. James Guild was a patriotic 
 and popular citizen, a skillful physician, maintaining for long 
 years an extensive practice, a devoted Methodist, and a man 
 of kindness. He delighted in alleviating human suffering. He 
 made long journeys, performed difficult surgical operations, 
 
313 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 and for the service charged such small fees as indicated that 
 he was actuated simply by the desire to relieve suffering pa- 
 tients. 
 
 Miss Stella Houghton, who was born in Lynden, Vermont, 
 Dec<?mber 29, 1802, and w^ho was associated with the Kev. AVil- 
 bur Fisk who was for some years Principal of the Wesleyan Acad- 
 emy, at Wilbraham, Massachusetts, came to Tuskaloosd., Ala- 
 bama, and put her membership in the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church there, in 1830. In the journey of Miss Stella Houghton 
 from her native land to Tuskaloosa Capid, winged and armed, 
 adventured in the way and played a part in which he surpassed 
 his own romantic wonders of ancient times. It was on this 
 wise: A Board of Trustees contracted with Miss Houghton to 
 take charge of a Seminary of learning at that town, and in 
 obedience to and in furtherance of the objects of the contract 
 existing she came to Tuskaloosa. The journey from her home 
 in the far off north to Mobile was made by sea. The Board of 
 Trustees of the Academy at Tuskaloosa delegated one of their 
 number, Mr. David Scott, a confirmed bachelor, adjudged by 
 the number of years he had spent in that state, to proceed to 
 Mobile and to accompany from there to Tuskaloosa the lady " 
 who was coming to take charge of their school. Mr. Scott per- 
 formed the task assigned him. On a pleasant steamer the trip 
 was made. Miss Houghton took charge of the unpretentious 
 school by the Black Warrior Falls. But the sequel of that 
 journey from Mobile to Tuskaloosa is yet to tell. Between 
 David Scott and Stella Houghton there was attachment and 
 love at once, courtship immediately ensued, and before the year 
 was out they stood together devotees at the altar of Hymeneus, 
 and were bound with the nuptial chain. Henceforth they were 
 one, henceforth she was Mrs. Stella Scott, and henceforth that 
 name adorned the Church Kegister of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church at Tuskaloosa. She was one of the noblest of that noble 
 galaxy which worshiped God under the auspices of Methodism 
 in the lovely town of Tuskaloosa. She was a woman of great 
 personal worth, and of considerable literary attainments. She 
 was an intelligent, devout, and active Christian. With kind 
 words and kind deeds she consoled the sorrowing and the suf- 
 fering, and with liberal contributions she relieved the destitu- 
 tion of those about her, and with large contributions she fur- 
 
 TJie Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 
 
 319 
 
 thered the Kingdom of God. After serving her generation 
 well, she died at Tuskaloosa, in peace, April 25, 1844. Mr. 
 David Scott was born in South Carolina in 1792, moved to 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in 1822, and joined the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church in Tuskaloosa, in 1830, or about the time he was 
 married first. He married a second time. He amassed a good 
 fortune He died at Scottsville, in August, 1868. Mrs. Vaughn, 
 the wife of William Vaughn, LL.D., of the Vanderbilt Univer- 
 sity Mrs. McConnell, the wife of Col. J. W. McConnell, of Ala- 
 bama, Mrs. Jones, the wife of John A. Jones, and Mrs. Har- 
 grove, the wife of Bishop K. K. Hargrove, D.D., and others all, 
 are daughters of David and Stella Scott. These constitute a 
 large Methodist fraternity. 
 
 Two honored names, the names of John H. Vincent and Mary 
 Vincent, were entered on the Kegister of the Methodist Episco- 
 TDal Church at Tuskaloosa at an early day, possibly as early as 
 1822 They lived at Tuskaloosa in 1822, 1823, 1824, and in Mo- 
 bile in 1825, 1826, and 1827, and again in Tuskaloosa from at 
 least the latter part of 1830 till the latter part of 1837, when 
 they moved to Pennsylvania. John H. Vincent was born April 
 20 1798, and was brought up near Milton, Pennsylvania. He 
 was a descendant of the Huguenots. His great-great-grandfa- 
 ther Levi Vincent, was born in France, April 10, 1676, and was 
 about nine years old when the sentence of death by law on all 
 Huguenots in France was proclaimed, in 168d, by Louis XIV., 
 in the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which Henry IV. is- 
 sued in 1598, and he found a refuge from the cruel persecutions 
 and intolerant prosecutions against his sect in the Colony of 
 New Jersey, North America. The best i^^^^^^^^f^^^^^^ ^* 
 
 hand on the subject is that sometime from 1815 to 1817, when, 
 according to the date of his birth, he was but a lad, John H. 
 Vincent left his native Pennsylvania, and took up his abode in 
 what is now Alabama. Mary Baser was born m Philadelphia, 
 Pennsylvania, July 31, 1803. Her father Bernard ^^ser, by 
 occupation and position a Sea-captain, was born August 10, 1764, 
 and died in Batavia, West Indies, March 25, 1804, when she was 
 less than two years old. Her mother was born July 22, 17bo, 
 and died February 17, 1810, when she was less than seven years 
 old. Mary Baser passed under the dark shadow of orphanage. 
 She had two brothers who emigrated South, and engaged m 
 21 
 
320 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 business, one in Mobile and the other at Demopolis, Alabama. 
 She and John H. Yincent met at the home of one of her broth- 
 ers in Alabama, and the sequel of that meeting was love, court- 
 ship, and marriage. The record states that John H. Vincent 
 and Mary Raser were united in holy matrimony at Demopolis, 
 Alabama, September 6, 1821. Mr. Vincent had been brought 
 up a Presbyterian, and Miss Raser was brought up a Lutheran. 
 After their marriage they joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church in Tuskaloosa. The name of John H. Vincent stands 
 on the oldest Methodist Church Register for Tuskaloosa now 
 extant as a Steward, a Trustee, and a member of a Building 
 Committee. He filled at the same time these three important 
 ofiBces of the Church, and with his associates in office, managed 
 the financial afi'airs of the Methodists of Tuskaloosa, superin- 
 tended the construction of their house of worship, and held the 
 property in trust for the congregation. In the supervision of 
 the temporal affairs of the Church he was a valuable member, 
 and in Sunday-school work he was quite useful. In that work 
 he was versatile and skillful, full of tact, and a good talker. He 
 was an earnest, faithful Christian. His ideal model of Chris- 
 tian character was one of rare excellence. He estimated the 
 Christian ministry as of divine appointment, and questioned the 
 motives of the minister of the gospel who proposed to turn aside 
 from his holy calling to engage in secular pursuits, and predict- 
 ed for all so doing religious deterioration and financial ruin. 
 He maintained religion in his house. He had family prayers 
 twice a day, and carried his children with him to public service. 
 Among the intimate friends of John H. Vincent and Mary Vin- 
 cent in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, were the preachers who had 
 charge of the Station, and Henry W. Collier, Mary A. Collier, 
 Alfred Battle, Melicent Battle, James Guild, David Scott, and 
 Stella Scott. For many years after Mr. Vincent left Tuskaloosa 
 several of these friends corresponded with him and Mrs. Vin- 
 cent. Judging the character and standing of Mr. and Mrs. Vin- 
 cent by their associates, it is manifest that they were possessed 
 of social worth and personal merit. Taking his family with him, 
 he left Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in the latter part of 1837, and re- 
 turned to Northumberland County, Pennsylvania, and settled 
 near Milton, where he was brought up. He died in Erie, Penn- 
 sylvania, in August, 1873. Mary Vincent was a noble woman. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 321 
 
 Her price was above rubies. She was amiable, calm, cheerful, 
 conscientious, firm, kind, and patient. One who was with her 
 much said: " I never knew her to speak an uncharitable word ot 
 a living being." She was a loving wife, who brought honor to 
 her husband; and a model mother, who established her offspring 
 in righteousness. She was free from all affectation and hypoc- 
 risy. She was wise, devout, and pure. She was a consecrated 
 Christian, who prayed for the peace of Zion, and worked for the 
 prosperity of the Church of God. To recount her virtues and 
 portray her merits in full might provoke a charge of partiality, 
 and might, perhaps, be esteemed exaggeration, but she was, in- 
 deed, a saint. Her life was beautiful; her death was precious, 
 and attended with glory and triumph. Death, in her case, was 
 swallowed up in victory. She fell aslee:. in Chillisquaque, Nor- 
 thumberland County, Pennsylvania, February 16, 185A bome 
 of the children of John H. and Mary Vincent attained to emi- 
 nence in religion and to position in the Church of God. John 
 H Vincent, their son, and of whom the preachers stationed at 
 Tuskaloosa when he was a little boy were very fond, was born at 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, February 23, 1832. He ^^^ ^^^^^^^^^ ^ 
 exhort in 1849, and was licensed to preach in 18o0. He hliecl 
 various appointments in the Newark and Rock River Confer- 
 ences, and was prominent in many of the activities of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church, and then he attained to the Episcopal 
 office He was elected and consecrated a Bishop m the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church, in May, 1888. He is an active, enthusi- 
 astic, and attractive man, who does his work well, and who hon- 
 ors his high office and his great Church; and he is an honor to 
 his native town by the Black Warrior Falls in Alabama. Now, 
 1891 he still lives. The house of worship for the Methodists 
 of Tuskaloosa, which was planned by the last half of 1831, and 
 was finished by the first part of 1834, and which was construct- 
 ed under the supervision of John H. Vincent and his associates, 
 was repaired and improved in 1886 and 1887; and John H. Vin- 
 cent, the son, who was born in Tuskaloosa about the time the 
 house was in its incipiency, put in, when it was repaired and 
 improved, a neat and elegant memorial window, m honor of his 
 parents. That was a generous act of an affectionate son. Ihe 
 names and the memory of John H. and Mary Vincent will be 
 perpetuated in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, where they were first in- 
 
322 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 itiated into the Methodist Episcopal Church, as long as the 
 present house of worship remains. B. F. Vincent, another son, 
 was born in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in August, 1834 He is now, 
 1891, a preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church, in charge 
 of a congregation, under the auspices and the economy of 
 his Church, in Pueblo, Colorado. He has attained the degree 
 of D.D. . ^ 
 
 The first session of an Annual Conference ever held in Tus- 
 kaloosa, Alabama, was the session of the Mississippi Conference, 
 which commenced December 22, 1824, Bishop Joshua Soule pre- 
 sidmg. That was the first time Bishop Soule was ever in Ala- 
 bama. He was then in his forty-fourth year. He had been 
 consecrated to the Episcopal office the preceding May. He was 
 a man of extraordinary ability, and was a great preacher. In 
 person he was above medium height, erect, well proportioned, 
 and spare, his eyebrows were projecting and heavy, his eyes 
 were keen and penetrating, his face, as a whole, was striking 
 and expressive, his voice was strong, his presence was command- 
 ing, and while he was not wanting in the graces of humility and 
 meekness his general bearing was magisterial. He had the air 
 of a master, and the endowment and authority of a ruler. He 
 was one of the greatest ecclesiastical legislators American Meth- 
 odism ever had. His administration of affairs was vigorous, 
 and his preaching was profound and powerful. The sermon 
 preached by him at Tuskaloosa, on that Conference Sunday, 
 December 25, 1824, was such a masterly and comprehensive pres- 
 entation of doctrinal truth, and was delivered with such majes- 
 tic bearing, and with such power of utterance, and with such 
 unction of the Spirit that the large audience present and listen- 
 ing became oblivious of the surroundings, and arising from their 
 seats, they swayed to and fro, and gave expression to their en- 
 raptured feelings in audible sobs and in ringing shouts. He 
 visited Alabama and Tuskaloosa many times in the vears fol- 
 lowing that occasion. 
 
 On that Christmas day, and that Conference Sunday, a day 
 pre-eminently proper for the proclamation of the gospel, and for 
 the solemn service of inducting men into the sacred orders of 
 the Christian ministry, in the presence of the Methodist people 
 of Tuskaloosa, and others who assembled with them, William 
 Alexander, Marcus C. Henderson, Jonas Westerland,' William 
 
 Tlte Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 323 
 
 M. Curtis, Elijah B. McKay, and perhaps others, were ordained 
 deacons; and Samuel Patton, Henry P. Cook, Benjamin M. 
 Drake, and possibly others, were ordained elders. 
 
 William M. Curtis, here mentioned as ordained a deacon, and 
 who had just been admitted into full connection in the Confer- 
 ence, w^as at that time appointed for the next year in charge of 
 Tuskaloosa Station, then for the first time made a Station. He 
 was then a single man, in his twenty-seventh year. He was born 
 in Norway, New York, August 6, 1798, received a liberal educa- 
 tion, and grew up with good habits. At Cane Kidge Meeting 
 House, Jefferson County, Mississippi, where he was teaching, 
 he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church, November 16, 1821, 
 and soon after obtained remission of sins. In the early part of 
 the fall of 1822 he was licensed to preach, and at the session of 
 the Mississippi Conference, at John McKae's, Chickasawhay 
 Kiver, December 5, 1822, he was admitted on trial in the Con- 
 ference, and appointed to the Tuskaloosa Circuit, which then 
 had the town of Tuskaloosa in it as one of the appointments. 
 At the end of 1825, and the end of his work on the Tuskaloosa 
 Station, he located in order to visit his parents in the State of 
 New York, and to adjust some financial affairs. He returned to 
 the Mississippi Conference at the session at the end of 1826, 
 and continued a member thereof till the close of 1836, when 
 he again located, and was a local preacher in New Orleans from 
 1836 to 1850, and then a local preacher at Fayette, Mississippi, 
 till December, 1855, when he was again re-admitted to the 
 Mississippi Conference. He was a man of polished manners, 
 of deep piety, of rare qualities as a pastor, of superior ability as 
 a preacher, and of great usefulness to the Church. He was a 
 preacher of the Wesleyan type. He filled the first Stations in 
 the Conference in his day. He was a delegate to the General 
 Conference held in Philadelphia, May, 1832. He did a great 
 deal of acceptable ministerial work while he was a local preach- 
 er. He was acceptable and useful as a preacher to the close of 
 his life. He lived and died without a spot or blemish on his 
 moral character. He died in Canton, Mississippi, February 9, 
 1863, and was buried in Sharon. He crossed the line which di- 
 vides the visible from the invisible in peace and triumph. 
 
 In the list of appointments for 1826 is written: Tuskaloosa 
 town, Joshua Boucher. The Bevj^ Joshua Boucher was a man 
 
324 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alahama. 
 
 of more than ordinary ability, and it appears that at one time 
 he was entirely consecrated to the ministry, and was thoroughly 
 filled with the spirit of religion. He had great success in some 
 places. At the end of the year at Tuskaloosa, the end of 1826, 
 he located, and left the State of Alabama. He was a kinsman 
 of a preacher of the same name, who was a long while a member 
 of the Tennessee Conference, and who died at Athens, Alabama, 
 in 1845. This Joshua Boucher stationed at Tuskaloosa for 1826 
 was admitted on trial in the Tennessee Conference at the close 
 of 1818, and in two years was admitted into full connection, and 
 by the close of 1823 had been ordained deacon and elder. For 
 1822 he was in the Kentucky Conference, and at the close of 
 that year he transferred to the Mississippi Conference, and for 
 four years he served appointments in the State of Alabama. 
 Locating at the session of the Mississippi Conference at Tuska- 
 loosa in December, 1826, he was re-admitted to the traveling 
 connection in the Ohio Conference at the close of 1827. He did 
 some good work in the Ohio Conference. He' withdrew from 
 the connection in 1843. The last tidings which reached Ala- 
 bama concerning him and the last thing which the author of 
 these pages ever heard about him was that in 1876 he was in 
 the State of Missouri, in extreme age, being then more than 
 eighty years old, and had a wife, then, also, in extreme age, and 
 that he was in obscurity and in indigent circumstances, and 
 that he was appealing to the Masons for help, and that he 
 claimed, without having in his possession the evidence of the 
 fact, that he was initiated into the mysteries of Freemasonry in 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in the twenties. 
 
 Mentioning the case of one Joshua Boucher in obscurity and 
 poverty in the State of Missouri claiming to have been received 
 into a Masonic Lodge in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in the twenties, 
 calls up the fact that throughout the year 1826, the very year 
 the Rev. Joshua Boucher was in that place, there was in the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church in the town of Tuskaloosa, Ala- 
 bama, a fearful agitation, a bitter controversy, an unseemly 
 strife, on the subject of Freemasonry, especially on the sub- 
 ject of ministers of the gospel affiliating with that Fraternity, 
 in which the preacher in charge, the Rev. Joshua Boucher, and 
 the presiding elder, the Rev. Robert L. Kennon, were implica- 
 ted, and by which they were seriously hindered in their minis- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 325 
 
 terial work for the year, and the effect of which was exceedingly 
 damaging to Methodism in the place. During the year the 
 white members were reduced from sixty-eight to forty-eight, a 
 loss of nearly one-third the entire number. In that agitation 
 and controversy the Rev. Samuel M. Meek, then a local preach- 
 er at that place, took an active part. He was as strenuously 
 opposed to the initiation of preachers into the mysteries of Ma- 
 sonry and to their affiliating with that Fraternity as he was to 
 clothing the officers of the Church with episcopal prerogatives. 
 The controversy w*ds carried on in private circles, and by de- 
 bates in and addresses to assembled audiences, and by published 
 articles in the newspapers of the country. A faction, consist- 
 ing of a few members of the Methodist Episcopal Church at 
 Tuskaloosa, upon their own motion, and without any ecclesias- 
 tical authority, and in defiance of all authority, assembled and 
 adopted resolutions denouncing Masonry, and declaring that 
 they would not acknowledge as their minister any man who had 
 joined the Masons and continued to associate with them; and 
 that if the minister who might be sent to them by the Bishops 
 did not conform to their resolutions they would not receive him, 
 nor -feel themselves bound to give him quarterage, nor pay his 
 expenses, nor abide by his official acts. The resolutions adopt- 
 ed by that faction were inserted in the newspapers then pub- 
 lished at the town of Tuskaloosa, and they were copied by the 
 newspapers in different sections of the country, and they were 
 commented on in the usual style of the press, secular and re- 
 ligious. In some instances the comments and criticisms of the 
 press were in the spirit of opposition to Methodism. It was re- 
 ported as a fact that a presiding elder and a station preacher of 
 the Mississippi Conference, and, of course, the presiding elder 
 and the station preacher of Tuskaloosa were those intended in 
 the statement, had appeared in a procession of Masons in Ma- 
 sonic uniforms, and had listened to an oration, had partaken of 
 a feast, and had marched to the tune of "Yankee Doodle," all 
 of which was considered distasteful and disreputable. There 
 was, for the time, no allaying the storm. The issue was joined, 
 the 'contest was furious. The strife was suicidal, and the year 
 was worse than wasted. The membership, as already stated, was 
 reduced during the year, and nearly one-third the number was 
 lost. The question of ministerial affiliation with the Masonic 
 
326 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Fraternity agitated the Methodist Episcopal Church, at that pe- 
 riod, in other places beside Tuskaloosa. The following item is 
 found on record as a part of the proceedings of the South Car- 
 olina Conference in session at Charleston, South Carolina, Feb- 
 ruary 19, 1824: "Joshua N. Glenn and Noah Laney were called, 
 and it was stated by Brother A. Turner, that these brethren 
 have, during the previous year, joined the Masonic Fraternity, 
 which he thought exceptional, and after much having been said 
 on the subject the following Kesolution was submitted to the 
 Conference and carried by a large majority: ''Kesolved, that in 
 the opinion of this Conference the frequent immoralities which 
 occur among those who are called Freemasons, and the so usual 
 admission among them of persons who entertain no respect for 
 the Christian faith render it inexpedient and imprudent for any 
 of our preachers to unite themselves with that body.' The 
 cases of Brothers Glenn and Laney were laid over to afford an 
 opportunity for free conversation with them by such brethren 
 as may feel a wish to do so. After which Brother Laney arose 
 and made acknowledgment of his sorrow for having grieved the 
 hearts of his brethren by his conduct — and promised that he 
 would not attend Masonic Lodges unless necessarily required 
 so to do, his character then passed." The Eecord shows that 
 the next day "Glenn made some statements, and his character 
 passed." 
 
 While the strife on the subject of Masonry was going on at 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in which the Kev. Joshua Boucher and 
 others were involved, the Mississippi Conference held another 
 session at that place, and just two years after the first, and em- 
 bracing December 14-20, 1826. Bishop Joshua Soule and 
 Bishop Kobert K. Koberts were both present. William Win- 
 ans was Secretary. That was an auspicious event. It would 
 serve to arrest attention and allay strife. That was a grand 
 time in the town of Tuskaloosa. The General Assembly of Ala- 
 bama was in session for the first time in that place, having con- 
 vened there the 20th of the preceding month. Two noted bodies 
 convened at the same time in a small town, in that day, was enough 
 for public attention, and suflScient to create a sensation. On 
 Sunday, December 17, the deacons and elders were ordained. 
 Among the deacons ordained that day, and at that place, by Bish- 
 op Roberts, was Thomas Whitson, a local preacher, who lived fa 
 
 The Enlargement and Advaficement of the Work, 327 
 
 that section of Alabama or in the bounds of the Walker Mission, 
 and maintained a good reputation for many years. Eight travel- 
 ing preachers were ordained deacons, and two traveling preach- 
 ers were ordained elders. In addition to the business usually 
 before an Annual Conference there was presented a Report, 
 which was acted on, from the Board of Trustees of the " Eliza- 
 beth Female Academy," situate near the town of AYashington, 
 Mississippi, a school which was then presided over by Mrs. Caro- 
 line M. Thayer, and to which, as President, the Rev. John C. 
 Burrus was appointed for the next year. The Elizabeth Female 
 Academy was the first school ever put under the fostering care 
 of the Mississippi Conference. 
 
 A retjort was also presented to the Conference from the 
 "Mississippi Female Assistance Society," situate at AVashing- 
 ton, Mississippi. The object of that Society was to assist the 
 Mississippi Conference in supplying the deficiencies of the 
 preachers who did not receive in their respective Circuits and 
 Stations the amount allowed them by the Discipline of the 
 Church. There was received and distributed by the Confer- 
 ence, as the result of the first year's labor of that Society, three 
 hundred and twenty-five dollars. In answer to the address re- 
 ceived from the "Mississippi Female Assistance Society "an 
 elegant, appropriate, and appreciative response was written and 
 sent by the Conference to that Society. The document bears 
 date, Tuskaloosa, December 19, 1826. 
 
 The last act of the Conference session was to read the ap- 
 pointments for the next year, and for the place where the Con- 
 ference was assembled the Bishop read: Tuskaloosa town, 
 William Spruill At the end of the year 1827 the statistical 
 report showed ninety-three white and one hundred and fifty- 
 eight colored members, a very gratifying increase for one year. 
 There was held a Camp-meeting near town, beginning October 
 5, 1827, which, doubtless, gave accessions and contributed to 
 the increase. The Rev. William Spruill was returned to Tus- 
 kaloosa for the year 1828, but as stated elsewhere, it appears 
 that the Rev. Thomas E. Ledbetter served the Station for that 
 year. It seems that the health of the Rev. William Spruill 
 failed, and for that reason, possibly, Ledbetter was put in 
 charge of the Tuskaloosa Station. For the year the charge had 
 a net increase of twenty-six white and forty-two colored mem- 
 
328 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 329 
 
 bers. A Camp-meeting held near town, commencing October 
 16, 1828, doubtless contributed the most of that increase. At 
 the end of 1829 the Eev. William Spruill located. 
 
 The Mississippi Conference held its annual session again at 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, beginning Thursday, December 25, 1828. 
 Bishop Joshua Soule was present, and conducted the business 
 of the Conference. Notwithstanding the storm long presaged 
 by the state of the ecclesiastical atmosphere had commenced 
 and was raging furiously, and the work of disruption inaugu- 
 rated by the Keformers was progressing rapidly in some sec- 
 tions of the territory embraced in the Conference, and schism 
 was in the body, yet the business of the Church pertaining to 
 that session of the Conference went on, and the additions to the 
 ministry were encouraging. Fourteen were admitted on trial; 
 seven remained on trial; four were admitted into full connection; 
 six traveling preachers were ordained deacons, and seven travel- 
 ing preachers were ordained elders. 
 
 At that session one, the Eev. Peyton Smith Graves, was ex- 
 pelled from the connection. He was charged with falsehood 
 and fraud. He did not answer to the charges, but evaded a trial 
 by absenting himself, and by taking refuge at the shrine of the 
 Reformers, and allying himself with their cause, and attaching 
 himself to their organization. The Conference, however, pro- 
 ceeded with the investigation of the charges and expelled him 
 from the connection. The Eev. AVilliam M. Curtis was his ac- 
 cuser, and one P. Thomson, of New Orleans, Louisiana, partici- 
 pated in making the charges against him. Ever after his ex- 
 pulsion from the connection Mr. Graves had a special spite 
 against the Methodist Episcopal Church, and he showed a 
 special animosity to the Eev. William M. Curtis, to Mr. P. 
 Thomson, and to the Eev. Ebenezer Hearn. Some fifteen or 
 sixteen years after his trial at Tuskaloosa, and his expulsion 
 from the Methodist Episcopal Church he published some com- 
 munications reflecting on the character of the Eev. William M. 
 Curtis, and reflecting upon the character of P. Thomson, in 
 which he alluded to Curtis as his accuser, and to Thomson as in 
 league with Curtis in getting up one of the charges in 1828. 
 The pressure against Graves on account of the publications 
 damaging to the parties against whom they were fulminated was 
 so great that the Alabama Conference of the Methodist Protes- 
 
 tant Church, to which he then belonged, had, out of respect for 
 themselves, and for their own protection, to take cognizance of 
 his publications, investigate the statements they contained, and 
 call him to account for his conduct therein. The Conference 
 declared his publications " exceedingly inexcusable and highly 
 censurable," and that it was his duty to make full and imme- 
 diate restitution to the parties he had damaged in peace and 
 reputation, and that the restitution be made in as public a man- 
 ner as the offense had been committed: he had to write letters 
 to the parties concerned, and make confession of his wrong do- 
 ing and ask pardon. The letters he wrote were published, and 
 in that published form they are still extant. Their purpose 
 considered, said letters are rather curious productions, and while 
 they contain confession of wrong doing on his part, and while 
 they ask that pardon be granted him, they must have been very 
 offensive to the parties to whom they were addressed. In his 
 recklessness Mr. Graves published also some statements detri- 
 mental to the Eev. Ebenezer Hearn, for which and upon which 
 he was convicted of libel in the courts of Alabama. The rec- 
 ords of the courts contain statements of his conviction, and the 
 law books published in exposition of law make references to 
 the case of the State against Graves. At last, in 1848, having, 
 in the intervening time, been tried under charges and suspended 
 from the ministry, and then restored to the ministry, all done in 
 and by the Methodist Protestant Church, and under untoward 
 circumstances not a few, he, by permission, withdrew from the 
 Conference of the Methodist Protestant Church, the fact being 
 published. It is supposed the fact w^as published for informa- 
 tion to all concerned that the Methodist Protestant Church 
 might not be held longer responsible for him, and that she 
 might escape as far as possible the odium of his past misdeeds. 
 These monstrous irregularities, schisms, personal animosities, 
 and ecclesiastical strifes attaching to and associated with this 
 man Peyton S. Graves greatly scandalized Methodism in the 
 section where they occurred and in all the region where they 
 were known. In Autauga, Butler, Conecuh, Dallas, Lowndes, 
 and Wilcox Counties, the detriment to the general cause of 
 Methodism was very great. Who takes to his bosom and there- 
 in nourishes a viper will be stuug and damaged by that which 
 he feeds, protects, and caresses. The Methodist Protestant 
 
330 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Church which interposed her protection to Peyton Smith 
 Graves, a fugitive from ecclesiastical justice, and accepted in 
 her interest his championship in disrupting the Church from 
 whose judicial sentence he fled, paid at last the penalty of her 
 unwise course; she found, when it was too late to rid herself of 
 the stigma, that he was to her a moral upas whose influence was 
 exceedingly deleterious, and she had to get rid of him, if not in 
 mercy to him, at least in mercy and in justice to herself. Truth 
 will assert itself, and justice will, eventually, be vindicated. 
 The act of the Mississippi Conference of the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church in expelling Peyton S. Graves from the connection 
 has been thoroughly vindicated. 
 
 At that session of the Conference at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, 
 beginning Christmas day, 1828, there issued the twilight of a 
 new era. There and then was inaugurated the work of educa- 
 tion in Alabama by the Methodist Episcopal Church. There 
 and then "The Sims Female Acadamy" was reported to the 
 Conference by the Board of Trustees as completed and on the 
 threshold of its literary career. There and then the Confer- 
 ence, having received liberal otfers and encouraging guarantees 
 from persons residing at and around La Grange, Alabama, for 
 erecting and sustaining a Male College, and having before them 
 a proposition to unite with the Tennessee Annual Conference 
 in the enterprise, appointed commissioners to select and secure 
 a site, draft a Constitution, and appoint Trustees for said Col- 
 lege. In due course and in due process La Grange College was 
 in existence and in operation. 
 
 The Eev. Robert L. Kennon was the preacher in charge of Tus- 
 kaloosa Station for 1829 and 1830. Some one, not a member of 
 any Church, writing from Tuskaloosa, Alabama, August 17, 1829, 
 to the Christian Advocate and Journal and Zion's Herald, and en- 
 closing, to the Editors, Ten dollars as a donation to the " Pub- 
 lishing Fund," and signing himself a " Friend to Religion and 
 Methodism," gave his estimate of the numerical strength, finan- 
 cial ability, and the standard of benevolence of the Methodists 
 of Tuskaloosa. His estimate of the benevolence of the Meth- 
 odists of the place was not very flattering. He stated that there 
 was a Methodist Church at Tuskaloosa, having, according to his 
 information, seventy or eighty white members; that a number 
 of them were well able to contribute largely to the enterprises 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 331 
 
 established for the promotion of the interests of the Churcb; 
 that he had looked over the published list of contributors to the 
 " Publishing Fund" for the names of Methodists at Tuskaloosa, 
 and had looled in vain; and that he had two objects in view in 
 making his small contribution, first, to throw in his mite to the 
 holy cause, and, second, to arouse, if possible, the members of 
 the Methodist Church at Tuskaloosa from their lethargy, and 
 induce them, in the discharge of their bounden duty, to contrib- 
 ute of their means for the dissemination of religious knowledge 
 through the publications of the Church. 
 
 The Minutes of the Mississippi Conference furnished for pub- 
 lication at the close of 1830 were defective in that they did not 
 contain the numbers in Society at the close of that year. It is 
 manifest that there was not any increase in the membership at 
 Tuskaloosa for 1829 and 1830. The Society did not fully hold 
 its own during those two years. It was a time of great agita- 
 tion, and no doubt great wisdom and skill were required to con- 
 serve matters and maintain integrity. ^ ^ ^ 
 At the close of Dr. Kennon's term of two years, the Mississippi 
 Conference met again at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, Tuesday, Novem- 
 ber 24, 1830, and adjourned sine die, Friday, December 4, 1830, 
 havinc^ been in session eleven days. That was a long and per- 
 plexincr session. The situation had to be carefully reviewed, 
 and the interests of the hour called for wise adjustments of 
 affairs. An Agent was appointed for La Grange College. There 
 was no Bishop present, and consequently there were no ordi- 
 nation services. A large number of preachers were elected 
 deacons and elders, but none were ordained because no Bishop 
 was present to perform the service. That was the fourth ses- 
 sion of the Mississippi Conference which had been held at the 
 town of Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in six years. 
 
 The Rev Robert L. Walker was appointed in charge of the 
 Tuskaloosa Station for 1831 and 1832. In a letter written by 
 Mrs Mary Vincent to friends in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 
 and bearing date, Tuskaloosa, Alabama, June 12, 1832, are these 
 words: " Our town is improving rapidly, but Zion is languishing. 
 O for more true, heartfelt religion! Yesterday we had an ex- 
 cellent meeting. The house was crowded with a very serious 
 and attentive congregation. We feel the need of our pastor. I 
 think he is calculated to do much good here, though I am fearful 
 
332 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 we put too much dependence where we should not. I hope 
 Brother Walker has been much with you. It will be a great 
 gratification to hear from you by him." The Rev. Eobert L. 
 Walker, here mentioned by that godly woman, Mrs. Mary Yin- 
 cent, then one of the members of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 at Tuskaloosa, as " our pastor " was in Philadelphia through the 
 month of May, 1832, in attendance on the General Conference, 
 and he had not gotten back to Tuskaloosa, Alabama, when the 
 letter of Sister Vincent to friends in Philadelphia was written. 
 The General Conference session and the trip going to and re- 
 turning from it consumed about three months of the time of 
 the delegates who lived in Alabama. The latter part of 1832 
 was prosperous in the Tuskaloosa Station, and at the close of 
 the year Brother Walker reported the membership at one hun- 
 dred and ninety-five white and two hundred and twenty-nine 
 colored members. A Camp- meeting held below town October 
 18-25, 1832, resulted in forty-nine accessions to the membership 
 of white persons. The piety of the Church was deepened, her 
 spirituality and her membership increased in that day by Camp- 
 meetings. The members of the Methodist Episcopal Church at 
 Tuskaloosa may not have been very generous in contributing to 
 the "Publishing Fund" of the Church, but they did contribute 
 with a princely liberality to the support of Camp-meetings and 
 Annual Conferences. They held and maintained one or more 
 Camp-meetings every year, and entertained an Annual Confer- 
 ence every two years for eight or ten years in succession. They 
 certainly did a generous part on that behalf. Their hospitality 
 abounded. Has any other place in Alabama ever equaled Tus- 
 kaloosa in taking care of Annual Conferences? In Christian 
 hospitality Tuskaloosa is not excelled. 
 
 The history of Tuskaloosa Methodism would be incomplete 
 were no account taken of the membership of Africans at that 
 place. Through all that period of eight years of the Tuska- 
 loosa Station now passing in review tlie roll of colored members 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church was longer than the roll of 
 white members. The white members numbered sixty-eight at 
 the beginning of the period and one hundred and ninety-five at 
 the close of the period. The colored members numbered sev- 
 enty-one at the beginning of the period and two hundred and 
 twenty-nine at the close. The white and colored members were 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 333 
 
 under the same ministry. He who preached to the one preached 
 to the other; he who a-dministered the ecclesiastical affairs of 
 the one administered the ecclesiastical affairs of the other. The 
 two classes, the white and the colored, met for religious service 
 at different hours, but they were under the care of the same 
 preacher. The great body of the colored members were the 
 slaves of the white members of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 On the Register for 1831 are found the names of the preachers, 
 exhorters, and class leaders. York Fontaine, Robin Smith, 
 Peter Banks, and Webster Banks are named as local preachers; 
 Jack Bearing is named as an exhorter; David Collier and Jack 
 Guild are named as class leaders. The Register shows a larger 
 number of coloi'ed than of white members expelled. There 
 were at least two reasons why more were expelled among the 
 colored than among the white members. The Discipline could 
 be administered with less friction with the colored than with 
 the white members. It was not as difficult to arraign a colored 
 member for immorality as it was to arraign a white member. 
 The colored members did not have as keen perception, and 
 as clear an apprehension of the enormity of offenses as the 
 white citizens, and hence a greater number of them violated 
 their vows and committed crimes. The colored members did 
 not have as great facilities for concealing their sins as the white 
 members, hence more of them were caught. The crimes for 
 which the colored members were expelled^ are given in the 
 Record, and are named immorality, intemperance, uncleanness, 
 fighting, stealing, lying. Many of them were moral, honest, and 
 temperate, true and truthful, pure and pious. Some of them 
 are reported in the Register as having died in peace and in faith. 
 Many of them upon dying were translated to the home of the 
 pure and the good. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The Enlakgement and Advancement of the Wobk of 
 
 Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THE Mareugo Circuit first appeared for the year 1826. The 
 name of the Circuit indicated the center of the Territory 
 which it was to occupy. It was to embrace Marengo County, 
 Alabama, and the points which touched thereabout. The Cir- 
 cuit included a part of Wilcox County, and at certain points, 
 for a time, went into Clarke, Greene, Perry, and Sumter. Lines 
 in that day were not well established, and in the work of the 
 Church boundaries were indefinite. Previous to the organiza- 
 tion of the Marengo Circuit the Territory which it was to em- 
 brace had been touched on its various sides and penetrated by 
 the Tombecbee, Cahawba, Tuskaloosa, and Cedar Creek Cir- 
 cuits. These four Circuits here named touched each other, so 
 far as they touched, in the Territory set oft* in December, 1825, 
 to the Marengo Circuit. 
 
 The first preacher appointed to the Marengo Circuit was the 
 Rev. John Collier. He was born in Virginia, in 1800, and at 
 the age of eighteen years he joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church; afterwai*& he was licensed to preach, and, December 
 25, 1823, he was received on trial in the Mississippi Conference; 
 at the close of 1825 he was admitted into full connection in the 
 Conference and ordained a deacon; at the session of the Confer- 
 ence in December, 1826, he located, so the Marengo Circuit 
 was the last appointment he filled in connection with the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church. He spent a year or two, after locat- 
 ing, in sympathy with the Reformers, or the "Associated Meth- 
 odist Churches," and finally, not later than May, 1829, he 
 repudiated his ordination, his baptism, and his Methodism, and 
 declared his acceptance of immersion for baptism, and received 
 ordination at the hands of the successors of Ezekiel Holliman and 
 Roger Williams. He lived in jVlarengo County, and preached 
 the doctrine that immersion in water is a Christian ordinance, 
 and necessary to the existence of a Christian Church. This he 
 (334) 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 335 
 
 did under the auspices of the Baptist Church. He and the 
 Rev. Thomas S. Abernathy, Sen., married sisters. 
 
 For a long while there were but few, if any, houses of wor- 
 ship in Marengo County, Alabama. The public services were 
 held by the Methodists in private residences, in School -houses, 
 under trees and awnings made of brush. At the county seat 
 after it was established the Methodists worshiped in the Court- 
 house. In 1819, Nathan Hawkins, who was born in 1786, on 
 Holston River, in East Tennessee, and who united with the 
 Methodists in Christian County, Kentucky, and who had lived a 
 few months near Erie, Greene County, Alabama, moved to 
 Marengo County, Alabama, and settled near a place which bore 
 the euphonious name of Screamersville, and not more than a 
 section line or two from where Linden was finally located. In 
 the house of this man, Nathan Hawkins, the Methodist preach- 
 ers held public worship and proclaimed the word of life. At 
 his house, in 1823, before the Marengo Circuit was formed, the 
 Rev. Henry P. Cook, then the preacher on the Tombecbee Cir- 
 cuit, had an appointment once a month, though, of course, the 
 appointment was not met with much regularity. 
 
 By an act of the General Assembly of Alabama, passed De- 
 cember 6, 1820, Commissioners were appointed to select a site. 
 for the permanent seat of justice for the County of Marengo j; 
 and said Commissioners having finally selected said site, the- 
 General Assembly of Alabama, by an act approved December- 
 17, 1823, appointed Commissioners to survey, lay off, and selll 
 lots at the site selected and named Linden; and to contract for,, 
 and cause the public buildings for the County of Marengo to be- 
 erected. A year later, by legislative enactment, a special tax: 
 was provided for to defray the expenses of erecting said public: 
 buildings; and in due course the buildings were completed. 
 Previous to the erection of the permanent public buildings in 
 the town of Linden a pine pole Court-house served the County. 
 Public services were held by the Methodist preachers in the 
 pine pole Court-house. From the earliest times the Methodists 
 have worked at Linden, and thereabout, but religion has never 
 flourished much there. In September, 1829, the Rev. William 
 riuker, the pastor of the Baptist Church at Linden, was con- 
 victed of adultery and excluded from the Church. He had for 
 several terms represented the County in the Legislature. The 
 22 
 
336 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 downfall of that preacher of the gospel brought scandal on the 
 Church and great harm to religion. The Christian cause has not 
 recovered from that damage to this day. The perpetration of sin, 
 especially the sin of adultery, by a preacher of any denomina- 
 tion of Christians scandalizes religion and emboldens infidelity. 
 
 At an early day a Methodist Society was organized in a School- 
 house about one mile from the present Old Spring Hill. By 
 that Society a Meeting House was built of hewed logs, proba- 
 bly about 1827, and the place was called Mount Zion. That 
 Society was composed at the first of intelligent, thrifty, and 
 liberal citizens. Daniel Curtis, Thomas K. Curtis, and several 
 members of the Curtis families, and Jane Lucy and her daugh- 
 ters were members at Mount Zion in the time of the building 
 of the first Meeting House there. Enoch James, a local preach- 
 er, and John Tagart, a local preacher, were members there at an 
 early day, and at a little later date John and Jake McCarty and 
 their families, and the families of Kaif Grayson, Martin Wil- 
 son, and James Eenfroe were added to that Society. William 
 McAlister and John Boyd were there in the early days. Later 
 still came others who were most devoted Methodists, and whose 
 liberal views, generous acts, and magnanimous support of the 
 institutions of the Church contributed much to the elevation of 
 religion and the perpetuation of the influence of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church in that section of Alabama. Daniel Curtis 
 was the class leader at Mount Zion at an early day, and a good 
 class leader has ever contributed much to the spirituality of a 
 Society. 
 
 At various points in the territory of the Marengo Circuit 
 Societies were organized as communities formed and oppor- 
 tunity offered. Camp-meetings commenced in that section of 
 the State at an early day. A Camp-ground was established at 
 Mount Zion in 1828, or in 1829, and Camp-meetings were held 
 there annually for many years, and they were attended with 
 great religious power and achieved grand results. 
 
 The preacher for Marengo Circuit for 1827 was the Kev. 
 John Griffing Jones. That was his first and last work in Ala- 
 bama. He did a good work and made a lasting impression on 
 that Circuit. He was born in Jefferson County, Mississippi 
 Territory, August 23, 1804 Just after he had passed seven- 
 teen summers he was, as a seeker of religion, admitted into the 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 337 
 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, and in three or four months 
 thereafter he was pardoned of guilt and filled with love impart- 
 ed by the Holy Ghost; as the days passed peace gave place to 
 doubts, and then doubts subsided and assurance ensued; and 
 subsequently, though in the same year, he attained a pure 
 heart. By a District Conference at Bethel Camp-ground, in 
 Wilkinson County, Mississippi, October 9, 1824, he was licensed 
 to preach, and was recommended to the Annual Conference for 
 admission on trial. At the session of the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, December 24, 1824, his recom- 
 mendation was presented and he was admitted. At the session 
 of the Conference at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, beginning Decem- 
 ber 14, 1826, he was admitted into full connection, and on Sun- 
 day, December 17, he was ordained a deacon by Bishop Robert 
 B. Roberts; and at the session of the Conference at Tuskaloosa, 
 on Sunday, December 28, 1828, in the presence of the Confer- 
 ence and the congregation. Bishop Joshua Soule ordained him 
 an elder. He was a delegate to a number of the General Confer- 
 ences of his Church. He read, studied, and wrote much. He 
 knew the Scriptures thoroughly. He was a man of prayer and 
 of piety. He wrote a History of Methodism in the Mississippi 
 Conference which is a very valuable work, and well written. 
 He deserves a monument for that work, and it is a monument 
 itself. He continued a member of the Mississippi Conference 
 till the close of his earthly pilgrimage. On October 1, 1888, he 
 left these earthly shores and entered into the mansions on 
 high. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas S. Abernathy and the Rev. John A. Cot- 
 ton were the preachers on the Marengo Circuit in 1828. That 
 year there was a revival in that Circuit such as had not been 
 in that country before, and over one hundred were added to the 
 Society; and Preston Cooper, a young man of neatness and of 
 industry, was licensed to preach and recommended from that 
 Circuit as a suitable person to be admitted on trial in the trav- 
 eling connection, and at the session of the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, December 25, 1828, he was ad- 
 mitted on trial. 
 
 Hugh McPhail and John Bilbo were the preachers on the 
 Marengo Circuit for 1829. That was the first and the last year 
 of itinerant work by these two men in Alabama. They had for 
 
338 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 339 
 
 the year on the Circuit a moderate increase of white members 
 and a considerable decrease in colored members. The Eev. 
 Hugh McPhail had been living as a local preacher in the sec- 
 tion of Alabama embraced in the Marengo Circuit for a num- 
 ber of years, and he had just been re-admitted to the traveling 
 connection by the Mississippi Conference when he was ap- 
 pointed in charge of the Marengo Circuit At the end of the 
 year he located again, and lived in the bounds of the Marengo 
 Circuit, or in the surrounding region thereof for a long while, 
 exercising as a local preacher, and administering medicine for 
 a livelihood, and finally he removed to Mississippi, in which 
 State he died. In December, 1811, he was admitted on trial in 
 the South Carolina Conference, and in due course as provided 
 in the Discipline he was admitted into full connection, and or- 
 dained deacon and elder. For the years 1816 and 1817 he was 
 a member of the Tennessee Conference, and at the session of 
 that Conference beginning October 30, 1817, he located, and 
 then moved to Alabama. He was a good man and a good 
 preacher, but he was too anxious about pecuniary interests to 
 continue in the itinerant work long at a time. 
 
 For 1830 the Marengo Circuit was served by the Kev. Daniel 
 D. Brewer and the Kev. Joseph P. Sueed. They were good 
 men and true, but at that time they were without much expe- 
 rience and without great attainments, and it is not to be sup- 
 posed that they succeeded on the Circuit in anything beyond 
 ordinary achievements. The Kev. Joseph P. Sneed had just 
 been admitted on trial in the Mississippi Conference, and that 
 was his first Circuit. He made a faithful and successful 
 preacher. He was an itinerant preacher from the time he en- 
 tered the Mississippi Conference on trial December 17, 1829, 
 till he died, November 21, 1881, except from the first of 1846 
 till the last of 1855, during which time he was a local preacher. 
 He preached in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and 
 Texas. In the prosecution of the work of the ministry he en- 
 counted dangers, endured hardships, and suffered privations, 
 but to encounter, endure, and suffer he esteemed a privilege. 
 Dismal swamps with hooting owls, hissing adders, prowling 
 beasts of prey, and deathful miasma, and boundless prairies 
 with unbroken solitude never daunted his courage, nor damp- 
 ened his zeal, nor arrested his going. He moved grandly on in 
 
 his great mission in bearing a message of redemption and sal- 
 vation to the wandering and the lost. For more than a quarter 
 of a century he possessed in his own personal experience and 
 enjoyed in his own life the blessing of entire sanctification. 
 He died, at the date already mentioned, in Milam County, 
 Texas, and was buried at Port Sullivan. 
 
 The preachers on the Marengo Circuit for 1831 were Eugene 
 V. Le Vert and Ewell Petty; and for 1832 Daniel Monaghan 
 and Hazlewood B. Parish. 
 
 At Tuscumbia, the town by the Big Spring five or six miles 
 from the lower end of Muscle Shoals, subscription to a fund was 
 secured, in 1826, to build, at that place, a Meeting-house for the 
 use of the Methodists; and in September, 1827, the gratifying an- 
 nouncement was made that the Meeting-house provided by the 
 subscribed fund, a building sixty by thirty-six feet and contain- 
 ing a spacious gallery, had been erected and was complete from 
 foundation to roof. In July, just two or three months before 
 the announcement of the completion of the Meeting-house was 
 made, a few women organized themselves in a band to fast and 
 pray for a revival, and while the godly women were fasting and 
 praying a revival work deep in its nature and extending over 
 that section of the Tennessee Valley went on, and at the altar 
 of the Methodist congregation at Tuscumbia gathered large 
 numbers of mourners, many of whom were justified and re- 
 ceived into the Society under the provisions of the Discipline, 
 and while joy filled the hearts of the worshipers, songs of praise 
 and shouts of victory were heard in the assembly of the saints. 
 
 Under these circumstances, the house of worship just com- 
 pleted, and true piety and a genuine revival prevailing, the 
 Tennessee Conference held its session at Tuscumbia, beginning 
 November 22, 1827. Unusual love, harmony, and peace pre- 
 vailed at that session of the Annual Conference. The Confer- 
 ence Sunday was a great day, notwithstanding it was a cloudy, 
 cold, and rainy day; twelve deacons and seven elders were or- 
 dained. Bishop Joshua Soule presided over the deliberations 
 of the Conference. On Sunday he delivered a grand sermon, 
 lifting up an ensign upon the land, and showing the people the 
 way wherein they might walk, and the thing which they might 
 do. Less than two months before that, on the third day of Oc- 
 tober of that year, the degree of Doctor of Divinity had been 
 
340 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 conferred on him by the University of Nashville. At that ses- 
 sion of the Conference Tuscumbia was made a Station, and the 
 Bev. Francis A. Owen appointed to serve it for 1828, and he was 
 returned there for 1829. 
 
 The salvation of the Lord was seen in Tuscumbia during 1828. 
 At a Quarterly Meeting held there July 25, of that year, a num- 
 ber were received into the fellowship of the Church, and during 
 the following months an unusual work of reformation and of 
 grace, such, it was thought, as never before was witnessed in 
 that place, progressed without abatement, and a large number 
 were added to the Society. 
 
 In June, 1828, the Tuscumbia Sunday School Union, auxiliary 
 to the Sunday School Union of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 was organized, and Managers were appointed, consisting of the 
 following persons: Dr. George Morris, John Southerland, Jr., 
 William Manifee, Thomas AVooldridge, D. S. Goodloe, Sen., and 
 B. Merrill. There were connected with this Sunday-school, 
 when first organized, one Superintendent, six male and six fe- 
 male teachers, and seventy-eight scholars. Only two of the 
 teachers were professors of religion when first they connected 
 themselves with the work of the school. In September, 1829, 
 when it had been in operation about eighteen months, the school 
 had increased in the number of pupils, and was, under the divine 
 blessing, in a prosperous condition. Up to that date thirty- 
 seven of the scholars had made a profession of religion, and 
 had, after their justification, generally evinced that stability and 
 firmness in the Christian cause creditable to those of maturer 
 years; and the ten teachers, who when they entered the school 
 were without faith and without renewing grace, had obtained 
 the grace of regeneration, and were triumphant in Christian ex- 
 perience. 
 
 The preacher for Tuscumbia Station for 1830 was the Rev. 
 Robert Paine. He was also Superintendent of La Grange Col- 
 lege. He served the two together, though they were about ten 
 miles apart. 
 
 For 1831 the Rev. Ambrose F. Driskill was at Tuscumbia, 
 and for 1832 the Rev. Pleasant B. Robinson was stationed at 
 Tuscumbia. 
 
 It is a fact not without its significance that from the close of 
 the first year as a Station to the close of 1831 Tuscumbia had 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 341 
 
 an annual and continued decline in its membership both white 
 and colored. At the close of 1828 there were reported at Tus- 
 cumbia one hundred and fifty-six white and ninety-four colored 
 members; at the close of 1831 there were seventy-two white and 
 thirty-seven colored members. During the year 1832 there was 
 a gain of nine white and three colored members. After five 
 years' work there were not half as many members at the town of 
 Tuscumbia as there were at the end of one year. 
 
 There was a Paint Rock Circuit on the river of that name, 
 which continued for three years beginning with 1824; there was a 
 Saint Clair Circuit in the county of that name for 1826 and 1827; 
 the town of Claiborne, in Monroe County, Alabama, was a Station 
 for 1827, and then again for 1830; the Oakmulgee Circuit first 
 appeared for 1829; the Prairie Circuit first appeared for 1830. 
 None of these appointments has had separate notice, but as they 
 were all in the bounds of territory which has passed in review 
 in connection with other Circuits, and as they all were only 
 temporary, except the last two named, it is not necessary to give 
 them special consideration. 
 
 Florence, on the Tennessee River, was first made a Station for 
 1829, with the Rev. William P. Kendrick as preacher. Accord- 
 ing to the best testimony accessible, a Society of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church was organized at that place in 1822, and of the 
 following persons: John Cox, a local preacher, Mrs. Frances 
 Cox, Miss Mary Cox, Thomas L. Cox, James Cox, Dr. Shadrach 
 Nye, John Kerr, and Joseph Paddleford. After that Society 
 was organized, and the same year, Thomas Farmer and Eliza- 
 beth Farmer, husband and wife, and Jacob Ellinger, a local 
 preacher, moved to Florence, and being Methodists before they 
 came, they united with the Society there. Farmer was a shoe- 
 maker, and Ellinger, in addition to being a local preacher^ was 
 a silversmith. A large room of a log house, the residence of 
 John Cox, and the front room of the residence of Thomas Far- 
 mer, which was used as a shoe-shop, served, as occasion required, 
 as a place of meeting to hear preaching and to hold class-meet- 
 in o-s. These rooms were used for divine worship by the Meth- 
 odists till a Church was built in 1826. The first Church built 
 there was on what was then the west side of the town, and in 
 size was about thirty by twenty-four feet. That house was aft- 
 erward moved to where the Methodist Church now, 1891, stands. 
 
342 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 For 1823 a new Circuit was put in the list of appointments, 
 and named Florence, and Nathaniel E. Jarratt, the son of a 
 Methodist preacher, and then about twenty-two years old, was 
 the preacher on that new Circuit. He located, an act which, 
 after it was too late to undo, he regretted. He died in the State 
 of Mississippi, in the first month of 1862. At the end of one year 
 the name of the new Circuit was changed from that of Florence 
 to Cypress. Henceforth till it was made a Station, Florence was 
 in the Cypress Circuit; and for 1824, the preachers for that place 
 and that Circuit were George W. Morris, and James W. Allen; 
 for 1825, Thomas Madden; for 1826, Jeremiah Jackson, and 
 Francis A. Jarratt; for 1827, Elias Tidwell and William M. Hol- 
 liman; for 1828, William M. Holliman and John W. Jones. 
 During 1828 a grand revival swept through the Cypress Circuit. 
 In August of that year a Camp-meeting was held near Florence, 
 by the Methodists, at which upward of one hundred persons 
 were brought to a knowledge of the pardoning love of Christ; 
 and immediately after that meeting a gracious revival took place 
 at the town of Florence, in which fifty-five members were added 
 to the Methodist Episcopal Church at that place, while a goodly 
 number were added to the Presbyterian Church there. Other 
 Camp-meetings were held in the bounds of the Cypress Circuit, 
 and that year there were between two and three hundred mem- 
 bers added to the Methodist Episcopal Church in that Circuit. 
 That grand revival and large increase in the membership at 
 Florence induced that place to attempt to proitide for a preacher 
 all their own, and at the end of the Conference year Florence 
 was made a Station and the Cypress Circuit, for the time being, 
 went on without it. The Cypress Circuit for the series of years 
 beginning with its organization at the close of 1822 to the close 
 of 1828 had a steady growth in membership. At the end of the 
 first year of its existence there were reported in its bounds one 
 hundred and seventy-seven white and thirty-one colored mem- 
 bers, and at the close of 1828 the number was five hundred and 
 ninety-eight white and seventy-six colored members. At that 
 period the revival culminated, and for the next four years, or 
 from that time till the close of 1832 the Circuit did not more 
 than hold its own in numbers. The Cypress Circuit was named 
 for a large creek of that name which forms a junction with the 
 Tennessee Kiver not far from the town of Florence. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 343 
 
 H 
 
 John Cox, the local preacher, and the leading man in that 
 first Society at Florence, was born at Portsmouth, England, and 
 was inducted into Methodism and licensed a local preacher un- 
 der the administration of the Wesleyan Methodists. It is not 
 known exactly when he came to America. He was in Marshall 
 County, Kentucky, as early as 1808, and lived in Nashville, 
 Tennessee, in the first part of 1821, and from there he moved to 
 Florence, Alabama. He was, in addition to being a local 
 preacher, the class leader of that first Society in Florence, 
 and he was well qualified for and admirably adapted to the du- 
 ties of that office. He knew the Scriptures, and was pious and 
 zealous. His class-meetings were profitable and edifying. He 
 was a tower of strength. Mrs. Frances Cox was the wife of 
 John Cox, the local preacher, and the mother of Miss Mary 
 Cox, Thomas L. Cox, and James Cox. She was born in England, 
 and was the daughter of the Kev. Thomas Longley, who was one 
 of the preachers and expounders of God's Holy Word, under 
 the care and in connection with John Wesley, and who was 
 named by Mr. Wesley in his Deed of Declaration made and 
 signed February 28, 1784. She was prompt and punctual in at- 
 tendance upon the services of the Church, and was a woman of 
 beautiful Christian character, amiable, humble, pious, and 
 pure. Miss Mary Cox demonstrated her faith, and attested her 
 fidelity by searching out the poor and caring for them, and by 
 visiting and nursing the sick. By marriage she became Mrs. 
 George, and she last lived in Selma, Alabama. She departed 
 hence^to heaven, whither, by her alms and prayers, her memo- 
 rial had preceded her. Thomas L. Cox was about thirteen years 
 old when that Society at Florence was organized. He joined 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church in Nashville, Tennessee, about 
 one year before he became a member of that Society at Flor- 
 ence. In 1833 he was licensed to preach, and in November of 
 that year he was received on trial in the Tennessee Conference, 
 and immediately transferred to the Alabama Conference, and 
 for 1834 he was on the Buttahatchee Circuit; for 1835 he was on 
 Centerville Circuit, these two appointments being in the State 
 of Alabama. At the session of the Alabama Conference at Tus- 
 kaloosa, beginning December 16, 1835, he was received into full 
 connection, and on the Conference Sunday he was ordained a 
 deacon, and at the close of the session of the Conference he was 
 
344 
 
 Historif of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 assigned to the Chickasawhay Circuit, but his work was done. 
 On January 18, 1836, a hemorrhage brought him to the gates of 
 death, and he soon passed through the gates in grand triumph. 
 He died in Mobile, Alabama. 
 
 John Kerr, one of the eight who constituted that first Meth- 
 odist Society at Florence, Alabama, was a native of Ireland. 
 He came to America in 1817, and in the very year the Society 
 at Florence was organized he was recommended, as by Disci- 
 pline provided, as a suitable person for the traveling connection, 
 and in pursuance thereof at the session of the Tennessee Con- 
 ference at Ebenezer, Green County, near Greenville, East Ten- 
 nessee, in October, 1822, he was admitted on trial, and trans- 
 ferred in that relation to the Virginia Conference, in the bounds 
 of which he spent his days and found his grave. He attained 
 to the full offices of the ministry, and did successful work for 
 many long years. He was a quiet, modest, and retiring man, 
 who never sought earthly preferments. He continued a mem- 
 ber of the Conference till his translation to the paradise on 
 high. He died March 31, 1865. 
 
 Jacob EUinger, the local preacher, and the silversmith, who 
 came into that first Society at Florence just after its organiza- 
 tion, joined the Tennessee Conference in the latter part of 1826, 
 and continued therein till the close of 1831. He afterward moved 
 to Kentucky. Till life's fitful close he maintained the faith. 
 
 Thomas Farmer, the shoe-maker, was emotional, and demon- 
 strative. He went about the streets and from house to house 
 declaring his joy and delivering to his neighbors exhortations 
 on the subject of religion. He died in Florence. His wife, 
 Elizabeth Farmer, lived to an uncommon old age. She ended 
 her long pilgrimage at Florence, patient, and pious to the last 
 
 Thomas J. Crowe became a member of the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church at Florence as early as 1824, and was an active 
 member for a number of years, but for some reason, now not 
 known, he withdrew from the Church, and ever after stood 
 aloof from her communion. When he died he was buried with 
 Christian service, and on the occasion a suitable sermon was 
 preached by that local preacher and judicial officer, the Rev. and 
 Hon. William B. Wood, a man who, for his work for Methodism 
 at Florence and the surrounding country, deserves a monument. 
 
 Mrs. Martha Brandon, whose earthly pilgrimage was pro- 
 
 JUDGE WILLIAM B.. WOOD. 
 
 (344) 
 
The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 345 
 
 ^ 
 
 longed beyond that of all her descendants, was for more than 
 half a century a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at 
 Florence, she having affiliated at that place as early as 1824, 
 and there continued in the communion until her death. Her 
 upright life was a power for good, and in class-meetings and in 
 love feasts she constantly declared her love of God and at- 
 tested her confidence in his goodness. She was without guile 
 and without hypocrisy. 
 
 James Sample, a brother of Mrs. Martha Brandon, and his 
 wife, Mrs. Parthenia Sample, a daughter of Gov. Hugh McVay, 
 became members of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Flor- 
 ence by or before 1826. James Sample was a leader in every 
 good work. In building houses of worship, in sustaining Camp- 
 meetings, in hospitality, in benevolence, in prayer, and in song, 
 he led the active, generous, and worshiping hosts. He was de- 
 voted to the Lord, and addicted to his service. His wife, Par^ 
 thenia Sample, whose life was not long, was a woman of Chris- 
 tian zeal and of Christian hospitality. She died in Florence. 
 James Sample married the second time, and sometime in the 
 fifth decade of this nineteenth century he removed from Flor- 
 ence to the State of Mississippi, where he died iu 1864. 
 
 The style of the appointment and the names of the preach- 
 ers were as follows: for 1830: Florence and South Florence, Ja- 
 cob B. Crist; for 1831: Florence and South Florence, Lorenzo 
 D. Overall; for 1832: Florence, Wilson L. McAlister. 
 
 For some reason the Florence Station did not flourish, and at 
 the close of 1832 it was relegated to the Cypress Circuit. At 
 the close of its first year as a Station there were sixty white and 
 twenty-eight colored members; at the close of 1830 there were 
 forty white and twenty-eight colored members; at the close of 
 1831 there were forty-eight white and twenty colored members; 
 and at the close of 1832 there were thirty-seven white and sev^ 
 enteen colored members. The decline, in a weak place as that 
 was, was very great, and very perceptible, and exceedingly em- 
 barrassing. Everything was so feeble that the order of having' 
 a Station was abandoned and Florence was in the Cypress Cir- 
 cuit for 1833 and 1834. 
 
 The Methodist Episcopal Church at the town of Courtland, 
 Lawrence County, just nine years after the town, by Legislative 
 enactment, had been incorporated, undertook to sustain a Sta- 
 

 346 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 347 
 
 tion, and for 1829 and 1830 Lorenzo D. Overall, a single man, 
 but an elder, was the preacher in charge. The flock consisted 
 of eighty-six white and one hundred and thirty-four colored 
 members. For 1830 the towns of Athens and Triana, they to- 
 gether having a membership of sixty, constituted a pastoral 
 charge, under the oversight of the Rev. James W. Allen; and 
 the next year Courtland and Athens were put together with Al- 
 len as preacher in charge. The two places, Courtland and Ath- 
 ens, had one hundred and eight white and one hundred and five 
 colored members. Failing to sustain the position of a Station, 
 Courtland fell back into the Franklin Circuit, and never ap- 
 peared as a Station any more until 1859. Athens fell back into 
 the Limestone Circuit, where it remained until 1836. 
 
 Under discouragements and disabilities incident to ailments, 
 the Rev. James W. Allen, in November, 1831, located. During 
 an itinerant ministry of nine years he filled acceptably the lead- 
 ing Stations at that day in the Tennessee Conference. At Ath- 
 ens, Alabama, where he did his last itinerant work, he was re- 
 leased from earth's sufferings and woes, on Monday, October 1, 
 1838, and in the cemetery at that place his comrades buried his 
 body. There, through him who is the resurrection and the life, 
 he will rise out of the grave, and from thence he will go up to 
 meet the Judge of quick and dead. 
 
 In 1817, Andrew Dexter, from somewhere in the antislavery 
 States, located a town in south-east and south-west quarters of 
 Section seven. Township sixteen. Range eighteen, in Alabama 
 Territory, and named it New Philadelphia. In 1818, a Land 
 Company, with some cash, though without a soul, located anoth- 
 er town on Section twelve. Township sixteen. Range seventeen, 
 and adjoining New Philadelphia, and named it East Alabama. 
 In the same year, some parties made au other town just west of 
 the two here above named, and called it Alabama Town. These 
 towns, all in such proximity, were rivals of each other. The fol- 
 lowing quotation from the Laws of Alabama will show the time 
 and manner of the origin of the town named therein, as well as 
 the place of its location, and the limits assigned to it at the first: 
 
 "Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives 
 of the State of Alabama, in general assembly convened, That all 
 that tract of land situate on the east bank of the Alabama River, 
 of the following description, viz.: Fraction number twelve, 
 
 Township sixteen, Range seventeen, south-east and south-west 
 quarters of Section number seven, Township sixteen, Rauge 
 eighteen, including all that part of the river lying opposite to 
 said Fraction, within sixty yards of its margin, in the County of 
 Montgomery, is hereby incorporated, and shall be called and 
 known by the name of the town of Montgomery." That act 
 was passed December 3, 1819. That act of incorporation con- 
 solidated the towns of New Philadelphia and East Alabama, and 
 obliterated their names, and left the Alabama Town to carry on 
 its conflict and prosecute its rivalry with the newly incorporat- 
 ed and newly named town as best it could. Alabama Town dis- 
 appeared in the on-going of matters. 
 
 The moral status of Montgomery during the first decade of 
 its existence was suggestive of apathy, lethargy, and even things 
 worse. In truth, for two decades and a half the place was openly 
 and shamelessly immoral. During that period of its existence 
 a move profligate place was not to be found in Alabama. For the 
 first decade of its existence there was not an organized Church at 
 the place, nor was there thereat a house of worship in any proper 
 condition for divine service. Some missionary under the auspices 
 of some Home Missionary Society of that day, visited Montgom- 
 ery, in 1828 and in the middle of that year wrote an account of 
 the religious condition of the place at that time, which was pub- 
 lished in the Family Visitor and Telegraph, a paper issued from 
 Richmond, Virginia, in which the following statement is made: 
 
 " The town of Montgomery, situated on the River Alabama, 
 in Alabama, contains about twelve hundred inhabitants, of 
 which five or six only are professors of religion. They have a 
 Meeting-house, which is not yet finished, though commenced 
 several years ago. They have no regular preaching, sometimes 
 none at all for five or six weeks together. The Bible is seldom 
 seen or used by the inhabitants, except in courts of justice, 
 where it is used in the way of business, as if a sight of the Holy 
 Book would operate as a charm to bind the conscience, while its 
 truths and sanctions are unknown and unheeded. As to religion 
 or morality, there is little of either in the place. These facts 
 are derived from a source on which we may rely with confidence. 
 The condition of this town is an index of the moral state of 
 many places in the south and west, where the people perish be- 
 cause there is no vision." 
 
348 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 This statement was copied into the Christian Advocate and 
 Journal and Zion's Herald, of September 12, 1828, a paper pub- 
 lished in the city of New York, and the Editor made such com- 
 ments upon the facts set forth as he deemed proper and perti- 
 nent, whereupon the Alabama Journal, a newspaper published 
 at Montgomery, gave the Editor of the Christian Advocate a se- 
 vere castigation, charging him with entertaining an uncharitable 
 opinion of the religious character of the citizens of Montgomery. 
 The Editor of the Christian Advocate in response to the writers 
 for the Alabama Journal, and in defense of himself against their 
 castigation and accusation, proposed to them that if they would 
 furnish him a well autlienticated statistical account of the re- 
 ligious state of the town of Montgomery, he would publish the 
 account for the information of his readers, and do all he could 
 in that way to roll away any reproach which had been innocent- 
 ly brought on the people of Montgomery. No report — statistical, 
 authenticated, or otherwise — was ever presented, and for the very 
 reason that none could be furnished which would be creditable 
 to the people of the place, or that would discredit the statements 
 which had been made and published, and under which they 
 writhed and raged. They writhed and raged, but they never de- 
 nied the substantial facts which had been published. 
 
 The Montgomerif Bepublican, a newspaper published at Mont- 
 gomery, and afterward changed in name to the Alabama Journal, 
 announced in its issue of February 17, 1821 : " We are about to 
 begin preparations for erecting a place of public worship." 
 Look at the words used and see how far that people were from 
 even the prospect of having a place of public worship. " We 
 are about to begin preparations for erecting! " That was not even 
 a beginning of preparation. Nothing ever came of it. In the 
 early part of 1823, an address was set forth to the people by the 
 Rev. Dr. Moses Andrew, a local preacher of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, and at that time living at Montgomery, and Wil- 
 liam Sayre, a Presbyterian, declaring that " Montgomery is be- 
 coming conspicuous for its advantages, and is already respecta- 
 ble for its size and population" and "there is not a house of 
 worship among us," and setting out a document for subscription 
 with sums attached to be paid for erecting a house of worship 
 at Montgomery, which should be "open to all orthodox minis- 
 ters," and not "belong exclusively to any denomination of Chris- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 349 
 
 tians." July 10, 1823, at a meeting of some of the citizens of 
 the place, held for the purpose, preliminary steps were taken to 
 erect a house of worship, and by the end of that year a house, 
 forty-eight feet long and twenty-four feet wide, was commenced, 
 on a lot owned by a Land Company. After herculean efforts, 
 sometime in 1825, a weather-boarded and covered frame stood 
 forth as the product of the benevolence of the whole people of 
 Montgomery. In that rough, unceiled, unfinished condition, 
 without a pulpit and without seats for a congregation, it stood 
 for at least four long years. A school-master, at his own ex- 
 pense, and for his own personal accommodation, put some sort 
 of school furniture in it and occupied it as a school-house. 
 The court-house was the place where divine service was held 
 when a passing or visiting preacher happened along; or, in ab- 
 sence of the court-house some private residence was used, and 
 this was the case until the latter part of 1829. 
 
 This criminal neglect of the house of God and of the institu- 
 tions of religion in a growing town, where, as early as 1822, it 
 was boastfully stated, " the mercantile business done here very 
 far exceeds that of any town of the same magnitude we have 
 ever known," is found in the character of the people who gath- 
 ered there, and controlled the public sentiment of the place. It 
 did not originate in the fact that there were no preachers in the 
 country. The preachers were accessible, and could have been 
 had, but they were rather neglected and rejected than sought 
 for and appreciated. The public advertisements and public no- 
 tices of that day reveal the character of the citizens of that town 
 at that time. In the beginning of 1821, one merchant of the 
 place advertised that he had for sale or exchange "whisky, gin, 
 cognac brandy, sugar, and molasses per barrel;" and another 
 " offered for sale six barrels of sugar, five of gin, four of whisky, 
 four of rum; " and still another " offered in a general assortment 
 of goods forty barrels of whisky, four barrels of gin; " and yet 
 another had "just received a general assortment of sugar, tea, 
 coffee, rum, wine, tobacco;" and on Independence Day, "a 
 grand ball was given at Montgomery Hall." In October, 1822, 
 was made this announcement: "We are pleased to hear that 
 there will" be a public ball in this town on Wednesday, the 30th 
 inst. . . . This elegant amusement, which tends so much 
 to refine and polish the manners and soften the asperities of life, 
 23 
 
350 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 we hope will not be discontinued during the winter." In De- 
 cember, 1823, the following announcement was made: "The 
 Montgomery races will commence on Thursday next, and con- 
 tinue three days. A new race-course is progressing near the 
 villa^re. The gentlemen of the turf meet at the court-house this 
 day to form a jockey club. It is probable that a jockey club 
 ball will be given during next year's races for the gratification of 
 the ladies." Preaching and piety never find much appreciation 
 with people who are given up to balls and brandy, jigs and gin, 
 mammon and mirth, and races and rum. 
 
 The first preacher who exercised his ministry at Montgomery, 
 Alabama, was the Eev. James King, a local preacher of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. He was born 1782, and joined 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1800. He married in 1802. 
 He was licensed to preach in 180G, and was ordained a deacon, 
 by Bishop William McKendree, in Wilmington, North Carolina, 
 in 1816. He preached as a local preacher in North Carolina for 
 twelve years, when he moved to Alabama. He says over his 
 own signature: " On the 21st of April, 1819, 1 removed with my 
 family to Alabama. I arrived at Alabama Town, where I met 
 with some of my North Carolina friends, who prevailed upon 
 me to stop there for the year. My ministerial labors during 
 that year were as follows: One Sabbath at Alabama Town— the 
 next at Philadelphia (now Montgomery). I was the first li- 
 censed preacher that ever preached in that place. This was one 
 of the years of great trial and privation to me, there being no 
 regularly organized Society, and I heard but one sermon 
 preached during the time. In the winter of 1819, I removed to 
 Conecuh Eiver." The greater p;irt of the remainder of his life 
 he spent in Conecuh and Wilcox Counties. He was a local 
 preacher to his death, which occurred January 12, 1870. He 
 was buried at Oak Hill, Wilcox County, Alabama. He was a 
 plain, good man. 
 
 On Sunday, August 26, 1821, the Kev. James H. Mellard, 
 then a local preacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church, liv- 
 ing in Autauga County, Alabama, conducted divine service in 
 the court-house, in Montgomery, the town being without a 
 Church. The Eev. Peyton S. Graves, one of the preachers on 
 the Alabama Circuit at the time, was announced to perform di- 
 vine service at the court-house at Montgomery, between three 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 351 
 
 and four o'clock in the afternoon of Sunday, October 20, 1822. 
 No doubt, from time to time other preachers held services at 
 the court-house, of which there is no record. The local and 
 itinerant Methodist preachers in passing to and fro preached 
 occasionally in the court-house from year to year, though there 
 was no organized Society in the place. The Presbyterians and 
 Baptists likewise had services occasionally in the court-house, 
 conducted by their own i)reachers, though neither of these de- 
 nominations organized a Church in the town until after the 
 Methodists had organized a Society. It has been stated by 
 what ought to be good authority that the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church was organized September 15, 1829, in the Church built 
 in the town for all denominations. This statement is made by 
 M. P. Blue, Esq., in his " Churches of the City of Montgomery, 
 Alabama." For good reasons it is believed that the Eev. James 
 H. Mellard organized a Society in Montgomery in the latter 
 part of 1828. That was the year he was on the Alabama Cir- 
 cuit as preacher in charge, and the Alabama Circuit was the 
 Circuit which was round about Montgomery, and to which the 
 Mills and Westcott Meeting House belonged, and it was just 
 about that time that the "Associated Methodist Eeformers" 
 were agitating and disrupting the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 in that section of Alabama and in other places. It was just 
 then that the Eev. Peyton S. Graves, the junior preacher on the 
 Alabama Circuit with the Eev. James H. Mellard in charge, 
 took his leave of tlie Methodist Episcopal Church and led the 
 hosts of the "Eeformers" thereabout. All these things con- 
 spire in the support of the statement that the Society was or- 
 ganized in Montgomery in the last months of 1828. The Soci- 
 ety first organized consisted of about ten members— nine women 
 and one man, and a number of these had up to that time held 
 their membership at the Mills and Westcott Meeting House, 
 two miles from town. 
 
 For a number of years that Society experienced great incon- 
 veniences and many annoyances from a want of a suitable place 
 of worship. That noted unfinished house started for a place of 
 worship, and which did not belong exclusively to any denomi- 
 nation of Christians, was still there, was still there in a state of 
 chaos, tne ownership in all denominations, and the titles in no 
 one, except that the titles to the lot on which the structure stood 
 
352 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 were in a Land Company. Yes, that structure was still there, 
 and just enough of it, and under just such environments as to 
 be inadequate to any good purpose. Invested rights and joint 
 claims made complete the something and the nothing! The 
 pittance of money invested, the mutual ownership involved, the 
 endless chatter about the fraternity, good will, and Christian 
 union expressed and sustained through the use of a Union 
 Church made complications which the wisdom of the serpent 
 and the blamelessness of the dove combined could not control. 
 That incomplete structure, then under decay, could neither be 
 held, nor turned loose: could neither be kept, nor gotten rid of. 
 It was offered and rejected, released and retained. It was a 
 source of friction, and an object of strife. Satan hindered Paul 
 by the agency of the persecuting Jews, and Satan hindered the 
 few Christians of Montgomery by the agency of that structure 
 called a Union Church. It was a damage to all the denomina- 
 tions, a blight upon the common cause, a public nuisance. 
 
 Notwithstanding the smallness of the Society and the incon- 
 veniences under which said Society labored, by then the organ- 
 ization was little more than a year old steps were taken to 
 secure the services of a Station preacher, and at the session of 
 the Mississippi Conference beginning December 17, 1829, the 
 Kev. Benjamin A. Houghton was appointed to the town of 
 Montgomery for the next year. He did his work faithfully, and 
 notwithstanding the many disadvantages, added on probation, 
 and by certificate, and otherwise, fourteen persons during the 
 
 year. 
 
 The Eev. Eobert D. Smith was the preacher on the Mont- 
 gomery Station for 1831. The work in the year prospered, and 
 at the end of the year there were reported sixty-four white and 
 thirty-five colored members. 
 
 The preacher for Montgomery Station for 1832 was the Rev. 
 Seymour B. Sawyer, who was when he entered on his work 
 there just twenty -four years old, and a single man. That was 
 his first pastoral charge, his first appointment as an itinerant 
 preacher. That was a year of great prosperity to the Society 
 at Montgomery in the addition of members. There was an in- 
 crease of forty-six white and ninety-two colored members. 
 The whole membership more than doubled and the colored 
 membership more than tripled during the year. Notwith- 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the W^ork. 353 
 
 standing the Methodists of the town of Montgomery were, 
 at the beginning of 1832, oppressed with impecuniosity and 
 absolute poverty, and notwithstanding they were then without 
 tenure or temple, and notwithstanding an adversary at that time 
 with malicious purpose persistently enterprised their defeat in 
 possessing themselves of a place of worship, and notwithstand- 
 ing the untoward had then reached the utmost bound, victory 
 came to the sacred cause, and there was during that year per- 
 ceptible advancement and positive improvement in the temporal 
 affairs of the Society. The end of the distress and the end of 
 the strife came at last, and the notorious Union Church with 
 the parcel of ground on which it stood passed into the posses- 
 sion of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The lot on which 
 stood the Union Church belonged, as already stated, to the Ala- 
 bama Company. Tiiat Company sold the lot and house at pub- 
 lic auction. The Methodists bid for the property, but withdrew 
 from the contest before it was closed because the property ran 
 to a price beyond their financial ability to pay. The property 
 was closed out to General John Scott for the sum of five hun- 
 dred dollars, and General Scott, though not a member of the 
 Church, generously donated it to the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church for use as a place of worship. One liberal man was 
 found where there ought to have been many, and that was a 
 joyous day with that feeble band of Christian workers. The 
 deed was made by the Alabama Company to the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, and was executed May 9, 1832, by John Giu- 
 drat and John H. Thorington, Agents of the Alabama Company, 
 to John G. Rush, Robert Harwell, Zachariah Fields, Neil Blue, 
 Thomas Hattchett, Robert Parker, and Andrew Crossley, Trus- 
 tees of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 
 At the session of the Mississippi Conference at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, beginning November 24, and adjourning December 4, 
 1830, the Greene Circuit was placed in the list of appointments, 
 and the Rev. Ralph G. Christopher put in charge of it for 1831, 
 the statements of his obituary to the contrary notwithstanding. 
 The Greene Circuit occupied the country between the Tuska- 
 loosa or Black Warrior and the Tombigbee Rivers, and extend- 
 ed from the junction of these rivers into Pickens county. 
 
 In order to give the names of the men who composed the 
 Quarterly Conference and the names of the Societies which 
 
354 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 constituted the Greene Circuit at the time of its organization, 
 as well as a sample of the order of the business of a Quarterly 
 Conference of that time the Minutes of the First Quarterly 
 Conference held for that Circuit are transcribed here in full: 
 
 "Minutes of the First Quarterly Meeting Conference held for 
 Greene Circuit at Ebenezer, March 12, 1831. 
 
 Members present: Kobert L. Kennon, P. E.; E. G. Christo- 
 pher, A. P.; John R Lambuth, L. R; Eeuben Mason, L. D.; 
 Benjamin Williams, C. L.; William Eaney, C. L.; Duncan 
 McPhail, C. L. 
 
 Q. 1. Are there any complaints? 
 A. None. 
 
 Q. 2. Are there any appeals? 
 A. None. 
 
 Brother Eeuben Mason was received as a member of the Con- 
 ference by letter from the Quarterly Meeting Conference. 
 Appointment of Stewards. 
 
 The following persons were nominated by the preacher in 
 charge and elected by the Conference: J. N. Thompson, Benja- 
 min Williams, William Anderson, and John E. Lambuth. 
 John E. Lambuth was elected Eecording Steward. 
 A list of Societies rendered to the Stewards: 
 
 Ebenezer $ 7 10 
 
 Salem 4 70 
 
 Thompson's 3 50 
 
 Springfield 4 00 
 
 Bay's 00 
 
 Everett's 1 50 
 
 $20 62J 
 Amount of Quarterage paid to E. L. Kennon: 
 
 Expenses $ 1 62J 
 
 Quarterage 5 00 
 
 Paid to E. G. Christopher: 
 
 Quarterage 14 00 
 
 No further business before the Conference, it adjourned to 
 meet again on the 10, 11, and 12 of June, at Salem. 
 
 E. L. Kennon, P. E. ; 
 
 John E. Lambuth, Secty." 
 There is a mistake in adding the totaL 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 
 
 355 
 
 Ebenezer was in the neighborhood of Portland, just above 
 the junction of the Black AVarrior and the Tombigbee. The 
 Eev. John E. Lambuth, a local preacher, and his wife's family, 
 Kirkpatric, held membership there. The Eev. John E. Lambuth 
 was the father of the Eev. John W. Lambuth, so long a Mis- 
 sionary in China and Japan. John W. Lambuth was born 
 near Ebenezer. Springfield, one of the Societies named above, 
 was two or three miles east of north of the town of Eutaw. 
 In two years the Greene Circuit was enlarged until it took in 
 Hargrove's Church, in Pickens County, and had eighteen or 
 more appointments. At the end of the first year there were 
 on the Greene Circuit one hundred and forty-eight white and 
 sixty-two colored members. 
 
 The preacher on the Greene Circuit for 1832 was William 
 Weir. That was his second year in the Conference on trial. 
 The first Quarterly Conference for the year was held at Salem, 
 the second at Ebenezer, and the third at Thompson's Meeting 
 House, July 21, 1832, w^here and when it was: "Eesolved, That, 
 this Quarterly Conference do concur with the Quarterly Con- 
 ference of the Prairie Creek Circuit in the resolution to carry 
 into effect the provisions of the Discipline for the support of 
 the traveling preachers and their families; and that we do ap- 
 point J. E. Lambuth one of our Delegates to attend a Meeting 
 of Delegates from the different Circuits and Stations in the 
 bounds of the Tuskaloosa District in order to devise means to 
 
 effect this object.'* 
 
 Certainly there was a necessity in that day for inaugurating 
 and executing plans and devising means for supporting the 
 traveling preachers and their families, and the resolutions 
 adopted indicated that there were some persons connected with 
 the Prairie Creek and the Greene Circuits who appreciated the 
 work of the ministry and understood the obligations of the peo- 
 ple in the premises. A correct enumeration of the sufferings 
 endured and the burdens borne by the priests of the sanctuary 
 of that day brought to them and laid upon them by the mea- 
 eerness of the means of subsistence and the actual scarcity of 
 bread would a narrative unfold stranger than fiction. The peo- 
 ple literally refused to let the men who had sown unto them 
 spiritual things reap their carnal things, they refused to let them 
 even glean among the sheaves, or about the hedges. The chil- 
 
356 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 dren of the priest of the sanctuary often needed bread, and few 
 from among the people gave unto them. The persons and the 
 ofl&ces of the priests were not respected, and the elders were not 
 favored. The people were as cruel as the ostrich of the wilder- 
 ness, which is hardened against her young ones, as though they 
 were not hers. The Eev. Kobert L. Kennon, the presiding 
 elder of the Tuskaloosa District, a man of noble spirit, of com- 
 plete graces, of brilliant talents, wise in counsel, efficient in ad- 
 ministration, the noblest among the noble, the chiefest among 
 thousands, continually going forth making the crooked ways 
 straight, breaking in pieces the gates of brass, cutting in sun- 
 der the bars of iron for the liberation of captive souls, bringing 
 forth to the people the hidden riches of secret places, and open- 
 ing to them the very fountains of bliss and immortality, actual- 
 ly presided over Quarterly Conferences and departed with the 
 pitiful receipt of five and six dollars, and sometimes no receipt 
 whatever. 
 
 There is a well authenticated tradition that Edward Clement 
 with his family moved to where Greenesborough, Alabama, now 
 is, in 1820, when, at the place, there were but a few persons and 
 a few log houses, and in the course of a year or two he built a 
 well framed and neatly weatherboarded and ceiled house, on 
 the lot, where, now, in 1891, stands the court-house of Hale 
 County, and as he intended it for a Hotel, and used it for that 
 purpose, he named it the " Planter's Inn." In that Inn, on 
 April 7, 1823, was ])orn James A. Clement, the eleventh child 
 and seventh son of Edward and Margaret Clement. By an act 
 of the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of 
 Alabama, passed and approved December 24, 1823, the town of 
 Greenesborough, in Greene County, was incorporated. In 1823 
 the Rev. Ralph Griffin Christopher, M.D., a local elder of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, moved to Greene County, Ala- 
 bama, and in the neighborhood of Greenesborough. Im- 
 mediately Edward Clement, who was a Methodist in South 
 Carolina before he came to Alabama, invited Dr. Christopher to 
 preach at Greenesborough, and furnished to the preacher and 
 his audience as a place for preaching, the reception room of the 
 Planter's Inn. In that reception room of the Hotel, James A. 
 Clement, in the same year he was born, was baptized, by Dr. 
 Christopher; and there, in the same room, and in the same 
 
 The Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 357 
 
 year, the year 1823, Dr. Christopher organized a Methodist So- 
 ciety, the first ever organized at Greenesborough. Edward 
 Clement and Margaret Clement, his wife, and two of their 
 daughters were members of that new Society. There is a tra- 
 dition that there were six members of that original Society. 
 Who the other two were is not now certainly known, but the in- 
 dications are that Thomas M. Johnson and Eliza A. Johnson 
 were the other two; they were there in the beginning of things, 
 and a long while members of that Society, with their names at 
 the head of the list. The Rev. John DuBoise joined at Greenes- 
 borough, by certificate, December 21, 1834, Dr. William Jones 
 joined there, on trial, November 22, 1835, and Robert Dickens 
 was received in the Church there in 1834, and other prominent 
 members about the same time, and still others in still later 
 years, so it is evident that they were not of the original six. 
 
 One zealous and liberal man can do much for the cause of 
 religion. There is a tradition which says that in the time from 
 1823 to 1826 John Nelson, who was not a member of any 
 Church, donated a lot in the town of Greenesborough, and on 
 it, with his own labor and means, Edward Clement built a 
 house of worship for the use of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. The oldest Deed on record made to the Methodists of 
 Greenesborough was made March 12, A.D. 1836, and was made 
 by John May, James Yeates, and Francis Thomas, Commis- 
 sioners of Greenesborough, and was made to Andrew AValker, 
 Robert Dickens, William Jones, and Thomas M. Johnson, 
 Trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The lot to 
 which the Deed is made is designated as lot No. Fifty- four 
 in the plan and plot of the Town of Greenesborough, in the 
 County of Greene, lying upon the back Alley in said Town, 
 and north of Main Street, and directly north of Lot No. 
 Twelve, and containing one half acre more or less. It is the 
 same lot now owned by the African Methodist Episcopal (Zion) 
 Church. It is not known where Mr. John Nelson, who donated 
 the lot for the use of the Methodists in the town of Greenes- 
 borough, was born. His donations, and the donations out of 
 his accumulations, have been a benefit to Methodism about 
 Green esborough. 
 
 Mr. Edward Clement was born in Amelia County, Virginia, 
 September 21, 1780. His wife, Margaret Clement, nee Mont- 
 
358 
 
 History of Metliodism in Alabama, 
 
 gomery, and related to the poet of that name, was born in the 
 State of Pennsylvania, November 7, 1780. During their minor- 
 ity, Edward Clement and Mai-garet Montgomery went to Spar- 
 tanburg District, South Carolina, where they became acquaint- 
 ed, and where, about 1800, they married. Soon after marriage 
 they joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1826 Mr. 
 Clement removed from Greenesborough and settled six miles 
 from the place on the road leading to Centerville. He moved 
 asain and settled in four miles of Gainesville, Sumter County, 
 Alabama, where he died September 21, 1841. He was buried 
 at Gainesville. There he held his membership while he lived 
 four miles from the place. He was a muscular man, weighing 
 about two hundred pounds. He was a man of decision, and of 
 purpose. Though a man of few words, he was affable in spirit, 
 and social in disposition. He was pronounced on all questions 
 of temperance, integrity, and piety. He led his household in 
 righteousness. During all the years, nearly, he was in the 
 communion of the Church he was a class leader, and enjoyed 
 
 the meetings. 
 
 Mrs. Margaret Clement died in Perry County, Alabama, in 
 the summer of 1855, and she was buried at Mount Hermon 
 Church in that County, and eight miles from Greenesborough. 
 She was a woman of Christian principle, and of steadiness of 
 
 character. 
 
 James A. Clement, who was baptized in the reception room 
 of the Planter's Inn, in his infancy, and in the same year the 
 Methodist Society was organized there, made a preacher, an 
 able preacher, and was long a member of the Alabama Confer- 
 ence. He was licensed to preach at Mount Hermon Church, 
 on the Centerville road, eight miles from Greenesborough, in 
 
 October, 1842. 
 
 Greenesborough was first named in the appointments of 
 1832, and was put down in the following style: Greenesborough, 
 Erie, etc., Thomas S. Abernathij. At the end of the year the 
 charge was reported as having sixty-one white and thirty-one 
 colored members. 
 
 CHAPTEE XV. 
 
 Annual Conferences, Distkicts, and Presiding Elders in 
 
 Alabama. 
 
 DUKING the period of years from the beginning of 1808 
 till the close of 1832, just a quarter of a century, several 
 Annual Conferences held jurisdiction and operated in the dif- 
 ferent parts of the Territory set off in 1817 and named Alabama. 
 During that period the South Carolina Conference, the Western 
 Conference, or the Tennessee Conference, the Mississippi Con- 
 ference, and the Georgia Conference occupied some part of 
 what is now Alabama. From the beginning of 1808 till the 
 close of 1811 the Tombecbee Charge was attached to the Oconee 
 District of the South Carolina Conference, with the Ptev. Josiah 
 Eandle one year and the liev. Lovick Pierce three years presid- 
 ing elder. As stated in a former chapter, neither of these pre- 
 siding elders ever visited the Tombecbee work. At the close of 
 1811 the Tombecbee Circuit was attached to the MississipjDi Dis- 
 trict of the Western Conference, and for 1812 the Eev. Samuel 
 Dunwoody was api^ointed presiding elder. The Tombecbee 
 Circuit was then the only pastoral charge which in that section 
 touched what is now Alabama. For some reason unknown the 
 Eev. Samuel Dunwoody did not go to the Mississippi District, 
 but was changed and appointed to Charleston, South Carolina. 
 Who took his place on the District is not known. For 1813 the 
 Tombecbee Circuit was in the Mississippi District of the Ten- 
 nessee Conference, the Eev. Samuel Sellers, presiding elder, 
 and for 1814, 1815, 1816 it was in the Mississippi District of 
 the Mississippi Conference, the Eev. Samuel Sellers, presiding 
 elder. Through those years the Mississippi Conference existed 
 provisionally, and under contingent conditions and perplexing 
 circumstances. It was while the Eev. Samuel Sellers was pre- 
 siding elder of the Mississippi District, and as such had super- 
 vision of the Tombecbee Circuit, the terrible massacre of Fort 
 Mims took place, and the Creek Indians and the British Na- 
 tion waged war to the danger and detriment of every one in 
 
 (359) 
 
358 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 gomery, and related to the poet of that name, was born in the 
 iState of Pennsylvania, November 7, 1780. During their minor- 
 ity, Edward Clement and Margaret Montgomery went to Spar- 
 tanburg District, South Carolina, where they became acquaint- 
 ed, and where, about 1800, they married. Soon after marriage 
 they joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1826 Mr. 
 Clement removed from Greenesborough and settled six miles 
 from the place on the road leading to Centerville. He moved 
 again and settled in four miles of Gainesville, Sumter County, 
 Alabama, where he died September 21, 1841. He was buried 
 at Gainesville. There he held his membership while he lived 
 four miles from the place. He was a muscular man, weighing 
 about two hundred pounds. He was a man of decision, and of 
 purpose. Though a man of few words, he was affable in spirit, 
 and social in disposition. He was pronounced on all questions 
 of temperance, integrity, and piety. He led his household in 
 righteousness. During all the years, nearly, he was in the 
 communion of the Church he was a class leader, and enjoyed 
 
 the meetings. 
 
 Mrs. Margaret Clement died in Perry County, Alabama, in 
 the summer of 1855, and she was buried at Mount Hermon 
 Church in that County, and eight miles from Greenesborough. 
 She was a woman of Christian principle, and of steadiness of 
 
 character. 
 
 James A. Clement, who was baptized in the reception room 
 of the Planter's Inn, in his infancy, and in the same year the 
 Methodist Society was organized there, made a preacher, an 
 able preacher, and was long a member of the Alabama Confer- 
 ence. He was licensed to preach at Mount Hermon Church, 
 on the Centerville road, eight miles from Greenesborough, in 
 
 October, 1842. 
 
 Greenesborough was first named in the appointments of 
 1832, and was put down in the following style: Greenesborough, 
 Erie, etc., Thomas S. Abernathij. At the end of the year the 
 charge was reported as having sixty-one white and thirty-one 
 colored members. 
 
 CHAPTEE XY. 
 
 Annual Conferences, Distkicts, and Pkesiding Elders in 
 
 Alabama. 
 
 DUKING the period of years from the beginuiug of 1808 
 till the close of 1832, just a quarter of a century, several 
 Annual Conferences held jurisdiction and operated in the dif- 
 ferent parts of the Territory set off in 1817 and named Alabama. 
 During that period the South Carolina Conference, the Western 
 Conference, or the Tennessee Conference, the Mississippi Con- 
 ference, and the Georgia Conference occupied some i)art of 
 what is now Alabama. From the beginning of 1808 till the 
 close of 1811 the Tombecbee Charge was attached to the Oconee 
 District of the South Carolina Conference, with the Piev. Josiali 
 Eandle one year and the liev. Lovick Pierce three years presid- 
 ing elder. As stated in a former chapter, neither of these pre- 
 siding elders ever visited the Tombecbee work. At the close of 
 1811 the Tombecbee Circuit was attached to the Mississippi Dis- 
 trict of the Western Conference, and for 1812 the Eev. Samuel 
 Dunwoody was appointed presiding elder. The Tombecbee 
 Circuit was then the only pastoral charge which in that section 
 touched what is now Alabama. For some reason unknown the 
 Eev. Samuel Dunwoody did not go to the Mississippi District, 
 but was changed and appointed to Charleston, South Carolina. 
 Who took his place on the District is not known. For 1813 the 
 Tombecbee Circuit was in the Mississippi District of the Ten- 
 nessee Conference, the Eev. Samuel Sellers, presiding elder, 
 and for 1814, 1815, 1816 it was in the Mississippi District of 
 the Mississippi Conference, the Eev. Samuel Sellers, presiding 
 elder. Through those years the Mississippi Conference existed 
 provisionally, and under contingent conditions and perplexing 
 circumstances. It was while the Eev. Samuel Sellers was pre- 
 siding elder of the Mississippi District, and as such had super- 
 vision of the Tombecbee Circuit, the terrible massacre of Fort 
 Mims took place, and the Creek Indians and the British Na- 
 tion waged war to the danger and detriment of every one in 
 
 (359) 
 
3G0 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Annual ConferenceSy Districts, and Presiding Elders. 361 
 
 that section. Sellers was the only presiding elder in the Mis- 
 sissippi Conference for 1816, and at four consecutive Annual 
 sessions of the Mississippi Conference he was the President, no 
 Bishop being present. Bishop Eobert R. Roberts reached the 
 session held October, 1816, and presided during the last days of 
 the occasion, Sellers having presided and guided the affairs iu 
 the first and advancing i)art of the session. At that session of 
 the Conference Sellers located, having completed his eleventh 
 year of an itinerant ministry. He lived only a few years after 
 he located. He was physically well formed, though hardly of 
 medium size, and he was of hardy mold, though his complexion 
 was fair and his hair was of light color. In his mental and 
 moral make-up he was a man of poise. He was an animated 
 preacher, a leader of men, and an administrator of ecclesiastical 
 affairs. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Griffin was the presiding elder of the Mis- 
 sissippi District with the Tombecbee Circuit in it for 1817 and 
 1818. 
 
 The Flint Circuit was organized by a missionary, a part of it 
 being in what is now Madison County, Alabama, and it was one 
 of the appointments of the Western Conference for 1810, and 
 for that and the next year was in the Cumberland District, with 
 the Rev. Learner Blackman, presiding elder, and for the next 
 seven years it was in the Nashville District, three of the years 
 Learner Blackman being the presiding elder, and the other four 
 years the Rev. Thomas L. Douglass being the presiding elder. 
 
 In less than one short year after he left the District in which 
 the Flint Circuit was one of the appointments the Rev. Learner 
 Blackman camQ to the terminus of life and labor. He was 
 drowned in the Ohio River, near Cincinnati. He and his wife 
 were traveling in a carriage, and in crossing the river in an open 
 ferry-boat, the horses which drew the carriage became fright- 
 ened and leaped from the boat into the river, and drew him who 
 held the reins into the river with them, and the powerful billows 
 swept him down, and instantly extinguished his life. His body 
 was recovered and buried in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was a native 
 of New Jersey. He was about thirty-four years old, and he had 
 been an itinerant preacher about sixteen years. Though he was 
 snatched away before he had reached the meridian of life, he 
 had made proof of his ministry. His parish actually extended 
 
 from the Delaware Bay on the east to the neighborhood of the 
 Sabine River on the west, and from twenty-ninth degree of north 
 latitude on the south to the Ohio River on the North. He 
 preached amid the luxuriant cornfields of the State of Dela- 
 ware, in the swamps of Mississippi and Louisiana, and about 
 the Cumberland Mountains and in the Great Bend of the Ten- 
 nessee River. In the discharge of ministerial duty he traversed, 
 back and forth, time and again, the wilderness where dwelt the 
 Indian in his savage life and barbarous habits. He did hard 
 and successful work. He was a man of polite manners, of 
 great energy, and of Christian zeal without any offensive eccen- 
 tricities. In the midst of his usefulness and in the midst of his 
 domestic bliss he was hurried home to God and to glory. 
 
 At the Annual Conference convened in October, 1818, and at 
 which the appointments were made for the next year, the Dis- 
 tricts were re-arranged, and the Tennessee River District of the 
 Tennessee Conference, and the Alabama District of the Mis- 
 sissippi Conference were made, and these two Districts contained 
 all the appointments then in Alabama Territory. That year and 
 the next the Tennessee River District was composed of the 
 same pastoral charges, except one Circuit, and the Rev. Thomas 
 D. Porter was the presiding elder. That District has been de- 
 scribed, and the Rev. Thomas D. Porter has been sketched in a 
 preceding chapter. 
 
 The Alabama District was constituted of three pastoral 
 charges, two of them in Mississippi, and one, the Tombecbee 
 Circuit, in Alabama. The next year the Alabama Circuit was 
 added to it, and for 1821 the District was still further enlarged 
 by the addition of the Conecuh Circuit. During these throe 
 years the Rev. Thomas Griffin was the presiding elder of that 
 Alabama District. 
 
 At the session of the Conference in December, 1832, he located, 
 having been in the itinerant ministry twenty-three years. He 
 started in the South Carolina Conference, and on reception into 
 full connection in that Conference he was sent to Louisiana. He 
 was henceforth a member of the Mississippi Conference till his 
 location. He was born in Virginia, at what time is not known, 
 but he grew to manhood on the frontiers of Georgia, in Ogle- 
 thorpe County. He was of Welch descent, and his mold, features, 
 complexion, carriage, and traits of character clearly indicated 
 
362 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Annual Conferences, Districts, and Presiding Elders, 363 
 
 his nationality. He was about medium height, sallow in com- 
 plexion, sturdy, industrious, decided, and firm. His mother was 
 a member of the Baptist Cliurch, and his father was of that 
 faith, thou^rh not initiated. Thomas Griffin was inducted into a 
 Christian experience, into the Methodist Episcopal Church, and 
 into the ministry in early life. His parents were much opposed 
 to his engagement to the itinerant ministry, but he was true to 
 his convictions. He was, when he started in the ministry, very 
 limited in his literary attainments, but he was, notwithstanding 
 that, a great singer, and a rousing, stirring preacher, fearless, 
 earnest, plain, direct. He did much for Christianity under the 
 auspices of Methodism in Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi. 
 He married one of the daughters of the Eev. John Ford, who 
 lived so long on Pearl Eiver. 
 
 At the close of 1820 there was a change made in the bounda- 
 ries of the Tennessee Eiver District, and a new district was 
 made and called Cahawba. By the new arrangement the Ten- 
 nessee District was all north of the Tennessee River, and the 
 Cahawha District extended from the Coosa River, the head 
 waters of the Mulberry Creek, and the Alabama River on the 
 south to the Tennessee River on the north, and from AVills 
 Creek, the Cherokee Indian line, on the east to the Tombigbee 
 River on the west, and was composed of the Cahawba, Franklin, 
 Marion, and Tuskaloosa Circuits; and Jones's Valley, Lawrence, 
 and New River Circuits were added to it when they were made. 
 
 For 1S21 the Rev. Thomas D. Porter was presiding elder of 
 the Tennessee District; and the presiding elder on it for 1822 
 was the Rev. William McMahon, and at the close of 1822 the 
 name of the District was changed to Huntsville, and the Rev. 
 "William McMahon continued on it as presiding elder for 1823 
 and 1824. The presiding elder of the Alabama District for 1822, 
 1823, 182-1 was the Rev. Nicholas Mclntyre. For 1821 the Rev. 
 Thomas Nixon was presiding elder of the Cahawba District, 
 and preacher in charge of the Cahawba Circuit. The presiding 
 elder of the Cahawba District for 1822 was the Rev. John C. 
 Burruss, and he was followed on the District by the Rev. Alex- 
 ander Sale, who served it for 1823, 1824. 
 
 While his parents were in transit from Scotland to America 
 on the high seas, the Rev. Nicholas Mclntyre was born, Octo- 
 ber, 1700. By his father's dying charge, received when he was 
 
 / 
 
 about eighteen years old, he was aroused to a realization of his 
 lost condition, and when he was about twenty years of age he 
 obtained the forgiveness of sins, and the renewing of the Holy 
 Ghost. He was recommended from the Santee Circuit, and was 
 admitted on trial in the traveling connection by the South Car- 
 olina Conference in session at Fayetteville, North Carolina, Jan- 
 uary 14, 1814. In January, 1820, he was sent from the South 
 Carolina Conference, a missionary to the Mississippi Conference, 
 and from then until his death, which occurred August 15, 1824, 
 he preached in Alabama. He was the presiding elder of the 
 Alabama District at the time of his death. He was true, able, 
 faithful, and successful. 
 
 The Rev. John C. Burruss started in the Virginia Confer- 
 ence, being received on trial in February, 1814, and into full 
 connection in January, 1816, and locating at the same time, and 
 for about six years he was a local preacher, and most of that 
 time, or at least a part of that time, he lived in the Franklin 
 Circuit, in Franklin and Lawrence Counties, Alabama. He was 
 a brother of the wife of the Rev. Alexander Sale. He was a 
 brother of Richard Burruss, who was a member of the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church at Ebenezer, near Courtland, Alabama, 
 and at one time a trustee of the Church. This Richard Bur- 
 russ was a man who judged the qualities and metal of a horse 
 with great accuracy, and a man who obtained and lost religion 
 every year — he obtained it in the summer, and lost it in the 
 winter. He once, so it is reported, saw the Saviour in a hickory 
 tree, and he finally turned Universalist. The Rev. John C. 
 Burruss was re-admitted to the traveling connection in the 
 Mississippi Conference at the time he was appointed presiding 
 elder of the Cahawba District. He made a greater impression 
 as a preacher in the bounds of the Cahawba District than any 
 other preacher of that day. He was somewhat of a scholar, 
 having made considerable literary attainments, and he was ornate 
 in his style, and quite a fluent speaker. He was for four years, 
 and while a member of the Conference, President of the Eliza- 
 beth Female Academy at Washington, Mississippi, and for two 
 years, while a member of the Conference, he was Agent of the 
 American Colonization Society. He was stationed in New Or- 
 leans, Louisiana, for 1835, and at the close of that year he lo- 
 cated. 
 
364 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Annual Conferences^ Districts, and Presiding Elders, 365 
 
 The General Conference in May, 1824, changed the bounda- 
 ries of the Tennessee and the Mississippi Conferences, and the 
 Tennessee Conference was so bounded as to include that part of 
 North Alabama watered by those streams flowing into the Ten- 
 nessee Eiver. That extended the Tennessee Conference further 
 South than it had been hitherto, and made a re-arrangement of 
 the Districts necessary. The Franklin and Lawrence Circuits, 
 hitherto in the Mississippi Conference, were, under the new 
 boundaries, in the Tennessee Conference. At the close of 1824 
 the Districts were arranged according to the order of the new 
 boundaries of the Conferences, and the Huntsville District was 
 re-arranged, and under its new form extended entirely across 
 the State of Alabama, from the Georgia line on the east to the 
 Mississippi line on the west, and including in its bounds all the 
 pastoral charges in Alabama belonging to the Tennessee Con- 
 ference, except the Shoal and Cypress Circuits, which were for 
 four years, beginning with 1825, in Forked Deer District, and 
 then for four years, closing with 1832, with Florence, m the 
 Eichland District. The Cahawba District in the changes of 
 boundaries lost the Franklin and Lawrence Circuits, and was 
 given the Alabama Circuit; and the Alabama District, giving up 
 the Alabama Circuit, took in the Mobile andPensacola Mission. 
 At the same time the Tallahassee District of the South Caro- 
 lina Conference, which had in it the Chattahoochee Circuit, 
 which was partly in Alabama, was made, and the next year that 
 District took in other pastoral charges in Alabama. 
 
 For five years in succession, beginning with 1825 and closing 
 with 1820, the Eev. William McMahon was presiding elder of 
 the Huntsville District, the provisions of the Discipline to the 
 contrary notwithstanding. The appointments to the Indians 
 was attached to the Huntsville District through these years. 
 The Kev. William McMahon was a grand man. He moved with 
 imperial step, and with the moral tread of a giant, and his ad- 
 ministration was royal and righteous. For 1830, 1831, and 1832 
 the Rev. Joshua Boucher was the presiding elder for the Hunts- 
 ville District. 
 
 For four years, beginning with 1825 and closing with 1828, 
 the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn was presiding elder of the Alabama 
 District, and the four succeeding years, closing with 1832, the 
 Rev. James H. Mellard was presiding elder of this District. 
 
 For four years, beginning with 1825 and closing with 1828, 
 the Rev. Robert L. Kennon was the presiding elder of the Ca- 
 hawba District; and for 1829 and 1830 the Rev. Ebenezer 
 Hearn was the presiding elder on it; and for 1831 and 1832 the 
 boundaries of the District were somewhat changed, and the 
 name was changed to Black Warrior, and the Rev. Robert L. 
 Kennon was the presiding elder. 
 
 For 1832 there was a Tombecbee District, and the Rev. Eb- 
 enezer Hearn was the presiding elder. 
 
 For four years, beginning with 1825, the Rev. Josiah Evans 
 was the presiding elder of the Tallahassee District; and for the 
 next four years, closing with 1832, the Rev. Zaccheus Dowling 
 was the presiding elder of this District, with its boundaries 
 greatly changed. 
 
 For one year each the Rev. Lewis Garrett, the Rev. Robert 
 Paine, and the Rev. Thomas Smith was presiding elder of the 
 Forked Deer District, with Shoal and Cypress Circuits within 
 the District. For three years, the years 1830, 1831, 1832, 
 the Rev. James McFerrin was presiding elder of the Richland 
 District with Shoal and Cypress Circuits in the District 
 
 There were in the State of Alabama, at the close of 1832, 
 when the Alabama Conference was organized, in round num- 
 bers, about twelve thousand Methodists, the number of twa 
 thousand being colored members. There were at work in the 
 State, at that date, about sixty-five itinerant preachers. It is 
 not possible to ascertain the number of local preachers then in 
 the State. The above estimate of twelve thousand does not 
 count the members of the Methodist Protestant Church at that 
 time in the State of Alabama; and the sixty-five itinerant 
 preachers is exclusive of the itinerant preachers of that Church. 
 The Methodist Protestant Church claimed in the latter part of 
 1830 to have in Alabama, eight hundred and eighty-one mem- 
 bers; and in 1833 they claimed to have in the State one thou- 
 sand members. That Church also claims to have commenced 
 in 1829 with sixteen preachers. 
 24 
 
N 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 367 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 THAT part of Alabama within the following designated 
 lines has a peculiar history and a special interest: A line 
 beginning on the eastern bank of the Coosa River opposite the 
 mouth of Wills Creek; running from thence down the eastern 
 bank of the Coosa River to a point one mile above the mouth of 
 Cedar Creek, thence east two miles, thence south two miles, 
 thence west to the eastern bank of the Coosa River, thence 
 down the eastern bank thereof to the upper end of the We- 
 tumpka Falls, thence east from a true meridian line to a point 
 due north of the mouth of Okfuskee Creek, thence south by a 
 true meridian line to the mouth of Okfuskee Creek on the 
 south side of the Tallapoosa River, thence up the Okfuskee to 
 a point where a direct course will cross the same at the distance 
 of ten miles from the mouth thereof, thence a direct line to the 
 junction of the Summochico Creek and the Chattahoochee 
 River; from thence along the eastern line of the State of Ala- 
 bama to one mile above the north line of Township fourteen; 
 from thence a direct line to the beginning point on the Coosa 
 River opposite the mouth of Wills Creek. The territory en- 
 closed by the foregoing lines was the last of the ancient domain 
 of the Creek Indians, ceded by them to the United States, and 
 they ceded it by treaty made March 24, 1832; and it was in the 
 bounds of this territory that Mission Stations and Mission 
 work for the Creek Indians were located, and was prosecuted 
 by the South Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. The Creek Indians resisted unto blood, striving 
 against the surrender of the land of their fathers to the white 
 man; some of them resisted unto blood even when the time of 
 their departure by the terms of the Treaty had arrived; and it is 
 not surprising. No deeper affliction, no more trying ordeal can 
 befall a people than the dispossession of their native land, than 
 separation from the land and graves of their ancestors. It is, 
 therefore, not strange that these aborigines resisted the issue, 
 (366) 
 
 though they might have known that it was folly to fight against 
 the inevitable, and to resist that which had already been con- 
 summated. 
 
 Noted history and special interest attach also to that part 
 of Alabama enclosed by the following designated lines: Com- 
 mencing at the Tennessee River, opposite the Chickasaw Is- 
 land, running from thence a due south course to the top of the 
 dividing ridge between the waters of the Tennessee and Tom- 
 bigbee Rivers, thence eastwardly along said ridge, leaving the 
 head waters of the Black Warrior to the right hand, until op- 
 posed by the West branch of Wills Creek, down the east bank 
 of said creek to the Coosa River; from thence a direct line to 
 the eastern line of the State of Alabama one mile above the 
 north line of Township fourteen; from thence along the eastern 
 line of the State of Alabama to the northeast corner of the 
 State; from thence along the northern line of Alabama to the 
 Tennessee River; from thence along the southern bank of the 
 Tennessee River to the starting point opposite the Chickasaw 
 Island. The territory embraced within the foregoing lines was 
 of the last portion of the ancient domain of the Cherokee In- 
 dians ceded by them to the United States. They ceded it, as 
 the last portion of land owned by them east of the Mississippi, 
 in a Treaty made December 29, 1835. It was in that territory 
 and in the adjoining section in Georgia and Tennessee and 
 North Carolina that the Tennessee Conference established Mis- 
 sions to the Cherokee Indians. 
 
 The work of opening a Mission and introducing Christian 
 civilization to the Indians in Alabama by the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church was provided for at the Conference held at Col- 
 umbia, South Carolina, commencing January 11, 1821, when 
 Bishop McKendree appointed the Rev. William Capers Mis- 
 sionary in South Carolina, and to the Indians. For the deli- 
 cate and difficult work undertaken no more suitable agent 
 could have been selected than the Rev. William Capers, the 
 amiable, intelligent, and eloquent son of South Carolina. 
 Funds had to be secured to support the enterprise, and permis- 
 sion for ministers of the gospel to enter their territory and en- 
 gage in preaching and teaching among them had to be obtained 
 from the Chiefs of the Nation. The Rev. Mr. Capers applied him- 
 self diligently to the work, and he succeeded admirably in apart 
 
368 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 of the enterprise. He enlightened, and enthused the Charch on 
 the subject, and secured liberal gifts for the enterprise. He, 
 in September of the year, accompanied by E. A. Blount, a gen- 
 erous and noble Christian gentleman, and who, under a com- 
 mission for the purpose, in 1826, superintended the running 
 and marking the boundary line between Georgia and Alabama, 
 went to the town of Coweta on the Chattahoochee Kiver to lay 
 before the chiefs whom he might find there the purposes of the 
 Church in the premises, and to negotiate such articles of agree- 
 ment as would further the work. In October he made a second 
 visit to the capital town of the Nation on the Chattahoochee. 
 A National Council was held in November, and the Chiefs of 
 the Nation in Council assembled agreed that a Mission might 
 be opened in their country, and their children might be in- 
 structed in Christian civilization. Consent was given to the in- 
 troduction and prosecution of the work, but the consent was nei- 
 ther unanimous nor hearty. There was strong opposition in 
 the Creek nation to having the gospel introduced among them. 
 The Indians were opposed to any innovations upon their cus- 
 toms and habits. 
 
 In the Conference at Augusta, Georgia, on Saturday, February 
 23, 1822, "The report of the Conference Missionary was read," 
 at the conclusion of which the Conference gave their Mission- 
 ary a " unanimous vote of thanks for his indefatigable labors, 
 wisdom, prudence, and success in forming Missionary Schools 
 among the Creek Indians." The efPort was made to have two 
 Schools in the Nation. One, and the principal one, was in 
 Alabama, about one mile from the Chattahoochee Kiver, about 
 nine miles below the present city of Columbus, and was near 
 Fort Mitchell which was afterward established. The second 
 School was to be in Alabama, in the neighborhood of the town 
 of Tuckabatchee on the Tallapoosa Kiver. At the same Con- 
 ference at which the Keport of the Conference Missionary was 
 read, on the 27th of the month, it was moved by Daniel Hall 
 and seconded by William Capers, and unanimously agreed to 
 by the Conference, "that the site of our second Missionary 
 School which is to be in the neighborhood of Tuckabatchee 
 in the Creek Nation be called McKendree." 
 
 The appointments for 1822, in which and with which the ac- 
 tual work among the Creek Indians commenced, are as follows: 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 869 
 
 Indian Mission, William Capers, Superintendent, with the 
 charge of the collections. 
 
 Asbury and McKendree, Isaac Smith, Andrew Hammill. 
 
 The Kev. William Capers was the Superintendent of the Mis- 
 sion for four years, or from the beginning of 1821 till the close 
 of 1824. Then the Mission was placed as a regular appoint- 
 ment in a District, and the presiding elder was, by his official 
 relation, the Superintendent of the Mission. For 1825, 1826 
 the Kev. Samuel K. Hodges was the presiding elder of the Dis- 
 trict in which it was placed. For 1827, 1828 William Arnold 
 was the presiding elder, and for 1829 Andrew Hammill. Every 
 year during its existence two preachers were assigned to the 
 Mission. The Kev. Isaac Smith was one of the two and in 
 charge for five years. For 1823 the Kev. Daniel G. McDaniel 
 was with Mr. Smith. For 1824 the Kev. Matthew Kaiford was 
 there with him, for 1825, 1826 the Kev. Whitman C. Hill. For 
 1827, 1828 the Kev. Andrew Hammill was in charge of the 
 Mission, and the Kev. Whitman C. Hill was his colleague. For 
 1829 the Kev. Nathaniel H. Khodes was in charge of the Mis- 
 sion, with Kobert Kogers as colleague. That year closed the 
 Asbury Mission in Alabama. 
 
 W^ben the Kev. William Capers was appointed Missionary in 
 South Carolina and to the Indians he was just thirty-one years 
 old. The Kev. Isaac Smith when appointed to take charge of 
 the Asbury Mission was about sixty-three years old, and his 
 colleague, the Kev. Andrew Hammill, was about twenty-four 
 years old. These men of God, Capers, Smith, and Hammill, at 
 the beginning of 1822, entered promptly upon their work, and 
 prosecuted it with fidelity. The Superintendent, Mr. Capers, 
 emphasized the financial affairs, and with all possible dispatch 
 improved and fitted up the premises at Asbury for the proper 
 prosecution of the work proposed by the Mission. A School- 
 house was built in which Mr. Smith opened a School. It is 
 said that at the opening he received and enrolled the names of 
 twelve Indian children, and in a week he had as many more. 
 It appears that the School which was to be in the neighborhood 
 of the town of Tuckabatchee on the Tallapoosa Kiver and called 
 McKendree never formulated, and at the end of the first year 
 all trace of it, even the name, disappeared. At Savannah, 
 Georgia, on Monday morning, February 24, 1823, the Confer- 
 
370 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ence, in session, upon motion, referred Brother Hammill, Mis- 
 sionary, to the Treasurer of the Missionary Committee for set- 
 tlement of his deficiency in salary. On the Wednesday morn- 
 ing following, " Brother Smith addressed the Conference on the 
 subject of the Mission at Asbury." 
 
 That School at Asbury Station, one mile or so west of the 
 Chattahoochee Biver in Alabama, was an innovation, and pro- 
 posed radical changes in the habits of the aborigines. It pro- 
 posed to take the children of savages, who in a state of nudity, 
 and fantastically and grotesquely bedecked with the horns of 
 the ox, the tails of beasts, the feathers of owls, and the talons 
 of hawks, roamed the unbroken forest in degradation, and 
 clothe them in comely garments, which would give decency and 
 virtue, neatness and comfort, and put them in a Boarding 
 School. Upon the inauguration of the Mission a small farm 
 was opened in connection with the School, and it was kept up 
 as long as the Mission and the Boarding School continued. As 
 late as 1826 the farm was still small, there being only about 
 twenty-five acres in cultivation, and the stock of cattle on it not 
 exceeding thirty-five head. The farm was managed by a man 
 hired for the purpose. In 1825, and not until then, the Mis- 
 sionaries obtained permission to engage the Indian children in 
 manual labor. In that year the Bev. Isaac Smith, the senior 
 preacher of the Mission, obtained from the Little Prince, and 
 one of the Cusetau Chiefs liberty to teach the native children 
 to work. That order gave an impetus to matters, and the busi- 
 ness of the Mission was greatly improved. The children en- 
 gaged in the work of the farm with promptness and with cheer- 
 fulness, such as had not been anticipated. After the edict giv- 
 ing permission to employ the children in domestic labor and 
 instruct them in agriculture and the mechanical arts, there was 
 a necessity for domestic tools and manufacturing implements 
 which was not fully supplied. The boys needed carpenters* 
 tools, and the girls needed cards, wheels, and looms. Some of 
 the girls did attend to the domestic concerns of the household, 
 and some learned to knit and sew. Some of them became very 
 neat in dress. 
 
 The principal business of the School, aside from the imme- 
 diate salvation of the soul, from its incipiency to its final close, 
 was to instruct the children in the ordinary branches of educa- 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 371 
 
 tion. They were taught reading, writing, grammar, and arith- 
 metic, and many of them made gratifying advancement in 
 these studies. Many competent judges who were not associa- 
 ted with the School, but who attended the examinations of its 
 classes from time to time, expressed in high terms the excel- 
 lence of the work done in the School, and declared in emphatic 
 terms that the pupils acquitted themselves with credit. 
 
 The Mission work in the Creek Nation was, from the begin- 
 ning to the end thereof, environed by many difficulties, and 
 those who had the work in hand felt hope and fear by turns, 
 the hope of success and the fear of failure. Some of the Chiefs 
 openly opposed the admission of the Missionaries to the Nation, 
 and even the Chiefs wh6 consented to the establishment of the 
 School for their people did not pay the slightest attention to 
 the preaching of the Missionaries, or in any way give the 
 slightest encouragement thereto. The indications are that not 
 until the latter part of 1825 did a single Chief hear a single ser- 
 mon from one of the Missionaries, and not until then was there 
 even an indication of an opening for preaching to the aborig- 
 ines at large, and that indication was deceptive, the hope it in- 
 spired was never realized. On December 13, 1825, a very cold 
 day, the Bev. Isaac Smith met at the Council Square, which it is 
 supposed was at the town of Coweta, some of the Chiefs, among 
 them Little Prince, the head man of the Nation, and about fifty 
 other Indians, and he preached them a sermon, which, on ac- 
 count of the extreme cold, had to be short, after which the 
 Chiefs expressed a willingness to hear him at any time. The 
 venerable man of God took that for an omen of good, but the 
 future did not realize the good anticipated. One thing, how- 
 ever, is sure, the Bev. Mr. Smith had gained the confidence of 
 the Chiefs as to his friendship for them. The United States 
 Agent of Indian Affairs at the Agency near Asbury, Col. John 
 Crowell, had as little appreciation of preachers as the Indian 
 Chiefs had, and while he was, under the instructions of the 
 United States Government, compelled to consent to the estab- 
 lishment of the School at Asbury, and recognize its existence, 
 he did as much to hinder the preaching of the gospel as did the 
 Indian Chiefs. 
 
 In addition to the difficulties and hindrances which origina- 
 ted in the natural opposition of natives and Agent, there were 
 
372 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 37^ 
 
 feuds in the Nation, fearful commotions, constant migrations, 
 and general uncertainties, all of which militated against the 
 work of educating and evangelizing the clans. 
 
 At Indian Springs, on the twelfth day of February, one thou- 
 sand eight hundred and twenty-five, a Treaty was concluded be- 
 tween the representatives of the United States and those claim- 
 ing to represent and act for the Creek Nation, by the terms of 
 which there was ceded to the United States all the lands of the 
 Creek Nation then lying within the boundaries of the State of 
 Georgia, and all their lands then in Alabama north and west of 
 a line running from the first principal falls on the Chattahoo- 
 chee Kiver, above Coweta town, to Okfuskee Old Town, upon 
 the Tallapoosa, thence to the falls of the Coosa River, at or 
 near a place called the Hickory Ground. That Treaty was 
 signed on the part of the United States by duly authorized 
 Commissioners, and on the part of the Creek Nation by William 
 Mcintosh, Head Chief of Cowetas, and fifty-one other Chiefs, 
 and was ratified by the United States on the seventh day of 
 March, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-five, but a great 
 majority of the Chiefs and Warriors of the Creek Nation repu- 
 diated it, and protested against its execution, claiming that its 
 stipulations were void because it was signed on the part of the 
 Indians by persons having no sufiicient authority to form 
 Treaties and make cessions. A great majority protested and 
 resisted. The party protesting charged William Mcintosh, 
 Head Chief of the Cowetas, with betraying the cause of the 
 Indians, and selling out to the Georgians, and it must be con- 
 fessed that the stipulations of the Treaty, and the stipulations 
 of the articles supplemental thereto, indicate that the charges 
 made against Mcintosh were founded in truth. That Treaty 
 was in contravention of a known law of the Creek Nation. A 
 storm of indignation arose, and raged unrestrained. A party 
 of Warriors determined to avenge the injuries which they re- 
 ceived at the hands of the Head Chief of the Nation, and they 
 proceeded to the home of W^illiam Mcintosh, and killed him. 
 That did not allay the indignation, but rather intensified it. 
 Parties formed, divisions and strifes ensued. While a great 
 majority of the Nation were united against the Treaty and 
 against the men who made it, there was a Mcintosh party. 
 There were sharp contests and bitter strifes, and unhappy con- 
 
 ■ 
 
 sequences were anticipated. The situation was so fraught with 
 evil consequences that the United States Government had to 
 take steps to remove the difficulties, and arrest an intestine 
 war. A Council was called to meet in the city of Washington, 
 and on the twenty-fourth day of January, one thousand eight 
 hundred and twenty-six, a Treaty was made with the Chiefs and 
 Head Men of the Creek Nation of Indians, in which the Treaty 
 concluded at the Indian Springs, on the twelfth day of Febru- 
 ary, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-five, was declared 
 to be null and void, to every intent and purpose whatever, and 
 every right and claim arising from the same to be canceled and 
 surrendered. 
 
 It was in 1825, while the tumults created by that noted 
 Treaty, so offensive to a great majority of the Chiefs and War- 
 riors of the Nation, and which cost Mcintosh his life, were pre- 
 vailing, that the United States troops were stationed at Fort 
 Mitchell near the Asbury Mission School. 
 
 The cession of his lands to the white man was the thing 
 which the Indian most of all dreaded, and the thing which he 
 most earnestly opposed. To the aborigines the presence of the 
 white man on the borders of their lands was a constant menace, 
 and any movement which intimated the ceding of territory 
 alarmed their fears and aroused their ire. The cession of that 
 extensive district of country named for cession in the Treaty 
 consummated under the treachery of Mcintosh excited the 
 Creeks as only the alienation of home and country can excite 
 human beings. The Indian's already intense hatred of the 
 white people was intensified by that business of Treaty and ces- 
 sion, and his already existing aversion to the white people's re- 
 ligion was thereby increased, and the disabilities under which 
 the Missionaries prosecuted their work among the savages were 
 thereby greatly multiplied. 
 
 The tragic events and untoward circumstances which followed 
 the making of that fatal Treaty, for a time, diminished the 
 number of pupils in attendance upon the School at Asbury, and 
 threatened a general disaster to the Mission, but in spite of all 
 evils, the Mission survived and the work went on. The Rev, 
 Isaac Smith, the senior Missionary, became, in some way, im- 
 plicated in the complications growing out of that ever memor- 
 able Treaty, and he was thrust at by his enemies, and distressed 
 
374 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 in his feelings. It is judged that his influence with the Indians 
 was not damaged by anything he did in the premises, but that 
 his influence with the Indians was rather strengthened and 
 helped. It appears that in the investigations of the Tragedies 
 growing out of that notorious Treaty the Commissioners of 
 Georgia proposed a number of written interrogatories to the Kev. 
 Isaac Smith, and he did not answer said interrogatories as the 
 Commissioners wished him to answer, and he was charged with 
 interpolating one of the interrogatories, with untruth in answer- 
 ing another, and with evasion in answering others. The South 
 Carolina Conference, investigating the charges, found nothing 
 against him worthy of death. On December 19, 1825, just 
 twenty-five days before the Conference met which investi- 
 gated the charges against him, and while he was annoyed by 
 the very censures which the case involved, he wrote over his 
 own signature these words: "The sun is near setting with 
 me, I expect soon to be beyond the censure or praise of mor- 
 tals." 
 
 The Agent of Indian Aifairs, Colonel John Crowell, was in- 
 volved in some trouble growing out of the tragedies and polit- 
 ical questions which followed the making of that mischievous 
 Treaty. He was, in some way, through his Agency, or other- 
 wise, associated with the tragedies which occurred in the Nation, 
 and he was entangled by the strifes prevailing at the time. He 
 was exceedingly ofi'ensive to those who had charge of the Mis- 
 sion at Asbury. He was an irreligious man, and had no sympa- 
 thy with preachers, and was not disposed to tolerate their work 
 or aid their cause. In the official management of the Indian Af- 
 fairs and in his personal influence he was against the interests 
 of the Mission and against the men who had control of it just 
 as far as he could be. He made himself obnoxious, and the 
 South Carolina Conference, led by the Kev. William Capers, 
 prepared and adopted a memorial against him, and resolved to 
 furnish the Governor of Georgia with a copy of the memorial. 
 By the Conference in session on the afternoon of January 20, 
 1826, at Milledgeville, Georgia, it was " Moved and carried that 
 the Governor of this State be allowed to have a copy of Brother 
 Capers' Memorial against the Agent, Colonel John Crowell." 
 That action of the Conference, or something else, seems to have 
 had a good influence upon Colonel Crowell, for two years from 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 375 
 
 the time of that action, lacking a few days, he did, in the fol- 
 lowing certificate, give to the School faint praise: 
 
 "Ckeek Agency, January 4, 1828. 
 
 " I was present at the examination of the Indian children at 
 the Asbury Mission School, in this Nation, a few days since. 
 Several of the larger children have, in the last twelve months, 
 made considerable progress, and several smaller ones, and who 
 had been but a short time at school, surpassed my most san- 
 guine expectations, for which much credit is due to the gentle- 
 men who have charge of the institution. 
 
 John Crowell, Agent for Indian Affairs." 
 
 Colonel Crowell had not advanced further in his friendship 
 for the Mission than had the Indian Chiefs, for the Little Prince, 
 a few days later, gave the following commendation of the Mis- 
 sionaries in charge of the School: 
 
 " Creek Nation, January 8, 1828. 
 
 "I, Tustinuggee Hopaie, or Little Prince, head man of this 
 Creek Nation, certify that I reside in the immediate neighbor- 
 hood of the Asbury Missionary School, in this Nation, and so far 
 as I am informed, the conduct of those who have charge of the 
 institution has been perfectly satisfactory, and I have no cause 
 of complaint. The children seem to be satisfied, and say they 
 are kindly treated. 
 
 his 
 
 Little X Prince." 
 
 mark. 
 
 During the time the Kev. William Capers was Superintendent 
 of the Mission he visited the School at Asbury repeatedly, and 
 the children at the School, Indians though they were, treated 
 him with the tenderest affection, and made the greatest demon- 
 strations of their joy upon his arrival at the place. In Septem- 
 ber, 1823, he spent several days at Asbury, and on Sunday, the 
 twenty-first of that month, he baptized Mr. Martin, the man 
 who was hired to manage the little farm which was in connection 
 with the School, and he administered the Lord's Supper to the 
 few who would communicate, and he considered the fruits gath- 
 ered an earnest of the harvest to follow. A short time after 
 that day's service, there was, among the children under the care 
 of the School, a gracious religious awakening, and several of the 
 children gave evidence of a genuine work of grace in the soul, 
 and that interest was had with the children, notwithstanding the 
 Missionaries, up to that time, and for some time afterward, were 
 
376 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 377 
 
 not permitted to preach the Gospel to the adult Indians of the 
 tribe. 
 
 The United States troops being stationed at Fort Mitchell, 
 which was near Asbury, the Missionaries preached to them, and 
 in December, 1825, there were eleven soldiers belonging to the 
 Society at Asbury, six of whom, if no more, were born of God. 
 There were at the same time eleven Indian children belonging 
 to the Society, and three of the Indian boys at the School would 
 conduct the prayer meetings, and there in the wilderness, among 
 savages. Love-feasts and class-meetings were held. 
 
 Hardridge, a white man, born in South Carolina, but from a 
 child residing in that part of the Creek Nation, his wife, an In- 
 dian woman, together with two soldiers, were baptized on the 
 night of the eighteenth of December, 1825, at Asbury. Mr. 
 Hardridge and his wife were valuable acquisitions to the Church. 
 Tliey were deeply experienced in the things of God, were zealous, 
 worshipers, active workers, and influential persons. Brother 
 Hardridge was in great favor, as a man, with the Indians. 
 They were his people. He had grown up among them, and 
 had married one of their women. He could speak the English 
 and the Indian languages, and rendered valuable services as an 
 interpreter. The first sermon Brother Smith, the senior Mis- 
 sionary, ever preached to Chiefs and adults in the Nation was 
 interpreted by Brother Hardridge. Brother Hardridge said of 
 himself: "I am a poor ignorant creature, but God has had 
 mercy upon me. What a Saviour I have found! I am a won- 
 der unto myself." On Sunday night, March 26, 1826, in a 
 Love-feast, Sister Hardridge, Indian though she was, arose, and 
 told in her own mother-tongue, how she had been brought to 
 know the Lord, and how happy she was since she had found 
 the divine peace, never was she so happy before in her life. 
 She told how her own people laughed at her in derision, and 
 chided her with the folly of having turned Christian. In reply 
 to their jeers and taunts, she said: "Till I die, I will never quit 
 praying." 
 
 One of the Quarterly or Sacramental Meetings was held 
 April 2, 1826, and the next Sunday, April 9, four of the boys 
 belonging to the School were baptized, and received into the 
 Church. Joseph Marshal was baptized by the name of Joseph 
 Soule, Jesse Brown was baptized by the name of Jesse Lee, 
 
 Thomas Carr was baptized by the name of Thomas Coke, and 
 John Winelett was baptized by the name of John AVesley. In 
 that year the Missionaries obtained access to a few Indian 
 families. There were that year about fifty children in School, 
 but there was on the part of the children some unsteadiness, 
 and there was scarcity of clothing, which was furnished by the 
 Mission. At that time there were in the School three or four 
 Indian girls, one of w^hom was named Ann Capers, and another 
 Mary Ann Battis, who for neatness in dress and appearance 
 would equal thousands in civilized life. Henry Ferryman and 
 Samuel Mcintosh were young men, Indians, of piety and prom- 
 ise, and Daniel Asbury was an Indian lad there at the same 
 time of good name and of religious bearing. September 2, 
 1826, the time of formulating the report for the year, there 
 were present at the School above fifty pupils. The money ex- 
 pended in the interest of the mission for 1826 was $1,681.95. 
 
 Through the last three years of the Mission the greater part 
 of the congregations were Negroes, and though some of them 
 were slaves owned by the Indians, they were valuable members 
 of the Church. They could speak both the English and the 
 Indian languages, and as they could interpret they were medi- 
 ums of communication. The removal of a part of the Creek 
 tribe to the west of the Mississippi Kiver in 1827 reduced the 
 number of pupils in the School at Asbury, though there was 
 during that year a very good increase in the membership of the 
 Church in the Mission. During the year 1827 seventeen In- 
 dians and thirty-three Negroes joined the Church at the Mis- 
 sion, and six members were discontinued, nine were removed, 
 and two died. At the close of that year there were in the So- 
 ciety at that place sixty members, forty-three of them being 
 Negroes, fifteen of them being Indians, and two of them being 
 white persons. That year the Missionaries preached at the new 
 town of Columbus, about nine miles above Asbury, and formed 
 there a class of eleven white members. Another event of that 
 year was the reception of one hundred dollars ($100) from the 
 United States Government to support the Asbury School. In 
 a Treaty made at the Creek Agency, on the fifteenth day of 
 November, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-seven, and 
 which Treaty was signed in the presence of the Kev. Andrew 
 Hammill, and the Rev. Whitman C. Hill, their names being at- 
 
 w 
 
378 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 tached to the Treaty as witnesses, it was agreed to allow one 
 thousand dollars toward the support of the Asbury Station, it 
 being in the Creek Nation, and under regulations of the De- 
 partment of War. That was all the aid the Mission ever re- 
 ceived from the United States, so far as is known by the author 
 of these pages. Those in charge of the School at Asbury ap- 
 plied to the Government for aid in supporting the School, and 
 expected an annual contribution, as other Schools were being 
 helped. 
 
 During 1828 four or five members were expelled from the 
 Church for negligence, and at the close of the year there were 
 sixty-nine members in the Society, forty-three of them being 
 Negroes, twenty-four of them being Indians, and two of them be- 
 ing white persons. There were at that time over fifty children in 
 the School. It was in the fall of 1828 that Samuel Chicote, who 
 was born in the year 1819, on the Chattahoochee Eiver, in Ala- 
 bama, and was for years an able and influential preacher and 
 member of the Indian Mission Conference, Indian Territory, was 
 sent to "the Methodist Boarding School near Fort Mitchell," 
 where he remained until sometime in 1829, when he went with 
 his parents to the land west of the great Mississippi Kiver. 
 At the same time that Samuel Chicote was at the School at As- 
 bury, James McHenry, who was born on Flint Kiver, in Geor- 
 gia, possibly about 1818, but had to, under the provisions of a 
 Treaty concluded on the twenty-fourth day of January, one 
 thousand eight hundred and twenty-six, move to Alabama by 
 the first day of the succeeding January, and was loug a 
 preacher in the Indian Mission Conference, in the Indian Ter- 
 ritory, was also " at the Methodist Boarding School near Fort 
 Mitchell, in Alabama." 
 
 The Methodist women of that day at Camden, and Charleston, 
 South Carolina, and at Augusta, Georgia, bestowed much labor 
 on the Mission to the Creek Nation, they toiled with their own 
 hands and gave much alms out of their own means to clothe, 
 adorn, and civilize the Indian children gathered in the School at 
 Asbury, Alabama. Their names are not known to this author, 
 nor to many persons of this generation, but their deeds are on 
 record, and their works do live, and shall endure to all genera- 
 tions. Their kindly offices entitle them to eulogy; were their 
 names known they would adorn this page; their names are 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 379 
 
 worthy to be mentioned with the name of Phebe, who was a serv- 
 ant of the Church at Cenchrea, and with the name of Mary, 
 who bestowed much labor on the Apostle to the Gentiles, and 
 with the names of Tryphena and Tryphosa, two devoted sisters, 
 who labored in the Lord in apostolic times. 
 
 From the beginning of the Mission among the Creek Indians 
 to the close thereof the establishment was kept up at compara- 
 tively heavy expense, and with rather meager results, the pros- 
 pect never very bright, but sometimes very gloomy, and, the 
 vicissitudes being many, the embarrassments having accumula- 
 ted until they were insurmountable, at last, the inevitable was 
 accepted, and the field was abandoned. In a General Council, 
 convened at Wetumpka, the third day of January, one thousand 
 eight hundred and twenty-eight, the last vestige of the claim 
 and title of the Creek Nation to lands within the chartered lim- 
 its of the State of Georgia^ was, by stipulation, obliterated. 
 The Nation was then confined to the narrow limits of that terri- 
 tory in Alabama which had not yet been ceded to the United 
 States. That day the tribe lost hope, and became more discon- 
 tented and restless and more indifferent to religion and educa- 
 tion than ever before. The white settlers approached the very 
 borders and encroached upon the narrow limits of that reduced 
 and enfeebled tribe, and in the vicinity thereof exposed to sale 
 large quantities of intoxicants, and the savages, as much given 
 to sensuality as their white neighbors were given to avarice, be- 
 came more intemperate and indolent than they were in former 
 years. The Mission was environed by a new set of opponents. 
 The property of the Mission was in jeopardy as it had not been 
 in the past years. The cattle, poultry, and corn belonging to 
 the Mission were stolen, and it became evident that it was im- 
 possible to keep together enough of the property and products 
 of the premises to prosecute the work successfully. Under 
 these circumstances, at Columbia, South Carolina, Wednesday, 
 February 3, 1830, the South Carolina Conference being in ses- 
 sion: "It was moved and carried That the Asbury Mission es- 
 tablished among the Creek Indians be discontinued." " It was 
 then moved and carried That Brother Hammill be requested to 
 furnish the Conference at as early an hour as practicable with 
 a statement of the facts and circumstances which have led to 
 the relinquishment of the Asbury Mission." Brother Andrew 
 
380 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Ham mill made report according to request, and it was ordered 
 printed in the Advocate and Journal. The Mission among the 
 Creek Indians at Asbury, Alabama, was at an end. At the time 
 the Mission was abandoned there were connected with it as 
 members sixteen Indians, one white person, and a large number 
 of Negroes. The supposition is that these all went in the course 
 of the next few years to the lands assigned the Creeks west of 
 the Mississippi Kiver. About the last of 1836, or by that time, 
 the last of that tribe left Alabama. 
 
 The Creeks have been represented by those who were among 
 them as ignorant and superstitious, and corrupt and profligate; 
 as full of conceit and deceit. Evidently they descended from 
 fallen Adam; and many of them were no worse in any respect 
 than their civilized neighbors, and many of them have made as 
 good Christians as any of the pale faces. 
 
 The Kev. William Capers, who inaugurated the work of the 
 Gospel among the Creek Indians, and who was often at Asbury, 
 in Alabama, was a man of note and worth; who did much serv- 
 ice for the Church in various relations and in numerous fields. 
 He was the author of a Catechism, which has been recognized 
 as of superior merit; and he was the firm friend of the slaves of 
 the United States; was the founder of Missions to the slaves of 
 his native State; and was elected and consecrated a Bishop of 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, at the first General 
 Conference of that Church. He died at his home, in his native 
 State, January 29, 1855. He was buried at Columbia, in his na- 
 tive State, the very same place at which he was appointed Mis- 
 sionary in South Carolina Conference, and to the Indians. 
 
 The Rev. Isaac Smith, a native of Virginia, for three years an 
 orderly sergeant in the army under AVashington and La Fay- 
 ette, the friend and host of Bishop Asbury, and other of the 
 Bishops of the Church, for more than half a century a minis- 
 ter of the Gospel, serving the longest term at Asbury Mission 
 of any man ever connected with it, and terminating his active 
 ministry at that place, was a man of noble character, a model 
 Christian, and he made an honorable record. ** Believing every 
 word of God, meek above the reach of provocation, and thor- 
 oughly imbued with the spirit of love and devotion, he was a 
 
 saint indeed." 
 
 An incident may be related here which will relate his patriot- 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 381 
 
 ism, and which will indicate his fidelity to the ministry and his 
 constant adherence to his religion. In August, 1824, Marquis 
 De La Fayette, the friend of Washington and of American lib- 
 erty, made a visit to the United States, landing at New York, 
 and he was tendered a reception worthy of his patriotic serv- 
 ices and worthy of the country whose liberty he had helped to 
 achieve. The Senate and House of Eepresentatives of the State 
 of Alabama in General Assembly convened, at Cahawba, Ala- 
 bama, passed, by unanimous vote, a resolution, which was ap- 
 proved, December 24, 1824, as follows: "And be it further 
 Eesolved, That his excellency the Governor be requested to in- 
 vite, in such manner as he shall deem most respectful. Major 
 General La Fayette to honor the State of Alabama with a visit, 
 and in the event of his acceptance of such invitation, he be re- 
 ceived in such manner as shall best comport with the important 
 services he has rendered the American people." In pursuance 
 of the Resolution Governor Pickens invited the distinguished 
 guest of the Nation to Alabama, and the invitation was accept- 
 ed, and the visit was made. On March 31, 1825, the venerable 
 and honored La Fayette, under an escort of Georgians, halted, 
 in the midst of the Creek Nation, upon the eastern bank of the 
 Chattahoochee River, whose western side laves the soil of Ala- 
 bama. The Georgia escort delivered the hero of American lib- 
 erty, and their guest, to fifty nude and painted Creek Indian 
 warriors. The Indians, vying with the citizens of the United 
 States in the homage paid the noble Frenchman, conveyed him 
 across the river and put him down on Alabama soil. He was 
 then about one mile from the Asbury School. One of the first 
 white men to greet La Fayette when he set foot on Alabama 
 soil was the man who for three years attended him as orderly 
 sergeant, and carried messages for him while the struggle for 
 the independence of the American Colonies went on. That man 
 was the Rev. Isaac Smith, the Missionary in charge of the As- 
 bury School for the Indians. They greeted, recollected, and 
 recognized each other. There in the howling wilderness, and in 
 the presence of painted warriors and naked savages, the old com- 
 rades in arms embraced each other, and gave expression to their 
 friendship, and vent to their emotions, and the once young or- 
 derly, now a grave preacher of the Gospel and a devoted Mis- 
 sionary, prayed with and for the old Commander and patriot, 
 25 
 
n 
 
 382 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 3Iissions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 383 
 
 and with deep emotion, strong faith, and earnest petitions com- 
 mended him to the court of Heaven, and besought for him cit- 
 izenship in the kingdom of Christ, and the liberty which 
 pertains to the sons of God. How anomalous and yet how 
 appropriate all this! No event in all the course of that trium- 
 phal tour through the American continent made a deeper or 
 more lasting impression upon the old patriot than that reunion 
 of himself and the orderly sergeant of the former times, on the 
 borders of Alabama. La Fayette tarried for the day, and he 
 and Smith, the Missionary to the Indians, talked of the past 
 and the present, in sweet counsel, and in the meantime wit- 
 nessed one of those special contests and social pastimes peculiar 
 to the aborigines, a game of ball. The meeting of his old Com- 
 mander at the very spot of his missionary labors was one of the 
 unexpected pleasures which the Kev. Mr. Smith enjoyed beyond 
 description. That meeting recollected the reminiscences of the 
 past, revived his spirits, renewed his youth, strengthened his 
 patriotism, and made an epoch in his eventful life. 
 
 The Kev. Isaac Smith died in Monroe County, Georgia, at the 
 age of seventy-six, and went to his eternal home. His children 
 have honored him by religious lives. 
 
 The Kev. Andrew Hammill, a man of ability, integrity, and 
 piety, an able minister of the New Testament, a Delegate to 
 several General Conferences, and who made the last report ever 
 made of Asbury Mission, died March 22, 1835. 
 
 The Kev. Matthew Kaiford was a native of Georgia. He 
 commenced preaching in 1818, and was one of the preachers 
 appointed to Asbury Mission for 1824, at the close of that year 
 he located, and as a local preacher he was connected with the 
 Asbury Mission until it was discontinued, and he labored as a 
 local preacher at that place *' with pleasure to himself and profit 
 to others." At the time the Mission was discontinued he was 
 re-admitted to the itinerant ranks. He was punctual and faith- 
 ful. He died in liis native State, April 16, 1849. 
 
 The Kev. Whitman C. Hill was at Asbury for four years, be- 
 ginning with 1825 and closing with 1828. He married one of 
 the daughters of the Kev. Isaac Smith, the senior preacher at 
 the Mission. He w^as born in 1790, and died in 1861, and was 
 admitted into the South Carolina Conference on trial in Decem- 
 ber, 1809, all other statements to the contrary notwithstanding. 
 
 He was a man of more than ordinary ability, and achieved 
 much success in the fields he served, when there were condi- 
 tions of success. He was long on the Superannuated list. He 
 will no doubt in the last day see the gathering of the results 
 of his work at Asbury. 
 
 Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Hill, mother and daughter, the wives of 
 the missionaries whose names they bore, and related by blood 
 to the Kemberts of South Carolina and Alabama, did much 
 faithful and efficient work at the Asbury Mission. They were 
 there in all Christian meekness moderating the domestic affairs 
 of the School. The deeds of those noble women were of note, 
 and worthy of praise. Upon the Indian girls at the School they 
 bestowed great parental care, and thoroughly instructed them 
 in the domestic affairs of civilized life. They taught them to 
 cook, wash, sweep, sew, knit, and darn, etc. ; and also instructed 
 them, in so far as could be done under the surroundings, in the 
 rules of politeness and etiquette. These women succeeded in 
 giving good satisfaction to the boarders and patrons of the 
 School. They helped to prepare the moral waste, and to sow 
 the seeds of truth, and in the day when the final harvest is 
 gathered and garnered, there will be sheaves the result of their 
 sowing and culture. 
 
 In the lovely County of Kowan, in the patriotic and conserv- 
 ative State of North Carolina, in the midst of a generous and 
 hospitable people, was the home of a reputable family by the 
 name of Neely. In that home, and to that family, on January 
 13, 1802, was born a comely child, of small mold and feeble 
 frame, to whom was given the name of Kichard. From that 
 home, in a few years, Kichard was carried, by his parents, to 
 Kutherford County, in the State of Tennessee, where he grew 
 to a lad, trim and handsome. In that County, at a Camp- 
 meeting, on August 20, 1819, that lad, Kichard Neely, received 
 the renewing of the Holy Ghost, and was initiated into the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. He entered at once upon an ac- 
 tive Christian life, and his zeal increased as the field enlarged. 
 In April, 1821, he was licensed to exhort, in September follow- 
 ing, he was licensed to preach, recommended to the Annual 
 Conference as a suitable person to be admitted into the travel- 
 ing connection, and at the session of the Tennessee Conference 
 in the succeeding November, he was admitted on trial by the 
 
384 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Conference, and was sent, as junior preacher, to the Jackson 
 Circuit for the year 1822. The Tennessee Kiver was at that 
 time the line between the white settlements and the lands of 
 the Cherokee Indians where the Jackson Circuit touched that 
 river. For that year the Jackson Circuit traversed the length 
 of the Paint Rock River to its junction with the Tennessee 
 River, and with the Tennessee River as its southern boundary, 
 went up to Belle Fontte and Bolivar, and Doran's Cove. On the 
 south side of the Tennessee River opposite that Circuit then 
 lived the Cherokee Indians in full right and possession. As 
 Richard Neely served the Jackson Circuit he touched the bor- 
 ders of savage life. He fell into a place not where two seas 
 met, but where two manner of people touched side by side. 
 Silent influences often prepare the way for new developments 
 and grand results. Mere happenings, not in any way depend- 
 ent upon preconcerted plan or purpose, are often potent fac- 
 tors. The barest casualties direct and control the course of 
 human events. Fortuitous associations, associations neither 
 pre-arranged nor designed, become powerful in the inaugura- 
 tion and prosecution of even divine work. That which is 
 spontaneous is often most potent and enduring. The drift of 
 circumstances, as unforeseen as the course of the wind and the 
 drift of the clouds, often decides the fate of Empires. The 
 Apostle said, " The things which happened unto me have fallen 
 out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel." The dispensa- 
 tion of the gospel to the Cherokee Indians did not begin in pre- 
 meditated purpose and pre-arranged plan, but commenced in 
 fortuitous circumstances, accidental approximations, and inci- 
 dental associations. No one was sent to the Cherokees as a 
 preacher or Missionary. Richard Neely was sent to the Jack- 
 son Circuit, which terminated at the boundary line between the 
 civil and the savage. Richard Neely, the white man, and Rich- 
 ard Riley, the native Cherokee, met. Richard Riley lived at 
 that time twelve miles south of Fort Deposit. Fort Deposit is 
 on the Tennessee River five or six miles north-west of Gunters- 
 ville. Mr. Riley invited the Rev. Richard Neely to preach at 
 his house, and the invitation was accepted. 
 
 It was in the Spring time of 1822, just after the burning of 
 the woods, when the fresh, green grass in luxuriance was cover- 
 ing hill and dale, the wild flowers were out in variety, beauty, 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 385 
 
 and fragrance, the birds, responsive to the cheer of the season, 
 were singing in the boughs, and the deer were feeding beside 
 the rivulets which run among the hills, when the Rev. Richard 
 Neely, with the dew of youth, the zeal of apostles, and the faith 
 of martyrs, passed over the river which laved the borders of his 
 Circuit, and entered the land of savages, to proclaim to the 
 dwellers of the forest that gospel which brings to view, through 
 its light, righteousness and immortality. From that time on 
 through the Conference year. Brother Neely preached once a 
 month at the house of Richard Riley, and in the summer he, 
 assisted by the Rev. Robert Boyd, who was then junior preach- 
 er on the Limestone Circuit, all other statements to the contrary 
 notwithstanding, held a meeting there at Richard Riley's, and 
 organized a Society of thirty-three members, all natives, and 
 appointed Brother Riley class leader. That was the beginning 
 of Christian work among the Cherokee Indians in Alabama un- 
 der the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church. That 
 was the beginning of the gospel in the Cherokee Nation under 
 the ministrations of Methodism. 
 
 The work performed and the success attained by the Rev. 
 Richard Neely among the Cherokees, at Riley's, twelve miles 
 south of Fort Deposit, was reported to the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence at the session in October, 1822, and considered by the 
 Conference with marked interest. The Conference decided 
 to take under the care and supervision of its ministry those 
 whom the youthful Neely had by his labors gathered into the 
 fold, and to establish a Mission to the Indians of the Cher- 
 okee Nation in the neighborhood of Mr. Richard Riley, and 
 to provide a fund for its support; and in pursuance of said 
 purpose the appointment was made and announced for the 
 ensuing year as follows: Cherokee Mission, Andrew J. Craw- 
 ford. 
 
 The Rev. Andrew Jackson Crawford was a man of sterling 
 worth, a man of education, and of business qualities and habits, 
 a minister of gifts and grace. He was, according to the action 
 of the Conference, as a Missionary, to reside in Richard Riley's 
 neighborhood, to preach to the Indians, and instruct their 
 children. It was more than a month after the adjournment of 
 the Annual Conference before Brother Crawford reached his 
 assigned post of duty. On December 7, 1822, he reached Rich- 
 
386 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ai-cl Riley's, and was, by Mr. Riley, welcomed to the Nation as 
 a bearer of Christian tidings. A council was immediately con- 
 vened, composed of the leading natives in that part of the Na- 
 tion, to consider the question of establishing a School under the 
 direction of the newly arrived Missionary. The council recom- 
 mended the establishment of the School, and on December 30, 
 1822, the School was opened by Brother Crawford with twelve 
 children, the number soon increasing to twenty-five. Some of 
 the children made considerable progress in the elements of an 
 education. During the year there was on the j3art of some of 
 the natives considerable indifference to the School, but at the 
 time the Conference met in November, 1823, there were fifteen 
 children in the School, and the patrons made a tender of aid in 
 the erection of a boarding house, provided the Conferenc43 could 
 furnish teachers to carry on such establishment. The Rev. Mr. 
 Crawford reported more success in preaching to the natives 
 than in teaching the children. Upon his first attempts to 
 preach to the natives there was manifested decided opposition, 
 but through Mr. Riley's influence, the opposition was soon sup- 
 pressed, and at once a comfortable house to be used for preach- 
 ing was erected by the natives, and regular religious services 
 were held in it every Sunday. 
 
 On Saturday and Sunday, January 18, 19, 1823, a Quarterly 
 Meeting was held at Mr. Riley's, the Rev. Thomas Stringfield 
 attending in the place of the Rev. William McMahon, presid- 
 ing elder, and several other preachers also being present. It 
 was a time of peace and power, of unction and happiness. At 
 a love-feast, on Sabbath morning, the natives were present, par- 
 ticipating in the services to their own profit and to the delight 
 of the preachers. The Indians spoke in their own language 
 the w^onderful works of God. After the love-feast Stringfield 
 and Crawford preached, and during the services of the day 
 three Indians obtained peace in believing. 
 
 At the request of Brother Riley, the preachers on Paint Rock 
 Circuit for that year, 1823, the Rev. Greenberry Garrett, and 
 the Rev. Ambrose F. Driskell, preached at the appointment on 
 the Mission once a month, and Mr. Riley provided for paying 
 their ferriage over the Tennessee River. Upon consultation, of 
 preachers, Richard Riley, and other leading Indians in the 
 neighborhood, a resolution was reached to hold a Camp-meeting 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 387 
 
 at Riley's, and in pursuance thereof preparation was made and 
 completed, and on Thursday, July 31, 1823, the force of preach- 
 ers for the occasion met at the place, and found Richard Riley, 
 and his brother, and several other Indians in tents on the 
 ground, with due preparation for the entertainment of the 
 preachers and others. All who attended the meeting, and many 
 natives were there, some from sixty miles away, were comfort- 
 ably lodged and generously fed. When this is said it must be 
 remembered that the meeting was in the forest and among sav- 
 ages. The preachers lodged in a tent erected for their use, and 
 supplied with clean beds. The crowds of natives in attendance 
 were attentive to the word preached, it was a time of gracious 
 visitation, and, for a work among savages, grand results fol- 
 lowed. Thirty-one professed to find peace with God through 
 our Lord Jesus Christ, and tw^enty-five adults and twenty chil- 
 dren were baptized. It was difficult to close the meeting, so in- 
 tense was the interest. When, on Monday morning, the time 
 for the final adjournment of the meeting had come, and the 
 congregation was dismissed for what was intended the last 
 time, twenty or thirty of the Indians gathered in the altar, and 
 requested the preachers to tell them how to obtain the favor of 
 the Great Spirit, and be happy like those of their tribe who 
 were praising God. They listened with the profoundest atten- 
 tion while one of the preachers, through an interpreter, point- 
 ed out to them Jesus, as one with the Great Spirit, and the way 
 to heaven. The concourse of natives dispersed and returned to 
 their homes with the greatest reluctance, and one Indian, a man 
 of wealth and piety, proposed to his people to return to the 
 Camp-ground, devote their entire property to the cause, and con- 
 tinue the meeting so long as the property would furnish ade- 
 quate supplies. The revival power continued, a new Society 
 was organized at another place within the range of the Camp- 
 ground, and the Society, the only one, except the one at the 
 Camp-ground, was greatly strengthened by the work of the 
 Camp-meeting. At the close of the Conference year of 1823, 
 there were in the Mission at Rih^y's over one hundred mem- 
 bers, and among them were two native exhorters, of fine ability, 
 Gunter and Brown. Brown was a young man of good English 
 education, and a fluent interpreter. He possessed unction, and 
 was full of missionary fire. This was a grand change which 
 
i 
 
 388 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 389 
 
 liad come to a people who awhile ago were in a state of savage 
 darkness, starless, rayless, and hopeless. 
 
 At the close of the first year of the Cherokee Mission thjere 
 were a number of children who had been to the School who 
 could write a fair hand, and who could read the word of God. 
 Certainly that was a wonderful attainment for one year. The 
 entire expenditure of money for the Mission the first year of 
 its existence did not exceed two hundred dollars. 
 
 The work was enlarged for 1824, and the Eev. Thomas L. 
 Douglass was appointed Conference Missionary and Superin- 
 tendent of Indian Missions, and the Kev. Eichard Neely was 
 appointed to Lower Cherokee Mission, and the Kev. Nicholas 
 D. Scales was appointed to Upper Cherokee Mission. The 
 work of the Kev. Thomas L. Douglass, under the appointment 
 which he had, was to travel through the bounds of the Tennes- 
 see Conference, form Missionary Societies, as branches of the 
 Auxiliary Society of the Conference, collect funds, superintend 
 the Missions, and visit such parts of the field as were most con- 
 venient and as he judged most important. The Upper Chero- 
 kee Mission did not touch Alabama. The point at which the 
 Rev. Nicholas D. Scales was stationed was at Koss's Post Of- 
 fice, or near it, at Mr. Coody's, and about one hundred miles 
 from Kichard Kiley's. Mr. Coody had been changed by grace, 
 and had the gospel preached in his house, was a good exhorter, 
 and a leader among his people, and had voluntarily offered to 
 contribute one hundred dollars annually for the support of the 
 Mission. The Lower Cherokee Mission to which the Kev. 
 Kichard Neely was assigned was the Mission in Kichard Kiley's 
 neighborhood. There Brother Neely preached and taught, but 
 he also made preaching tours to adjoining neighborhoods. At 
 the close of the year there were in the Lower Cherokee Mission 
 a membership of one hundred and eight Indians and forty-three 
 Negroes, and in the Upper Cherokee Mission eighty-one In- 
 dians and twenty Negroes. At the session of the Conference in 
 the latter part of 1824, the amounts necessary for the Mission- 
 aries for the ensuing year were estimated and fixed at three 
 hundred and fifty dollars for Missionaries with families, and 
 one hundred and fifty dollars for Missionaries without families. 
 A contingent fund of one hundred dollars for the Missions was 
 also allowed. 
 
 The religious interest among the Cherokees having deepened 
 and widened, the work, for 1825, though no Superintendent was 
 appointed to it for that year, was still further enlarged, and 
 three men were assigned to the field. The Kev. Nicholas D. 
 Scales was assigned to Upper Cherokee Mission, which was the 
 School at Coody's near Koss's Post Office, and the same work he 
 had the year just closed. The Kev. Isaac W. Sullivan was ap- 
 pointed to Middle Cherokee Mission, which was the School at 
 Kichard Kiley's. These two Missionaries, Scales and Sullivan, 
 were to devote themselves to the work of teaching the children 
 the ordinary literary branches. They could preach as oppor- 
 tunity offered and occasion required. 
 
 The Kev. Kichard Neely was appointed to Lower Cherokee 
 Mission. He was not to take charge of a School, but he was to 
 preach. He was to organize in the Nation and supervise a reg- 
 ular Circuit, a work which hitherto had not been attempted in 
 a heathen land, and among wild men of the woods. Ever zeal- 
 ous, active, and aggressive, he had resolved to devote his life to 
 the religious awakening and salvation of the Cherokee Indians. 
 He went regular rounds on a Circuit in the Nation, employing 
 all his time in preaching, just as did Methodist preachers 
 among the white people in Tennessee, Alabama, and other 
 States, leaving the work of teaching the children to cipher, 
 read, and write to others. The most of his Circuit was in Ala- 
 bama, though the entire Nation was before him, and there was 
 not a rival in all the field. There was nothing to arrest his 
 march or to circumscribe his operations from Wills Creek to 
 within the chartered limits of North Carolina. He had as es- 
 tablished points from which to operate the Society at Kiley's 
 and two others in the regions thereabout, and the Society at 
 Coody's. The following lines encompassed his Circuit: A line 
 from Chickasaw Island in the Tennessee Kiver to the junction 
 of Wills Creek and the Coosa Kiver, the Coosa Kiver to the 
 junction of Etowah and the Oostanaula, from the junction of 
 these rivers to the point of Lookout Mountain, where Chatta- 
 nooga now is, from there the Tennessee Kiver to Chickasaw 
 Island. He preached anywhere he could gather a congregation 
 in the bounds of that territory, and he would have gone further 
 but it was physically impossible, and anywhere he was was 
 home, and the spot of ground where night overtook him in the 
 
390 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 journey was liis bed. He was, for Christ's sake, a rover amoDg 
 savages, and, for Christ's sake, he adopted the style of life pe- 
 culiar to that wuld tribe, and, for Christ's sake, he accepted the 
 people as his people. He married one of the natives, a Miss 
 McNair; a woman of education. 
 
 For 1826 the appointments in the Cherokee Mission were: 
 Kewtown, Francis A. Owen; Gunter's, Ambrose F. Driskill; 
 Wills Yalley, Eichard Neely. That management was about the 
 same as the year before, except a change in the name of the ap- 
 pointments and a change in two of the preachers. The Rev. 
 Eichard Neely was continued in the same work and on the 
 Circuit, and he reached his appointment on his return from 
 Conference on Sunday, December 4, 1825, and was- received by 
 the native Christians with demonstrations of intense pleasure, 
 and earnest declarations of their confidence in him and love for 
 him. The Indians w^ere much attached to those in whom they 
 confided. They were as good as the sinners of other branches 
 of the human family, the}' did good to those who did good to 
 them, xls late as March 10, 1826, which was a very rainy and 
 disagreeable Friday, Brother Neely had not obtained any one 
 to travel with him and interpret for him, and at that date was 
 without prospect of such assistance, but nevertheless he had 
 filled all his appointments. Notwithstanding that winter was 
 very cold, and the preparation for comfort was very meager on 
 the part of most of those denizens of the forest, the Missionary 
 had considerable congregations of worshipers, and while not 
 many new adherents were added to the Societies, the Christians 
 had seasons of rejoicing, and grew in the knowledge of divine 
 things, and developed a true concern for the salvation and hap- 
 piness of others. The outlook for the work was encouraging, 
 the prospect for good promising. One of the stopping-places 
 for Brother Neely on the Wills Valley Circuit in the Cherokee 
 Nation was Brother Coody's. There have been some variations 
 in the orthography in waiting the name of the Eev. Eichard 
 Neely. The orthography found in his own communications has 
 been followed in these pages. 
 
 The year 1826 closed the effective work of the Eev. Eichard 
 Neely. At the session of the Conference which commenced 
 November 28, 1826, being broken down in health, and unable 
 longer to perform the full amount of labor which a pastoral 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 391 
 
 charge required, and unable to endure longer the exposure inci- 
 dent to the field in which his lot was cast, he was granted the 
 relation of a supernumerary preacher, and in that relation his 
 name was attached to the Jackson Circuit, which was in prox- 
 imity to the Cherokee Nation and the Missions therein, and he 
 continued to live in the Indian country, and he expended the 
 fragment of strength which was left to him in preaching to the 
 natives among whom he had introduced the glorious gospel of 
 the blessed God. At the Conference at Tuscumbia, Alabama, 
 in November, 1827, he was placed in the list of superannuated 
 preachers, just before which he preached his last sermon, a 
 farewell sermon to the Cherokees, whom he loved as his own 
 soul, and for whom he expended his strength, exhausted his 
 health, and had sacrificed his life. His last sermon was 
 preached in great weakness, in much suffering, and in many 
 tears. In January, 1828, he was carried a journey of four days, 
 to Dr. Wright's, near Knoxville, Tennessee, in search of med- 
 ical aid, where in February ensuing, he died of consumption. 
 His intense interest in and his zeal for the elevation and salva- 
 tion of the Cherokees was shown to the last day of his earthly 
 sojourn. His estimate of the states on the different sides of 
 the line which separates the visible and the invisible w^as given 
 in his last audible words on this side of the line: "Heaven is a 
 better place than this." Though he lived among and preached 
 to the savages of the Cherokee tribe, he lived, and preached, 
 and died amidst grand scenes and inspiring surroundings. Be- 
 side the majestic and gracefully bending Tennessee Eiver and 
 in sight of the lofty Lookout Mountain he lifted up an ensign 
 to the heathen and proclaimed to listening mortals him who 
 "by his strength setteth fast the mountains; being girded with 
 power;" and who "cutteth out rivers among the rocks," and 
 whose "eye seeth every precious thing." The name of the Eev. 
 Eichard Neely shall live so long as self-denial is practiced, phi- 
 lanthropy is appreciated, and the history of the gospel among 
 the aborigines of Alabama is known. 
 
 The work was still further enlarged for 1827. The only man 
 retained in the work for that year who had been previously en- 
 gaged in it was the Eev. Francis A. Owen. He was returned to 
 Newtown. The Eev. George W. Morris was sent to Gunter's. 
 The Eev. William P. Nichols was appointed to Coosewattee. 
 
392 
 
 History of Method ism in Alabama, 
 
 These three appointmeuts were Schools. The Key. James J. 
 Trott was appointed to Wills Valley Circuit, and the Rev. 
 Turtle Fields, a native Cherokee, was appointed to travel and 
 preach in the Nation, under the direction of the Superintend- 
 ent, or the presiding elder of the Huntsville District, the Eev. 
 William McMahon. 
 
 Coosewattee was in Georgia. 
 
 In the latter part of May, 1827, Owen and Trott were report- 
 ed in good health and fine spirits, and Fields, the native Cher- 
 okee, was at that time reported as having great success, God 
 being with him in truth and power. During the preceding 
 months of the Conference year more than one hundred natives 
 had been received into the Church on trial, and the old mem- 
 bers were steadfast in the faith, and were walking steadily in 
 the way of life. Three Camp-meetings were held in the Nation 
 during that year, and there were added at least two hundred 
 and seventy-five members. There was perceptible improve- 
 ment in the condition of the people throughout the Nation; 
 they were adopting the habits of civilized life. As the Indians 
 learned the gospel, believed in Christ, and were allied to God 
 they abandoned, so far as they could, their wild state in the 
 woods, left off praying to water-falls, snakes, and clouds, en- 
 larged their cabins, improved their habitations, and made pro- 
 vision against nakedness, hunger, and cold. 
 
 The appointments for 1828 for Cherokee Mission: Wills Val- 
 ley, Greenberry Garrett; Oostaknahla, Turtle Fields (a native 
 Cherokee); Echota, James J. Trott; Ooithkellogee, G. T. Hen- 
 derson; Creek Path, John B. McFerrin; Chatooga, Allen F. 
 Scruggs; Salakowa, Dickson C. McLeod. 
 
 During the year 1828 Bishop William McKendree made a 
 tour through the Cherokee Nation and profoundly impressed 
 the men of the Nation with whom he came in contact. It was 
 estimated at that time that there were in the Cherokee Nation 
 about fifteen thousand souls, and the three Circuits then exist- 
 ing and to which preachers were assigned extended over about 
 half of the territory then belonging to the Cherokees in their 
 ancient domain, and there were about seven hundred members 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the three Circuits; about 
 three hundred and forty-five of these members were in Alabama. 
 There were four Schools, two of them organized that year, and 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 393 
 
 there were about one hundred pupils in the four Schools, and 
 some of these pupils had attained proficiency in English Gram- 
 mar. At one of the Schools there was a Tract and Sunday 
 School Society. In the month of September, 1828, there were 
 three Camp-meetings held in the Nation, at which good order 
 prevailed, and many natives received the renewing of the Holy 
 Ghost, and Christians rejoiced and were intensely happy. The 
 Cherokee Christians at that time were orderly, and were 
 perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same 
 judgment, and were not behind in any of the ordinary gifts of 
 the Spirit, and they were enriched in utterance and knowledge. 
 They were pious in heart and blameless in life. There were, 
 however, a few cases of apostasy, and some had to be expelled. 
 There were, in that year of grace, two licensed preachers and 
 nine licensed exhorters among the native Cherokees, all men of 
 marked piety, and men who labored zealously for the salvation 
 of their people, and who exerted a good influence wherever they 
 
 went. 
 
 The amount collected for Missions in the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence during 1828 was three hundred and fifty-six dollars, of 
 which sum the two Missionary Societies in Alabama, Huntsville 
 and Courtland, paid one hundred and twenty-one dollars, Hunts- 
 ville sixty-one and Courtland sixty. At Murphreesborough, 
 Tennessee, December, 1828, the Tennessee Conference being in 
 session, there was held a Missionary Anniversary, the great 
 theme of discussion and the sole subject of interest being the 
 Cherokee Mission. Three native Cherokees took an active part 
 in the exercises of the Anniversary. These three natives were 
 John Fletcher Boot, Turtle Fields, and Edward Gunter. Boot 
 was a full blood Cherokee, and when baptized was given the 
 name of John Fletcher, was a man of considerable talents, and 
 a licensed preacher, and made an efiicient itinerant preacher. 
 At that Anniversary Boot delivered a speech in his native 
 tongue on the subject of Missions and religion among his peo- 
 ple. The speech was interpreted by Edward Gunter, who was 
 a half blood Indian, and a man of deep piety, and a licensed ex- 
 horter; and who was a soldier with General Andrew Jackson, 
 and was at the famous battle of the Horse Shoe, on the Talla- 
 poosa River. Gunter also made a speech at the Anniversary on 
 the subject of religion among the Cherokees. Turtle Fields 
 
39^ 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 made a good speech on the same subject. He was an eminent 
 Chief, a man of deep piety and of holy power. He was a long 
 while a preacher, and quite useful and successful in the itiner- 
 ant ministry. These three men made a deep impression on the 
 white persons who attended that Missionary Meeting. 
 
 The appointments for 1829 were as follows: Wills Valley and 
 Oostanaula, John B. McFerrin; Coosewattee, Turtle Fields; 
 Mount Wesley and Asbury, D. C. McLeod; Chatooga, Green- 
 berry Garrett; Salakowa, Nicholas D. Scales; Neely's Grove, 
 Allen F. Scruggs; Conesauga, Thomas J. Elliott; James J. 
 Trott, General Missionary to travel through the Nation. 
 
 The work for the year commenced with encouraging prospects 
 alike for the increase of intelligence and stability among the 
 members, and additions to their numbers, and the increase of 
 the Schools in numbers and efficiency, and an increase of the 
 funds to carry on the work. All the good which was anticipa- 
 ted in the beginning of the year was realized by the close. The 
 work in the Schools flourished. The members of the Church 
 prospered and there were additions to their numbers. Eleven 
 hundred and fifty dollars and eighty cents was the sum collect- 
 ed in the bounds of the Conference during the year for Missions; 
 and at the Anniversary held in the Methodist Church at Hunts- 
 ville, Alabama, November 23, 1829, the above sum was added 
 to by a contribution from the congregation for Missions of one 
 hundred dollars. There were a number of Cherokee Christians 
 present at that meeting, giving interest to the occasion and new 
 life to the cause. 
 
 The Eev. William McMahon was connected with the work 
 among the Cherokees, being presiding elder, from the beginning 
 of that work in 1822 to the close of 1829; and he held Quarter- 
 ly Meetings and from one to three Camp-meetings every year 
 in the Nation from the time of the first appointment of a preach- 
 er to that work until the close of his presiding eldership there. 
 
 The field was filled for 1830 by the following appointments: 
 Superintendent of the Cherokee Mission, Francis A. Owen; 
 Wills Valley, Dickson C. McLeod, Spear, interpreter. Boot; 
 Conesauga, G. M. Rogers, Young Wolfe, E. Graves, interpreter; 
 Valley Town, Robert Rogers, W. Mcintosh, interpreter. Turtle 
 Fields; Chatooga, Joseph Miller; Mount Wesley and Asbury, 
 J. J. Trott; Coosewattee, Jacob Ellinger, Joseph B. Bird, in- 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 395 
 
 terpreter; Selacoa, Greenberry Garrett; Agency, William M. 
 McFerrin; Lookout, Nicholas D. Scales. 
 
 The men w^ho entered upon the Mission work among the 
 Cherokee Indians in the beginning of 1830 found the condition 
 of that people much improved in many respects. It is true 
 that they had not as a people, abandoned altogether their sav- 
 age habits and barbarous customs, nor had they formally re- 
 nounced their peculiar superstitions, but many of them had 
 built for themselves comfortable houses, and had productive 
 fields about them, and had attained some tolerable knowledge 
 of handicraft and useful implements, and had donned habili- 
 ments which gave comfort, inspired cleanliness, and protected 
 virtue. Many of the young Indians had a thirst for knowledge 
 and learning, and many children were seeking places in. the 
 Schools taught by the Missionaries. The then principal Chief 
 of the Nation, Mr. John Ross, had, on the north bank of the 
 beautiful Coosa River between the mouth of Wills Creek and 
 the junction of the Etowah and the Oostanaula Rivers, a dwell- 
 ing house equal in style to the houses owned and occupied by 
 men of enlightened habits and ample fortunes, and his dwell- 
 ing was surrounded by well cultivated fields. Mr. Ross was a 
 man of splendid talents and brilliant attainments, and owned 
 and used to profit a well selected library. He was a member 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and was a zealous worker 
 and an influential leader in the divine cause. At the home of 
 Mr. Ross, on the Coosa River, there was a house of worship, 
 and a Society of native Christians. An officer of the United 
 States Government, who, with a small party of United States 
 soldiers, visited the Cherokee country in 1830- to quell some dis- 
 turbances which had arisen through the intrusions of some 
 white men in the Nation, and who in the discharge of the com- 
 mission with which he was invested visited Mr. Ross, the prin- 
 cipal Chief, has given an account of a religious service which 
 he witnessed on the Sunday of his arrival at the home of the 
 Chief. The officer attended the services upon the invitation of 
 Mr. Ross. There were present about fifty Indians, who were 
 dressed much after the manner of white people, and in gar- 
 ments of their own manufacture. There were at and partici- 
 pating in that service two regularly ordained preachers of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, one a full blood Indian, and the 
 
398 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 other one-fourth white. The service was conducted in the 
 Cherokee language according to the order of service used by 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church. The hymns sang by the con- 
 gregation were in the Cherokee language, having been trans- 
 lated from the English, and the tunes were English. Hymn 
 Books printed in Cherokee were used on that occasion, so says 
 the reporter, and nearly all the congregation participated in the 
 singing. The Scriptures were read, a sermon was preached, 
 and exhortations were delivered after the style of the Metho- 
 dists of the time. The congregation was orderly, attentive, and 
 devout. Christ was owned in the wilds of the Cherokee Na- 
 tion, and worshiped in the tongue of the savage tribe, and the 
 wilderness and the solitary place were made gla'd. 
 
 One School, if no more, was organized in the Nation in the 
 beginning of 1830, and one new Circuit was made at the same 
 time. The Coosewattee School had twenty-seven children be- 
 ginning in the alphabet, not one of whom could speak English. 
 The Superintendent, the Rev. Francis A. Owen, changed the 
 work of Joseph B. Bird, and appointed him to teach the School 
 at Coosewattee, as he could speak and interpret both the Eng- 
 lish and Cherokee languages. The Yalleytown Circuit, which 
 lay among the lofty mountains and romantic and sublime 
 scenes within the chartered limits of North Carolina, was or- 
 ganized that year and traveled by the Rev. Greenberry Garrett, 
 William Mcintosh being his interpreter, and the Rev. Turtle 
 Fields, one of the Chiefs of the Nation. During that year there 
 were five Schools and five Circuits in the Nation, and one hun- 
 dred and forty-four children were connected with the Schools, 
 some learning the letters and syllables, some spelling, some 
 reading, some studying geography, some arithmetic, and some 
 English Grammar. There were Schools at Mount Wesley and 
 Asbury Stations, and at Asbury, a brother Crutchfield, a resident 
 of the Nation, and a volunteer teacher, working at his own ex- 
 pense, and without compensation, was teaching, with fifteen 
 children under his instruction. The most advanced pupils in 
 all the Nation were at Lookout. Including a few interpreters, 
 there were employed in 1830 in the work in the land of the 
 Cherokees, seventeen Missionaries. William M. McFerrin was 
 at the Agency, and had sixty additions to the Society there. 
 The Second Quarterly Meeting on Wills Yalley Circuit was 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 397 
 
 held for three days, beginning Friday, April 30, and was an 
 occasion of profound interest. Favorable reports were made 
 from the different Societies of the Circuit, and Boot, the na- 
 tive preacher on the work, was doing acceptable work among 
 his kindred and for his tribe. At that Quarterly Meeting the 
 natives camped on the ground, and the work was marvelous, 
 not so much for its extent as its thoroughness and profound- 
 ness. There was a noted case, a young Indian from the wilds 
 of Arkansas, who previously knew nothing of salvation, even as 
 a theory, was wrought upon in a marvelous manner and con- 
 verted, and he and six others joined the Church. At a Quar- 
 terly Meeting, just after the one for Wills Valley Circuit, held 
 at Chattooga, a marvelous work was witnessed. Two women, 
 one seventy and the other nearly ninety years old, joined the 
 Church, and a man eighty years old, named Bonecracker, was 
 changed in heart, and united with the Church, producing a 
 sensation wide sweeping. The work throughout the Cherokee 
 Nation that year was thorough and profound. The Nation was 
 stirred with a religious awakening. There have been more ex- 
 tensive ingatherings in other years among other peoples than 
 was had that year among the Cherokees, but there was never a 
 more profound work and thorough renovation anywhere than 
 was witnessed among that people of the woods. In many in- 
 stances the aborigines packed their victuals to the places of 
 meetings, and remained on the ground throughout the entire- 
 services of from three to four and more days. A part of the 
 work done in the midst of heathen superstitions was the Sun- 
 day-school work. There were in the Cherokee Nation duriug- 
 1830, three flourishing Sunday-schools, in which sixty children 
 were instructed in the Holy Scriptures. Twenty-three hundred 
 and eighty-seven dollars and twelve and a half cents were ex- 
 pended in the support of the Missions in the Cherokee Nation 
 for the year 1830. The Cherokees, when inducted into the di- 
 vine mysteries were loving, generous, and benevolent. They 
 desired a dissemination of divine truth. At Mount Wesley, in 
 the Nation, a Missionary Society was established called the 
 Branch Missionary Society of the Cherokee Nation, auxiliary 
 to the Tennessee Conference Missionary Society, and from that 
 Society of the Cherokee Nation was forwarded to the Missionary 
 Society of the Tennessee Conference at its Anniversary held on 
 26 
 
398 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 the evening of November 9, 1830, twenty-three dollars, accom- 
 panied by an interesting address from Mr. W. S. Adair, a na- 
 tive of the Cherokee Nation. The little children of that be- 
 nighted land cast in their mites to swell that sum sent as a gift 
 to the treasury of the Church. That benevolence of the con- 
 verts from heathenism to Christianity was of the spirit of the 
 gospel, was in accord with the commission of Christ, and was a 
 rebuke to many who boasted of superior advantages and intel- 
 ligence. 
 
 The Cherokee Mission was kept up continuously by the Ten- 
 nessee Conference until the close of 1834, when it was discon- 
 tinued by that Conference, the great body of the Indian mem- 
 bers outside of the bounds of the Holston Conference emigrated 
 west, and those remaining in the Holston Conference were 
 turned over to that Conference. By the close of 1838 the pro- 
 vision for the emigration of the last of the Cherokees was com- 
 plete, and the last Indian preacher was transferred from Hol- 
 ston to Arkansas. From the close of 1830 the membership 
 steadily decreased, and the field contracted, not because the In- 
 dians were less interested in the gospel than formerly, not be- 
 cause the membership apostatized, not because the Missionaries 
 engaged in the work were not efficient and faithful, but be- 
 cause many emigrated to the Cherokee possessions west of the 
 Mississippi River. At the close of 1830 there were one thou- 
 sand and twenty-eight Indian members in that Mission, which 
 was the largest number ever reported in the Cherokee Nation 
 under the supervision of the Tennessee Conference. The work 
 was all the while most successful in that part of the Nation 
 v^ithiu the chartered limits of Alabama, and the smallest results 
 v^ere attained in that part of the Nation within the chartered 
 limits of North Carolina. The Wills Yalley Circuit was the 
 first and the strongest in the Nation. When the Cherokee 
 Mission was discontinued by the Tennessee Conference at the 
 close of 1834, there were five hundred and eight Indian and 
 seventeen Negro members then in the bounds of their ancient 
 
 domain. 
 
 Some of the preachers engaged in the work among the Chero- 
 kees were there a number of years, others were there only one 
 or two years. Ambrose F. Driskill, John Wesley Hanna, Uriah 
 Williams, Frederick G. Ferguson, and Hiram M. Glass were 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 399 
 
 each there only one year. Driskill and Ferguson were as teach- 
 ers and were not in charge of Circuits. 
 
 The Rev. James J. Trott, after being an itinerant preacher in 
 the Tennessee Conference eight or nine years, and preaching to 
 the Cherokee Indians for about five years, withdrew from the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church and joined the followers of the 
 Rev. Alexander Campbell He married a woman of the Cher- 
 okee tribe. 
 
 The Rev. Turtle Fields was the first Cherokee Indian ever 
 employed as an itinerant preacher under the auspices of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. In December, 1826, he was 
 named in the Minutes of the Conference as employed to travel 
 and preach in the Nation under the direction of the Superin- 
 tendent of the Cherokee Mission. At Tuscumbia, Alabama, in 
 November, 1827, he was admitted on trial in the Tennessee 
 Conference, and at the end of two years he was admitted into 
 full connection and was ordained a deacon, and in the on-going 
 of matters he was ordained an elder. He was a member of the 
 Tennessee Conference, serving his own tribe as an itinerant 
 preacher, until the close of 1834, when he was transferred to the 
 Holston Conference. At the Holston Conference in October, 
 1835, he was put down on the Minutes as transferred to the 
 Alabama Conference; it is, however, probable that he never had 
 any official relation to the Alabama Conference, as at the close 
 of 1836 he appeared again as a member of the Holston Confer- 
 ence. In the fall of 1837 he was transferred to the Arkansas 
 Conference, and at the close of 1839 he located. He was phys- 
 ically well made: tall and strong, and in the days before his 
 adherence to the Christian religion, he was a warrior and he 
 proved himself a hero. He was a solr'.i^r under General Andrew 
 Jackson in the war with the Creek Indians. He was an earnest 
 man, a good and successful preacher. He did much hard work 
 in his day. 
 
 The Rev. Dixon C. McLeod, born in Anson County, North 
 Carolina, March 13, 1802; admitted on trial in the Tennessee 
 Conference November, 1823; and died April 10, 1840 ; spent 
 five years of his ministry, beginning with 1828 and ending with 
 1832, among the red men of the forest. His only work in Ala- 
 bama was among the Cherokee Indians. He was one year on 
 the Wills Valley Circuit, and two years he was Superintendent 
 
p%^ 
 
 \ 
 
 400 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama. 
 
 401 
 
 of the Cherokee Mission, in which position he swept the whole 
 field, which extended from Wills Creek, in Alabama, to the 
 lofty mountains and majestic scenes in North Carolina. In the 
 discharge of his duties to the sons of the forest he endured 
 manacles, indignities, and maltreatment. " Upon one occasion, 
 because of his attachment to his work and his devotion to the 
 interests of the people whom he served, he was arrested by the 
 pretended officers of justice, and deprived of his own horse, and 
 dragged on foot a distance of seventy or eighty miles as a prison- 
 er." He was thus treated, not by the reputed savages, not by 
 the Indians, but by the white people of a State which boasted 
 of civilization. 
 
 The Cherokees were recognized as a Nation, and were by Treaty 
 stipulations under the protection of the United States of America, 
 and were to be secured in the possession of the country occupied 
 by them, they were to be secured against the intrusions of all 
 white persons whatsoever. The Treaty stipulations provided 
 that if any citizen of the United States, or other person not an 
 Indian, should settle on any of the Cherokees' lands, such per- 
 son thereby forfeited the protection of the United States, and 
 the Cherokees might punish him or not, as they pleased. 
 Georgia became impatient of the presence of the Indians within 
 her chartered limits, and undertook to extend her jurisdiction 
 over the lands owned and occupied by the Cherokees. Colli- 
 sions between Governments ensued. The Cherokee Nation re- 
 sisted the encroachments of Georgia. The United States, true 
 to Treaty obligations with the Indians, undertook to restrain 
 the State of Georgia from intrenching upon the Cherokees, and 
 the State of Georgia resisted the authority of the United States. 
 The conflict was sharp, the contest strong, the excitement in- 
 tense. The people of Georgia determined by any means, dis- 
 honorable or otherwise, to get rid of the Indians, and they be- 
 came embittered against the preachers of the gospel, the Mission- 
 aries to the Cherokees, and accused them of giving the Indians 
 such advice and exerting over them such an influence as ob- 
 structed the furtherance of the plans of Georgia in the politi- 
 cal purposes involved, and the Legislature of the State passed 
 laws the purpose of which was to expel the Missionaries from 
 the Cherokee Nation. The Missionaries could not desist from 
 preaching the gospel because Georgia had the audacity to en- 
 
 act laws detrimental to their work. The Missionaries could not 
 aftbrd to abandon the work of preaching the gospel to a Nation 
 because the State of Georgia disregarded the national compact, 
 and the fidelity of the United States to treaty stipulations, and 
 interposed laws in conflict with such compact and such stipula- 
 tions. It is history that the State of Georgia arrested the Mis- 
 sionaries, the men who preached the gospel to the Cherokees, 
 and harassed men, whose only crime was that of doing good, 
 with criminal prosecutions. It is history that the State of Geor- 
 gia confined in the Penitentiary at hard labor the Rev. S. A. 
 Worcester, and the Rev. Elizur Butler, two Missionaries to the 
 Cherokee Nation in the employment of the American Board of 
 Commissioners of Foreign Missions. In a Court convened by 
 authority of the State of Georgia, and on September 15, 1831, 
 these two men were convicted of violating a law which de- 
 manded that all white men who were found residing on Chero- 
 kee lands within the chartered limits of Georgia after a certain 
 date, without having taken the oath of allegiance to the State 
 of Georgia, should be imprisoned in the Penitentiary at hard 
 labor for four years. These men believed that as Missionaries 
 to the Nation, preaching the gospel to the Indians, they were 
 not under any obligations to take an oath of allegiance to the 
 State of Georgia, and the interpretations of the United Sta'>es 
 of her obligations to the Treaty stipulations with the Indians, 
 and the course of the United States Government in the prem- 
 ises justified these men in this belief, and as the law was doubt- 
 less enacted simply for the expulsion from the Nation of the 
 Missionaries, and to terminate their ministry to the Indians they 
 refused to obey the law. They suffered, and gloried in a dis- 
 pensation of suffering. It was under that sort of administra- 
 tion that the Rev. Dixon C. McLeod was arrested, dismounted, 
 and dragged seventy or eighty miles, and abused and beaten ! He 
 would better have fallen into the hands of savages. He man- 
 aged, however, to escape the Penitentiary, and resume his work 
 in preaching the gospel of peace to the men of the woods. 
 
 Boot was a Cherokee, without taint of blood, born in the an- 
 cient land of his fathers. He was a leader among his people, a 
 warrior, and a patriot. He knew and spoke only the Cherokee 
 Language. He was ever true to whatever cause he espoused. 
 About the year 1827, when he was about thirty-four years of 
 
402 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Missions to the Indians in Alabama, 
 
 403 
 
 age, he was baptized into the Christian religion, receiving the 
 name of John Fletcher, and was admitted into the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, by the Kev. William McMahon. Some time 
 in 1829 he was licensed to preach, and was employed by the Su- 
 perintendent, on the Wills Valley Circuit, for the ensuing year; 
 and in November, 1830, he was admitted on trial in the Tennes- 
 see Conference. His name was printed wrong in the General 
 Minutes, when it was put down among those received on trial. 
 It was printed Jolm R Buriium, when it should have been Boot. 
 His full name was John Fletcher Boot. For 1832 he was a<rain 
 on Wills Valley Circuit. At Nashville, Tennessee, November 
 11, 1832, having been received into full connection in the Con- 
 ference, he was ordained a deacon, by Bishop James O. Andrew, 
 and he was returned to Wills Valley Circuit for the next year. 
 At Lebanon, Tennessee, November 8, 1834, he was ordained an 
 elder, by Bishop James O. Andrew, and was transferred to the 
 Holston Conference. In the fall of 1838 he went to the home 
 of the Cherokees West of the Mississippi Eiver, and was trans- 
 ferred to the Arkansas Conference. In his native land and in 
 his native tongue he preached the gospel and administered the 
 Christian Sacraments. For about ten years he ranged over the 
 mountains and through the valleys of his native land to give to 
 his benighted people the everlasting truth and redeem them 
 from the superstitions of heathenism. He was a grand preacher. 
 He grasped the subject in hand with master mind, and with a 
 sublimity and majesty seldom surpassed he uttered gospel truth 
 and poured forth appeals which were absolutely irresistible. 
 He died in the itinerant work, true and devoted through all the 
 years of his ministry. He gave also special attention to the 
 civil interests of his people. He was a member of the Indian 
 Mission Conference at the time of his death, and filling a Cir- 
 cuit, and at the same time a member of the Executive Council 
 of the Nation. He was on his way to an appointment to preach 
 when the summons of death met him. He died at his post, Au- 
 gust 8, 1853. 
 
 AtHuntsville, Alabama, in November, 1829, William Mcintosh, 
 a native Cherokee, then about thirty-three years of age, and 
 fluent in the use of the English language, as well as in his na- 
 tive Cherokee, was appointed as interpreter for the Missionaries 
 in the field. About a year previous to that time he had been 
 
 renewed in nature and inducted into the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. He continued to interpret for the Missionaries in his 
 native land until 1834, when he emigrated to the home of the 
 Cherokees west of the Mississippi River. He continued to in- 
 terpret for the Missionaries in the land whence he went. He 
 was devout and pious, warm and enthusiastic. He was one of 
 the best interpreters that ever translated for a speaker. He 
 was a fine specimen of a Christian, and he was finally licensed 
 to preach, and, in 1841, he was admitted on trial in the Arkan- 
 sas Conference, and was a member of the Indian Mission Con- 
 ference from the time of its organization till his death. His 
 Christian life extended over about thirty years, during which 
 time he wrought much for God and his Nation. He died near 
 Tahlequah, Indian Territory, December, 1858. 
 
 Edward Graves, Joseph B. Bird, and John Spear were inter- 
 preters in the Mission Field of the Tennessee Conference, and 
 did good work in giving the gospel to the Cherokees. 
 
 The gospel did more than all things else to deliver the Chero- 
 kee Indians from errors, delusions, and degradations which so 
 long held dominion over them. The work of giving the gospel 
 to that savage tribe, in view of the complications surrounding' 
 them, involved most delicate tasks, and required great wisdom, 
 prudence, and endurance, but the Cherokee Christians never 
 gave the Methodist Episcopal Church special trouble. The 
 work with the redeemed Indians was promotive of the Kingdom 
 of Christ. The Christians in the Cherokee Nation never an- 
 noyed the Church with heresies, schisms, or ecclesiastical tu- 
 mults. There were many hindrances encountered in the work, 
 but they were not from ecclesiastical sources. The Cherokee 
 Christians maintained a commendable type of piety. Inspired 
 with humble fear, and filled with the principles imparted by di- 
 vine grace, they shouted with a mirth born of devotion, and 
 served God, spreading his praise through earth and sky. The 
 work begun in the land of their fathers was transferred to their 
 Western home, and still goes on. Many happy souls have been 
 translated to the heavenly courts and the upper choirs, where 
 they " ascribe their conquest to the Lamb, their triumph to his 
 death," and still many more, of that once benighted tribe, are 
 on their way to the city of golden streets and splendid man- 
 sions. The redeemed of the Lord shall come from every land, 
 and so they come from the land of the Cherokees. 
 
 I' 
 \ 
 
 \ 
 
 ■ HI 
 
p% 
 
 Agitation and Secession, 
 
 405 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 The Agitation in and Secession from the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Chukch in Alabama. 
 
 THE Methodist preachers of America, iu Conference assem- 
 bled, in the city of Baltimore, Maryland, December 24, or 
 Christmas eve, 1784, unanimously agreed to become a separate 
 body, and following the counsel of John Wesley, who recommend- 
 ed to them the Episcopal mode of Church government, formed 
 themselves, without a dissenting voice, into a separate and inde- 
 pendent organization, under the denomination of the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church. In the on-going of affairs, the vast 
 extent of country occupied by that Church made presiding 
 elders indispensable to the exercise of the Episcopal preroga- 
 tive, and the environments of some preachers have made it nec- 
 essary for them to desist from the itinerant work, and so the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, by her peculiar organization and 
 by her unique administrations, has had the orders of deacons 
 and elders, the offices of bishops and presiding elders, and 
 the classes of itinerant preachers, local preachers, and mem- 
 bers. 
 
 In the ranks of the Methodist Episcopal Church there have 
 arisen every now and then agitators and innovators. Agitators 
 and innovators have ever assumed that it is a popular thing 
 in America to denounce ecclesiastical authority, and it has 
 ever been a chief occupation of such persons to denounce the 
 exercise of ecclesiastical power. In the estimation of such per- 
 sons the firm administration of law and the vigorous enforce- 
 ment of Discipline are the same as usurpation and despotism. 
 The Eev. James O'Kelley, one of the men who participated in 
 the organization of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and who 
 gave a hearty approval to the Episcopal form of government, 
 and who was ordained an elder at the same time, in a little 
 more than seven years from that date, became a vehement ag- 
 itator, and led, a fiery and restless Irishman that he was, a 
 furious assault on Episcopal prerogative, and then seceded 
 (404) 
 
 from the Church. That was the beginning of attempts at 
 abridging Episcopal prerogative, obliterating ecclesiastical dis- 
 tinctions, and paralyzing aggressive movements. 
 
 An effort was made in the General Conference, in May, 1820, 
 to transfer from the Bishops to the Annual Conferences the 
 prerogative of choosing the presiding elders, and fixing their 
 stations. The measure was prosecuted and contested with 
 great vigor. The discussion of the subject was more than 
 ardent, it was bitter and stormy. The measure was carried, 
 but the storm was not allayed. The Kev. Joshua Soule had 
 been elected Bishop, but before the day had arrived for his 
 consecration to the office, that measure, which he considered 
 an innovation, and unconstitutional, had been adopted, where- 
 upon he declined to be inducted into the office. That presented 
 a protest and a dilemma! The General Conference finally 
 receded from the position assumed, and suspended the new 
 rule for four years, a most singular proceeding, but Joshua 
 Soule was not inducted into the Episcopal office until the rule 
 was abolished four years later, and he was re-elected. 
 
 At the same General Conference of 1820, the Kev. William 
 Capers, of the South Carolina Conference, introduced a meas- 
 ure which was adopted, providing by law a District Conference 
 for local preachers, and clothed with the functions of granting 
 license to preach to suitable persons, and of recommending 
 suitable persons to the Annual Conferences for admission into 
 the traveling connection, and for ordination. 
 
 The debates on the prerogatives of the Bishops in choosing 
 the presiding elders, and fixing their stations, and the estab- 
 lishment of the District Conference of local preachers encour- 
 aged the agitators and the disaffected. The close contests in 
 the General Conference, and the approach to success of the 
 measure of transferring the prerogative of the Bishops to the 
 Annual Conferences greatly emboldened the innovators, and the 
 local preacher's District Conference gave them organization, 
 which was a most suitable preparation for their agitations, and 
 added temptation to debate the issues inaugurated. So soon as 
 they found themselves organized they finished the equipments 
 for carrying forward their work by the institution of a suitable 
 organ of communication. About 1821, the '* Western Keposi- 
 tory " was brought into existence for the purpose of discussing 
 
 i^i 
 
 If 
 
 »l 
 
406 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 and advocating the ecclesiastical rights of the local preachers 
 and the laity. In many places the District Conferences for 
 local preachers were used to set forward the schemes of the in- 
 novators. The District Conference of local preachers for the 
 Eoanoke District of tlie Virginia Conference, prepared and 
 sent to the Virginia Conference an elaborate address, bearing 
 date December 7, 1821, in which it was asserted that the Gen- 
 eral Conference w^as without authority to pass laws or make 
 rules to govern local preachers, and in which was entered a sol- 
 emn protest against the exercise of such power, such usurpation. 
 At the Eoanoke District Conference held in the latter part of 
 
 1822, the address prepared the year before, \\ith a circular letter 
 to accompany it, was ordered sent to all the District Confer- 
 ences of local preachers throughout the United States. The cir- 
 cular letter bears date, ^Vashington, North Carolina, January 1, 
 
 1823. It is said that these documents were forwarded to the 
 local preachers of the connection, in District Conferences as- 
 sembled, for the purpose of calling their attention to the con- 
 sideration of their common rights as preachers, and also to call 
 attention to the enormous prerogatives with which the itinerant 
 preachers invested themselves, and, moreover, to rebuke the as- 
 sumptions of the traveling preachers which would not allow- the 
 local preachers to be more than mere ciphers in point of au- 
 thority, nor to maintain any better than a kind of proscribed 
 standing. The spirit of agitation was fully aroused, and the 
 work of innovation was fully inaugurated. 
 
 Notwithstanding Methodism in Alabama, at the time of which 
 note is now being made, was not more than six years old, except in 
 the sections originally occupied by the Tombecbee and the Flint 
 Circuits, the spirit of innovation had reached the State. In 1823, 
 in Dutch Bend, Autauga County, Alabama, a meeting was held 
 composed of some of the local preachers of the Alabama Cir- 
 cuit, of the Alabama District, of the Mississippi Conference of 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church through the transactions of 
 which was prepared a memorial on rights and grievances, and 
 which was addressed to the General Conference of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church to meet May, 1824. There is no official 
 record of that meeting of local preachers now known to be ex- 
 tant, but there are some accounts of it, and it is certain the meet- 
 ing was held, and that its business was transacted with enthu- 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 407 
 
 siasm; It is stated upon reliable authority that the following 
 men, all at that time being local preachers residing in the bounds 
 of the Alabama Circuit, were present in that meeting and par- 
 ticipated in its proceedings: Eli Terry, Peyton Bibb, Britton 
 Capel, Elijah Myers, Arnold Campbell, Mark Howard, Alex- 
 ander Talley, Joseph Walker, Henry Whetstone, Jacob Whet- 
 stone. There may have been others. It is said, and it is no 
 doubt true, that the Eev. Alexander Talley, M.D., wrote the 
 memorial for that body of local preachers. In the memorial 
 was set forth in strong terms the grievances of the local preach- 
 ers, and therein a vigorous petition was made for the redress of 
 said grievances. The memorial charged that in the economy 
 and administration of the Methodist Episcopal Church the 
 merits of local preachers were discounted, their rights dis- 
 carded, and that as men; and preachers, they were graded below 
 their brethren of the itinerancy. The petition in the memorial 
 asked the removal of all restrictions, oblivion of all distinctions, 
 the obliteration of all grades, and that they should have granted 
 to them as local preachers representation in the Annual Confer- 
 ences and in the General Conferences. As though they were ap- 
 pealing from the tyranny which denies the right of conscience, 
 incarcerates the innocent, and terrifies the helpless, that body 
 of local preachers, in common with their fellow innovators, 
 demanded the abolition of all restrictions, classifications, dis- 
 tinctions, and grades in the Church; and, yet, they demanded 
 the recognition and perpetuation of the distinction and grade of 
 local preachers, and that by the enactment of a constitional pro- 
 vision that they should be represented in Annual and General 
 Conferences as local preachers, and by local preachers. Con- 
 sistency is a jewel, but partisan bias which will destroy estab- 
 lished order will not be likely to preserve consistency, and hence 
 it is not surprising that there was discord in the demands of 
 these innovators. In the meeting of these local preachers, in 
 Dutch Bend, in 1823, commenced the agitation in Alabama 
 which ended in strife and secession. 
 
 To the General Conference which met in May, 1824, was pre- 
 sented a number of memorials on the much stressed subject of 
 rights and privileges. The memorials conveying to the General 
 Conference the petitions of the innovators were in different 
 forms and contained slightly different details, but were all uni- 
 
408 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 form in charging itinerant preachers with usurpation of ecclesi- 
 astical authority, and with tyranny in the exendse of absolute 
 power; and all these memorials agreed in demanding a surren- 
 der of legislative rights, and a division of ecclesiastical power. 
 Said memorials were filled with complaints, criticisms, and 
 claims. Whether the authors of the numerous petitions were 
 impelled by convictions of duty or by inordinate thirst for power 
 they were bold and defiant, threatening persistence in their de- 
 mauds for redress of grievances and a lease of rights even to 
 secession. 
 
 The General Conference a^ppointed a Committee of twelve, con- 
 sisting of one delegate from each Annual Conference, and to 
 that Committee referred all the memorials on the subject of in- 
 novations. The Committee had two men on it who at that time 
 lived and preached in Alabama, the Rev. William McMahon, then 
 presiding elder of the Huntsville District, Tennessee Conference, 
 and the Rev. Alexander Sale, then presiding elder of the Ca- 
 hawba District, Mississippi Conference. In the course of events 
 the Committee reported the result of their deliberations on the 
 affairs committed to them, and the General Conference acting 
 upon the Report of the Committee adbpted a document which 
 embodied the views of the Conference on the matters involved. 
 By order of the General Conference, a document, with the 
 Bishops' names attached, was published as a response to the pe- 
 titions which had been addressed to the Conference for deter- 
 mination and action. The document was dispassionate, and in- 
 cisive. In it the General Conference said to the innovators: 
 "We believe the proposed change to be inexpedient," and as- 
 signed the reasons for the belief. 
 
 That action of the General Conference of 1824, demonstrated 
 the fact that the great body of the Church, both of the clergy 
 and the laity, were opposed to the innovations petitioned for, and 
 that it was as impossible to effect the asked for changes as it was 
 to disorganize the Church. The few among the innovators who 
 simply desired a change in the form of Government, accepted 
 the action of the General Conference, and refrained from further 
 agitation on the subject. Among the few who were of that mind 
 and pursued that course was the Rev. Alexander Talley, M.D. 
 at that time a local preacher in the Alabama Circuit, and resid- 
 ing in Autauga County, Alabama. He desired the Conferences 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 409^ 
 
 represented in part by laymen, but he did not desire disintegra- 
 tion, he was not a disruptionist, and he accepted the action of 
 the Church in 1824, and was true to her interests till the day of 
 his death. He, at the close of 1825, re-entered the itinerancy, 
 and ended his days a member of the Mississippi Conference of 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 
 But the action of the General Conference of 1824 did not 
 satisfy the larger number of the innovators, and, as if the forces 
 had been organized in advance, and results had been anticipated 
 and provided for, a meeting of a party of those who were deter- 
 mined to continue the work of disintegration at all hazards was 
 convened in the city of Baltimore, Maryland, immediately on 
 the final adjournment of the General Conference, even before 
 the Bishops had finished the Circular ordered in response to the 
 petitions; and in that meeting such measures were instituted 
 and perfected as were deemed best calculated to sustain the pur- 
 poses and accomplish the work in view. Provision was made 
 for the publication of a periodical entitled "The Mutual Rights 
 of the Ministers and Members of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church; " and also for the organization of Societies in all parts 
 of the United States, whose duty it should be to advocate the 
 principles and inculcate the doctrines of the innovators. At 
 that meeting the "Union Society of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church in the City of Baltimore " was organized under a con- 
 stitution with eleven distinct Articles. The periodical thus pro- 
 vided for was issued without delay. These agitators persevered, 
 and became vehement in their policy of disorganization. The 
 work proceeded, and the Union Societies multiplied as the 
 months and years went by. The whirlwind passing through 
 a field raises a dust and rattles in a small way, in like manner 
 the disruptionists raised a dust and noise in the ecclesiastical 
 field. Of course, as, through the Mutual Rights paper and the 
 Union Societies, war was made without ceasing on the action 
 of the General Conference, and on the Government, admin- 
 istration, and administrators of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, there was collision and there was resistance, sharp and 
 steady. 
 
 As Union Societies multiplied and the Mutual Rights period- 
 ical extended its circulation, the Discipline of the Church, and 
 the administration of those in authority were inveighed against 
 
 ,i 
 
410 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 with iDcreased boldness and mischief. In social discourse, in 
 speech and oration in the assembled Union Society, and by 
 written and printed communication the Government of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church was denounced; and, in the fur- 
 therance of their designs, the innovators made provision for 
 Conventions, both State and General. As a matter of course 
 the Discipline of the Church had to be maintained, and the 
 Church herself had to be protected and defended. Those to 
 whom was committed the oversight of the flock were not so pu- 
 sillanimous and supine as to offer no resistance to a party of 
 Schismatics who covered their designs with the pretext of re- 
 forming the Government they would abolish, and continued to 
 work under the aegis of the very Church they would disintegrate 
 and destroy. As a natural consequence and in the interest of 
 self-preservation, those who engaged in inveighing against the 
 Discipline of the Church, whether preachers or laymen, were 
 arrested in their nefarious designs, whenever detected, and when 
 they persisted they were expelled. Those very innovators who 
 with such flippancy imputed to the Bishops of the Church evil 
 purposes and charged them with usurpations of ecclesias- 
 tical power, and with the inauguration of oppressive and cruel 
 measures persisted in maintaining that inveighing against the 
 Discipline, and pertinacious resistance to authority were com- 
 mendable acts performed in the exercise of a divinely given 
 liberty; and that such acts were not in any sense, under divine 
 economy, censurable. They constantly insisted that an active 
 campaign against the Methodist Episcopal Church in which she 
 was constantly denounced as despotic, and cruel, was virtuous 
 and commendable. In the estimation of those in authority, 
 traducing the Church and her ministers, sowing dissensions, in- 
 stituting and perpetuating disputes, strifes, and divisions were 
 offenses of sufficient turpitude to forfeit communion and fellow- 
 ship in the Church, and in the on-going of affairs a number of 
 innovators in different places were expelled from the commu- 
 nion of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 
 In November, 1827, a General Convention of innovators, con- 
 sisting of delegates appointed by the State Conventions and 
 Union Societies, met in Baltimore, Maryland, and prepared a 
 memorial to the General Conference to meet in May, 1828, re- 
 newing the demand presented to the General Conference of 
 
 Agitation and Secession, 
 
 411 
 
 1824, for a change of the form of Government so as to transfer 
 the executive and legislative prei-ogatives from the Bishops and 
 itinerant preachers to the local jDreachers and laymen. That 
 memorial was presented, and others on the same subject were 
 also presented, and the General Conference took action upon 
 and made response to all memorials presented, but, adhering to 
 the purposes of the great body of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, they made no fundamental changes in the government 
 of the Church and made no unreasonable concessions to the 
 agitators. The contest became more intense, expulsions and 
 withdrawals were multiplied, and, by those expelled and with- 
 drawn from the Methodist Episcopal Church, Societies were 
 organized from time to time as matters culminated at different 
 places. The first of the independent Societies was organized, 
 in advance of the General Conference of 1828, in Baltimore, 
 Maryland, December 23, 1827. November 12, 1828, a General 
 Convention of the Seceders met in Baltimore, Maryland, and 
 prepared seventeen "Articles of Association " under which was 
 organized the "Associated Methodist Churches." By these 
 "Articles of Association " the newly formed Societies were gov- 
 erned until a subsequent Convention, which met November 
 2-23, 1830, in Baltimore, formally organized the Methodist 
 Protestant Church, under a Constitution and Discipline by that 
 Convention made and adopted. 
 
 The form of Government and the Constitution adopted by the 
 Seceders in the organization of the Methodist Protestant 
 Church indicate the purposes by which they were actuated and 
 the views which they entertained in the war which they waged 
 against the Methodist Episcopal Church. In the Methodist 
 Protestant Church bishops and presiding elders were discard- 
 ed, and so far as authority inhered it reposed in the hands of 
 the laity. These Seceders denounced bishops and presiding 
 elders as privileged classes, as distinct grades invested with 
 special rights, clothed with monopoly of power, and vain of dis- 
 tinctions, and having dominion over conscience, and being in- 
 tolerable, and oppressive tyrants, and lords over the divine 
 heritage. In connection with the grave charges against the 
 Episcopacy, these patriotic Seceders, in the Constitution which 
 they adopted, enacted that *'No higher order of ministers shall 
 be authorized than that of Elders," and declared that " all Eld- 
 
412 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ers in the Church of God are equal" and that "ministers are 
 forbidden to be lords over God's heritage, or to have dominion 
 over the faith of the saints." Truth is sometimes mixed with 
 false assumptions, and attached to false accusations, and mar- 
 shaled in the service of slander rather than the cause of justice; 
 but truth is truth, and slander is slander still. 
 
 A displeased and disconcerted party, violent, intemperate, 
 and insubordinate, dealing in defamation, fostering divisions 
 and schisms, is an element of death from which any Church 
 may desire to be delivered. When that body of innovators se- 
 ceded, the Methodist Episcopal Church experienced positive 
 relief— relief from internal strife, a strife which none can af- 
 ford to carry very long. The great body of the Methodists of 
 America were satisfied with the Church as it was organized at 
 the first, and they remained steadfast. The party wliich with- 
 drew was so few in numbers that no vital part was affected and 
 no material interest was hurt. With that little party of se- 
 ceders went the clamor, din, and fuss, and the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church was left intact, with her grand forces and ag- 
 gressive agencies, to prosecute her legitimate work. However, 
 it must not be imagined that no damage accrued to the com- 
 mon cause of Methodism by the secession and through the 
 Methodist Protestant Church, of which more will be said fur- 
 ther on. The Schismatics contested for division of power, and 
 quarreled about who should govern the Church; aud then, 
 when they instituted a Church for themselves, they made all 
 alike governors and interpreters. Every one was to govern and 
 no one was to be governed. They instituted a headless Church 
 — a Church founded on rights and prerogatives, and responsi- 
 ble to the irresponsible masses, au associated anarchy. A 
 rope with the twist out of it is worthless, for it is soon fretted 
 and gone. About that Methodist Protestant Church there was, 
 strange as the phrase may sound, a positive slackness, and the 
 most apparent thing connected with it was its inanity, a consti- 
 tutional provision of ineflSciency. That which antagonizes 
 governmental power tends to anarchy and disintegration. The 
 elements and principles of the Methodist Protestant Church are 
 the elements and principles of anarchy. The men who consti- 
 tuted the Methodist Protestant Church could distract and de- 
 stroy, but could not control, unify, and build. There has never 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 413 
 
 yet been a Government that was too strong, nor an administra- 
 tion that was too powerful and too aggressive. 
 
 The Methodist Protestant Church received its orsranic form 
 of government in the false assumption that ecclesiastical and 
 civil authority are identical in their principles, and the "Con- 
 stitution" and *' Declaration of Ptights" set forth by that 
 Church abound with senseless verbiage which originate in that 
 assumption, and the bungling Articles of said official documents 
 have more of the texture of a political paper than of the ele- 
 ments of the Bible. Ecclesiastical and civil authority are not 
 of the same nature, though it is not necessary to state here the 
 difference. There is necessarily such a thing as government in 
 the Church of God, and that government has been committed 
 to officers— officers designated bishops, elders, deacons, pastors, 
 teachers, and overseers. The man who would abolish these of- 
 fices or deprive their incumbents of power and authority in the 
 administration of ecclesiastical affairs is too much prejudiced in 
 mind and perverted in judgment to give a correct exegesis of 
 the Scriptures or a proper analysis of ecclesiastical polity. 
 Would as well deny the utility of tire and abandon its use, be- 
 cause in its use there is liability of burning the house which 
 shelters the inmates, and of burning the chattels which serve 
 their purposes, as depose the officers of the Church and abolish 
 ecclesiastical government, because, forsooth, some one may, in 
 his administration, be guilty of injustice and oppression. 
 
 The authority to ordain ministers and install pastors never 
 vested in the people, but in the ministers themselves. The 
 ministers, the rulers of the Church, are to execute the laws, 
 and the people are to obey. Eights, prerogatives, and duties 
 are distributed in that order. The exercise of authority in 
 the Church is ordained for the inculcation and perpetuation of 
 sound doctrine, and to secure to the flock union, peace, and edi- 
 fication. The minister is to govern the Church, admonish and 
 reprove the wayward, and expel, under due forms, the incorrigi- 
 ble, and all this is to be done without infringing private judg- 
 ment or personal conscience, and without infringing personal 
 liberty; and the people are to concur in the authority of the 
 pastor, co-operate in his administration, and obey his godly ad- 
 monitions. They are to aid and not hinder his work The 
 27 
 
414 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 people are to obey those who have rule over them, and not in- 
 terpose objections to their authority. 
 
 God has ordained the Church and the State, the minister and 
 the magistrate, but has not prescribed any particular form of 
 government, either ecclesiastical or civil. The form of govern- 
 ment is subject to modifications, and it is perfectly legitimate to 
 organize under such forms as may suit the manners and cus- 
 toms of men in different places and countries, provided nothing 
 be enjoined or allowed contrary to the Holy Scriptures. Any 
 form of government having under it righteous laws righteously 
 administered has the divine approval.' God appointed over the 
 people of Israel Judges, and for about the space of four hun- 
 dred and fifty years the Judges ruled with the divine approval 
 and blessing. Then the form of government was changed, and 
 Kings were in authority, and whenever the Kings ruled in 
 righteousness God approved and the nation prospered. The 
 men who organized the Methodist Episcopal Church organized 
 under the principle that there are no prescribed forms of gov- 
 ernment, and that the most efficient form of government should 
 be adopted. They judged the Episcopal form of government 
 to be the best, and organized accordingly. They were as free 
 from the lust of power and the spirit of tyranny as were those 
 who organized under other forms. Time, experience, and re- 
 sults have demonstrated that they organized well and wisely, 
 and that other forms of government among Methodists of these 
 United States have not been needed. The Methodist Protes- 
 tant Church was organized upon such principles and for such 
 purposes and embodied such elements as made failure inevi- 
 table. As there is no form of government prescribed in the 
 Scriptures so there is no absolute standard and no uniform ra- 
 tio of representation provided in the management of ecclesias- 
 tical affairs. The ministers of the gospel are officers clothed 
 with authority to guide the affairs of the Church, and do what- 
 ever is necessary for the administration of the Sacraments and 
 the edification of the body of Christ. There is no such thino- 
 in the Church as constituency and delegated power. There is 
 a divinely authorized ministry, and in the hands of that minis- 
 try are the oracles of God. Delegated power to enact laws for 
 the Church of Jesus Christ is an absurdity and a farce. Any 
 system of representation which undermines any divinely estab- 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 415 
 
 lished order of society should be rejected. The theory that 
 callings, classes, colors, grades, and sexes must have chosen rep- 
 resentatives in the departments which adopt and execute the 
 laws and regulations of a Church or State in persons belonging 
 to said callings, classes, colors, grades, and sexes is unscriptaral 
 and absurd, is a theory born of ignorance and arrogance, and fos- 
 tered by demagogism and fanaticism, and in its turn fosters in- 
 fidelity, communism, and anarchy. The qualifications of rep- 
 resentatives are not found in complexion, gender, or occupation, 
 but in the ability to enact judicious and effective law^s, and to 
 wisely administer public affairs'. 
 
 The agitation and the commotion created by the schismatics 
 was not more intense in any part of the connection than in that 
 part of Alabama then included in the Counties of Autauga, 
 Butler, Dallas, Lowndes, Montgomery, and Wilcox. All those 
 local preachers, excej^t the Rev. Alexander Talley, M.D., who 
 have been mentioned, on another page, in connection with a 
 meeting in Dutch Bend, in Autauga County, Alabama, in 1823, 
 and in connection with a memorial then prepared and presented 
 to the General Conference at its session in 1824, were discon- 
 tented agitators, and were active agents, through all the various 
 stages of the issue, in organizing the Methodist Protestant 
 Church. Other local preachers and some itinerant preachers 
 in that part of the State were equally active in the strife. 
 There were Union Societies organized in various localities, 
 though it is difficult to fix the dates of the organizing of many 
 of them at this distance of time. At the village of Greenville, 
 Butler County, at that time one of the appointments of the Ce- 
 dar Creek Circuit, a Union Society was organized in November, 
 1827. There was a Union Society of considerable strength at 
 Rocky Mount, Autauga County. At that place the Seceders 
 gathered on Friday, May 1, 1829, to organize an Annual Con- 
 ference for South Alabama. The first thing they did when they 
 assembled on that day was to call the Union Society of that 
 place together and read to it the Articles of Association agreed 
 upon by the Convention in Baltimore, Maryland, the preceding 
 November, when the Society dissolved itself by adopting the 
 Articles of Association and organizing itself into an Associated 
 Methodist Church. That work finished, there and then, at that 
 place and that day, those present, and there were preachers 
 
 m 
 
 I'.- 
 
416 
 
 Hisfonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Agitation and Secession, 
 
 417 
 
 present from different parts of the State, organized the Annual 
 Conference of the Methodist Associated Churches of the Ala- 
 bama District, and transacted such business as was esteemed 
 proper for the occasion. There were sixteen preachers present 
 who became then members of the Conference and participated 
 in its business, and there were six others who sent up their 
 names, not to be members, at that time, of the Conference, but 
 as sympathizers with the cause. The work was, in initiation, 
 formed into appointments and preachers were assigned thereto. 
 The Eev. Britton Capel was chosen President of the Confer- 
 ence, and so to him belongs the distinction of being the first 
 President of the Conference of the Methodist Protestant 
 Church in Alabama. He was also a delegate to the General 
 Convention which met November 2, 1830. At that session, at 
 Eocky Mount, May 1, 1829, at which it was said peace and love 
 prevailed, it was ordered that another Conference should be 
 held in the latter part of that same year, but at this distance of 
 time and in the absence of Journals, official documents, and pe- 
 riodicals of that date it is impossible to state whether the Con- 
 ference ordered for the latter part of that year was held. One 
 historian says, " a second Conference was held in September of 
 that same year," and another historian, and one of an earlier 
 date, says, the "second session" was "held September 16, 
 1830." This statement of the earlier historian is corroborated 
 by the published Minutes of more recent date in which the 
 sessions are numbered. Only one session for 1829 is counted. 
 It is not certainly known who were the preachers at Rocky 
 Mount at the organization of that Conference. It is certain 
 that the Rev. Peyton Bibb, the Rev. Britton Capel, the Rev. 
 Arnold Campbell, the Rev. Peyton S. Graves, the Rev. Samuel 
 M. Meek, the Rev. Elijah Myers, and the Rev. Eli Terry were 
 there, and active in the work of organization. It is very prob- 
 able that the Rev. Joseph Walker was there, fiery, and fanatic- 
 al. He was one of the first and leading agitators. He was 
 among the first contributors to the " Mutual Rights" paper, and 
 in his published communications he denounced the govern- 
 ment and administration of the Methodist Episcopal Church in 
 undisguised, and bitter terms. He was one of the local preach- 
 ers found near Montevallo, Alabama, in 1818, by the Rev. Ebe- 
 nezer Hearn. He was the father-in-law of Hearn, and the 
 
 father of the Rev. Robert L. Walker, who for a number of 
 years was an eflicient member of the Mississippi and Alabama 
 Conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The son-in- 
 law, the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn, and the son, the Rev. Robert L. 
 Walker, were uncompromising defenders of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, through all the strife, and to the last. The 
 great majority of the preachers present that May day, in 1829, 
 were local preachers belonging to the Alabama Circuit of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, and lived in the section where 
 Autauga, Dallas, and Montgomery Counties joined, principally 
 in Autauga, and Montgomery Counties. The Rev. Peyton 
 Smith Graves had been for a number of years a member of the 
 Mississippi Conference, and for 1828 was on the Alabama Cir- 
 cait, and left the Mississippi Conference and the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church as related in another place. 
 
 During the year 1830 the agitation carried on by the innova- 
 tors ran high throughout the Cedar Creek Circuit, which Circuit 
 embraced a part of Butler, Dallas, and Wilcox Counties, and 
 during that year a number of the disaffected seceded from the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church and openly espoused the cause of 
 the Associated Methodists. Benjamin Dulany, John Jenkins, 
 James Jenkins, and Robert Durham, all local preachers, at that 
 time, residing in Wilcox County, and members of the Quarterly 
 Conference of the Cedar Creek Circuit, withdrew, that year, 
 from the Methodist Episcopal Church and joined the new or- 
 ganization. Samuel Oliver, a local preacher, residing at or near 
 Greenville, Butler County, and a member of the Quarterly Con- 
 ference of the Cedar Creek Circuit, withdrew and joined the new 
 Church in that same year, and the great majority of the Soci- 
 ety at Greenville withdrew in a body with him, and it was one 
 of the strongest Societies of the Methodist Protestant Church 
 in Alabama for many long years. 
 
 Benjamin Dulany was recommended by a Quarterly Meeting 
 Conference held at Harper's Meeting House, Edisto Circuit, 
 December 19, 1807, and was admitted on trial by the South Car- 
 alina Conference, December 30, 1807, and he located December 
 22, 1814. He was re-admitted into the traveling connection by 
 the Mississippi Conference, December, 1825, and for 1826, 1827 
 he was in charge of the Cedar Creek Circuit, and he located 
 again in December, 1827. It was currently reported and gen- 
 
 
418 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Agitation and Secession, 
 
 419 
 
 erally accredited that he, while an itinerant preacher in charge 
 of the Cedar Creek Circuit of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 secretly circulated the "Mutual Eights" paper, and secretly 
 inveighed against the Government and administration of the 
 Church of which he was then a member and preacher, and from 
 which he was, for the time, drawing a stipend, by advocating 
 the innovations proposed by the "Mutual Eights" periodical 
 He was the secret leader of the Schismatics, and sowed the seeds 
 of dissension. He was the man who inaugurated and fostered 
 th9 damaging secession at Greenville, Alabama. The members 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church who knew him personally 
 and were acquainted with the part he took in the premises con- 
 sidered him a bad man at heart, a wolf in sheep's clothing, a 
 traitor to his vows, and utterly devoid of principle. Under- 
 standing his attitude, and his treasonable couise, the Eev. James 
 H. Mellard, the presiding elder, and the Eev. Le Eoy Massen- 
 gale, preacher in charge of the Circuit, passed him, and others 
 above mentioned with him, by in the administration of the 
 Lord's Supper on the occasion of a Quarterly Conference at 
 Shady Grove, near Camden, Wilcox County, Alabama, in 1830. 
 AYhen he discovered, as he did by that act of withholding from 
 him the elements of the Sacrament, that his treason was 
 known, and that further disguise was impossible he went out to 
 his own and made a virtue of going, pleading that he had been 
 driven out of the Methodist Episcopal Church by unwarranted 
 insult. The Methodist Protestant Church honored him, and 
 though he was a poor preacher, they gave him position. Once, 
 if not oftener, they elected him President of their Annual Con- 
 ference. He died in Wilcox County, Alabama, about 1852. 
 
 The Eev John Jenkins was a man of ordinary capacity and 
 of limited influence. He died about 1854. The Eev. James 
 Jenkins was born in South Carolina, February 9, 1785, and emi- 
 grated to Alabama some time previous to 1813. He was at the 
 famous battle of Burnt Corn, July 27, 1813, and in that battle 
 was wounded. He was for more than twenty years a member 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and severed his connection 
 with that Church, in 1830, having inveighed against her polity 
 until she refused to give him the Sacrament, and espoused the 
 cause of the Church with a bill of civil rights. He was a man of 
 ordinary capacity and of moderate influence. He was esteemed 
 
 a man of integrity by his associates in the bill of rights. He 
 died at his residence, in Wilcox County, Alabama, May 8, 1849. 
 
 The Eev. Samuel Oliver was an Irishman, and a fair preacher. 
 
 In that secession at Greenville, Alabama, as at some other 
 places, there were transactions which involved questions of equi- 
 ty, and in which equity was violated. A majority of the Soci- 
 ety at Greenville seceded from the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 and allied themselves to the new organization. A minority, 
 consisting of Judge James Lane, James Holmes, Mr. Bonner, 
 and a few others, maintained allegiance to the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church. The house dedicated to the worship of God, and 
 in which the Methodists had been accustomed to meet for di- 
 vine service at the town of Greenville was the property of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, and by every law, human and di- 
 vine, it was for the use and benefit of those true to the Church 
 to which it belonged, but the party which seceded possessed 
 themselves of it by seizure and continued to occupy it as their 
 own. They claimed it on the plea that it belonged to the ma- 
 jority. The preachers of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 preached in that house only by the grace and permission of the 
 Methodist Protestant Church members. That was strange pro- 
 cedure for a people who claimed specifically to be " trusting in 
 the protection of Almighty God." It was a strange spectacle to 
 see a faithful band, because they were in the minority, dispos- 
 sessed of their house of worship by those who claimed to be 
 moving in the securement of the best forms of Church govern- 
 ment, and who asserted that "nothing is expedient that is un- 
 just," but so it was. The loss of their house of worship, and 
 the domination of the Methodist Protestant Church put the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church at a great disadvantage at Green- 
 ville, and for many years the cause languished and the faithful 
 were greatly depressed. 
 
 The Eev. Le Eoy Massengale was a prominent actor in the 
 great issues and stirring events of the year 1830 on the Cedar 
 Creek Circuit. He was the preacher in charge of that Circuit 
 that year, and he defined the issues and aligned the parties. 
 He unmasked the innovators and exposed their intrigues, and 
 forced them to an open assumption of their work and to an 
 open avowal of their purposes, and into the organization of the 
 disintegrators. * 
 
 
420 
 
 Histonj of Metlmlism in Alabama. 
 
 countL „Z ^'^^Z'^'^"^' Conference, which in the official 
 
 count IS numbered as the second in order, which was held be- 
 ginning September IG, 1830, in connection with a Camp meel 
 
 ty Alabama there were appointed to pastoral charges: the Rev. 
 
 the Kev. Benjamm Dulany, the Eev. Peyton S. Graves, the Eev 
 
 if: \ p '^ "'! ^''■- J- ^^«Cormick; and as " unstationed xAIin- 
 isters and Preachers," there were present: the Kev. A. J. Camp- 
 bell, the Eev. G. A. Campbell, the Eev. J. Holly, the Eev Eli 
 MM the Eev. John Meek, the Eev. Samuel M. Meek, t^ 
 
 Eev. James xMeek, the Eev. Samuel Oliver, the Kev. AVil iam 
 Eice, and the Eev. Eli Terry. There were a few other preacl" 
 ers connected with the Circuits. They had, few as they were, 
 more ministers and preachers than pastoral charges. Dulany 
 Graves, and Eice were, by their associates in the new orgauizal 
 tion considered "great revivalists." At that Conference in 
 September, 1830, here were reported in the new organization, 
 
 members."" '"'' ""^'' ^"'^'^'^'^ ^'^'^ ^'s'^'y-- 
 
 The innovators constantly asserted that defeat and ruin were 
 inwrought m the Episcopal form of government. They con- 
 stantly boasted of the vast numbers who advocated their views 
 
 from 1820 to 1831, when the work culminated, and the work was 
 completed m a new organization, they indulged the delusion 
 that the great majority of the members of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church were in sympathy with the principles they cher- 
 ished and the movements they anticipated. They, in profound 
 blindness, fostered the belief that, in the final separation, they 
 would carry with them the great body of the laity and the local 
 preachers beloiiging to the Methodist Episcopal Church, and 
 that they would leave the itinerant preachers and bishops 
 in terrible iso ation, without congregations and without access 
 to the mass of the American citizens. The results never con- 
 tirmed the assertions of the innovators, and their expectations 
 were never realized. At the close of 1833 and the beginning of 
 1834 the organization of the new Church being complete, and 
 the first General Conference thereof in session, they claimed a 
 total membership of " twenty-six thousand five hundred and 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 421 
 
 k 
 
 i 
 
 eighty-seven," and ministers and preachers of something " over 
 five hundred," about "one third" of whom were itinerant; 
 wdiereas, at the same time the Methodist Episcopal Church had 
 "six hundred and thirty-eight thousand seven hundred and 
 eighty-four members, and two thousand four hundred and fifty- 
 eight traveling preachers,' and, at the close of 1836, when the 
 first census of the local preachers of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church was given, there were " four thousand nine hundred and 
 fifty-four." The difference in Alabama was as great as in the 
 other portions of the country. At the beginning of ISStt the 
 Methodist Protestant Church had in Alabama one thousand 
 members, and the Methodist Episcopal Church had in Alabama 
 sixteen thousand one hundred and seventy-three members, and 
 about eighty traveling preachers in the bounds of the State of 
 Alabama, in the members and preachers in the State connected 
 with the Alabama and Tennessee Conferences, and the local 
 preachers in Alabama, at the close of 1836, when first given, in 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church were about two hundred and 
 fifty. That did not look much like absorbing the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, nor like her chosen ministry and ordained 
 bishops w^ere left alone. 
 
 The aggregation at the beginning was not so great as had 
 been anticipated by the friends of the measure, and the success 
 in the following years was not equal to what had been boasting- 
 ly promised. The facts in the case and the truth in the prem- 
 ises demand the statements that the Methodist Protestant 
 Church had its genesis in petty jealousies and sordid ambitions, 
 and that the secessionists who inaugurated it " raised impious 
 war" against the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in default 
 of reason, and without even the semblance of scriptural emula- 
 tion, prosecuted the war with imprecations. They were the 
 dupes of their own illusions, and the resistance to which they 
 had recourse consumed what little force they possessed, and 
 their work not only failed of good results to themselves, but was 
 detrimental to the common cause of Christianity. Assuming to 
 be the advocates of representative government, and assuming to 
 provide elective assemblies, they made, demagogues that they 
 were, appeals to popular sentiment, but failed of success, or at 
 least of any large measure of success. 
 
 That new departure and adventure in ecclesiastical affairs was 
 
422 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 A c) Hat ion and Secession, 
 
 423 
 
 attended with great strife, especially was that the case in the 
 bounds of the Alabama and the Cedar Creek Circuits, which 
 then covered a large territory in the State. Fierce debates and 
 angry disputes were frequent in family circles and in social and 
 religious meetings. At meetings for divine worship, in the 
 Meeting Houses, unseemly wrangles often occurred, and were 
 as polluting to the house of God as would have been the abom- 
 inations of the heathen. The participants in these strifes, who 
 claimed to be contending for divine principles rather than 
 groundless and absurd speculations, were often on the verge of 
 pugilism, and showed decided disposition to resort to physical 
 blows rather than to the use of logical arguments. They 
 seemed to have more confidence in physical force and in carnal 
 weapons than in Scriptural analysis and spiritual weapons. 
 They seemed to think the obtuse and the perverse could be 
 reached more effectively by the fist of the champion than by 
 the argument of the orator. An analysis of their conduct would 
 indicate rather a preponderance of temper and a deficiency of 
 grace, and that the parties were in the terrestrial rather than 
 the celestial sphere. Families were divided and Churches were 
 disrupted. The administration of Discipline and the enforce- 
 ment of law was then, as ever, offensive to the formal, listless, 
 and lawless, and under a rigid administration to which the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church was committed many of the mem- 
 bers belonging to the classes here noted were filled with discon- 
 tent and unfriendliness, and while one in his right mind can but 
 know that the Church which courts the alliance of the incorri- 
 gible and the unruly courts ruin and death, yet, the Methodist 
 Protestant Church encouraged the disaffection found in the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, and offered in their fold to the 
 disaffected protection against all disabilities incurred by of- 
 fenses and guaranteed unwarranted leniency, and many with- 
 drew from the Methodist Episcopal Church, and accepted the 
 proffered alliance and protection. This, of course, widened the 
 breach, and intensified the w^ar between the two organizations. 
 In the contest houses of worship built for the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church were seized and retained by the seceding part}^, 
 and the Church for which they w^ere built was dispossessed. 
 In addition to the case at Greenville, already mentioned, may 
 be named the Mills and Wescott Meeting House, built under 
 
 the leadership and by the efforts of Thomas Hatchett, on the 
 land of Hance Baker, Sen., about two miles from Montgomery, 
 which was seized, just after it was finished, in 1829, by the As- 
 sociated Methodists, and Mr. Hatchett and the few others who 
 remained true to the Methodist Episcopal Church had to find 
 quarters and immunities at another place. It must, however, 
 be said to the credit of the parties who seized the Mills and 
 Wescott Meeting House that they refunded the money expend- 
 ed by Mr. Hatchett in its erection. Hope Hull, about ten 
 miles from Montgomery, went, both House and Society, into 
 the new^ organization. Strife reigned in all that section. Some 
 of those who had been prominent members of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church who led off in the secession may be named 
 here. 
 
 At Asbury, the Church named for Bishop Asbury, in Dutch 
 Bend, Autauga County, were Lewis Houser, Mark Howard, al- 
 ready mentioned, William Keener, James Mitchell, James Stou- 
 denmire, John Stoudenmire, and Benjamin Taylor; at Washing- 
 ton, in the same County, were James Goodson, Buckner Harris, 
 and Thomas Smith ; at Lebanon, in Dallas County, four or five 
 miles south-east of Cahawba, were William Olds, L. C. Graham, 
 and James Alexander; in Lowndes County, were E. H. Cook, a 
 member of the Convention which formulated the Discipline of 
 the Methodist Protestant Church, J. P. Cook, Hudson Powell, 
 Seymore Powell, Kobert Kussell, and Benjamin F. Tower; in 
 Montgomery County, were B. S. Bibb and Abner McGehee, a 
 man of wealth and worth, who in after years made considerable 
 contributions to benevolent objects; in Butler County was 
 James K. Benson; and in Wilcox County, was Mr. Steadman. 
 Many of these men here named, if not all, were persons of ster- 
 ling worth, and possessed of a measure of piety, and this, not- 
 withstanding they were leaders in tumult, disruption, and se- 
 cession; and were at the head of the most belligerent column 
 ever marshaled on the field of the militant hosts; and notwith- 
 standing they were the champions of incoherent principles, and 
 the adherents of a form of Church government essentially weak, 
 inherently defective, a form of government which guaranteed 
 folly and failure. 
 
 Space w^ould fail should the attempt be made to tell of the 
 Eev. Moses Andrew, M.D., and the Rev. William Terry, local 
 
 s 
 
424 
 
 Historij of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 preachers, and Charles G. Eush,' James E. Nicholson, James 
 Howard, Thomas Hatchett, and others of the Alabama Circuit; 
 Judge James Lane, Barr, Luckie, Harrington, Grimes, Barns, 
 Warren, Yeldell, Godbold, McArthur, Eoss, Davis, Muldrow, 
 aud others of the Cedar Creek Circuit who, through all the 
 agitation, secession, and desertion, stood firm against every in- 
 novation on the Episcopal form of government. 
 
 The men who, where prevailed in deepest rage the unre- 
 strained contention, defended the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 against innovations, and against the assaults of the Methodist 
 Protestant Church were the Eev. Eobert L. Kennon, the Eev. 
 James H. Mellard, and the Eev. Ebenezer Hearn. There were 
 many others who were in the active campaign, and who did val- 
 iant, aud efficient service in the cause of Episcopal Methodism, 
 but these throe men here named were in the lead, and w^ere face 
 to face, and hand to hand w4th the foe. These three men were 
 presiding elders much of the time when the controversy was at 
 its highest. 
 
 The Eev. Eobert L. Kennon was conspicuous in the battle. 
 He was rigid in his construction and administration of law, he 
 was calm, collected, and considerate in his manner, and his ser- 
 mons were logical, convincing, and popular. He was a tower of 
 strength, and the cause he espoused engaged his resources. 
 
 The Eev. James H. Mellard w^as an untiring defender of the 
 faith, polity, and works of the fathers. He clung with tenacity 
 to the old landmarks of Methodism, and fought with persist- 
 ence the party engaged in disruption. He was presiding elder 
 in Alabama much of the time during the period in w^hich the 
 Methodist Protestant Church was inaugurating and perfecting 
 its organization. He had a special gift for and took a peculiar 
 delight in polemics. He never tired of controversy. He had 
 vast stores of information, which was ever at his command, and 
 which he used to good effect. It was no uncommon thing for 
 him to preach three hours at a time, and apparently without ef- 
 fort on his part and without fatigue to himself. The length of 
 his sermons sometimes exhausted the patience of some of his 
 auditors. The Journal of the South Carolina Conference, 
 where it records the proceedings of the Conference on the aft- 
 ernoon of January 1, 1801, contains this item: "James H. 
 Mellard proposed as a traveling preacher. Accepted." The 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 425 
 
 same Journal, where it records the proceedings of the Confer- 
 ence on Thursday, January 2, 1806, contains the following item: 
 « The Conference voted that Brother James Mellard shall have 
 a letter wrote by the Committee of Address as a mild reproof 
 for his too long preaching, praying, &c., and speaking too fast." 
 The Journal, recording the proceedings of the Conference two 
 days later, January 4, 1806, says: "An address was written to 
 Eev. James H. Mellard and approved." From these items it 
 appears that the South Carolina Conference in the early part of 
 the ministry of the Eev. James H. Mellard, and in the first dec- 
 ade of this century, tried by a letter of reproof to cure him ot 
 the fault, as they esteemed it, of delivering unduly long ser- 
 mons and of making long prayers, but it appears that the effort 
 made was not successful, for, in Alabama, during the third and 
 fourth decades of this century, he was still noted for his exceed- 
 ingly long sermons. His sermons were not long because he was 
 slow of speech, for he was reproved for ''speaking too fast." 
 The only consolation that can be entertained concerning the 
 failure to cure him of the evil of preaching long sermons is 
 that his resources were used in his sermons of undue length, as 
 occasion required, in the defense of the doctrines and polity of 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, and against one of the most 
 virulent attacks ever made upon a body of Christians. 
 
 The Eev. Ebenezer Hearn, though neither learned nor bril- 
 liant was a man of great will power, courage, and personal force. 
 He had no sympathy with those who rebelled against the adopt- 
 ed polity and made war upon the authorized administration of 
 the Church. He was steadfast in the faith of the fathers, and 
 he entered the lists, when the issue was presented, in defense of 
 the polity of the Methodist Episcopal Church against the at- 
 tacks of the turbulent party of innovators who had undertaken 
 to reo-ulate the ecclesiastical affairs of the Methodists of the 
 United States. He resisted the adversary with the might which 
 was in him, and made a vigorous and successful defense of the 
 cause which he espoused He was a man of strict construction, 
 vigorous administration, and of imperious bearing, and there 
 is no doubt but that in some instances he failed m, at least, the 
 appearance of proper leniency, and thereby subjected himself to 
 the charge of being haughty and overbearing, and consequently 
 dama-ed the cause he would serve. In the untoward movement 
 
426 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Agitation and Secession. 
 
 427 
 
 f 
 
 Le was peculiarly environed, and was peculiarly related to some 
 of the antagonistic agents, and he suffered more persecution and 
 annoyance than any other man, perhaps, in Alabama. His 
 father-in-law, the Kev. Joseph Walker, long a local elder in 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, and who at the time of the 
 secret workings of the innovators lived in the same Circuit with 
 him, was one of the most inveterate agitators and fiery Schis- 
 matics in the United States, and was prominently arrayed 
 against him. The whole body of Protestant Methodists were 
 exasperated against the Eev. Ebenezer Hearn, and persecuted 
 him with a desperation which indicated a determination to ef- 
 fect his ruin. This was kept up for fifteen or more years. He 
 finally convicted the Kev. Peyton S. Graves of Libel in the 
 courts of the State, after which the Protestant Methodists sus- 
 pended their efforts against him. He stood like a wall to the 
 end. They beat him with successive blows, but never demol- 
 ished him or his principles. 
 
 In Alabama the Methodist Protestant Church was complete 
 in its organization and in good working order by 1832, but hav- 
 ing little, if any, existence in any of the prominent places it 
 was without any controlling influence in the State. Cahawba, 
 Demopolis, Florence, Huntsville, Mobile, Selma, Tuskaloosa,' 
 and Tuscumbia, which were at that time most of the prominent 
 places in Alabama, were without any Society or house of wor- 
 ship of the Methodist Protestant Church. There were a few 
 members of that Church living at Montgomery as early as 1830, 
 and a house of worship was built by them facing Coosa Street 
 about the close of 1832, though it " was destroyed by fire on 
 Monday morning, April 28, 1834," and not until 1842 did they 
 build again. In October, 1842, a house was dedicated by them 
 in the town of Montgomery, and the Society at that time con- 
 sisted of about nine members, two of whom were males. 
 
 In 1832 the disruption had been effected, a new Church or- 
 ganization had been made, the Methodist Episcopal Church had 
 been relieved of a troublesome faction and internal strife, and 
 the handful of would be Keformers found themselves by them- 
 selves, in all respects feeble enough, and needing relief and 
 Eeformation more than any other body of Christians around 
 them. There were enough of them to hinder the work of Meth- 
 odism, to impede the cause of Christianity, without the possi- 
 
 bility of accomplishing sufficient good to counterbalance tho 
 evil. There were some able men and women among them, but 
 the folly of the movement was apparent in its incipiency, and 
 the folly of it was demonstrated at every step, and the folly of 
 it has long since been confirmed, though there are still a few to 
 defend the movement, and the folly. 
 
CHAPTEE XVIII. 
 
 The Beginning of the Work of Education in Alabama Un- 
 der THE Auspices of Methodism. 
 
 AT the time of the General Conference of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, May 1-24, 
 1828, there were, in successful operation under the control of 
 the several Annual Conferences where they were located, six or 
 seven institutions of learning, two of them having college char- 
 ters. The following were these institutions: Augusta College, 
 in Kentucky, Madison College, in Pennsylvania, Elizabeth Fe- 
 male Academy, in Mississippi, Tabernacle Academy, in South 
 Carolina, Maine Wesleyan Seminary, in Maine, Wesleyan Acad- 
 emy, at Wilbraham, Massachusetts, and two Seminaries, in the 
 State of New York, the names of which were not given. To 
 that General Conference there was reported an Academy, at 
 that time in course of erection, at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, which 
 was finished in September following, and called The Sims Fe- 
 male Academy. 
 
 At the session of the Tennessee Conference at Nashville, be- 
 ginning November 28, 1826, a Standing Committee, a Committee 
 to work in the intervals of Conference, was appointed to inquire 
 into the propriety of founding a College under the patronage of 
 that Conference. The Committee was composed of five traveling 
 preachers and five laymen, some of whom were local preachers, 
 as follows: William McMahon, Kobert Paine, Thomas L. Doug- 
 lass, Alexander Sale, Lewis Garrett, William McNeil, James L. 
 Armstrong, Turner Saunders, James Frazier, and Joseph T. El- 
 liston. It was declared in advance of the appointment of the 
 Committee that it was not the object of the Conference to estab- 
 lish a religious or theological institution; such the members of 
 that Conference believed might not be serviceable, but it was 
 simply their wish to give their friends an opportunity of edu- 
 cating their youths where their morals and principles would not 
 be ruined by bad examples and erroneous sentiments. At the 
 session of the Conference at Tuscumbia, Alabama, beginning 
 (428) 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education. 
 
 429 
 
 November 22, 1827, in which unusual peace, love, and harmony 
 prevailed, the Committee appointed at the previous annual ses- 
 sion reported that nothing had been matured on the subject. 
 Upon further consideration of the matter, the Standing Commit- 
 tee was continued, this time composed of William McMahon, 
 Eobert Paine, Thomas L. Douglass, Lewis Garrett, Alexander 
 Sale, John Lytle, Turner Saunders, John M. Taylor, Joseph T. 
 Elliston, and H. R. W. Hill. The Committee was instructed 
 and authorized to keep the subject open for the reception of 
 proposals of sites and contributions, and report the progress 
 made to the next annual session of the Conference. At the ses- 
 sion of the Tennessee Conference held at Murfreesborough, Ten- 
 nessee, beginning December 4, 1828, the Standing Committee, 
 appointed at the preceding session of the Conference on the sub- 
 ject of founding a College under the patronage of that Confer- 
 ence, reported that a communication on that subject had been 
 received from a number of gentlemen acting as a Committee on 
 behalf of a number of subscribers at La Grange, Alabama, and 
 its vicinity. The communication was presented and read to the^ 
 Annual Conference, and after diligent inquiry, in which satis- 
 factory information was elicited relative to the eligibility of the 
 place and the various advantages of the situation, and the fact 
 was made to appear that about ten thousand dollar?? had been 
 subscribed for establishing the institution at that place, it was 
 unanimously " Resolved, That the Tennessee Conferenc(? College 
 be located at La Grange, in North Alabama; and on motion it- 
 was Resolved, That William McMahon, Robert Paine, Lewis- 
 Garrett, James McFerrin, John M. Holland, Francis A. Owen,. 
 Turner Saunders, John Southerland, John M. Taylor, Thomas- 
 Preston, Weston T. Rucker, Henry S. Foote, Hartwell King, 
 John J. Winston, Alexander Sale, and Moses Hall be, and they 
 are hereby appointed Commissioners for the purpose of secur- 
 ing the site, raising funds, and carrying the institution into op- 
 eration. Also Resolved, That William McMahon be appointed 
 an Agent to visit the Mississippi Conference, and propose a 
 union with them in the establishment and advantages of the 
 College contemplated at La Grange. And believing, as we do, 
 that the best interests of the Church and the community are 
 identified with the success of our Conference College, we do sol- 
 emnly pledge ourselves to each other to use our best exertions 
 28 
 
430 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 on our respective Districts, Circuits, and Stations, during the 
 ensuing year, to collect funds for the benefit of the insti- 
 tution." 
 
 The Kev. William McMahon appeared before the Mississippi 
 Conference, convened at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, December 25, 
 1828, and presented the propositions of the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence relative to the College to be established at La Grange, Al- 
 abama. The Mississippi Conference, by formal action, acceded 
 to the propositions tendered, and appointed Commissioners to 
 participate in the proposed work of establishing an institution 
 of learning. 
 
 The Commissioners, instructed and empowered by the two 
 Conferences to erect, equip, and set in operation a College of 
 the style and title prescribed, met at La Grange, Alabama, Jan- 
 uary 10, 1829, and disposed of the initial affairs committed to 
 their hands with promptness and facility. They selected a site 
 on which to erect the edifice to be appropriated to the use of 
 students, formed a constitution for the government of the Col- 
 lege, and prepared an address to the public setting forth the de- 
 sign and character of the institution so auspiciously inaugurat- 
 ed. From the many choice plots of land offered the Commis- 
 sioners at La Grange for the College site " that beautiful and 
 commanding eminence called Lawrence's Hill " was selected by 
 unanimous agreement. 
 
 La Grange, Alabama, is situated on the summit of the moun- 
 tain which overlooks the lower part of the Tennessee valley. 
 Its origin can be easily told, and its composition in the first 
 years of its existence can be readily described. At that point of 
 the mountain there are numerous springs of water, some of 
 which are mineral, and the atmosphere is suprjosed to be pure 
 and salubrious. Immediately on the discovery of the supposed 
 natural facilities for health and comfort, a few of the thrifty 
 families owning farms in the adjoining valley took up residence 
 at that point on the mountain. These few families constituted 
 a community, it was scarcely a village, and its center, where clus- 
 tered a number of its springs, was called La Grange. During 
 the years 1828 and 1829, there was at La Grange an Academy, 
 and Edward Dramgoole Sims was the Principal. 
 
 Why was that place. La Grange, Alabama, selected as the 
 place for the College? Several causes operated, and a number 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education, 
 
 431 
 
 of influences were potent. The persons living in the communi- 
 ty of La Grange and in the adjoining valley were intelligent 
 and prosperous, and had an instinct for and an interest in such 
 an institution of learning as a College, and were able financial- 
 ly to contribute to its establishment and support. A larger 
 number of persons in that section took an active part m the en- 
 terprise and made more liberal offers for it than m any other 
 section within the bounds of the Tennessee Conference. That 
 had a controlling influence. 
 
 As stated above. La Grange was scarcely a village, and, it may 
 be added, was remote from cities and thoroughfares, and that 
 commended it to the people of that day as a choice location for 
 a seat of learning. In that day it was agreed, and by common 
 consent maintained, that a large commercial town, or even the 
 neighborhood of a large town of any kind, was not a proper 
 place for the location of a large school, and that if such a school 
 were located even in a village the village should be so inconsid- 
 erable and moral as to derive its whole importance from the 
 school The absence of population at a seat of learning was held 
 to be an absolute guarantee against the introduction of expensive 
 habits and destructive vices. In commending the place to the 
 public the Commissioners, who selected the site at La Grange 
 said- "The secluded position of the College seems m no small 
 degree to sanction the hope that the enticements to dissipation 
 and idleness, which are too frequently observed to assemble 
 themselves in the vicinity of institutions of this kind, will not 
 dare to exhibit themselves here." 
 
 La Grange as a natural situation was unsurpassed. I he 
 prophets have spoken of " the glory of Lebanon," and " the ex- 
 cellency of Carmel;" and much has been said, m prose and 
 poetry, of Pisgah's summit, from whence the whole land of 
 Canaan may be seen; and Mount Sinai, in the Arabian desert, 
 with bare and rugged sides, towering peaks, and divme asso- 
 ciations, possesses lofty grandeur and awe-inspiring memories; 
 but that site, in Franklin County, Alabama, whereon was 
 erected La Grange College, with its unique surroundings of 
 forests, hills, mountains, springs, streams, valleys, and expanse 
 of view, is not a whit inferior to any of the mountains of Bible 
 history, and is "beautiful for situation." From the site of La 
 Grange College was seen the ideal landscape. The Commis- 
 
432 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 sioners were enticed by the scene, and inspired by the view, and 
 they said: "The view from this point is almost as extensive as 
 at sea. To the north may be distinctly traced the majestic cur- 
 vatures of the Tennessee Kiver, rolling its plenteous tide through 
 the bosom of the fertile valley to which it has imparted its own 
 name, and gliding peacefully onward in the direction of the 
 Ohio. At the distance of ten and twelve miles, and on oppo- 
 site banks of the Tennessee- Kiver, stand the flourishing villages 
 of Tuscumbia and Florence. The interjacent country is one 
 of uncommon beauty and productiveness, divided into farms of 
 convenient extent, and graced with the rural dwellings of the 
 cultivators of the soil. At a distance may be descried the blue 
 summits of the Black Warrior Mountains, streaking their vary- 
 ing outline along the southern horizon. Nearer at hand on 
 hills of milder elevation, whose tops are crowned with romantic 
 forests of pine and oak, and which serve to complete a scene of 
 as much blended sublimity and beauty as any in the Western 
 country — perhaps in the United States." 
 
 Towering mountains, rising hills, outlying valleys, meander- 
 ing rivers, and skirting forests do not guarantee the permanent 
 success of a college. To reject the populous and enterprising 
 place, where thoroughfares converge, and select the inaccess- 
 ible and insignificant place is to throw away possibilities 
 and advantages without any compensation. The school to be 
 large, self-supporting, and permanent must be in the midst of 
 thrifty enterprises, and accessible to a numerous population. 
 The larger the field the brighter the prospect, the grander the 
 opportunity. Temptations to vice will ever be found by the 
 vicious, whether in the city full or the country waste. The se- 
 questered spot is not the place for a large school. In monastic 
 institutions licentiousness in its worst forms has held sway, and 
 vice in its worst features has prevailed. 
 
 At the sessions of the Tennessee and Mississippi Conferences, 
 the first in November and the latter in December, 1829, the 
 Constitution drafted for the government of the College by the 
 Commissioners was amended and approved, and the Rev. Wil- 
 liam McMahon was appointed Agent for the College, and the 
 preachers of the Conferences subscribed about three thousand 
 dollars for the enterprise. It is not known what amount the 
 laymen of the country had contributed for the cause, neither is 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education, 
 
 433 
 
 it known what amount was expended in the purchase of the 
 grounds, the erection of the buildings, and other improvements 
 
 and outfit. 
 
 Just one year and one day from the time the Commissioners 
 met to select the site for the College, the necessary improve- 
 ments had been made and the College opened. It opened and 
 went into operation January 11, 1830. It went into operation 
 without ostentation, but vigorously, and with encouraging pros- 
 pects. While it had a Preparatory Department, the curriculum 
 adopted was extensive and thorough, and the men engaged in 
 the different Departments were men of superior worth and at- 
 tainments. In two months from the time it opened there were 
 within its halls seventy pupils, with assurances that in less than 
 four months the number would exceed one hundred. In plan- 
 ning the College the Trustees appended a Deaf and Dumb Asy- 
 lum, but the want of funds prevented the erection of buildings 
 for that appendage at the first, and the Trustees proposed to 
 petition Congress to donate unappropriated lands within the 
 State for that part of the institution. It seems that that part 
 of the enterprise never formulated. In addition to the College 
 building there were a Steward's hall and dormitories. 
 
 There were two sessions in the year of five months each. 
 The first session of the first year closed June 11. The second 
 session commenced July 12, and closed November 12. At that 
 time the tuition was twenty dollars for the year of ten months, 
 and the board for the ten months was eighty dollars, and the 
 incidental expenses did not exceed for the ten months four dol- 
 lars. During the first year the College had neither apparatus 
 
 nor library. 
 
 The College opened on the day above named w^ith the follow- 
 lowing Faculty: The Rev. Robert Paine, Superintendent; Mr. 
 William W. Hudson, Professor of Mathematics and Modern 
 Languages; Mr. Edward D. Sims, Professor of Ancient Lan- 
 guages. . . 
 
 The Committee appointed by the Tennessee and Mississippi 
 Conferences to visit La Grange College to inspect and report its 
 condition, which Committee consisted of Lewis Garrett, Gilbert 
 D. Taylor, Fountain E. Pitts, AVilliam P. Kendrick, and Ebene- 
 zer Hearn, were present at the examination of the students on 
 June 9, 10, 11, which closed the first session. The Committee 
 
434 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 reported seventy-nine pupils present, and the examinations ex- 
 ceedingly gratifying and highly satisfactory. The Faculty was 
 at that time appointed on Committees to collect a Library, and 
 Chemical and Philosophical Apparatus, Minerals, etc., for the 
 College. The Committee reported with emphasis: " This insti- 
 tution is purely literary and scientific; no theological professor- 
 ship shall ever belong to this College, and the inculcation of the 
 peculiar tenets of any religious denomination is expressly for- 
 bidden by the Constitution." 
 
 It was " enacted by the Senate and House of Eepresentatives 
 of the State of Alabama in General Assembly convened. That 
 a seminary of learning, be, and the same is hereby established 
 at La Grange, in Franklin County, to be denominated the La 
 Grange College." This act with its several sections was ap- 
 proved January 19, 1830, eight days after the College opened its 
 doors for the reception of students. Section third of the act 
 is as follows: 
 
 *'And be it further enacted, That the following persons have 
 been duly chosen Trustees of the College, and are recognized as 
 residing in La Grange and its vicinity, to wit: Turner Saunders, 
 Alexander Sale, Alexander Sledge, John Davis, Moses Hall, 
 John Southerland, Jr., Benjamin B. Jones, Claiborne Saunders, 
 Epps Moody, Henry S. Foote, Sion L. Perry, James B. Lock- 
 hart, William H. Winter, Dudley Dunn, Thomas Woldridge, 
 Hartwell King, Bernard McKernan, John W. Hodges, John W. 
 Scott, Freeman Fitzgerald, Kichard Ellis; and the following 
 persons have also been chosen Trustees and are considered as 
 residing at a distance from the institution, to wit: William 
 Winans, Edmund McGehee, Alexander Covington, Greenwood 
 LaFlow, John Boss, William McMahon, Alexander Talley, Jo- 
 seph McDowell, James McFerrin, John M. Taylor, Henry W. 
 Khodes, Jack Shackleford, Samuel W. Mardis, Eobert Paine, 
 Weston T. Kucker, Henry E. W. Hill, Thomas Brandon, John 
 D. Bibb, Gilbert D. Taylor, Jesse Coe, Kichard Jones, James 
 Saunders, John M. Holland, James H. Mellard, Eobert L. Ken- 
 non, David Moore, Eobert H. Watkins, John B. Eowe, and 
 John Coffee." 
 
 The fifteenth section enacted, "That the institution hereby 
 incorporated shall be purely literary and scientific; and that the 
 Trustees are hereby prohibited from the adoption of any system 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education, 
 
 435 
 
 of education which shall provide for the inculcation of the pe- 
 culiar tenets or doctrines of any religious denomination what- 
 soever." ,,,-,. i • J 
 In founding a College in Alabama the Methodists were m ad- 
 vance of the State, and of all Churches, and of all denomina- 
 tions of Christians. The first College opened and chartered m 
 the State of Alabama was the La Grange College. At the time 
 it opened its halls and went to teaching as a College, and at the 
 time it was chartered by the Senate and House of Eepresenta- 
 tives of the State of Alabama as a College, there was no other 
 School opened in the State having the grade of a College. 
 
 One would naturally suppose that a College founded by a de- 
 nomination of Christians, and which College was to continue 
 under the auspices of such denomination, had been founded for 
 criving instruction in Christian doctrines, for inculcating reli- 
 gious tenets, but the founders of La Grange College, extraordi- 
 nary as it may seem, by constitutional provision, as has already 
 been seen, prohibited the inculcation of religious doctrines at 
 that institution, and they commended the inhibition as a meri- 
 torous provision, giving to the School a supreme excellence. 
 Nothing was to be taught but literature and science. The 
 founders of that College did not wish to establish a theological 
 institution; they were uncompromisingly opposed to theological 
 schools, theological departments, and theological chairs. How- 
 ever it must not be inferred that these noble men and women 
 were opposed to a school of a religious character and whose in- 
 fluence would advance the cause of Christianity. La Grange 
 College was founded to furnish an institution where the youths 
 of the Church and the country could be educated without haz- 
 ard to their morals and principles from evil associations and 
 
 false sentiments. . . ^ i. xv t r. 
 
 The Eev. Eobert Paine, the first President of the La Grange 
 Colleo-e and who was President for more than fifteen years, and 
 did more than any one else by his work and influence to give the 
 College character and to sustain it in its mission, was born m 
 North Carolina, November 12, 1799, and when about fifteen 
 years old he removed with his father and family to Giles County, 
 Tennessee, where before he was nineteen years of age he was 
 admitted to the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 The Eev. Eobert Paine was a personable man. He was 
 
436 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 descended from neither Titan nor Pigmy. He was neither 
 emaciated nor corpulent. He was without undue length of limb 
 or body. In form, stature, and weight there was consonance 
 and congruity. He was elegant, genteel, graceful, and mod- 
 est. His features were symmetrical, his complexion lustrous, 
 and his eyes mild and brilliant. His face was expressive of 
 blended strength, grace, and sweetness. There was nothing 
 about him of the somber or the silly, he was neither austere nor 
 obsequious. He was alike free from the imperial bearing of 
 the autocrat and the cringing of the mendicant and the menial. 
 ^\ hile he was not endowed with any extraordinary genius, he 
 had a clear judgment, a steady will, and was capable of lofty 
 conceptions. B.e was refined, elegant, brilliant, and witty. His 
 qualities of heart were not inferior to his intellectual endow- 
 ments. He had a love for beauty, truth, and justice. There 
 was nothing in his person, dress, or manner which would pro- 
 voke criticism. He was exactly fitted, well endowed, and duly 
 qualified for President of a College. For that office none sur- 
 passed him. When he took charge of La Grange College he 
 was in the full bloom of young manhood, and was about the 
 meridian of life when he resigned the charge to other hands. 
 
 He was endowed with rare talents for teaching, in which work 
 he was seldom surpassed. His lectures on Moral Science 
 were sublime productions, terse, logical, pure, finished, and 
 unctious withal. He was an able preacher, though not uniform. 
 He sometimes failed, utterly failed in his attempts at preaching. 
 His audiences always regretted his failures, for his failures 
 were attended with a promise of something sublime and edify- 
 ing. Even when he made mortifying failures there were given 
 such marked indications of ability, there were such flashes of 
 intellect, there were such scintillations of heavenly inspiration, 
 there were such outlines of divine truth set forth in the begin- 
 ning of the sermon, it gave to the audience intimations of ap- 
 proach to a sublime effort, and left with the audience the feel- 
 ing that had he succeeded according to the conception he had 
 of the subject in hand they would have received a message of 
 superior excellence, and no little edification. In diction, 
 thought, and sentiment he was pure, elevated, and refined. 
 
 He served the College as President, though at the first, out 
 of pure modesty, he would not be called President, but Super- 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education. 
 
 437 
 
 intendent, until he was ordained Bishop of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, South, in May, 1846. His first work as a Meth- 
 odist preacher was in Alabama. His first pastoral charge, to 
 which he was appointed before he was nineteen, was the Flint 
 Eiver Circuit, which was partly in Alabama, and included 
 Huntsville. His second Circuit was Tuskaloosa, and extended 
 from forty to fifty miles in width along the whole length of the 
 Tuskaloosa or Black Warrior Eiver, or at least from Hardwick's 
 Shelter, where Carthage is, to Bristow's Cove, near Wills 
 Creek. The Eev. Kobert Paine tilled every position assigned 
 him with fidelity to the cause and with credit to the Church. 
 He was Chairman of the Committee of nine of the General Con- 
 ference of the Methodist Episcopal Church of 1844, which drew 
 the plan and presented the paper for the division of the Church. 
 His name will live as long as the History of Methodism in 
 America is known. He was President of La Grange College at 
 the time he wrote that memorable paper, called the Plan of Sep- 
 aration. He died at his residence, at Aberdeen, Mississippi, 
 
 October 19, 1882. , . • t r. n ^ 
 
 The two Professors first elected to chairs m La Grange Col- 
 lege filled them only two or three years. William W. Hudson, 
 who filled the chair of Mathematics and Modern Languages, 
 and who was graduated at Yale College, left La Grange upon 
 being elected to the chair of Mathematics and Mental Philos- 
 ophy in the University of Alabama, in 1833. 
 
 Edward D. Sims, who filled the chair of Ancient Languages, 
 who received his A.M. at Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and who 
 was under twenty-five years of age when he entered upon his 
 duties in La Grange College, filled his chair through the ses- 
 sions of 1830, and then left the College to enter the Christian 
 ministry. At the Fourth Quarterly Conference for Franklin 
 Circuit, held at the Camp Ground near Kussellville, Alabama, 
 October 2, 1830, Edward D. Sims was licensed to preach, and 
 recommended as a suitable person to join the traveling connec- 
 tion. Just one month from that day the Tennessee Conference 
 met and he was received into the Conference on trial and ap- 
 pointed for the next year to the Nashville Circuit. At the 
 next session of the Conference he was appointed, as the Min- 
 utes for 1S32 show, "Professor of Mathematics and Natural 
 Philosophy in La Grange College." At the close of 1832 he 
 
438 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 was transferred to the Virginia Conference, and he never re- 
 turned to La Grange. For a number of years he was a mem- 
 ber of the Virginia Conference and Professor in Randolph- 
 Macon College. In December, 1841, he was elected to the 
 chair of English Literature in the University of Alabama, and 
 in November, 1842, he was transferred from the Virginia to the 
 Alabama Conference. He died suddenly at Tuskaloosa. Ala- 
 bama, in April, 1845, and was buried at that place. He was 
 honored at his burial. Being a man of accurate learning and 
 of classical attainments, he was eminently fitted for University 
 work, and he gave reputation to the Colleges with which he was 
 associated, and he filled his chairs in the same with benefit to 
 the students under his care. He was a devout Christian, and 
 was strongly attached to the work of the ministry. He was 
 simple, modest, sincere and amiable. In the social circle he 
 was pre-eminent. He was equal to the companionship of kings 
 and courts. He was the peer of princes. 
 
 The Charter of the College provided for and named fifty 
 Trustees in the Board. The purpose was doubtless to attach as 
 many as possible to the College, bat the wisdom of appointing 
 ^^ large a Board might be questioned. There are many objec- 
 tions to so large a Board. 
 
 The second man named on the Board of Trustees to take 
 charge of La Grange College was Alexander Sale, than whom a 
 wiser counselor and a truer friend the College never had. He 
 was a native of Amherst County, Virginia, and was born near 
 the close of the war for Independence. The Bev. Alexander 
 Sale joined the Virginia Conference on trial in February, 1808, 
 and located in February, 1814. He moved to Alabama, and 
 settled in the Tennessee Valley, south of the Tennessee Eiver, 
 about 1820. He was re-admitted to the traveling connection in 
 the Mississippi Conference in December, 1822, and was presid- 
 ing elder on the Cahawba District for the two succeeding years, 
 which District at that time extended from the Tennessee River 
 to the Alabama River. At the close of 1824 Mr. Sale trans- 
 ferred to the Tennessee Conference, which then took in that 
 part of the Tennessee Valley in which his home was situated, 
 and which up to that time had belonged to the Mississippi Con- 
 ference. At the close of 1827 he again located, and remained a 
 local preacher until his death. He died in Louisiana some time 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education, 
 
 439 
 
 in the sixties of this century. For a considerable period of his 
 life he was a man of wealth, but in the last years of his pilgrim- 
 age he lost his worldly possessions. Like Saul, the king, he 
 was from his shoulders and upward higher than any of the 
 people, and he was proverbially straight. His eyes were as 
 keen, and searching as an eagle's, his features indicated strength 
 of character, and he had a will as firm as the everlasting hills. 
 Bold and brave, he was as lordly as a nobleman. He was noted 
 for his imperial bearing, lofty dignity, and rigid piety. He was 
 a man of faith, and an intelligent, and powerful preacher. He 
 was a leader and a commander. He brought up children who 
 were an honor to him, and a joy as well. Hon. John B. Sale, 
 his son, was educated at La Grange. He had a brother, the 
 Rev. John Sale, who was for more than thirty years, or from 
 November, 1795, till January, 1827, an itinerant preacher. He 
 preached mostly in Ohio and Kentucky. He was a member of 
 the Ohio Conference when he died, January 15, 1827. 
 
 The Rev. Alexander Sale engaged himself as a systematic 
 peace-maker. He devoted Monday of the week to that work. 
 Every Monday he went through the community, removing mis- 
 understandings, adjusting disputes, allaying strifes, reconciling 
 enemies, and putting a truce to neighborhood broils and private 
 hostilities. Who attempts to adjust the disputes of enemies, 
 and to allay the strifes of contentious spirits undertakes a work 
 which is always difficult, and which is seldom successful. No 
 doubt the Rev. Alexander Sale was sincere and religious in 
 his purpose in that special work which he did so systematic- 
 ally as to devote Monday of each week to it, and no doubt he 
 claimed the blessing which the Saviour pronounced upon peace- 
 makers,' but a professional peace-maker is often an officious and 
 curious meddler, "a busybody in other men's matters." The 
 work of peace-makers upon which the Son of God pronounced 
 a blessing is a broader, deeper, grander work than listening to 
 a confidential recital of the grievances, supposed or real, of 
 angry and belligerent neighbors. 
 
 Jack Shackleford, M.D., one of the Trustees of La Grange 
 College, born in Virginia, March 20, 1790, though brought up 
 under the shadow of orphanage, made a bright record for him- 
 self. He moved to Shelby County, Alabama, in the latter part 
 of 1818 or the first part of 1819, where he occupied positions of 
 
440 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 honor. He was a member of the House of Representatives of 
 the State of Alabama from Shelby County in 1820, and was a 
 member of the Senate of the State of Alabama from Shelby 
 County for three sessions, beginning with the session in 1822. 
 He moved from Shelby County to Courtland, Lawrence County, 
 Alabama, probably, in 1829, where he died January 27, 1857. In 
 1825 or 1826, while living in Shelby County, Alabama, he joined 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church. He was a man of courage, in- 
 tegrity, faith, piety, and benevolence. He served the cause of 
 liberty, humanity, and Christianity. While he was a man of 
 lively disposition and of mirthful spirits he was a man of deli- 
 cate feelings, of refined nature, and of great reverence, as a 
 Resolution introduced by him and adopted by the Quarterly 
 Conference held for Franklin Circuit, at Courtland, Alabama, 
 April 4, 1835, will indicate: " The following by Brother Shackle- 
 ford was adopted: Resolved, That we recommend to all the mem- 
 bers in our Church, to abstain from the use of Tobacco, while 
 in attendance at the House of God, regarding its use, while in 
 our Houses of Worship, as extremely offensive, indelicate, and 
 indecent, and often a source of great annoyance to the members 
 and congregation in their devotions." One of the most remark- 
 able incidents in the life of Dr. Jack Shackleford was connected 
 with the war which resulted in the establishment of the State 
 of Texas. In 1835 the people in that part of Mexico now known 
 as Texas resisted the arbitrary proceeding of Santa Anna and 
 his associates in the attempt to establish over the country a 
 military despotism. Upon the manifestation of the disloyalty 
 of the people to the military reign inaugurated, Santa Anna sent 
 an army into the country to enforce the requisitions of his gov- 
 ernment The people met the invading forces of the military 
 chieftain with armed resistance. The war was hot, the contest 
 sharp and bitter. There were numbers of men in the United 
 States who sympathized with the people who offered resistance 
 to the usurpations of Santa Anna, and in considerable numbers 
 they rushed to their assistance. In the generosity of his nature 
 Jack Shackleford despised usurpation and despotism, and under 
 the promptings of the love of liberty he gathered in North Al- 
 abama a company of volunteers, and rushed to the help of the 
 struggling Texans. In March, 1836, Shackleford and his men, 
 about one hundred in number, were all, except, perhaps, seven. 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education. 
 
 441 
 
 captured by Santa Anna's forces on one of the broad plains of 
 what is now the State of Texas. When captured Shackleford 
 and his men were marching with all possible speed to join Colo- 
 nel Fannin and his forces, who had surrendered just before 
 Shackleford arrived on the field. Fannin and his men and 
 Shackleford and his men, in all about four hundred, were car- 
 ried to Goliad, where, notwithstanding Fannin had surrendered 
 on the condition that he and his men should be treated kindly 
 and should be transported to the United States, they were 
 treated with indignity, and were finally massacred. Jack 
 Shackleford was the only one who escaped with his life. He 
 begged to be executed with his men, but the Mexicans refused to 
 grant him his Request, and held him a prisoner for a long while. 
 He eventually escaped from prison in spite of the vigilance of the 
 guards, and returned to his home in Courtland, Alabama, 
 whence, as already related, he went to his final reward. 
 
 Hon Henry C. Foote, one of the Trustees of La Grange Col- 
 lege lived awhile at Tuscumbia and also at Courtland, and final- 
 ly moved to Mississippi. He was a lawyer of ability, and an 
 
 r>T'ator 
 
 Hon Samuel W. Mardis, for whom Mardisville, Talladega 
 
 County, Alabama, was named, was a man of talents and of m- 
 
 ^G^orge W Foster, who filled the offices of class leader and 
 steward in the Church, and at one time held his membership at 
 Ebenezer, not far from Courtland, and who was a brother-in-law 
 of Hon James E. Saunders, was a most liberal contributor to 
 La Grange College. He died in Florence during the war be- 
 
 tween the States. 
 
 It is necessary, in order to have a perfect knowledge of the 
 subiect to state that the Rev. William Winans, D.D., one of the 
 Trustees of the College, bitterly opposed that provision m the 
 charter of the College whereby it was enjoined that the institu- 
 tion incorporated should be purely literary and scientific, and 
 that the Trustees should not adopt any system of education pro- 
 viding? for the inculcation of the peculiar tenets or doctrines of 
 any religious denomination whatsoever; and in his position on 
 this point Dr. Winans had a numerous following, though he and 
 his followers were in a fearful minority. The majority of the 
 Methodists of America were until in recent years opposed to 
 
442 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education. 
 
 443 
 
 theological schools. However, it must not be supposed that La 
 Grange College and its founders were against religion or reli- 
 gious influences. The Kev. Eobert Paine, the President, deliv- 
 ered to the students of that College some of the finest Lectures 
 on the Evidences of Christianity ever delivered to a body of 
 students, and the College was noted through its entire history 
 for its moral and religious influence. 
 
 Agents were appointed by the Tennessee and Mississippi Con- 
 ferences to advocate the interests of La Grange College and to 
 solicit funds for its support. The Eev. AVilliam McMahon was 
 the Agent for the College appointed by the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence for 1830, 1831, and 1832; and then he was the accredited 
 Agent to attend the Session of the Georgia Conference at La 
 Grange, Georgia, January 2, 1833, and present to that Confer- 
 ence communications soliciting the aid and support of that Con- 
 ference for La Grange College at La Grange, Alabama. 
 
 The Rev. Ebenezer Hearn was the Agent of the College ap- 
 pointed by the Mississippi Conference for 1831; and the Eev. 
 Joseph McDowell was the Agent appointed for it by the Missis- 
 sippi Conference for 1832. There are no data in hand from 
 which to ascertain the amounts the Agents gathered for the Col- 
 lege during the years here named. The Eev. Ebenezer Hearn 
 states in his Journal that for 1831 he acted as Agent for the 
 College, and that in the discharge of his duty he traveled 
 through Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, and Tennessee, and 
 that he succeeded in collecting money and in securing subscrip- 
 tions for the College quite as well as he anticipated. The Geor- 
 gia Conference organized and held its first session at Macon, 
 Georgia, beginning January 5, 1831; and according to the Jour- 
 nal of that Conference, on Monday, January 10, 1831, the Con- 
 ference being in session in the Hall furnished by the County, 
 and the Eev. Thomas Samford presiding: "Brother Hearn of the 
 Mississippi Conference was introduced by the President to the 
 attention of our body, after which he presented his credentials 
 which were read announcing him as an accredited Agent to col- 
 lect funds for the La Grange College, whereupon our worthy 
 brother addressed the Conference explanatory of the objects of 
 his mission." For the next day the Journal records the follow- 
 ing item: "On motion, Eesolved, That this Conference highly 
 approve the object of the Mississippi Conference in supporting 
 
 I 
 
 the College of La Grange, and the appointment of our respected 
 brother Hearn as an Agent for that purpose, that they deem him 
 fully entitled to the confidence of the community generally, and 
 sincerely hope that the liberality of the Methodist public will 
 be extended to the object of his agency." 
 
 The Georgia Conference met at La Grange, Georgia, January 
 2, 1833, and the Journal for Thursday morning, January 3, con- 
 tains the following item: "Brother John Early, of the Virginia 
 Conference, and Brother McMahon, of the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence, made separate and distinct communications to this body— 
 the first in reference to the Eandolph-Macon College, and the 
 second in reference to the La Grange College, which communi- 
 cations were referred to a Committee consisting of Brothers 
 Stephen Olin, Ignatius A. Few, Lovick Pierce, A. Howard, and 
 
 William Arnold." 
 
 The Journal records as a fact that on Friday, January 4, the 
 Committee on Eandolph-Macon College and La Grange Col- 
 lege made to the Conference a report on the subject in hand, 
 and the Conference adopted Eesolution " 4. That we have full 
 confidence and take a lively interest in La Grange College, will 
 recommend it to the support and liberality of our friends and 
 the public, and will do what we can to promote the success of 
 any Agent who may visit us for the promotion of its interests." 
 
 On Monday, January 7, the Conference, as the Journal re- 
 cords: " On motion, Eesolved, That the Eev. William McMahon 
 as Agent of La Grange College be invited to take up collections 
 within the bounds of this Conference, and that he be furnished 
 with a copy of the Eesolution reported by the Committee and 
 adopted by this Conference recommending the said College of 
 La Grange to the confidence of our brethren." 
 
 From these items it appears that the Mississippi and Tennes- 
 see Conferences endeavored to enlist the Georgia Conference in 
 behalf of La Grange College located in Franklin County, Alaba- 
 ma, and that they did so far succeed as to get a recommendation 
 to the favorable notice and the liberal donations of the Metho- 
 dists of Georgia. The actual amount of Georgia's pure offer- 
 ings to that literary enterprise is not now known, but it is pre- 
 sumed that it was not very large. 
 
 The Eev. William McMahon was one of the most efficient 
 Agents ever appointed for La Grange College. He was well 
 
444 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 qualified for the work, and had a cause which commanded atten- 
 tion and deserved benevolence, and no doubt he would have suc- 
 ceeded in gathering larger sums for that institution of essential 
 worth but that there were so many of those to whom he ap- 
 pealed " who with dust inanimate held wedded intercourse." 
 He was not born to luxurious life, nor to hereditary fame, and 
 he was not of those who strove for place, and eminence, and 
 swelling titles, and pompous names. He was equally free from 
 sloth and ambition. He was sincere and true, faithful to vows, 
 stern against sin. He was an honest seer. He had decision of 
 character, and never yielded to chance. He was a native of Vir- 
 ginia, and had the sorrow to lose his father in his early child- 
 hood. His mother was a pious woman. He was received on 
 trial in the Western Conference at Cincinnati, Ohio, October, 
 1811. For sixteen years, or from the latter part of 1819 to the 
 latter part of 1835, he lived near Huntsville, in Madison Coun- 
 ty, Alabama, and discharged the duties of his ministry mostly 
 in North Alabama; preaching to the civilized and the savage, to 
 the white man, the Negro, and the Indian. He attended more 
 Camp-meetings in North Alabama, and did more ministerial 
 work at them, perhaps, than any other one man. He did the 
 grandest work in North Alabama, in the Tennessee Valley, of 
 any man ever in it. It was the Rev. William McMahon who 
 kept out of North Alabama the strife of the innovators, and pre- 
 vented, in that section, the establishment, in any measure of 
 strength, of the Methodist Protestant Church. He stood a tow- 
 er and a strength against that movement, and in that behalf is 
 entitled to all praise. He was a leader in Israel. He was a 
 member of many General Conferences. He attained the degree 
 of Doctor of Divinity. His first wife, Mrs. Rachel McMahon, nee 
 Rachel Lewis, ever fearless and ever faithful, ever pious and 
 ever patient, preceded him to the grave and to the better land 
 nearly fifty years. She died about sunrise, Wednesday, No- 
 vember 24, 1820, at the residence gf Mr. Richard Harris, near 
 Huntsville, Alabama. He died June 15, 1870, at the house of 
 his son-in-law, the Rev. J. N. Temple, in Paducah, Kentucky. 
 After the death of his first wife, he married a Miss Saunders, of 
 Alabama. She also preceded him to the grave. He was a 
 grand man everywhere. In the pulpit, and in the legislative 
 bodies of the Church he had few equals, and in the presidency 
 
 Beginning of the Work of Education. 
 
 445 
 
 of the Quarterly Conferences, and in the administration of af- 
 fairs he had no superiors. Devotion, energy, judgment, superi- 
 ority, and success were his. He was a member of the Memphis 
 Conference at the time of his death. He commenced the world 
 poor, and died in the same condition. He went on foot, when a 
 youncT man, having a satchel and some kind of walking stick, 
 from Virginia to Ohio. He attained to affluence in the course 
 of years, but was reduced, before he died, to extreme poverty. 
 There was nothing wrong in the providence, and there was noth- 
 ing wrong in the poverty. His faith never failed, and at death 
 he entered upon an inheritance which shall never fade away 
 «Ye shall be redeemed without money." "The redeemed of 
 the Lord shall return, and come with singing unto Zion; and 
 everlasting joy shall be upon their head: they shall obtain 
 gladness and joy; and sorrow and mourning shall flee away. 
 29 
 
CHArXEK XIX. 
 
 The Annual Sessions of the Alabama Conference of the 
 
 Methodist Episcopal Chuech. 
 
 THE formation of the Alabama Conference was anticipated 
 and provided for at the session of the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence in November, 1831. The Districts were arranged and the 
 appointments of the preachers were made then with reference to 
 the boundaries of the Mississippi and the Alabama Conferences 
 which were to be, and the places and times of the meeting of the 
 two Conferences were fixed. As anticipated and provided for, 
 the General Conference which met in May, 1832, authorized the 
 organization of the Alabama Conference, and fixed the bounda- 
 ries, which included all that part of the State of Alabama not 
 included in the Tennessee Conference, AVest Florida, and the 
 Counties of Jackson, Greene, Wayne, Clarke, Lauderdale, Kemp- 
 er, Noxubee, Loundes, and that part of Monroe east of the Tom- 
 bigbee River in the State of Mississippi. That part of North 
 Alabama watered by those streams flowing into the Tennessee 
 Eiver was included in the Tennessee Conference. 
 
 The Alabama Conference was organized at Tuskaloosa, Alaba- 
 ma, AYednesday, December 12, 1832. AVhatever statements or 
 intimations there may be to the contrary, this date is neverthe- 
 less absolutely correct. Bishop James O. Andrew presided over 
 the body at that its first annual session, and if not the very first 
 that Conference was among the first presided over by him after 
 his consecration to the Episcopal office. 
 
 It fell to the lot of the Rev. Robert L. Walker to provide for 
 the entertainment of the members of that Conference as he was 
 in charge of the Church at Tuskaloosa at that time. 
 
 At that session of the Conference six preachers were received 
 on trial, ten continued on trial, five admitted into full connec- 
 tion, five ordained deacons, three ordained elders, two located, 
 two put on the supernumerary and two on the superannuated 
 roll, reported eight thousand one -hundred and ninety-six white 
 and two thousand seven hundred and seventy colored members 
 C446) 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 447 
 
 in Society, made four Districts, and assigned to work, includ- 
 ing two supernumerary men, forty-nine preachers. ^ That 
 was a splendid array of men and a magnificent outline of 
 work for that day. A multitude of seraphs burning in inef- 
 fable glory could not present to the Lord of the vineyard a 
 more sublime spectacle than was presented by that outline of 
 sacred work and that party of consecrated workmen. 
 
 The preachers of the Conference, to the number of twenty- 
 three, on Tuesday of the Conference session, December 18, 
 in a meeting held for the purpose, formed themselves into a 
 Society, the style and title of which was: "The Preacher's 
 Society of the Alabama Annual Conference." The Constitu- 
 tion adopted declared: ''The object of this Society shall be to 
 create a fund, the proceeds of which, after the capital amounts 
 to two thousand five hundred dollars, may be appropriated to 
 the relief of such preachers as may be peculiarly necessitous." 
 The Constitution provided that " Every traveling preacher of 
 the Alabama Annual Conference, who shall pay two dollars and 
 fifty cents annually, shall be a member of this Society; and the 
 payment of fifty dollars at one time shall constitute a member 
 
 for life." 
 
 With song and music, prayer and sermon, such as stirred Uie 
 emotions and inspired the faith of saints and alarmed the fears 
 of sinners, public worship was carried on from day to day and 
 from night to night during the entire session of the Confer- 
 
 ence 
 
 The last night of the first session of the Alabama Conference 
 came The moment for adjournment sine die came. The ben- 
 ediction was pronounced for the last time just after the ap- 
 pointments of the preachers for the next year had been an- 
 nounced Just before announcing the appointments, the Lord's 
 Supper was dispensed. Bishop Andrew conducting the admm- 
 istration The reception of the holy communion is a most sol- 
 emn service, and what was a delightful occasion, the showing 
 forth the Lord's death by a company of divinely appointed am- 
 bassadors, was marred by the untimely performances of the 
 Eev Job Foster, the eccentric, who while the service of the holy 
 communion was proceeding pranced up and down the aisle of 
 the Meeting House with such vehemence as to endanger life and 
 limb and frighten and disgust the audience; and all this in the 
 

 448 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Sessio}is of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 449 
 
 name of religion and the assumption of ecstacy. But the holy 
 men retained their equilibrium in the midst of the provocation, 
 and, in good order and with solemn reverence, proceeded to the 
 finale. 
 
 The second session of the Alabama Conference was held at 
 Montgomery, Alabama, beginning December 11, 1833, Bishop 
 John Emory, presiding. 
 
 The Constitution of the Preacher's Fund Society of the Ala- 
 bama Annual Conference provided that its Annual Meetings 
 "shall be held on the first Monday in the session of the Annual 
 Conference." In accordance with that provision the Society 
 met in Montgomery, Monday, December 16, 1833, and transact- 
 ed its business. 
 
 An increase for the year of twenty-four hundred and eighty- 
 six white and three hundred and ninety-three colored members 
 was reported at that session of the Conference, and sixty 
 preachers, including Supernumeraries, Professors, and Agents, 
 were assigned appointments. 
 
 One of the preachers, then at the end of his first year on 
 trial, and who was present, makes the following statement con- 
 cerning that session of the Conference: "In due time we were 
 at Montgomery, and homes assigned us. My sleeping apart- 
 ment was in an old vacated Hotel, near the river, in company 
 with a crowd of young preachers, and we had to go out and get 
 our meals at different places in the city. The weather was ex- 
 tremely bad, rain, snow, and sleet fell on us. The Conference 
 convened at the appointed time. Bishop Emory presided, much 
 to the satisfaction of the brethren. Business was dispatched 
 by the Bishop, carefully and safely, so that on Sunday the ordi- 
 nations were attended to, the Bishop preaching at 11 o'clock. 
 I confess I had either looked for too much, set my estimate of 
 the Bishop's preaching abilities too high, or else I was in a bad 
 condition to hear; probably this last; for I was really disap- 
 pointed, but in looking round I saw a number of the older 
 preachers in tears, viz., E. V. Le Vert, K. L. Walker, E. L. Ken- 
 non, James H. Mellard, Ebenezer Hearn, and others, so that I 
 decided certainly it is in me, but could not help thinking that if 
 I were up there saying those identical words, using the same 
 gestures and intonations of voice, not a tear would have been 
 shed, their heads would have been hung, perfectly ashamed of 
 
 me. I was not the only one that entertained such thoughts. 
 Brother James Thompson, an excellent local preacher of the 
 Cedar Creek Circuit, who was at the Conference for ordination, 
 and who heard the Bishop's sermon, told me he had the same 
 thoughts. AVe both concluded that a position and name had a 
 great deal to do in producing effects by some divines. Bishop 
 Emory was certainly a good divine, a good writer, and an intel- 
 lectual preacher; but somehow it did not, to my weak capacity 
 of judging, so appear that day. In due time the work of the 
 Conference was closed, and every one ready to leave, and only 
 waiting for the secret roll to be unfolded, and receive their ap- 
 pointed sphere of labor for the next year. The Bishop very 
 gravely approached the stand and announced the appoint- 
 ments." 
 
 At Greenesborough, Greene County, Alabama, December 10, 
 
 1834, the Alabama Conference met in Annual session. Bishop 
 James O. Andrew presiding. The Secretary for that session of 
 the Conference alleging that he had lost the paper containing 
 the statistical answer to the question. What numbers are in So- 
 ciety? never furnished said statistics for the General Minutes. 
 The answers to five of the regular questions in the Conference 
 business were not furnished. The Secretary seems to have been 
 a man lacking in carefulness and promptness. 
 
 One of the preachers who was received into full connection 
 and ordained a deacon at that time, gives the following account: 
 " We proceeded to Greenesborough. My lodging was assigned 
 me, as at Montgomery the winter before, with a crowd of young 
 preachers, among whom were Walter H. McDaniel, Theophilus 
 Moody, and others, in the upper room of an old building, the 
 lower part of which was used as a machine shop for the putting 
 up and sale of spinning-jennies by a Mr. Peter Mclntyre. We 
 took our meals at a Brother Dickens', a prominent member of 
 the Church at that place. He entertained a number of the old- 
 er preachers. Bishop Andrew among them. My class consisted, 
 as the year before, of Eobert Smith, E. H. Moore, Isaac N. Mul- 
 lins, Robert Dickson, Humphry Williamson, Theophilus Moody, 
 and' myself. All of whom were examined and passed, except 
 Brother Moody, he was deficient in his studies, and left on trial 
 by the first vote taken, much to his mortification; but the vote 
 was afterward reconsidered, and he was received, and with the 
 
450 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference, 
 
 451 
 
 others elected to deacon's orders, which were conferred by the 
 imposition of Bishop Andrew's hands the Sunday following. 
 Brother Paul F. Stearns had been stationed at Greenesborongh 
 that year, and upon him rested the labors of conducting the 
 outside business at this session, which he discharged, I think, 
 to the satisfaction of all." 
 
 The Alabama Conference again convened at Tuskaloosa, Ala- 
 bama, December 16, 1835. When the hour for the Conference 
 to open arrived Bishop Joshua Soule had not reached the place, 
 and the Kev. E. Y. Le Vert was chosen by ballot President. 
 On Saturday of the Conference session, December 19, the 
 Preacher's Fund Society of the Alabama Annual Conference 
 met, Dr. R. L. Kennon in the chair. On Sunday, December 20, 
 Bishop Soule preached one of his grand sermons, and ordained 
 a number of deacons and elders. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference of the Chickasawhay Circuit rec- 
 ommended to the Alabama Annual Conference to meet at Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, December 16, 1835, the Rev. Stephen Fatherly 
 Pilley as a suitable person to be admitted on trial into the 
 traveling connection. Immediately on the presentation to the 
 Conference, in due form and officially, of that recommendation, 
 strong opposition to the reception of the applicant into the 
 Conference was developed. The presiding elder who officially 
 presented the recommendation and a number of the older mem- 
 bers of the Conference vigorously resisted the admission of the 
 applicant to Conference prerogatives. Objections w^ere urged 
 against the Rev. Stephen Fatherly Pilley on the following 
 grounds: First, he had been a member of a Theatrical Troupe, 
 was a good fiddler, loved [fun and frolic, and it would be im- 
 possible for him to attain the gravity and the influence of a 
 minister of the gospel in the places where he had led theatric- 
 als, fun, and frolic, and had fiddled for the entertainment of 
 the frivolous, and especially in Mobile where he had been no- 
 torious in that line of things. Second, he was a married man, 
 with a wife and one child. 
 
 With such environments and with the influence of the men 
 of age and position against him the prospect for the Rev. Ste- 
 phen F. Pilley was gloomy, indeed. The Rev. Abiezer 
 Clarke Ramsey, a young man then at the end of one year's 
 membership in the Conference, and who had never made a 
 
 Bpeech on the Conference floor, a young -- "/J-Ji^J^^^t 
 feeble body, in personal appearance as contemptible as ever 
 Saul of Tarsus was. heroically espoused the cause of the apph- 
 
 "On the Chickasawhay Circuit in the early Pa^ °t^im Jh; 
 Eev. A. C. Eamsey witnessed the mtroduction o* M'^j^?^' ^^ 
 into the kingdom of grace and into a -w ^ife Mr. E msey 
 wp«t to sDeud the night at the house of Jesse Gv&^ es. iiioiner 
 Gra es inSld on having a sermon, Brother Eamsey consent- 
 S smaUcongregation was summoned and ---^ed xn on 
 of the rooms of the dwelling, Eamsey stood - «'« fl^:-^ ^^ *^^^ 
 back of a chair, and delivered his message, and at the close of 
 his sermon he invited persons who desired salvation to make 
 ?iems"es known. Mr Stephen F. Pilley, with apparent con- 
 en td with signs of deep P-\--' ^^^l t^eal 
 on the floor with his head in the chair by -l"f J^^ Pf ^^ 
 bad stood in the delivery of his sermon^ ^Sv professed 
 .bile prayers were being offered for him Mr. ^^l^y P- ^^f^ 
 to find pardon and experience regeneration. The next clay at 
 
 he Meeting House, where Mr. Eamsey preached, Mr. Pilley 
 presented llmself as a candidate for membeiship in the Meth- 
 od stEpLopal Church, and, in due time and by in-ocess pro- 
 vided he was admitted. The Eev. Mr. Eamsey had for Mr. Pil- 
 
 ev a conclrn which others did not have, and saw in him the ele- 
 
 pntfof success which others did not see, and he admitted his 
 
 Tm to reTo^:^il and advocated his reception into the min- 
 
 '^'11 tTJ^S^- discussion which ensued on the subiect. 
 BroUier Eamsey resorted to arcfumentum ad Iwmnemm his de 
 
 '"%c S efeve y one o' his opponents might have been 
 I^molirBy thTtests applied to Pilley and the rule en- 
 Cedt his case not one of his opponents would have been 
 T 1 ,^ to the ministry. Brother Pilley had once been a sm- 
 :trSad t -n wli opposed his reception. Jossibly t ey 
 
 S done man t..^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
 
 performing on the Fddle.y ^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^ ^^^ 
 
 been .'^ -ange^ by divm^ op ^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^.^ .^^ 
 
 ^::f:ZsXl!r\mey claimed that his heart and life 
 
452 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference, 
 
 453 
 
 had been changed and that he was a witness of the divine clem- 
 ency. The heart of an Actor and of a Fiddler could be changed 
 by divine grace applied by the Holy Ghost, and the work of 
 divine power might be just as thorough in such cases as in oth- 
 ers. The power which changed the hearts of the preachers of 
 the Alabama Conference and which changed Saul of Tarsus 
 could as effectually change Pilley, the Actor and Fiddler. Even 
 before Brother Pilley united with the Church he was not given 
 to vicious habits, such as profanity and fraud, drunkenness and 
 debauchery. 
 
 In response to the objection that Pilley had a wife and a 
 child Eamsey asserted that there was no sin in being the hus- 
 band of a wife and the father of a child. Methodist preachers 
 were not required to vow the estate of single life, or to abstain 
 from marriage. There was no reason for refusing those who 
 had a wife and children admission to the ministry, as those ad- 
 mitted to the ministry without them would very soon have 
 them. If they were not married they ought to marry, and they 
 w^ould. These are not the utterances of mere idealism and 
 poesy. In the course of his speech Brother Kamsey said to the 
 Bishop that, left to his own choice, he would as soon take 
 Brother Pilley, the next year, for colleague on his Circuit as any 
 one untried. The Rev. Stephen F. Pilley was admitted into the 
 traveling connection, and was the colleague of the Bev. A. C. 
 Bamsey for the two years succeeding. Pilley was a man of 
 lofty conceptions, deep piety, great efficiency, and long useful- 
 ness. 
 
 The Conference appointed a committee consisting of J. Fos- 
 ter, B. L. Kennon, and E. Hearn to consider the propriety of 
 establishinc: a Periodical. 
 
 An offer from the North-east part of the Conference territory 
 to establish a Manual Labor School under the care of the Con- 
 ference was presented by the Bev. Greenberry Garrett and a 
 Committee was appointed to carry the project into effect under 
 certain regulations. The Committee consisted of G. Garrett, 
 J. Foster, B. Smith, J. Matthews, W. Murrah. 
 
 For Delegate to the General Conference William Murrah re- 
 ceived thirty-two votes, William Wier twenty-nine votes, Eu- 
 gene Y. Le Yert twenty-five votes, and Bobert L. Kennon 
 twenty-three votes, and were elected. 
 
 At that Conference steps were taken to make the examina- 
 tions of the undergraduates in the ministry more thorough and 
 satisfactory. More than a half century has passed since that 
 action of that Conference, and the examinations of undergrad- 
 uates are still superficial and unsatisfactoiy. 
 
 The next session of the Alabama Conference opened at Mo- ^ 
 bile, Alabama, January 4, 1837, Bishop Thomas A. Morris, a 
 very amiable man and a pleasant officer, presiding. Though the 
 ordinary business of the Conference was dispatched pleasantly 
 and properly, the session was attended with events which 
 caused deep sorrow and with developments which created pain- 
 ful solicitude. The year 1836, the year just then passing in re- 
 view, had been a year of sore trials with the Methodist preach- 
 ers and people of Alabama. Not only were there great spiritual 
 declension and financial stringency in the Church, but there 
 was mourning on account of two fallen comrades who had fal- 
 len during the year, the first who had fallen by death since the 
 organization of the Conference, and one went down by the de- 
 stroyer during the session of the Conference. 
 
 The Bev. Thomas L. Cox, who started out in the ministry 
 from Florence, Alabama, in the latter part of 1833— his license 
 bears date September 21, 1833-and who served Buttahatchee 
 Circuit for 1834, and the Centreville Circuit for 1835, and was 
 appointed to the Chickasawhay Circuit for 1836, was stricken 
 with a violent hemorrhage from the lungs January 18, just aft- 
 er he reached his Circuit, and soon passed to " the undiscovered 
 country from whose bourne no traveler returns." His death 
 was triumphant. His body was laid away in the burying 
 ground in the city of Mobile. 
 
 The Bev. Bobert A. Smith, who had served the Oakmulgee 
 Circuit one year, and the Jones's Yalley Circuit two years, and 
 who was appointed to the Montgomery Station for 1836, and 
 who served it faithfully till he was stricken with fever in the 
 month of August, died October 25. After he was stricken with 
 fever the kind family in which lived the lady to whom he was 
 betrothed, conveyed him in a carriage from Montgomery to 
 their home near Elyton, Alabama, and nursed him tenderly 
 and ministered kindly to his wants till he surrendered to the 
 king of terrors, and went to join the bloodwashed throng in the 
 enjoyment of the sublime realities of the land of paradise. He 
 
 :■.;■ 
 
454 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 was buried in the graveyard at Elytoii. A small, rough stone 
 still stands, 1891, at the head of his grave with the following 
 inscription: "Rev. Robert A. Smith, Died October 25. 1836 
 Aged 27 years." 
 
 The Conference held memorial services for these two com- 
 rades, and during the session of the Conference the Rev. 
 George W. Cotton, who had served the La Fayette Circuit for 
 the year just then closed, 1836, and who was then eligible to 
 membership in the Conference and to deacon's orders, aiid who 
 during the session of the Conference was being entertained at 
 the house of Brother Gascoigne, died of pneumonia, and died in 
 peace. Brothers Pilley and Ramsey witnessed his struggle 
 with death and closed his eyes. Bishop Morris, in the presence 
 of the Conference and the congregation, preached his funeral 
 from Colossians iii. 3, 4, and then he was laid away in a grave 
 beside the grave of the Rev. Thomas L. Cox in the burying 
 ground in the city of Mobile. The members of the Church in 
 Mobile paid the expenses of his burial. He left a wife and 
 daughter behind who mourned on account of his death. 
 
 That Conference session was peculiarly sad. Many of the 
 preachers were induced to locate at that time, and the* Confer- 
 ence was greatly weakened by the loss of its greatest and most 
 promising men. It was maintained by some that there was a 
 neglect of duty, a decline of piety, a conformity of the Church 
 to the world, and a loss of moral influence throughout the Ala- 
 bama Conference. There was such a lack of ministers that the 
 work was not properly supplied. Bishop Morris said: "There 
 are plenty of able ministers in the bounds of the Alabama Con- 
 ference to supply the work fully, if they could be had; but they 
 are attending to their farms, their merchandise, etc." The 
 Church was worldly and penurious. The preachers, under the 
 pretext, possibly under the necessity, of making a living, and 
 in some cases under the influence of covetousness, were giving 
 attention to secular affairs, and every department of Church 
 work sufi'ered detriment. Notwithstanding the sombre aspect 
 of the general situation presented by the depletion of the min- 
 isterial forces and the decrease in membership, two or three 
 preachers less receiving appointments for 1837 than for 1836, 
 and there being a decrease in the membership for the year 1836 
 of near three hundred, there was, perhaps, a disposition on the 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 455 
 
 part of some to brood over the disasters of the year and unduly 
 disparage the state of the Church. 
 
 The Preacher's Fund Society met in Mobile, Alabama, Mon- 
 day evening, January 9, 1837, and again the next evening after 
 the session of the Conference, R. L. Kennon in the chair. The 
 fund increased very slowly. The whole amount in hand at that 
 time was seven hundred and ninety-nine dollars and sixty-four 
 cents. Nothing to disburse. ^ ^ 
 
 The Alabama Conference met at Columbus, Mississippi, 
 Wednesday, January 3, 1838, Bishop James O. Andrew presid- 
 ing. The regular business vested in the Conference under the 
 genius of Methodism was conducted with propriety and com- 
 pleted with facility. In the examination and estimation of 
 ministerial character and in the determination of ministerial 
 relations the Conference at that session exercised more than 
 ordinary care, and in the discharge of the public function de- 
 volving in that behalf enforced the rules governing in the prem- 
 ises with rigid exactness. Goaded to desperation by threatened 
 calamity to the Church by the loss of ministers, the Conference 
 absolutely refused to grant the request of more than one who 
 
 asked a location. 
 
 Eight preachers were admitted on trial, four located, one was 
 expelled, one died, there had been an increase of thirty-six 
 members during the year, and six hundred and forty-two dol- 
 lars and seventy-nine cents had been contributed to the Confer- 
 ence Collection. To the friends of Christianity not stolidly in- 
 different the state of things represented by these facts and fig- 
 ures must have been depressing. 
 
 The Sunday before Conference met was the last day of the 
 year 1837. The rules of the Conference providing for the ex- 
 aminations of the preachers seeking Conference relations and 
 orders required the Committees of examination and the men to 
 be examined to be at the place of meeting some days in advance 
 of the opening of Conference, and in accordance with this re- 
 quirement a number of the preachers spent Sunday, December 
 31 at Columbus. On that day at 11 o'clock a.m., Dr. R. L. Ken- 
 non preached there in the Methodist Church from Isaiah xxvi. 
 3-5. The Doctor was in good health and buoyant spirits, and 
 preached with vigor, animation, and eloquence. The children 
 of God were devout and prayerful, and great emotion was 
 
4.56 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 N 
 
 evinced throughout the congregation. A watch-night service 
 was held at the Church in which the old year was watched out 
 and the new year was watched in. In that watch-night service, 
 which was closed just after the new year came in, Dr. Kennon 
 i:articipated, and was quite animated, exhorted and prayed with 
 extraordinary fervor and power. On Monday he helped in the 
 examination of the classes, a work in which he was deeply in- 
 terested, in the evening he conplained of being unwell, and on 
 Tuesday he took his bed, from which he never again arose. 
 The Conference proceeded with its business, and on Tuesday, 
 January 9, 1838, just as it was finishing up the business for ad- 
 journment sine die, the sad announcement was made in the Con- 
 ference room Dr. Kennon is dead! A solemn pause ensued and 
 deep sighs and numerous tears evinced the profound grief felt 
 by the members of the Conference. The Conference appointed 
 the E.ev. S. B. Sawyer and the Rev. William Wier a Committeo 
 to prepare and publish a proper memoir of Dr. Kennon. Bish- 
 op Andrew preached his funeral to a crowded and weeping as- 
 sembly; the body was conveyed to Tuskaloosa, Alabama, and 
 on January 12, 1838, was committed to the ground in the cem- 
 etery at Tuskaloosa, in hope of the general resurrection at the 
 last day. As Dr. Kennon's death took place just as the Con- 
 ference had assembled to read out the appointments of the 
 year, and the announcement of his death was made just at that 
 juncture, and as he was the man who was to go to Tuskaloosa 
 Station, his death left Tuskaloosa to be supplied for that year. 
 A Bev. Mr. Hardy filled the Tuskaloosa Station, as a supply, 
 till September 21, when he died. 
 
 The Rev. Robert L. Kennon was born in Granville County, 
 North Carolina, in 1789, and was regenerated when eleven years 
 old, and was ever after a pious, working Christian, deeply in- 
 terested in the salvation of souls. The Rev. Robert L. Ken- 
 non was recommended by a Quarterly Meeting Conference held 
 in Sparta Circuit, Pine Woods Meeting House, December 17, 
 1808, and was admitted on trial by the South Carolina Confer- 
 ence at Liberty Chapel, Georgia, on the afternoon of Decem- 
 ber 27, 1808, Bishop Asbury presiding. He was admitted into 
 full connection and elected to deacon's oflBce, Decemjier 24, 
 1810. He was elected to elder's orders, and located Decem- 
 ber 22, 1812. These items are taken from the Journal of the 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 457 
 
 South Carolina Conference. He located on account of feeble 
 
 ^After locating and acquiring medical tuition he administered 
 medicine as a profession and for a livelihood, and, as opportu- 
 tunity offered, exercised the office of local elder, in the Church 
 until December, 1824, when he was re-admitted to the traveling 
 connection in the Mississippi Conference. From 1819 to the 
 close of 1824, as stated in another place, he resided at luska- 
 loosa, Alabama; and after that, thirteen years of his active life 
 and ministry were given to Methodism in the State. He did 
 grand work for the Church. He exerted during all his years 
 in Alabama a salutary influence. No man was more extensively 
 known felt, and appreciated in Alabama Methodism m his day 
 than Dr. Kennon. His work was not limited by the number 
 of miles he traveled and the number and character of sermons 
 he preached, thougli he traveled extensively and preached often 
 and crrandly. The horizon swept by his vision was outlying 
 and expansive, and he planned for filling the extensive field 
 with efficient agencies and holy influences. He planned wisely 
 and for large results. By the ideas he inculcated, he expanded 
 the views of others, and by the plans of work he devised and 
 inaugurated he made others efficient. ^ , , -r 
 
 For four years, beginning with 1825, the Rev. Robert L. 
 Kennon was presiding elder of the Cahawba District, which 
 was composed of the Alabama, Cahawba, Jones's Yalley, Tuska- 
 loosa New River, and Marion Circuits, and Tuskaloosa Station. 
 For 1829 and 1830 he was preacher in charge of Tuskaloosa 
 Station For 1831 and 1832 he was presiding elder of Black 
 Warrior District, which consisted of Marengo, Prairie Creek, 
 Tuskaloosa New River, Marion, Columbus, Greene, and Oak- 
 mul-ee Circuits, and Tuskaloosa Station. For 1833 he was 
 prea°cher in charge of Greenesborough and Marion Station. 
 For 1834 he had a supernumerary relation. For 1835. and 
 1836 he was preacher in charge of Mobile Station. For 1837 
 he was preacher in charge of Tuskaloosa Station. These ap- 
 pointments give the field which he occupied for so many years. 
 A magnificent field it was, and well did he occupy it till his 
 Lord came and took him to himself. 
 
 Dr Kennon was about medium height, of spare mold and 
 straight form, blonde, with featuies indicative of intellectuality. 
 
■"^i 
 
 458 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 His step was agile and elastic. He was gentle, sincere, gener- 
 ous, and benevolent. He was dignified while he was free from 
 stiffness and affectation, and was of cheerful disposition and of 
 mirthful spirit without being silly and frivolous. AVith elegant 
 address, pleasing manners, and social qualities richly endowed 
 he was an agreeable companion, ever inspiring affection and 
 awe. His conversation was often brilliant, sometimes pro- 
 found, and always pious and profitable. As a preacher he was 
 earnest, emotional, and eloquent. Salvation with him was a 
 reality, and he loved the souls of men, and in his estimation it 
 ought to be the chief concern of mortals here below to attain 
 salvation. He labored to secure the interests and advance the 
 happiness of all classes. He worked for the elevation and sal- 
 vation of the Negroes no less than the Caucasians. 
 
 He married Miss Martha Bush, in Warren County, Georgia. 
 He made his home honorable and his household happy. He 
 was a loving husband and a kind father. His children cherish 
 his memory, and bless his name, and praise his deeds. 
 
 Before his death he was considered the father of the Alabama 
 Conference. His wise counsels, pious example, loving spirit, 
 and ardent interest in his fellows gave him a warm place in the 
 affections and the confidence of his brethren. They were 
 strongly attached to him. AVhen he died one of his comrades 
 said: "He left not his like among us." 
 
 The Alabama Conference convened in annual session at 
 Montgomery, Alabama, January 2, 1839, Bishop Thomas A. 
 Morris in the chair; and nine preachers were received by trans- 
 fer, including two who had just been admitted on trial by the 
 Conference from which they had been transferred; fifteen 
 others were admitted on trial; so that, though a number located, 
 a number discontinued, one had been expelled, and one had died, 
 there were assigned to appointments for the ensuing year seven- 
 teen more preachers than had been the year just then closed. 
 
 The Conference held its annual session at Tuskaloosa, Ala- 
 bama, beginning Wednesday, January 1, 1840, and adjourning 
 sine die the next Wednesday. On December 29, 1839, the Sun- 
 day before the Conference assembled, Bishop James O. An- 
 drew, then at Tuskaloosa awaiting the opening of the session 
 of the Conference, over which he was to preside, preached on 
 his favorite theme: "The Eelative Duties of Parents and Chil- 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 459 
 
 dren. Husbands and Wives." At night of the same Sunday 
 the Kev. Kobert Paine, then President of La Grange College, 
 who was also at Tuskaloosa awaiting the approaching session 
 of the Conference, preached in the Methodist Church. The 
 Eev. AVilliam Wier, who heard the sermon, said: "He had a 
 good plan, and labored hard to give energy and animation to 
 his enlarged thoughts, but he was dull in spite of all." The 
 Eev. Mr. Wier pronounced Bishop Andrew's sermon " a most 
 profitable discourse." 
 
 The average preacher of that time had but little genius for 
 companionship with books, and in the study of theology and in 
 the acquisition of literary taste and knowledge he was neither 
 diligent nor efficient. The Course of Study prescribed for un- 
 graduates was not mastered. At that session of the Conference 
 in a class of seventeen preachers who had been on trial one 
 year there were only seven present for examination, and of that 
 seven examined on Watson's "Life of Wesley," three had a 
 torerable idea of the book, the others had barely read it, and 
 not one of the class had ever read AVatson's "Dictionary." 
 
 A very tranquil session of the Alabama Conference, presided 
 over by Bishop James O Andrew, was held at Selma, Alabama, 
 beginning December 30, 1840, and adjourning sine die January 
 6, 1841. During that session of the Conference, January 2, 
 1841, an Act was approved, which was passed by the Senate and 
 House of Eepresentatives of the State of Alabama, in General 
 Assembly convened in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, incorporating the 
 Centenary Institute of the Alabama Conference of the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church, in the County of Dallas. Of course the 
 Centenary Institute thus incorporated engaged the attention of 
 the Alabama Conference assembled in the town of Selma. 
 
 The next annual session of the Alabama Conference was held 
 at MoMe, Alabama, beginning December 15 and adjourning sine 
 die December 22, 1841. That was a busy session. The Eev. 
 Fountain E. Pitts, of the Tennessee Conference, attended that 
 session of the Conference in the interest of the South-icestern 
 Christian Advocate. 
 
 December 28, 1842, the Alabama Conference convened in the 
 city of Montgomery, Alabama, Bishop James O. Andrew in the 
 chair. The Conference was in session more than a week. The 
 Eev. John B. McFerrin, and the Eev. George McClintock, two 
 
460 
 
 History of Methodism in Alahatna. 
 
 men who made reputation, attended that session of the Confer- 
 ence. 
 
 The Alabama Conference convened at Columbus, Mississippi, 
 December 27, 1843. At 11 o'clock a.m. on Sunday, the last day 
 of the year, Edmund S. Janes, afterward Bishop, preached a 
 sermon touching the office of deacons in the Church of God. 
 Immediately upon the close of the sermon ten traveling dea- 
 cons were ordained. At 3 o'clock p.m., the same day, the Eev. 
 John B. McFerrin, Editor of the South-irestern Christian Ad- 
 vocate, preached a sermon defining the office and expounding 
 the duties of elders in the Church of God. Upon the close of 
 the sermon six traveling elders were ordained. Probably a 
 number of local deacons and elders were also ordained. Bish- 
 op Joshua Soule presided at that Conference, and he conducted 
 the ordination services. The services were conducted with the 
 holy unction, solemn awe, and sublime dignity peculiar to Bish- 
 op Soale. The spectators were awed and rejoiced. The im- 
 pressions of that day lasted. The name and house of God were 
 exalted. By that ordination service the people present were 
 made to feel: "Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, in 
 the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness." At that 
 session of the Conference delegates to the General Conference 
 were elected consisting of Jesse Boring, Jefferson Hamilton, 
 "William Murrah, and Greenberry Garrett. 
 
 The Alabama Conference met at Wetumpka, Autauga Coun- 
 ty, Alabama, Wednesday, February 26, 1845, and adjourned 
 sine die the next Wednesday, March 5. These are the correct 
 dates, all statements wheresoever found to the contrary notwith- 
 standing. Bishop James O. Andrew presided. On Sunday, 
 March 2, ten traveling deacons and eight traveling elders were 
 ordained. The state of matters at the time of that Conference 
 produced friction. There were difficulties to settle. The whole 
 connection was agitated on the slibjects of slavery and separa- 
 tion. That was the time at which the Alabama Conference 
 had to take action on the necessity of the Conferences in the 
 slave-holding States uniting in a distinct ecclesiastical connec- 
 tion. The questions involved were of grave character, and the 
 agitation over them was intense. Passion ruled the hour. Bishop 
 Andrew was presiding over the Conference under the disabili- 
 ty imposed on him by the action of the General Conference and 
 
 Sessions of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 461 
 
 by the action of the Bishops in leaving his name entirely out 
 of the plan of episcopal visitations. By the plan made out 
 Bishop Soule was to preside over the Alabama Conference. 
 But the Conference continued its work, kept intact, provided, 
 so far as its action affected matters, for the settlement of the 
 great questions before the Church, finished its business, sent 
 out its preachers, and adjourned in usual form. 
 30 
 
Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 463 
 
 CHAPTEE XX. 
 
 The Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work 
 
 OF Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ON March 24, 1832, a Treaty was made between the United 
 States and the Creek tribe of Indians, the first Article of 
 which was: "The Creek tribe of Indians cede to the United 
 States all their land East of the Mississippi Kiver." The land 
 hereby ceded was bounded by and lay within the following 
 named lines: Beginning near the mouth of Wills Creek and 
 running down the Coosa River with its eastern bank to the up- 
 per end of Wetumpka Falls, from thence east from a true merid- 
 ian to a point due north of Oakfuschee Creek, thence south by 
 a meridian line to the mouth of Oakfuschee Creek, thence up 
 the same, according to its various meanders, to a point where a 
 direct course will cross the same at the distance of ten miles 
 from the mouth thereof, thence a direct line to the mouth of 
 Semochechaba Creek, which empties into the Chattahoochee 
 River, thence along the eastern line of Alabama to about one 
 mile north of Township fourteen, thence along the line which 
 was then between the Creeks and the Cherokees to the Coosa Riv- 
 er near the mouth of Wills Creek. With that Treaty of March 
 24, 1832, went the last of the ancient domain of the Creek In- 
 dians. Immediately on the ratification of that Treaty white 
 population began to flow into the territory ceded; and the Ala- 
 bama Conference at its first session in December, 1832, appoint- 
 ed a preacher to the population who had crossed over into 
 that newly ceded and beautiful country. Talladega Mission 
 was the name given to the new appointment, and the Rev. Jesse 
 Ellis was the man put in charge of it. Before the Creek War- 
 rior got out of the country Christian Societies were organized 
 and Quarterly Conferences were held therein. 
 
 There is but little recorded concerning the Talladega Mission 
 for 1833. The proceedings of one Quarterly Conference for 
 that year are on record. It was the first one held for the Talla- 
 dega Mission, though it should have been the second, as the one 
 (462) 
 
 for the first round was never held. That Quarterly Conference, 
 the first one ever held on the eastern side of the Coosa River 
 in the State of Alabama, was held at Bethel Meeting House, 
 May 25, 1833, and was presided over by the Rev. R. G. Chris- 
 topher, then the presiding elder of the Coosa District. The 
 members present and constituting that Quarterly Conference 
 were: Jesse Ellis, the preacher in charge of the Mission; Leo- 
 nard Tarrant, Harris Taylor, John Gilliland, J. Hutchinson, 
 local preachers; James T. Whitehead, John Box, exhorters, 
 and Adam A. Lackey, class leader. All the local preachers 
 here named as present presented that day the certificates of their 
 official standing and were thereupon recognized. Harris Tay- 
 lor, James M. Hutchinson, William Garrett, Robert C. Wilson, 
 and Richard R. Jones were severally nominated by Brother 
 Ellis and were elected Stewards for the Mission. James T. 
 Whitehead, recommended by Zion Society, presented an appli- 
 cation for license to preach, and the license was not granted. 
 Leonard Tarrant was the Secretary of that Quarterly Confer- 
 ence. Bethel Meeting House, at which that Quarterly Confer- 
 ennce was held, was four miles from the T(jwn of Talladega, 
 and in what is now familiarly known as the Cove. There is 
 still, in this year, 1891, a Meeting House at that place in 
 which the Methodists meet and worship. That meeting house 
 in which that first Quarterly Conference for that Mission was 
 held did not belong to the Church; at least, there was no title 
 to it. There was probably not a house of worship in the Mis- 
 sion that year which belonged by deed to the Church. The 
 Talladega Mission was organized and announced as an appoint- 
 ment by the Alabama Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church in the same month that Talladega County was consti- 
 tuted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State 
 of Alabama, and at the end of its first year reported two hun- 
 dred and sixty-six white and twenty colored members. 
 
 The Quarterly Conferences for the year 1834 were all held. 
 The presiding elder, the Rev. R. G. Christopher, was at only 
 the third and fourth. The preacher in charge of the Circuit for 
 that year, William C. Crawford, and the preacher who was a 
 supply, Tapley Bynum, were present at all the Quarterly Con- 
 ferences. The Records state "that the preachers this year 
 got their Disciplinary allowance." 
 
 m 
 
464 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Rev. William C. Crawford, who was in charge of the 
 Talladega Circuit for 1834, says: "When I went to the Circuit 
 I found that our people were working under the shadow of the 
 Cumberland Presbyterian Church, and believing that the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church was a plant which could not grow 
 well in the shade, I resolved to spend one year in establishing 
 a distinction between it and other Churches, and I succeeded. 
 I held a Camp-meeting at Jones's Camp-ground, down the 
 creek from Talladega Town several miles. I was the Bishop. 
 A Cumberland Presbyterian tented at that meeting, and three 
 of his preachers attended. Then and there was my time and 
 place for decisive battle. There was opportunity for the ac- 
 complishment of my purpose to make Methodists of my people. 
 I had Judge Tarrant and Dr. Sevier, local Methodist preach- 
 ers, with me, and I did not ask the Cumberland preachers to 
 preach. My brethren would say to me, ' Why do you not ask 
 them to preach? ' I would reply, * I really do not wish them to 
 preach, and how can I say that I do? I am not hypocrite 
 enough for that. If yoa wish them to preach ask them, and I 
 will say nothing.' Well, that they would not do. These 
 things went on until Sunday of the meeting, when the victory 
 was won. The Cumberland Presbyterian tore down his tent, 
 and moved home, and the Cumberland preachers left with him. 
 For a while it appeared that I stood alone. At 11 o'clock a.m.. 
 Dr. Sevier preached, and we had one convert. It was whis- 
 pered about by some that I had killed everything. Not a man 
 could I get to lift the collection usually taken for the preachers 
 in charge of the work. Then I said, ' Stand aside, brethren, I 
 was never mealy-mouthed about such things, I can do it my- 
 self.' I made a little talk, sent round the hat, and got twenty- 
 six dollars and twelve and a half cents, the largest public col- 
 lection which had ever been taken at any one time and place in 
 the Circuit. I was encouraged, and I concluded things were not 
 as dead as my big men appeared to suppose. The people on 
 that Circuit from that day were Methodists and not Cumber- 
 lands." 
 
 The Rev. William C. Crawford, who rendered that valuable 
 service to the common cause of Christianity by curing the peo- 
 ple of an unrighteous sentiment about the union and coopera- 
 tion of Churches which hold conflicting doctrines and discord- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work 465 
 
 ant forms of government and modes of worship, though not 
 highly educated, was a man of sound judgment and sterling 
 worth. He was about thirty years old when he settled that 
 conflict in the alliance of antagonistic forces, having been born 
 Sebtember 13, 1804 At Macon, Georgia, on Friday, January 
 7, 1831, he was received on trial by the Georgia Conference; 
 and at La Grange, Georgia, January 3, 1833, he was received 
 into full connection by the same Conference, and elected to 
 deacon's orders, and ordained on the following Sunday, by 
 Bishop James O. Andrew; and at that session of the Georgia 
 Conference he was transferred to the Alabama Conference, and 
 appointed to Pensacola and Escambia Mission, which he 
 served, some of the appointments of the Mission being in Ala- 
 bama. He closed his work on the Talladega Circuit for 1834, 
 and at the session of the Annual Conference in December he 
 located, and immediately left the State of Alabama. About the 
 time he closed his work on the Talladega Circuit he married 
 Miss Rhoda Watkins, the daughter of Lewis Watkins, who 
 lived two miles or more from the town of Talladega. In Janu- 
 ary, 1835, he, with his young wife, took up abode west of the 
 Sabine River, in the Province of Texas, and in what is now 
 Shelby County, Texas. He was involved in all the wars of 
 Texas from then till now, 1891, and he is still living. He was 
 one of the signers of Texas Independence, and was a member 
 of the Convention which made the Constitution of the Lone 
 Star State. He rendered some service in that Convention of 
 which he has been justly proud. He and his wife had their 
 first child baptized by a Methodist preacher in 1836, and they 
 were members of the first Methodist Society organized in what 
 is now Shelby County, Texas. He has been an active, zealous 
 local preacher in the land of Texas. 
 
 The chief places on the Talladega Circuit at which Societies 
 were organized and public worship was held during the years 
 closing with 1845, were. Bethel, Talladega Town, Jacksonville, 
 Kelley's Spring, Cedar Creek, Jones's, Owens Spring, Ren- 
 froe's, Terrapin Creek, White Plains, Mount Pleasant, Mardis- 
 ville. Boiling Spring, Cold Water, Syllacauga, Cane Creek, Ash- 
 ley's, Alexandria, Antioch, Chinnabee, Murphree's, Ohatchee, 
 Bethlehem, Mount Olivet, Dry Valley. 
 
 March 24, 1838, the Quarterly Conference appointed N. 
 
466 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Ganaway, W. L. Kideout, and Thomas H. P. Scales to procure 
 a ri^^^lit to the ground on which to build the Church denomina- 
 ted Bethel, and also to contract for building the same, agreeably 
 to the rules of our Discipline. At a Quarterly Conference, 
 November 16, 1839, the Trustees of Bethel Church reported 
 that a Deed had been procured for the ground, and that they 
 were in debt for the Church seventy or eighty dollars. That 
 was the beginning of the ownership of Church property at that 
 place, notwithstanding the Methodists had been meeting there 
 for worship for nearly six years previous to that time. 
 
 At the Talladega Battle Ground, adown the Spring branch, 
 and not far from where the United States soldiers who fell 
 there in battle in 1813 are buried, in some sort of a Meeting 
 House, the Kev. Jesse Ellis preached in 1833; and there a 
 Quarterly Conference was held for Talladega Circuit. March 8, 
 1834. At that Quarterly Conference a Committee was appoint- 
 ed to secure a lot in the Town of Talladega for a Meeting House 
 and Parsonage. On September 20, 1836, Commissioners of the 
 County of Talledaga having due authority in the premises, in 
 consideration of one hundred dollars to them in hand paid, did 
 execute a Deed to the Trustees of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church to Lot No. 113 in the plan of the Town of Talladega. 
 A small wooden church was erected on that Lot, and there the 
 Methodists worshiped, perhaps, for twenty years, or more. 
 
 Jacksonville, in Benton County, is first mentioned in con- 
 nection with a Quarterly Conference held there April 19, 1834. 
 At another Quarterly Conference held there June 11, 1836, a 
 Committee was appointed to superintend the building of a 
 Meeting House at Jacksonville, and at a Quarterly Conference 
 held August 8, 1840, it appeared that there was not a full Board 
 of Trustees for the Jacksonville Church, and a number of per- 
 sons were elected trustees thereof. From the records setting 
 forth these several transactions it is inferred that some time 
 between the middle of 1836 and the beginning of 1840 a Church 
 was built in Jacksonville. 
 
 Kelley's Spring was in Talladega County, five or six miles 
 north-east of the town of Talladega, and not far from what was 
 once the noted home of the father of Hon. J. L. M. Curry. It 
 first appears in the annals of Methodism in connection with 
 a Quarterly Conference held there August 8, 9, 1834 Men of 
 
 Further E nlargement and Advancement of the Work. 467 
 
 note and worth were there. There was a Camp-ground there 
 It appeared on the records as one of the payiog Societies until 
 down in the forties, possibly as late as 1845. 
 
 Cedar Creek became a preaching place ^^'^''\^^ 1^"^^^%^^^. 
 A Quarterly Conference was held there September 27, 1834 
 It was at, or near the place now known as Fayetteville, m the 
 lower end of Talladega County. It was kept up by the name of 
 Cedar Creek until 1838, when it gave place to the name of fay- 
 etteville. Methodism still lives there. . 
 
 A Camp-meeting, which has been mentioned m another place 
 was held at Jones's Camp-ground in 1834. That Camp-ground 
 was on the north side of Talladega Creek, and ^^^^ ^^^^^^^^ 
 Selma, Rome, and Dalton Railroad now crosses said Creek, and 
 Tt was kept up for some years. A Quarterly Conference was 
 held at that place, September 8, 1838, at which twenty-five of- 
 ficial members, fourteen of whom were local preachers, and 
 the presiding elder were present; and to which was reported 
 thirty dollars quarterage paid by the members of Jones s 
 Camp-ground, and the public collection taken for quarterage at 
 that meeting was thirty-six dollars and eighty-seven and a half 
 
 ""^Trustees for a Meeting House to be built at Owens Spring 
 on Chockolocko Creek were elected at a Quarterly Conference 
 held at Kelley's Spring, August 8, 1834; and on September 19, 
 1835, a Quarterly Conference was held at " Owe^ns Spring en- 
 cam^me^t;" and from that time "Owens Spring Camp- 
 ground" was a noted place, financially one of the strongest ap- 
 pointments on the Circuit, at which a Quarterly Conf e™ was 
 held nearly or quite every year. To this date, 1891, there is 
 still a Methodist congregation which worships there. Owens 
 Spring is nine or ten miles from the Town of Talladega and a 
 
 little east of north. . ., , i • i. 
 
 Terrapin Creek Church was on a Creek of that name which 
 runs through the eastern part of Benton County and empties 
 nlthe Coosa Eiver in the County of Cherokee. The church 
 was probably north-east of Jacksonville, it appears on record 
 for the first time in February, 1835. There was a Camp-ground 
 
 '* White Plains is first mentioned in March, 1836, with a con. 
 tribution to the support of the ministry to the amount of two 
 
468 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 469 
 
 dollars. August 8, 1840, "Trustees for the Camp-ground at 
 the White Plains " were put on record, they had been elected 
 previous to that time. White Plains is in the beautiful Chock- 
 olocko Valley, east of Jacksonville. The Methodists still wor- 
 ship at White Plains. 
 
 About the first of 1834, Hon. Samuel W. Mardis, a man of 
 talents and of piety, for many years a Methodist, at one time a 
 member of the Congress of the United States, moved to Jum- 
 per Springs, in Talladega County, and in honor of this man the 
 name of the place was changed. Henceforth it was called Mar- 
 disville. It is south-west of the Town of Talladega five miles. 
 The Honorable man for whom it was named died there Novem- 
 ber 14, 1836. Mardisville first appeared in Methodist records 
 April 25, 1835, with a contribution for the support of the min- 
 istry of two dollars and a half. It has been a preaching place 
 through all the intervening years. Most of the time the So- 
 ciety there was rather small. For three years, beginning with 
 1842, Talladega and Mardisville were together as a pastoral 
 charge. The first Quarterly Conference ever convened at Mar- 
 disville met there April 1, 1837. 
 
 Boiling Spring is credited with five dollars quarterage June 
 11, 1836, and a Quarterly Conference, of very respectable num- 
 bers, was held there February 16, 1839, and about one year and 
 a half afterward Trustees were elected for the Church there, 
 and instructed to use their best efforts to procure a title to the 
 Church property at that place as early as practicable. That 
 Church was about one and a half miles south-east of Oxford, in 
 the County of Benton. 
 
 There is a large Spring, from which flows off a clear, and ma- 
 jestic stream, in Section twenty-nine. Township sixteen, Eange 
 seven, East, and in what was originally Benton County. In the 
 neighborhood of that noted Fountain of water the Methodists 
 established a preaching place, and, finally, in a beautiful grove 
 on the banks of the clear, and majestic stream which flows forth 
 from that immense Fountain, and a short way below the same, 
 a Camp-ground was established. The place was named Cold- 
 water, and the name was entered upon the Journal of the Quar- 
 terly Conference of the Talladega Circuit, September 2, 1837, 
 by virtue of the fact that one or more persons at that preach- 
 ing place contributed quarterage to the amount of seventy- 
 
 five cents. On August 8, 1840, « Trustees were elected for the 
 Society or Church at Coldwater." There a Quarterly Confer- 
 ence met March 9, 1844, and many have been held there since 
 that There is still a Methodist Church at '' Coldwater Camp- 
 ground " That community has always had a numerous white 
 population, and the Methodist congregation there has always 
 been large, and the contributions for Church purposes have 
 been uniformly small. Tiiat seventy-five cents in 1837 was 
 every way indicative, was prophetic, was the precursor, and 
 the omen of that which was to follow. 
 
 Syllacauga appears in the annals of Methodism at the sam^ 
 time that Coldwater is put on record. In the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence Journal Syllacauga is written just under Coldwater, and is 
 credited with twenty-five cents quarterage. A Quarterly Con- 
 ference was " held at Syllacauga, Talladega County, Alabama, 
 June 16 1838," and at that time was the place credited with 
 quarterage te the amount of eight dollars. For long years 
 Methodism was quite weak at that place. 
 
 Cane Creek Society was on a Creek of that name, in Benton 
 County, and is supposed to have been in the neighborhood of 
 what has long been known as Morrisville. Cane Creek is first 
 mentioned with Coldwater and Syllacauga. It went on the rec 
 ord as having contributed three dollars quarterage. There was 
 held a Quarterly Conference at Cane Creek Meeting House, 
 March 7, 1840. Through all the years since, the Methodists 
 liave had a place of worship there. , „. -.ooo 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held at Talladega, March 24, 18d8, 
 upon resolution " appointed a Committee to procure the Ground 
 on which to build a Church near to Brother Ashley's, according 
 to rules of our Discipline." March 17, 1840, a deed was made by 
 John Ashley and his wife to three and thirteen-fortieths 
 acres of Ground in Section eight. Township twenty. Range four. 
 East, to Martin McElroy, William Kelley, William H. Hudson, 
 M E. Charr, George Riser, and John Ashley, Trustees of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. There is a Methodist Church 
 there still. It is commonly called Riser's. 
 
 At Alexandria, a place in Benton County, and in one of the 
 most beautiful valleys in the State of Alabama, the Methodists 
 established an appointment for preaching and organized a So- 
 ciety, and the place is mentioned in the Records of the Circuit 
 
470 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 471 
 
 as early as October, 1838. At the fourth Quarterly Conference 
 for 1839, under the question, Are there any complaints? the 
 preacher in charge of the Circuit presented before the Confer- 
 ence complaints against the Society at Alexandria to the effect 
 that the members thereof manifested a want of interest in the 
 cause of Christ, by not attending their Class Meetings and Cir- 
 cuit Preaching generally and almost universally. The Confer- 
 ence resolved that Brother Sawyer, the presiding elder, inform 
 the Society, by letter, that for their non-attendance at Class 
 Meeting and Circuit Preaching, unless they reformed in that 
 respect, the Society would be left out of the plan of the Circuit. 
 The action of the Quarterly Conference seems to have had a 
 good effect upon the Society, as it reported next year more 
 quarterage than had been reported therefrom at previous Quar- 
 terly Conferences. The Society continued in the plan of the 
 Circuit. 
 
 Antioch was east of the Town of Talladega five or six miles. 
 Carter's School House, which was four miles north-east of the 
 Town of Talladega and on or near the place known as the J. L. 
 M. Curry place, was a point at which the Methodists preached, 
 but the members who worshiped there moved south and helped 
 to establish Antioch. Through the payment of one dollar for the 
 support of the ministry, "Antioch Society " went upon the Eec- 
 ord of the Circuit September 28, 1839. In September, 1843, a 
 Committee was appointed to build a church at Antioch. 
 
 Chinnabee was in a valley of that name east of the Town of 
 Talladega, and about ten miles from Talladega. For many 
 years there was a Camp- ground there. The name of Chinnabee 
 first goes on the Record November 16, 1839, with eight dollars 
 quarterage annexed. Trustees were elected for Chinnabee 
 Church, August 8, 1840. 
 
 Bethlehem, which was about eleven or twelve miles from the 
 Town of Talladega, and north of east from that place, and three 
 or four miles from Chinnabee Camp-ground, first appeared in 
 the affairs of the Circuit in June, 1843, and in September of 
 that year reports the existence of a Sunday-school under its 
 auspices with a Superintendent, a Secretary, a Librarian, two 
 male and four female teachers, and thirty scholars. 
 
 There is a valley between Chockolocko and Bine Eye Creeks 
 called Dry Yalley. In that Yalley the Methodists had an ap- 
 
 pointment and a Society. In November, 1843, a Committee was 
 appointed to build a Meeting House in Dry Valley for the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, and Trustees were appointed for 
 
 said Church. 
 
 According to the official Rolls, the leading and active men in 
 the Talladega Circuit during the period from the beginning of 
 1833 to the close of 1845, were: "Leonard Tarrant, Harris 
 Taylor, James T. Whitehead, William Garrett, Robert C. Wil- 
 son, Richard R. Jones, James H. Hutchinson, Tapley Bynum, 
 John Box, James Long, James H. Thomason, John N. Gould- 
 ing, James W. Poe, Thomas Hicks, Adam A. Lackey, Josiah 
 H. Hill, John Gilliland, Lewis Watkins, Peter Rubel, Elbert 
 F. Sevier, James Cole, Michael Armbrester, Thomas H. P. 
 Scales, Jacob D. Shelley, Thomas Roland, James L. Wright, 
 Benjamin 0. Stripland, Matthew Carter, John Driskill, William 
 McClellan, William McPherson, A. D. Gaskill, Alexander 
 Douglass, Pollard Rhodes, Bartlett Renfroe, Solomon Martin, 
 John Nabors, Francis Self, John Renfroe, Francis M. Cary, 
 John Ashley, William Cattingham, William W. Hendrick, Ed- 
 ward Patton, W. L. Rideout, Thomas D. Barr, John C. McGee, 
 James J. Carpenter, John L. Seay, John Brooks, Eli Bynum, 
 Edward L. Woodward, Edward McMeans, James B. Watson, 
 Brown Seay, Willis Franklin, William H. Mabry, James S. Stock- 
 dale, Jacob Stoner, James Hampton, Jennbeth Winn, Nicholas 
 P. Scales, Henry Fullingham, James F. Grant, William Gore, 
 George Riser, William S. Carpenter, Joseph Camp, William 
 Hufferd, Daniel C. Mclntire, Rees Pickens, Elijah Teague, 
 William' B. Turnipseed, James C. Francis, Robert H. Broils, 
 Jared E. Groce, Green Penn." ^ ^ 
 
 Many of these men here named were in that Circuit at work 
 through all the period named, and afterward; others were 
 there only a part of the time. 
 
 In the spring of 1833, just previous to the holding of that 
 first Quarterly Conference for Talladega Mission, the Rev. 
 Leonard Tarrant, a local preacher, moved to Jumper Springs, 
 in the County of Talladega, Alabama; and as he spent most of 
 his Christian and ministerial life, about twenty-nine years, in 
 Talladega County, and inasmuch as he was a member and the 
 Secretary of the first Quarterly Conference ever held for the 
 Talladega Mission, and inasmuch as he was one of the great 
 
 
472 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 factors of Methodism in that section of the State, a sketch of 
 his life properly comes in at this part of the history. 
 
 The Eev. Leonard Tarrant was, perhaps, a native of Virginia, 
 and was born June 26, 1785. His education, which was quite 
 thorough and extensive, was obtained in Garrard County, Ken- 
 tucky. He possessed more than ordinary talents, and superior 
 business qualities. He was a fine scribe, an admirable reader, 
 and something of a poet. For a time he engaged in teaching, 
 and he was an able and efficient teacher. September 22, 1812, 
 he was married to Miss Jane Estill. He brought up two 
 daughters and a son. Virginia Caroline was born October 9, 
 1813; Edwiue Ethelbert was born July 10, 1815; and Harriet 
 Eliza was boru September 24, 1817. For a while he lived at 
 Winchester, Tennessee, and removed from there to Shelby 
 County, Alabama, not later than 1824. He was a member of 
 the House of Kepresentatives of the State of Alabama from 
 Shelby County, Alabama, for 1831 and 1832, and a member of 
 the Senate of Alabama from Talladega County, for 1849 and 
 1851. 
 
 The Treaty made between the United States and the Creek 
 Indians, March 24, 1832, engaged to allow ninety principal 
 Chiefs of the Creek tribe to select one section of land each, and 
 every other head of a Creek family to select one-half section 
 each, which tracts should be reserved from sale for their use 
 for the term of five years, unless sooner disposed of by them; 
 and also stipulated that said tracts of land might be conveyed 
 by the persons selecting the same, to any other persons for a 
 fair consideration, the contract to be certified by some person 
 appointed for that purpose by the President of the United 
 States. Under that provision of the Treaty, the President of 
 the United States, Andrew Jackson, appointed Leonard Tar- 
 rant Certifying Agent; and that notwithstanding Tarrant was 
 in politics a Whig, and Andrew Jackson a Democrat, and held 
 the self-evident proposition that to the victors belong the 
 spoils. That appointment carried Tarrant to Jumper Springs, 
 in the bounds of the Territory where lay the lands to be dis- 
 posed of and where lived the Indians interested in the compen- 
 sation to be received. 
 
 The office of Certifying Agent continued for a number of 
 years, and until the business involved by the stipulations of 
 
 ■?«a^s*. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 47 a 
 
 the Treaty was finished; and Leonard Tarrant filled the office 
 BO long as it existed; and he managed the business committed 
 to his hands with entire satisfaction to the United States Gov- 
 emment and to the entire satisfaction of the Indians interested 
 in the transactions involved, but not to the satisfaction of the 
 speculators, and swindlers who were engaged in trading m the 
 newly acquired lands. Never were more iniquitous frauds at- 
 tempted and never were there more wicked devices resorted to 
 in any dispensation of business than were attempted and were 
 resorted to in that time and section by the land dealers. Cor- 
 ruption and collusion ruled the hour. From various States 
 and many sections men poured into the ceded territory to 
 secure the lands selected by the heads of the Indian families 
 by nominal sums and worthless considerations. Mr. Tarrant 
 the Certifying Agent, was a terror to the swindler. He had 
 been placed in office by the United States Government to see 
 that the Indian received a just compensation for the land guar- 
 anteed by the Treaty, and he was faithful to his trust. The 
 sharpers tried to deceive him, and to bribe him. He was hard 
 to deceive, and could not be bribed. When the land traders 
 had tried him, and found him forever on the side of right, and 
 always on the side of the poor isavage against the swindler, 
 they offered him a large sum of money to vacate, or resign his 
 office, but he could not be bought. He retained his position, 
 and helped the Indian in securing a just compensation for his 
 land Tradition tells that on one occasion some misanthrope 
 was in conversation with Andrew Jackson, the President of the 
 United States, about the citizens of Alabama, and said to the 
 President- "There is not an honest man in Alabama;" to 
 which the President replied: "Leonard Tarrant is in Alabama, 
 and I know he is an honest man." ^ ^ . ^ 
 
 For a number of years Mr. Tarrant was Judge of Probate, 
 and with credit to himself and with benefit to his constituents 
 discharged the duties of the office. 
 
 The exact day when, the precise place where, and the special 
 ministrations in which, Leonard Tarrant emerged from the 
 moral shadows which dimmed his perceptions and hedged him 
 about with death, and entered into the light of the sons of God 
 are now unknown; but the event, so full of bliss and Bplendor 
 occurred at some time before all the days of the year 1825 had 
 
474 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 rolled away, and at some place less than twenty leagues from 
 the geographical center of Alabama. He joined the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church. Eenewed of heart, forgiven of sin, con- 
 stantly rapt in celestial transports, enchanted by the melting 
 strains of divine music heard in the assembly of the saints, 
 inspired with the hope of finally obtaining admission to 
 imperial roalras, and of forever enjoying imperial bliss, Mr. 
 Tarrant no longer, as once he did, engaged in the sports of 
 the turf, no longer, as once he did, took pleasure in frolic 
 and fun; but he at once entered upon the work of Christ, 
 and sought to learn of sainted sage and bard divine. Without 
 any the least delay he commenced preaching. He commenced 
 preaching even before he had opportunity to obtain license 
 from the Church. In the stately length and wide expanse of 
 the Christian field he found ample room and verge enough for 
 the full employment of his heaven given endowments. He was 
 never engaged in any other than in the local ranks, but in that 
 relation he was active and useful. 
 
 The date of his license to preach is unknown. He was or- 
 dained a deacon by Bishop James 0. Andrew, at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, Sunday, December 16, 1832. . The Legislature of Ala- 
 bama was in session at Tuskaloosa at that time, and Mr. Tarrant 
 was a Eepresentative in attendance from Shelby County. He 
 was ordained an elder by Bishop James O. Andrew, at Mont- 
 gomery, Alabama, on Sunday, January 1, 1843. He was made 
 a Life Member of the Missionary Society, at Chinnabee Camp- 
 ground, in Talladega County. 
 
 In physical structure the Kev. Leonard Tarrant was large 
 and portly, measuring more than six feet two inches in height, 
 and weighing at least two hundred and twenty pounds. In 
 complexion he was lively, fair, and flushed with red. His eyes 
 were clear and grey; his eyebrows were heavy, and his hair was 
 thick; by the use of the razor he kept his face bare of beard. 
 Mustache and whiskers he never allowed on his lip and face. 
 His countenance was frank, mild, and benignant. He had- 
 character and reputation, and both were without blemish. He 
 was a holy man, and above suspicion. All who knew him re- 
 spected and reverenced him. He was popular in the house- 
 holds of the country. In a blank book, pocket size, he record- 
 ed, in a neat and beautiful hand, the names of the various 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 475 
 
 couples which he married ranging over the years from 1837 to 
 1861 This little book contains the names of fifty-two couples 
 at whose marriage he officiated. Many of these names are 
 familiar in Talladega County; such as William Simmons and 
 Ann C. Cruikshanks; Hugh G. Barclay and Mrs. Margaret 
 A Brown; Joseph N. Savery and Nancy M. Givens; Benton 
 W. Groce and Caroline B. McEldery; William Wilson and 
 Caroline M. Estill; Andrew Lawson and Priscilla Douglass; 
 Boliver Eason and Sarah J. Shelly; James H. Joiner and 
 Carolina E. McLane; George K. Armbrester and Missouri E. 
 
 Griffith. ^ ^. , 
 
 The subject of this sketch wrote poetry, none of which was 
 ever published, so far as is known, and none of which would 
 rank with the best pieces written by Wesley and Watts, but 
 some of his poetical productions have merit, and are superior 
 to many pieces of other authors which have been published 
 
 and praised. ^ t**- j- -n 
 
 The Eev. Leonard Tarrant died at his home, at MardisviUe, 
 
 Talladega County, Alabama, February 25, 1862. The day he 
 
 died the jonquils, harbingers of coming spring, were blooming in 
 
 profusion in the yard before the door, and the snow, which had 
 
 fallen the night before to the depth of two or three inches, in 
 
 a freak of departing winter, lay upon the ground. A friend, 
 
 the Eev John Corley, on a visit to him, took leave of him, and 
 
 in taking his last farewell, asked: "What shall I tell your 
 
 friends about your prospects?" The dying man answered: 
 
 ** Tell my friends that last night I was up to my ankles in the 
 
 cold waters of death, this morning I was up to my knees, now I 
 
 am up to my loins, but I have no fear, as the flowers m the 
 
 yard before the door are blooming amidst the snow which lies 
 
 about them, so my soul is blooming for glory." In a few hours 
 
 after that utterance his soul went forth from this realm of woe 
 
 and death to glory and to God. In the precincts of light his 
 
 soul is ever blooming, full of love and full of joy. He is now 
 
 before the throne and with the Ancient One. 
 
 The Eev. Leonard Tarrant planted Antioch, Chinnabee, and 
 Bethlehem Societies. He established them. 
 
 The Eev. Harris Taylor, a local preacher, associated himself 
 with the Talladega Circuit at the very beginning, and contin- 
 ued associated with the same in that section of the country, 
 
476 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 and among its most efficient men, until his death, in 1852. He 
 was buried at Alexandria, Benton County. 
 
 William Garrett, one of the stewards elected at the first 
 Quarterly Conference held for Talladega Mission, was, at that 
 time, a young man who had just emigrated from East Tennes- 
 see and settled in the bounds of that Mission. He served the 
 Talladega charge in the office of steward, exhorter, class leader, 
 and Trustee for a number of years. He was a class leader in 
 that charge as late as 1840. In 1837 he entered the public 
 service of the State of Alabama. For some years he was 
 Clerk of the House of Kepresentatives. For thirteen years he 
 was Secretary of State. He served also in the House of Kep- 
 resentatives and in the Senate of the State. He filled the 
 places of public trust with distinction. *He wrote and pub- 
 lished a large and estimable volume bearing the title: "Eemi- 
 niscences of Public Men in Alabama, for Thirty Years." He 
 maintained his connection with the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 through life, and was a valuable member. For years he resided 
 in Coosa County, and died there. 
 
 The Rev. Elbert F. Sevier, a local elder, was admitted as a 
 member of the Quarterly Conference held for Talladega Circuit, 
 at Kelley's Spring, August 8, 9, 1834, and was connected with 
 that Circuit for three or more years. He was admitted into the 
 Tennessee [Conference on trial in the latter part of 1823, and 
 was a member of the Holston Conference until the latter part of 
 1831, when he located, and in due course came to Alabama. 
 He returned to the State of Tennessee, and in the latter part of 
 1839 was re-admitted to the Holston Conference. He was a man 
 of talents, social rank, learning, and piety. During the time he 
 was associated with the Talladega Circuit in Alabama, he was 
 efficient in the cause of Methodism. He did much in that form- 
 ative period in guiding affairs. His wise counsels in the man- 
 agement of matters were invaluable, and his able and profound 
 sermons helped to extend the Redeemer's kingdom. 
 
 One instance of his guiding wisdom in the extremity of the 
 hour may be given. The relation of Methodism to the aboli- 
 tion of slavery was an interesting question in the newly settled 
 regions of Alabama. The opponents of Methodism used the 
 agitation of the hour to the detriment of the cause dear to 
 Methodists. It became necessary to avert the damage. At a 
 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 477 
 
 
 Quarterly Conference held at Owens Spring Encampment, for 
 Talladega Circuit, September 19, 1835, a Quarterly Conference 
 composed of nineteen official members, and which was presided 
 over by the presiding elder, the Rev. Greenberry Garrett, and 
 whose Secretary was William Garrett, the following pre- 
 amble and resolutions, under the lead of the Rev. Elbert 
 F. Sevier, were, with great emphasis, adopted: "Whereas, 
 certain Fanatics to the North are publishing numerous incen- 
 diary papers on the subject of Abolition, calculated to stir up 
 the Slaves to insurrection and rebellion, and thus endangering 
 the peace and civil order of society and also the civil and reli- 
 gious institutions of the Country; and, whereas, reports have 
 been put into circulation, implicating the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, and especially the Ministers of said Church as favor- 
 ing the wicked and nefarious schemes of said Abolitionists, We, 
 the members of the Quarterly Meeting Conference held for 
 Talladega Circuit in the Alabama Conference, at Owens 
 Spring Camp-ground, on the 19th September, 1835, having ta- 
 ken the subject into consideration, adopt the following resolu- 
 tions: 1. Resolved, That we totally disapprove of the doctrine 
 and schemes of the Abolitionists and Fanatics on the subject of 
 Slavery. 2. That we believe the views and sentiments of the 
 Church throughout our whole country are in accordance with 
 ours as expressed above. 3. That we will use our best exertions 
 to stop the circulation of all papers, tracts, or pamphlets, calcu- 
 lated to stir up insurrection or excite rebellion among the 
 Slaves of the South and West, and to crush all plans or devices 
 coming within our knowledge having any such tendency. 
 4. That the above preamble and resolutions, be published in the- 
 newspaper published in the Town of Talladega, the Christian 
 Advocate in New York, and Western Methodist in Nashville." i 
 
 There is nothing found anywhere on the subject excelling 
 that document. It shows intelligence, adaptability, patriotism, 
 and piety. It was an admirable paper for the emergency of the 
 hour. The Rev. Elbert F. Sevier had the insight and the pa- 
 triotism and the piety to engineer such a good production and 
 such a timely deliverance to acceptance and adoption. 
 
 Much of the time that the Rev. Mr. Sevier was in the itiner- 
 ant work in the Holston Conference he was presiding elder on 
 
 the best Districts. Occasionally he was on Stations, such as 
 31 
 
 '\ 
 
478 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 479 
 
 Sir 
 
 Knoxville and Cliattaiiooga. He died somewhere about Chat- 
 tanooga in the year 18G2. His works endure, and praise him. 
 
 The Eev. Thomas H. P. Scales was received as a local preach- 
 er and a member of the Quarterly Conference of the Talladega 
 Circuit, April 20y 1835, and was intimately associated with and 
 an active and intelligent worker in the Circuit until December, 
 1841, when he was received on trial in the Alabama Conference. 
 It is not know^n when or where he was licensed to preach. He 
 was eligible to deacon's orders when he joined the Talladega 
 Circuit, though he was not ordained till the close of 1839. He 
 made three distinct efforts to obtain admission into the Annual 
 Conference before he succeetled, the Quarterly Conference of 
 the Talladega Circuit, or the Jacksonville whichever it was 
 called at the time, recommended him as a suitable person for 
 admission every time he asked for it. The last time he was 
 recommended at Owens Spring, October 16, 1841. He pro- 
 fessed to have perfect love and entire holiness of heart, and he 
 made a nseful preacher, and filled some of the best appoint- 
 ments. He died in 1853. 
 
 So far as is now known James H. Thomason was the first 
 man ever licensed to preach by the Quarterly Conference of the 
 Talladega Circuit. He was licensed at Kelly's Spring, in Au- 
 gust, 1834. Tapley Bynum was the first one ever recommended 
 by the Quarterly Conference of that Circuit to the Annual Con- 
 ference for admission into the traveling connection. He was 
 not admitted by the Annual Conference. 
 
 The preacher on the Talladega Circuit for 1835 was Daniel 
 B. Barlow, and it was provided that one should be supplied. 
 At the second Quarterly Conference for the year John Poe ap- 
 peared as the supply. He filled that position till the close of 
 the year, and at the fourth Quarterly Conference held at Owens 
 Spring, September 19, 1835, he, together with James Cole, and 
 James H. Thomason, was recommended to the Annual Confer- 
 ence for admission into the traveling connection. He was ad- 
 mitted by the Annual Conference upon that recommendation, 
 but at the end of two years on trial discontinued. Cole and 
 Thomason were not admitted. 
 
 All the preachers connected with the Circuit for the year 
 were paid their full allowance for quarterage and traveling ex- 
 penses, and there was a surplus of money which was sent up to 
 
 the Annual Conference for distribution under the law of that 
 day. The Talladega Circuit in that day was first-class in finan- 
 cial affairs. 
 
 In two years the membership on the Circuit had nearly thrib- 
 bled. Immigration, no doubt, helped to swell the number. 
 
 The preachers for Talladega Circuit for 1836 were Edward 
 H Moore, and Benjamin L. West. Moore was a native of 
 Oglethorpe County, Georgia, born August 20, 1810. West was 
 a native of Bobeson County, North Carolina, born March 29, 
 1810. There was an increase in the number of the members of 
 the Church on that Circuit that year of two hundred and ninety- 
 six At the fourth Quarterly Conference held for that Circuit 
 October 29, 1836, R. M. Richards and James M. Mitchell were 
 licensed to preach as local preachers. 
 
 The Rev. Wiley W. Thomas was the preacher on the Talla- 
 dega Circuit for 1837. The Rev. Edward Patton was received 
 asl local preacher and a member of the Quarterly Conference 
 of the Tallade-a Circuit, April 1, 1837, and the Rev. James Wil- 
 lis a local de^acon from the bounds of the Holston Confer- 
 ence presented the certificate of his official relation and was 
 recognized as a member of the Talladega Circuit that year. 
 Francis M. Cary was licensed to preach by the Quarterly Con- 
 ference of that Circuit November 4, 1837. The Quarterly 
 Conferences for that year engaged much in the consideration 
 of financial plans, and in efforts to build a parsonage for the 
 Circuit. Many resolutions were passed on these subjects. 
 
 The building of a parsonage for the Circuit elicited much at- 
 tention through the year 1838. The subject was of profound 
 interest, but the task seems to have been herculean. 
 
 The following certificate of membership was presented to the 
 Quarterly Conference held at Syllacauga, June 16, 1838: *'The 
 bearer hereof, William W. Hendrick, has 'been an acceptable 
 member and local elder in the Methodist Episcopal Church, in 
 Buckino-ham Circuit, Virginia Conference, September 16, 1837. 
 
 George W. S. Harper." 
 
 "Also Mrs. Frances W. Hendrick and Miss Mary V. Hendrick 
 
 have been acceptable members of the Methodist Episcopal 
 
 Church in Buckingham Circuit, Virginia Conference, Septem- 
 
 h 16 1837. George W. S. Harper." 
 
 This man, the Rev. William W. Hendrick, was born in Vir- 
 
 u% 
 
480 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 481 
 
 ginia, December 17, 1788; was converted and joined the Church 
 in 1804; licensed to preach, and joined the Virginia Conference 
 on trial, at Newberne, in North Carolina, in February, 1807; in 
 due course reached full membership in the Conference and 
 elder's orders, and located in February, 1812. He left Virginia 
 about the time his certificate of {membership bears date, and 
 by due course of journey reached Mardisville, Talladega 
 County, Alabama, and took up residence there. He died at his 
 home in Talladega County, Alabama, January 17, 1863. After 
 a long life of usefulness he died in the faith. His descendants 
 are Methodists. 
 
 At a Quarterly Conference held for Talladega Circuit, at 
 Mount Pleasant, Benton County, November 19, 1838, Thomas 
 D. Barr was licensed to preach, and there and then he and 
 Francis M. Cary were recommended to the Annual Conference 
 to be admitted on trial in the traveling connection. Barr was 
 then in his twenty-fifth year, and a native of North Carolina. 
 He was regenerated at nine years of age, and he united with 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church five years after his conversion. 
 He moved to Talladega County, Alabama, in the latter part of 
 1833. Cary, when he received from the Quarterly Conference 
 that recommendation for itinerant work, was in his twenty 
 fourth year, and was a native of Madison County, Alabama. 
 In his nineteenth year he was regenerated. In pursuance of 
 the recommendations which had been obtained Barr and Cary 
 were both admitted on trial by the Alabama Conference in 
 January, 1839. Cary remained on trial in the Conference three 
 years, and then discontinued. In due process Barr was ad- 
 vanced to membership in the Conference and to the order of 
 an elder. He continued in the Alabama Conference to the end 
 of his earthly pilgrimage. His last appointment was Marianna, 
 Florida, and there* he died of fever September 4, 1843. He 
 was a man of integrity, seriousness, humility, and piety. He 
 succeeded in the work of the ministry, and died in the faith. 
 
 In November, 1838, in the whole length and breadth of the 
 Circuit from Fayetteville in the lower end of Talladega County 
 to Rabbit Town in Benton County there were but two Sunday- 
 schools with three Superintendents, ten teachers, fifty scholars, 
 and two hundred volumes in Libraries. At what points these 
 two schools were is not certainly known. The next year, the 
 
 I 
 
 Oircuit then having been divided, there was only one School in 
 the Jacksonville Circuit, and that was at Bethel. In that 
 region covered by the Talladega Circuit at its first organization 
 and up to the year now under consideration the Baptists and 
 the Cumberland Presbyterians had the controlling influence. 
 The Baptists then in that region were mostly anti-missionaries, 
 who opposed Missionary Societies and Sunday-schools. The 
 Cumberland Presbyterians were prosecuting their effort at 
 popularizing themselves with the insinuating policy of union. 
 They were for union meetings and union Sunday-schools. 
 With the union proclivities fostered by the Cumberland Pres- 
 byterians and the anti-missionary doctrines disseminated by 
 the Baptists to contend against, with other potent influences 
 and untoward environments against them, the Methodists had 
 a hard time in organizing Sunday-schools in that Circuit. 
 
 At the close of 1838 the Talladega Circuit was divided into 
 two, one called the Talladega and the other the Jacksonville. 
 The Talladega Circuit as it existed in 1839 was mostly in TaU 
 ladega County, and the principal appointments on it were Talla- 
 dega Town, Mardisville, Ashley's, Syllacauga, and Fayetteville. 
 Jacksonville Circuit had Jacksonville, Alexandria, Boiling 
 Spring, Coldwater, Mount Pleasant, Ohatchee, and White 
 Plains in Benton County, and Antioch, Bethel, Chinnabee, 
 Kelley's Spring, and Owens Spring in Talladega County. 
 The preacher on the Talladega Circuit for that year was Wil- 
 liam Moores. The preacher on the Jacksonville Circuit for 
 that year was Jesse Ellis. 
 
 The members of the Quarterly Conference held at Boiling 
 Spring, February 16, 1839, for the Jacksonville Circuit formed 
 themselves into a Missionary Society, and adopted a Constitu- 
 tion. The first Article of the Constitution is as follows: "This 
 Association shall be called the Jacksonville Circuit Missionary 
 Society, Auxiliary to the Missionary Society of the Alabama 
 Conference." The seventh Article constituted the members of 
 the Quarterly Conference of the Jacksonville Circuit the Board 
 of Managers. The eighth Article decreed that there should be 
 an annual meeting of the Society held at the time and place of 
 holding the third Quarterly Conference for the Circuit. At 
 the Quarterly Conference for the Talladega Circuit held March 
 27, 1836, it was resolved to form the Quarterly Conference into 
 
482 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 a Missionary Society, but the resolution was not carried into 
 operation until 1839. By action of the Quarterly Conference 
 August 20, 1842, the Missionary Society of the Circuit was dis- 
 continued. The Society operated under great disadvantages, 
 and the results achieved were comparatively small. Out of a 
 subscription of one hundred and fifty dollars made on the Cir- 
 cuit in 1839, about thirty-five dollars were collected. 
 
 Strong resolutions were passed in 1839 in favor of securing a 
 Parsonage for the Jacksonville Circuit, but beyond the resolu- 
 tions not much was done. Much complaint was also made 
 about the neglect of class-meetings, and resolutions were 
 adopted concerning the increase of the number to be held and 
 the increase of those who attended. That was the Centenary 
 year of Methodism, and the Jacksonville Circuit, through its 
 Quarterly Conference, provided for holding two Centenary 
 Meetings on the 25 of October, one at Owens Spring Camp- 
 ground, the other at Jacksonville. At the third Quarterly Con- 
 ference for that year, held at Owens Spring, September 28, 
 W. L. Rideout and William McClellan were licensed to preach. 
 During that year the Rev. James T. Whitehead, who was a 
 member of the first Quarterly Conference ever held for the 
 Talladega Mission, fell under charges of a serious nature, and, 
 while upon investigation he was acquitted of the charges, the 
 Quarterly Conference held at Bethel, November 16, 1839, by 
 action had in the case, declined to renew his license; where- 
 upon, he fled to the Methodist Protestant Church, and he ob- 
 tained license to preach in that Church. He was not very effi- 
 cent among his new associates. He stood on their record in 
 connection with Benton Circuit among the unstationed preach- 
 ers. The same Quarterly Conference which, by formal action, 
 refused to renew the license of James T. Whitehead, recom- 
 mended the Rev. John Brooks, a man of note and of worth, to 
 the Annual Conference for re-admission into the traveling con- 
 nection, and the Alabama Conference at the ensuing session 
 re-admitted him upon that recommendation. There was for 
 that year an encouraging increase in the number of members 
 in the two Circuits which occupied the territory formerly oc- 
 cupied by the one. In white and colored members there was 
 an increase of over two^ hundred and fifty. 
 
 The form of the Circuits continued as they were the preceding 
 
 Further Enlargemen t and Advancement of the Work, 483 
 
 year, though there was a change in the preachers. The Rev 
 Jesse Ellis located and became a local preacher m the Circuit, 
 and the Rev. William Rhodes was the preacher in charge of the 
 Jacksonville Circuit for 1840; and the Rev. Theophilus Moody 
 was the preacher in charge of the Talladega Circuit for that year. 
 There were some adverse events and damaging sensations m 
 that part of the vineyard during the year 1840. In the first 
 nlace the Rev. James L. Wright, who had been connected with 
 the cause there from the beginning, and who had caused some 
 trouble at the first by his irregularities and by claiming pre- 
 rogatives without properly accredited credentials became dis- 
 affected and in the year 1840 he openly inveighed against the 
 Discipline and polity of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and 
 when advised by the presiding elder in charge of affairs that 
 for such conduct a prosecution was inevitable he withdrew and 
 attached himself to the Methodist Protestant Church. Sensa- 
 tion and friction ensued, and the cause was injured. He occu- 
 pied some little position among his new allies, bat his influence 
 was circumscribed. The Methodist Protestant Church took 
 off quite a number, first and last, of the local preachers who 
 were once connected with the Methodist Episcopal Church m 
 that section of the country. The Rev. James M Hutchinson, 
 one of the men elected a steward at that Quarterly Conference 
 held at Bethel Meeting House, for Talladega Mission of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, May 25, 1833 finaly joined the 
 Methodist Protestant Church, and preached ^ith them The 
 Rev James S. Stockdale, after long connection with theMetho- 
 dist Episcopal Church, and after repeated trials and expulsions 
 from the Church and suspensions from the ministry, finally 
 joined the Methodist Protestant Church. Such acquisitions 
 were not calculated to do any Church much good. 
 
 In the next place, the Rev. Josiah H. Hill, who was present 
 as a local preacher, at the Quarterly Conference held ^or Talla- 
 dega Circuit at Cedar Creek, September 27, 1834, who had 
 been somewhat punctual and prominent through the succeed- 
 ine years, at last, in 1840, fell into trouble and came to grief. 
 His case was connected with one of the most singularly man- 
 aged Quarterly Conferences ever held in the connection. There 
 is nothincr like it in the history, of ecclesiastical affairs. He was 
 triad by 1 Quarterly Conference, which, though m the nature 
 
484 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 485 
 
 of the case not endowed with ubiquity and eternity, was held 
 at two different points, in two different Counties, more than 
 twenty miles apart, and at different times, times separated by 
 forty intervening days. That Quarterly Confererce met and 
 proceeded to business at White Plains Camp-ground, in Ben- 
 ton County, September 19, 1840. The first thing, after the de- 
 votional exercises and the preliminary matters of organization, 
 m that Conference was to lodge complaints against the moral 
 character of the Rev. Josiah H. Hill. Then two small items of 
 business were transacted, and the Conference arraigned Mr. 
 Hill upon a bill of charges involving falsehood and slander. 
 These charges had their origin in some financial transactions 
 and some statements concerning the casting of ballots at an 
 election for members of the Legislature. The Quarterly Con- 
 ference rendered a verdict declaring Mr. Hill, the defendant, 
 guilty as charged in the bill of indictment, and aflixed a penalty; 
 by formal enactment declined to renew his license, and author- 
 ized a reproof administered to him by the presiding elder. 
 Wonderful penalty, indeed, for such offenses! "The Confer- 
 ence then adjourned to meet again to transact the further busi- 
 ness of this Conference, on the Saturday preceding the first 
 Sabbath in November next, at Owens Spring Camp-ground." 
 The Journal says: "Conference met according to adjournment 
 on October 31, 1840." The first thing on record after the en- 
 rollment of the names of the members present, is: "Eesolved 
 by this Conference that the case of J. H. Hill be reconsidered, 
 on this being done it was resolved that J. H. Hill be expelled 
 from our Church." That was a wonderful Quarterly Confer- 
 ence. Thomas Lynch was the presiding elder, and Thomas H. 
 P. Scales was the Secretary of that Conference. Owens Spring 
 Camp-ground, at which Mr. Hill's case was reconsidered, was in 
 Talladega County. Mr. Hill may have been guilty, but the 
 so-called Quarterly Conference by which he was expelled was 
 beyond all doubt an illegal body. A Quarterly Conference 
 may adjourn from hour to hour, and from day to day, to finish 
 business pending, but may not adjourn to a distant day and 
 place, and after the lapse of weeks review and undo its own 
 work. Great sensation followed that long pending, and sus- 
 pended, and itinerating Quarterly Conference. It discredited 
 
 I 
 
 its own work, annulled its own authority, and scandalized the 
 common cause of religion. 
 
 By that illegal Quarterly Conference held at Owens Spring, 
 October 31, 1840, the Eev. Nicholas P. Scales, then not twenty- 
 three years of age, was duly recommended to the Annual Con- 
 ference to be a traveling preacher, and on that recommendation 
 the Alabama Conference at the session beginning December 
 30, 1840, admitted him on trial, and sent him as junior preacher 
 to the Jacksonville Circuit. He died a member of the Alabama 
 Conference, in February, 1861, though no account is taken of 
 his death in the proceedings of the Annual Conference. He 
 held a superannuated relation in the Conference from January, 
 1848, till his death. He was born in Tennessee, January 15, 
 1818, and moved to Talladega County, Alabama, in 1835. He 
 was buried in the graveyard at the Town of Talladega. 
 
 The preacher on the Talladega Circuit for 1841 was Jesse 
 Ellis, and on the Jacksonville Circuit for that year there were 
 two preachers, James P. McGee, and Nicholas P. Scales. 
 Henry Fullingham was licensed to preach at Alexandria Camp- 
 ground in August of that year, and Edward McMeans and 
 Willis Franklin were licensed to preach at Owens Spring, in 
 October. During the third quarter of that year one hundred 
 and seventeen persons were received on probation, and during 
 the fourth quarter eighty-seven were received. All this on the 
 Jacksonville Circuit. A house of worship somewhere in the 
 neighborhood next to Alexandria was donated to the Methodists 
 by Elijah Loyd, and was accepted and placed in the hands of 
 Trustees. Debts which were annoying and damaging had been 
 incurred in building houses of worship in the bounds of the 
 Jacksonville Circuit, and during that year great efforts were 
 made by special meetings and public collections to liquidate 
 
 the debts. 
 
 The appointments for 1842 were: Talladega and Mardisville, 
 Edward J. Hammill. Jacksonville, Theophilus Moody, George 
 McClintock. This was a new arrangement of the work. Talla- 
 dega and Mardisville were together and made the entire 
 pastoral charge, and it seems that what had formerly been in the 
 lower end of Talladega Circuit, such as Ashley's, Clear Creek, 
 Syllacauga, Fayetteville, and Hatchett Creek Camp-ground, were 
 now in the Harpersville and Coosa Circuits. Hatchett Creek 
 
486 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Camp-ground had possibly not been in the Talladega Circuit. 
 It was on Hatchett Creek, in Talladega County, in Section twenty- 
 eight. Township twenty-one, Range six, East; and it was deed- 
 ed by Reuben Philips and his wife to Timothy Ford, Abraham 
 Hester, John Evans, Sen., Uriah Evans, and Ezekiel Wilder, 
 Trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church, September 29, 
 1843. It had been a Camp-ground previous to the time it was 
 conveyed by deed to Trustees. That Camp-ground was estab- 
 lished in the month of October, 1837, or some months earlier, 
 and was established at the instance and by the efforts of the 
 Rev. fleuben Philips. 
 
 For four years beginning with 1842 and closing with 1845 
 the towns of Talladega and Mardisville constituted a pastoral 
 charge. Edward J. Hammill, Theophilus Moody, Yarnum L. 
 Hopkins, and Lewis G. Hicks served the work as preacher in 
 charge each one year. At the end of 1844 Mardisville fell 
 out of the charge and at the end of 1845 Talladega went back 
 into the Circuit, and the name of the Circuit was changed from 
 Jacksonville to Talladega. Thus early ended the effort of the 
 two towns to maintai"^. a pastoral charge. The Methodists in 
 those towns at that early day were few in number and feeble in 
 resources. At that time political strife and party spirit en- 
 grossed the country, and the Church did not grow much. In 
 the town of Talladesra at that time the members of the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church were mostly women, and though they 
 were noble women, and kept the cause alive, they were under 
 great disabilities. Mrs. Elizabeth Dixon, Mrs. Ann M. Jones, 
 Mrs. Mary Moore, Mrs. Shelley, and others were women of 
 consecration and of piety; and the Sunday-school was carried on 
 mostly by these women until 1842. Of course, the Sunday- 
 school was feeble and was conducted imperfectly. In May, 
 1842, under the ministry of the Rev. E. J. Hammill, James G. 
 L. Huey joined the Methodist Episcopal Church at Talladega, 
 and the women above named laid hands on him and inducted 
 him into the office of Sunday-school Superintendent. Even 
 Mr. Huey carried on the Sunday-school for some while with- 
 out any public prayer. The School was opened by reading a 
 lesson out of the Scriptures and singing a song selected from 
 such Hymn Books as they had. That method of conducting 
 the introductory services of the School prevailed until Mrs. 
 
 I 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 487 
 
 Samuel F. Rice with her children entered the School. Mrs. 
 Rice modestly informed the Superintendent that the order of 
 the services was not satisfactory, and suggested the offering of 
 a public prayer. The suggestion was accepted. Henceforth 
 prayer was made in that School. 
 
 The number of members was not as large at the close of 1845 
 in that charge as it was at the close of its first year. 
 
 The preachers appointed to Jacksonville Circuit were, for 
 1843 Haman Bailey, and John Jones; for 1844 Haman Bailey, 
 and Clayton C. Gillespie; for 1845 Acton Young, and Clayton 
 
 0. Gillespie. , i i. • 
 
 John L. Seay was licensed to preach as a local preacher m 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church by the Quarterly Conference 
 held for the Circuit at Owens Spring Camp-ground, September 
 16 1843, having been recommended by the Society at Antioch, 
 and, now, in 1891, Rev. John L. Seay still lives near the site of 
 Antioch, a local preacher. 
 
 Alexander Douglass was licensed to preach as a local preach- 
 er by the fourth Quarterly Conference held for the Circuit for 
 1843; and by the same quarterly Conference "The License of 
 a Colored Brother, an exhorter named Sam, the property of 
 Brother Kerr, was renewed." ^ 
 
 Throughout the bounds of the Jacksonville Circuit during 
 the year 1843 much distraction was endured and great detri- 
 ment ensued. Preachers and members committed crimes of 
 enormity, and entailed scandal on the Church. Members of 
 some of the Societies were annoyed and irritated by charges 
 and counter-charges against each other. There is one instance 
 on record where a member of the Church charged a local 
 preacher with crimes upon which the local preacher was 
 tried by the Quarterly Conference, and acquitted; and the 
 Quarterly Conference required the preacher in charge to cause 
 the member who brought the charges against the local preach- 
 er to appear before a Committee to answer to the charge of 
 Malicious Prosecution. The local preacher in the case was 
 James S. Stockdale and the member was Massingale H. Porter. 
 The Rev. John Jones, the junior preacher on the Circuit, and 
 who was on trial in the Annual Conference and consequently 
 amenable to the Quarterly Conference of the Circuit for his 
 life was, for the crime of Falsehood, expelled from the Church 
 
488 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 by the Quarterly Conference held for the Circuit at Alexandria, 
 November 19, 1843. That was a sad ending of a man who had 
 been sent to the people with the message of gospel truth. It 
 was alleged that he perpetrated the falsehood by making con- 
 flicting statements concerning a note given to Herndon and 
 Kelley. Reproach was entailed upon the Christian cause, and 
 that reproach was felt throughout that Circuit and beyond, and 
 outlasted the year in which it originated. 
 
 The Quarterly Conferences held for the Jacksonville Circuit 
 for 18-44: licensed W. Posey, William Gore, and J. B. Seay to 
 preach, and during that year there were numerous Church 
 trials, arbitrations, and appeals. Of these there were enough 
 for all purposes of fume and fermentation, disturbance and 
 disquiet. If the purification attained was equal to the putre- 
 faction disclosed, the work should have been satisfactory. 
 
 Upon the motion of Haman Bailey, the preacher in charge 
 of the Circuit, the third Quarterly Conference for the year ap- 
 pointed a Committee of five to draft a preamble and resolution 
 expressing the sense of that Conference on the subject of the 
 division of the Church north and south as provided for by the 
 Acts of the General Conference of that year. The Committee 
 reported a paper on that subject which was adopted and ordered 
 published in certain secular and religious Newspapers named. 
 
 The Conference year for 1844 went into the calendar of 1845, 
 the session of the Annual Conference beginning February 26, 
 1845, and extending into the days of March. The fourth 
 Quarterly Conference for the Jacksonville Circuit for the cur- 
 rent year 1844 was held January 18, 1845. On the previous 
 Saturday, January 11, the preacher in charge of the Circuit, 
 the Rev. Haman Bailey, died. The Record of that Quarterly 
 Conference, held just one week after his death, says: "Owing 
 to the death of our much Beloved Brother, H. Bailey, (Circuit 
 Preacher) it was thought prudent that this Conference do 
 something for the comfort of his bereaved and dependent 
 family, and Brothers Taylor, Patton, and Groce were appointed 
 to make some arrangement for their comfort." The Parsonage 
 for the Jacksonville Circuit, which was secured and made ready 
 for the preacher and his family the beginning of 1844, was near 
 the Academy, at Marble Spring, on Chockolocko Creek, near 
 Owens Spring Camp-ground, and about nine miles north-east 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advance ment of the Work. 489 
 
 of the Town of Talladega. There on January 11, 1845, the 
 Rev. Haman Bailey died, and in the neighborhood near there, 
 in the Jemison Grave-yard, he was buried. He was not a man of 
 finished education, but he was a faithful, useful, and an accept- 
 able minister of the gospel. He preached the doctrine of the 
 Bible, and lived a life of sanctity. 
 
 Close to where the Chinnabee Valley and the outlying hills 
 join, there was left and there lingered a savage by the name of 
 Coffee who was attached to his wigwam in his native land, and 
 who had escaped the imperative order of the United States 
 officer who gathered together and sent thence across the Mis- 
 sissippi River the last remnant of the Creek tribe of Indians 
 who roamed among the beautiful streams of Alabama. An in- 
 cident in the life of that savage, and one of no small import, 
 may be here narrated. At Chinnabee, and not a great way 
 from the hut of that denizen of the forest, the Methodists es- 
 tablished a Camp-ground as early as 1839; and that year, or 
 the next, Coffee attended a Camp-meeting held at that place, 
 and, savage though he was, the Lord commanded the blessing 
 of eternal life upon him. Just a little way from the outer part 
 of the Shed under which the congregation assembled for divine 
 worship there was a log which had been left in clearing off the 
 grounds. On that log Coffee, with, perhaps, some members of 
 his family, seated himself while divine service went on, and 
 there the Spirit reached him. Henry, a colored man who was 
 about twenty-five years old, and who had himself been con- 
 verted in 1836, and who was, for many years, under the law, 
 the property of John L. Seay, and who was in the days of 
 slavery an exhorter, and exercised his gifts as a preacher, and 
 who, after the manumission of the slaves of the country, was 
 one of the foremost preachers in the Colored Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church in the United States, and always, from the day 
 of his regeneration till his death, in 1884, one of the most pious 
 men of any Church, discovered the fact that Coffee was under 
 conviction, and made it known to the preachers in charge of 
 the services. The preachers and other Christians gathered 
 about him, and treated him as a mourner. They conversed 
 with him and prayed for him. He understood only the Indian 
 language. The Rev. Leonard Tarrant led the prayer offered 
 in the interest of Coffee, and John L. Seay, who was a member 
 
490 
 
 llistortf of Mt'tlnuUsm in Ahxbama. 
 
 of tho Churcli, ami who undorHiooil the liulinii uiul tho English 
 hiULCiuii^os, Hottni as intt^rprotor, ami iiitorpri»ttHl tho prayors 
 otTtuoil for him ami tho instructions givon him. Throufjjii Tar- 
 rant ami Soay ho was instriu'trtl in tlu» gos[)ol, and hnl in sup- 
 plication at the throne of graces ami from CJoil through Ji»su8 
 Christ he obtainoil salvation. Tlu* Whiti* nuin, thi» Jilack man, 
 ami the Iveil man all joined in the work of salvation, and together 
 pnrtieipateil in the joy which tMisueil. The language of Coifee 
 as a penitent and as a I'onvert was strikingly different. When 
 he was a ])enitont under conviction he expressed his fei^iings 
 by saying, speaking in the Indian language, " Heart sick heap." 
 AVlien he attaimnl regent^-ation he said, " Heart no h>nger sick. 
 Master of breath is good; 1 am stingy of him." 13y the last re- 
 mark he meant to express his high appreciation of (lod, and 
 his intense love for him. The intense language spoken by that 
 Creek Imlian at Chinnabee Camp-gronnd, in Talladega County, 
 Alabama, in America, in the tirst half of the nineteenth century, 
 reminds one of the intense language spoken by Jesns on the 
 Mount in Palestine, Asia, in the tirst half of the tirst century. 
 The citizens of the kingdom of Christ, whether they come from 
 among the savage or civilized, the rude or cnltured, speak a 
 uniform and pure language, and for the reason that the feel- 
 ings and impulses imparted to the heart by the inspiration of 
 the Holy Spirit are the same in all cases. 
 
 At the close of one dozen years from the introduction of 
 Methodism into Talladega and Benton Counties, there were in 
 the bounds of the territory first occupied by the Talladega Cir- 
 cuit more than twenty Methodist Societies of established worth, 
 the membership of which aggregated more than twelve hun- 
 dred, and from which a number of efficient men had been sent 
 into the ministry. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 The Further Enlarqemknt and Advancement of the Work 
 
 OF Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THAT largo portion of the territory acquired from the 
 Creek Indians by the Tn^fity of March 24, 1832, and which 
 was not traversed by the Talladega Circuit, was presented Uy 
 the notice of the Alabama Coufenuice at the session thereof at 
 Montgomery, Alabama, December 11, 1833. October 1, 183:), 
 tho llev. E. G. llichards, a local preacher of the M(.*thodist 
 Episcopal Church, entered permanent abode at the place since 
 then known as La Fayette, in Chambers County, Alabama. 
 Ho immediately heard of a few Methodists at and about 
 Hurst's Store, where the town of Fredonia now stands, and he 
 went out and preached to them. He at once formed the purpose 
 of securing a Missionary for that section of the country. To 
 that end, he gathered all the Methodists who could be assem- 
 bled at Hurst's Store, thirteen in number, as a nucleus for a 
 Mission He went to the session of the Alabama Conference 
 at Montgomery, Alabama, December 11, 1833, and represented 
 to the Conference the necessities of the unoccupied field, and 
 the demands of the sheep without a shepherd. At Hurst's 
 Store in the primeval forest where still roamed the Indian in 
 his savage state and habits, there was a Class already formed 
 of thirteen Methodists who, though they were not furnished 
 with a house of worship ornamented with vessels of gold and 
 silver and hangings of fine twined linen and of royal colore, 
 and had to worship under the boughs of the trees or the open 
 heavens, or at most in a very rude hut, needed a spiritual guide 
 and a divinely commissioned teacher. At other points there 
 were scattered settlers in need of spiritual oversight. The 
 Conference put down in its list of appointments one which 
 hitherto had not existed: Chattahoochee Mission: io that Mis- 
 sion was sent for 1834, Sidney Squires, and Hugh M. Finley. 
 
 The Chattahoochee Mission for 1834 occupied all the newly 
 acquired territory south of Talladega and Benton Counties, and 
 
 (491) 
 
 i 
 
I 
 
 492 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 consisted of the then Chambers, Coosa, Macon, Randolph, Eus- 
 sell, and Tallapoosa Counties, and that part of the new cession 
 included in Barbour County. It was a large field with few 
 white inhabitants in it and many savages. All was rude and 
 rough. The two Missionaries traveled through the field preach- 
 ing wherever inhabitants could be found and organizing Socie- 
 ties wherever Methodists enough to make a Society could be 
 gathered. But few of the places where Societies were organ- 
 ized that year are now known. There were at least four So- 
 cieties formed in Chambers County by the close of that year; 
 one near Caraway's Mill, six miles above where Fredonia now 
 is, of which Bonner, Rutland, and others were members; one 
 at Kidd's Store, now Oak Bowery, of which Webb Kidd was a 
 leading member; one at the place now known as La Fayette, of 
 which there were only three members, the Rev. E. G. Richards, 
 Mrs. Sarah Dudley, and Mrs. Kitty Driver; and one at Hurst's 
 Store, now Fredonia, and which was the largest Society in the 
 bounds of the Mission. Mrs. S. M. Hurst was one of the 
 charter members at that place, and Mr. J. A. Hurst, the man 
 who established the Store at that place, was a Methodist and a 
 local preacher there for many years. 
 
 The Rev. Hugh M. Finley was in his second year on trial in 
 the Conference, and he died that year at Hurst's and was 
 buried on the lot on which the house of worship was afterward 
 built by the Methodists at Fredonia. At the end of the year 
 on the Chattahoochee Mission the Rev. Sidney Squires trans- 
 ferred to the Mississippi Conference, and on the organization 
 of the Arkansas Conference he became a member thereof, and 
 he located at the close of 1839. 
 
 The country embraced in the Chattahoochee Mission for 
 1834 was at the close of that year and for 1835 assigned to five 
 different appointments as follows: Clayton Mission, Uchee Mis- 
 sion, Line Creek Mission, Chambersville Mission, and Talla- 
 poosa. 
 
 The Clayton Mission was partly in Barbour and partly in 
 Macon Counties, and was within the newly ceded territory, ex- 
 cept Clayton, which was outside and two miles south-west of 
 the line. Clayton and Irwinton (now Eufaula) were the most 
 prominent preaching places on the Mission, with others of les8 
 note within the intervening points between these places and 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 493 
 
 the Uchee Mission. The preacher assigned to the Clayton 
 Mission for the first year of its existence was Zaccheus Dowling. 
 At the close of the year there w^ere one hundred and twelve 
 white and forty-eight colored members. 
 
 The Uchee Mission was named after the Uchee Creeks 
 which traverse the County of Russell, the name indicating the 
 section of country in which the Mission was situated. The 
 preacher on that Mission for its first year was the Rev. Daniel 
 C. Mclntyre. At the close of the year there were in that Mis- 
 sion one hundred and twenty-four white and fifty-three colored 
 members. 
 
 Line Creek, for which Line Creek Mission was named, was, 
 at that point, the line of the newly ceded territory, and was lalso 
 the line between Montgomery and Macon Counties. That Mis- 
 sion was left to be supplied for 1835, and there was no return 
 made from it for the year, and it disappeared from the list of 
 appointments for the time being. 
 
 Chambersville, for which Chambersville Mission was named, 
 was the county town of Chambers County, and was afterward 
 changed from that name to La Fayette. Chambersville Mis- 
 sion embraced anywhere in Chambers and Randolph Counties 
 and about the edges of the adjourning Counties not embraced 
 in other appointments. The preacher for that Mission for that 
 first year was the Rev. Paul F. Stearns, and one to be supplied, 
 and at the end of the year the report showed four hundred and 
 fifty-nine white and eighty-four colored members in the bounds 
 of that charge. 
 
 The Tallapoosa Charge was in Tallapoosa and Coosa Coun- 
 ties, and the preacher on it the first year of its existence, the 
 Rev. Richard N. Crowson, had hard work and small success. 
 Only thirty-four white members, and none of any other sort, 
 were gathered in the whole length and breadth of the work. 
 
 For 1836 that region of country was divided between Clay- 
 ton, Uchee, La Fayette, and Tallapoosa Mission, with the 
 Rev. William B. Neal at Clayton, the Rev. Alexander R. Dick- 
 son at Uchee, the Rev. George W. Cotton and the Rev. John 
 W. Broxson at La Fayette, and the Rev. John Poe at Talla- 
 poosa. The Lower Creek Indians conceived the idea of retain- 
 ing their lands and remaining in their native country, the 
 Treaty of cession and stipulations of removal to the contrary 
 32 
 
494 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 notwithstanding, and by the first of May, 1836, they were com- 
 mitting depredations upon and were in open hostilities against 
 the new settlers in the newly acquired territory. Kussell 
 County was about the center of the hostile demonstrations, and 
 the places where most of the depredations were committed were 
 in that county, but the agitation was wide spread, and extended 
 over the newly acquired territory, and beyond; and the work of 
 the ministry was interrupted, and for the time suspended in all 
 the pastoral charges here mentioned. For that year Uchee and 
 La Fayette charges had no increase in members, Clayton had 
 an increase of only forty-six members, and Tallapoosa had an 
 increase of seventy-eight members. 
 
 The preachers for 1837 were: Clayton, the Eev. John Bos- 
 well; Uchee, the Kev. J. Davis, the Kev. Charles Strider; La 
 Fayette, the Rev. John Hunter; Tallapoosa, the Rev. Benjamin 
 L. West; and Randolph Mission, a new appointment, was to be 
 supplied. 
 
 The preachers in that territory for 1838, with Line Creek 
 Mission again added to the appointments, were: the Rev. 
 James Shanks at Clayton; the Rev. John Hunter at Uchee; 
 the Rev. William C. Robinson at La Fayette; the Rev. John 
 Boswell at Line Creek; the Rev. Benjamin L. West at Talla- 
 poosa; Randolph Mission, to be supplied. 
 
 The work in that territory increased rapidly at that date, and 
 a number of new appointments were made for 1839. Irwinton, 
 Tuskegee, Coosa, and Terrapin Creek Mission were all added 
 for that year, and Uchee disappeared. The Rev. John W. 
 Starr was appointed to Irwinton; the Rev. Thomas H. Capers, 
 and the Rev. John W. Talley, Jr., to Tuskegee; the Rev. John 
 Hunter to Tallapoosa; the Rev. James P. McGhee to Coosa; 
 the Rev. William Spann to Terrapin Creek; the Rev. John T. 
 Rbper to Randolph; the Rev. James Shanks returned to Clay- 
 ton; the Rev. John Boswell to Line Creek; the Rev. William 
 C. Robinson to La Fayette: 
 
 For 1840 the charges in that territory remained the same, ex- 
 cept Terrapin Creek disappeared. The Rev. John W. Starr re- 
 turned to Irwinton; the Rev. John Hunter to Tallapoosa; the 
 Rev. John W. Talley, Jr., was appointed to Clayton; the Rev. 
 L. B. McDonald to Line Creek; the Rev. William C. Robinson, 
 and the Rev. Jefferson Bond to Tuskegee; the Rev. E. AY. Sto- 
 
 Furthey Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 495 
 
 ry to La Fayette; the Rev. James P. McGhee to Randolph; and 
 Coosa was to be supplied. 
 
 For 1841 the charges in that territory were increased by the 
 addition of Glennville, Russell, and Chattahoochee Mission. The 
 Rev. Elias W. Story returned to La Fayette, and the Rev. James 
 Peeler was appointed with him; the Rev. L. B. McDonald re- 
 turned to Line Creek; the Rev. Charles B. Eastman went to 
 Irwinton; the Rev. William C. Robinson tg Glennville; the Rev. 
 John Hunter, and the Rev. J. Laney to Tuskegee; the Rev. 
 Henry T. Jones to Russell; the Rev. John T. Roper to Talla- 
 poosa; the Rev. Thomas J. Williamson to Chattahoochee; the 
 Rev. George R. W. Smith to Coosa; the Rev. Abel Pearce to 
 
 Randolph. 
 
 The charges in that territory for 1842 were: Irwinton Station, 
 the Rev. Stephen F. Pilley; Glennville, the Rev. Benjamin L. 
 West, the Rev. William C. Robinson, Sup.; Line Creek to be 
 supplied; Tuskegee, the Rev. Samuel Armstrong, the Rev. 
 Joshua Starr; Russell, the Rev. Elias W. Story; La Fayette, the 
 Rev. Thomas J. Williamson; Dadeville, the Rev. Nicholson P. 
 Scales; Chattahoochee Mission to people of color, the Rev. 
 Alexander McBride; Coosa, tlie Rev. Jesse Ellis, the Rev. Ed- 
 ward W. Barr; Randolph, the Rev. John Hunter. 
 
 The charges in the same territory for 1843 were: Irwinton 
 and Glennville, the Rev. Stephen F. Pilley; Glennville Circuit, 
 the Rev. John Hunter; Line Creek, the Rev. Abraham B. Elli- 
 ott; Tuskegee, the Rev. Samuel Armstrong, the Rev. Robert R. 
 Dickinson; La Fayette, the Rev. Thomas J. Williamson, the 
 Rev. James H. Laney; Russell, the Rev. Elias W. Story, the 
 Rev. J. R. Locke; Dadeville, the Rev. Joshua Starr; Chattahoo- 
 chee Mission, the Rev. A. McBride, the Rev. Leonard Rush; 
 Randolph, the Rev. J. Kuykendall; Coosa, the Rev. Jesse Ellis. 
 
 The charges for 1844 were: Eufaula and Glennville, the Rev. 
 Thomas H. P. Scales; Aberfoil, the Rev. James Peeler, the Rev. 
 Alexander McBride; Glennville Mission to people of color, the 
 Rev. William K. Norton; Line Creek, the Rev. John R. Locke; 
 Tuskegee, the Rev. E. W. Story, the Rev. James A. Heard; 
 La Fayette, the Rev. John Hunter, the Rev. O. R. Blue; Dade- 
 ville, the Rev. E. J. Hammill; Russell, the Rev. John C. Carter, 
 the Rev. Joshua Starr; Randolph, the Rev. James M. Wells; 
 Coosa, the Rev. Theophilus Moody, the Rev. John W. Ellis. 
 
496 
 
 History of Method ism in Alabama. 
 
 The charges for 1845 were: Eufaula and Glennville, the Kev. 
 Samuel Armstrong; Enon, the Eev. James Peeler; Glennville 
 Colored Mission, the Eev. William K. Norton: La Fayette, the 
 Rev. J. "W. Starr, the Rev. Thomas J. Campbell; Dadeville, to 
 be supplied; Crawford, one to be supplied, the Rev. Wil- 
 liam H. Carlisle; Chattahoochee Colored Mission, the Rev. 
 Leonard Rush, the Rev. J. B. F. Hill; Tuskegee, the Rev. 
 John C. Carter, the pev\ James A. Clement; Line Creek and 
 Woodley Bridge Colored Mission, the Rev. A. S. Harris; Killa- 
 bee Colored Mission, the Rev. E. W. Story; Hillabee Mission, 
 the Rev. Jesse Ellis; Coosa, the Rev. John Hunter, the Rev. 
 William Ira Powers; Randolph, the Rev. Wiley White; Musca- 
 dine, to be supplied. 
 
 At the close of 1844 there were in the bounds of that last 
 ceded territory of the Creek Indians, and where the savage 
 tribe had so recently waged hostilities, and committed depreda- 
 tions, and scalped the white man, more than five thousand white 
 members and more than two thousand colored members. Surely 
 it was better to have that country inhabited by that many Chris- 
 tians than by savages, whether many or few. 
 
 The Town of Irwinton is mentioned in an Act of the General 
 Assembly of Alabama, approved January 16, 1834; and again in 
 an Act approved January 8, 1836, incorporating the Trustees of 
 the Irwinton Academy; and again in an Act approved January 
 9, 1836, amending an act incorporating the Town of Irwinton. 
 The General Assembly of Alabama passed and approved an Act 
 January 2, 1843, to alter the name of the Town of Irwinton to 
 that of Eufaula. The Methodists commenced preaching at Ir- 
 winton at the beginning of the place, and have maintained a 
 good organization there all the time since. The statement that 
 the Rev. Morgan C. Turrentine organized a Methodist Society 
 at the Town of Irwinton, Barbour County, Alabama, is founded 
 upon pure fiction. From tlie close of 1829 to the close of 1849 
 the Rev. Morgan C. Turrentine was a member of the South 
 Carolina Conference, all that time filling appointments in South 
 Carolina and in North Carolina, with all the State of Georgia 
 between him and Alabama. Squires, Finley, Dowling, and Neal 
 were the only preachers having charge of the territory in which 
 Irwinton was located from the beginning there at the close of 
 1833 to the close of 1836. It has been stated, by those claiming 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 497 
 
 to know, that the Methodists erected a house of worship at Ir- 
 winton in 1835, and it was the first erected at that place by any 
 denomination. Irwinton was set off from the Clayton charge at 
 the close of 1837, and was put down as a Station at the close of 
 1842, though it had Glennville with it during 1843, 1844, 1845. 
 At the close of 1845 there were in the Society at Eufaula about 
 one hundred white and sixty colored members. 
 
 In the county of Barbour, fifteen miles from Eufaula, a 
 preaching place was established and a Society was organized, 
 and the place was known as Norton's School-house, though the 
 official name of the church was Providence. That church began 
 with and flourished through the fostering care of the Rev. John 
 W. Norton, a local elder of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 who fixed his permanent home at that place in 1835, and who 
 died there March 15, 1862. He was born January 22, 1794, and 
 was received on trial in the South Carolina Conference in De- 
 cember, 1814, and finally located in January, 1826. His sons 
 and grandsons have made efiicient traveling preachers. He was 
 dignified, genial, generous, conservative, and wise; he wrought 
 constantly for the promotion of Society and the Church. 
 
 The Rev. James Elizabeth Glenn, a native of Franklin 
 County, North Carolina, and who attained justification and re- 
 generation, in his nineteenth year, at a Camp-meeting at Goose 
 Creek Camp-grouud, in his native State, and who was licensed 
 to preach at Plank Chapel, in his native county, and who was 
 two years, beginning in February, 1806, in the traveling connec- 
 tion in the Virginia Conference, and for six years, closing in 
 January, 1814, a member of the South Carolina Conference, and 
 who was a citizen of Abbeville District, South Carolina, from 
 1814 till 1832, and who had a temporary home in Randolph 
 County, Georgia, for three years, settled himself, while yet the 
 savages roamed the forest thereabout, in 1835, on the eastern 
 line of Township thirteen, and Range twenty-eight, in Barbour 
 County, Alabama. Soon the place assumed the proportions of 
 a village, and was called Glennville, in honor of the noted 
 settler. From 1836 preaching has been kept up at Glennville, 
 and since 1838 a flourishing Methodist organization has been 
 maintained at that place. 
 
 The headwaters of Cowikee, Upintolocco, and Big Uchee 
 Creeks are close together, and thereabout is a most beautiful 
 
498 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 region of country. A settlement was attempted there by ad- 
 venturous white men, while yet the savage roamed and hunted 
 in that region. The very year of the savage outbreak, the year 
 1S3G, John McTyeire, of Barnwell District, South Carolina, 
 sought him out a possession in that lonely land, and by the year 
 1838 he, with his household, was domiciled beside his own dead- 
 ening and clearing. Others were there as soon, and a commu- 
 nity at once existed. A preaching place was established by the 
 Methodists and a Methodist Society was organized there at the 
 beginning, and, in the on-going of things, Uchee Chapel was 
 built; and there a Methodist Church has flourished since. John 
 McTyeire, the father of Bishop Holland N. McTyeire, John B. 
 Tate, Joel Hurt, Henry Hurt, William Threadgill, and their 
 families, and others constituted that flourishing Methodist So- 
 ciety. The little village of Uchee is ono of the loveliest spots 
 in the original County of Russell. There, in the early spring of 
 1857, at the house of one Dr. Green, the author of these pages 
 drank his last cup of coffee. 
 
 Sixteen miles west of the Chattahoochee Eiver, on an air line, 
 in the County of Russell, in the year 1837, Daniel Bullard built, 
 of split logs and boards, a house of worship, twenty-four by 
 twenty-two feet, at a cost of two hundred and twenty dollars, 
 and the place was called Lebanon; it was in a mile or two of the 
 present town of Opelika; and the Society there at that time 
 consisted of twenty-two members. That church was kept up in 
 a flourishing condition till the close of 1857, when the member- 
 ship moved to the town of Opelika. The church at Lebanon was 
 girded with strength and adorned with grace. In 1839 there 
 was a permanent revival there, and a substantial ingathering. 
 
 In 1838 a Society was organized, and a house of worship, in 
 keeping with the times and state of the country, was erected in 
 Township eighteen, Range twenty-nine, and named Mount Zion. 
 In 1844 a new house of worship was erected, which stands to 
 this day. That Mount Zion is on an elevated plot of ground 
 near the Railroad, seven or eight miles north-west of Columbus, 
 Georgia. The church at Mount Zion has ever been one of 
 worth and influence, noted for intelligence, liberality, and piety. 
 
 By 1841 the Russell Circuit was formed and in full working 
 order, and consisted of the following Societies: Crawford, Glenn 
 Chapel, five miles from the present town of Seale, Girard, Leb- 
 
 FurtJier Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 499 
 
 anon, Mount Zion, Salem, Shady Grove, south of Opelika ten or 
 twelve miles, Soule Chapel, six miles from Columbus, Georgia, 
 Uchee Chapel, Wacoochee, Watoola, (Capps,) White's, Wesley 
 Chapel, between Big Uchee and thi town of Crawford, and Un- 
 ion, between Lebanon and the town of Auburn. Among the 
 prominent and faithful men who labored at these several Soci- 
 eties in the early day may be mentioned: Rev. John C. Ardis, 
 Rev Charles A. Brown, Rev. John Crowell, Rev. James W. 
 Capps, Rev. Isaac Faulkenberry, Rev. Luke T. Mizell, local 
 preachers, Daniel Bullard, William Barnett, H. M. Crowder, S. 
 R. Boykin, W. Dunlap, James Allen, John W. Allen, Washing- 
 ton Burt, Young Edwards, Daniel Johnson, R. P. Laney, F. 
 Morton, R. S. Hardaway, Joel Hurt, Benjamin Borum, W. J. 
 Gibson, John McTyeire, Mark McCutchen, Theophilus White, 
 and John B. Tate. In 1843 the Russell Circuit suffered a great 
 loss in the death of Hartwell Bass, a man of strength, piety, 
 
 and influence. 
 
 While yet the Indian, in contemplation of his final exodus 
 from his own country, in dejected solitude, tread his native soil 
 and listened to the plaintive dirges sung by the gentle winds 
 amid the tree-tops of his native land, a number of Methodists, 
 who were afterward distinguished for zeal and piety, as if they 
 came just in time to introduce innovations upon the long-estab- 
 lished customs of the savage, moved into Macon County. That 
 immigration created a demand for ministerial services in that 
 region. That demand was met as best it could be under the dis- 
 abtlities of the limited supply of preachers and the rude condi- 
 tion of the country. ^ ^ ^ a - t f 
 
 It is said by those esteemed good authority that a bociety of 
 Methodists was organized at Tuskegee in 1835, consisting of 
 Joseph Cameron and his wife, and Mrs. James Dent, and Mrs. 
 Thomas S. Woodward. Cameron was a mechanic, illiterate, and 
 poor- as a member of the Church he was, for a while, punctual, 
 pious, and profitable, but he finally died a drunkard. The court- 
 house a little log building with a dirt floor, was used by that 
 Society as a preaching place. About 1836 a School-house was 
 built and was used as a place for preaching by all who came 
 that way and engaged in that kind of services. The first house 
 of worship for the Methodists at Tuskegee was completed in 
 1841. The membership of that Society during the time worship 
 
500 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 was held in the School-house, in addition to the members already 
 named, consisted of the Eev. Kobert Adams, once a member of 
 the South Carolina Conference, the Eev. John Chappell, Charles 
 George Eush, James Nicho!son, Alfred Hardy, Samuel P. Bas- 
 comb. Dr. E. H. Howard, George Menifee, William H. Stand- 
 ford, and some of the members of the families of some of these 
 mentioned here. John B. Bilbro became a citizen of Tuskegee 
 and a member of the Society at that place in 1841. He joined 
 the Church in 1833 at Columbus, Georgia. 
 
 Traditio]! says that the Eev. John Boswell, he then being 
 presiding elder of the Chattahoochee District, organized a So- 
 ciety, in 1834, in the house of James Howard, at Cross Keys, 
 about sixteen miles west of Tuskegee, and that a log house was 
 built soon after the organization of that Society for a place of 
 worship. James Howard and his wife, Tabitha, and his daugh- 
 ter, Sarah, and Joseph H. Howard and his wife and his daugh- 
 ter, and others were members at Cross Keys at the first. 
 
 In 1835 a Society was organized six miles west of Tuskegee, 
 and was known as Clanton's. Its members at the organization 
 were Nathaniel H. Clanton, John A. Green, Anson Davis, Ben- 
 jamin Motley, and others. The house of worship at that place 
 was a log cabin. That log cabin was superseded in 1842 by Mc- 
 Kendree Chapel, which was built one half mile nearer Tuskegee. 
 In after years all the little Societies in that region were united 
 in Union Church, which was eight miles west of Tuskegee. 
 
 Tuskegee Camp-ground, four miles west of Tuskegee, was es- 
 tablished in 1838, and the tenters there at that date were Col. 
 Nathaniel H. Clanton, James Nicholson, Charles G. Eush, Lew- 
 is Hoffman, Jacob Hoffman, Alfred Hardy, A. Chappell, the 
 Eev. John Chappell, the Eev. Eobert Adams, and James How- 
 ard. The Eev. John Chappell was once a member of the Geor- 
 gia Conference. He was good natured and true. 
 
 As early as 1837 there was a large Society at Auburn with 
 Thomas H. Harper as class leader. The Harper family was 
 large, and many of them belonged to the Society at the town of 
 Auburn. 
 
 The Methodist preachers went into that newly settled region 
 unencumbered with assumptions of sacerdotal dignities, *and 
 functions, and paraphernalia, and entirely removed from the 
 distractions engendered of conflicting edicts issued by opposing 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 501 
 
 councils and rival pontiffs, and they applied themselves with 
 diligeuce to the one work of gathering the population into the 
 fold of the great Shepherd, and by 1839 they had a well organ- 
 ized Circuit, which bore the name of Tuskegee, and which lay 
 round about from that place, and extended over much of the 
 County of Macon. In the Societies which constituted that Cir- 
 cuit were men and women, not a few, of personal piety and 
 power. 
 
 There was one who apprehended that for which he was ap- 
 prehended by Christ Jesus, and who, having his name in the 
 book of life, attained unto distinction among his fellows, who 
 may be properly noticed here. So far as his person and posi- 
 tion were to be implicated there was to him no meaning in the 
 claim of the jurisdiction of the pontiff. He was simply a lay- 
 man, and he was Charles George Eush. He came from South 
 Carolina to Alabama in 1818, and from then till his death in 
 1858, a period of forty years, he allied himself with the Metho- 
 dism of Alabama. He lived a dozen years at Washington, Au- 
 tauga County, Alabama, and was there when the innovators cre- 
 ated a revolt against and led a secession from the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church. While Mr. Eush, in common with all good 
 men, deplored the ecclesiastical discord created by the innova- 
 tors he could not be neutral in the contest, and, adhering through 
 all the controversy to the Methodist Episcopal Church, he led 
 an active campaign in defense of the established usages of Meth- 
 odism, and he exerted a strong influence in impeding the prog- 
 ress and in suppressing the work of the secessionists. 
 
 He was of German descent, and was of sturdy mold of char- 
 acter. In literary attainments he was limited, but in habits of 
 industry he was thoroughly trained, having been brought up at 
 a trade, that of a blacksmith. W^hen he had nearly reached his 
 majority he hired himself, or was hired by his father, to a neigh- 
 bor to superintend a distillery through the brandy making sea- 
 son: and while he was engaged in that business he was convict- 
 ed and regenerated, and confirmed in the Lutheran Church, the 
 Church of his ancestors, and he continued in the business of 
 distillation until his contract expired. He never for a moment 
 considered the business derogatory to Christian character, or 
 destructive to moral integrity. 
 
 For a time he resided in Montgomery County. While resid- 
 
UUtoi'ij of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 iiig in tliat County ho held his membership at the city of Mont- 
 gomery. That noted event, the Falling of the Stars, which oc- 
 curred on the morning of Wednesday, November 13, 1833, 
 marked the beginning of an exalted state of religious experience 
 in the case of Brother Rush. He was asleep at his home. In 
 the midst of the phenomenon he was awakened by the screams 
 of frightened persons^, white and black, whose fears had been 
 aroused, and who, in the dreadful extremity of the hour, were 
 exclaiming that the day of Judgment had come. He dressed 
 in haste, and, with much foreboding, looked out upon the dis- 
 play in the heavens above. When he saw the multitude of 
 shooting stars and falling meteors his anticipations of dreadful 
 catastrophe were contirmed, and he accepted it as a fact that 
 the day of Judgment had really come. Whereupon he commit- 
 ted himself and his cause to God who was to be on the throne 
 of that day. He was, at once, in a state of confidence and calm- 
 ness. In the infallible judgment of God he reposed, and ho 
 awaited in peace the opening of the books, the revelation of the 
 accounts, and the final award. When the day dawned, the sun 
 arose, and the stars quit falling, he was greatly disappointed, 
 and did truly regret that the phenomenon had terminated with- 
 out the anticipated Judgment. Though his faith in Christ was 
 tested on a false issue, it was nevertheless really tested. From 
 that day forth he was not afraid of the issues of death. The 
 mythology of the ancients treats much of astronomy, and many 
 of the superstitions of mankind are associated with the stars. 
 The stars have been conspicuous in the records of human events. 
 "The astrologers, the star-gazers, and the monthly prognostica- 
 tors'* have ever been associates. The holy Scriptures make 
 constant allusion to " the stars of heaven and the constellations 
 thereof." The author of the book of Job swelled the profound 
 strains and added to the sublime imagery of his inimitable po- 
 etry by allusions to "Arcturus, Orion, and the Pleiades," and by 
 allusions to the ancient time when in the survey of the founda- 
 tions of the earth " the morning stars sang together." In their 
 lofty song of praise to the Lord God of Israel, a song rich in 
 poetic measure, Deborah and Barak make reference to the fact 
 that "the stars in their courses fought against" the oppressors 
 of Israel. With the imagery of "wandering stars" have been 
 described apostates from the Christian faith. The Star seen iu 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 503 
 
 the East by the wise men guided to the babe born at Bethle- 
 hem, who was Christ, the Lord. It is true, therefore, that 
 Brother Bush was not the only one whose Christian life has had 
 to do with the fancies and freaks of astronomy, and has been 
 affected by the stars and their appearances. 
 
 About 1836 Mr. Bush moved to Macon County, and estab- 
 lished his home two and a half miles south of Tuskegee. He 
 was of even temper, truthful, honest, dignified, serious, cheer- 
 ful, proper, of steady habits, industrious, attentive to affairs, 
 economical, possessing sound judgment, and great wisdom. 
 Though he eschewed politics, he was a useful citizen and a ben- 
 efactor. His influence in the Church to which he belonged and 
 the circle in which he moved was unbounded. He made money 
 rapidly, and ho used it profusely in benevolence. He helped to 
 build School-houses, churches, and Colleges, and to support 
 preachers, missionaries, orphans, paupers, and strangers. He 
 responded promptly to every benevolent claim brought to his 
 attention, and he usually responded in the amount solicited. 
 He was not only wise in counsel, abundant in alms and benevo- 
 lence, but he was a man of prayer and of piety. He had his 
 times and places for secret devotion. He furnished himself 
 with a Bible, the Life, Sermons, and Writings of Wesley, the 
 Lives of Benson, Clark, Carvarso, and others of the Wesleyan 
 Methodists, the Southern Christian Advocate, and the Secular Pa- 
 pers of his section of the country. These furnished the staple 
 of what he read. As regularly as he had his meals, night and 
 morning he had worship with the family. With unsurpassed 
 punctuality and regularity he filled his place at the house of 
 God It is said that the horse which he used in going to and 
 from the church became so accustomed to going that of his own 
 accord he would leave the street at the right place to reach the 
 hitching post, and on reaching the post would turn the buggy 
 wheel to the proper position to make it easy to dismount from 
 the buggy, and he would stand at the post, without hitching, 
 until his'^master returned to the buggy after the close of divine 
 service. Brother Bush was at church, day and night, whenever 
 there was religious service in any form. In his second wife, Sa- 
 rah as in his first wife, Elizabeth, he had proper encourage- 
 ment and efficient help in every good word and work. She was 
 a woman of meek and quiet spirit, and of great benevolence. 
 
COl 
 
 Histoi'ij of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 505 
 
 She kept a regular outfit of bedding in her house for the use of 
 poor wanderers who might come that way. Often did she, with 
 tears in her eyes, as she would bid the preacher farewell on the 
 threshold, put into the hands of the departing man of God five, 
 ten, or more dollars. Often did she furnish the preacher's fam- 
 ily clothing, and more than once did she turn over her own bed 
 and servant to the use of the preacher's wife. AVith the sincer- 
 ity and fidelity of plighted promise, with fealty as sacred as an 
 oatli, with the ambition peculiar to a mother, with supplications, 
 which catalogued items which may not be recorded in this con- 
 nection, and with a faith as sublime as that of Hannah, of old, 
 she, from before his birth, consecrated to the Christian ministry 
 her son, John Wesley Eush. Through all his infancy, child- 
 hood, youth, and profligacy her faith never wavered. Tiie God 
 of Israel granted her the petition that she had asked of him, 
 and she lived to see the desire of her heart, and the confirma- 
 tion of her faith. She lived to see her son initiated into the 
 Christian ministry, and to hear his voice as from the walls of 
 Zion he repeated the divine amnesty to a rebellious race. 
 
 But the record of Charles George Eush is not yet complete. 
 For a half century, including the period from the time of his 
 majority to the time of his death, he was the owner of slaves. 
 Shall he be anathematized, for this? Shall it be said of him, 
 because he owned slaves, that his hands, his bed, liis furniture, 
 his house, and his lands were stained with blood ? and that he 
 was more savage than lions and bears? First of all he erected 
 a Chapel on his plantation for the use and benefit of the Ne- 
 groes. There they were preached to and there the negro chil- 
 dren were catechised and instructed regularly. The great ma- 
 jority of the Negroes on the plantation were religious, and cases 
 of adultery, lying, and stealing among them were rare. Under 
 the ministry of the Methodist preachers appointed from time to 
 time to serve them the Negroes engaged in prayer and praise 
 and reached a high state of enjoyment. In the government of 
 his slaves Mr. Eush was controlled by the same sense of justice 
 and mercy which controlled him in the government of the other 
 persons under his authority. He considered himself responsi- 
 ble to God, who made all men, for the well-being, in this and 
 the life to come, of the slaves under his control. He, therefore, 
 discouraged every form of cruelty and of vice on the part of 
 
 those who managed his slaves, and on the part of the slaves 
 themselves. He enforced morality upon all concerned for the 
 reasons that vicious acts were injurious to character and offen- 
 sive to God. In the contracts made with his Overseers he stip- 
 ulated that said Overseers should abstain from intoxicants and 
 from profane and obscene language, and that they should, with 
 their Sunday clothes on, attend preaching with the Negroes at 
 the plantation Chapel, and that they should require the Ne- 
 groes to have on their Sunday clothes. He also stipulated that 
 in the correction of the slaves cruel punishment should not be 
 indulged. On his tombstone are engraved these words: *'The 
 Orphan's Friend." After serving his generation by the will of 
 God, Charles George Eush fell on sleep, and was laid to rest in 
 the family burying ground, near Tuskegee, Alabama. 
 
 In 1835 there came and settled near the place now called Sa- 
 lem, in Eussell County, Alabama, one who, at the Crawford 
 Camp-ground, in the State of Georgia, in 1830, and about the 
 time he had reached his majority, had experienced that remark- 
 able change which made him a new creature in Christ Jesus, 
 and gave him the Spirit of adoption. He afterwards lived near 
 the town of Auburn, in the county of Macon, Alabama. That 
 one was Isaac Hill, than whom a more unselfish man never 
 came to Alabama. He was a plain man, without genius, with- 
 out brilliancy of intellect, without great learning, but possessed 
 of Christian sentiments, steady purposes, generous impulses, 
 meekness, and humility. He was an humble layman, who found 
 in that position ample verge for the employment and use of all 
 his gifts and graces, and who never had anything to lavish on 
 splendor, pomp, and folly, but who expended much in benevo- 
 lence and charity, and, in many ways, rendered solid service to 
 mankind. His alms, like streams from living fountains, flowed 
 steadily and constantly. He gave alms and contributed to be- 
 nevolent objects as he prayed, without ceasing. He did large 
 things in building churches, in supporting Camp-meetings, and 
 in educating the indigent. Many visitors at the Camp-meetings 
 were lodged and fed at his hospitable tent. He gave liberal 
 sums to the College built at Auburn by the Methodists. He 
 filled efficiently the offices of class leader and steward. He 
 honored his Church, and was honored by her. In all things 
 requisite or necessary to salvation the Bible was his guide, and 
 
506 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the book of Discipline was liis ecclesiastical code. He fell on 
 sleep at Notasulga, Alabama, April 23, 1886, and his body was 
 committed to the ground with Christian ceremonies at Auburn, 
 Alabama. 
 
 By 1837 the La Fayette Circuit, extending over a large scope of 
 country, was thoroughly organized. The largest official gathering 
 on that Circuit for that year was at the Third Quarterly Confer- 
 ence and the record of that Quarterly Conference contains the 
 names of the appointments on the Circuit at that date. That Quar- 
 terly Conference was held at Oak Bowery Camp-ground, Septem- 
 ber 25, 1837, Ebenezer Hearn, presiding elder of the Irwintou 
 District, in the chair. The Rev. John Hunter, preacher in 
 charge of the Circuit, was present, and also the following official 
 members: John B. Chappell, local elder, Evan G. Eichards, 
 local deacon, William Menifee, John E. Starr, and Jonathan 
 Morris, local preachers, Eobert Boren, John E. Gilbert, and 
 William Waldrop, exhorters, David Boren, Nathaniel Grady, 
 George Menifee, stewards, John Trammell, Gideon Eix, Jesse 
 Garrett, William W. Harper, Lemuel Jackson, John E. Page, 
 Elijah C. Hunter, and William E. Miller, class leaders. Na- 
 thaniel Grady was Secretary of the Quarterly Conference and 
 also Eecording Steward. The appointments on the Circuit that 
 day were: Oak Bowery, La Fayette, Kemp's, McGilFs, Clement's, 
 Piney Grove, Allen's, Pisgah, Bonner's, Fredonia, Mount Zion, 
 Grear's, Tallasee, Mount J<jfferson, Cusseta, Eady's, Webb's, 
 Day's Camp-ground. 
 
 According to data in hand McGill's Church, located in Ran- 
 dolph County, near, and on the west side of, the Tallapoosa Elv- 
 er, a little north of Hutton's Ford, now Louina, was organized, 
 by^ the Eev. John Hunter, on a week day, in the summer of 
 1837. The principal members who constituted that Society 
 were the Hardys, Harrises, McGills, and Smiths. Spencer 
 Smith, who had just settled a home at the place where Daviston 
 has recently sprung up, was appointed class leader at McGill's 
 Society upon its organization. The house built there for wor- 
 ship was made of split logs, and was eighteen by twenty feet, 
 covered with rough boards, held on with what was called weight- 
 poles, and had a dirt floor covered with pine-straw, and seats, 
 without backs, made of puncheons. Spencer Smith, in after 
 years, became a local preacher, and was useful in that country. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 507 
 
 He died at Eockford, Coosa County, Alabama, in 1883, at the 
 advanced age of one hundred years, his wife, who was one of the 
 charter members at McGill's, having preceded him to the Bet- 
 ter Land a few months. In 1838 two men, who held member- 
 ship at McGill's, were licensed to exhort, who were afterward 
 licensed to preach. Mr. Harris, the elder of the two, made a 
 useful local preacher. The other, George E. AV. Smith, the son 
 of the class leader, was adopted into the heavenly family when 
 twelve years old, was at a Quarterly ConCerence held for La 
 Fayette Circuit at Day's Camp-ground, October 15, 1838, as an 
 exhorter, was licensed to preach in 1839, being then nineteen 
 years of age, and was received on trial in the Alabama Confer- 
 ence in January, 1840, and appointed for that year junior 
 preacher on the Tombecbee Circuit; for 1841 was in charge of 
 the Coosa Circuit; for 1842 he was at Pensacola, Florida; and 
 for 1843 he was appointed in charge of Apalachicola, Florida. 
 He died, in the midst of an effort to build a house of worship, 
 at Apalachicola, Florida, April 16, 1843. He was useful in life, 
 and the peace of God sustained him in death. He was small in 
 stature, and was but a youth when he died, but he was grave, 
 and solemn, and had the weight and influence of a messenger 
 from God. Endowed with talents of high order, he had the 
 prospect of attaining distinction in the ministry. He rose a])ove 
 the disadvantages of adverse environments. Having a thirst 
 and capacity for knowledge, he attained it, notwithstanding 
 School facilities were lacking in the wilderness where was cast 
 
 his lot in his youth. 
 
 Day's Camp-ground was near the line between Tallapoosa and 
 Chambers Counties, and just east of the present town of Dud- 
 leyville. It is of record, as named, as early as September 25, 
 
 1837. At a Camp-meeting held there the middle of October, 
 
 1838, at which Ebenezer Hearn, presiding elder, William C. 
 Eobinson, preacher in charge of the Circuit, and Thomas H. 
 Capers, McCarter Oliver, Samuel C. Daily, J. E. Starr, Green 
 Cousins, J. E. Gilbert, and William Menifee, local preachers 
 then belonging to the Circuit, and eight exhorters, and sixteen 
 class leaders were present. Ethelbert S. Smith, the brother of 
 George E. W. Smith, then a boy ten years old, while pressing 
 his way to the altar, and McCarter Oliver putting his hand on 
 his head, and saying: "God bless this little boy," was instantly 
 
508 
 
 History of Methodism in Alahama. 
 
 renewed in nature and plenteously endued with divine grace. 
 For many years Ethelbert S. Smith has been an itinerant 
 preacher. At this time, 1892, he is a member of one of the Con- 
 ferences in Texas. 
 
 A Camp-ground was established as early as 1837 at Oak Bow- 
 ery, as early as 1838 at Fredonia, as early as 1843 at Bethlehem, 
 and all these Camp-grounds named were kept up for a number 
 of years. 
 
 A house of worship was built at La Fayette in 1837. The 
 Deed to the lot on which the Church was built bears date June 
 3, 1837, and the Trustees named in the Deed were: Alsee Holi- 
 field, John Trammell, Beverly Walker, Elliotte H. Muse, Sam- 
 uel B. Turner, Evan G. Kichards, and Bartholomew B. Moore. 
 
 The blunders, foibles, and atrocities of mankind are very 
 great, even under the administrations of religion. Many things 
 are done even in the Councils of the Church which lack com- 
 pleteness, and never attain thereto. The demonstration of the 
 truth of these assertions is found in the history of the m*en who 
 sought imluction into the offices of the ministry through the 
 Quarterly Conferences of the La Fayette Circuit, and of the 
 several transactions of the Quarterly Conferences of that Cir- 
 cuit entered from time to time. The feats accomplished in the 
 enactment? and the administrations of the Quarterly Confer- 
 ences of that Circuit at that early day were not often surpassed. 
 They indicated instability and indifference to the principles of 
 justice and the standards of moral rectitude. There was varie- 
 ty and there was conflict of action. The work was done and un- 
 done with facility. Men were inducted into the ministry and 
 deposed therefrom with a facility indicative of anything other 
 than adherence to sound doctrine. No doubt the members of 
 the Quarterly Conferences of that Circuit made fallibility a 
 virtue, and acknowledged adherence to the saying of Pope, "To 
 err is human." 
 
 James K. Starr was, by the Quarterly Conference of the Cir- 
 cuit, licensed to preach April 22, 1837, and on September 25, 
 following, there being proof that he had been engaged in some 
 fraudulent transactions, the Quarterly Conference decided that 
 he be deprived of his official standing in the Church; and then 
 at the Quarterly Conference March 31, 1838, he applied for a 
 license to preach, which, after examination, was granted. Less 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 509 
 
 than one year was consumed in said transactions. Other Church 
 trials, involving men of prominence, grew out of that case; un- 
 rest, and great excitement ensued, and yet, as though nothing 
 was ever to be settled, a vacillating administration was adhered 
 to. At the Quarterly Conference held at Day's Camp-ground, 
 October 15, 1838, James K. Starr was recommended to th© Ala- 
 bama Conference as a suitable person to be admitted on trial. 
 The Annual Conference did not admit him. 
 
 At that same Quarterly Conference held at Day's Camp- 
 ground, October 15, 1838, Thomas P. C. Shelman, formerly an 
 elder in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and having with- 
 drawn from said Church, applied to be re-admitted as a local 
 preacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and, after thor- 
 ough examination of the whole matter, he was unanimously re- 
 ceived; and it was Resolved that the Quarterly Conference 
 unanimously recommend to the Georgia Annual Conference the 
 restoration of Brother T. P. C. Shelman's credentials as a dea- 
 con and elder. Thomas P. C. Shelman, recommended from the 
 Augusta District, was admitted on trial by the South Carolina 
 Conference, at Columbia, Tuesday evening, February 2, 1830; 
 and in the Journal of the Georgia Conference for January 14, 
 1835, it is recorded: "Thomas P. C. Shelman was next called, 
 and on motion. It was resolved that it be entered on the Minutes 
 that he has withdraw^n from the Church." In the Journal of 
 that Conference for December 15, 1838, is this entry: "The 
 Bishop presented a communication from Brother Ebenezer 
 Hearn, a presiding elder in the Alabama Conference, on the sub- 
 ject of restoring the credentials of Thomas P. C. Shelman, late 
 a traveling preacher in this Conference who withdrew from the- 
 Church; said communication was accompanied by certificates^ 
 and on motion. It was ordered that his Parchments be restored, 
 and the Secretary was directed to send a certificate of the pro- 
 ceedings of the Conference to Brother Hearn, of the Alabama 
 Conferen-ce." T. P. C. Shelman was recommended to the Ala- 
 bama Annual Conference for an appointment by the Quarterly 
 Conference held at Fredonia Camp-ground, August 14, 1841, but 
 he did not get the appointment. In 1846 Shelman was admit- 
 ted on trial in the Alabama Conference, and located at the close 
 of 1851. Some men are uncertain. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held at Fredonia, November 15, 
 33 
 
510 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 1842, licensed Toliver Spaiin to preach, and the Quarterly Con- 
 ference held at Bethlehem Camp-ground, September 1(), 184IJ, a 
 period of time less than a year, expelled him from the Church 
 because he had run away and d«^fraudeil his creditors. 
 
 At the same Quarterly Conference at which Toliver Spann 
 was exi)elled from the Church Mark \V(»stmor(^land was licensed 
 to ])reach. He was a man with a history. Mark Westmoreland 
 was recommended by the Athens District Conference, Decem- 
 ber 4, 1821, and was admitted on trial by the South Carolina 
 Conference at Augusta, Georgia, February 2(), 1822. The record 
 made at Wilmington, North Carolina, for February 19, 1825, 
 says: "Mark Westmoreland was not present. The following 
 motion was submitted and carried. Moved, That whereas M. 
 Westmoreland has been neglectful of his appointments on his 
 Circuit the past year, and prematurely made efforts to marry, 
 that a letter of reproof be written to him by the Secretary, after 
 which his character passed." The record made at Milledgeville, 
 Georgia, for Friday morning, January 13, 1826, says: "Mark 
 Westmoreland was examined and there appearing to have been 
 imprudences in his conduct he was not elected to elder's office." 
 The record for January 20, 1826, says: "Mark Westmoreland, 
 through Brother Hodges, requested a location, which was 
 granted." In December, 1829, Mark Westmoreland was re-ad- 
 mitted into the traveling connection by the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence, and in January, 1837, he again, and for the last time, lo- 
 cated. By a process, not now known, he lost his place in the 
 ministry, and in 1843 he is licensed to preach de novo by the 
 Quarterly Conference of the La Fayette Circuit. He was pres- 
 ent as a local preacher in the Quarterly Conference held for La 
 Fayette Circuit at Emory Chapel, December 21, 1844. There 
 charges were brought against him by John Hunter. The 
 charge was seeming discrepancy in written statements which 
 he had made. A Committee investigated the charge, and ac- 
 quitted Westmoreland. He disappeared from Methodist rec- 
 ords. He joined the Baptists. He was a man of intellect, but 
 unstable and unwise; he was destitute of caution and pru- 
 dence; he was selfish and inert. 
 
 James H. Laney was admitted on trial in the Alabama Con- 
 ference, and for 1843 appointed junior preacher on the La Fay- 
 ette Circuit, and at the close of the year he was discontinued by 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 511 
 
 the Conference, and became a local preacher on the La Fayette 
 Circuit. He was charged with discrepancy, a mild way of stat- 
 ing the case, in three specifications: 1. In regard to having bor- 
 rowed a cloak from Brother Joel Hurt. 2. In regard to boot 
 in swapping horses with Brother Joel Hurt. 3. In regard to 
 entering into business with J. A. Hurst. The Quarterly Confer- 
 ence held at La Fayette, June 8, 1844, found him guilty of the 
 threfe specifications herein set forth, and expelled him from the 
 
 ! Church. 
 
 The low estimate placed upon the sacred work of the Chris- 
 tian ministry by the leaders of the La Fayette Circuit is indi- 
 cated by the facility with which the Quarterly Conferences of 
 that Circuit recommended preachers as suitable persons to be 
 admitted to the traveling connection. AVithin the short space 
 of six years, beginning in 1839, the Quarterly Conferences of 
 that Circuit had recommended, more than once, five different 
 preachers to the Alabama Conference for the high calling of 
 the itinerant ministry which the Annual Conference rejected. 
 These preachers so repeatedly recommended and so uniformly 
 rejected were James K. Starr, William B. Barnett, Harris Stearns, 
 William A. Smith, and Nathaniel C. Barber. Some of these 
 men were doubtless true Christians, but their environments 
 disqualified them for the intricate work of the itinerant 
 
 ministry. 
 
 Henry Starr, Joel D. Trammell, William W. Waldrop, Samuel 
 G. Jones, and Basil E. Lucas were severally licensed to preach 
 by the Quarterly Conferences of the La Fayette Circuit held in 
 1839. Hilliard J. Hunter was licensed to preach by the Quar- 
 terly Conference held for La Fayette Circuit at Mount Jeffer- 
 son, April 3, 1841; and Urban C. Tigner, Alexander McBride, 
 and John M. Tatum were each licensed to preach by the Quar- 
 terly Conference for that Circuit at Oak Bowery, November 13, 
 1841. At a Quarterly Conference for the Circuit at Oak Bowery, 
 in 1844, John S. Sappington was licensed to preach, and at a 
 Quarterly Conference held for La Fayette Circuit at Harmony 
 Church, December 6, 1845, Daniel Duncan, John C. L. Aikin, 
 and Humphrey Gilmore were each licensed to preach. Hunter, 
 McBride, and Duncan made successful itinerant preachers. 
 Aikin was on trial in the Alabama Conference two years. 
 
 McCarter Oliver and Green Cousins were for many years lo- 
 
512 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 cal preachers on the La Fayette Circuit. They were local 
 preachers before they moved into the bounds of that work. To 
 say that they were true Christian men, representative and use- 
 ful, is saying much to their praise, and just as little as should 
 be said of them. Lemuel Jackson was for long years a member 
 of the Church in the bounds of that Circuit, filling the office of 
 class leader. No better man ever lived in any country, or be- 
 longed to any Church. He was without guile. 
 
 Nathaniel Grady was a member of the Quarterly Conference 
 of the La Fayette Circuit for more than twenty years, death 
 terminating his membership therewith. He was a class leader, 
 and Secretary of most of the Quarterly Conferences held through 
 all the years he was connected with the work, and a steward 
 most of the time. He died Friday morning, November 27, 1846. 
 He was well known and highly esteemed. He was a worthy 
 citizen, a faithful steward, and a pious Christian. 
 
 This closes the notice of La Fayette Circuit for the present. 
 It was a noted Circuit at that date at which it has now passed 
 under review. 
 
 Emuckfau Creek became historic through a desperate battle 
 fought on or near it between the forces under General Andrew 
 Jackson and the Creek warriors, January 23, 1814 On or near 
 that creek, and near the line of Randolph and Tallapoosa Coun- 
 ties, the Methodists established Emuckfau Camp-ground, as 
 early, perhaps, as 1842, and for many long years Camp-meetings 
 were held at that place which were attended with supreme de- 
 light and with divine results. 
 
 Tn 1836 Glover McCain, a local preacher in the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, and Seaborn McCain, his brother, moving 
 from Tennessee, settled west of where the present town of Line- 
 ville is situate, and soon a Society was organized at Morton's 
 School-house, which was between the sites of the present towns 
 of Lineville and Ashland. By the close of the next two years 
 Joseph D. McCann and James G. McCain had pitched their 
 tents in the same vicinity. Barr, Kilpatrick, and others were 
 there about the same time, adding numbers and strength to the 
 Methodist forces. In the course of time a Church was built and 
 named Smyrna, and Morton's School-house abandoned. Joseph 
 D. McCann and Glover McCain were leaders in hospitality and 
 in the financial support of the Society at Smyrna. Edward W. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 513 
 
 Bar, who joined the Alabama Conference on trial at its session 
 beginning December 30, 1840, and who broke down and died in 
 about two years, and John W. McCann, who was received on 
 trial by the Alabama Conference in the first part of 1846, and 
 who continued a member of that Conference for more than for- 
 ty years, were members of the Church at Smyrna when and be- 
 fore they commenced their ministry. 
 
 A Quarterly Conference for Randolph Mission, Montgomery 
 District, Alabama Annual Conference, of the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church, was held at Cahulga Camp-ground, October 30, 1837, 
 Greenberry Garrett, presiding elder, in the chair. John How- 
 ell applied to that Quarterly Conference for liberty to preach as 
 a local preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and, after 
 due inquiry concerning his gifts, grace, and usefulness, he was 
 judged to be a suitable person to be endowed with the liberty 
 sought, and he was authorized to preach, and a license certify- 
 ing to the fact was given him. He died in 1854. His descend- 
 ants still live, and many of them are Methodists, some of them 
 are Methodist preachers. Cahulga Camp-ground was in Town- 
 ship sixteen. Range twenty-four, east, and in about one mile of 
 the present town of Heflin, in the present County of Cleburne, 
 Alabama. Cahulga has been a preaching place from the time 
 of that Quarterly Conference in 1837 till now, 1892. There is a 
 house of worship there now, though dilapidated and neglected. 
 
 In 1844 in Randolph Circuit there was a sweeping religious 
 influence. There were near four hundred converts, and between 
 three and four hundred were added to the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. 
 
 In Township fourteen and Range twenty-six, and in what was 
 once the south-east corner of Macon County, are outlying sandy 
 ridges and gently rising hills and intervening depressions. 
 From out the sides of these ridges and hills issue springs of 
 water, and adown these depressions, in various directions, run 
 limpid streams. At an early day the Rev. James E. Glenn vis- 
 ited that region, and, charmed with the gushing fountains and 
 lucid streams, and reminded by the same of the statement that 
 John baptized in Enon, near to Salim, because there were many 
 springs and rivulets there, he named the place Enon. It was 
 rightly named, and that has been the name thereof. 
 
 Tradition says that in the early Spring-time of 1840, the Rev. 
 
514 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Thompson Glenn, a local preacher, preached a sermon at Enon. 
 That was the first sermon ever delivered at the place. The ser- 
 mon was preached in the woods, under the boughs of the majes- 
 tic trees, for at that time " no temple stood, or altar smoked " in 
 that region. Soon after that first sermon was preached the 
 Kev. John W. Talley, Jr., organized a Society there. Talley was 
 then the preacher in charge of the Clayton Circuit. It is re- 
 ported upon reliable authority that Granville White, William 
 Pitts, John Cleckley, Samuel Harwell, Howell Peebles, Wesley 
 McGehee, W. E. Dubose, Jasper Banks, and Jabez Banks were 
 among the first members at Enon. That Society, organized in 
 the woods where so many beautiful rivulets run among the hills, 
 did not build a temple of worship adorned with " Doric pillars 
 overlaid with golden architrave," and lighted with "starry 
 lamps and blazing cressets, fed with naptha and asphaltus." 
 Granville White had opened a shop, in which he worked as a 
 blacksmith, just a few months previous to the formation of that 
 Society, and that shop was used as a preaching place, and the 
 anvil therein served as a pulpit on which the Bible and Hymn 
 Book, used by the preacher, lay. There was naught to inspire 
 pride, and at the same time, as it was the best which could be 
 done, there was naught repulsive in the surroundings. About 
 the time the Methodists organized at Enon two local preachers, 
 the Kev. Thomas Lancaster and the Kev. Appleton Haygood, 
 took up abode there. In the latter half of 1840 a log School- 
 house was built, which was used for a time as a preaching place 
 by both Methodists and Baptists. In the latter part of 1841 
 the Methodists built for themselves a Church out of logs, in 
 which they worshiped till 1845. The house of worship there 
 now, 1892, was built in 1845. The Kev. John J. Groves, a local 
 preacher, and a teacher, became a citizen of Enon in 1843. He 
 taught in the week and preached on Sunday. He was industri- 
 ous, and pious, and a preacher of good ability. 
 
 In the autumn of 1843 James J. Banks left his habitation at 
 Cullodenville, Georgia, and established his home at Enon, Al- 
 abama. Not a spirit more noble ever came to that place of 
 springs and rivulets. He was truly an acquisition, would have 
 been to any place. He was a lovely character in whom com- 
 bined dignity, grace, composure, and sweetness. He was gift- 
 ed and pious; his conceptions were large, his aims high, his 
 
 JAMES J. BANKS. 
 
 (514) 
 
Further Enlargement and Advayicement of the Work, 515 
 
 deeds generous and noble. To truth and honesty he held te- 
 naciously, ever abhorring that which was false and hollow. No 
 attractions whatever could induce him to deviate from the right 
 line. He accepted the sacred teachings, the divine behest 
 obeyed, and was himself a factor in society. To religion and 
 ecclesiastical affairs he gave constant attention. The welfare 
 of society he apprehended, and he projected and executed in 
 behalf of the same. On taking up his abode at Enon he insti- 
 tuted plans and devised ways for building a new house of wor- 
 ship at that place, one suited to the necessities of a growing and 
 prosperous community; and, as a result, in 1845, a new house 
 was dedicated to divine service. James J. Banks was the 
 friend of the preacher. His own personal supervision he gave 
 to the interests of the preacher's family. He took care that 
 meal and meat, wood and water were not lacking at the preach- 
 er's home. His children have been Methodists, and have been 
 an honor to him. They have supported Methodism by their 
 morals and their means, and Methodism has honored them. 
 
 When organized, the Society at Enon was under the preacher 
 on the Clayton Circuit; for the next three years Enon was one 
 of the appointments in the Glennville Circuit; then for one year 
 it was in the Aberfoil Circuit; for a number of years then there 
 was an Enon Circuit; then Enon and Chunnenuggee were 
 together. 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 The Further Enlargement and Advancement of the 
 Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 BY a Treaty made December 29, 1835, the Cherokee Indians 
 ceded to the United, States the last of their lands east of 
 the Mississippi River. That part of the Territory in Alabama 
 owned by the Cherokees and ceded by the stipulations of that 
 Treaty was embraced within the following lines: The Tennessee 
 River from where the north line of Alabama crossed it down to 
 Chickasaw Island, a line from Chickasaw Island a due south 
 course to the top of the dividing ridge between the waters of 
 the Tennessee and Tombigbee Rivers, thence eastwardly along 
 said ridge leaving the head waters of the Black Warrior to the 
 right hand, to the western Bank of Wills Creek, thence down 
 the said bank of said creek to its junction with the Coosa River, 
 thence a line in a south-east course to the east line of Alabama 
 about one mile above the north line of Township fourteen, thence 
 the east line of Alabama to the north-east corner of the State, 
 thence the north line of the State to the Tennessee River at the 
 beginning point. The Cherokee Indians, like the Creek Tribe, 
 resisted to the last expulsion from the land of their fathers and 
 the place of their nativity. From 1828 there was made persist- 
 ent effort to extinguish the title of the Cherokees to all lands 
 east of the Mississippi River, and there was constant expecta- 
 tion that the consummation so devoutly wished would be reached 
 immediately. For seven long years the Cherokees baffled those 
 who would supplant them and defeated all efforts to dispossess 
 them by negotiations. They opposed all Treaties for ceding 
 their lands, and they were the last of the Indian tribes to leave 
 their long-cherished country. By September, 1838, fourteen 
 thousand and the last of them were on the march for the lands 
 allotted them west of the Mississippi River. The constant ex- 
 pectation of a Treaty of cession and the departure of the last 
 of the tribe to the distant West induced the white people to 
 pour into the country long before the Treaty stipulations and 
 (516) 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 517 
 
 removal were effected, and the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 took steps to preach to the new settlers in that region of Ala- 
 bama at least a year before the Treaty ceding the country was 
 made. 
 
 The Alabama Conference at its session at Greenesborough, 
 Alabama, December, 1834, put in its list of appointments Wills 
 Creek Mission, and assigned to it, for 1835, the Rev. Jesse Ellis. 
 At the close of that first year there were reported on the work 
 one hundred and eighteen white and four colored members. 
 For the next year the appointment was put down as Wills Val- 
 ley Mission, and two preachers, the Rev. Zaccheus Dowling and 
 the Rev. Edward Graves, were sent to it. At the end of that 
 year there were, in connection with the Mission, four hundred 
 and ten white, twenty-four colored, and one hundred and sixty 
 Indian members. No doubt the Indian members were, some of 
 them at least, those who had been brought into the Church dur- 
 ing the Mission work, by the Tennessee Conference, among the 
 Cherokee Indians. The Tennessee Conference had a Missionary 
 to the Cherokees there up to that time. That appointment was 
 continued as Wills Valley until the close of 1846, when it was 
 changed to the name of Lebanon. The preachers on Wills Val- 
 ley were: for 1837, the Rev. John Foust and the Rev. James 
 W. Brown; for 1838, the Rev. John Foust; for 1839, the Rev. 
 Jeremiah Williams, who was a twin brother of the Rev. Uriah 
 Williams; for 1840, the Rev. H. Bailey; for 1841, the Rev. 
 Thomas D. Barr; for 1842, the Rev. William Rhodes; for 1843, 
 the Rev. William Rhodes; for 1844, the Rev. James P. McGebee; 
 for 1845, the Rev. William Rhodes. 
 
 The leading men in the Wills Valley charge in the early years 
 of its existence were: Warwick Bristow, Thomas F. Lamar, 
 Jesse Wellborn, Benjamin Peyton, Nathan Lamar, David Sibert, 
 Samuel B. Watts, Thomas J. Rogers, Jacob Gillespie, William 
 R. Nicholson, L. W. Nicholson, Jeremiah Cox, Israel Cox, An- 
 drew Igou, W. H. Holloman, S. Chasteen, Sampson Clayton, 
 Gilbert Simms, Hezekiah Austin, B. Wright, Joseph Davenport, 
 Richard Roberts, Morris Castell, William Pankey, Samuel D. 
 Warren, George W. Hayes, Jesse Samples, T. K. B. McSpadden, 
 and S. C. Smith. 
 
 The Rev. Warwick Bristow, a local preacher, came to Alaba- 
 ma some time previous to the spring of 1818, and settled in a 
 
^518 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 cove which has since borne his name, Bristow's Cove. In 1834 
 he moved into the bounds of the Cherokee country, and settled 
 in Wills Valley. There he retained his home till he died in 
 1854, giving twenty years of his useful life to that section. 
 While he was more noted for his piety than his talents, he pos- 
 sessed great power as a preacher. He was a great revivalist, 
 so-called, possessing great faith, and giving himself much to 
 prayer. He ever maintained a Christian character. The last 
 week of his earthly pilgrimage he attended a series of religious 
 meetings at one of the Churches of the Circuit. At the last 
 service of the meetings, " in age and feebleness extreme " though 
 he was, he gave to persons present an opportunity to join the 
 Church. He said: "During my ministry of about sixty years I 
 have received many into the Church. I have received the white 
 man, the red man, and the black man. I come once more, my 
 last time before quitting the field, as a recruiting officer, to en- 
 list soldiers under the banner of Him who has established his 
 throne by his cross." More than a dozen persons went forward 
 and united with the Church. He then, standing before the au- 
 dience with trembling limbs and whitened locks, a patriarch on 
 the verge of the grave, and on the verge of heaven, made his 
 farewell talk. He said: "This is the last time I will ever meet 
 you at Church, I have very few more days to live, my work is 
 done, my sufferings are over. I shall go to my home, and I 
 shall die without a pain or a struggle." At the close of his 
 talk nearly every person in the congregation advanced to the 
 altar, shook his hand, and received his benediction. The scene 
 was most affecting. That was on Tuesday. Wednesday he vis- 
 ited a house, talked and prayed with the inmates, some of whom 
 were sick. Thursday he went home. Friday, " without a pain 
 or a struggle," he died. On the occasion of his funeral a ser- 
 mon was preached by Dr. J. C. Stewart, from the Text: "Lord, 
 now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy 
 word: for mine eyes have seen thy salvation." At the Church, 
 near his home where he had held his membership, were his re- 
 mains buried to await the day when Christ shall conduct the 
 armies of the righteous to the land of glory. 
 
 William R. Nicholson, who was born in South Carolina, July 
 10, 1800, moved into the bounds of the Cherokee Nation and 
 settled in Wills Valley, Alabama, as early as 1834, where he re- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 519' 
 
 mained until his death, June 25, 1869. He was a worthy mem- 
 ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church a decade and a half be- 
 fore he immigrated to Alabama, and he was in Wills Valley 
 before the beginning of the organization of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church there among the white population. He had fifteen 
 children born to him, all of whom lived to mature years, and 
 made useful members of the Church and Methodists. Five of 
 the sons entered the ministry, and made efficient preachers. 
 Propagation and ecclesiastical aggressions for the growth of the 
 Church are at agreement. Both conduce to the ends desired. 
 Brother Nicholson was prudent in conversation, just in business 
 transactions, liberal, as liberality was accounted in his section 
 of the Church, in his contributions and public benefactions. 
 He was beneficent to the extent of his ability. He lived a good 
 life. The blessing of God was in his house. He died well. 
 His memory is a benediction. 
 
 In 1834, the Rev. Edmund Pearson, then the Superintendent 
 of the Cherokee Mission under the appointment of the Tennes- 
 see Conference, organized a Society in the house of William R. 
 Nicholson, at the foot of Sand Mountain, in Wills Valley. The 
 mention of this incident leads to the further remark that in the 
 obituary of the Rev. Edmund Pearson published in the General 
 Minutes, there are two or more statements which are incorrect, 
 and which, by suppression, deny some important facts in his life. 
 The statements here alluded to set out that Pearson was for a 
 number of years a member of the Holston Conference, and for 
 three years a presiding elder therein, and that he was for a time 
 a local preacher in Talladega County, Alabama. Whereas, he was 
 never a presiding elder in the Holston Conference, and he was 
 never a local preacher in Talladega County. From the end of 1821 
 to the end of 1825 he was connected with the Mississippi Confer- 
 ence as a traveling preacher. He was for one year, the year 1829, 
 a member of the Holston Conference, From the latter part of 
 1832 to the latter part of 1837 he was a member of the Tennes- 
 see Conference, and for the years 1833 and 1834 he was Superin- 
 tendent of the Cherokee Mission, in the latter year of which he 
 organized that Society in the house of Nicholson. For about 
 four years, or from 1838 to the close of 1841, he was a local 
 preacher in the Wills Valley Circuit, and did more to improve^ 
 and elevate the style of work and the sentiment of the Church. 
 
520 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 in that Circuit than any man in the bounds thereof. As an il- 
 lustration of his apprehension of the things which pertained to 
 the work, and his activity in setting forward the same, it may 
 be stated that at a Quarterly Conference held for Wills Valley 
 Circuit, at Bethel Meeting House, April 13, 1839, of which he 
 was a member as a local preacher, on his motion, and through 
 his good offices in behalf thereof, there was passed a Kesolution 
 that some efficient means be adopted by the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence for the erection of good and comfortable Houses of wor- 
 ship for the various Societies constituting that pastoral charge. 
 At the end of 1841 he was re-admitted iuto the traveling connec- 
 tion in the Alabama Conference, and he was for the next four 
 years presiding elder of the Talladega District, w^ith Wills Valley 
 Circuit as one of the appointments belonging to it. For the three 
 years next succeeding his term on the Talladega District he was 
 appointed presiding elder of the Tuskaloosa District, and he 
 died September 23, 1848, being about fifty years old. 
 
 The Methodist Episcopal Church began among the white 
 population of Wills Valley with the organization of that Society 
 in the house of Nicholson. Some time before 1839 a Meeting 
 House was built, and the place was called Bethel, which means 
 the house of God, and Bethel continues till this day, 1892. 
 The membership at Bethel in its infancy were William K 
 Nicholson and his wife, William Landers and his wife and 
 children, Thomas F. Lamar, Kobert Gains, Thomas Capehart, 
 and their wives, and others whose names are not at hand. 
 More than fifteen men have gone into the ministry from the 
 membership of that Church; among them, Warren D. Nich- 
 olson, Charles D. Nicholson, Evan Nicholson, Eufus Nichol- 
 son, and Priestly E. Nicholson. These five brothers, the sons 
 of William K. and Jane Nicholson, have been itinerant preach- 
 
 ers. 
 
 The preaching places on the Wills Valley Circuit, which were 
 established in the beginning of the work in that section, and at 
 which Churches continued to thrive, were, in addition to Bethel 
 already named, Bristow's, Camden, Sulphur Spring, Salem, Shi- 
 loh. Muddy Pond, Mount Zion, Union Meeting House, and Leb- 
 anon. Eden Camp-ground and Harmony Camp-ground were 
 popular places there in the very beginning. 
 
 Bristow's, in Big Wills Valley, was established in 1835. The 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 521 
 
 Eev. Warwick Bristow and his family, and David Sibert and 
 his family were the leading members there at the first. 
 
 Muddy Pond was near what is now called Brandon's Station, 
 and was organized as early as 1836. Sampson Clayton, Solo- 
 mon Clayton and their wives, Anna Clayton, Samuel D. War- 
 ren, and his family, and Kichard Koberts were members at that 
 
 place. 
 
 Camden was about two miles west of what is now Portersville, 
 
 and in Big Wills Valley. 
 
 Sulphur Spring was near Nathan Lamar's, near Holloman's, 
 and down the Valley about six miles from Valley Head. 
 
 Union Meeting House was in Lookout Valley, above Valley 
 
 Head. 
 
 In that section of country occupied by Wills Valley Circuit 
 the rustic style was marked and prevalent. The crude and the 
 rude prevailed in the architecture, customs, and manners of the 
 people. That there is nothing to do but to save souls was a fas- 
 cinating and popular sentiment in that Circuit, and in that 
 work, as popularly understood, the members of the Church 
 thereabout were earnest, active, and zealous, but liberal enter- 
 prises were not instituted, and generous financial expenditures 
 were not made. The sums contributed for the support of the 
 Christian ministry and Christian agencies were meager, indeed. 
 
The Growth of Methodism throughout Alabama. 523 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 The Growth of Methodism throughout Alabama. 
 
 DURING the period included in the years from 1832 to 
 1845 the Methodists in that part of Alabama included in . 
 the Tennessee Conference were generally zealous in behalf of 
 Christianity under the auspices of the Church to which they be- 
 longed, and during those years there was progress made in 
 most places. During that period there was a gain of about 
 twenty-five hundred members, including white and colored. 
 At Tuscumbia, Florence, and La Grange there was vacillation 
 d urines all the period now under consideration. Tuscumbia, 
 which was put in the list of Stations at the close of 1827, had 
 accessions and depletions, the depletions occurring more fre- 
 quently than the accessions, and finally, at the close of 1840, 
 the place was relegated to the Circuit. Florence did not suc- 
 ceed so well as Tuscumbia. Florence would rally and as quick- 
 ly decline, would attempt to be a Station, and then would fall 
 back into the adjoining Circuit. At the close of 1844 Florence 
 and Tuscumbia together, then trying to sustain a pastoral 
 charge, had one hundred and thirty-three white and one hun- 
 dred and five colored members. At that same time La Grange 
 had sixty-three white members, and having tried to be a Station 
 one year, dropped back into a Circuit which offered aid and 
 comfort. Decatur was first made a Station in October, 1841, 
 with the Piev. Joshua Boucher as the preacher, and at the close 
 of the first year there were reported sixty white r.nd seven col- 
 ored members belonging thereto. The Church there advanced 
 and retrograded by turns, and was only uniform in being feeble, 
 but never went back into a Circuit until after the war between 
 the States, and then only for a year or two. 
 
 The Rev. Joshua Boucher, the Rev. Thomas Madden, the Rev. 
 Ambrose F. Driskill, the Rev. Justinian Williams, the Rev. 
 Dawson Phelps, the Rev. R. L. Andrews, the Rev. Elias Tidwell, 
 the Rev. Frederick G. Ferguson, the Rev. Pleasant B. Robin- 
 Bon, the Rev. A. T. Scruggs, the Rev. J. M. Holland, and the Rev. 
 (522) • 
 
 Gilbert D. Taylor were among the principal preachers who dis- 
 pensed the gospel and administered ecclesiastical affairs in that 
 part of the State included in the Tennessee Conference during 
 the period now under review. The Rev. James McFerrin, the 
 Rev. William M. McFerrin, and the Rev. John B. McFerrin had 
 each his last appointment in Alabama during that period. 
 
 The Rev. John B. McFerrin, who attained to great eminence, 
 and whose life has been written, and who was licensed to preach 
 in Alabama, and whose first Circuits were in Alabama, did his 
 last work in Alabama, in the capacity of presiding elder of the 
 Florence District, and in the year 1837. He was a man of great 
 personal power. He was rough and rugged, sturdy and strong, 
 strategic and stable. He was an honor to the State where he 
 commenced preaching, and to the Church of which he was so 
 long a member. He was long an Editor of a Church organ, and 
 at the head of the Missionary Society of his Church, and in 
 charge of the Publishing House under the auspices of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, South. His preaching was plain, 
 simple, direct, and attended by divine power. He died at his 
 home near Nashville, Tennessee, May 10, 1887, lacking only one 
 short month and five days of being eighty years old. A great 
 concourse attended his funeral, which was conducted with the 
 simplicity so congenial to him. 
 
 The year 1833 closed the ministry in Alabama of the Rev. 
 William M. McFerrin. He was recommended to the District 
 Conference as a suitable person to obtain license to preach and 
 also to be recommended to the Annual Conference as a suitable 
 person for the itinerancy by the Quarterly Conference held for 
 Franklin Circuit, at Spring Creek Camp-ground, October 25, 
 1828. There were twenty-six members present in that Quarter- 
 ly Conference. William M. McFerrin was himself a member of 
 that Quarterly Conference, being at the time a class leader. 
 His father, the Rev. James McFerrin, was the preacher in 
 charge of the Circuit, and the Rev. William McMahon was the 
 presiding elder. The District Conference which was held a 
 short while after the Quarterly Conference making the recom- 
 mendations licensed him to preach, and recommended him to 
 the Annual Conference, and at the session of the Tennessee Con- 
 ference which convened at Murf reesborough, December 4, 1828, 
 he was admitted on trial in the Conference. He had not yet 
 34 
 
 Hi 
 
 I 
 
524 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 reached his majority. After long and laborious service, in va- 
 rious places and in different positions, sometimes on Circuits, 
 sometimes on Missions, sometimes on Districts, in Alabama and 
 Tennessee, he, at last, on September 29, 1886, fell to rest and 
 went to his last reward. He was a model man. Useful and 
 happy to the last. He was hardly twenty-five years old when 
 he did his last work in Alabama. 
 
 The Kev. James McFerrin, who was in all that makes a man, 
 a Christian, and a preacher, the equal of his sons, commenced 
 his itinerant ministry in Alabama, where he was living, in the 
 end of 1823, and closed his ministerial work in the State in the 
 capacity of presiding elder in the end of 1833. His last appoint- 
 ment as an itinerant was the Wesley Circuit in West Tennessee. 
 He was a local preacher at ihe time of his death. He died 
 September 4, 1840. He did great work in Alabama in revivals 
 and in accessions to the Church. He had the martial fire and 
 
 the military spirit. 
 
 The Eev. Gilbert D. Taylor, a man of good literary attain- 
 ments, and of high rank, and of deep piety, did valuable work 
 in Alabama. He was Missionary to the people of color, and 
 presiding elder on Districts. On August 6, 1870, in his seventy- 
 ninth year, from his residence in Pulaski, Tennessee, he took his 
 exit to the Better Land. 
 
 The Rev. Justinian Williams entered the itinerant ministry 
 in the Missouri Conference, but closed his life and his work in 
 the Tennessee Conference. He did efficient work in Alabama; 
 one year on Franklin Circuit, two years at Tuscumbia and Flor- 
 ence, and one year at Decatur. He was a man of great energy, 
 and a preacher of fine ability. He maintained mercy, justice, 
 and humility. He died in February, 1859, having passed his 
 three score and ten. On his death bed he sang lines which 
 were suggested by anticipations of home and treasure in the city 
 
 of the skies. 
 
 The Rev. Joshua Boucher was licensed to preach in Madison 
 County, Alabama, as early as 1811, and more than twenty years 
 of his ministry were given to that part of Alabama watered by 
 the streams flowing into the Tennessee River. Than he a more 
 indefatigable and impressive worker was never in that part of 
 the State. He was appointed to Circuits, Stations, and Dis- 
 tricts, and he preached to vast audiences all through that sec- 
 
 » 
 
 f 
 
 The Growth of Methodism throughout Alabama, 525 
 
 tion. While he was not acquainted with the subtilties of the 
 schools, nor deep-versed in belles-lettres, he was an original 
 thinker and an animated and entertaining speaker. When he 
 was an infant his father was killed by Indians, and he was 
 brought up under the disabilities of orphanage. He was a na- 
 tive of Virginia, but grew to manhood in Kentucky. He was a 
 pious man and a diligent preacher. He was generous and harm- 
 less. Just there was his weakness. His generous and inoffen- 
 sive nature so dominated him that his administration was not as 
 vigorous as it should have been, as was especially disclosed in 
 his household. His children were not worthy to be numbered 
 with the honorable. No doubt the characteristic qualities trans- 
 mitted by descent instigated the untoward course which fixed 
 an unenviable reputation, but an inefficient home government 
 had much to do in the matter. He was presiding elder of the 
 Huntsville District at the time of his death. He died at Ath- 
 ens, Alabama, August 23, 1845. His end was peace and assur- 
 ance. His body was deposited in the cemetery at Athens. 
 
 There were laymen, including local preachers, in that period 
 who maintained good works for necessary uses, and were fruit- 
 ful in the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ, who were then 
 worthy of salutation, and are now worthy of mention ; and there 
 were events which marked progress, and may not be left out of 
 history. 
 
 The Rev. John M. Cherry, a man of meekness, integrity, and 
 piety, was a local preacher in Limestone County for twenty 
 years. He died in that County in 1839. During those years 
 he preached, as opportunity offered, at the various Societies in 
 the County, and he was a great help at the Camp-meetings. He 
 preached often to the Negroes, and he had many fast friends 
 among them. He sang sweetly, prayed eloquently, and preached 
 efficiently. He was without reproach. After he was gone to 
 his home in the great beyond, his children shared the sympathy 
 and received the benevolence of those who knew him, and, no 
 doubt, for his sake as much as for their own. His sons became 
 ministers of the gospel. Two, the Rev. W. D. Cherry and the 
 Rev. S. M. Cherry, who have wrought well in the itinerant min- 
 istry, are here named. 
 
 In 1818, the Rev. John Moore, a native of North Carolina, 
 then about sixty years old, moved to Limestone County, Alaba- 
 
Ill 
 
 526 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Growth of Methodism throughout Alabama. 527 
 
 ma, where he lived thirty-four years, dying April 28, 1852. He 
 was for seventy-eight years a Methodist and for sixty-eight a 
 Methodist preacher. He was ordained to the offices of the min- 
 istry by Bishop Asbury. He was a holy man and a useful 
 preacher and admirable in all the relations of life. He was lib- 
 eral and hospitable. His home gave shelter and entertainment 
 to weary itinerant preachers. In his will he gave Fifty dollars 
 to Foreign Missions, Fifty to the American Bible Society, and 
 Nine hundred to the Preachers' Belief Fund of the Tennessee 
 
 Conference. 
 
 Previous to 1836 the Methodists of the town of Athens, in 
 Limestone County, worshiped in the School-house of the town 
 and in the basement room connected with the Masonic Hall. 
 That year the Eev. Joshua Boucher being presiding elder and 
 the Eev. F. G. Ferguson preacher in charge of the Station, a 
 house of worship was built for the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 The Trustees named in the Deed to the Lot on which the Church 
 was erected were: Samuel Dewoody, J. W. Lane, Daniel Cole- 
 man, Thomas C. Malone, and W. Keyes. That house is still in 
 
 use. 
 
 Honorable Daniel Coleman, one of the Trustees named in 
 that Deed, moved to Limestone County, Alabama, in 1819, and 
 upward of thirty-five years afterward died at Athens. He was 
 made Judge of the County Court by the Legislature of Alaba- 
 ma when he was only nineteen years old, and was finally ap- 
 pointed Judge of the Supreme Court of the State. He espoused 
 the cause of Christianity, and was ardently attached to the doc- 
 trines and usages of Methodism. He admired and enjoyed the 
 lovefeasts and class-meetings, and was a superior Sunday- 
 school teacher. He filled efficiently the office of President of 
 the Trustees of the Female Institute of the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence at Athens, Alabama, from the founding of that School till 
 his death, a period of nearly fifteen years. He was tall and 
 slender in person, and in complexion fair. He was grave, even 
 when a boy, in bearing he was austere. He was a man of parts, 
 position, and piety, and his influence was wide and wholesome. 
 He was a factor in the Church as well as in the country. His 
 life and labors gave character to the Church of his choice. Jus- 
 tice and piety were well defined in his character. Dr. K. H. 
 Kivers, who knew him well, says: "One of the most affecting 
 
 scenes I ever witnessed was when his slaves came in from the 
 plantation to bid him farewell before he should go hence. He 
 made them a loving, tender talk, and bid them his last farewell. 
 In a few days he was gone to his eternal reward." A letter 
 w^ritten with his own hand in prospect of immediate death, a 
 last testament to his loved ones, is given here, copied from the 
 
 document itself: 
 
 ** Athens, August 8, 1856. 
 
 *'My Dear Wife and Children: I am about to die, and it will 
 
 probably be a long time before I will see you , all again. I 
 
 want to tell you how very much I love you, and how much I 
 
 shall desire to meet you again. I trust to meet you in 
 
 Heaven. You must try and practice all I have told you about 
 
 being good and pious, truthful and loving. The children 
 
 must be obedient to their Mother, and loving and kind to their 
 
 brothers and sisters, kind to the servants, and just to 
 
 everybody. Give your hearts to Jesus, and pray to him to 
 
 help you to live, as I have told you, and we will meet in 
 
 Heaven, where parting will be no more. I expect my older 
 
 children, by their example and instruction, to endeavor to train 
 
 the younger children to become what I trust by God's help I 
 
 have endeavored to make them. Early in life I adopted the 
 
 maxim: *Be just, and fear not,' bat I could not live up to the 
 
 maxim without the aid of the religion of Jesus. I rely alone 
 
 on the atonement made by the Saviour. 'For I know that my 
 
 Eedeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon 
 
 the earth, and though after my skin, worms destroy this body, 
 
 yet in my flesh shall I see God.' My heart is very full, and I 
 
 have much more to say to you, but my strength fails, and I 
 
 must close. May Almighty God bless you, and save you, and 
 
 bring us all, without the loss of one, to meet in Heaven, is my 
 
 prayer." 
 
 Mrs. Elizabeth Peterson Coleman, the wife of Judge Daniel 
 Coleman, was born in North Carolina, May 22, 1811, was mar- 
 ried to Judge Coleman when she was sixteen, in the blush of 
 her youth and in the bloom of her beauty, and died at Athens, 
 Alabama, February 15, 1885. Some time before 1835 she joined 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, and for more than a half 
 century she adhered to her Church and religion, and contributed 
 her measure of service to the great cause. She was a brilliant 
 
528 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 woman, stood in the high ranks of society, and maintained her 
 position in the house of her honored husband with propriety 
 and satisfaction. 
 
 The children of these noble parents have maintained a good 
 position, a number of them are religious, and one of the sous 
 has long been an active and pious minister of the gospel in con- 
 nection with Methodism. The Kev. James L. Coleman gradu- 
 ated at La Grange College, and has honored his natural ances- 
 try and his Alma Mater. 
 
 Thomas C. Malone, George Malone, Stith Malone, and John 
 N. Malone were all closely related by blood, and were all promi- 
 nent and useful Methodists in Limestone County during the 
 period now under notice. Thomas C. Malone, mentioned as 
 one of the Trustees of the house of worship at Athens, was the 
 father of Stith Malone, and George Malone was the father of 
 John N. Malone. Stith Malone was an M.D., and eminent in 
 his profession. Honorable John N. Malone filled many pub- 
 lic Stations in the State of Alabama with credit to himself 
 and profit to the public. These men all did much for Meth- 
 odism. 
 
 The Eev. Simpson Shepherd was a local preacher living at 
 Athens, a part of the time at least, during the period from 1835 
 to 1845. He was a power in the land. Being a man of com- 
 manding presence, of fine native talents, and superior literary 
 attainments, there were few who surpassed him. He was born 
 and brought up in the Emerald Isle, and was both witty and 
 eloquent. Though only a local preacher, except for two years, 
 he preached extensively through the country. He also deliv- 
 ered lectures on various subjects. He delivered addresses on 
 Temperance and Literary themes. He had two excellent daugh- 
 ters, Martha and Mary, who were intelligent, and were devoted 
 Methodists; and, assisted by these two daughters, he taught a 
 Female School at Athens, prior to the founding of the Insti- 
 tute of the Tennessee Conference at that place. He left Athens 
 and, with his daughters, went to Louisiana. He died suddenly 
 about 1850. He made a brief journey of about forty miles on 
 horseback to visit one of his daughters, and on reaching her 
 premises he dismounted and proceeded to the residence, but 
 died before he reached the door. 
 
 Samuel Dewoody, one of the Trustees of the Church, was 
 
 The Growth of Methodism throughout Alabama. 529* 
 
 sound in doctrine, and always zealous in life, and earnest in an 
 effort at saving others. 
 
 William Eichardson, an attorney of distinction, a man of 
 rigid morals, was a Methodist at Athens, and served his gen- 
 eration with great fidelity and usefulness. 
 
 Thomas Bass was there in that day, than whom there was not 
 a better man anywhere. He was loved by all who knew him. 
 
 Dr. Jonathan McDonald, a successful physician and farmer, 
 who amassed a large fortune for his time, was a Methodist who 
 contributed liberally to the support of the Church and her 
 institutions. 
 
 Ira Ellis Hobbs, a native of Virginia, and named for a no- 
 ted Methodist preacher of his father's day, was a model Chris- 
 tian and class leader. He gave his time, labor, and means to 
 the Church and the support of her enterprises. 
 
 Dr. B. W. Maclin, the son of Thomas Maclin, a native of 
 Virginia, was for about half a century one of the pillars of 
 the Church at Athens, and made larger contributions to the 
 institutions of the Church thereabout than, perhaps, any one 
 else. 
 
 Of women at Athens in that day who attained the redemp- 
 tion that is in Christ Jesus, and sustained the righteousness 
 which is by the law of faith, may be mentioned Mrs. Polly 
 Malone and her daughters, Mrs. McDonald and Mrs. Eeese. 
 They were holy women and trusted in God. They did much 
 to keep the fires burning on the altars of the Church. In in- 
 structing and assisting penitents in the great struggle for jus- 
 tification they were not a whit behind the foremost. They were 
 active, not only in the works of piety, but in benevolence and 
 sympathy. They ministered to the poor, the sick, and the 
 griefful. Their works praise them. 
 
 Mrs. Kebecca Hobbs, a native of Virginia, daughter of Thomas 
 Maclin, wife of Ira Ellis Hobbs, and a Methodist, lived more 
 than half a century in Limestone County, Alabama, being at 
 least fourscore years old at the time of her death. She was 
 one of the active agents and liberal contributors in erecting 
 the house of worship for the Methodists at Athens in 1836. 
 She was distinguished among the refined, intelligent, and noble 
 citizens of the lovely town of Athens. She was richly endowed 
 and was cultured, refined, and elegant. She was chaste and 
 
 .!' 
 
5'60 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 holy, and walked the flowery paths of peace. She pursued 
 
 that course which guarantees purer joys than sordid elements 
 
 can give. She was a woman of deeds and piety, and did not 
 
 seek distinction in dress and drollery. She adorned herself in 
 
 modest apparel, tasty, neat, and nice. Her constant language 
 
 was: 
 
 ** Jesus, thy blood and righteousness 
 My beauty are, my glorious dress: 
 'Midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed, 
 With joy shall I lift up my head." 
 
 She was educated, and she devoted her energies to teach- 
 ing. She taught at Athens many years before the Institute of 
 the Tennessee Conference was established at that place, and 
 afterward she taught in that School. She taught the poor for 
 nothing, and devoted much of her earnings to Church inter- 
 ests. 
 
 In the year 1844 there was in the town of Athens a work of 
 grace in which there were marvelous effects and wonderful re- 
 sults. The Rev. Ethelbert H. Hatcher, then in the twenty-sev- 
 enth year of his age, a man of extraordinary endowments, and of 
 liberal culture, and of exemplary life, a Poet and an Orator, was 
 in charge of the Church at Athens, and the Eev. R. H. Rivers 
 and the Rev. R G. Ferguson, men of gifts and grace, were con- 
 nected with the Female Institute of the Tennessee Conference 
 at that place. These preachers, with the Rev. W. D. F. Sawrie, 
 then Agent of the La Grange College, did the preaching on that 
 grand occasion. That special manifestation of saving power 
 commenced in the Female Institute. The first day there was a 
 Pentecostal day on which more than a dozen girls professed the 
 attainment of saving grace, and before the work culminated in 
 the community at least one hundred persons made the same pro- 
 fession. The anointings of the Holy Ghost were upon the peo- 
 ple. One man fifty years old, Robert C. David, was regenerated, 
 and one little girl, Sallie B. Richardson, was renewed by grace 
 divine. On one day more than half a hundred received baptism, 
 and a larger number formally assumed membership in the 
 Church. Old feuds were settled, enmities were reconciled, and 
 neighbors long estranged cherished each the other with affec- 
 tion. The children of God were filled with ecstasies, raptures 
 akin to the bliss of angels. The man regenerated at fiity years 
 
 The Growth of Methodism throughout Alabama. 531 
 
 of age and the child renewed at eight lived upright and beau- 
 tiful lives till they were transported to the paradise of God. 
 
 During the period now under consideration James K. March, 
 William S. Kittrell, Samuel T. Crenshaw, and John Fraser were 
 official members in tlie Athens Station, and were men of note 
 and worth. John Fraser was not a whit behind the foremost of 
 his brethren. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 The Further Enlargement and Advancement of the 
 Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THE Town of Marion, in Perry County, never appeared in 
 name in the list of appointments until the close of 1832, 
 at which time Greenesborough and Marion were named togeth- 
 er, and the Rev. Robert L. Kennon appointed thereto. For the 
 next year Marion and Selma were named together as an appoint- 
 ment, apparently merely nominal, and the Rev. T. S. Abernathy, 
 a supernumerary, put in charge. At the end of that year Mar- 
 ion and Selma disappeared, both places falling back into adja- 
 cent Circuits bearing other names. Not till the close of 1838 
 did Marion again appear; then it was named in the list of ap- 
 pointments, being the name of the Circuit to which it belonged, 
 and the Rev. James M. Boatwright and the Rev. Norman Mc- 
 Leod were appointed to serve the same for the year 1839. It 
 was the Marion Circuit again for 1840, with the Rev. Walter H. 
 McDaniel preacher in charge. At the end of that year Marion 
 was taken out of the Circuit and made a Station, and the Rev. 
 Moses Morris was appointed to superintend its interests. At 
 the end of its first year as an independent Station its entire 
 membership numbered thirty-seven white persons. The preach- 
 er who had served it for the year located at that time. That 
 was a small membership and a feeble Station. For 1842 it was 
 served by the Rev. Wiley W. Thomas, and the membership in- 
 creased to eighty-nine white and thirteen colored persons. The 
 preachers for Marion in the succeeding years were: 1843, the 
 Rev. William Moores; for 1844, the Rev. Jesse P. Parham; 1845, 
 1846, the Rev. Thomas H. P. Scales. At the close of 1845 there 
 were in that Station one hundred and fifteen white and seventy- 
 two colored members. 
 
 The Methodists built a house of worship there in connection 
 
 with the Hall of the Masonic Lodge. That house served them 
 
 for many long years. Elisha F. King, one of the old citizens of 
 
 Perry County, and a wealthy farmer four or five miles south of 
 
 (532) 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 533 
 
 Marion, was a Methodist at the town of Marion, bat it is not 
 now known how early he was a member there. 
 
 John Patrick gave up his native land, and emigrated to the 
 United States of North America, and about the last part of 1836, 
 or the very first of 1837, took up abode at Marion, Perry Coun- 
 ty, Alabama, where he resided for thirty years, and where he 
 died the first part of 1867. He was born in 1809, or the very 
 first part of 1810, at a place which had been the home of his an- 
 cestors for seven generations, five miles from Londonderry, in 
 the County of Tyrone, Ireland. For generations his ancestors 
 were Presbyterians, and he was trained in the faith of his fa- 
 thers, but, in his native land he formed the acquaintance of the 
 Methodists, attended their meetings, and attached himself to a 
 Methodist Society. Through a period of thirty years at his 
 adopted home he was a steadfast member of his adopted Church, 
 much of the time a steward, class leader, and Sunday-school su- 
 perintendent therein, and to all intents and purposes a pillar 
 thereof through all these years. He was inestimable. He was 
 rather under medium size, and of feeble body, with florid com- 
 plexion, blue eyes, brown hair and whiskers, and good Irish 
 features. He was a saddler by trade, possessed good means, 
 and never married. His life was without blemish and his char- 
 acter without spot. Though at times but few stood with him 
 and Zion languished, he never failed in the distinct utterance of 
 his faith and the regular perforraance of his Christian work. 
 He wrought well, and everywhere made a good impression. 
 The good loved him, the scoffers, who walked after their own 
 lusts, respected him, the poor, the widow, and the orphan shared 
 and rejoiced in his benefaction, and mourned his loss when 
 dead. His good name and his good deeds live after him. 
 
 At Mount Zion, eight miles from Marion, a place mentioned in 
 a former chapter, there was, in 1837, an extraordinary meeting of 
 twelve days' continuance under the oversight of the Rev. Wil- 
 liam B. Neal and the Rev. Richard M. Crowson, assisted by the 
 Rev. Edward H. Moore. It was an occasion of great joy to the 
 members of the Church, and there were about one hundred and 
 fifty professed to be justified, and nearly as many were received 
 into the Methodist Episcopal Church under the system of pro- 
 bation. At the close of the sermon at the last service of the 
 occasion, a prominent citizen by the name of Boyd, who had 
 
h 
 
 534 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Worh 535 
 
 been attending regularly through all the meeting, but who had 
 given no other sign of special interest, upon an invitation to 
 join the Church being given, arose from his seat, and fell to the 
 floor, and was instantly transformed in nature, and adopted 
 into the divine family. He arose in his ecstasy, and joined the 
 Church as a probationer. All through his after life he was an 
 active member, and a pious Christian. He died in the faith, and 
 went to the land of glory. 
 
 August 15, 1831, George Phillips, William K. King, and Ca- 
 leb Tate, Agents and Commissioners of the Selma Town Com- 
 pany, conveyed to the town Council of Selma, a Lot of land in 
 Selma, "for the promotion of Christianity," "to have and to 
 hold the said Lot of land to the said Town Council of Selma, 
 their assigns and successors forever, and for the uses and trusts 
 following: that is to say, for the erection of a Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, to be under the government, management, and 
 control of the Methodist denomination of Christians, and such 
 rules and regulations as the Methodist or the Church to be es- 
 tablished may prescribe; and it is understood that the same is 
 to remain a Church Lot for the uses aforesaid forever." 
 
 From that document it would appear that by the foresight of 
 a Town Company, organized for trade and trajBfic in lands, pro- 
 vision was made for the introduction and perpetuation of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church in the town of Selma, Alabama. 
 At the time that Deed was made there were no Methodists at 
 Selma to constitute a Board of Trustees, and the Lot was deeded 
 to the Town Council, and it was held for the use of the Metho- 
 dists by said Council until March, 1878, when the City conveyed 
 it to a Board of Trustees, named in the conveyance, as a place 
 of worship for the use of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South. That last Deed was made at the instance of Chancellor 
 John, himself a Methodist, to remove all question as to the per- 
 fection of title. 
 
 The town of Selma did not grow rapidly. Twenty years after 
 it was incorporated it had only four hundred and thirty-one 
 white population and six hundred and twenty-two Negroes. 
 Jockey Clubs were better supported than Churches, and more 
 appreciated than religion. Many years elapsed before the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church was recognized at the place. It is 
 probable that different Methodist preachers had occasional ap- 
 
 pointments there before any Society was organized at the place. 
 In 1827 the Eev. Joseph Walker, a local preacher, and an inno- 
 vator of extreme temper, had at least one appointment to preach 
 at Selma. For 1834 the Rev. T. S. Abenathy, a supernumerary 
 preacher, was appointed to Marion and Selma, an appointment 
 merely nominal, and at which nothing was accomplished. The 
 appointment was discontinued at the end of the year. It is said, 
 but it is by no means certain, that in the first part of 1835 J. L. 
 Claughton erected a wooden building on the lot given by the 
 Town Company already recited, and that in the next year, 1836, 
 the Eev. Daniel H. Norwood organized a Society in that build- 
 ing, and that Norwood preached there regularly until the An- 
 nuli'l Conference put a preacher in charge of the affairs of the 
 Society. It is clearly indicated that the first Methodist Society . 
 at the town of Selma was organized in 1837. The first Society 
 consisted of eleven members, among whom are recollected the 
 following: J. L. Claughton, Mrs. Sarah Maples, Josiah Hinds 
 and wife, James Adams and wife, Mrs. Nolly, and Miss Eliza 
 Nolly. For 1838 Selma and Valley Creek were made an ap- 
 pointment, and the Rev. AVilliam A. Smith put in charge of it. 
 For 1839 the appointment was continued, and the Rev. Asbury 
 H. Shanks served it. During that year William J. Norris, and 
 his brother, James A. Norris, and Thomas W. Street, and others, 
 were added to the Society at Selma. It is said that for many 
 years William J. and James A. Norris constituted about the 
 strength of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Selma. The 
 Sunday-school of the Methodist Episcopal Church was organ- 
 ized in Selma in 1837. Selma was made a Station at the be- 
 ginning of 1840, and at the end of that year the Annual Con- 
 ference was held there, and after all that, there were only fifty- 
 five white and sixty-seven colored members at the place. In a 
 sort of heroic effort, the place was continued as a Station for 
 1841, and at the end of the year there had been a decline of 
 ten white and fifty colored members. Then the place was rele- 
 gated to a Circuit, where it remained for three years, and was then 
 again set off as a Station, though it was left to be supplied, be- 
 cause the pay had to be supplemented. At the end of 1845, 
 after supplying and supplementing, there were forty white and 
 one hundred colored members. Through the years here enu- 
 merated such men as the Rev. William Moores, the Rev. Wiley 
 
536 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 W. Thomas, the Rev. AVilliara W. Bell, and the Rev. James 
 Young dispensed the gospel to that people. For many years 
 the Brothers Norris, above mentioned, bore tha financial bur- 
 den of the Church at Selma. There was a struggle there 
 against general feebleness, against fluctuations, backslidings, and 
 apostasies. In 1845, on account of the feeble state of atfairs, 
 the presiding elder of the District in which the charge was sit- 
 uated, the Rev. Greenberry Garrett, supplied the Selma Station. 
 
 While the progress of Methodism at some points in Dallas 
 County, Alabama, was not as rapid as could have been desired, 
 yet the adherents thereof wrought in all parts of the County, 
 and the Societies organized therein at an early date, under the 
 commendable efforts of the members constituting them, attained 
 a measure of success; and other Societies were organized in the 
 County as time went on, and the several Societies built for 
 themselves houses of worship suited to their circumstances and 
 necessities. 
 
 Some of the work which was done during the period now un- 
 der review, the particular locality of the several Societies, and 
 who were some of the leading Methodists in different sections 
 of the County may be learned from the statements herein im- 
 mediately following. 
 
 August 4, 1835, James Brown made a Deed to a Lot, four 
 miles west of Selma, in Section thirty-two, Township seventeen, 
 Range ten, on which to erect a house of worship for the use 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The Trustees named in 
 that Deed were John Merideth, Malachi Scarborough, Noah 
 Williams, Andrew Yost, and James Russum. 
 
 Edward Murphy, on December 7, 1836, made a Deed to a Lot 
 for the Church known as County Line Church, four miles north 
 of Yalley Creek, in Section two. Township eighteen. Range ten 
 The Trustees named were Isaac Rich, David Cumming, An- 
 drew Wood, and James McGaugh. 
 
 September 16, 1839, William P. Molett made a Deed to a 
 Lot at the town of Warrenton, for the use and benefit of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. The Trustees were Abner M. 
 Coleman, Abner T. Howell, Samuel Mays, Edward Dudley, and 
 A. C. Ramsey. 
 
 November 1, 1842, Thomas B. Goldsby, for the use and bene- 
 fit of the Methodist Episcopal Church, made a Deed to a Lot, 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 537 
 
 three or four miles west of what is now known as Marion 
 Junction, in Section seventeen. Township seventeen. Range 
 eight. The Trustees were Richard Spencer, William B. Mc- 
 Henry, Elijah J. Boothe, William M. Boothe, William Smith, 
 George AV. Thach, and Thomas E. B. Pigues. 
 
 October 23, 1844, a contract was made to build Yalley Creek 
 Church. Thomas B. Goldsby, John Paulling, George A. B. 
 W^alker, A. H. Mitchell, and Greenberry Garrett, were the 
 members of the Building Committee. The last member here 
 named did most of the w^ork of the Committee. The builders 
 were Samuel H. Wallace and Amos White. The house was to 
 be sixty-one feet and four inches in length, and forty-one feet 
 in width, and was to cost thirty-five hundred dollars, and it was 
 built according to contract. The Deed thereto was made July 
 10, 1845, and the Trustees were George Childers, Noel Pitts, 
 John Paulling; and David Mims. The house was dedicated to 
 divine service, Sunday, October 5, 1845, in connection with a 
 Quarterly Conference occasion. Yalley Creek is Summerfield. 
 
 Dallas and Wilcox Counties join, and as has been related in 
 another place, the Cedar Creek Circuit took in, back in the 
 time now under consideration, a part of both Counties, as well 
 as a part of other Counties. In 1834, two houses of worship, 
 which may be mentioned here, were built, in Wilcox County, 
 which were in use a great many years. One was in Black's 
 Bend, near Black's Bluff, and called Tait's Chapel. The other 
 was six miles north-east from Camden, and called Society Hill. 
 
 Before Tait's Chapel was built the Methodists held their serv- 
 ices and had their preaching in the residence of a Mr. McPher- 
 son near where the Chapel was erected. The year Tait's Chapel 
 was built there was a Camp-meeting held there which was at- 
 tended with w^onderf ul manifestations and great results. There 
 were forty-five added to the Church. 'Among those justified 
 at that meeting were Theophilus Williams and his charm- 
 ing wife. They were the very salt of the earth, and through 
 many years they were the pillars of the Church where they lived 
 in Monroe County. The Rev. Richard Pipkin did his last 
 preaching at that Camp-meeting. From thence he returned 
 home, sickened and died, and was buried at Oak Hill, near Al- 
 lenton. James Tait, Walter Ross, A. K. Smith, Abram God- 
 bold, Reuben Muldrow, Josiah Garlington, Peter McArthur, 
 
538 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 John P. Davis, Henry Spencer, the wives of these men, Mrs. 
 Ann McCants, and others, were members at Tait's Chapel in 
 that time. A noble band they were, fit " to hold communion 
 with the heavens above," 
 
 The Society at Society Hill was organized through the influ- 
 ence of the Kev. James Thompson, who established himself a 
 home in that neighborhood, and the house of worship there 
 was built, in great part, by his labor, and the interests of that 
 Church were fostered with watchful care and unremitting toil 
 by him through the remaining years of his life. The McNiels 
 and the Campbells were also strong members at that place, and 
 did much in support of the good cause. 
 
 The Kev. James Thompson was never an itinerant preacher, 
 but he preached through a wide region of country round about 
 from Society Hill, reaching out in Butler, Conecuh, Clarke, Dal- 
 las, Lowndes, Monroe, and Wilcox Counties, and within the 
 ample range of his ministry he exerted a commanding influence. 
 He was sedate and dignified, a righteous man and an honest 
 seer. He exercised good judgment in the selection of subjects 
 for the pulpit, and he succeeded in admirable degree in the 
 preparation and delivery of sermons. Unction, pathos, and 
 mellow voice were his, and he put his thoughts in logical form, 
 and his audiences were often entranced, melted to tears, and 
 moved to action. He was solid in character and sound in doc- 
 trine. Philosophical investigations were, perhaps, good enough 
 for those inclined to them, but he took the Scriptures as of di- 
 vine origin, and the truth of God, which he accepted upon sim- 
 ple faith, illumined all about him, and gave him immunity from 
 the uncertain and the visionary. That the Holy Ghost im- 
 plants in the human heart a virtuous impulse, and imparts life 
 to dead faculties, and that faith is the power which overcomes the 
 evil one he accepted As wholesome and comforting doctrines. 
 Pantheistic dogmas, and extramundane deities he scouted as 
 unworthy of confidence. He believed in a God separate from 
 all things, and yet omnipresent, and ever present with his saints. 
 To him Christ was not merely an ideal man in whom pure mo- 
 rality was realized, but he was the Lord and Euler of all things, 
 and the administrator of grace, a real Saviour, entitled to confi- 
 dence, honor, and worship. With him religion was sine qua non. 
 He never gave credence to the heretical idea that he needed re- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 539 
 
 ligion only for a time, and then only as a bolster, and that he 
 would eventually outgrow it, rise above it, and be independent 
 of it. He regarded the Sabbath with strictest observance, and 
 kept up an altar of prayer in his house. 
 
 He was twice married. His first wife, the mother of all his 
 children, six in number, and a good woman and true, died in 
 1835, and was buried at Society Hill. In 1836 he married a 
 Mrs. Mason, one of the best women who ever lived anywhere, in 
 any age. She was not a strong-minded woman, she was not en- 
 dowed with the talents of statesmanship, or the gifts of oratory. 
 She was not thorough in the classics of antiquity, she knew, 
 perhaps, nothing of the hexameters of Homer and Virgil, but 
 she had the power of a steady purpose, and the inspiration of 
 Christian obligation and integrity. She was neat, and lady- 
 like, perfectly free from all arrogance, overweening, and over- 
 bearing. She was gentle, meek, and kind. She had fair com- 
 plexion, and blue eyes, and her face beamed with kindness and 
 sweetness. She sought neither fame nor wealth, and in the 
 generous impulses of her nature she dispensed hospitality and 
 charity in no mean degree. She confided in God with the sim- 
 plicity of a little child, and if she was not perfectly innocent it 
 was because it is impossible so to be in this present state. She 
 outlived her husband a number of years. The Kev. James 
 Thompson and most of his children rest in the grave-yard at 
 Society Hill. Dr. Benjamin D. Thompson, one of the sons, was 
 a strong pillar of the Church in his day. Miss Margaret Jane 
 Thompson, one of the daughters, joined the Church at Society- 
 Hill in 1837, was married to the Kev. Alexander McBride, a 
 member of the Alabama Conference, August 20, 1846, and died 
 in Autauga County, Alabama, March 31, 1848, and she was in- 
 terred at her request at Society Hill, beside her mother. All 
 the daughters died in young womanhood, and, all joining the 
 Church when girls, were model Christians. 
 
 The Kev. Frederic P. Norsworthy, a man of rare gifts, com- 
 manding powers, and noted personality, touched the Church in 
 a prominent manner in the Cedar Creek Circuit. He attained 
 a place among the itinerant preachers of the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church in January, 1826. By some channel not now known 
 he had attained deacon's orders prior to his entering the itiner- 
 ant work. He was admitted to the South Carolina Conference 
 35 ' 
 
540 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 and ordained elder in that Conference, and he became a mem- 
 ber of the Georgia Conference at its organization. He had 
 good appointments, and for about six years did well, but at last 
 fell into evil and brought a burden upon the Church. At a ses- 
 sion of the Georgia Conference held at La Grange, Georgia, his 
 case was referred to a Committee for investigation, and the 
 Committee made a report of the case to the Conference on Jan- 
 uary 7, 1833. The finding of the Committee was that three 
 charges were suggested against him. 1. Adultery committed or 
 attempted. 2. Imprudence with females. 3. Slander in a 
 charge made and not proved against a female. The Commit- 
 tee further reported that on a careful examination of all the tes- 
 timony and statements which go to prove the first charge they 
 find him not Guilty. On the second charge compelled to believe 
 him Guilty. On the third charge are of opinion that there 
 were injudicious and improper expressions used by Brother 
 Norsworthy, are not prepared to pronounce him guilty of will- 
 ful slander. The Committee presented with the above the fol- 
 lowing resolution for adoption: ''Resolved: That in conse- 
 quence of the imprudence of which Brother Norsworthy is 
 found guilty that he be suspended from all official services in 
 the Church for one year." On the next day the report of the 
 Committee was called up, and the following action had: "The 
 motion for adopting the report of the Committee on the first 
 charge was put and carried. Their decision on the second 
 charge in the report, was also on motion adopted. On the third 
 cliarge the report of the Committee was set aside. It was re- 
 solved that the accused be found guilty of slander by a vote of 
 twenty-nine to twenty-eight. The Resolution closing the re- 
 port of the Committee was read, and on motion it was so amend- 
 ed as to read: Resolved, That in consequence of the imprudence 
 of which Brother Norsworthy is found guilty, and especially 
 under the solemn admonition given him on a former occasion, 
 that he be divested of his ministerial character." The next day 
 Ignatius A. Few, one of the members of the Conference, en- 
 tered the following protest: 
 
 *'I protest against the decision of this Conference in finding 
 F. P. Norsworthy guilty of slander, 1. Because he never has 
 been either before this Conference or a Committee acting under 
 its direction put on his trial for slander, he never has been ac- 
 
 Furiher Efdargement and Advancement qf the Work. 541 
 
 <5used of speaking false words injurious to the character of an- 
 other, and invited and allowed to prove his innocence, and the 
 decision of the Conference, he was guilty of slander, was upon 
 a gratuitous supposition in which he was neither invited nor al- 
 lowed to defend himself. 2. I protest against the decision of 
 the Conference in this case because having found him guilty of 
 slander, they have refused to expel him from the Church with- 
 out any confession of his guilt or avowal of penitence or prom- 
 ise of amendment affording the dangerous example of retaining 
 a member convicted of a crime which excludes him from the 
 kingdom of grace and glory without penitence, confession, or 
 promise of reformation. I. A. Few." 
 
 " La Grange, Georgia, January 9, 1833." 
 
 After that expulsion from the ministry Mr. Norsworthy made 
 his home at or near Pleasant Hill, Dallas County, Alabama, in 
 the bounds of the Cedar Creek Circuit. In the year 1837, un- 
 der the ministry of the Rev. A. C. Ramsey and the Rev. S. F. 
 Pilley, Norsworthy professed to be reclaimed from his base de- 
 clension, and at the last Quarterly Conference for the Circuit 
 for that year he applied for a license to preach, but the Quar- 
 terly Conference, controlled by such local preachers as Peavy, 
 Stearues, and Thomi)son, declined to grant him a license. He, 
 however, had the gift of perseverance, and at a Quarterly Con- 
 ference held the next year for the Circuit at Pleasant Hill, 
 where he held his membership, he renewed his application for 
 license to preach, and that Quarterly Conference gave him the 
 authority he asked. He then went forth in the capacity of a 
 local preacher in the Circuits adjacent to him, and he stirred the 
 Church apd the country as no other preacher in that section was 
 able to do. The very elements of his nature which made him 
 erratic and unreliable were the elements in which inhered the 
 passion and pathos, fire and fervor, by which he controlled and 
 moved an audience. 
 
 In 1839, through the instrumentality of the Rev. A. C. Ram- 
 sey, a supernumerary preacher on the Circuit for the year, a 
 Camp-ground was established at Ebenezer, called Oak Hill, in 
 Wilcox County, at which a Camp-meeting was held that year, 
 and at which Camp-meetings were held in subsequent years. 
 Frederic P. Norsworthy, then a local preacher, attended that 
 Camp-meeting in 1839. Ramsey was a tenter and helped to en- 
 
542 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 tertain the people. The Rev. Asbnry H. Shanks, who then had 
 charge of Selma and Valley Creek, and who was a member of 
 the Georgia Conference at the time Norsworthy was deposed 
 from the ministry, and was transferred to the Alabama Confer- 
 ence at the very session of the Georgia Conference at which 
 Norsworthy was deposed, was at the Camp-meeting at Ebenezer 
 in 1839, as were also a number of men and women from Selma. 
 The life and official death of Norsworthy was well known. The 
 Rev. L. B. McDonald was in charge of the meeting, but for 
 some reason he had relegated to the Rev. James King, a local 
 preacher, the duty of appointing the preachers to occupy the 
 pulpit at the different hours of service. On the part of the masses 
 on the Campus there was a great clamor for Norsworthy to 
 preach, but on the part of some, there was a stubborn opposi- 
 tion to his preaching. Those from Selma declared they would 
 not hear him. Father King heard the clamor for Norsworthy 
 and the opposition to him, and was in a dilemma. Finally, after 
 consultation, King decided to have Norsworthy preach at the 
 afternoon service on Sunday, and the appointment was am- 
 nounced. Many were delighted, some were displeased. The 
 hour came, the congregation assembled. The Rev. Mr. Shanks 
 took his seat in the altar just in front of the preacher. The 
 people from Selma declined to take seats with the congregation, 
 but seated themselves about the tents in sufficient proximity to 
 hear distinctly what was said. The issues of the hour were con- 
 tingent, and what they would be was of deepest concern. Nors- 
 worthy felt that the vindication of himself and the cause of God 
 depended upon his effort at that hour, and he proceeded with 
 the services determined to acquit himself well. His opening 
 prayer was full of meekness and dependence, and there was in 
 it the glow of piety and the language of faith. In profound 
 utterance he invoked the divine aid in the adventure of the hour. 
 There were deep prejudices which he had to meet. He an- 
 nounced his text, an appropriate text, one full of warning, sym- 
 pathy, and consolation; one indicating the mission of the disci- 
 ples of Christ in the world, their danger and their aid. "I 
 pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but 
 that thou shouldest keep them from the evil." (John xvii. 15.) 
 In the exposition of the text he portrayed the evil which is in 
 the world, and which is encountered by Christians. He en- 
 
 FiirtJier Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 543 
 
 larged upon the different phases thereof. As he moved out 
 from point to point he caught the tenderness, pathos, and conso- 
 lation which are in the text, and he threw all the emotion of his 
 nature into his arguments. His theme opened out to him sub- 
 limely, and he became grandly eloquent. He seemed borne " on 
 wings of holy ardor strong," and he appeared in holy rapture, 
 as though he " stood on the mount of God." His very gestures 
 seemed under the control of the divine Spirit, and his utterances 
 were as sublime as inspiration. The Rev. Asbury H. Shanks 
 could not suppress his emotions, and while the preacher dis- 
 cussed the great theme in hand Shanks responded audibly. 
 Those who refused to join the congregation, and seated them- 
 selves about the tents where they could hear, began to move 
 toward the congregation when the eloquence of the preacher 
 began to peal afar, and before he closed they were in the crowd, 
 and as near to him as they could get. When Norsworthy closed 
 his sermon the congregation was participating in one general 
 shout, and many penitents were at the altar, a large number of 
 whom found the peace of God before the evening was gone. 
 Such an excitement had not been witnessed at any time dur- 
 ing the meeting before. Such excitement was not often had 
 anywhere. The good sisters who had persistently refused 
 to consent to his being permitted to preach changed their 
 minds, and said: "He certainly must be a good man, he 
 certainly is persecuted; and whether he be a sinner or not, he 
 •can preach." He moved from Dallas County to Tallapoosa 
 County, Alabama, where he died. It was said that he gave evi- 
 dence in his last sickness, and on his dying bed, that God was 
 with him in forgiving mercy, and that he was prepared to go 
 hence. The foibles of his life terminated. 
 
 The Hayneville Circuit was first made for 1835, and it about 
 continued in statu qitOf averaging about two hundred white mem- 
 bers, and larger colored membership. A prosperous year on 
 that Circuit was 1843, eighty-four white and sixty-five colored 
 members joining the Methodist Episcopal Church; Hayneville 
 having protracted services, and Lowndesborough Ridge, four 
 miles from Hayneville, having a Camp-meeting with good re- 
 sults. At the end of that year Hayneville and Lowndesborough 
 were united in an appointment and constituted a pastoral charge. 
 
 The Cahawba Circuit made in 1818, and which extended more 
 
5U 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 545 
 
 than the length of the Cahawba Kiver, was, at the close of 1833,. 
 re-arranged, and the name disappeared, the upper part of it be- 
 ing in the Ashville Circuit, which then for the first time ap- 
 peared in the Minutes. 
 
 The Marengo Circuit was named at the close of 1825, and con- 
 tinued on the list of appointments until January, 1840, when it 
 disappeared. The Cahawba, Linden, and Gaston Circuits were 
 made at that time, the Linden Circuit embracing, no doubt, the 
 majority of the appointments which had been in the Marengo 
 Circuit. 
 
 The new Cahawba Circuit made at the time the Marengo Cir- 
 cuit disappeared was kept up by that name for at least ten years, 
 and had in it most of that time the town of Cahawba, and ex- 
 tended over a large region of country, and had a large member- 
 ship. At the town of Cahawba there was scarcely anything dis- 
 tinctively religious for many years. Though it was one of the 
 oldest towns in Alabama, and was once the Capital of the State, 
 no denomination was strong enough to build a house of worship 
 there until after 1848. About the time that last Cahawba Circuit 
 was made a house for the use of all denominations was built by 
 the citizens of the town, and the Methodists, Presbyterians, and 
 Episcopalians used it as opportunity offered. 
 
 Woodville, the same as Uniontown, in Perry County, was for 
 many years one of the appointments of the Caliawba Circuit, 
 though as late as 1843 there was no organized body of Chris- 
 tians at that place, except an exceedingly small and feeble class 
 of Methodists, served by a passing preacher once a month. 
 The citizens of "Woodville, before there was any religious Soci- 
 ety of any sort organized at the place, built a house for the use 
 of all denominations. The Methodists had a grand ingathering 
 there of members in 1843, though they had no house of wor- 
 ship of their own at that place till 1849. They had at the in- 
 gathering here alluded to about one hundred accessions. That 
 gave religion an impetus, and from that time several of the de- 
 nominations made good progress. 
 
 Two preachers, the Rev. Peter Hasskew and the Rev. Alonzo 
 J. Kean, were appointed to the Linden Circuit for 1842. Kean 
 had just been admitted on trial in the Conference, and early in 
 the year he proved himself deficient in virtue and integrity,, 
 and left to religion a reproach and to the Circuit a vacaHcy.. 
 
 John Christian Keener had just come to Alabama on a mission 
 romantic and religious. He came in pursuance of plighted faith 
 to consummate vows of matrimony. He entered matrimony and 
 the ministry. He was licensed to preach in the first half of the 
 year by a Quarterly Conference held for the Linden Circuit at 
 Rehobeth, Wilcox County, Alabama. He was immediately put 
 in the place vacated by the downfall of Kean, and filled out the 
 year as junior preacher on that Circuit. The Circuit had then 
 only twenty-four appointments. Dayton, Demopolis, Linden, 
 Spring Hill, and Rehoboth were of the number. Demopolis 
 had been for two years associated with Livingston, but that year 
 it was in the Linden Circuit. 
 
 The newly married and newly licensed preacher was full of 
 zeal and ecstacy, and he moved around and through the Linden 
 Circuit as a divine messenger, and, at most of the centers of op- 
 eration, he had good success in the evangelizing work in which 
 he was engaged. He held his first meeting at Dayton, at which 
 he witnessed sixty or seventy conversions. His compensation 
 was in doing the work and in gaining adherents to Christ. On 
 commercial account, in commodities and bills of exchange, he 
 received next to nothing. It is altogether possible that that 
 very Linden Circuit on which he commenced his ministry, and 
 on which he was initiated into the mysteries of itinerant life, 
 was the original from which was drawn that graphic represen- 
 tation given in that unique book, '* Post-Oak Circuit." The Lin- 
 den Circuit was, no doubt, a good Circuit for its day. " Post- 
 Oak Circuit," as a book, is inimitable. In every element of mer- 
 it it surpasses " The Georgia Scenes," and " Simon Suggs." 
 
 At the session of the Annual Conference which convened De- 
 cember 28, 1842, the Spring Hill Circuit was made, and the Rev. 
 Jesse P. Perham was appointed to serve it the ensuing year. 
 He was then nearly twenty-seven years old, and had been mar- 
 ried about one year, having married Mrs. Jeannette A. McAl- 
 pine, and had just been received into full connection in the 
 Conference and ordained a deacon. He was a native of New 
 Hampshire, was by trade an engineer and a machinist. He was 
 a citizen of Livingston, Alabama, when, in the latter part of 1839, 
 he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. At the town of 
 Demopolis, July 4, 1840, he was licensed to preach. He locat- 
 ed at the close of 1845. 
 
546 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Notwithstanding Demopolis was one of the oldest towns in 
 Alabama, and there was much wealth about the place, there had 
 not been built a house of worship of any sort there up to 1843, 
 nor had a religious Society of any name existed at that place up 
 to that time. The Methodists had made repeated efforts to es- 
 tablish themselves there, but without success. The Eev. An- 
 drew Jackson Crawford, once a member of the Tennessee Con- 
 ference, and who at the time now under review was a local 
 preacher, and was in charge of the United States Land Office at 
 Demopolis, and was afterward a member of the Alabama Con- 
 ference, began a house of worship at Demopolis for the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church about the beginning of 1840, but it was 
 many years before it was finished. Without seats, without 
 plastering, and only partly weather-boarded, that structure 
 stood a constant declaration and public reminder that the peo- 
 ple of the place were irreligious. For 1840 and 1841, Demopo- 
 lis was attached to Livingston, and various efforts made to es- 
 tablish a Christian Society at the place, even a Quarterly Con- 
 ference was held there, but no success was attained. There 
 were two women, Mrs. Glover and Mrs. Taliaferro, living at the 
 place, who were Methodists, but they had their membership at 
 some other point. Demopolis was a side appointment on the 
 Linden Circuit for 1842, and was given an occasional night serv- 
 ice. At the end of that year it was recognized in the Spring 
 Hill Circuit, entitled to the same measure of service which it 
 had been receiving. The Spring Hill Circuit, for 1843, was in 
 the Mobile District, the Kev. Jesse Boring, presiding elder. 
 At the first Quarterly Conference of that year for the Spring 
 Hill Circuit there were more than one hundred persons who at- 
 tained justification, and at least one hundred probationers were 
 added to the Church. At that Quarterly Conference the presid- 
 ing elder proposed to hold the next Quarterly Conference at 
 Demopolis. The members of the Quarterly Conference knew 
 Demopolis. They had an experience in connection with the 
 place, and, perhaps, also a prejudice against it. They opposed 
 holding the Quarterly Conference at that place. They ridi- 
 culed the idea of such a course. They said the people of De- 
 mopolis would not extend to the official members the usual hos- 
 pitality of such occasions. The place, as a field for religious 
 operation, was unpromising. The people were wholly irreligious. 
 
 Further Enlarfjement and Advancement of the Work. 547 
 
 However, the presiding elder, in the face of all the forbidding 
 features of the case, insisted on going to Demopolis, and his 
 wish in the premises prevailed, and in due course the Quarter- 
 terly Conference met at Demopolis. It was held in the leaf- 
 crowned month of June. The presiding elder, the Rev. Jesse 
 Boring, went to Demopolis, and carried with him the Bev. John 
 Christian Keener, then in his first year on trial in the Alabama 
 Conference, and junior preacher with the Bev. Lovick Pierce, 
 at Franklin Street and West Ward, Mobile. These two, with 
 the preacher on the Circuit, went to work with the earnestness 
 born of true faith. 
 
 On beginning the meeting a Society was organized, composed 
 of the following persons: Mrs. Allen Glover, Mrs. Benjamin 
 Taliaferro, and her daughter. Miss Martha Taliaferro, Mrs. W. 
 D. Lyon, Mrs. Gleason, Thomas Y. Bamsey, and Lewis B. Mc- 
 Carty. 
 
 In a few brief days after the meeting commenced the Bev. 
 Thomas W. Dorman, the Bev. Joshua T. Heard, and the Bev. 
 Nohemiah A. Cravens joined the forces concentrated at the 
 town designated the city of the people. The six preachers now 
 massed at the place so long noted for its wickedness and obdu- 
 racy were a power within themselves. Boring was sensitive 
 and eloquent. Perham was gushing and enthusiastic. Keener 
 was sturdy and persistent in revival work. He never despaired 
 of the salvation of an awakened sinner who sought the Lord. 
 Few have excelled him in the work at the altar. Dorman was 
 prompt, systematic, and sympathetic. Heard was strong, and 
 in prayer he was gifted. Cravens was gifted in the work of re- 
 ligious awakenings. At the time of that meeting at Demopolis 
 he was only a local preacher. He had been under disabilities. 
 A number of years previous to that time he had been expelled 
 from the ministry and the Church by the Kentucky Conference. 
 He was licensed again in Alabama a little more than a year 
 previous to that meeting now under consideration, and he was 
 afterward received again into the itinerant ministry by the Ala- 
 bama Conference, and had a long and useful career. He did 
 some of the most successful work of any man in Alabama. 
 
 The preachers were patient and courageous, and toiled hard 
 in the meeting, but for the space of a whole week there was not 
 the slightest interest manifested on the part of the masses of 
 
548 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 the people. Fiually, redemption's power was wonderfully dis- 
 played in the audience, and the little band of Christians pres- 
 ent, consisting, principally, of the preachers and the newly or- 
 ganized Society of seven, sat on the mount of vision encircled 
 with the divine effulgence. The influence was irresistible; the 
 meeting went on for a month from the time of its beginning, 
 and at the close it was estimated that over one hundred persons 
 had experienced a change of heart. At once three Churches 
 bounded forth with life and zeal, and in a short while three 
 houses of worship were finished in the place; one by the Meth- 
 odists, one by the Presbyterians, and one by the Episcopalians. 
 At the close of the meeting, the presiding elder took the Eev. 
 John Christian Keener from Mobile, and put him in charge of 
 Demopolis for the remainder of the year. Keener was also the 
 preaclier on that Station for the next year. From that time 
 till the present the Methodists have had a preacher stationed at 
 Demopolis. The first statistics shown for the place were re- 
 ported at the close of 1844, when there were sixty-eight white 
 and one hundred and fifteen colored members. 
 
 Two of the preachers who served the Demopolis Station, the 
 Eev. John Christian Keener and the Rev. Holland Nimmons 
 McTyeire, were afterward inducted into the Episcopal oflice. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 The Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work 
 
 OF Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 THE first item of Methodist history in Walker County, Ala- 
 bama, which the Kecords have preserved is that a Quar- 
 terly Conference for the Blount Circuit convened at the house 
 of John Keys, in that county, June 14, 1833. The Kev. An- 
 thony S. Dickinson, the preacher in charge of the Circuit, pre- 
 sided. Theophilus Moody, junior preacher on the Circuit, 
 John Turner, E. G. Musgrove, I. G. Deskin, Eobert Williams, 
 local preachers, Alfred Lane, John Gurganus, exhorters, Jesse 
 Harbin, Joseph Ricliey, James M. Patton, and David Blanton, 
 class leaders, were present as members of that body. E. G. 
 Musgrove was the Secretary. The amount of money reported 
 to that Quarterly Conference received from the Circuit for the 
 Quarter for the support of the ministry was thirty-four dollars 
 and eighty-seven and one-half cents. 
 
 At the time now under review Walker County was a very 
 large county, including within its limits what was afterward 
 constituted and named Hancock County, subsequently changed 
 in name to Winston. 
 
 At the Annual Conference in December, 1833, Walker Mis- 
 sion was made and put in the list of appointments, and was con- 
 tinued under that classification and title until the close of 1835, 
 when the name was changed to that of Jasper. By the name 
 of Jasper it was called till the close of 1842, when the name 
 was changed to New Lexington, after which the name of Jasper 
 did not appear for ten years. To fully understand the arrange- 
 ment of the work it is necessary to state that through the years, 
 beginning with 1838, in which the charge first called Jasper and 
 then New Lexington existed, there was also a Walker Mission, 
 which occupied a part of Walker County. The Walker Mission 
 at that time occupied the eastern half of Walker County, and was 
 sometimes associated with Blount Circuit. The pastoral charge 
 called Jasper and then called New Lexington lay alons: and on 
 
 (549) 
 
^550 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 either side of Bylers Road, and extended from North Port on 
 the Warrior River to the northern boundary of Walker County. 
 Parts of Fayette, Marion, Tuskaloosa, and Walker were included 
 in that charge. No doubt some of the preaching places on that 
 work had previously belonged to other Circuits. The preach- 
 ing places mentioned in that Circuit in 1842 were: Bethel, 
 Bethlehem, Blanton's, Cole's, Jasper, New Lexington, North 
 Port, Pleasant Hill, Pryor's, Rock Spring, Shiloh, Zion, Snow's, 
 Tubbs's, Turner's, Williams's, Yellow Creek. The Whitsons, 
 Freemans, and Coles had their membership at Zion, in the 
 south-eastern part o^ Fayette County. 
 
 By a Quarterly Conference held at Shiloh, April 3, 1837, one 
 of the local preachers was tried for intemperance in the use of 
 ardent spirits, and for vending ardent spirits, and was convicted, 
 and expelled from the Church. To that same Quarterly Con- 
 ference it was reported that Jesse Harbin, formerly a member 
 -of that body, had withdrawn from the Church under charges 
 which, if true, would have expelled him from the connection. 
 
 As late as 1838 all the preaching houses occupied by the 
 Methodists in the bounds of the Jasper charge were on land 
 still owned by the United States. Lands which had not been 
 purchased from the Government. It was also held that in con- 
 sequenee of the unsettled state of affairs nothing could be done 
 in the premises. Here is a clear indication of the style and 
 standard in that region at that time. 
 
 In 1837 there was one Sunday-school in the bounds of the 
 Jasper charge. The next year there were two, one at Pleasant 
 Hill Meeting House, and one at McConnel's School-house. 
 That was about the strength of Sunday-schools for years in that 
 work. 
 
 In March, 1838, a Missionary Society auxiliary to the Mis- 
 ■sionary Society of the Alabama Annual Conference was organ- 
 ized with a suitable Constitution by the Quarterly Conference, 
 and G. J. Isbel was appointed the Treasurer. 
 
 At a Quarterly Conference for Jasper charge held at Gold 
 Mine Camp-ground, about five or six miles from the line of 
 Walker, and in the County of Marion, September 8, 1838, the 
 Rev. John R. Gamble, a local preacher, recently removed from 
 Shelby County, Alabama, to Walker County, made application 
 for membership in that Quarterly Conference, and was received, 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 551 
 
 and his license was renewed. From that time till bis death in 
 1863 he resided and worked in Walker County. His descend- 
 ants have been worthy Methodists. Two sons, Hon. Francis 
 Asbury Gamble and Dr. John W. Gamble, are preachers in the 
 local ranks. Two daughters, Mrs. Foust, of Blount Springs, 
 and Mrs. Wilson, of Leeds, are devout Christians. The grand- 
 children are devoted Methodists. 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held for Jasper Circuit, at New 
 Lexington, August 3, 1839, Julius Nicholson Glover, who was 
 an itinerant preacher in Alabama from the beginning of 1855 
 till his death in 1888, was licensed to preach. 
 
 There were a number of men in the bounds of the Jasper 
 charge, who from the beginning there and for many years gave 
 much time in active and zealous service to the Church under 
 the auspices of Methodism. They were generally men of limit- 
 ed means and meager attainments. In addition to those already 
 mentioned may be named Thomas Whitson, William Cole, and 
 James H. Freeman, who were local preachers there previous to. 
 1837. The Rev. James H. Freeman lived and worked in that 
 country a long while, and was one of the very best Christians. 
 There were a number who filled the offices of class leader and 
 steward who were men of good influence in that region. 
 There were a number of exhorters who did good in the divine 
 cause. William Crump, Benjamin Jones, Jonathan Sherly, 
 Jesse Freeman were all worthy of mention. Ashley Aldridge 
 and Robert Davis, men of but little education, were long in 
 that section. The Rev. Thomas Whitson was ordained deacon 
 at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, December 17, 1826, by Bishop R. R- 
 Roberts, and elder at the same place, December 23, 1835, by 
 Bishop Joshua Soule. 
 
 The first statistical report on record for Walker Mission 
 shows three hundred and fourteen white and sixteen colored, 
 members. At the beginning of 1845 the two charges which 
 embraced Walker County, and which, as stated elsewhere, in-, 
 eluded some territory outside of Walker, claimed seven hun- 
 dred and eleven white and one hundred and eighteen colored 
 
 members. 
 
 The Greene Circuit, occupying the country between the Tom^ 
 bigbee and Warrior Rivers, continued to extend to the head-wa-. 
 ters of Hubbub Creek in Pickens County until th^ close of 1834^ 
 
o52 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 when the Pickens Circuit was made. Then a few of the ap- 
 pointments went from the Greene Circuit to the Pickens Cir- 
 cuit. Hargrove's, which has already been mentioned, on or 
 near Hubbub Creek, was one of these. The Quarterly Confer- 
 ence held for Greene Circuit, at Pleasant Grove, September 20, 
 1834, upon a recommendation from the Society at Hargrove's, 
 licensed J, A. Shockley to preach the gospel. Hargrove's 
 Church has had, through all the years, even until now, a noted 
 career. As early as 1835 a Camp-ground was established there, 
 at which, for twenty-five years, large and intelligent audiences 
 gathered annually for divine worship. Scores of souls have 
 been born to God there, and there hundreds have been edified. 
 The Eev. Kichard Shockley, the Rev. Hiram M. Glass, the 
 Rev. Seth Byars, the Rev. John Cameron, and Daniel J. Har- 
 grove, class leader and steward, were great men there, and use- 
 ful. It is estimated that seventeen preachers, among them 
 Bishop R. K. Hargrove, have gone out from that Society. 
 Daniel J. Hargrove moved there in 1821, and died there June 
 17, 1869. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Greene Circuit at Ray's, 
 May 20, 1836, licensed Robert S. Finley to preach, and the 
 Quarterly Conference held for the same Circuit at Pleasant 
 Grove Camp-ground, October 1, 1836, recommended him to the 
 Annual Conference to be admitted on trial in the Conference. 
 The Alabama Conference admitted him, and he traveled about 
 eight years, and located. The Quarterly Conference for Greene 
 Circuit at Gordon's, July 29, 1837, licensed Robert J. Gill to 
 preach, and the Quarterly Conference for the same Circuit held 
 at Salem or Sadler's, October 7, 1837, licensed Benjamin R. 
 Thompson to preach, and recommended him and Gill and R. G. 
 Hammill as suitable persons to be admitted on trial in the 
 traveling connection. Thompson and Gill were admitted upon 
 that recommendation by the Alabama Conference. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Greene Circuit at De 
 Graff en ried's, October 27, 1838, gave to Wilson Moore, a native 
 of South Carolina, then about twenty-three years old, and just 
 regenerated in that very month, a license to preach the gospel, 
 and also recommended him to the Annual Conference as a suit- 
 able person to be admitted on trial in the Annual Conference. 
 He was admitted into the Alabama Conference, and was in 
 
 / 
 
 Farther Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 553 
 
 charge of the Marianna Station, Florida, when he died in Sep- 
 tember, 1841. 
 
 Ferdinand Sealey, a man who lived a long while in that coun- 
 try, was licensed to preach by a Quarterly Conference held for 
 Greene Circuit at Pleasant Grove, September 7, 1839. Jesse 
 Daniel was licensed to preach by a Quarterly Conference for 
 the same Circuit at Everett's, November 23, 1839, and Isaac 
 Gregory was recommended by the same Quarterly Conference 
 to the Annual Conference for admission on trial. He was ad- 
 mitted, but remained on trial only one year. 
 
 John A. Spence, who appeared in 1836 as a class leader, and 
 a year later as an exhorter, was licensed to preach by a Quarter- 
 ly Conference for Greene Circuit at Gordon's, October 31, 1840, 
 and was recommended by the same body to the Annual Confer- 
 ence as a proper person for the traveling connection. Upon 
 that recommendation he was admitted into the Alabama Con- 
 ference, and remained in the itinerant work in Alabama in con- 
 nection with Episcopal Methodism until 1874, when he with- 
 drew from the Alabama Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, and united with the Methodist Protestant 
 Church. He proved to be a man of good ability and of more 
 than ordinary attainments, but a man of sour temper, always 
 dissatisfied, always complaining, always engaged in adverse 
 criticism. 
 
 William O. Williams and William J. Ledford were licensed 
 to preach and recommended for admission to the traveling con- 
 nection by the Quarterly Conferences of the Greene Circuit, one 
 in 1843 and the other in 1844, and both were admitted by the 
 Alabama Conference. Williams traveled one year, and Ledford 
 three years. 
 
 As late as 1838 the Church property in Greene Circuit was, 
 for want of Trustees, held with uncertain tenure when an effort 
 was made to supply the lack and remedy the evil. That same 
 year an effort was made to establish in the bounds of that Cir- 
 cuit a Circuit School, btit the enterprise failed. 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held at Ebenezer, July 6, 1839, 
 "on motion of Rev. J. R. Lambuth, seconded by R. J. Gill, 
 Brothers James Kirkpatrick, C. C. Jordan, and Allen Moore 
 were elected Building Committee for building a new Church at 
 Ebenezer." Ebenezer was one of the leading places on the 
 
654 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Circuit, ami the Rov. J. R Lamlmth, who lived there and had 
 hekl his memberfc^hip there for many years, and who has been 
 mentioned on former pages as once a member of the Alabama 
 Conference, was an active local preacher in the Greene Circuit, 
 and exerted an extensive inHuence. 
 
 A Quarterly Conference held for Greene Circuit at Eay's 
 Meetin- House, May 20, 183(;, appointed Trustees, consisting 
 of Henry Cleveland, J. N. Thompson, W. Daniel, William 
 Scarbinovv, and Young Kirksy, to build a Methodist Church at 
 or near Mesopotamia. In Aju-il, 18:^8, Mesopotamia appears on 
 the record with a contribution of seven cbllars and a half for 
 the support of the ministry, and again in October of that same 
 year with a contribution of tive dollars for the same benevo- 
 lence. That is all that ever ap])ears on record concerning Mes- 
 opotamia. Mesopotamia was a straggling settlement in sight 
 of what is now the town of Eutaw, and about three miles west 
 of the Warrior River. The presumption is well sustained that 
 the house contemplated at or near Mesopotamia was never 
 built until another provision was made. On May 30, 1840, a 
 Quarterly Conference held for Greene Circuit, at New Hope, 
 appointed William Murphy, James Snedecor, and William' 
 Daniel a Committee to superintend the building of a Church at 
 Eutaw. That is the first mention of Eutaw in Methodist 
 records. At that time Eutaw presented a contribution of nine 
 dollars for the support of the ministry, and the next Quarterly 
 Conference for Greene Circuit was held at that place, August 
 15, 1840, and four dollars were contributed for the ministry. 
 The members present in that first Quarterly Conference ever 
 held in Eutaw were: Elisha Calloway, P. E., R. H. Herbert, P. 
 C, F. D. Poyas, L. E., A. Harris, L. D., R. J. Gill, L. P.,' F. 
 Sealy, L. P., and B. Williams and B. Crawford, Stewards. 
 
 Eutaw and Ebenezer were taken from the Greene Circuit and 
 made an appointment for 1842, and the Rev. Jesse P. Perham 
 put in charge thereof. At the end of that year Ebenezer and 
 Trinity, one of the Societies of the Greene Circuit, were put to- 
 gether as an appointment, and left to be supplied, but, for some 
 reason no separate supply was furnished, and the two places 
 went on for the year as part of the Greene Circuit; while for 
 that year and the year following Eutaw was by itself, and the 
 Rev Joshua T. Heard was in charge of it. When first reported 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 555 
 
 by itself Eutaw had eighty-seven white and one hundred and 
 fourteen colored members. For 1845 Pine Grove was detached 
 from the Greene Circuit and attached to Eutaw, and the Rev. 
 N. P. Scales was apiK)inted to the charge thereof. Pine Grove 
 and Eutaw remained together for three years, and then sepa- 
 rated, and Springfield was attached to Eutaw. For a number 
 of years there was fluctuation in the membershii^ at Eutaw. 
 Decrease and increase alternately. 
 
 The proceedings of the Quarterly Conference for the 
 Greenesborough Station for the first three years of its existence 
 were mislaid and never recovered. It is a matter of record, 
 however, that for 1833 Greenesborough and Marion were to- 
 gether, and the Rev. R. L. Keunon was the preacher in charge; 
 that Robert Dickens and Franklin Shaw were stewards; that 
 Greenesborough contributed for the liquidation of the expenses 
 of the year four hundred and thirty-four dollars and fifty cents, 
 and Marion contributed forty -seven dollars and thirty-one 
 cents. 
 
 Ascending to the sublime height of Christian duty as it was 
 seen and provided for in that day, Greenesborough in 1835 paid 
 the Rev. S. B. Sawyer his quarterage and traveling expenses in 
 full, and paid the Rev. E. V. LeVert his quarterage and family 
 expenses .in full. That was the whole sum of three hundred 
 and forty dollars. Joshua, the Sexton, was paid for his services 
 twenty-five dollars, and twenty-five dollars were expended in 
 Sunday-school Books. Under the impulses of a tender regard 
 for superannuated preachers, widows and orphans, forty-five 
 dollars were generously contributed to the Conference collec- 
 tion. A lively Sunday-school, composed of sixty-three scholars 
 and teachers, and having one hundred and seventy-five volumes 
 in Library, was kept in existence. 
 
 At the first Quarterly Conference for 1836 Robert Dickens, 
 Henry J. Garrett, Andrew W^alker, John M. Bates, Green D. 
 Williams, and Joseph B. Markham were elected stewards. 
 Fifty-six dollars and thirteen cents were contributed, in a pub- 
 lic collection, for defraying the expenses of the Delegates to 
 the General Conference which convened in May of that year. 
 
 An effort was made in 1837, the Rev. Claiborne Pirtle in 
 
 charge of the Station, to secure a Parsonage and build a new 
 
 Church, but neither enterprise succeeded. The preacher was 
 36 
 
556 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 absent on account of sickness from August till the close of the 
 year. He was never able to work any more, and he located at 
 the close of 1840. Calamities came thick and fast. In 1838 
 the Kev. E. V. LeVert was put in charge of Greenesborough in 
 a supernumerary relation, and the Eev. Francis H. Jones was 
 the presiding elder. Jones fell into sin, and was not at 
 Greenesborough Station after May of that year, and he was ex- 
 pelled from the connection at the session of the Alabama Con- 
 ference following the date of his crime. 
 
 Annoyances to the Church at Greenesborough and impedi- 
 ments to the divine work there were constantly recurring. 
 Earth has not recently seen a state where mingles no eviL If 
 there be those who are in virtue complete and in good confirmed 
 they are such a select band as to be conspicuous only by their 
 fewness. Eeligion is often scandalized at her own altars, and 
 wounded by her own adherents. There are many things every- 
 where to mar the peace, and disturb the equilibrium of Chris- 
 tians, and hinder the divine cause in spite of the best intentions 
 and the best efforts. Human language to be adequate to the 
 state of things here below must be replete with words which 
 express censure. 
 
 The Kev. Alexander Winbourn was transferred from the Ten- 
 nessee Conference, and stationed at Greenesborough for 1839. 
 The stewards at his new field of labor immediately after the 
 session of the Alabama Conference collected and advanced to 
 him forty-five dollars for quarterage and part of his expenses 
 from Tennessee to Tuskaloosa. He entered upon his work 
 promptly, and was at the first Quarterly Conference, held March 
 16, 1839, as preacher in charge of the Station. That terminated 
 his ministry at Greenesborough. Nevermore does he appear on 
 the records at that place. For some reason and through some 
 process not now known, he was relieved of the pastoral over- 
 sight of that charge between thp time of the first and the second 
 Quarterly Conferences. In the absence of all knowledge on the 
 subject it is useless to indulge conjecture. At the end of the 
 year the Alabama Conference placed him on the superannuated 
 list, and after that his name disappears from the roll, and it is 
 not known how. 
 
 The Rev. James M. Boatwright, with another preacher, was 
 appointed to Marion Circuit for 1839. When Winbourn was 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 557 
 
 relieved of the Station at Greenesborough, Boatwright was put 
 in charge. At the second and all subsequent Quarterly Con- 
 ferences for Greenesborough Station for that year the Kev. 
 James M. Boatwright was present as the preacher in charge, 
 and he received quarterage, and paid board as the preacher of 
 
 that tiock. 
 
 Soon after taking charge of the Church at Greenesborough 
 the Rev. James M. Boatwright, it is said, gave great offense to 
 the Methodists and the people of the place generally. It was 
 after this wise: He took board and lodging in the house of 
 Robert Dickens, who was, at that time, the leading steward of 
 the Church and the largest contributor to the financial support 
 of the charge. Mr. Dickens, assisted by his overseer, on what 
 he supposed a proper occasion, took in hand to correct and 
 punish one of his slaves, a Negro man of great strength. The 
 Negro resisted the correction tendered him, and made some 
 demonstrations of violence upon the master and overseer. Mr. 
 Boatwright wad in his room and in sufficient proximity to the 
 scene of contest to have knowledge of the situation and to as- 
 sist in the suppression of the insubordinate slave. Mr. Boat- 
 wright did not rush to the scene of action. At this distance 
 of time and place it is safe to say and proper to assert that Mr. 
 Boatwright acted wisely, discreetly, and righteously in leaving 
 Mr. Dickens and his overseer to guide their own affairs, dispose 
 of their domestics, and suppress those whose duty it was to be 
 in subordination to their authority. But the members of the 
 Church and the people generally had an opportunity to make a 
 case against the preacher, and the opportunity was not allowed 
 to pass. He was condemned and denounced. "Muttering 
 sounds of sullen wrath " were heard all around. Members of 
 the Church refused to attend his ministry, and the congrega- 
 tion was depleted, the place of worship was almost forsaken. 
 The excitement was intense enough. The presiding elder, the 
 Rev. E. V. LeYert, advised Mr. Boatwright to retire from the 
 charge; but the preacher, conscious of the correctness of his 
 course, declined to voluntarily retire. The presiding elder did 
 not exercise his authority and remove him. He stood to his 
 post, and' faithfully discharged his duties. In spite of all the 
 persecutions he endured he had a good year. According to the 
 records thirty persons were inducted into the Church that year. 
 
558 
 
 Hisiorij of MetJwdism in Alabama. 
 
 In 1839 the Quarterly Conference appointed another Com- 
 mittee to bnild a new Church, and that time a measure of suc- 
 cess ensued, and by the first part of April, 1840, the new build- 
 ing was sufficiently advanced for the congregation to occupy it, 
 and at that time, and in that unfinished state it was dedicated 
 to divine worship, by the Rev. E. V. LeYert, the presiding 
 elder. Trouble ensued also. In building the house a debt was 
 incurred, or for building it a claim was set up in the prosecution 
 of which damage was entailed upon the Society. The last 
 time the once strong supporter of the Greenesborough Station, 
 Robert Dickens, is mentioned in the records of the Quarterly 
 Conference of that Station is March 18, 1843. In the proceed- 
 ings of that day it is recorded: "Brother R. Dickens appeared 
 before the Conference, and stated that the Trustees were in 
 debt to him for the building of the Church; whereupon, the 
 following Resolution was passed: Resolved, That the Quarterly 
 Conference do hereby recommend to the Trustees on the one 
 part and R. Dickens on the other to refer the disputed matters 
 between them on the subject of the debt due him to some per- 
 sons selected by themselves in the usual form of arbitration, 
 and that they meet on next Saturday, March 25, and report the 
 result to the next Leaders' Meeting." The evil which has fal- 
 len upon the Church through debts made, and then loosely 
 managed, is untold. There is not room to relate what evils 
 have been entailed upon Christianity, in connection with 
 Church-debts, through reposed confidence, broken promises, 
 partial payments, not exacting receipts, and last, but not least, 
 forcing men, who have been liberal to the cause, to accept the 
 settlement of the debt in place of its payment. These things 
 have lost to the Church, in many instances, her best friends, 
 and most pious members. 
 
 In those days some strange ecclesiastical proceedings were 
 had in connection with the Quarterly Conferences of Greenes- 
 borough, and some strange proceedings without Quarterly Con- 
 ferences. In 1839 a man was licensed to preach by a body 
 called together at a different time to that of any of the four 
 Quarterly Conferences of the year. The first Quarterly Con- 
 ference was held March 16, 1839, and the second Quarterly 
 Conference July 6, 1839, and the other two at subsequent dates; 
 and the record contains the following: "At a call of the officiary 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 559 
 
 members of the Church June 2, 1839, A. P. Merrell was 
 licensed to preach. E. V. LeVert, P. E.; J. D. Moore, Secre- 
 tary." That is given verbatim. 
 
 In the proceedings of the Quarterly Conference held June 8, 
 1844, is found the following: 
 
 "Any References? Yes. Isaac Thurmond, colored man, for 
 adultery acquitted by Committee, and referred by preacher 
 in charge; the decision reversed, and Isaac expelled." Strange 
 and illegal proceeding this. Here was a private member of the 
 Church expelled who was never convicted before the Society, 
 or a Committee of the Society, of which he was a member. 
 Here was a private member convicted and expelled from the 
 Church who had been absolutely acquitted by the only body to 
 which he was amenable for his conduct. The Quarterly Con- 
 ference had no authority in that case to convict and expel. 
 The Quarterly Conference had authority to confirm or reverse 
 the verdict in the case referred thereto by the preacher in 
 charge, but inasmuch as it was a verdict of acquittal which was 
 reversed, the Quarterly Conference only had authority to re- 
 mand or refer the case to the Society for a new trial. That 
 Quarterly Conference which did that strange work was presided 
 over by the Rev. Charles McLeod, presiding elder; the preach- 
 er in charge, who referred the case, was the Rev. Thomas H. 
 Capers; and the other members of the body present and 
 taking part were John Dubois, L. E., J. W. Houck, Exh., Dr. 
 P. W. Kittrell, Dr. W. T. Webb, R. S. Hunt, Thomas W. John- 
 ston, stewards, and Jesse Gibson, C. L. These were men of in- 
 telligence and fidelity. If such administration prevailed in the 
 intelligent centers, what was done in the remote districts and 
 less favored sections? 
 
 Robert Dickens, Thomas W. Johnston, stewards, the Rev. 
 John Dubois, a local preacher, and Joseph AY. Houck, an ex- 
 horter, Were, indeed, pillars in the Church at Greenesborough. 
 They were prompt, punctual, and liberal. They gave ^ their 
 time, energies, and means to the interests of Christianity. Du- 
 bois was a working member of the Church in Alabama for sixty 
 years or more. Ho died January 31, 1884, in his eighty- 
 seventh year. 
 
 From 1832 to 1845, the period now under review. Camp- 
 grounds were established and kept up by the Methodists in 
 
560 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 various places in all sections of Alabama, and at most of these 
 places Camp-meetings were held annually. At a few places in 
 a few instances two meetings were held in a year. Camp- 
 grounds and Camp-meetings in that time were everywhere 
 much after the same order, though they differed in the style 
 and extent of outfit accordim^ to the condition and tastes of the 
 people in the different sections where they were established and 
 held. The shed, the stand, the altar with its straw, and the 
 group of tents were common to every Camp-ground, though in 
 many places these were made of raw materials, and rough-cast. 
 In some instances the shed was built of the brush and boughs 
 of the forest; in other instances boards were used, and in some 
 cases planks were furnished. Different materials were utilized 
 in the construction of tents, such as coarse cloth, rough boards, 
 and good planks. In some instances wagons were utilized for 
 sleeping apartments. In the wealthy and more advanced sec- 
 tions commodious tents were erected, and convenience and com- 
 fort arranged for. Preaching, exhorting, praying, singing, and 
 assembling penitents in the altar for prayer and instruction were 
 common to all Camp-meetings. A Camp-meeting meant preach- 
 ing four times a day. In the time now under consideration Camp- 
 meetings were popular and profitable. They were the grand and 
 absorbing occasions in the sections in which they were held. 
 There was one other thing common to all Camp-meotings of that 
 time: the entertainment was free. The tent-holders entertained 
 without charge all who attended. Great good was often accom- 
 plished at those meetings. People and preachers gathered 
 from all directions and from great distances. The preaching 
 was usually edifying, the exhortations eloquent and rousing, 
 the prayers earnest and fervent, and the singing inspiring. 
 Much was usually anticipated in the preaching of the occasions. 
 The expectation was that the preaching would be of a high 
 order. 
 
 An account of one single Camp-meeting in this connection 
 may suffice. 'On or near the highway leading from the town of 
 Marion in the County of Perry to the town of Greenesborough 
 in the then County of Greene, and not far from an equal dis- 
 tance from these towns was a Camp-ground known as DeYam- 
 pert's. The well-built shed with its grand stand and spacious 
 altar, and the commodious tents tastefully grouped about the 
 
 Farther Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 561 
 
 beautiful grounds gave an air of neatness, and indicated expen- 
 diture and aggregation. A mile or more away from that en- 
 campment in the midst of beautiful groves and fertde lands 
 stood the stately mansion of L. Q. C. DeYampert. DeYam- 
 pert was a local preacher, a man of wealth, and a very prince m 
 Israel. He had once been a member of the South Carolina 
 Conference. He was surrounded with many worthy associates. 
 At that magnificent Camp-ground, in the lovely autumn of 1843, 
 was held a Camp-meeting which made an impression on the sur- 
 rounding country. The occasion was magnified. There was 
 much outlay and much display. Many of the preachers m 
 charge of affairs in the surrounding country were engaged to 
 attend the meeting. The great event of the meeting was to be 
 the presence of the Kcv. Lovick Pierce, then stationed m Mo- 
 bile, and considered a star of the first magnitude in the ecclesi- 
 astical firmament. His proposed coming had been heralded far 
 and near. The sensation was complete, the excitement was in- 
 tense, all expectant were the people. The great preacher 
 reached the Camp-ground according to engagement, but, alas! 
 he was sick, and continued sick for many days, and could not 
 
 preach. 
 
 The Rev. Charles McLeod, the presiding elder, was in charge 
 of the meeting. The Rev. T. V/. Dorman and the preachers of 
 the work in the midst of which the Camp-ground was located, 
 and others were present. There was another preacher there, a 
 stranger, one who came unheralded. The Rev. Thomas O. Sum- 
 mers was the man. He was then from the Republic of Texas. 
 He was making a tour of Alabama and other States soliQiting 
 funds to pay debts incurred in the erection of houses of worship 
 for the use of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Galveston 
 and Houston, Texas. He was a native of England, at the time 
 herein mentioned he was about thirty-one years old, had been 
 in the United States about thirteen years, had been preaching 
 nine years, and was unmarried, and was in search of a good 
 wife. In his manners in the social circle he was brusque, in 
 ttie pulpit he was stormy and fidgety. He exhibited at that 
 Camp-meeting at DeYampert's Camp-ground some horned 
 frogs in alcohol preserved, which he had brought with him 
 from Texas. It is quite easy to imagine the impression which 
 he made on the minds of the Camp-meeting folks of Alabama 
 
562 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 563 
 
 concerning himself by the exhibition of his frogs, and the inter- 
 est which he created thereby in the peculiar product of the then 
 neighboring Eepublic of Texas. Tradition says that about the 
 second day of that Camp-meeting the Rev. Mr. Summers was 
 put up to preach, and that the effort of that hour was unaccepta- 
 ble to the congregation, and to Brother DeYampert it was 
 quite offensive. He was offended by the matter of the sermon 
 and the manner of the preacher. The other preachers filled 
 the pulpit at the different hours from that on, leaving Summers 
 to himself, his horned frogs, and his Agency for funds for erect- 
 ing Churches in the land from which he had brought his exhib- 
 its. Summers, true to his business, solicited a contribution 
 from DeYampert to assist his Churches in Texas. DeYampert 
 gruffly refused to make a contribution. The meeting went on, 
 Sunday approached, Dr. Pierce continued sick. Hopes were 
 entertained, so tradition says, that Dr. Pierce, the great preach- 
 er, would recover sufficiently by Sunday to preach on that day; 
 but on the arrival of Saturday evening the physician who had 
 charge of the sick man pronounced against his preaching. 
 There was an emergency. The presiding elder called a Coun- 
 cil, constituted of the home preachers. The business of the 
 Council was to improvise and provide for the services of Sun- 
 day, the great day. The Council met in the capacious tent of 
 DeYampert. The perplexing question was: Who shall preach 
 at 11 o'clock A.M. Sunday? It was first suggested that, of 
 course, the presiding elder was the preacher for that hour, but 
 he humbly declined in favor of any one who could and would 
 meet the emergency. The home preachers were suggested, one 
 after another, until all had declined. Not one was willing to 
 attempt to preach at that hour in the face of the expectation 
 created by the trumpeted fame of Dr. Pierce. At last one in 
 the Council moved that the Rev. Thomas O. Summers be ap- 
 pointed to preach at 11 o'clock a.m. Sunday. That proposition 
 stirred the indignation of Brother DeYampert, who railed out, 
 " He cannot preach the gospel! The poorest preacher here can 
 preach better." The council adjourned and dispersed without 
 making any appointment for the great hour, and the presiding 
 elder had the responsibility and the prospect of occupying the 
 hour himself. While the preachers were engaged in the consul- 
 tation about the appointments for Sunday the Rev. Mr. Sum- 
 
 I 
 
 mers, who was being entertained at Brother DeYampert's tent, 
 was in his room in the tent adjoining the one in which the 
 preachers were assembled, and in such proximity that he could 
 not avoid hearing what was said. 
 
 The morning ushered a beautiful day. It was Sunday. The 
 people poured into the encampment by hundreds. They came 
 from far and near. They came in style and without style. 
 They came by all modes of travel. Many came in rich attire, 
 attended by grand equipage. They came to hear the great 
 preacher. Even the outskirts of the encampment were 
 thronged. One who never saw the equipage of a wealthy fami- 
 ly and the equipage of a poor family in Alabama in the days 
 concerning which this narrative is being made, and who never 
 saw the multitude assemble on a great Camp-meeting day, can- 
 not have any clear idea of the peculiar mingle and pdrade of 
 such an occasion. The carriage of a wealthy family in Alabama 
 in the days of slavery was of special model. It was a four- 
 wheeled vehicle fitted to double harness and the use of a pair of 
 horses. The body of that carriage was of rather massive pro- 
 portions. It was delicately lined and trimmed within with lin- 
 en, silk, and satin, and furnished with two double seats softly 
 cushioned. On the outside it was ornamented with finely pol- 
 ished materials, and in front was a high-mounted double seat. 
 The body was hung on mammoth springs. That carriage was 
 usually drawn by a pair of horses which matched in color, size, 
 and form, and in it usually went the mother and daughters of 
 the family. On the high seat in front sat the driver, who was 
 a well-dressed Negro man, who w^as trusted with the reins, and 
 with him sat the waiting-maid, who was a Negro, well-dresssd, 
 neat, and clean. The driver and the waiting-maid seated on 
 the high front seat of the elegant carriage were the badge of 
 the large wealth and superior elegance of the family to which 
 the outfit belonged. The Negro who drove the family car- 
 riage in Alabama in that time had a sacred trust and a distin- 
 guished position, and of which he was sufficiently proud. A 
 Ne*gro in Congress to-day is not more important. The Negro 
 driver of that day was w^ell-dressed. If any one thinks that 
 Negroes in Alabama in the days of slavery did not have um- 
 brellas, linen, and broadcloth, he is simply mistaken. 
 
 In Alabama in that day a wealthy family, consisting of the 
 
564 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 usual uumbers in a household, including father, mother, sons, 
 daughters, and servants in attendance, starting out on a beauti- 
 ful Sunday morning to a great Camp-meeting presented, to say 
 the least of it, a flattering view of life. The group move out; 
 the family carriage, already described, containing mother, 
 daughters, driver, and waiting-maid, in the front; a fine buggy, 
 drawn by a superb gelding, with the head of the family and his 
 Negro attendant seated in it, follows close after the carriage; 
 two elegant saddle-horses, each trapped with saddle, bridle, and 
 martingale, and mounted by one of the sons of the household, 
 follow next the buggy; and last, but not least, two mules, each 
 wearing an old saddle and an inferior bridle, and one carrying 
 Peter, the oldest Negro man belonging to the place, and the 
 other carrying Jane, the oldest Negro woman on the premises, 
 who had a cloth as white as snow tied about her head, follow in 
 the rear, and complete the group. 
 
 In that day in Alabama a poor family starting out on a beau- 
 tiful Sunday morning to a great Camp-meeting presented, if not 
 a flattering view of life, a significant exhibition. Many of the 
 poor had no outfit of any kind; some had only the ox and cart 
 by which the grist was conveyed to and from the mill ; others 
 had only the horse which pulled the plow which turned the 
 glebe; several horses and several saddles in the possession of a 
 family was the most extensive outfit and best equipage to which 
 the poor aspired with any hope of success. The poor were at 
 the Camp-meetings. With or without outfits they were there. 
 They would pour in from the hills and woods. Men, women, 
 and children would go. They v/ould go by all modes of travel: 
 on foot, on ox-carts, on ox-w^agons, on horse-back, some in the 
 saddle, some in the lap, some behind; in that day a horse which 
 would not carry double and thribble was not by any means a 
 choice animal. It took all these, the rich and the poor, to make 
 a Camp-meeting in the forties of this century. 
 
 All these were at that Camp-meeting at De Yampert's 
 Camp-ground in that beautiful autumn of 1843, at which the 
 frogs from the Kepublic of Texas were exhibited. The gath- 
 ering of that multitude was impressive. As the dusty crowds 
 from the hills and woods swelled the throng, and as the numer- 
 ous groups of the rich, with the roar and clatter of wheels and 
 hoofs, the glare and glitter of trappings and fixtures, ap- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 565 
 
 proached the outskirts and rolled through the encampment the 
 interest became intense. The scene was really impressive. 
 
 The presiding elder looked upon the vast throng, and beheld 
 the array of wealth and elegance, and at the very last moment 
 his courage failed, and instead of preaching himself, as till 
 that very moment he had really expected to do, he, upon his 
 own responsibility, and at the risk of incurring the lasting dis- 
 pleasure of Brother DeYambert, led the Rev. Thomas O. Sum- 
 mers on the stand, and informed him that he must preach. Mr. 
 Summers knew the situation, but he was not in the least 
 abashed. He at once proceeded with the services. He read a 
 hymn after the manner peculiar to himself, and then prayed. 
 The prayer was seldom equaled. It was characterized by de- 
 votion, unction, propriety of utterance, variety of petition, and 
 heartiness of thanksgiving. To use one of Mr. Summers's own 
 phrases it was "good to the use of edifying." AVhen through 
 "^'ith the introductory part of the services, and ready to proceed 
 with his sermon, Mr. Summers took his position at the book- 
 board, and looking Brother DeYampert, who was near the 
 stand, and in full view, squarely in the face, said: "I heard it 
 declared last night I could not preach the gospel. May the 
 Holy Ghost enable me to preach this day to this dying people, 
 * not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be 
 made of none effect.' " He then read his text: " But we preach 
 Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the 
 Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews 
 and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of 
 God." The text contained a theme and swept a field suited to 
 the order of mind peculiar to Mr. Summers, and he was that 
 day at his best, and he drew, the Holy Spirit assisting, the au- 
 dience to the theme, and before he was through with the ex- 
 position of the text the assembly gave demonstrations of great 
 enthusiasm. At the close of the sermon the spacious altar was 
 crowded with penitent sinners. The meeting went on for some 
 days longer with intense interest and with glorious results, the 
 Eev. Mr. Summers working efficiently, and working till the 
 conclusion of the last doxology. Brother DeYampert changed 
 his mind, reversed his verdict, gave Mr. Summers a liberal 
 contribution for his Churches in Texas, and he became one of 
 Mr. Summers's greatest admirers and warmest friends. 
 
rm 
 
 Jlisfonj of Methodism in Aluhania. 
 
 In tlie month of Soptonilx^r, 1S4I^, fiml on ilio tonr in which 
 ho ftttondod tlu* C\'unp-iniM'tin^ at Dt^Yninpcrt's, Mr. SiimnuTrt 
 visitt^l 'ruskaKM>sa, Alabama, antl luul Miss Marsilla Sexton, of 
 that phico, rooommcmhHl to him, by adivpiato judgoH, as a suit- 
 nbh^ lady for an ilinoranl pn^achor's \vifi\ Ho wooed and woii 
 tiu^ huly tluis iHH'ommendeil; by what pmcoss lie carried on 
 his courtship is not known. He returned to Texas, ho had not 
 yet married, nttondod the Texas Conference in Docomber, was 
 transferred to the Alabama Oonforonce, and stationed at Tuska- 
 K>osa for 1S44; wound up his affairs in the Republic of Texas; 
 left Gjdveston in January, 1844; reached Tuskaloosa, Alal)ama, 
 in one week, and on the last day of that month hrt was married 
 to Miss Marsilla Sexton, the woman of his choice. From the 
 time he transferred to the Alabanni (\>nftn-once till his doalh in 
 1S8'2 he had his membership as a ])reacher in Alabama. Ho 
 attained distinction as a preacher and author. Tho degrees of 
 D.D. and LL.D. were conferred upon him. Ho was long in 
 the editorial work of the Church. He did much work for tho 
 Church. He was a member of the General Conferences from 
 time to time. He was one of tho Professors of the Biblical 
 Department of the Vanderbilt University at tho time of his 
 death. He was buried on the Yandobilt Campus, but when his 
 widow died his son had his remains removed to the cemetery 
 for the city of Nashville, Tennessee. In Alabama he filled ap- 
 pointments at Tuskaloosa, Livingston, and Mobile. 
 
 The mention of Tuskaloosa in connection with the Rev. 
 Thomas O. Summers brings that ])lace again in review. There 
 was much fluctuation in the membership at Tuskaloosa, Ala- 
 bama, during the period from 1832 to 1845. The Eev. Rob- 
 ert L. Walker closed his ministry at Tuskaloosa with 1882, 
 and left one hundred and ninetv-five white and two hundred 
 and twenty -nine colored members. The Rev. Seymour B. 
 Sawyer was in charge of Tuskaloosa Station after Mr. AValk- 
 er, and left at the close of the one year there two hundred and 
 fifteen white and three hundred and eight colored members. 
 The Rev. J. E. Jones was in Tuskaloosa after Sawver one 
 year, and failed to report the numbers in the Station at 
 the close of his year. For two years in succession, the years 
 1835 and 1836, the Rev. William Murrali was in charge of tho 
 flock at Tuskaloosa, and at the end of his first year he reported 
 
 Furiher Knhmjrment and Advanccwent of the Work. 567 
 
 one hundred and sixty-two white and one hundred and sixty- 
 fcmr colored members, and at the close of his second year one 
 hundred and forty-four white and one hundred and thirty-five 
 colored members. For 1837 the Rev. Robert L. Kennon was the 
 Stationed preacher at Tuskaloosa, and with that year and with 
 that people closed his life work, and left in that charge two 
 hundred and (me white and one hundred and forty-two colored 
 members. For 1838 Tuskaloosa was supplied by the Rev. 
 Charles Hardy, who had been a member of the Georgia Con- 
 ference, and had just located. Ho was a supply, and did not 
 reach Tuskaloosa till about th(^ middle of March. At the close 
 of the year he left one hundred and ninety-eight white and one 
 hundred and sixty-nine colored members. For about two 
 months, and until the Rev. Mr. Hardy reached Tuskaloosa, the 
 Rev. Basil Manly, a Baptist preacher, and who had just been 
 installed President of the University of Alabama, preached for 
 the Methodists at the morning service on Sunday. The con- 
 gregation thought him devotedly pious and of great simplicity, 
 and an interesting and practical preacher. He attained dis- 
 tinction. For 1839 the Rev. Thomas Linch was in charge of 
 Tuskaloosa, and there were at the close of his service in the 
 Church there one hundred and eighty-one white and one hun- 
 dred and seventy-seven colored members. For 1840 the Rev. 
 William Murrah was again put in charge of Tuskaloosa, and at 
 the close of the year there were only one hundred and twenty- 
 seven white and one hundred and thirty-five colored members 
 in the Church there. For 1841 and 1842 the Rev. Jefferson 
 Hamilton was the preacher at Tuskaloosa, and he reported at 
 the close of his first year one hundred and fifty-four white and 
 one hundred and seventy-five colored members, and at the close 
 of his second year one hundred and eighty white and two hun- 
 dred and thirty colored members. The Rev. Thomas H. Capers 
 was tho preacher there for 1843, and at the close of the year 
 there had been a gain of five white and of thirty-four colored 
 members in the charge. During the following year, under the 
 ministry of the Rev. Thomas O. Summers, there was a decrease 
 of forty-seven white and an increase of twenty-three colored 
 members. For all the years at Tuskaloosa the year 1845 was 
 the one of grandest results. That year the Rev. John Chris- 
 tian Keener had the charge at Tuskaloosa, and a meeting was 
 
568 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 held there in September of that year which continued more 
 than two weeks, and in which more than one hundred and forty 
 persons professed to find the peace which passes understanding, 
 and more than one hundred joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. Before the meeting closed the Eev. Mr. Keener was 
 so exhausted he could not preach and was unable to participate 
 in any active service. The Eev. Nehemiah A. Cravens, then a 
 local preacher, joined in the work during the last week, and 
 labored until his great strength was exhausted. There was a 
 moral revolution. At the end of the year there was in that Sta- 
 tion the largest membersliip ever reported at that place. There 
 were two hundred and thirty-six white and three hundred and 
 sixty-two colored members. There is not much permanency in 
 such work. The next year the Eev. John C. Keener was in 
 charge there, and, with all the advantages of his relation to the 
 work, he reported at the close of the year a decrease of thirty- 
 six white and twelve colored members. The net full has many 
 fish which have to be thrown away because bad. 
 
 The Hon. Marmaduke Williams was born in North Carolina 
 in 1772, and was forty years a citizen of Alabama, and more 
 than thirty years a citizen of Tuskaloosa. He tilled many 
 positions of honor and usefulness. He was Judge of Probate, 
 a member of the House of Eepresentatives of his adopted 
 State, and a member of the Congress of the United States from 
 his native State. He joined the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in May, 1833, when he was sixty-one 
 years old, and he continued a member at the same place until 
 his death, in the latter part of 1850. 
 
 George Purcell, who lived to old age, and at last died in Mis- 
 sissippi, and maintained his allegiance to religion and Metho- 
 dism to the end of his pilgrimage, joined the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church in the first part of 1836, at Tuskaloosa, Alabama. 
 
 Mary A. Kennon and Julia Kennon, daughters of the Eev. 
 Eobert L. Kennon, joined the Methodist Episcopal Church at 
 Tuskaloosa, in April, 1838, a few brief months after their 
 father's death. They have been women of worth. Their 
 mother, the widow of Dr. Kennon, died in 1876, in her eighty- 
 first year. She was a worthy Christian. She was a woman of 
 great endurance and of great kindness. 
 
 December 10, 1.^36, Edward B. Yaughan and Mrs. Mariah 
 
 Farther Enlargement and Advancement of the Worh. 569 
 
 Yaughan, his wife, natives of Yirginia, though then but recent- 
 ly come from Greene County, Alabama, to the town of Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, were received by certificate into the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church at Tuskaloosa. In financial affairs and busi- 
 ness occupations Mr. Yaughan was cautious, wise, far-seeing, 
 and successful. He had much wealth and extensive influence. 
 He never sought place or power, never made a parade of milita- 
 ry titles and burnished steel, but he was patriotic, and a con- 
 servator of the public peace. He was a man of broad views and 
 generous deeds. The law of love was in his heart, and he gave 
 himself and his means to Christian benevolence. He was active 
 in Church work, and liberal in the support of Christian enter- 
 prises. He was of those who were ever glad when it was said: 
 "Let us go into the house of the Lord." He attended the 
 preaching of the word, the Prayer Meeting, the Class Meeting, 
 the Lovefeast, the Sacrament, and the Sunday-school. He 
 searched for those needing aid, and bestowed his alms unasked. 
 He dried orphan's tears, and soothed aching hearts. He was a 
 man of integrity, and of piety, and he ever trusted in him 
 " Who guides the circuit of the endless years." He died at 
 Tuskaloosa, Alabama, February 8, 1868, being just seventy 
 years old. A vast concourse of mourners attended his funeral 
 Hon. John James Ormond and his wife, Minerva Ormond, 
 joined the Methodist Episcopal Church on probation at Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, in July, 1840, and were received into full con- 
 nection there in January, 1841. Before marriage Mrs. Ormond 
 was Miss Minerva Banks, and resided in the Tennessee Yalley. 
 Judge Ormond was a native of England, born during the last 
 decade of the eighteenth century, and was brought to America 
 the next year after his birth. He was brought up in orphan- 
 age. Notwithstanding his opportunities were quite limited, he 
 attained great learning. He studied law in Yirginia, and be- 
 .came a citizen of the Tennessee Yalley, Alabama, a short while 
 after Alabama became a State. Judge Ormbnd was at one 
 time a member of the General Assembly of Alabama from the 
 County of Lawrence, and he was for a number of years, and un- 
 til he voluntarily resigned the position, one of the Judges of the 
 Supreme Court of the State. He was modest and retiring, and 
 incapacitated for and disinclined to demagogism. Of ancestral 
 line and hereditary fame he never boasted, nor ever made pa- 
 
570 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 rade of his natural talents and acquired attainments. It is not 
 known that he ever sighed " for wealth, or fame, or power." It 
 is certain he was no suppliant, no sycophant. He never fawned. 
 He ascended to and retained position upon his intrinsic merit 
 and by efficiency and fidelity. While he was not insensible " to 
 the approbation of the enlightened and virtuous," he discharged 
 his duties and devoted his services to the State not for pension 
 and praise, but for the vindication of right, the maintenance of 
 justice, and the advancement of the general welfare. Integrity 
 characterized all his acts, both private and public, personal and 
 official. His judicial papers were model productions, both in 
 matter and style, both as to the legal lore and classic taste 
 evinced. He was logical and chaste. His writings will be 
 searched in vain for expletives. In his personal association 
 and bearing he was what would be called aristocratic and lord- 
 ly. He was exclusive and seclusive. He never associated with 
 the rabble, and with those of his own circle he had none of that 
 familiarity which breeds contempt and engenders suspicion. 
 He was never known to unbend, nor his dignity intermit. Never 
 for a moment did he forget the proprieties of the man and the 
 Judge. He never made any concessions. To the level of com- 
 mon men and vulgar things he never descended. No one ever 
 attempted to play pranks on Judge Ormond. In manners he 
 was eminently graceful, and he always conformed to the exact 
 rules of propriety and the nice requisitions of etiquette. In 
 his person he was clean, and in his character he was pure, in 
 his life he was upright, and in his judicial administration he 
 was without reproach, though he did not always escape censure 
 from those who were adversely involved in his judicial decis- 
 ions. Physically he was of slender mold and delicate form, and 
 of thin features, and his visage was graced with intellectuality. 
 In politics he was an adherent of the Whig party. In religion 
 he adhered to Methodism, and was an active worker in his 
 Church, and he contributed liberally of his large means in the 
 support of the enterprises of Christianity. He maintained his 
 religion to the end of his pilgrimage. He died at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, March 4, 1866. 
 
 The Tombecbee Circuit from 1832 to 1845 had a membership 
 ranging from two hundred to five hundred white persons and 
 from one hundred to two hundred colored persons. The follow- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 571 
 
 ing preaching places were in the bounds of the Tombecbee Cir- 
 cuit for 1843, though Societies were not established at all of 
 them: Suggsville, Union, Coffeeville, Clarksvill©, Smith's, 
 Spinks's, Macon, Gilmore's, Dixon's School-house, Flat-top, Mc- 
 Intyre's, Moore's School-house, Horse Creek, Wilson's School- 
 house, Bear Creek, Lower Peach Tree, and Lewis's School- 
 house. Throughout the region embraced by these appoint- 
 ments there were from the first a number of active members, 
 though, of course, matters were in a feeble and scattered condi- 
 tion, or it would not have taken so large a country or so numer- 
 ous appointments as late as the date given here to make a pas- 
 toral charge. In addition to the persons elsewhere mentioned 
 may be named as active members in the early day Joshua Wil- 
 son, an exhorter, and the Eev. John Scarborough, a local preach- 
 er, and in the little later time, Mrs. Martha T. Kimbell and Mrs. 
 Finch, subsequently Mrs. Henderson. 
 
 Suggsville, named for a Mr. Suggs, was a village at an early- 
 day, and from the first of its existence a Methodist center. 
 Camp-meetings were held there possibly as early as 1817. 
 Bishop Enoch George was there exercising his Episcopal pre- 
 rogatives as early as 1819. Ira Portis, who died in 1825, and 
 who was the father of Solomon W. Portis and John W^. Portis, 
 settled there in 1818. A Sunday-school banner at Suggsville- 
 bears date 1823. It is not, however, certain that it was, strictly 
 or in any sense, a Methodist Sunday-school. 
 
 A very noted meeting was held at Suggsville in 1838. It was 
 the purpose to make of it a grand occasion. It was to begin as- 
 a Quarterly Meeting and then be protracted as occasion might 
 justify. A number of preachers, in addition to those who 
 would be officially connected with it and be charged with its 
 administration, were invited to attend. It commenced, accord- 
 ing to previous appointment, on Friday, the fast-day. The Rev. 
 Elisha Calloway, the presiding elder, was present during his al- 
 lotted time. On the afternoon of Saturday, the Rev. A. C. 
 Ramsey, the Rev. James King, the Rev. James Thompson, the 
 Rev. William McCracken, and the Rev. Thomas Burpo, the 
 preachers who had been engaged to attend the meeting, arrived. 
 Ramsey at that time was a member of the Alabama Conference, 
 and on the Cedar Creek Circuit, and King, Thompson, and Mc- 
 cracken were local preachers in that Circuit, and Burpo was a 
 37 
 
572 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 local preacher on the Bellville Circuit, and lived near the Ala- 
 bama Kiver on the opposite side from Suggsville. Brother 
 Burpo carried his family with him to that meeting. Burpo and 
 his family, conveyed in the family carriage, were attended by 
 the family nurse, a Negro girl, mounted on a horse. On arriv- 
 ing at the Church, which stood in the edge of the village, the 
 Negro girl dismounted and tied the horse to a h itching-post, 
 and when she was ordered to go to the house at which the 
 preacher and family were to be guests she, not being charged 
 with taking care of the horse, left him where she tied him. 
 The preachers and the family here mentioned all spent the 
 night at Brother John Chapman's, all comfortable and happy; 
 all were oblivious of the fact that Brother Burpo's horse on 
 which his servant had ridden was unstalled and iinfed. Sunday 
 morning, the morning for the Lovefeast, dawned, and about the 
 time of the rising of the sun. Brother Burpo sauntered out to 
 the lot and cast around to see what was the condition of his 
 horses. He discovered that the horse devoted to the use of the 
 servant-girl was missing. The girl was called up and interroga- 
 ted on the subject, and she divulged the fact that she, not know- 
 ing anything of the provision for taking care of the horse, had 
 left him where she tied him at the Church. Search was made 
 for the horse at the post where he was left the preceding after- 
 noon, but he was not there. Upon further search, however, the 
 horse was found where he had been carried by parties who were 
 evidently not moved by the omnipotence of grace. He teas 
 found in the Church, standing facing the pulpit, and tied secure- 
 ly to it, and a pair of spectacles made of pine-bark fitted to his 
 eyes and securely fastened on, aud the Bible spread open just in 
 front of him. The altar railings and fixtures, which were new, 
 and some new pews which were just about the altar had been 
 torn away and thrown out of the Church. No doubt those who 
 cast out altar railings and pews, and adjusted horse, pulpit, 
 Bible, and mock spectacles flattered themselves that there were 
 pastime and smartness in the performance, but there were rath- 
 er trespass, damage, indignity, and sacrilege. The horse was 
 taken out of the house of worship, put in his proper place, and 
 fed. A Council was called, and a decision reached in the case. 
 The decision was that the preachers should not make allusion 
 to the matter either in private or public. Till near the end of 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 573 
 
 the meeting the decision was scrupulously adhered to. The Rev. 
 John French, a local preacher who lived a few miles from Suggs- 
 ville, concluded that as the meeting was reaching its terminus si- 
 lence on the subject was no longer a virtue or a necessity. Two 
 young men in the community were suspected as the perpetrators 
 of the outrage, and they were in the congregation when Mr. 
 French delivered his opinion, and they received a public castiga- 
 tion, and just such a castigation as an incensed Irishman could 
 inflict. He said much which cannot and need not be reproduced 
 and put on record, but a part of his speech shall be given: " We 
 know who did that mischief. There you sit now. Poor, con- 
 temptible fellows, that you are, I do not know where you can go 
 to get clear of the disgrace which you have brought upon your- 
 selves, and which disgrace will follow you. You cannot stay 
 here, this community will not tolerate you, and you cannot go to 
 Texas, for I have just had a letter from there in which it is stat- 
 ed that house-breakers and burglars who go there from the 
 States are summarily hanged. Poor fellows, you will have to 
 run somewhere, if the good Lord does not kill you soon." Ac- 
 cording to tradition one of the young men supposed to be guilty 
 of the great folly did actually die in a short time, and the other 
 did really run away. Their names may pass to oblivion. It is 
 a fact that from the time of the beginning of Methodism in Al- 
 abama down to the middle of this century in many parts of the 
 State it was a common thing for lewd fellows of the baser sort 
 to annoy and damage church-goers by, under the cover of the 
 night while religious service was going on, cutting bridles and 
 saddles and harness, and disfiguring horses by shaving their 
 manes and tails, and taking off and hiding buggy wheels. Not- 
 withstanding the damage, inconvenience, annoyance, and hu- 
 miliation experienced from that sacrilegious performance of 
 putting a dumb brute in the sacred place, the meeting went on 
 with success, divine power and unction attended those who con- 
 ducted the services and good results were attained. Perhaps 
 Suggsville never had a better meeting in its history. 
 
 In October, 1843, Ramsey, Thompson, King, and Curry held 
 another protracted meeting at Suggsville which was good in re- 
 sults. 
 
 The Rev. Joel Rivers, a local preacher and a native of En- 
 gland, but from his youth a citizen of the now United States, 
 
574 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 moved from the town of Fayetteville, North Carolina, to Fort 
 Claiborne, Alabama, accompanied by his children, all then 
 grown, and purchased land, and, on it, at his own expense, in 
 1816, the lot being at Claiborne, erected a house of worship for 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church. The first Society at Clai- 
 borne, organized just prior to the erection of the house of wor- 
 ship there, consisted of the Kev. J.oel Kivers, Ehoda Eivers, his 
 wife, and a number of their children. If there were any others 
 it is not now known. In the after time and at an early day, the 
 Eev. James Thompson and his wife, Benjamin Lucus and Mrs. 
 Nancy Lucus, Mrs. Jane Blue, Andrew Tarlton and his wife, 
 William Woolworth and his wife, and Stephen Steele w^ere 
 members of that Society. Stephen Steele, in 1821, married 
 Elizabeth Rivers, the daughter of the Rev. Joel Rivers, and was 
 a Methodist at the town of Claiborne from 1825 till his death 
 in 1868, and was through all the years the chief supporter of the 
 Church at that place. When the first house of worship erected 
 there became inadequate to the purposes for which it was built, 
 it was superseded by a new and more commodious house which 
 was built by subscription, but was at last paid for by Stephen 
 Steele out of his own funds. The new house was built on the 
 lot on which stood the first one, and Brother Steele had in his 
 possession the deed thereto until the Federal troops destroyed 
 it, with other valuable papers, during the war between the 
 States. The home of Stephen Steele was the home of Metho- 
 dist preachers. Too much could not be said in praise of Ste- 
 phen Steele, the silversmith of Claiborne, Alabama. He was 
 the servant of the Church to which he belonged, and he was the 
 servant of the Master. He was a native of Vermont, and died 
 in his eighty-seventh year. His wife, who was a strong charac- 
 ter, survived him two years. They can never be forgotten 
 while the history of the town of Claiborne is remembered. 
 
 At the close of 1840 the members at Claiborne flattered them- 
 selves that they were able to take care of a preacher by them- 
 selves, and the place was made a Station, and the Rev. Francis 
 Asbury McShan was appointed to serve the charge for 1841, 
 and at the end of the year there were eighty-eight white and 
 seventv-five colored members in the Society. For 1842 and 
 1843 the Rev. John D. Lofton was in charge of Claiborne 
 Station, and at the end of the two years reported one hundred 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 575 
 
 and ten white and two hundred and fifty colored members be- 
 longing thereto. For 1844 Monroeville was joined with Clai- 
 borne, and Louis B. Hicks appointed thereto, and at the end of 
 the year there were at the two places one hundred and fifty- 
 seven white and two hundred and sixty-five colored members. 
 For 1845 Claiborne was again by itself with the Rev. James A. 
 Heard as preacher, and at the end of the year there were one 
 hundred and ten white and two hundred and twenty-one colored 
 members; and although the place was continued as a Station 
 for another year, that is the last time that Claiborne ever ap- 
 peared in the reports or the appointments. Since 1846 Clai- 
 borne has been one of the appointments in a Circuit. 
 
 There was no Methodist Church at Gosport prior to 1839, 
 and no regular preaching there for twenty years after that 
 Somewhere about 1839, two men, John Mackay and George 
 Cheny, who were Methodists, assisted by Samuel Forward, who 
 was not then a member of any Church, built, of rough logs, 
 a house for a place of worship, and in it they occasionally had 
 preaching. That house stood for twenty years. The Rev. Joseph 
 T. Curry, who was the junior preacher on the Tombigbee Cir- 
 cuit for 1843, preached at Gosport once that year. In his Jour- 
 nal for that year he makes the following significant entry: 
 "Sunday, August 13, preached at Gosport, text Joshua xxiv. 
 15, to a large congregation, but not very attentive among the 
 young; the want of Religious Education unfits man for the 
 company of a Christian community." In February, 1847, Sam- 
 uel Forward, of Gosport, joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, under the administration of the Rev. James L. Cotton, 
 and continued therein. 
 
 The town of Jackson, situate between Tombigbee River and 
 Bassett's Creek in Clarke County, was incorporated by Legisla- 
 tive enactment in 1816, and had a rapid growth, and attained 
 population and business which it could not retain, and decline 
 ensued. The social state and taste of that community did not 
 conduce to the introduction of Christianity under the auspices 
 of Methodism. The establishment of a Methodist Church at 
 that town was an innovation long delayed. It was 1842 when 
 a Methodist Society was organized and a place of worship was 
 improvised at that place. In that year Mrs. A. C. Taylor, 
 the wife of Walter Taylor, joined the Methodist Episcopal 
 
676 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Church, and she immediately had a dwelling-house moved to a 
 suitable lot, and such changes made in the building as was 
 necessary to adapt it to public worship, and furnished it with 
 pulpit and seats. She then induced the nearest itinerant 
 preacher she could find to take the place into his Circuit. On 
 Monday, once a month, the Circuit Rider, as he was then called, 
 preached in that house so promptly improvised by that zealous 
 Christian woman. So soon as the preacher opened an appoint- 
 ment at that place he organized a Society of three members, 
 and in a few weeks a good man and his wife moved to Jackson 
 and joined the Society, making the number five. The growth 
 was slow, but the increase was perceptible. In the Journal of 
 the Rev. Joseph T. Curry for 1843 is found the following state- 
 ment concerning Jackson: "Saturday, September 9: Two days 
 Meeting at Jackson. Preached from Isaiah iii. 10, 11. Con- 
 siderable feeling in the congregation. In the evening Brother 
 Calhoun preached. God poured out his Spirit. Eight persons 
 joined the Church. Sunday 10. Preached again from Isaiah 
 V. 4. Good feeling and attention. Evening Brother Calhoun 
 preached. Two other persons joined the Church. God, in 
 mercy, is visiting this place which has been so famous for 
 wickedness. May God help those who have started. Amen!" 
 
 Mrs. Taylor, the first avowed friend and active benefactor of 
 Methodism at the town of Jackson, Alabama, lived many years, 
 and rendered great service to the cause espoused; and through 
 all the years of her Christian pilgrimage she entertained pious 
 sentiments, cherished the sweets of religious experience, and 
 cherished the blissful anticipation that when the solitudes of 
 life were all passed, she would enter into the Palace of the 
 King Eternal. 
 
 Some time after Mrs. A. C. Taylor joined the Church, her 
 husband, Mr. Walter Taylor, attached himself to the same 
 Church, and was liberal in his support of the institutioas 
 thereof. He was born at Jackson, Alabama, in 1817, and in 
 1835 he was graduated with distinction from the Augusta Col- 
 lege, Kentucky, which College was under the auspices of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. He died in 1886. Mr. Walter 
 and Mrs. A. C. Taylor had eight children who grew to maturity 
 and became Methodists, and noted for piety and usefulness. 
 The family has been noted for intelligence, refinement, and use- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 577 
 
 fulness. From David Taylor, who settled at what is now Jack- 
 son as early as 1812, there sprang a numerous tribe; and many 
 of these descendants of that man have been and are Metho- 
 dists. At this date they are scattered abroad; some of them 
 are in Louisiana, and others of them are in Florida. 
 
Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 579 
 
 CHAPTEK XXYL 
 
 The Further Enlargement and Advancement of the 
 Work of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 AT Mobile there was, under the auspices of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, but one pastoral charge up to the 
 close of 184:0. During 1833 and 1834 there was, in addition 
 to the Mobile pastoral charge, which was served those two 
 years by the Kev. Eobert L. Walker, a Mobile Mission, but it 
 appears that that Mission was outside of Mobile and in the 
 country. In that period things in Mobile were neither sublime, 
 majestic nor assuring. The membership was comparatively 
 small in 1833, and in that time the Sunday-school received 
 damage even from its supposed friends. Brother AValker, 
 then the preacher in charge of the Church, writing to Brother 
 John H. Vincent, of Tuskaloosa, Alabama, a letter bearing date 
 Mobile, January 28, 1833, says: "Our Sabbath School here is 
 small, and has recently received a deadly stab through the 
 treacherous and hypocritical conduct of William P. Hill, of 
 whom you have heard. He was President and Secretary of the 
 Sabbath School, and had made considerable collections to pur- 
 chase books for the School. He had the money in hand (he 
 was also in possession of Missionary money of which I do not 
 wish you to speak), was considerably in debt, borrowed money, 
 and went to New Orleans about the last of December, and has 
 strangely disappeared, and the common opinion is now that he 
 has run away, and recent disclosures rather confirm the sus- 
 picion. This is dreadful, as it destroys public confidence, or at 
 least creates suspicion, etc." At the close of 1833 there were 
 reported eighty white and three hundred and fifty colored 
 members. At the close of the succeeding year and the end of 
 Brother Walker's term of service no statistical report was made 
 from the Alabama Conference for the General Minttes. 
 
 In 1833 the Kev. Kobert L. Walker married Miss Glorvina 
 Kennedy, a woman of great worth and solid piety. 
 
 The Kev. Kobert L. Walker was well qualified for and ad- 
 (573) 
 
 
 mirably adapted to the work of the Christian ministry. He 
 was by nature possessed of some of the qualities necessary for 
 the work of an overseer of the flock, but in that work, which is 
 higher than and separate from all secular occupations, it was 
 impossible to retain him. A few brief months after he had 
 married, and long before his second year of the ministerial 
 term as then fixed by the law of the Church was out at Mobile 
 he had determined to locate and engage in secular pursuits, and 
 had made declaration of his purpose and had perfected his 
 plans for the same. His friends who esteemed him and who 
 appreciated his worth in the ministry endeavored to dissuade 
 him from such course, but he deliberately and pertinaciously 
 adhered to his purpose. His warm and firmly attached friend, 
 John H. Vincent, then an active official member of the Church 
 at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, wrote him a kind and affectionate let- 
 ter strongly and earnestly advising him not to leave the pastoral 
 work for secular pursuits. He replied in a long letter to 
 Brother Vincent, in which he attempted to vindicate his course 
 in the premises. He was restive under the admonitions of his 
 friends, and somewhat tart in his answers to them. He rested 
 the defense of his course upon the ground that in the Alabama 
 Conference provision was not made for the ample support of a 
 preacher's family. In reply to Brother Vincent he said: "I 
 speak with reverence to God and charity to my brethren 
 and the world, but my conviction is, that so long as God is de- 
 pendent for the support of his ministers, upon such stewards 
 as we generally have, they will defeat his designs, and deprive 
 the Church of an experienced and well-disciplined ministry; in 
 which case, they and not the preachers will be answerable in the 
 great day." " I had rather meet savage life, in its wildest and 
 most loathsome forms with equality, than to live in the midst 
 of polished Society, with such disparity of circumstances, and 
 indifference to necessit^r as we sometimes see in our Church." 
 "The servant (or slave as Bishop Emory has it) who labors for 
 a Christian congregation has a right to expect that his and his 
 family's reasonable wants will be supplied. This is not done! 
 No, not in our Conference." At the close of 1834 he located, 
 and entered fully into business, independent of stewards and a 
 priest's stipends, and in the space of a dozen brief years he 
 drove to financial distress, not to say more. To have exchanged 
 
580 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 that financial heritage for a pastoral charge and a preacher's al- 
 lowance would have been a positive relief. He whom God calls 
 to preach would better abide the heavenly calling, and make 
 full proof his ministry. 
 
 The Kev. Eobert L. Kennon succeeded the Kev. Robert L. 
 Walker, at Mobile, and remained two years, and he was suc- 
 ceeded by the Rev. William Murrah, who remained two years, 
 and he was followed by the Rev. Jefferson Hamilton, who re- 
 mained two years, and that brought the close of 1840, at which 
 time there were in the charge two hundred and eighty-five 
 white and four hundred and fifty-nine colored members. The 
 following extract from a letter written by Dr. Kennon to 
 Brother Vincent, the letter bearing date Mobile, May 8, 1835, 
 will show the condition of things there at that time: " Few men 
 need the forgiveness of friends more than myself. I should 
 have written before this, but I have had my hands and heart 
 full. When I arrived here I found serious difficulties amongst 
 the members of the Church. They have after much perplexity 
 been adjusted by the expulsion of two members, but the effects 
 remain in jealousies, and heart-burnings, etc. The case was of 
 a scandalous character — a man and wife parting— and the 
 members had been split into parties. Notwithstanding, we have 
 some gracious times — congregations crowded, much weeping, 
 many penitents, and every week some convert— and yet, alas! 
 how many are inactive, and how vast the crowd pressing to 
 eternal death. The Presbyterians here are taking the lead of 
 us in zeal and effort. They have had a protracted meeting 
 which has been abundantly blessed. Their minister is a man 
 of great power of elocution, zealous, and pious." 
 
 For 1841 there were three charges in Mobile, named as follows: 
 
 First charge, Thomas H. Capers. 
 
 Second charge, Seymour B. Sawyer. 
 
 Seaman's Mission, to be supplied. 
 
 At the close of the year First charge had three hundred and 
 fifty white and five hundred and ninety colored members, and 
 the Second charge had one hundred and fifteen white members. 
 The Seaman's Mission did not yield anything for that year. 
 The next year the appointments were: 
 
 Franklin Street, Thomas H. Capers. 
 
 Jackson Street, Jesse Boring. 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 581 
 
 For 1843 the appointments were: 
 
 Franklin Street and West Ward, L. Pierce, J. C. Keener. 
 
 Saint Francis Street, Jefferson Hamilton. 
 
 African Church, to be supplied. 
 
 The next year the appointments were: 
 
 Franklin Street, Giles P. Sparks. 
 
 Saint Francis Street, Jefferson Hamilton. 
 
 West Ward, John D. Lofton. • 
 
 African Church, to be supplied. 
 
 For 1845 the appointments were: 
 
 Saint Michael Street and Saint Michael Street colored charge^ 
 J. T. Heard, O. R. Blue. 
 
 Saint Francis Street, T. W. Dorman. 
 
 West Ward, T. Y. Ramsey. 
 
 German Mission, George Rottenstien. 
 
 In February, 1843, revival influence fell upon Mobile, and 
 about one hundred and fifty souls were converted and added to 
 the Church there. 
 
 Under the ministry of Dr. R. L. Kennon the Franklin Street 
 house of worship was enlarged and improved; lecture-room and 
 class-rooms were added. 
 
 In 1841 was organized what has been known as Saint Fran-^ 
 cis Street Church. At first it worshiped in a house belong- 
 ing to another denomination. The membership was at first 
 small, but continued to grow. Its first class was constituted 
 of members from Franklin Street Church. West Ward com- 
 menced in a Sunday-school inaugurated in that part of the- 
 
 city. 
 
 There was a " Female Missionary Society of Mobile," and 
 subsequently a " Children's Missionary Society " was organized. 
 Some time not earlier than 1833 a squad of Choctaw Indians 
 tarried for the time near Gainesville on the Tombigbee River in 
 Alabama. A white woiiian going up town on that errand pecul- 
 iar to women, shopping, came up with a number of Indian boys, 
 and she engaged them for a short while in conversation. She 
 said to one boy who attracted her attention that she would re- 
 turn that way in a short while, and that if he would go and live 
 with her she would teach him to read and write. She went her 
 way, made her purchases, and returned to her home along the 
 route she passed to town, and she found the boy waiting for 
 
582 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 her, and eager to be taught the customs of the paleface nation. 
 She took him to her home. The boy's name was Dixon W. Lewis. 
 How he got his name cannot be deposed to in this place, and now. 
 He was immediately pat under tuition. His body was washed and 
 clothed, and his hair trimmed and combed. A'child of the forest, 
 he had, first of all, to be taught, and had to learn, how to wear 
 clothes, sit on chairs, sleep in beds, and eat with knives and forks, 
 etc. When it was deinonstrated that he was going to remain and 
 conform to civil habits he was put to the study of letters. He 
 learned rapidly, and was sent to the village School. In the 
 course of events the family of which he had become a member 
 moved to Mobile, Alabama. The mother of the family was a 
 Methodist. She united with the Franklin Street Church, and 
 put her children and the Indian boy, who was then about nine- 
 teen years old, in the Sunday-school. Of course, the Indian 
 attracted attention. With facility he acquired a knowledge of 
 the Catechism. The Missionary Societies already named took 
 him under tuition, and resolved to educate him and qualify him 
 to be a Missionary to his own people. His education was com- 
 pleted and he was licensed to preach, and at the session of the 
 Alabama Conference held at Mobile, beginning February 28, 
 1846, he was admitted into the Conference on trial. For that 
 year he was in the very land of hik nativity on the Lauderdale 
 Circuit in the Gainesville District. At the end of 1846 he 
 was transferred from the Alabama Conference to the Indian 
 Mission Conference, and went from the land of his birth and 
 the home of his youth to the country assigned his people west 
 of the Mississippi Kiver. In November, 1847, having been two 
 ecclesiastical years on trial in the traveling connection, one 
 year in the Alabama Conference and one year in the Indian 
 Mission Conference, he was received into [full connection in 
 ihe Indian Mission Conference, and ordained deacon. In due 
 course and upon opportuuity he was ordained elder. To his 
 own nation in their land beyond the Mississippi Kiver he 
 preached the everlasting gospel. He continued a member of 
 the Indian Mission Conference and in the effective work of the 
 ministry till his end came. He died of pneumonia in 1857. 
 He was calm and peaceful in his death. He was a man of abil- 
 ity. For 1854 he was left without a regular pastoral charge in 
 view of his making certain translations into Choctaw. He was 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 683. 
 
 an able preacher, a wise counselor, and a man of influence in. 
 the adjustment of the affairs of his people. 
 
 During the fourth decade of this century Mobile more than, 
 thribbled its population, and during the period from' 1832 to 
 1845 the Methodist Episcopal Church in that place was in- 
 creased in its numbers and improved in its general resources 
 by immigration. In 1835 Mrs. Emily S. Dubose, a woman of 
 kind disposition, consecrated life, and who gave much alms to 
 the poor, moved to Mobile, and, carrying with her a certificate 
 of her membership, became a member of the Society there. 
 She continued a member in Mobile tQl 1848, when she was 
 transferred to that city which hath foundations, whose builder 
 and maker is God. 
 
 About the time or a little after the coming of Mrs. Dubose to 
 Mobile, three noted members from Augusta, Georgia, by au- 
 thority of their certificates of membership, attached themselves 
 to the Methodist Episcopal Church in Mobile. They were Ma- 
 jor Franklin C. Heard, his wife, Mrs. Ann M. Heard, and Mrs. 
 Emily W. Woolsey. Mrs. Heard lived but a short time after 
 moving to Mobile. Major Heard had membership there more 
 than a dozen years. He died in Mobile about the middle of 
 this century. All the time he was in Mobile he filled official 
 position in the Church; most of the time he was class leader, an 
 office for which, by his steady faith, strong emotions, and holy 
 impulses, he was eminently fitted. In his case the work of con- 
 viction, repentance, and regeneration was of rapid process and 
 short duration. While Dr. Lovick Pierce preached on the text: 
 "And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: there- 
 fore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn 
 down, and cast into the fire," Major Heard, with hat in hand, 
 stood in the aisle of the church, near the door, and listened 
 with marked attention. When penitents were called he went 
 forward in great haste,^ and fell down on his knees at the altar, 
 and cried aloud, and in a few minutes he experienced the peace 
 incident upon justification and regeneration. His wife, who was 
 a penitent at his side, was renewed at the same hour. All this oc- 
 curred at Greenesborough, Georgia, in 1827. At that time Ma- 
 jor Heard lived at Augusta, Georgia, but he with his family was 
 on a visit to old friends at Greenesborough, where formerly he- 
 had lived. The Sunday after he had received a change of heart 
 
584 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 he with his wife and three children was baptized, and he and his 
 wife were received into the Church. That was literally the begin- 
 ning of a new life in that family. Previous to that time Major 
 Heard had been a man of the world, and had delighted in and 
 participated in the prevailing sports of that time and country. 
 
 The life of one of the individuals here named in the consum- 
 mation of its aggregated incidents, its real events, involves all 
 the phases of sentiment, and contains material which would 
 adorn and enrich a book of romance. To endow a man with 
 prescience would be to him a positive evil. The capacity to 
 prognosticate one's own future would be a positive disqualifica- 
 tion for life's duties. A pre-exhibition of one's own life and 
 destiny would be overwhelming and repulsive. One would re- 
 pudiate his own best conduct could he see in advance its final 
 result. Mrs. Emily W. Woolsey, nee Sims, is the member of the 
 Church whose life was so romantic. At one time there lived in 
 Augusta, Georgia, the Rev. James O. Andrew, then preacher in 
 charge of the Methodist Episcopal Church there, and his wife, 
 Mrs. Anne Amelia Andrew, Mr. A. B. Woolsey and his wife, Mrs. 
 Emily W. Woolsey, Major Franklin C. Heard and his wife, Mrs. 
 Ann M. Heard. These at that time were neighbors and friends, 
 and all, except Mr. Woolsey, were members of the same Church. 
 These women here named, each presiding at the time in her 
 own household, were warm and intimate friends. About the 
 same time and after these persons all lived in Augusta, Georgia, 
 Mr. George Childers and his wife, Betsy Childers, were zealous 
 members of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Childers's Chap- 
 el, near what was afterward called Summerfield, Alabama. Soon 
 after moving to Mobile, Alabama, Mrs. Heard died, and in a short 
 while Mr. Woolsey died. In the on-going of time Major Heard 
 and Mrs. Woolsey married. In the lapse of years Major Heard 
 died, and Mrs. Betsy Childers died also. Mrs. Emily W. Heard 
 after the death of Major Heard moved to Summerfield, Ala- 
 bama, and in the events of passing years Mr. George Childers 
 and she married. Some time after this marriage Mr. and Mrs. 
 Childers were on a visit to Mobile, and Mr. Childers died there. 
 In the succession of days Mrs. Anne Amelia Andrew died in 
 in the springtime of 1842; and Mrs. Leonoro Andrew, the wom- 
 an whom Bishop Andrew married in the early part 1844, died 
 about the first of June, 1854. About six months after the death 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 585 
 
 of the second Mrs. Andrew, the Bishop and Mrs. Childers, with 
 due consideration and genuine sentiment, became man and wife, 
 taking each the other for better for worse. They had experience 
 and were not afraid of a leap in the dark. They took no risk. 
 They endangered no one's happiness. Bishop Andrew died 
 March 1, 1871, and last of all the woman, Mrs. Emily W. An- 
 drew, died also, having had, in perfect accord with the law and 
 the gospel, four worthy husbands, all four of whom died in Mo- 
 bile, Alabama, and two of whom had been the husbands of two 
 of her dearest friends. This woman so well and repeatedly mar- 
 ried was a woman of great energy, of sound judgment, of good 
 manners, of elegant bearing, of deep piety, and of rich expe- 
 rience in divine things. 
 
 There was considerable prosperity in the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church in the city of Montgomery, Alabama, during the 
 year 1833, when the Bev. W. K H. Mosley had charge of the 
 Station. The congregation was enlarged and the membership 
 increased, and that called for larger room and more extensive 
 outlays. There were at the close of that year one hundred 
 and seventy white and one hundred and thirty-two colored 
 members. At the beginning of the next year, when the Rev. 
 Seymour B. Sawyer w^as again in charge of the Station, a larger 
 house of worship was imperatively demanded for the use of the 
 congregation, and the erection of such house was undertaken. 
 The work was inaugurated in the presence of overwhelming 
 difficulties. The members of that Society were poor, and in the 
 city there was a money stringency seldom equaled. There was 
 obtained in money and materials a subscription which aggrega- 
 ted eight hundred dollars. One thousand dollars were borrowed 
 from J. B. Leavens, of Mobile, Alabama, and with that limited 
 provision for the entire work, in the month of March of that 
 year, a contract was consummated for the erection of a house 
 of worship adequate to the demands of the congregation. In 
 about one year from the time the contract was made the house 
 stipulated for was completed, and formally dedicated to divine 
 worship. Alas! there was a debt incurred, and not provid- 
 ed for, which nearly destroyed the Society. From the time 
 the enterprise was inaugurated till the debt was finally dis- 
 posed of, the Society declined. Whereas, there were at the 
 incipiency of the work of building one hundred and seventy 
 
586 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 white and one hundred and thirty-two colored members, at th9 
 close of 1838 there were forty-nine white and eighty-four col- 
 ored members belonging to the Society. After about live yeaj-s 
 of burden and menace, Mr. Neil Blue, in his own person and by 
 his own means, at great inconvenience to himself and at great 
 hazard to his financial affairs, relieved the Church of the debt. 
 That house was built on the site where stood that notorious 
 Union house, and on the lot where yet stands the Court Street 
 Church. That house was of wood, and was sixty feet long ajid 
 forty-five feet wide and had an extensive gallery, which gallery 
 was generally occupied by the Negroes. In 1839, after that 
 debt was assumed by Brother Blue, glorious things were 
 wrought in that house, and the Highest himself established the 
 work. The Rev. Wiley W. Thomas was that year in charge of 
 the Station, and there was a grand ingathering, though the 
 number had at the beginning of the work for the erection of 
 the new Church was not reached. The increase that year went 
 from forty-nine white members to one hundred and thirty-four 
 white members, and from eighty-four colored members to one 
 hundred and twelve colored members. In that revival in Oc- 
 tober of that year, Oliver Rufus Blue, the son of the man who 
 had disposed of the debt, was, to use his own words, " born 
 again." He afterward preached in that house, and adminis- 
 tered the affairs of that Society. He was licensed to preach 
 there October 12, 1843. From 1839 to the close of 1845, there 
 was, except about two years, a steady increase in the number 
 of members, though not until the latter part of 1845 was the 
 number of members equal to the number had at the beginning 
 of the work of erecting the new Church. Then the member- 
 ship reached the number of two hundred and twelve white and 
 three hundred and twenty-five colored members. During 1845, 
 under the ministry of the Rev. Jefferson Hamilton, D.D., and 
 the Rev. William B. Neal, the former in charge of the Station 
 and the latter in charge of the District, there was a most 
 remarkable work of divine grace in the city of Montgomery. On 
 July 19, of that year, began, in the house of worship of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church in the city of Montgomery, the 
 Second Quarterly Meeting for that ecclesiastical year. The en- 
 vironment was propitious, the correlation of forces was con- 
 ducive to the success of the divine cause. The preachers 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 587 
 
 proclaimed the word of God, asserted the truth of the gospel, 
 and testified to the power thereof, the Holy Ghost attended 
 with unction and power, Christians were tilled with radiance, 
 sinners were attracted and convicted, the interest in the sub- 
 ject of religion became intense, and the meeting went on and 
 the work continued for three months or more without inter- 
 mission or cessation. About two hundred and thirty persons 
 professed the attainment of divine renewal, and the Churches 
 of all denominations in the city received accessions therefrom. 
 One hundred and ten were added to the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. The influence of that meeting swept out over all the 
 region round about. Wetumpka received the influence and felt 
 
 the power. 
 
 T. L. Brothers and R. Jones were official members of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church in Montgomery during the time 
 now in consideration. Mrs. Nancy Gilmer, nee Marks, a native 
 of North Carolina, after living in Virginia and Georgia, and 
 joining the Church in Georgia, moved to Montgomery, Ala- 
 bama, in 1829, and resided there till her death in May, 1845. 
 Through all the time she resided there she was a member of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. She was never carried about 
 with visionary things, but was a steady, prayerful, devout, and 
 active Christian. She was equal to almost any emergency, and 
 she surmounted the most formidable difficulties. She was fond 
 of the institutions of Methodism, and in Class-meetings con- 
 stantly testified of the saving power of Jesus and the glorious 
 grace of God. Her husband was brought to God in the glorious 
 revival in Montgomery, in 1839, and some of her children were 
 made partakers of the divine grace in the great revival of 1845. 
 In the transition to the great beyond she was tranquil and tri- 
 umphant. Mrs. Rosana Flowers was a member of the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church in Montgomery from 1832 to 1845. She 
 died in the last named year. She was strongly attached to the 
 doctrines and discipline of the Church with which she was affil- 
 iated. She at last entered upon ineffable joys and infinite de- 
 lights. 
 
 Wetumpka was for many years one of the appointments on 
 the Alabama Circuit, but at the session of the Alabama Confer- 
 ence in January, 1837, it was set off to itself as a Station, and a 
 preacher appointed to it for that year. Since that time We- 
 38 
 
588 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 tnmpka has been a Station. The Rev. "Ward Bulla rd was the first 
 preacher appointed to Wetumpka Station. He had just been 
 admitted on trial in the Conference, and at the end of the year 
 there was a deficiency of one hundred and fifteen dollars on his 
 annual allowance, which was paid to him from the fund which 
 was provided to make up the deficiencies of those who did not 
 obtain their regular allowance on the pastoral charges, and he 
 discontinued. One vear sufficed for his trial of the itinerant 
 ministry. He was from the north. The first statistical rej^ort 
 made for Wetumpka gave it fifty-five white and fifteen colored 
 members. The house of worship was on the west side of the 
 Coosa River, and in the northern suburbs of the town, and was 
 a little frame building. Somewhere about 1843 that building 
 was abandoned and a wooden building was erected near where 
 has since stood a brick Church, which in its turn superseded all 
 the others. As late as 1841 the Church at Wetumpka was con- 
 sidered too poor to give an adequate support to a preacher; and 
 the preacher stationed there that year and his wife had to teach 
 for a livelihood, and had to rent the house in which they lived, 
 and do all the domestic work of the house in order to meet the 
 necessities of the case. In the absence of records it is impos- 
 sible to ascertain who were the members in the first years of 
 Wetumpka as a Station. It seems that David C. Neal, a 
 brother of the Rev. William B. Neal, who joined the Church, 
 perhaps in Georgia^ moved to Wetumpka just in advance of 
 the making it a Station, and his wife, Martha A. Neal, joined 
 there in 1842 or 1843. 
 
 The preachers who served the W^etumpka Station from the 
 beginning of 1838 to the close of 1845 were: the Rev. Andrew 
 P. Harris, the Rev. Zaccheus Dowling, the Rev. Jeremiah Wil- 
 liams, the Rev. Abram B. Elliott, each one year, the Rev. Sey- 
 mour B. Sawyer, two years in succession, the Rev. Samuel Arm- 
 strong, the Rev. J. P. Perham, and all in the order here named. 
 At the close of 1845 the Church at Wetumpka numbered one 
 hundred and forty-five white and one hundred and twenty-four 
 colored members, and the congregation worshiped in a new 
 Church, an ordinary wooden building. 
 
 Several of the preachers of the Alabama Conference located 
 at the close of 1835, among whom were the Rev. Newitt Drew 
 and the Rev. Hazlewood B. Parish. They had both married 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 589 
 
 within the last two or three years. The plea of providing for 
 the household was the plea made by both these men for lo- 
 cating. 
 
 The Rev. Newitt Drew married the daughter of Brother 
 Alexander Henderson, who lived near Mount Pleasant, Monroe 
 County, and for whom Henderson's Church was named. Drew 
 bought him a place near his father-in-law, and engaged in 
 farming, but did no big things at it. He was a man of shabby 
 style, and penurious in his investments. In a penurious way 
 he accumulated some property. He was a man of moderate 
 talents, and limited attainments, a fair preacher, and a fervent 
 exhorter. He had some trouble with a School Teacher, who 
 killed him. For reasons he took his children from School, and 
 some hot words passed between him and the teacher. The next 
 day after that occurrence Drew, with others, went to the Church 
 to set things in order for an approaching Quarterly Meeting. 
 The aforesaid teacher approached him where he was at work, 
 and struck him with a piece of wood on the head. Drew never 
 spoke after he was hit with the piece of wood, and in about 
 seven hours he died. That was August 21, 1849. He held the 
 relation of a local elder at the time of his death. There we're 
 eight children in the house, one being born a few hours after 
 his death. 
 
 The Rev. Hazlewood B. Parish married the daughter of one 
 Brother Williams, and after his location he went to merchandis- 
 ing with his father-in-law at Allenton, Wilcox County, and soon 
 bankrupted, and he and his father-in-law were ever after insol- 
 vent. After his failure in merchandising he took up the prac- 
 tice of medicine, following the Thomson ian School. For many 
 years he lived where he died, near Gravely Creek and not far 
 from Black's Bluff, in Wilcox County. By constant application 
 to the administration of^ medicine, and by horse-swapping he 
 managed to maintain a large family. There were somewhere 
 about a dozen children in the family. One of the daughters 
 married the Rev. Daniel T. Mellard, who was once a member of 
 the Alabama Conference, and who was the son of the Rev. James 
 H. Mellard. Another daughter married the Rev. Neil Gillis, 
 also a member of the Alabama Conference. The Rev. H. B. 
 Farish was a man of extraordinary talents. He had fine gifts 
 as a preacher. He was a ready speaker, fluent, and ornate. 
 
590 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Had he continued in the itinerant ministry it would have been 
 well for him and the Church. As it was, he buried his talents, 
 neglected his gifts, and achieved but little. He was a local eld- 
 er to the day of his death, but for many years he preached but 
 seldom, and only on special occasions, such as funerals. The 
 congregations were always delighted to have him preach. The 
 only complaint made about his preaching was that he did not 
 preach enough. 
 
 The Alabama Conference at its session at Tuskaloosa, in Jan- 
 uary, 1840, granted the Rev. A. C. Ramsey a location, and held 
 memorial services for the Rev. R. G. Christopher, M.D., who 
 had died the preceding October. 
 
 The Rev. Abiezer Clarke Ramsey was admitted on trial in the 
 Alabama Conference at the time of its organization, and now 
 after seven years' work he is granted a location at the same place 
 at which he was received. From that day forth he was a local 
 elder. He was of slender mold, and had been all his life afflicted 
 with asthma. He was the picture of feebleness, and all who 
 knew his constant conflict with asthma supposed that in a brief 
 while he would be beyond the grave, but contrary to all appear- 
 ance and all expectation he lived more than half a century after 
 he located. Most of those years he spent in Wilcox County, Ala- 
 bama, although quite a while he resided at Gadsden, Alabama. 
 For forty or more years he filled the responsible office of stew- 
 ard in the Church as well as that of local elder. He did much 
 service both as a preacher and a steward. He kept open house 
 for many, many years. He engaged his strength and gave his 
 means to the Church. He was twice married. First, he mar- 
 ried Mrs. Elizabeth Amanda Bonham; second time he married 
 Miss Jane Hearn, the daughter of the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn. 
 His last wife preceded him to the grave a few years. His first 
 wife died in 1854 He died himself at the house of his son-in- 
 law, Mr. Joseph Benson, at Forest Home, Butler County, Ala- 
 bama, January 23, 1891. 
 
 Near Boyd's Ferry, on Dan River, in Halifax County, Virginia, 
 there lived in profound obscurity and in extreme poverty a man' 
 and his wife bearing the name of Christopher. On October 10, 
 1787, there was born at that place to that man and his wife a 
 son to whom was given the name of Ralph Griffin. Some ten 
 or a dozen years after the advent of that son the family moved 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 591 
 
 to Rutherford County, North Carolina, where, in a brief time, 
 the w4fe of the man and the mother of the child died. In a 
 short while after that, to the family, sad event, those of them 
 left, moved to Abbeville District, South Carolina. The father 
 of that household was an adherent of the Protestant Episcopal 
 Church, and against the Methodists he entertained inveterate 
 prejudice, and while he gave his children but little training 
 and scarcely any instruction in anything, he did succeed in im- 
 parting to them his prejudice against the Methodists. Ralph 
 Griffin Christopher knew nothing of the Methodists, except his 
 detestation of them, but some time during the two years, the 
 years 1805 and 1806, the Rev. Britton Capel was the presiding 
 elder of the Seleuda District, South Carolina Conference, he 
 visited a Camp-meeting on Corwaxwee Creek where he heard 
 the Rev. Britton Capel preach and was convicted, but he with- 
 stood the influence and wore out the impression. The next year 
 after his attendance at that Camp-meeting he moved to Greene 
 County, Georgia. He was still wicked. In 1808, though he did 
 not know anything about praying in secret, he, for the first time 
 in his life, kneeled to pray, and in that condition he went to an 
 altar to be prayed for. At a meeting at Burke's Camp-ground, 
 in Greene County, Georgia, he went to the altar as a mourner, 
 and at midnight of the Sunday of the Camp-meeting he was 
 renewed, and shouted for joy. He had present a friend, one 
 AVilliam Lurapkins, who helped him and rejoiced with him. He 
 had now reached his majority, and in 1809, under the ministry 
 of the Rev. Hilliard Judge, and in the bounds of Greene County, 
 Georgia, and in the bounds of the Appalachee Circuit, South 
 Carolina Conference, he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 In 1810 he was licensed to preach. At the time of his conver- 
 sion he did not know his alphabet. A few days after regenera- 
 ting power had attuned his heart to the melody of religion and the 
 love of God he felt that a commission to proclaim the gospel to 
 mankind was given to him, and this notwithstanding he knew 
 not a letter in any human language. He was as ignorant as it 
 was possible for one to be at twenty years of age in a civilized 
 land, but he greatly desired to be able to read and write. About 
 the close of 1810 and the beginning of 1811 he went to school 
 two months to a Methodist preacher. That was the number of 
 his school days, and the sum of his literary training. His 
 
592 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 further attainments he made by his own exertions. Though un- 
 der the disabilities of poverty, obsaurity, and ignorance, on a 
 July day in 1811 he left home and secular affairs and joined and 
 traveled with the Rev. Samuel M. Meek on the Appalachee Cir- 
 cuit. He had only one advantage. He had no wealth to for- 
 sake nor fame to forego. He was already inured to hardship 
 and want. At the session of the South Carolina Conference 
 held at Camden, South Carolina^ December 21-27, 1811, that 
 rude and untutored young man was received on trial in the itin- 
 erancy, and appointed for the next year to the Great Pee Dee 
 Circuit as the third preacher. Strange as it may seem, he ad- 
 vanced to the offices of the ministry in the time prescribed by 
 the Discipline, and the third year was stationed at Fayetteville, 
 North Carolina, and for the fifth year at Charleston, South Car- 
 olina. Having been for nine years or more in the laborious 
 work of the regular ministry, in January, 1821, he located. In 
 November, 1830, he was re-admitted to the Alabama Conference 
 and remained a member thereof till his death October 13, 1839. 
 Three years of the tiaie he was presiding elder. Poverty and 
 affliction were his heritage to the end, but he attained promi- 
 nence and usefulness in the ministry. He was free from ambi- 
 tion and avarice, and he did not engage in the ignoble strife of 
 being accounted tbe greatest among his fellows, nor heaping a 
 little shining dust, which might be called wealth, but he en- 
 gaged in laudable efforts to do good and be useful, and while he 
 entered the arena and went into the battle of life under great 
 disabilities, he was supported in the train of his efforts, and as 
 he w^ent on the field of his operations expanded as his intelli- 
 gence increased, and from his history may be learned how much 
 can be achieved, even under disadvantages, by application, en- 
 ergy, industry, and piety. His posterity still honor Methodism. 
 
 During 1841 four preachers, members of the Alabama Con- 
 ference, the Rev. Daniel Monaghon, the Rev. James M. Boat- 
 wright, the Rev. Noah Laney, and the Rev. Wilson Moore, 
 went hence to their reward. 
 
 The Rev. Daniel Monaghon was a veteran in the service, 
 and about twenty-two years of his ministry were spent in Ala- 
 bama, and whether he was in the local or the itinerant ranks he 
 was always active and efficient. He attained in his heart and 
 maintained in his life Christian perfection. His personal char- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work, 593 
 
 acteristics were prominent. He was an original preacher, an 
 impassioned speaker, and though quaint, he was felicitous in 
 his utterances and illustrations. On March 20, 1841, death 
 seized his mortal frame, and his spirit took up abode in the 
 goodly bowers which be along the banks of the river of life. 
 
 The Rev. James M, Boatwright did a little less than three 
 years' work in Alabama, coming to the State from the North 
 Carolina Conference in the first part of 1839, and dying July 5, 
 1841. It seems that he died at Gainesville, Alabama. He 
 commenced his ministry in the Virginia Conference. He was 
 of sweet spirit, pleasant manners, unpretentious bearing, and 
 was pious and zealous. When the hour of dissolution came it 
 brought no terror and he died in calm assurance of going to 
 bis Father's Kingdom. 
 
 The Rev. Noah Laney was a native of North Carolina and 
 was born the first year of this century. He did but little work 
 in x^ilabama. He was a member of the South Carolina Confer- 
 ence and then of the Georgia Conference. For 1840 he, in the 
 capacity of a local preacher, supplied the Circuit contiguous to 
 his home, and for 1841, having been re-admitted to the travel- 
 ing connection in the Alabama»Conference, he was made pre- 
 siding elder of the Irwinton District, and on July 10, of that 
 year, he died. He died with the assurance: " Christ is the rock 
 of my salvation." 
 
 Marianna Station lost both the presiding elder and the 
 preacher in charge by death in 1841. Laney, the presiding 
 elder, died, as above stated, and the Rev. Wilson Moore, the 
 preacher at Marianna, Florida, for that year, died of congestive 
 fever in the month of September, of that year, being about 
 twenty-six years old. He was a young man of power and 
 promise. He attained regeneration and joined the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church at jGainesville, Alabama, in October, 1838. 
 He was admitted into the Alabama Conference on trial in Jan- 
 uary, 1839. His career was brief, and his end triumphant. In 
 the conflict with death the Rev. AVilson Moore shouted: "The 
 Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge." 
 
 The Rev. Abram B. Elliott located in December, 1843. That 
 terminated his itinerant ministry. He was admitted on trial in 
 the Georgia Conference, at Macon, Georgia, January 7, 1831, 
 with A. H. Mitchell, William C. Crawford, Willis D. Matthews, 
 
594 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 all of whom have worked in Alabama. Brother Elliott died at 
 Leeds, Alabama. He was a local preacher till the end came. 
 He was a man of good ability. He was an enormous eater and 
 a great sleeper. He could sit down in Church and go to sleep 
 before the preacher could reach the announcement of his text. 
 He was a tall man, with black eyes and an intellectual face. 
 
 At the session of the Alabama Conference at AVetumpka, 
 Alabama, February 26, March 5, 1845, the Kev. James O. Wil- 
 liams located, and the Eev. Seymour B. Sawyer and others 
 were reported as having died during the then closing ecclesias- 
 tical vear. 
 
 The Kev. James O. Williams was of obscure origin. The 
 home where resided the family of which he was a member and 
 from whence he departed when he entered upon the work of an 
 itinerant preacher was near Somerville, Morgan County, Ala- 
 bama. It has been said he "was born near the town of Somer- 
 ville, Morgan County," but if that statement be true he must 
 have been born among the Indians, and in a land where still 
 prevailed savage laws and barbarous customs, for, evidently, 
 he was born before the territory embraced in Morgan County 
 was ceded to the United States by the Cherokee tribe of In- 
 dians. He was admitted on trial in the Tennessee Conference 
 in November, 1831; at the end of two years he was admitted 
 into full connection, ordained deacon, and located. Upon 
 locating he entered La Grange College as a student, and gradu- 
 ated from that College in 1836, and in the latter part of that 
 year he was re-admitted into the Tennessee Conference. In 
 the latter part of 1839 he was transferred to the Alabama Con- 
 ference. For 1840 he was junior preacher at Livingston and 
 Demopolis, and the next year he was in charge of that appoint- 
 ment. For 1842 he was at Gainesville and Jamestown, and for 
 the next year he was at Sumterville, and the next year to that, 
 and which was the last with him, he was at Brush Creek. 
 
 The Kev. K. H. Kivers, D.D., who knew him well, gives the 
 following description of him: "He was five feet eight or nine 
 inches in height. His neck was slightly awry, so that in walk- 
 ing he seemed to be looking in one direction and going in a 
 different one. His eyes were set deep in his head, and were 
 utterly inexplicable in their expression. They were overarched 
 by a pair of thick, heavy eyebrows, unbroken by any interval in 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 595 
 
 the center. His hair was coarse and rough, and stood up like 
 bristles. His forehead was high but narrow, and seemed to 
 converge nearly to a point at the top of his head. His com- 
 plexion was sallow and his countenance bloodless." 
 
 The friends of his youth considered James O. AVilliams a 
 youth of superior intellectual faculties, and thought him pos- 
 sessed of extraordinary gifts of oratory. The beginning of his 
 ministry was thought prophetic of future eminence and useful- 
 ness. Alas! the expectations created at the incipiency of his 
 ministry were never realized. 
 
 In form and feature he was abnormal, in soul he was erratic, 
 as a whole he was anomalous. In the very mold and elements 
 of his being he was fitted to devious paths, and by the very 
 laws of his constitution he was incapable of any but a devious 
 course. Dr. Kivers says : " His education was never sym- 
 metrical or thorough. It was like himself, irregular and inde- 
 scribable." He made improper alliances, subjected himself to 
 suspicions, fell into serious troubles, and fell under grave 
 charges, annoyed the Church, retired under a cloud, and is re- 
 membered for his eccentricities, and the stigmas which were 
 sought to be fastened upon him. He was tried in the Church 
 for numerous offenses, offenses of all grades from imprudent 
 conduct to gross immoralities. He was tried in the courts of 
 the Church, vigorously prosecuted, and ably defended. He 
 was acquitted of every charge brought in due form against him 
 before the tribunals of the Church, except, perhaps, the charge 
 of " carrying concealed weapons," and in that he justified him- 
 self on the plea of self-defense. 
 
 A fatal mistake was made in the case of James O. AMlliams 
 which he himself did not make. The authorities who had in 
 charge the interests of the Church before whom his case was 
 brought for a license to>preach made the blunder out of which 
 came all the blunders which followed in the case. The authori- 
 ties should have exercised the gift of discernment, and should 
 have been guided by the Scriptures and by the wisdom of a 
 divine administration, and if they had thus exercised thWiiiselves 
 and been thus guided in the affair they w^ould have sent the 
 man to the plow and not to the pulpit. The Scriptures clearly 
 teach, see Leviticus xxi. 17-27, that to put forward a man to ad- 
 minister the offerings of the sanctuary who is disabled by de- 
 
596 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 formities, or superfluities, or blemishes, is to profane the Sanc- 
 tuary which the Lord intends to be sanctified and kept holy. 
 That man Williams was put into a position for which, by the 
 very construction of his being, he was wholly disqualified^ and 
 the Church, at last, paid the penalty of the folly committed. It 
 did not require anything more than sound judgment and com- 
 mon discernment to see that he would, if put into the ministry, 
 drive to folly and end in shame. Dr. Eivers says: "Possibly, if 
 he had never gone to College, it would have been better." It 
 would have been infinitely better for him and the Church had 
 he never been put into the ministry. After he located he 
 studied law, and about six years after his location he died of 
 yellow fever, on a Steamer, which at the time was lying at Tus- 
 cahoma on the Tombigbee River, and near that place he was 
 buried. 
 
 The Eev. Seymour B. Sawyer, a native of North Carolina, 
 was born December 8, 1808. The family emigrated to Indiana, 
 where, when he was between twelve and thirteen years old, 
 Seymour B. was renewed by divine grace. He joined the 
 Cumberland Presbyterian Church, and when he was between 
 eighteen and nineteen years of age he was licensed to preach 
 in that Church, but, dissenting from some of the doctrines of 
 that denomination, he subsequently returned the license which 
 he had received in that communion. He joined the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, and in the State of Mississippi, when he 
 was between twenty-one and twenty-two years of age, he was 
 licensed to preach in the Methodist Episcopal Church. In due 
 course he was inducted into all the ofiices of the ministry, and 
 maintained an honorable distinction throughout his remaining 
 days on earth. He was a gentle, sweet spirited man, a diligent 
 pastor, and an earnest preacher. In his person and in his 
 family he had affliction. He was qualified by experience to 
 sympathize with all who were, on any account, in distress. 
 His wife, a good woman, became an invalid, which imposed on 
 him great care and deep anxiety. To seek a change of climate 
 which it was trusted might serve to restore health he left AVe- 
 tumpka, Alabama, with his wife, and started to his mother's home 
 in Indiana, but he never reached said home. He reached Nash- 
 ville, Tennessee, and there the invalid died, and there he buried 
 her mortal remains. He then retraced his way back to Wetump- 
 
 Further Enlargement and Advancement of the Work. 597 
 
 ka, Alabama, burying one of his children on the way. He ended 
 that sad journey at AVetumpka, and was immediately attacked 
 with pneumonia, and from that he lingered for eleven months, 
 and then, on September 23, 1844, he took his exit for worlds on 
 high. He died at Wetumpka, Alabama, surrounded by those 
 who loved him. On his death-bed he wrote a number of 
 stanzas which possessed considerable merit, and which as a 
 song was known as "Sawyer's Exit." He died in confidence of 
 an immediate entrance into heaven. He was the Secretary of 
 the Alabama Conference from its organization till his death. 
 
CHAPTEE XXVII. 
 
 The Work of Methodism among the Colored People in 
 
 Alabama. 
 
 rriHE Rev. Matthew P. Sturdevant, the first Methodist preach- 
 J_ er ever appointed to preach in the bounds of Alabama, 
 commenced his work in the State the month of the very year, 
 January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, in which ex- 
 pired the Constitutional provision against prohibiting the im- 
 portation of slaves into the several original States of the Union. 
 The very first list of members reported as belonging to the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church in the bounds of what is now 
 Alabama contained the names of fifteen colored members. 
 From that day there have been Methodists of the African race 
 in Alabama. At times in many places o£ the State the colored 
 members outnumbered the white members. Not, however, till 
 November, 1831, was there made a separate appointment to the 
 colored people in the State. In the list of the appointments of 
 the Tennessee Conference made November, 1831, and made 
 then for the next year, is found the following: 
 
 "Thomas M. King, Missionary to the people of color in 
 Madison and Limestone Counties, North Alabama. 
 
 Gilbert D. Taylor, Missionary to the people of color in 
 Franklin and Lawrence Counties, North Alabama." 
 
 These are the first appointments of the kind ever made in 
 Alabama, and the Rev. Gilbert D. Taylor, one of the two men 
 appointed to one of these first appointments ever made in the 
 State to the people of color, was the same man who in October, 
 1819, was rejected by the Tennessee Conference upon a recom- 
 mendation for admission as a preacher on trial because he 
 owned slaves. It is a little remarkable that the preacher who at 
 one time was not considered a suitable person to be trusted 
 with the care of souls and the interests of the Church of God 
 because he owned slaves should at another time be selected as 
 the man to do the delicate work of preaching to the slaves of 
 (598) 
 
 The Work of Methodism among the Colored People, 599 
 
 North Alabama, and for the reason that he did own slaves. 
 That is the history. At the time the two Missionaries were ap- 
 pointed to preach in North Alabama to the colored people 
 there were in round numbers about three thousand colored 
 members in the State of Alabama. In twenty-four years there 
 was a growth from nothing to three thousand. That was com- 
 mendable and encouraging. 
 
 Both the Missions to the people of color in North Alabama, 
 and no others were then in the State, were discontinued at the 
 end of one year, and there was not a separate pastoral charge of 
 that order organized in the State for four years. The environ- 
 ment was not favorable to the organization of separate charges 
 for the Negroes in Alabama, and progress in that line and on 
 that plan was slow. The plan of having the whites and the Ne- 
 groes in the same pastoral charge was the plan to which all were 
 accustomed, and many of the preachers, and many of the mem- 
 bers of both races preferred that order of things, and there was 
 much to commend it. It was the cheaper plan, for the same 
 preacher and the same house of worship would serve both class- 
 es. Under that plan there would be no classes of preachers. 
 None would be under the disparagement of being the preacher 
 of the slaves. The Negroes generally preferred the preacher 
 who served the white folks to the preacher who was appointed 
 specially to their race. Great difficulties were experienced m 
 inaugurating and maintaining a separate pastorate for the Ne- 
 groes. At the first, suitable places of worship were not provid- 
 ed and it was difficult to secure funds to pay the salaries of the 
 preachers who served the Negroes. It is correct to say that at 
 the time it was attempted to inaugurate that work the great 
 body of the slave owners in Alabama were unwilling to provide 
 places of worship and money for salaries. Large numbers were 
 opposed to preaching to the Negroes in separate congregations. 
 Many of the slave owners held and avowed the belief that 
 preaching to the slaves would foster insubordination, encourage 
 abolition'^sentiments, complicate civil affairs, and hasten eman- 
 
 cipation. -^t . -, c^l i l 
 
 The manumission of the slaves in the United States was, at 
 that time, pressed upon the public attention with great zeal and 
 unremitting diligence by the abolitionists of the country. The 
 position taken bv the Methodists upon the subject of slavery 
 
600 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 and emancipation and held from the time of the introduction of 
 Methodism in the United States to the time now under review 
 was not acceptable to slave-holders. The South Carolina Con- 
 ference in session at Sparta, Georgia, on the morning of Decem- 
 ber 29, 180G, interrogated the preachers presented that day to 
 be admitted into full connection in the Conference with respect 
 to traveling and slavery, and said preachers professed their in- 
 tention to travel as long as they were able, and that they " ab- 
 horred slavery." At Liberty Chapel, Georgia, December 2G, 
 1808, the preachers present that day to be admitted into full 
 connection in the South Carolina Conference " were examined 
 on the subject of slavery, and the Conference were satisfied with 
 their sentiments." Some of these preachers who "abhorred 
 slavery " and whose " sentiments " on the subject, therefore, 
 " satisfied " " the Conference " became very prominent as 
 preachers in South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama. Such 
 transactions on the part of Annual Conferences, and such dec- 
 larations on the part of itinerant preachers were not calculated 
 to give the slave-holders in Alabama much expectation of, to 
 them, a desirable result from the association, as guides and 
 teachers, of these preachers with their slaves, and consequently 
 access to the slaves was granted to the preachers with some 
 hesitancy and misgiving. Slave-holders in Alabama were ap- 
 prehensive of insubordination and insurrection, and laws were 
 enacted to suppress or rather prevent these. The statutes of 
 the State prohibited a Negro going off the premises of the own- 
 er without a pass from the owner or overseer giving permission 
 to go and return. Laws organizing patrol companies were en- 
 acted by the State, and were enforced with considerable vigi- 
 lance and severity. A Negro was not allowed under the law to 
 own a gun, or even carry one without written permission from 
 the owner or one in authority over the Negro. A Negro could 
 not preach to or exhort a congregation of his own color without 
 the presence of a number of white persons. The preacher ap- 
 pointed to serve the Negroes in the ministerial calling had a 
 most delicate position, and he had to be circumspect in all 
 things. There was not that alienation between the slave-hold- 
 ers and the slaves indicated by the prevalence of the fear of in- 
 subordination and insurrection, and indicated by the enactment 
 of rigorous laws against the Negroes gadding frora place to 
 
 The Work of 3Iethodii;m among the Colored People. 601 
 
 place without authority, and against mischievous assemblies 
 among themselves, and against their possessing themselves of 
 the instruments of war and butchery. There was in a sense a 
 community of interests between the races, and there was a 
 measure of kind feeling for each other. While there were ex- 
 cessive penalties attached to offenses, police regulations were 
 necessary for the safety of the people and the peace of the 
 country; and while excessive penalties cannot be vindicated, it 
 is a truth that there was as little crime under the administra- 
 tion of the code of Alabama in the days of slavery as could be 
 found anywhere else among the same number of inhabitants. 
 The patrol laws made for the government of the slaves in Ala- 
 bama were as effective as any laws ever enacted and enforced. 
 
 The slaves in Alabama felt a profound interest in the welfare 
 of their owners, and they had a laudable pride in the prosperity 
 thereof. While the Negroes on a plantation would combine to- 
 gether to appropriate to their own use the chicken, pig, and calf 
 belonging to the premises, they would go any length to protect 
 the property and guard the interests of their masters against 
 the depredations attempted by any one else. The slaves in Al- 
 abama had their prejudices and their preferences, and they pos- 
 sessed the instinct of economy and thrift, the faculty of discrim- 
 ination and invention, and they were adepts at concealment and 
 detection. An occurrence, bona fide, bearing illustration upon 
 these points may be related. 
 
 Near the town of Crawford, then the seat of justice of Russell 
 County, Alabama, and one of the appointments of the Crawford 
 Circuit of the Alabama Conference, there lived a Mrs. H., a 
 widow lady, and a Methodist. She had an elegant home and 
 an accomplished family. She possessed a good property, consist- 
 ing mostly of valuable lands and numerous slaves. Her hospi- 
 tality was most bounteous, and, apparently, freely bestowed. 
 At her elegant home she kept servants, some to cook and wait 
 in the house, and others to do the work about the yard, lot, and 
 garden. Those kept to do the outdoor work were a blind Ne- 
 gro man and a small Negro boy. The boy, who was about ten 
 or twelve years of age, acted as guide to the blind man. Mrs. 
 H., being a zealous Methodist, offered the young preacher who 
 was on the Circuit for the year a home at her house without com- 
 pensation. The young preacher accepted the offer, and, when in 
 
602 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 that part of the large Circuit, he made that his home, frequent- 
 ly staying there from two to four days at a time. The horse 
 which the preacher rode was a well-made and w^ell-kept one, 
 and in color a deep, rich sorrel. The horse-lot on the premises 
 of Mrs. H. was large, and about a couple of hundred yards from 
 the residence. In the middle of the lot was a long open shed 
 with a large trough in the center of it, running through from 
 end to end, where usually a number of horses were fed and ate 
 together. The young preacher always everywhere looked after 
 the comfort and well-being of his horse. One morning, while 
 spending two or three days at that elegant and hospitable place, 
 just as the sun was showing his unclouded face a little above 
 the horizon, the preacher entered the lot, and took a view of 
 the situation. The blind Negro man was standing near one 
 end of the long trough under the shed. The small Negro boy, 
 who acted as guide to the blind man, was standing near the 
 trough, and about equal distance from each end of it. Two or 
 three horses were standing up to the trough, eating. The 
 preacher's horse was standing under the edge of the open shed, 
 a little way from the long trough, stretching out his neck, and 
 poking out his head, all indicating that he longed to be at the 
 trough, eating, but dare not approach any nearer the provender. 
 "Without saying a word, the preacher walked quietly up to his 
 horse, took him by the fore-top, and led him up to a vacant 
 place at the trough, and put him in a position to eat. The blind 
 Negro did not know that the preacher was anywhere about the 
 lot. So soon as he beard the preacher's horse bite the ears of 
 corn he said, in a low, and significant tone, to the little Negro, 
 who was his guide and helper: "Drive that red horse atvaij." 
 The Negro boy, in a quiet way, but in a tone suited to the im- 
 
 partation of information said: "Mr, (calling the preacher's 
 
 name) put him there.'' That was a revelation to the blind man. 
 Immediately, as quick as thought, the blind Negro threw up 
 his arms and sawed his hands through the air, and in a most 
 expressive tone, said: "Hie! hie! hie! Drive these cows aicaij 
 from here. There are so many cows here a body can't feed a 
 horse!" There was not a cow in fifty yards of the shed, nor 
 any appearance of one intending to go in that direction. 
 The preacher said not a word, but after standing a short time, 
 and after watching his horse eat a little, he returned to the 
 
 The Work of Methodism amo ng the Colored People. 603 
 
 house, and tried to conjecture why that Negro did not wish the 
 "red horse;' as he called him, to eat; and he also meditated 
 upon the Negro's quickness, ingenuity, invention and general 
 exploit in trying to hide, when he found he was discovered, his 
 intention and effort to keep the "red horse" from eating. 
 That performance of that blind Negro showed a streak of hu- 
 man nature, and of human ingenuity hardly excelled in the his- 
 tory of mankind. What stratagem could surpass that? That 
 Negro w^as taking care of the provender of his owner. 
 
 At the time of the formation of the Constitution of the Unit- 
 ed States of America anti-slavery sentiments were strong 
 throughout the domain thereof, notwithstanding there was se- 
 cured, through manipulations, Constitutional provision for the 
 perpetuation of slavery. The sentiment and the slavery con- 
 tinued, and " an irrepressible conflict." It is equally true that 
 between slave-holders and slaves there were mutual attach- 
 ments, and that state of things, the prevalence of " an irrepres- 
 sible conflict " and of mutual attachment between slave-holdera 
 and slaves, continued until emancipation went into effect. There 
 is not the slightest disposition to discuss at this point the merits, 
 of slavery or the merits of emancipation; the purpose is simply 
 to note the state of things under which the work of Methodism 
 was prosecuted among the people of color in Alabama. 
 
 The work having been begun, though, under the sentiments- 
 and environments of the hour, it was suspended lOr four years, 
 was not to be abandoned, and the Alabama Conference had in 
 its list of appointments for 1837 the " Mission to colored peo~ 
 pie in Mobile, to be supplied." It turned out at last, however,, 
 that the " Mission to colored people in Mobile " was supplied 
 and served by the preacher in charge of the white congregation: 
 in the city, and at the end of the year it was, as a separate 
 work, abandoned. For 1838 there was only one separate ap- 
 pointment to the Negroes in the State, and that was indefinite 
 and nominal. It read: *' Mission to colored people, L. Massen- 
 gale." For 1839 there were three charges to the people of color: 
 the Madison, and Courtland Valley, and Bigbee Mission. For 
 
 1840 there were five Missions to people of color: the Hunts- 
 ville, Courtland Valley, Wilcox, Tombigbee, and Greene. For 
 
 1841 there were two of these Missions: Huntsville and Court- 
 land Valley. For 1842 there were eight Missions to the colored 
 
 39 
 
604 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 people: Hunts ville, Courtland Valley, Cypress, Mount Pleas- 
 ant, Chattahoochee, Woodly Bridge, Autauga, and Canebrake. 
 For 1843 Madison, Franklin, Lawrence, Mobile, Woodly Bridge, 
 and Chattahoochee were provided for. These six, and two new 
 ones, Glennville and Tallawassee, existed the next year. 
 Through the years from 1832 to 1844, there was, in that field, 
 fluctuation no little. It was enough to discourage any ordinary 
 faith and to dampen any ordinary zeal. For 1845 there were 
 fourteen charges to the people of color in the State, five of 
 them in the Tennessee Valley, and the others in South Ala- 
 bama. 
 
 The men herein named served one or more of these Missions 
 the number of years herein stated: The Kev. W. Jared, one 
 year; the Bev. Beuben Ellis, two years; the Bev. H. William- 
 son, one year; the Bev. Alexander McDonald, one year; the 
 Bev. Anthony S. Dickinson, one year; the Bev. Alexander Mc- 
 Bride, two years; the Bev. John Boswell, three years; the Bev. 
 Harris Stearnes, two years; the Bev. Leonard Bush, two years; 
 the Bev. Elisha Carr, three years; the Bev. L. Bichardson, one 
 year; the Bev. Henry P. Turner, two years; the Bev. William 
 H. Johnson, one year; the Bev. William K. Norton, two years; 
 the Bev. A. J. B. Foster, one year; the Bev. Turner P. Holman, 
 one year; the Bev. James Gaines, one year; the Bev. J. B. F. 
 Hill, one year; and the Bev. Peleg B. McCrary, one year. 
 
 At its organization the Chattahoochee Mission embraced 
 Bussell County and that part of Barbour County along the 
 Oowikee Creeks. In the early spring of 1842, which was about 
 the time the work was beginning to formulate, the Missionary 
 discerned, to his delight, that the masters of the slaves and the 
 managers of the Mission were apparently pleased with the ex- 
 periment of administering Christian instruction to the people, 
 and that the blacks received the word of life most thankfully, 
 and that many of them professedly gave up their bad habits. 
 However, at the same time it was true that some of the owners 
 of the slaves were avowedly opposed to the Mission, and they 
 maintained that if they granted to their servants the privilege 
 of Christian instruction after the fashion pursued by the Mis- 
 sionaries more might be required of them in the future. They 
 held that there was no good in increasing privileges, as it in- 
 creased responsibility. 
 
 The Work of Methodism among the Colored People. 605 
 
 In the latter part of April of that year, 1842, the Bev. John 
 W. Starr, the presiding elder, made a journey through the Mis- 
 sion, and, within five days, he preached at the plantations of 
 Sister Barnes, Mr. Mitchell. Brother Chambers, Mr. Whitaker, 
 Brother John Crowell, and Brother Flewellen. These places here 
 mentioned were in the section of Oswitchee Bend in Bussell 
 County. The overseer and his wife at Mitchell's place were 
 members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and at that place 
 on the occasion here mentioned the presiding elder baptized 
 seventeen children, and eleven adults; ten of the adults were 
 baptized by pouring and one by immersion. The place of 
 Brother Chambers was two and a half miles from Mr. Mitchell's 
 place, and there the presiding elder found a good Society, and 
 there he baptized thirty-two children. At Whitaker's, three 
 miles from Chambers, there was at that time no Society, but a 
 good prospect for one. At Brother Flewellen's on that occa- 
 sion they had a grand meeting, and a royal time. " It would 
 have done your heart good to have been there and have heard 
 the shouts of those poor Negroes." In 1843 there were on that 
 Mission twenty-eight appointments, and between four hundred 
 and fifty and five hundred members. The preaching places 
 were nearly all on the plantations. 
 
 The Woodly Bridge Mission, which was mostly in Montgom- 
 ery and Pike Counties, was enlarged in 1843, and the Mission- 
 ary preached or lectured from three to four times on Sundays, 
 and in the week about once a day. It was claimed that many 
 made rapid improvement. There was great need of training, and 
 much room for improvement in knowledge as well as in conduct. 
 The Catechisms of the Church were introduced and used on that 
 Mission that year, and the old and the young were catechised 
 together. On one occasion, after reading the Decalogue to a 
 large class, the Missionary asked: " What is the meaning of thou 
 shalt not commit adultery? " The answer given was: " To serve 
 our heavenly Father, and our earthly master, obey our overseer, 
 and not steal anything." On another occasion the question was 
 propounded: " What did God make you for? " It was promptly 
 answered: "To make a crop." Those Negroes were not utterly 
 blank, but there was certainly need of perseverance in dissem- 
 inating light and in attaining knowledge. 
 
 For 1844 Tallawassee Mission had twenty-one appointments. 
 
606 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 six other plantations having been tendered to the Missionary 
 for his supervision which, for the lack of time and strength, he 
 had to decline, and the Mission could have been sufficiently en- 
 larged to employ three Missionaries, each with a thousand col- 
 ored persons under his ministry; and there were already in its 
 bounds two hundred and seventy-five members. 
 
 For that same year, the Glennville Mission, which lay on the 
 Chattahoochee Kiver and the Cowikee Creeks, had thirteen ap- 
 pointments, with four hundred and forty members, and seven 
 hundred Negroes regularly preached to, and during the year 
 one hundred and three children and fifty adults were baptized. 
 
 At the close of 1845 there were on the soil of Alabama twelve 
 thousand six hundred and eighty-five Negroes who belonged to 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church; nine thousand six hundred 
 and fifteen of these were connected with the pastoral charges 
 of the white people, and three thousand and seventy were con- 
 nected with the Missions to the people of color. There were 
 not quite half as many colored as white members in the State. 
 
 The ideal standard of religious affairs was seldom reached 
 among the slaves in Alabama. Bondage, even under the most 
 favorable circumstances, is not a desirable state, and every one 
 " being a servant " would rather " be made free." The Negroes 
 in Alabama in the days of slavery "sighed by reason of the 
 bondage " under which they were held, and this statement is 
 made without any intention of affirming or denying that they 
 were subject to evil treatment and personal cruelty. Being cir- 
 cumscribed in their education and deprived of property rights, 
 they were limited in their apprehensions and in their benevo- 
 lent contributions, and circumscribed in their activities. In 
 the matter of religion they had to be in some measure co- 
 erced. Compulsion had to be resorted to in some instances. 
 Slaves that they were, they had to be treated as dependents, 
 and in some instances they had to be made to change their 
 apparel and attend divine service. Coercive measures may 
 seem out of place in religious matters and in questions of con- 
 science, nevertheless the owners of the slaves claimed the right' 
 to require that clean clothes should be donned on Sunday and 
 that divine service should be attended on the occasion of the 
 preaching by the man employed to minister to the Negroes in 
 divine things. While none could be forced to accept religion 
 
 The Work of Methodism among the Colored People. 607 
 
 or become a communicant in the Church, it was, nevertheless, 
 perfectly legitimate to adopt and enforce a rule that all slaves 
 on the premises should attend the preaching furnished them 
 free of cost to the dependents. But a majority of the Negroes 
 were glad of the opportunity to attend the services provided for 
 them, even many who would not affiliate with the Church and 
 would not partake of the Sacraments would attend upon the 
 preaching of the divine word. The channels of association to 
 which the slaves were limited induced an appreciation of ap- 
 pointments for divine service. Saturday-night frolics, annual 
 huskings, occasional holidays, and occasional barbecues consti- 
 tuted the principal entertainments and pastimes allotted the 
 Negroes, and the occasion for preaching and worship gave them 
 an opportunity for association and entertainment in which they 
 delighted, even though they cared but little for the theme of 
 salvation. 
 
 The Negroes were impulsive and demonstrative, and were 
 easily moved. A certain sort of ecclesiastical oratory put them 
 in a glow and set them in motion. Swinging and intoning were 
 popular parts of their worship. There was a peculiar swing- 
 ing of the body and there was a peculiar voicing of sounds 
 the inhibition of which cooled their ardor and marred their 
 happiness. The preacher who would be acceptable to the 
 Negroes in the days of slavery had to understand their desire 
 to toss and intone during divine service, and grant them liberty 
 and indulgence therein. There was among them in their wor- 
 ship a mixture of sighs, moans, and groans which made a pecul- 
 iar sound, and which was peculiar to them and which it is im- 
 possible to embody in words. While they were not cultured in 
 music, they were gifted in singing. Some of them were able in 
 prayer and in exhortation. They were fervent in spirit, serv- 
 ing the Lord. 
 
 The work went on with purpose, the men who served the 
 Missions to the people of color were mostly faithful, self-sacri- 
 ficing men and able ministers of the New Testament, and re- 
 suits followed. There were as pure specimens of Christian 
 character among the slaves in Alabama as were ever found 
 anywhere. It is true that among the thousands who joined the 
 Church there were impostors and apostates, but such have been 
 found in all the centuries among all classes and nationalities. 
 
 
 
608 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 There were hundreds who were examples of integrity, patience, 
 humility, meekness, devotion, and piety; men and women who 
 lived in the hope and died in the faith of the gospel of the Son 
 of God, and went home to heaven. The slaves gathered from 
 the Mission fields of Alabama will make a considerable part of 
 that triumphant host who, at the last day, shall enter in through 
 the gates of the city of the great King, and who shall ascribe 
 endless praises unto him who loved them, and washed them 
 from their sins in his own blood. 
 
 CHAPTBE XXVIII. 
 
 Centenary Institute. 
 
 ONE thousand eight hundred and thirty-nine was the cen- 
 tenary year of Methodism, and was celebrated as such by 
 the Methodists of Europe and America. It was celebrated 
 with thanksgiving to God for achievements made and prosperi- 
 ty attained, and with contributions for the work still to be en- 
 terprised under the auspices of Methodism. Devotional serv- 
 ices were held in numerous places, and large sums of money 
 were contributed for the various objects of Christian benevo- 
 lence. That centenary celebration deepened the piety and en- 
 larged the liberality of the people called Methodists, and gave 
 to their cause a new impetus. 
 
 A meeting was appointed and provided for by official action 
 of the Alabama Conference upon the subject of the celebration 
 of the centenary of Methodism. The meeting, clothed with 
 conventionary powers, was held, and by said meeting the enter- 
 prise of establishing in the State of Alabama an Institution of 
 learning of high grade for both sexes was inaugurated; and 
 the centenary year, as auspicious, was made the time for gath- 
 ering the funds necessary to build and equip the School de- 
 signed. With gratitude to God for his beneficent providence, 
 abundant grace, and expanded kingdom, and with deep concern 
 for posterity the Methodists of Alabama entered upon the cele- 
 bration of the one hundredth year of Methodism. They entered 
 upon the celebration with plan and purpose, with heart and 
 hope. The plan in providing a School for higher education 
 was to collect the money from the Methodists at large, and the 
 preachers on the different charges in the Conference were the 
 appointed canvassers and collectors, and subscriptions were to 
 be sought in every city, town, and hamlet; in every Station, 
 and Circuit; in every place where a Methodist could be found. 
 
 The twenty-fifth day of October of that centenary year was 
 the appointed time for assembling the hosts of Methodism at 
 
 (609) 
 
 $ 
 
 I 
 
N 
 
 610 
 
 Historij of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Centenary Institute. 
 
 611 
 
 the chosen places of worship for the special services of the 
 grand celebration. On that specific day sermons and addresses 
 suited to the occasion were delivered, and thank-offerings were 
 made. That day was observed throughout Europe and America. 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Franklin Circuit at Eus- 
 sellville, September 7, 1839, Kesolved to celebrate the centenary 
 of Methodism on the twenty-fifth day of October following in 
 concert with the friends of Methodism in Europe and America; 
 and further Resolved that the said celebration be held at the 
 three places, Eussellville, La Grange, and Ebenezer. Provision 
 was made for arranging for the services, and for taking sub- 
 scriptions for centenary purposes, and for appropriating the 
 funds in accordance with the recommendation of the next Ten- 
 nessee Annual Conference. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for the Circuit July 6, 1839, 
 selected Ebenezer Church as the place on Greene Circuit for 
 the general celebration of the centenary of Methodism, and 
 appointed the Rev. John R. Lambuth and the Rev. F. D. Poyas 
 to preach on the occasion. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Greenesborough Station, 
 September 7, 1839, appointed the Rev. James M. Boatwright 
 and the Rev. John Du Bois to deliver addresses on the cente- 
 nary of Methodism. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference of Wills Valley Circuit was held 
 at Eden Meeting House, on September 21, 1839, and, "The 
 Presiding Elder read the recommendation of the Convention 
 for the centenary celebration on the twenty-fifth of October 
 ensuing; when it was moved and carried that the general cele- 
 bration of centenary for Wills Valley Circuit he held at Shiloh 
 Camp-ground, commencing on the 24th of October. Brothers 
 Pearson, Williams, and Clayton were appointed to deliver the 
 centenary sermons on that occasion ; and a Committee consist- 
 ing of Brothers Clayton, Rogers, and HoUoman appointed to 
 to take up collections for said centenary purposes; when it was 
 resolved that sums of S30 be raised in subscription to be paid 
 in annual installments in equal sums of $10." 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Jacksonville Circuit Sep- 
 tember 28, 1839, adopted the following resolution: "Resolved, 
 by this Conference that there be held two centenary meetings 
 on this Circuit, on the twenty-fifth day of October next, the one 
 
 at Owens Spring Camp-ground and the other at Jacksonville; 
 Brothers Ellis and Taylor are appointed to deliver addresses on 
 that day at Jacksonville, and Brothers Patton and Scales to 
 deliver addresses on the same day at Owens Spring Camp- 
 ground." 
 
 These are specimens of the action had at different places and 
 in different Quarterly Conferences on the subject of the cele- 
 bration of the centenary of Methodism, and indicate the inter- 
 est felt and the plans operated on that great occasion. 
 
 The greatest tangible result of the centenary celebration in 
 Alabama was the establishment of the Centenary Institute. In 
 the title of the School the word Centenary was used because 
 the School was projected and much of the money used in its 
 establishment was collected in the centenary year. In the title 
 the word Institute was intended to indicate the grade of the 
 School and the extent of the curriculum. 
 
 Tlie neighborhood of Valley Creek in Dallas County was 
 selected as the location for the School. According to the senti- 
 ments of that day that was an admirable community for a 
 School. It was sparsely populated, and was remote from thor- 
 oughfares and commercial enterprises. It is said, however, 
 that the location was settled by a money consideration. The 
 Commission charged with the duty of locating the School pro- 
 posed to locate it at the place which contributed the largest 
 sum of money to the enterprise. Whoever made such a propo- 
 sition committed folly in Israel. In response to the proposi- 
 tion the Valley Creek community, so it is said, contributed nine 
 thousand dollars, the largest sum given by any place, and that 
 settled the question. 
 
 The Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Ala- 
 bama in General Assembly convened, by an act passed, and on 
 January 2, 1841, approved, declared "That Eugene V. Le 
 Vert, Ebenezer Hearn, William Murrah, Asbury H. Shanks, 
 Seymour B. Sawyer, Alfred Battle, Daniel H. Norwood, Daniel 
 Pratt, Aaron Ready, Elisha F. King, Franklin C. Shaw, Benja- 
 min I. Harrison, Noel Pitts, Shadrach Mims, and their asso- 
 ciates and successors in office are hereby constituted a body 
 corporate and politic, in deed and in law, by the name and style 
 of the Trustees of the Centenary Institute of the Alabama An- 
 nual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church." 
 
 
612 
 
 Histonj oj Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 By an act passed by the Senate and House of Representa- 
 tives of the State of Alabama, and approved January 15, 1829, 
 Yalley Creek Academy, in Dallas County, was incorporated, 
 and, in due course, that School, as a private enterprise, for the 
 use and benefit of that community, went into operation, and 
 was doing its work, in some measure, when Centenary Institute 
 was projected and ready for patronage. It took some while aft- 
 er Centenary Institute was enterprised to get it equipped for 
 work. With the nine thousand dollars donated by the Valley 
 Creek community one of the buildings of Centenary Institute 
 was erected, and in the latter part of 1843 the buildings of the 
 Institute consisted of a fine residence for the occupancy of the 
 President; and a two-storied wooden building, containing five 
 good recitation and study rooms, (each with a fire-place) 
 for the male department; and an excellent brick edifice, two 
 stories high, and containing on the first floor one large study 
 room and two smaller rooms for the use and accommodation of 
 the pupils; and on the second floor six commodious rooms, two 
 for the department of music, two designed for the Library and 
 apparatus, and two as Lecture and Recitation rooms, for the 
 female department. The buildings for the male and female de- 
 partments were at a distance from each other, with a deep and 
 beautiful valley intervening. The Valley Creek Academy had 
 to adjust itself to the new order of things, and by proper nego- 
 tiations its lands and buildings were conveyed to the Trustees 
 of the Centenary Institute. The last of the property of the 
 Valley Creek Acadamy was conveyed to the Trustees of Cen- 
 tenary Institute June 25, 1846, and consisted of a part of the 
 west half of the south-east quarter of Section twenty-three, 
 To\vnship eighteen. Range ten. The Valley Creek Academy 
 was thus, by due process, absorbed by or incorporated into the 
 Centenary Institute, and utilized as best it could be. 
 
 In the spring of 1842 some sort of opening was made of Cen- 
 tenary Institute, but the session was attended with more or less 
 friction, and but little was accomplished. In the summer of 
 1843 the Trustees elected the Rev. A. H. Mitchell, who had 
 been connected with Emory College, Georgia, President of Cen- 
 tenary Institute, and on the sixteenth of October of that year he 
 opened the session of the Institute with encouraging prospects. 
 There were between sixty and seventy pupils, including both 
 
 Centenary Institute, 
 
 613 
 
 sexes, present at the beginning of the term. Both the male and 
 female departments, at that time, were under the supervision of 
 the Rev. A. H. Mitchell. The session contained ten months, 
 and consequently there was but one session per annum. The 
 terms of tuition were twenty-five, thirty, and forty dollars per 
 session, according to studies, and it was advertised that board 
 could be had in any family in the neighborhood for ten dollars 
 per month, including fuel, lights, and washing. The President 
 of the Institute was assisted during that session in the male de- 
 partment by Mr. Holcombe, and in the female department by 
 Miss Dutton and Miss Casswell, and the music was taught by 
 Mrs. Walker. That session closed Thursday, July 25, 1844. 
 
 The next session opened Monday, October 7, 1844, and during 
 that term, and in the month of April, 1845, there was a sweep- 
 ing religious influence at Valley Creek, and the Church there, 
 the School sharing largely in the religious influence, received 
 about fifty members. About one hundred and thirty pupils 
 matriculated that session, and at the close of the session on 
 Friday, the eleventh of July, 1845, five graduates, Miss J. M. 
 Hawkins, Miss C. Bradley, Miss M. Paulding, Miss M. H. Nor- 
 wood, and Miss C. Coleman, were sent forth from the Halls of 
 that Institution of learning. At that time Mr. W. A. Simmons, 
 and Mrs. Walker resigned their positions as teachers. 
 
 In the summer of 1845 the name of the place was changed 
 from Valley Creek to that of Summerfield. It was thought 
 that the name of Valley Creek would give the idea that the 
 place was in a valley on a sluggish creek, and that those abroad 
 getting that idea would be afraid of the place as sickly, and so 
 they changed. Summerfield would have a more pleasant asso- 
 ciation, and make a better impression upon foreigners who had 
 never seen the place. It is said that the then Mrs. A. H. 
 Mitchell and Mrs. Greenberry Garrett suggested the name of 
 Summerfield in honor of the noted John Summerfield, the 
 great preacher. At the time the name Summerfield was given 
 to the place the citizens thereabout entertained the idea, that as 
 the place was near the center of the State and had other ad- 
 vantages, that the capital of the State might finally be located 
 at Summerfield. 
 
 The Teachers connected with the School during the session 
 which opened Monday, October 6, 1845, were, in addition to the 
 
G14 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Eev. A. H. Mitchell, who somewhere about that time had the 
 degree of Doctor of Divinity conferred on him by the Univer- 
 sity of Alabama, Mr. A. K. Holcombe, A.M., Professor of Eng- 
 lish Language; Mr. D. S. T. Douglass, A.M., Professor of Eng- 
 lish Literature; in the female department Miss M. D. Casswell 
 and Mrs. E. A. E. Jordan, Teachers in Literary and Scientific 
 departments; and Mrs. Cann and Mrs. Frances Davenport, 
 Teachers in Music. During that session there were one hun- 
 dred and sixty-five pupils in attendance upon all departments. 
 
 The Eev. Ebenezer Hearn and the Eev. William B. Barnett 
 were Agents for Centenary Institute for 1841, and for 1842 they 
 were Agents for that Institution and also for La Grange Col- 
 lege. For 1843 and 1844 the Eev. Ebenezer Hearn was Agent 
 for these two Institutions of learning. The Eev. Jesse Boring 
 was Agent for Centenary Institute for 1845. At this stage of 
 things it is impossible to ascertain what was accomplished for 
 the enterprise by the agency of Brother Barnett, and there is 
 no official statement at command to indicate what pecuniary aid 
 was secured by Brother Hearn. There is on record a personal 
 statement, made by Hearn, how reliable it is cannot be known, 
 in which he says he collected certain amounts each year for 
 Centenary Institute, and the amounts given in the four years ag- 
 gregate twenty thousand and seventy-seven dollars and fifty-nine 
 cents. In an official report still extant there is a statement as- 
 serting that the Eev. Jesse Boring, during the year of his agen- 
 cy, " booked some three thousand dollars new subscriptions, and 
 collected some three thousand dollars on old subscriptions." 
 
 In the selection of the fourteen Trustees as corporators of 
 the projected School, named Centenary Institute, there was 
 brought into requisition eminent talents and extensive influence. 
 Of the preachers named as corporators all, except the Eev. E. 
 V. Le Vert and the Eev. William Murrah, have been sketched 
 in this History on other pages and in other connections, and 
 while these two men here excepted were not distinguished as 
 specialists in institutions of learning, yet what is to be said 
 about them may as well be said here and now. 
 
 The Eev. Eugene V. Le Vert was in his forty-fifth year when 
 he was named as a Trustee of the Centenary Institute. He was 
 a native of Virginia. His father was a native of France. This 
 native of Virginia was endowed witli superior intellectual pow- 
 
 Centenary Institute, 
 
 GI5 
 
 ers, but for some reason he grew to manhood without education. 
 His tuition at a regular School did not exceed three months. 
 Under the instruction of his father he received some training 
 in the French language. September 13, 1819, he was renewed 
 by divine grace, and July 20, 1821, he was licensed to preach, 
 and immediately thereafter was employed by the presiding 
 elder for the remaining months of the Conference year on the 
 Tuskaloosa Circuit. There was no Jones's Valley Circuit at 
 that time. Jones's Valley w^as then a part of the Tuskaloosa 
 Circuit. At the end of the year he was received on trial in the 
 Mississippi Conference, and appointed for the next year junior 
 preacher on the Tuskaloosa Circuit. In due course he was ad- 
 vanced to the orders of the ministry. He served to the full 
 measure of his strength in the Christian ministry for more than 
 half a century, and he served well. He not only performed 
 much labor, but he endured many hardships. He devoted 
 much time to the defense of the doctrines of Christianity in the 
 public assemblies. He met antagonists fearlessly, and brought 
 into requisition logic, satire, pathos, and eloquence as occasion 
 required. In the pulpit he was deliberate, earnest, graceful, el- 
 oquent, and attractive. Through his ministry, so it is said, hun- 
 dreds were brought to Christ. 
 
 At this juncture may very properly be narrated an incident in 
 his ministry which led to a case of religious renewal and Chris- 
 tian usefulness. During the year 1822 he fell into a state of 
 despondency, being then, perhaps, less than a year old as a 
 preacher. In the hour of his gloom he rashly determined to 
 abandon the ministry. To the Eev. James Tarrant, an aged lo- 
 cal preacher in Jones's Valley, he revealed his purpose to re- 
 nounce his call and abandon the Christian ministry. Brother 
 Tarrant understood his case, and with great sagacity and with 
 much painstaking analyzed it for him, and showing him the 
 possibility of eventually overcoming his impediments and of be- 
 ing successful in the work to which he was persuaded he had 
 been called, he relieved his gloom, turned his mind, and induced 
 him to continue in the high calling upon which he bad entered. 
 
 In 1842, just twenty years after that eventful interview, the 
 Eev. E. V. Le Vert, as presidiug elder of the Selma District, 
 held a Quarterly Conference for Jones's Valley Circuit at 
 Smith's Chapel, about twelve miles from the town of Ely ton. 
 
m 
 
 616 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Centenary Institute. 
 
 617 
 
 Benjamin Tarrant, one of the sons of the Kev. James Tarrant, 
 was in attendance on that Quarterly Conference. He was then 
 near fifty years of age, and was a politician, a drunkard, and a 
 gambler, and had, all his life, to use his own words, " served the 
 devil faithfully." In his public ministrations at that Quarterly 
 Conference the Kev. Mr. Le Vert took occasion to refer to his 
 early ministry in that country, and especially to the incident of 
 his life when he received the counsel of the Eev. James Tarrant 
 which settled the issues of his cause. He told in pathetic terms 
 and with poetic beauty of his lack of education, and of his lack 
 of experience, and of his inability to sing, and of the deep 
 gloom which came over him; and how he described to Brother 
 Tarrant, the patriarch, his deficiencies, difiiculties, and despond- 
 ency; and how by the tender sympathy and wise counsel of the 
 aged man of God he had been induced to change his mind and 
 prosecute the divine work. In glowing terms and earnest spir- 
 it he pronounced a tribute to the memory of his benefactor, and 
 in conclusion announced that were there of the posterity of the 
 Eev. James Tarrant in that congregation still strangers to God 
 and his grace, it would afford him supreme delight for them to 
 turn to God, repent of their sins, and obtain justification 
 through their father's Saviour. That reference, narrative, and 
 appeal arrested Benjamin Tarrant, and led to his conviction and 
 his salvation. He at once set about seeking the renewing grace 
 of God, and in a short while came into a happy Christian expe- 
 rience. His character and life were entirely changed, and in a 
 few brief months he was licensed to preach in the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church. During the remaining part of his life he was 
 an accredited minister of the gospel, and while he was never 
 anything but a local preacher he was in labors abundant, and 
 was unsurpassed by any in his section in efficiency and useful- 
 ness. He spent months of each year, and without pecuniary 
 compensation, in protracted meetings. He was generally the 
 first to reach the place of a protracted meeting and the last to 
 leave it. He preached everywhere in Jefi'erson County and 
 much in other Counties. He claimed near the end of his pil- 
 grimage that he had, with his own hands, received into the 
 Church twelve hundred persons, in a ministry of thirty years, 
 which was an average of forty a year. He was a man of much 
 prayer, and of great faith, and as, what is called, an evangelist 
 
 he had but few if any equals in all the country where he labored. 
 He led thousands to the triumphs of faith in Jesus Christ. He 
 died at the age of eighty-one, February 14, 1874 and was bur- 
 ied in a grave-yard about five miles north of Birmingham, Ala- 
 bama. 
 
 The Kev. E. V. Le Vert was twice married, and his first wife 
 was the mother of fifteen children. His last ministerial act was 
 the administration of the Lord's Supper, which occurred the 
 Sunday before his death. He died surrounded by his children 
 and many friends, April 16, 1875, and his body was laid to rest 
 in the cemetery at Marion, Alabama. 
 
 The Kev. William Murrah was born in Georgia, in 1807; ed- 
 ucated at Franklin College, Athens, Georgia; admitted on trial 
 into the South Carolina Conference in the first part of 1829; 
 transferred to the Alabama Conference in the first part of 1835; 
 transferred to the North Mississippi Conference in 1874; died 
 at his home in Pickens County, Alabama, October 9, 1887; and 
 was buried at Columbus, Mississippi. He filled many impor- 
 tant and leading charges in Alabama, and was a delegate to sev- 
 eral General Conferences. He represented Pickens County, 
 Alabama, in the Legislature of the State in the days of recon- 
 struction. There was much political corruption in that time, 
 and, alas ! some in high places became degenerate children! 
 For 1879 his appointment read: West Point and Tibbee, Wil- 
 liam Murrah. That was his last pastoral charge. At the end 
 of that year he went on the superannuated list, where he re- 
 mained till he went hence to his reward. 
 
 The Hon. Daniel H. Norwood was a devout Methodist, pos- 
 sessed of mental endowments, literary attainments, and an opu- 
 lent estate. He was eminently qualified to fill the position of 
 a Trustee of an institution of learning. He was a Trustee of 
 Centenary Institute for a term less than three years. He died 
 previous to February, 1845. 
 
 The Hon. Daniel Pratt had been in Alabama about three years, 
 and was little more than forty years old, when he was appointed 
 Trustee and incorporator of Centenary Institute. He was a tall 
 man and straight, had large hands and feet, a Koman nose, and 
 eyes the color of the sky. Not only did his countenance beam 
 with benevolence, but his entire person indicated benevolence. 
 He was the embodiment of energy, integrity, and philanthropy! 
 
G18 
 
 Ilisfori/ of Methodism in Ahthama, 
 
 Centenary Institute, 
 
 C19 
 
 He was Master of Mechanical and Useful Arts. By his industry 
 and skill he accumulated large wealth, and did much for the 
 common country and the general good. He was without guile 
 and malice. He was a Methodist, and bore good will to all 
 Christians, and to every people. He served his generation. 
 
 Benjamin Inabnit Harrison, a native of South Carolina, a 
 man of many excellencies, and who was made Trustee of Cen- 
 tenary Institute when in the twenty-seventh year of his age, 
 moved to Valley Creek, Alabama, where Centenary Institute 
 was finally located, in 1832. He was an educated man, and dur- 
 ing much of his time followed the profession of teaching. He 
 lived many years at Valley Creek (Summerfield), but finally 
 moved away and died at the University of Alabama, in 1872. 
 He married in 1834 Miss Martha I. Childers. She died in 1843. 
 In 1845 he married Miss Adaline H. Simmons, the daughter of 
 the Rev. John Simmons, and a native of Henry County, Georgia. 
 At a Camp-meeting held near Valley Creek in 1835 Mr. Harri- 
 son was convicted, and firmly resolved to forsake the world, seek 
 the Saviour, and from thenceforth pursue the path of life, and, 
 though not then renewed, he immediately joined the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church. From that hour salvation was first in the 
 thought of his mind and supreme in the desire of his heart, and 
 he prayed earnestly and withoitt ceasing. Though for twelve 
 months his soul lingered in darkness, finally, one day, as he went 
 on horseback, in company with two godless men, to the town of 
 Selma, in the interest of some secular affairs, he, while the two 
 companions in travel talked of worldly things, fell into deep 
 meditation and secret prayer, and though he was surrounded 
 by circumstances which were trying and distracting, the last 
 clouds of doubt drifted away, and his soul was bathed in the 
 light of the divine Spirit. 
 
 His wives were both, excellent women and of noble families. 
 His first wife was cut down in early womanhood. His last wife 
 still lives, 1892. She was born in 1825, and is the sister of the 
 Rev. J. C. Simmons, who has worked so long in California. She 
 joined the Methodist Episcopal Church when less than eleven 
 years of age, and at that time obtained a sense of divine accept- 
 ance not before realized by her. Through all the years she man- 
 tained a lovely Christian character. Her children honor her. 
 
 In a deed made in 1845 conveying certain property to Cente- 
 
 nary Institute Robert A. Baker is named as one of the Trustees. 
 He was elected to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Nor- 
 wood, and from that time until his death, or for more than twenty 
 years, he was connected with that Institution of learning, and 
 was one of its most zealous friends and liberal benefactors. 
 Than Robert A. Baker a more eflicient layman never wrought 
 in Alabama. He was born during the first half of the first 
 decade of this century; it is said he began his Christian labors 
 in a Sunday-school, and it is possible that he began said labors 
 about the time he was converted in 182G. His name first apr 
 pears upon the ofiicial Records of the Church for the Franklin 
 Circuit in 1829. His name is registered in the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence Records for that Circuit as a class leader. He was steward 
 on the Franklin Circuit in North Alabama from October, 1830, 
 till June, 1841. At the close of 1841 he moved out of the bounds of 
 the Franklin Circuit and made his home in Sumter County, Ala- 
 bama, till about 1848, when he moved to Summerfield, Alabama. 
 From the time of his joining the Methodist Episcopal Church till 
 his death, a period of about forty years, he was an active Christian. 
 Wherever he was he worked for the divine cause, and while he 
 never entered the ministr}^ he filled all the offices common to 
 laymen, and participated actively in the public services of the 
 public assemblies. For months together he would attend and 
 work in the protracted meetings and Camp-meetings which were 
 held from year to year for promoting the interests of the Church 
 and securing the salvation of men. Robert A. Baker was brought 
 up in poverty and in orphanage, but these circumstances and ac- 
 cidents could not keep him in obscurity nor detain him from use- 
 fulness. He attained place and influence in the Church and in 
 the State as well. He was a member of the General Assembly 
 of Alabama from Franklin County for a number of sessions, and 
 attained to the position of Speaker of the House of Representa- 
 tives. He exerted a good influence as a member of the General 
 Assembly of the State, and did good work in guiding legislation. 
 He was calm, considerate, and conservative, and was noted for 
 industry and integrity. Had he been ambitious, he might have 
 filled higher offices in i\\Q State. He prosecuted large business 
 and controlled large funds. The ample means at his command 
 were used for every benevolent purpose. He made large con- 
 tributions to the various enterprises of the Church, inaugurated 
 40 
 
G20 
 
 History of Methodism hi Alabama, 
 
 and sustained enterprises. He gave by hundreds and into thou- 
 sands. He knew the meaning of a widow's sorrows and of an 
 orphan's woes, and he responded with liberal alms for the re- 
 lief of the helpless and the destitute. He was fervent in his 
 prayers and in his piety, and he was generous in his sympathies 
 and his alms. His prayers and his alms are allied in his me- 
 morial. Whether or not he was a man of undue sentiment, it is 
 certain he was a man of large charity, of numerous alms-deeds, 
 and of nobility of character. AVith his mind and money he in- 
 stituted and supported public enterprises and Christian benevo- 
 lence. He did liberal things himself, but he did more; he in- 
 fused into the communities of the Commonwealth wherever he 
 touched them a spirit of enterprise and benevolence, and he led 
 those with whom he came in contact to high purposes and to 
 noble deeds. He was not that dispicable character who, under 
 the sanctimonious assumption of being a peace-maker, strolls 
 through a community prying into secrets, rehearsing vitupera- 
 tion, and complicating difficulties, but he was that character 
 whose very presence is a benediction, and who promotes good 
 will and establishes peace among men. He was as good and 
 great in the private circle of home as in the public affairs of 
 men. In his home he found sublime felicity, and to all the mem- 
 bers of his household, including the domestics or slaves, he dis- 
 pensed blessings with beneficence. He was gentle and generous 
 in the administration of the affairs of home. On his wife and 
 children he bestowed warm affections and on his servants just 
 consideration. His mind was adorned with truth, his heart was 
 gemmed with righteousness, and his soul was illumined with love. 
 The divine instincts were vital in him, he was rich in the con- 
 sciousness that God was formed in him the hope of glory, and 
 his passions and desires were subordinated to the divine will. 
 Charmed by the beautiful, refined by the good, and filled with 
 the fellowship of the saints and the communion of God, he main- 
 tained consistency and efficiency, and was great in faith, love, 
 and deeds. He died suddenly in the last part of December, 1865, 
 and was buried at Summerfield, Alabama. He died across the 
 Bay from the city of Mobile. He served his generation accord- 
 ing to the will of God, and fell on sleep. One of his sons en- 
 tered the ministry, and was a member of the Alabama Confer- 
 ence at the time of his death. Another of his sons is an efficient 
 
 Centenary Institute, 
 
 621 
 
 member of the Church in the city of Mobile, Alabama. One of 
 his daughters married the Kev. Henry Clay Stone, who was in the 
 itinerant ministry in Alabama. Another daughter married the 
 Kev. Thomas C. Weir, long in the regular ministry. " God is in 
 the generation of the righteous." There is nothing better than 
 that a man should teach his children the divine ordinances, and 
 command his household after him, for the mercy of God is upon 
 them that love him and keep his commandments, even to a thou- 
 sand generations. 
 
Further History of La Grange College. 
 
 623 
 
 CHAPTEE XXIX. 
 
 Further History of La Grange College. 
 
 THE beginning of the work of education in Alabama under 
 the auspices of Methodism has been sketclied in a preced- 
 ing chapter. The narrative is here resumed in a further ac- 
 count of La Grange College. About the close of 1832 the 
 Eev. Edward D. Sims resigned his position as Professor in La 
 Grange College, and at the same time the Kev. William H. 
 Ellison was transferred from the South Carolina to the Ala- 
 bama Conference and appointed Professor in La Grange Col- 
 lege. From that time till the close of 1836 Professor Ellison 
 filled the chair of Mathematics. For 1835 and 1836 the Eev. 
 John N. Maffitt had a position in the College as Professor of 
 Elocution. From the beginning of 1836 to the close of 1839 
 the Eev. Collins D. Elliott was Professor in one of the chairs 
 of the College, and the Eev. E. H. Eivers also filled a chair 
 from the beginning of 1836 to the beginning of 1843, when he 
 resigned his position to take charge of the Tennessee Confer- 
 ence Female Institute at Athens, Alabama. In 1835 Henry 
 Masson and Thomas Barbour were elected Professors in the 
 College, one of Languages and the other of Chemistry. Henry 
 Tutwiler filled the chair of Mathematics, beginning his work in 
 January, 1840. Dr. Carlos G. Smith filled the chair which the 
 Eev. E. H. Eivers resigned in 1843. In the thirties Eichard 
 Shepherd and E. J. Muncham, each in turn, had charge of the 
 Preparatory Department connected with the College. 
 
 An encouraging number of students matriculated in the Col- 
 lege during every session held through the thirties, and a num- 
 ber graduated during that period. The degree of M.A. was 
 conferred on one at the commencement in July, 1832, on five in 
 1833, on seven in 1834, and on seven in 1835. The Hon. James 
 E. Saunders is authority for the statement concerning these 
 numbers. 
 
 It is said that in 1839 there was a special religious work in 
 (622) 
 
 the College which lasted three months, and that at the close of 
 it there were but few students who stood aloof from the Church. 
 
 In 1842 there was an increase in the number of students in 
 the College, and said students maintained good order and 
 morality, and pursued their studies with becoming diligence. 
 The usual annual examination was held that year beginning 
 May twenty-seven and closing June first, and the Commence- 
 ment exercises took place July fourth, following, when degrees 
 were conferred. On that day the next session began. The 
 session was oj^ened on and continued from that day, so it was 
 asserted, because it was conducive to health to remain on the 
 mountain of La Grange during the summer and fall. Those 
 who remained on the mountain through the summer and fall 
 months escaped bilious fever, which was quite prevalent in 
 other sections of the country. The College at that time owed 
 but little, the tuition fees paid the salaries of the officers, and 
 while funds were needed to liquidate the small indebtedness, 
 every one w^as hopeful and anticipated continued success. 
 
 In the latter part of 1843 the affairs of the College were in a 
 healthy condition. The literary department was flourishing. 
 About that time God poured out his Spirit upon the inmates of 
 the College, and quite a number of the students joined the 
 Church. In the spring time of 1845 the internal interests were 
 in a flourishing condition upon the whole, though in the second 
 session of that year there was a small decline in the number of 
 students in attendance. AVhile the internal affairs were in a 
 flattering state, its financial concerns were greatly embarrassed. 
 The session which opened in January, 1846, promised to be a 
 fair average in point of numbers, and very favorable in literary 
 results. At that time none but students in the College were 
 received, and all were doing well in their studies, and there 
 were fourteen candidates who were striving to complete an ex- 
 tensive course in the various branches of a collegiate education, 
 and for graduation at the end of the session. The external 
 affairs of the College were in an unpromising condition. 
 Money was greatly needed, but the resources of the Church 
 seemed to be exhausted. The Agency for the College of the 
 Alabama Conference for the past year had yielded but little, 
 and the Agency of the Memphis Conference had brought the 
 College in debt. Therefore, at that time the Alabama Confer- 
 
624 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ence did not appoint an Agent for it, but recommended that the 
 outstanding accounts of the Institution be placed in the hands 
 of the presiding elders, to be distributed to the preachers for 
 immediate collection. 
 
 There were only sixty pupils in attendance at the College 
 during 1848, and the Board of instruction at the close of that 
 year was not full. The indebtedness of the Institution at that 
 time was about five thousand dollars, the greater part of which 
 was due the Instructors. To relieve the embarrassment of the 
 hour an effort was being made to endow a Soule and Paine 
 Professorship with fifteen thousand dollars each. At its ses- 
 sion in January, 1849, the Alabama Conference adopted the 
 following: "Eesolved, That this Conference will heartily co- 
 operate with the Memphis and Tennessee Conferences in raising 
 its proportion of the Preacher's Fund for endowment of Soule 
 and Paine Professorships upon the plan of Tennessee and 
 Memphis Conferences." By September of that year between 
 twenty-six and twenty-seven thousand dollars had been raised 
 on the endowment of the chairs, and the College was paying ex- 
 penses. Xt that time it was said: "La Grange College has 
 ample buildings, an increasing endowment, pure air, beautiful 
 scenery, healthful associations, orderly, attentive students, a 
 full faculty, a good Library, good apparatus, with the patron- 
 age, substantial aid, and fresh, hearty good will of several of 
 the Annual Conferences of the Southern Church." The session 
 of the College which closed near this time closed in good con- 
 dition. 
 
 The forty-first session of the College began January 21, 1850. 
 At that time there was a Grammar School connected with the 
 College under the supervision of the Faculty. The entire ex- 
 penses of a student in the College at that time, which varied ac- 
 cording to the advancement of the student, was from sixty to 
 eighty dollars per session of five months. That covered tuition 
 fees, board, washing, fuel, lights, and servant hire. That was 
 certainly a model of cheapness for college education. The ses- 
 sion which opened on January 21, 1850, was interrupted, and in 
 less than one month from the time of opening, the exercises of 
 the Institution, under the pressure of a panic, had to be sus- 
 pended. Small-pox broke out at La Grange, a panic ensued, 
 and the Faculty immediately suspended the exercises of the 
 
 Further History of La Grange College, 
 
 625 
 
 College. It is not now known how many persons were affected 
 with the disease, but there were several. They were removed 
 to a distance of several miles from La Grange, and provided 
 with nurses, and all other communication with them prohibited. 
 G. E. Cumi^e, M.D., was at that time the resident physician at 
 La Grange. The Small-pox there at that time is said to have 
 been altogether accidental, no case having been known therein 
 thirty years preceding. The exercises of the College were sus- 
 pended about one month. On the twelfth of March, of that 
 year, a circular was sent out allaying all fear of danger, and 
 the exercises of the College were resumed. There were eighty 
 pupils in attendance when the exercises of the Institution sus- 
 pended; whether they were all in place on the resumption of 
 work is not now known. The session went on to the close with- 
 out further interruption, and on Thursday, July 4, 1850, Com- 
 mencement day, the College admitted to the degree of Bachelor 
 of Arts the following students: Nathan M. Gregg, Jacob W. 
 Swoop, Columbus Sykes, John C. Stevenson, Edward Mc- 
 Alexander, and Edward H. King. On that same day the La 
 Grange College conferred the honorary degree of Master of 
 Arts upon the Kev. Edward C. Slater, of the Tennessee Con- 
 ference, and that of Doctor of Laws upon Bishop Jcshua 
 
 Soule. 
 
 In January, 1851, the debt against La Grange College was 
 five thousand dollars, and the only plan by which to liquidate 
 it was selling Scholarships for eight years at one hundred and 
 twenty-five dollars per scholarship. The College had at that 
 time an endowment of thirty thousand dollars. The number of 
 students in the College for the session closing in June, 1851, 
 was one hundred and thirty, and there were at that time nine 
 graduates. The College at that Commencement conferred the 
 honorary degree of A.M. upon Dr. Francis E. H. Steger, and 
 the degree of D.D. upon the Rev. John B. McFerrin and the 
 Pvev. Piichard H. Rivers. At that Commencement the preach- 
 ers and orators who preached and orated vrere the Rev. John 
 B. McFerrin, the Rev. P. P. Neely, and AY. W. Garth. Garth 
 had formerly graduated at that College. 
 
 The next session opened the first Wednesday in August; and 
 in January, 1852, there was still a debt of five thousand dollars 
 a<>'ainst the College, and the buildings of the Institution needed 
 
626 
 
 History of Mefhodistn in Alabama, 
 
 Further History of La Grange College, 
 
 627 
 
 repairs to the amount of two thousand dollars. The liberality 
 of the Church had been exhausted. A perpetual solicitation of 
 College funds had dulled the ear and deadened the conscience 
 of the Church. The debt increased faster than the funds accu- 
 mulated. There was great complaint about the inaccessibility 
 of La Grange to South Alabama. Up to that time East Ala- 
 bama had not done anything for the College, either in pupils or 
 financial aid. 
 
 In the report of the College to the Alabama Conference at its 
 session in December, 1853, it was stated that one hundred and 
 fifty-three students had matriculated during the then College 
 session, and at that time there were only ninety-five p esent. 
 The fact that so large a number of the pupils who had matricu- 
 lated had left the College halls was discouraging to the friends 
 of the Institution. There had been a gracious religious influ- 
 ence in the College during that session. That was gratifying 
 to the ministers of the gospel and the friends of Christianity! 
 
 Upon consultation for the relief of their embarrassments, the 
 Trustees of the College deemed it essential that some plan be 
 adopted to endow the Institution permanently, and at a meet- 
 ing held in March, 1854, they resolved to sell one thousand 
 Scholarships at one hundred dollars each, said Scholarships to 
 commence whenever seven hundred and fifty had been sold, and 
 the Scholarships, when the proper papers had been executed 
 for them, to run twenty years. 
 
 The Faculty of the College in January, 1850, was composed 
 of: Edward Wadsworth, Professor of Mental and Moral Science; 
 James W. Hardy, Professor of Natural Philosophy and Chem- 
 istry; Osc&r F. Casey, Professor of Latin and Greek Languages; 
 Thomas G. Eice, Professor of Pure Mathematics; Thomas C. 
 Wier, Principal of the Grammar School and assistant teacher 
 in the Department of Languages. 
 
 In 1853 Mr. Hatch was secured for the chair of Chemistry 
 and Geology. The Kev. Bennett B. Eoss was a Professor in 
 the College in 1853, 1854, and 1855. 
 
 The La Grange College called into its service an army of 
 Agents who canvassed the country and asked alms in its behalf. 
 These revenue collectors were appointed officially from time to 
 time as occasion offered, by the Tennessee, Mississippi, Ala- 
 bama, and Memphis Conferences, which were sometimes in the 
 
 relation of patronizing Conferences. For 1833 the Tennessee 
 Conference had three preachers as Agents for the College in the 
 field, and at the same time the Mississippi Conference had one. 
 Those from the Tennessee Conference were the Revs. Greenville 
 T. Henderson, Alexander W. Littlejohn, and John B. McFerrin, 
 and the one from the Mississippi Conference was Francis A. 
 Owen. In 1837 four of the preachers of the Tennessee Conference 
 were Agents of the College, and in 1842 the Alabama Conference 
 had two Agents for it. This gives an insight into the manipula- 
 tions of the subject through the operations of official Agents. 
 The Agents for 1834 were the Revs. Littleton Fowler, John N. 
 Maffitt, and one to be supplied; for 1835 the Rev. Littleton 
 Fowler; for 1836 the Rev. Littleton Fowler; for 1837 the Revs. 
 Littleton Fowler, John M. Holland, Phineas T. Scruggs, and 
 John W. Hanner; for 1838 the Revs. John W. Hanner and 
 Simpson Shepherd; for 1839 the Rev. Simpson Shepherd; for 
 1840 the Rev. Finch P. Scruggs; for 1841 the Rev. F. G. Fer- 
 guson; and of the Memphis Conference, the Rev. Lorenzo D. 
 Mullins; for 1842, of the Alabama Conference, the Revs. Ebe- 
 nezer Hearn and William B. Barnett; for 1843, of the Alabama 
 Conference, the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn; for 1844, of the Tennes- 
 see Conference, the Rev. W. D. F. Sawrie; and for the Mem- 
 phis Conference the Rev. J. T. Baskerville, and of the Alabama 
 Conference the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn; for 1845, of the Mem- 
 phis Conference, the Rev. John T. Baskerville; for 1846, of the 
 Tennessee Conference, the Rev. E. Carr, of the Memphis Con- 
 ference the Rev. John T. Baskerville; for 1847, of the Mem- 
 phis Conference, the Rev. John T. Baskerville; for 1848, of the 
 Tennessee Conference, the Rev. William G. Gould, for 1850, of 
 the Tennessee Conference, the Rev. Joseph B. West; for 1851, 
 for the Memphis Conference, the Rev. William N. Morgan. 
 
 The Rev. Robert Paine w^as at the head of La Grange College 
 from its opening until his election to the Episcopacy in May, 
 1846. For three years he bore the title of Superintendent of 
 the College and for one year the title of Principal. Out of 
 simple modesty he, for four years, declined the title of Presi- 
 dent. Through the long period in which he presided over the 
 College he was its strength and stay. He guided its affairs 
 with wisdom and efficiency, and gave it power and influence. 
 
 The Rev. Edward Wadsworth succeeded to the Presidency of 
 
628 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 La Grange College, and assumed the duties of the office in the 
 autumn of 1846, about the same time that the Eev. B. H. Mc- 
 Cown assumed the duties of the chair of Languages, which chair 
 had just been vacated by Carlos G. Smith. The Kev. Edward 
 AVadsworth, as President of the College, conducted its affairs 
 till October, 1852, when he resigned his position and duties. 
 Upon the resignation of Mr. Wadsworth the Rev. James Ward 
 Hardy, a native of Georgia, a graduate of Randolph-Macon Col- 
 lege, and then nearly thirty-eight years of age, was elected Pres- 
 ident of the College, the duties of which office he performed un- 
 til he was summoned to a higher sphere, August 14, 1853. He 
 was licensed to preach the same year he was elected President 
 of La Grange College. He was a refined gentleman, a man of 
 generous nature. He was a zealous Christian, and a mature 
 scholar. 
 
 The Trustees of La Grange College, at the earliest possible 
 moment after the death of Mr. Hardy, elected the Rev. Richard 
 H. Rivers President of the Institution. Dr. Rivers, an alumnus 
 of that College, and a man of great simplicity and transparency 
 of character, entered upon the duties of the office of President 
 of his aJma.mater, March 6, 1854 He found an able and effi- 
 cient faculty, and all else unpropitious. The body of students 
 was small, the college buildings were dilapidated, and a long 
 standing debt was hanging over the Institution. Little more 
 than six and a half months had intervened from the death of 
 the lamented Hardy, and everything had assumed a gloomy 
 hue. If the buildings could be repaired, the debt liquidated, 
 the endowment enlarged, and the patronage extended, the Col- 
 lege might be perpetuated and advanced to greater usefulness, 
 otherwise the days of its glory were already ended. At that 
 stage of affairs a proposition was made to move the College 
 from La Grange to Florence, Alabama. The people of Florence 
 offered, as an inducement, to furnish better buildings than had 
 ever been at La Grange, and a more ample endowment than had 
 ever before been secured for the Institution, and a larger local 
 patronage than the entire patronage which La Grange had at 
 that time, and also to pay all the indebtedness then hanging 
 over the College. The subject was referred by the Trustees to 
 the Alabama, Memphis, and Tennessee Conferences, then 
 the patronizing Conferences of the Institution, for determina- 
 
 Fiirther History of La Grange College. 
 
 629 
 
 tion, and the said Conferences by official action authori^icd the 
 removal. It is said Florence gave twenty thousand dollars on 
 endowment. 
 
 In January, 1855, just a quarter of a century exactly from the 
 time the La Grange College matriculated its first class on La 
 Grange mountain, the janitor closed the doors of the College 
 halls on that sublime and consecrated spot forever. In that 
 month of January, 1855, the faculty and the students who had 
 gathered there for that session departed from the town of La 
 Grange , on the mountain, for the town of Florence, Alabama. 
 There at that place and time they claimed to open anew, and 
 proposed to continue the work of La Grange College. It has 
 been stated that there were one hundred and fifty pupils in at- 
 tendance at the opening in the new quarters. From that day 
 forth La Grange College at the town of La Grange on the 
 mountain stood empty and closed until the buildings, during 
 the war between the States, were consumed by fire. 
 
 The attempt to go on at Florence under the old name of La 
 Grange College was bitterly opposed and was abandoned. At 
 the session of the Tennessee Conference held in October, 1855, 
 R. H. Rivers was put down in the minutes as " President of La 
 Grange College, at Florence." That was the last time. The 
 General Assembly of Alabama, for some reason, and under 
 some influence, refused to recognize the College at Florence as 
 the La Grange College, and a new charter had to be secured for 
 the Institution at Florence under a new name. There was a di- 
 vision of sentiment and active opposition in securing the new 
 charter, or a charter for the new College. The act of the Gen- 
 eral Assembly of Alabama incorporating the Institution at Flor- 
 ence was vetoed by Governor Winston, but on February 14, 1855, 
 the General Assembly, by the constitutional majority, passed 
 the act of incorporation over the Governor's veto. The act 
 passed by the General Assembly, and which became law, clothed 
 certain Trustees, thirty-eight in number, with corporate author- 
 ity under the style and title of *' The President and Trustees of 
 the Florence Wesleyan University." The Florence Wesleyan 
 L'niversity was fostered for awhile. 
 
 La Grange College had a career of just a quarter of a centurj^ 
 and it did a great work for the generations which it touched. 
 Many of those graduated from its halls made useful men, and 
 
v 
 
 630 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 some of them attained conspicuous station; among whom may be 
 named: the Eevs. R H. Kivers, Joseph E. Douglass, and Wil- 
 liam E. Nicholson, and the Hous. Jeremiah Clemens, William 
 B. Byrd, William B. Wood, A. E. O'Neal, David P. Lewis, and 
 H. C. Jones, and Drs. J. W. Towler, and Thomas Maddin. 
 Lewis and O'Neal were called to the high office of Governor of 
 the State of Alabama by the suffrages of the people. 
 
 CHAPTEE XXX. 
 
 The Female Institute of the Tennessee Annual Confee- 
 ENCE OF the Methodist Episcopal Church, at Athens, 
 Alabama. 
 
 THE Tennessee Conference at its session at Athens, Alaba- 
 ma, in October, 1842, projected a School for girls, and the 
 General Assembly of Alabama in January, 1843, passed an act 
 incorporating the Female Institute of the Tennessee Annual 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, at Athens, Ala- 
 bama. The Trustees named in the act of incorporation were: 
 A. L. P. Green, Thomas Maddin, A. F. Driskill, Joshua Boucher, 
 F. G. Ferguson, Daniel Coleman, Ira E. Hobbs, B. W. Maclin, 
 Thomas Bass, J. F. Sowell, Thomas S. Malone, James C. Malone, 
 AVilliam Kicliardson, George S. Houston, K. W. Vasser, Jona- 
 than McDonald, and James Craig. 
 
 In the autumn of that year, 1843, the Tennessee Conference 
 Female Institute at Athens, as it was designated in the Minutes, 
 was opened, in a frame building in the rear of where a brick ed- 
 ifice for the School was afterward erected, with the Eev. E. H. 
 Kivers as President, and the Eev. F. G. Ferguson as Professor, 
 and Mrs. Ferguson, and one other person possibly, taught the 
 music of the Institute, and one lady presided in the hall as a 
 teacher. There was a good patronage at the beginning. 
 
 In due course was erected the excellent house which has so 
 long stood in the service of the School. The original purpose 
 of the projectors of the School was to lodge the pupils 
 from a distance with the families and in the homes at and 
 about the town, and not in the building of the Institute, 
 lience large boarding accommodations were not provided for in 
 the construction of the Institute building. The Eev. A. L. P. 
 Greene was the active advocate of the plan of boarding the 
 girls in the homes of the people of the place. The plan has 
 merit in it, whatever may be said about the impracticability of 
 such arrangement. It is in harmony with the divine ordinance 
 
 (631) 
 
 1 
 
632 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 to recognize and support the home. After some experience it 
 was deemed unwise to leave the premises for two days of the 
 week unprotected, and so the President, Dr. Eivers, fitted up 
 in the Institute building sufficient accommodations for a family 
 and a small number of boarders, and occupied it. What the 
 building cost is not now known. Mr. Benjamin W. Maclin, 
 probably, contributed a larger sum to the enterprise than any 
 one else. 
 
 Dr. Eivers was President of the Institute for a half dozen 
 years, and the Piev. F. G. Ferguson was Professor there for two 
 years, and his accomplished wife was one of the music Teachers 
 in the Institute for two or more years. Mrs. Kebecca Hobbs, 
 the wife of Mr. Ira E. Hobbs, taught in the School for a time. 
 When Professor Ferguson resigned his position the Eev. Ben- 
 jamin H. Hubbard was elected Professor of Mathematics, and 
 he held a Professor's chair so long as Dr. Eivers was President. 
 When Dr. Eivers resigned the Presidency of the School Dr. 
 Hubbard succeeded to that position, and was at the head of the 
 School till the close of 1852, when he transferred to the Mem- 
 phis Conference, and was appointed to Jackson Station, as 
 preacher in charge, and Professor in Jackson Female Institute. 
 He died at Jackson, Tennessee, May 2, 1853. He was a fair 
 scholar, a good teacher, a fine preacher, and a lovely Christian, 
 a man of faith. 
 
 The Eev. Smith W. Moore succeeded Dr. Hubbard in the 
 Presidency of the Tennessee Conference Female Institute, at 
 Athens. He held that position only one year, though he had 
 held the position of Professor in the Institute for three years 
 previous to his Presidency. He left Athens for La Grange, 
 Alabama, and in about one year transferred to the Memphis 
 Conference, where he worked till his death, September 2, 1880. 
 He spent a good many years in teaching. He was a native 
 of North Carolina, a pupil at Eandolph-Macon College, was 
 brought into the kingdom of God at Ealeigh, in his native 
 State, and died at Brown.sboro, Tennessee, and was buried 
 there in Oakwood Cemetery. He was licensed to preach in 
 1840. Dr. Moore was a scholar, teacher, preacher, and author. 
 He was gifted, pious, and useful. He died happy, and his 
 memory is precious. 
 Upon the resignation of Dr. Moore the Eev. Isham E. Fin- 
 
 The Female Institute of the Tennessee Annual Conference. 633 
 
 ley was elected President of the Tennessee Conference Female 
 Institute. He filled the position for two years. The Eev. 
 Isham E. Finley was succeeded by Professor George E. Naff, 
 who continued in the Presidency until about the beginning of 
 the war in 1861. Mrs. J. H. Childs took charge of the School 
 after Naff resigned, and she directed its destinies for some 
 years. She was a woman of great force of character, of intelli- 
 gence, and of worth. She was greatly devoted to the Church. 
 The Institute did well under her supervision. She was a 
 woman of fine personal aj^pearance. She died in Huutsville, 
 Alabama, and was buried in the cemetery at that place. 
 
 The method of collecting funds for the Institute is not very 
 well known. It is known that during the year 1845, the Eev. 
 Fielding H. Harris acted as Agent for the Conference Institute 
 at Athens, Alabama. AVhat success he had is not known. 
 
CHAPTER XXXL 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844. 
 
 THE Methodists found their way into the Colonies of North 
 America, and entered upon the sacred work to which they 
 were evidently called. They at once obtained access alike to 
 the slave owners and to the slaves. Both the slave owners and 
 the slaves attained the grace of God, and united with that pecul- 
 iar people. Very soon that guileless class of leaders who have 
 less wisdom than sensitiveness of conscience began an agitation 
 for the extirpation of the evil of slavery. The preachers in 
 Conference assembled at Baltimore, April 24, 1780, made the 
 following deliverance: "This Conference ought to require those 
 traveling preachers who hold slaves to give promises to^ set 
 them free." That was the first official action on the subject, 
 and was the beginning of strife, strife which outlasted the in- 
 stitution of slavery in North America. The Conference in ses- 
 sion in the spring time of 1784 enacted the following rule: 
 " Our friends who buy slaves with no other design than to hold 
 them as slaves, and have been previously warned, shall be ex- 
 pelled, and permitted to sell on no consideration." At the 
 Conferences held for the year 1785 the following action was 
 had: "It is recommended to all our brethren to suspend the 
 execution of the minute on slavery till the deliberations of a 
 future Conference; and that an equal space of time be allowed 
 all our members for consideration, when the minute shall be 
 put in force." Here is the law on the subject of slavery sus- 
 pended in the very beginning. Through all the history of ec- 
 clesiastical legislation on the subject, the statutes of the Church 
 concerning slavery were inoperative. The very provisions of 
 said statutes demonstrated that it was impossible to enforce 
 them, and that they were absolutely null and void. Even Dr. 
 Thomas Coke, who was so very conscientious in bearing testi- 
 mony against slaveholding, could desist when he crossed State 
 lines. He said: "I have now done with my testimony against 
 (634) 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844. 635 
 
 slavery for a time, being got into North Carolina, the laws of 
 this State forbiding any to emancipate their Negroes." In- 
 stead of leaving the civil affairs of the country to the civil au- 
 thorities, and the domestic matters to adjust themselves in the 
 on-going of time and things, and addressing themselves to the 
 legitimate work of their heavenly calling and keeping them- 
 selves in sympathy with all classes and conditions of Society in 
 the broad field before them those very conscientious preachers 
 rushed in where angels would not have ventured, and in- 
 augurated a useless agitation and a destructive war. The wise 
 and conservative had to expend their energies and lay under 
 contribution their best wits in improvising plans and measures 
 to keep from driving to shipwreck and ruin. They had to 
 manipulate compromises to hold the Church in sympathy with 
 public sentiment, and retain a hearing of the people. In order 
 that the Methodist Episcopal Church might maintain an exist- 
 ence in the slaveholding States it became absolutely necessary, 
 from time to time, to make concessions and to recede from the 
 positions assumed on the subject of slavery. 
 
 Memorable in the history of Methodism and of the country 
 was the session of the General Conference of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church which was held in the city of New York, begin- 
 ning May 1 and closing June 10, 1844. The question of slavery, 
 associated with the Kev. Francis A. Harding, of the Baltimore" 
 Conference, and Bishop James O. Andrew, agitated that ec-- 
 clesiastical body through the entire session of six weeks. On 
 May 20 the Committee on Episcopacy was instructed to ascer- 
 tain the facts concerning the connection of Bishop James O.. 
 Andrew with slavery, and report the result of the investigation! 
 to the General Conference the next day. The Committee com- 
 plied with instructions, and gave to the Conference Bishop 
 Andrew's own written statement of the facts in the case. That 
 report and statement, it seems, put the esse in official form be- 
 fore the Conference, and the case was set for hearing and dis- 
 position the day following. On the order of the day the case 
 was taken up in due form May 22. From that day till June 1 
 the case was discussed, and that under the pressure of the most 
 intense ecclesiastical and political excitement. The country 
 was agitated from center to circumference. A number of pre- 
 ambles and resolutions were presented and a number of propo- 
 41 
 
636 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 sitions were made on the subject. Finally, on June 1, the case 
 was disposed of by the adoption of the following preamble and 
 resolution: " Whereas the Discipline of our Church forbids the 
 doing of anything calculated to destroy our itinerant general su- 
 periiitendency, and whereas Bishop Andrew has become connect- 
 ed with slavery by marriage and otherwise, and this act having 
 drawn after it circumstances which, in the estimation of the 
 General Conference, will greatly embarrass the exercise of his 
 office as an itinerant general superintendent, if not in some 
 places entirely prevent it; Therefore, Kesolved, That it is the 
 sense of this General Conference that he desist from the exer- 
 cise of this office so long as this impediment remains." 
 
 That document was adopted by one hundred and eleven votes 
 for it, and sixty-nine against it. There were about twelve men 
 belonging to the Conferences in the non-slaveholdiug States who 
 voted against the measure. The Baltimore Conference was 
 divided in the vote, and one man from the Eepublic of Texas 
 voted yea. 
 
 It certainly required a genius for interpreting constitutions 
 and a gift for associating remote things to find in the con- 
 stitutional restriction against legislation which would tend to 
 "destroy the plan of our itinerant general superintendency " 
 the basis of a preamble for implicating a man in the charge of 
 violating the provisions of the Discipline who had accidentally 
 become connected with slavery. 
 
 The anti-slavery men held that a Bishop under the regula- 
 tions of the Methodist Episcopal Church was merely an officer 
 of the General Conference, and as such was liable to be de- 
 posed at will by a simple majority of the body without the 
 forms of a trial, and that no obligation existed even to assign 
 cause wherefore he was deposed. Dr. Hamline and others 
 argued that the General Conference had constitutional authority 
 to depose a Bishop summarily, and by simple resolution. Dr. 
 Hamline asserted that it was fitting, and expedient that Bishop 
 Andrew be deposed. He said the General Conference had the 
 authority to depose him, and that it would be treason not to do 
 so, and that notwithstanding he and his associates against the 
 Bishop, admitted that Bishop Andrew was " morally innocent." 
 They all pronounced Bishop Andrew without moral turpitude, 
 and without official delinquency. 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 184:4, 637 
 
 Those who defended Bishop Andrew rejected all the posi- 
 tions advocated in the case by the anti-slavery men. Bishop 
 Soule held that the constitution, laws and regulations of the 
 Church, the vows of ordination imposed upon and the parch- 
 ments granted to Bishops defined the relations, protected the 
 prerogatives, and prescribed the duties of Bishops. He held 
 that the Bishops were Bishops of the Church, and not of the 
 General Conference or of the Annual Conference, and that they 
 could not be deposed without formal arraignment, and opportu- 
 nity of defense, and a verdict arrived at by law and upon testi- 
 mony. Not by resolution, but by formal investigation, by 
 legal procedure, under forms of trial, can a Bishop be deposed 
 from his ecclesiastical functions. 
 
 Bishop Soule entreated the General Conference to defer 
 action on the case. He said: " Now it is the solemn conviction 
 of my mind that the safest course you can pursue in the prem- 
 ises is to pass this subject without any implication of Bishop 
 Andrew's character, and send out officially the plain and simple 
 facts in the case to all your Societies — to all your Conferences. 
 Let it be read everywhere, and then we may have a further ex- 
 pression of opinion, without any kind of agitation." His words, 
 though wise, were not regarded; his entreaty, though earnest, 
 was not heeded. 
 
 Time for its preparation having elapsed, a lengthy Protest 
 against the action of the General Conference attempting to de- 
 grade and punish Bishop Andrew was presented to the General 
 Conference and entered upon the Records thereof. That Pro- 
 test was signed by sixty delegates. A Rejoinder to the Protest 
 was made and entered upon the Journal of the General Confer- 
 ence. The making that Reply and putting it to record was a 
 most singular proceeding. 
 
 Meanwhile, the crisis called forth various eflForts to adjust 
 matters for the successful on-going of the Church in the future. 
 A paper, prepared by Dr. William Capers, was presented to the 
 General Conference, and referred to a Committee of nine for 
 consideration which proposed measures for keeping the Church 
 united under the jurisdiction of two General Conferences, one 
 to be held in the South, and one to be held in the North. No 
 agreement could be reached for adjustment on that basis, and 
 the Committee was released from further consideration of that 
 
638 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 plan. A declaration signed by fifty-one delegates was pre- 
 sented to the General Conference representing that the work 
 of the Christian Church could not be successfully prosecuted 
 in the slaveholding States under the jurisdiction of the General 
 Conference as then constituted. The paper embodying that 
 declaration was referred to a Committee of nine, and that Com- 
 mittee reported a document which was adopted by the General 
 Conference. That document provided for uniting the Societies 
 and the Conferences in the slaveholding States in a distinct ec- 
 clesiastical connection, should the delegates from the Confer- 
 ences in the slaveholding States find it necessary. That paper 
 contained provisions with regard to the sixth restrictive rule, 
 the property of the Book Concern, and the property in meeting- 
 houses, school-houses, colleges, and cemeteries which need not 
 be detailed in this connection. 
 
 The day after the General Conference adjourned sine die, the 
 delegates from the thirteen Conferences then in the slavehold- 
 ing States and Territories assembled in the Lecture room of 
 Green Street Church, in New York, and formulated an Address 
 to their constituents, and also a plan of procedure to be ob- 
 served by them in the disposition of the matters involved. The 
 Address contained an intelligent review of the action of the 
 General Conference just adjourned on the various points so 
 vitally affecting the interests of the Methodists in the slave- 
 holding section of the country, and was published, as was also 
 the plan of procedure, for the instruction and guidance of those 
 immediately concerned. The Address set forth the fact that 
 the action of the General Conference touching slavery and 
 abolition had placed the Methodists in the slaveholding States 
 and Territories under proscription and disability; and also that 
 the General Conference, having been advised that there might 
 be an imperative necessity in the premises, had provided for 
 formal and pacific separation, not schism, not secession, but 
 separation; and that the Methodists of the slaveholding States 
 and Territories were to be the sole judges of the necessity for 
 separation. The authors of the Address did not disguise the 
 fact that, though they had " clung to the cherished unity of the 
 Church with a firmness of purpose and force of feeling which 
 nothing but invincible necessity could subdue," they regarded 
 separation in the near future as inevitable. The Address re- 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844. 639 
 
 ferred the whole question to the dispassionate consideration of 
 the ministers and members of the Church in the slaveholding 
 States and Territories. The plan of procedure adopted by the 
 delegates recommended that no mass meetings be held, and 
 that no measures be instituted of a radical or revolutionary 
 nature, and that the Societies and congregations make their 
 views known through the Quarterly Conference, and through 
 the Quarterly Conferences reach the Annual Conferences. 
 
 The Methodists in the slaveholding States were under the 
 alternative of separating from the men who had deposed Bishop 
 Andrew because he was connected with slavery, or of arraying 
 the whole population of the South against them. They had to 
 separate from the abolitionists or give up the field in which they 
 were at work. A Church whose legislation was so radical on 
 domestic relations and social institutions as to create dissension 
 and distrust could not have access to either slaves or masters. 
 A Church whose legislation was in conflict with the legislation 
 of the State could never hope to be received with general favor 
 and prosper where the conflicting legislation touched the popu- 
 lation. The action of the General Conference was radical and 
 reckless, and it was impossible to be indifferent in the midst of 
 such reckless disregard of conservative views and compromise 
 measures. The Methodists, as an ecclesiastical organization, 
 should have abstained, from the first, and all the time, from all 
 interference with institutions authorized and established by the 
 civil laws of the country, and had they pursued that course, they 
 would have escaped the distraction which they had among 
 themselves on the subject of slavery, and the Church would not 
 have suffered the fearful evil of disruption. The vessel was 
 marred in the hands of the potter, marred by the very hands 
 which would make it. 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama and the people of the State gen- 
 erally were greatly excited over the action of the General Con- 
 ference on the subject of slavery, though so far as is now known 
 there was not an injudicious action had nor a revolutionary 
 measure instituted in the entire commonwealth during the whole 
 time of the terrible ordeal. The members of the Church at dif- 
 ferent places, in meetings called for the purpose, and in Quarterly 
 Conferences held in the order of regular business, passed pre- 
 ambles and resolutions expressive of their views on all the points 
 
640 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 involved. There is still extant an account of a political meeting 
 in the State in which action was had on that grave subject. The 
 proceedings of that political meeting and the proceedings of a 
 meeting of the official members of the Greenesborough Station, 
 Alabama Conference, will be put to record here in this connec- 
 tion, and are selected and given as indicating the feelings and 
 views entertained by the people throughout the State. These are 
 samples of many papers adopted in different parts of the com- 
 monwealth, and for which there is not room in the pages of this 
 History. 
 
 "A public meeting of the citizens of Bussell County, Alabama, 
 was held at Crawford, on June 8. This meeting was convened 
 for political purposes, and passed a preamble and resolutions in 
 accordance with those purposes. The following resolutions, 
 adopted, among the rest, without a dissenting voice, will interest 
 the readers of this paper: 
 
 Be it further Resolved, That this meeting has witnessed with 
 intense interest, and painful anxiety, the agitation of the slave 
 question in the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, now convened in the City of New York. They have 
 seen that a topic, which hitherto has excited the bad passions of 
 of man only in the orgies of fanaticism, or in the strife of fac- 
 tions in their unprincipled struggle for political power, has been 
 transferred to the foot of that throne which ought to be sacred 
 to charity, peace, and good will among Brethren of the same 
 Faith. They have beheld with unutterable indignation, the hu- 
 miliating fact of a Bishop of the State of Georgia, eminent for his 
 piety, learning, ability, and Christian virtues put in effect upon 
 his trial as a culprit, for the alleged sin of marrying a lady pos- 
 sessed of slaves, by which it is insultingly affirmed, that a slave- 
 holder is an unfit Teacher of the Word of God, and must sub- 
 mit, if tolerated as a member of the Church of Christ, to a sub- 
 ordinate station in the Ministry. A discrimination which finds 
 no warrant in the sacred oracles of God, and which involves I th 
 insult and outrage to the people of an entire section of this 
 Union. 
 
 Be it further Resolved, that if Bishop Andrew should be de- 
 posed from his Episcopal functions, we earnestly invoke the 
 clergy of the Methodist Episcopal Church at the South, to take 
 immediate measures for their secession from a Conference which 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844, 
 
 641 
 
 has placed so gross a stigma not only on themselves but on their 
 respective Flocks. An insult which can admit of but one reme- 
 dy, in the application of which they may be assured of the warm 
 sympathy and unalterable support of the religious congrega- 
 tions of the whole Southern States of every sect and denomina- 
 tion." (Southern Christian Advocate.) 
 
 "At a meeting of the official members of the Greenesborough 
 Station, Alabama Conference, held July 1, 1844, the following pre- 
 amble and resolutions were offered by Dr. Pleasant W. Kittrell, 
 and unanimously adopted: 
 
 Believing that the time has arrived, in the history of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church, when it becomes absolutely necessary 
 that the Southern portion of said Church should take a bold, in- 
 dependent, and decisive stand, in defense of its rights, and speak 
 out a language that shall be heard, and felt, from one extremity 
 of our union to the other — from Texas to the farthest shore 
 of New England — therefore. We, the official members of the 
 Greenesborough Station, Alabama Conference, in order that our 
 opinions may be distinctly avowed, known, and properly under- 
 stood, touching the subject of the recent action of the General 
 Conference, in the case of the Rev. James O. Andrew, one of the 
 Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church, do beg leave to set 
 forth our views in the following resolutions: 
 
 Resolved, That we regard the present as an awfully fearful 
 crisis in the history of our Church; one which threatens the 
 whole Church with evils of the most alarming character; which, 
 while it calls for a pow^erful exercise of Christian forbearance, 
 and charity, on our part, yet justifies us in preparing to meet it 
 in its worst form, both as it becomes Christians, and freemen. 
 
 Resolved, That we deem the action of the General Conference, 
 in the case of Bishop Andrew, as unconstitutional, uncalled for, 
 and disorganizing and revolutionary in its tendency, inasmuch 
 as no charge of immorality, or neglect of duty, was alleged 
 against him. 
 
 Resolved, That while we are disposed to accord to our breth- 
 ren of the North honesty of motive and intention, in their late 
 action, yet, we can but sincerely and heartily deprecate that 
 spirit of mistaken and misguided zeal, and false philanthropy, 
 which prompted their movements; that we view it as an unneces- 
 sary interference with our rights; at war with the true interests 
 
642 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 of the Church, and in violation of that spirit and temper that 
 should govern the conduct of Christ's people. 
 
 Kesolved, That we heartily approve the course of Bishop An- 
 drew, in refusing to resign, under the circumstances; for had 
 he done so, he would have closed the door (now open) for preach- 
 ing the gospel to the slaves of the South. 
 
 Eesolved, That the majority of the General Conference, in re- 
 fusing to regard the request of the Bishops, in reference to the 
 final decision of Bishop Andrew's case, manifested a deadly hos- 
 tility to the institutions of the South, and a contempt for the 
 usages of the Church, on all subjects of great moment. 
 
 Kesolved, That Bishop Andrew could have been profitably and 
 usefully employed, in the Southern portion of our Church, for 
 the next four years, without any violation of the rule governing 
 the work of a Bishop; as evidence— Bishop Hedding has been 
 confined to one portion of the work, not having visited the South 
 but once since his election. 
 
 Kesolved, That we believe it to be for the glory of God and 
 the salvation of souls, that the Church peaceably divide; for we 
 feel assured that we shall never be able to reconcile our breth- 
 ren of the North to the institutions of the South. 
 
 Kesolved, That Bishop Andrew has our entire confidence, as a 
 Christian and Christian minister; that we reverence him for 
 his intelligence and virtues as a man, for his zeal and industry 
 as a superintendent of the Church; in short, for all those noble 
 and dignified qualities of head and heart which have marked 
 his course and characterized him through life, in the various 
 stations which he has filled. 
 
 Kesolved, That we tender him our Christian sympathies, un- 
 der the unjust and cruel treatment which he has received from 
 his brethren of the North, and we pledge ourselves to sustain 
 him in his office, and pray that he may long live to bless the 
 Church by his godly example and pious precepts. 
 
 Kesolved, That Bishop Soule is eminently entitled to the 
 thanks of the Southern portion of our Church, for the noble, 
 dignified, and disinterested stand which he maintained during 
 the business of the General Conference, pending the trial of 
 Bishop Andrew's case, and for the respect which he evinced for 
 southern rights and institutions. 
 . Kesolved, That a copy of the above resolutions be signed by 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844. 643 
 
 the pastor and Secretary and transmitted to the Southern Chris- 
 tian Advocate for publication, with the request that our Church 
 papers will copy them, and that another copy be sent to Bish- 
 op Andrew. Thomas H. Capers, Pastor." 
 
 K. S. Hunt, Secretary. 
 
 That political meeting in Kussell County was held before the 
 adjournment of the General Conference and before the dele- 
 gates from the South had formulated their plans of operation? 
 and the spirit of that meeting was according to the impulses 
 of the hour, and according to the impulses born of the convic- 
 tions which the Southern people had on the subject. The meet- 
 ing at Greenesborough was held after time for more mature de- 
 liberation, and the spirit there was in accord with the mature 
 judgment of the Methodist people throughout the common- 
 wealth. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference for Tuskaloosa Station, Alabama 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, held June 15, 
 1844, the Kev. Charles McLeod, P. E., the Kev. Thomas O. Sum- 
 mers, P. C, and David Scott, Secretary, adopted a well conceived 
 document, a document written by the Kev. Thomas O. Summers, 
 in which was expressed the judgment of that body on the mat- 
 ters involved by the several actions of the General Conference 
 just four days previously adjourned. That Quarterly Confer- 
 ence said in that elegant document: "Peaceable secession is 
 greatly to be preferred to ceaseless denunciation, distrust, and 
 strife." 
 
 The Methodists of Mobile, Alabama, were greatly agitated 
 over the transactions which imperiled their prerogatives and 
 usefulness, and in a meeting of the male members of the sever- 
 al Charges of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the city, a 
 meeting presided over by F. C. Heard, and in which Jones Ful- 
 ler acted as Secretary, a strongly worded paper was adopted in 
 which the measures carried by the majority of the General Con- 
 ference were pronounced illegal, oppressive, and unkind; and 
 the abolitionists were respectfully requested not to obtrude 
 their ministerial labors in any of the Churches in the city of 
 Mobile. 
 
 At a Quarterly Conference for Kussell Circuit, Alabama Con- 
 ference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, held at Salem, Ala- 
 bama, July 13, 1844, a Committee, consisting of five local 
 
644 
 
 Ilistorij of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 preachers, the Eev. John Crowell, the Eev. William C. Robin- 
 son, the Rev. Charles A. Brown, the Rev. John Ardis, and the 
 Rev. James W. Capps, ai\d of two laymen who were not preach- 
 ers, William Balliew and John R. Page, presented preamble 
 and resolutions which were adopted. That paper so enthusi- 
 asticalJy supported by that Qu\arterly Conference declared that 
 an ecclesiastical assembly had no right to interfere with slavery 
 or any civil relations, that the settlement of such questions and 
 relations belonged exclusively to the civil assemblies of the 
 country. That document also declared that the time had come 
 when the maintainance of their rights both civil and religious 
 demanded that the Methodists in the South should separate 
 from the Methodists in the North, and maintain an independent 
 jurisdiction. 
 
 A Quarterly Conference held for Greenville Circuit, Alabama 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in July, 1844, 
 adopted an elegant paper which approved of the plan to hold a 
 delegated convention for the purpose of organizing a separate 
 and distinct body for the control of its own ecclesiastical matters. 
 The Rev. G. Garrett was the presiding elder who presided in 
 that Quarterly Conference, and James McFarland was the Sec- 
 retary. 
 
 The male members of the Methodist Episcopal Church at 
 Woodville, Alabama, (now called Uniontown) held a meeting 
 July 15, 1844, presided over by the Rev. Thomas J. Williamson, 
 with J. R. John, Esq., acting as Secretary, in which they ex- 
 pressed their feelings and views on the proceedings of the Gen- 
 eral Conference relating to slavery. Their views on the subject 
 were expressed by the adoption of a paper prepared and pre- 
 sented by G. N. AYare, R. H. Hudson, and James White. One 
 resolution adopted is the following: "Resolved, That a division 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church is indispensably necessary 
 and that under existing circumstances we cannot be satisfied 
 without it, and do hereby recommend that the separation take 
 place as soon as practicable, and that the plan of separation 
 proposed by the Committee for this purpose, and adopted by 
 the General Conference, is equitable, and should therefore be 
 carried out." 
 
 The Quarterly Conference for La Fayette Circuit, Alabama 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, held at Oak 
 
 (644) 
 
M 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844, 645 
 
 Bowery, Alabama, August 10, 1844, with forty-five members pres- 
 ent, and the Eev. John W. Starr, P. E., in the chair, and Na-^ 
 thaniel Grady, acting Secretary, adopted preamble and resolu- 
 tions which for exactness and comprehensiveness were not often 
 excelled. That Quarterly Conference passed the following: 
 
 "Resolved, That we recognize obedience to the laws of the 
 land as a high moral duty binding upon every good citizen, and 
 that any act of an ecclesiastical judicature, bringing the Church 
 into a position antagonistical to the State, is arrogant and revo- 
 lutionary, and fit only to be repudiated and denounced by all 
 good Christians." That Quarterly Conference also declared 
 their cordial approval of the plan to call a convention of minis- 
 ters to adopt a constitution and arrange for the organization of 
 a Church in the Southern States. 
 
 The male members of Asbury Church in Autauga County, 
 Alabama, held a meeting August 17, 1844, in which Samuel 
 Stodenmier, H. D. Holmes, the Rev. Acton Young, S. Mims, J. 
 B. Wilkinson, and Gasper GholsoH took a leading part, and in 
 which deep convictions and intelligent views were expressed on 
 the extraordinary events of the hour. In that meeting held in 
 the noble old Asbury Church it was declared: "That under ex~ 
 isting circumstances nothing short of a separation will suit the 
 feelings and views of the South, as her rights have been reck- 
 lessly trampled on by the majority; and the union of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church has been broken by the late General 
 Conference, by its action in the cases of Bishop Andrew and 
 the Rev. F. A. Harding." 
 
 At a meeting of the members of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, in the town of Auburn, Alabama, held after divine 
 service, Sunday, July 28, 1844, strong resolutions were passed, 
 under the leadership of Judge John J. Harper, J. A. Pelot, N. 
 J. Scott, Simeon Perry, M. Turner, and E. Wilbanks, denouuc-^ 
 ing the action of the General Conference on the subject of 
 slavery, and recommending separation and a distinct jurisdic- 
 tion. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference for Marion Station, Alabama Con« 
 ference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, took action upon 
 the exciting theme, and approved the purpose to separate the- 
 Church in the South from the Church in the North. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Greene Circuit, at Ebene- 
 
646 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 zer, August 17, 19, 1844, adopted a very expressive paper on 
 the momentous subject, as did the members of Society at Eb- 
 enezer at the same time. In that paper it was declared that 
 an outrage had been committed, by the General Conference, on 
 the discipline and usage of the Church. The plan to call a 
 Convention to complete a distinct ecclesiastical organization 
 was strongly approved. The Kev. L. B. McDonald, W. H. 
 McCurdy, K. T. Shelton, and H. L. Kennon were active in the 
 measures of that occasion. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference held for Oak Grove Circuit at 
 McGinney's Camp-ground, near Lowndesboro, Alabama, August 
 24, 1844, John W. Starr, P. E., in the chair, and Barton Stone, 
 Secretary, adopted a very exhaustive paper on this great sensa- 
 tion. In that excellent paper the preachers of the Alabama 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church were highly 
 commended for their disinterested Christian work in the Mis- 
 sions to the Negroes, and in it was denounced, with severe sar- 
 casm, " the supererogation of tender sympathy manifested by 
 our Northern brethern for the physical and temporal condition 
 of the slaves," while they had " effected so little for the spiritual 
 welfare of the same race among themselves." The members of 
 that Quarterly Conference, in that superb paper, asserted, 
 "that the unmolested enjoyment of our rights, nay, our very 
 existence as a Church, in any condition to be desired or tolerated, 
 depends upon separation." The fond hope was indulged that 
 in separation there would accrue lasting good. By separation 
 the Methodists in the South would escape distrust and suspi- 
 cion, and open the way to prosecute the work of evangelizing 
 the slaves of the South. 
 
 A Quarterly Conference for Demopolis Station, Alabama 
 Conference, held at Demopolis, Alabama, Jesse Boring, P. E., 
 and R. A. Smith, Secretary, adopted resolutions, clear and con- 
 cise, disapproving the action of the General Conference in de- 
 posing Bishop Andrew on account of his connection with 
 slavery, and accepting the plan of a separate jurisdiction. The 
 Resolutions were prepared and presented by the Rev. John C. 
 Keener, the preacher in charge of the Station. Keener was 
 then a young man, but he was pronounced on the subjects in- 
 volved. The Society at Demopolis adopted the resolutions 
 which the Quarterly Conference had adopted. 
 
 Tlie Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844. 647 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference held for Montgomery Station, 
 Alabama Conference, September 28, 1844, resolutions express- 
 ive of the feelings of the membership of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, connected with said Station, upon the action of 
 the General Conference upon the case of Bishop Andrew were 
 unanimously adopted. The Committee who drafted the resolu- 
 tions were Neil Blue, T. L. Brothers, and the Rev. S. F. Pilley. 
 It was declared: "That the constituted authorities of the civil 
 government have the entire control of legislative action upon 
 slavery in the United States; and the action of the majority of 
 the General Conference in attempting to interfere with civil 
 regulations for the purpose of making them the test of eccles- 
 iastical qualifications is contrary to the teaching of the New 
 Testament and the standard of doctrines adopted by the Metho- 
 dist Episcopal Church." 
 
 The Quarterly Conference for Eufaula Station, Alabama 
 Conference, adopted a long and very ably written report on the 
 subject of the division of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in 
 which it was declared that division was inevitable. On De- 
 cember 2, 1844, the members of the Society at Eufaula, Alabama, 
 adopted that same report, with one member dissenting. At 
 the meeting of the members at Eufaula, Dr. A. P. Crawford 
 presided, and E. B. Young acted as Secretary. 
 
 The Quarterly Conference for Jacksonville Circuit, Alabama 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in session at 
 Alexandria Camp-ground, Benton County, Alabama, appointed 
 a Committee, consisting of Harris Taylor, Haman Baily, Ed- 
 ward Patton, Clayton C. Gillispie, and James F. Grant, to draft 
 preamble and resolutions expressing the sense of that Confer- 
 ence on the subject of the division of the Church North and 
 South. At 7 P.M. Monday, July 15, 1844, the Quarterly Con- 
 ference in session, the Report of that Committee was received 
 and adopted. 
 
 Numbers of other Quarterly Conferences and numbers of 
 other Societies in the State took official arid public action on 
 the very perplexing subject. There was great unanimity on 
 the matters involved throughout the commonwealth. There 
 was one dissenting voice upon the action of the Society at Eu- 
 faula, and in one Circuit in the Alabama Conference, the Cen- 
 terville Circuity there was decided opposition to the division 
 
648 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 of the Church. Only a comparatively small fraction of the 
 members of that Circuit were in favor of the action of the 
 majority of the General Conference on the subject of slavery, 
 and opposed to the plan of separation recommended by that 
 body. Eegret over the situation was everywhere expressed, 
 and reluctance in taking the step for separation was everywhere 
 manifested, but in view of the insuperable difficulties in prose- 
 cuting the work in the South under the jurisdiction of a people 
 avowedly enlisted against the civil institutions of that section 
 the Methodists of Alabama with almost unanimous voice said 
 separation is inevitable, is absolutely necessary. Preachers 
 and laymen took an active part in the agitation, and they wrote 
 some valuable articles on the subject. The Rev. Thomas O. 
 Summers, who was at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, when the crusade 
 opened, wrote extensively during the agitation. He was a 
 leader in advocating and vindicating the rights of the South. 
 He preferred separation to schism. H© pronounced the course 
 pursued with Bishop Andrew as at once puerile and illegal. 
 
 The session of the Alabama Conference was held at Wetump- 
 ka, Alabama, beginning February 26, and closing March 5, 1845. 
 At that time and place the question of a separate jurisdiction of 
 the Annual Conferences in the South presented itself for settle- 
 ment, and the Conference formulated and adopted the following 
 deliverance : 
 
 " The Committee appointed by the Conference to take into 
 consideration the subject of a separate jurisdiction for the 
 Southern Conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church beg 
 leave to report. That they have meditated Yrith prayerful solici- 
 tude on this important matter, and have solemnly concluded on 
 the necessity of the measure. They suppose it to be superflu- 
 ous to review formally all the proceedings which constitute the 
 unhappy controversy between the Northern and Southern por- 
 tions of our Church, inasmuch as their sentiments can be ex- 
 pressed in one sentence, — They endorse the unanswerable Pro- 
 test of the Minority in the late General Conference. They be- 
 lieve that the doctrines of that imperishable Document cannot 
 be successfully assailed. They are firm in the conviction that 
 the action of the Majority in the case of Bishop Andrew was un- 
 constitutional. Being but a delegated body, the General Con- 
 ference has no legitimate right to tamper with the office of a 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844, 649 
 
 General Superintendent, his amenableness to that body and li- 
 ability to expulsion by it, having exclusive reference to malad- 
 ministration, ceasing to travel, and immoral conduct. They are 
 of opinion that Bishop Andrew's connection with slavery can 
 come under none of these heads. If the entire eldership of 
 the Church, in a conventional capacity, were to constitute non- 
 slaveholding or even abolitionism a tenure by which the Epis- 
 copal office should be held, or if they were to abolish the office, 
 they doubtless could plead the abstract right thus to modify or 
 revolutionize the Church in its supreme executive administra- 
 tion. But before the General Conference can justly plead this 
 right, it must show when and where such plenary power was 
 delegated to it by the only fountain of authority, the entire Pas- 
 torate of the Church. Your Committee are therefore of opin- 
 ion, that the General Conference has no more power over a 
 Bishop, except in the specified cases of maladministration, 
 ceasing to travel, and immorality, than over the Episcopacy, as 
 an integral part of our excellent ecclesiastical polity. It can no 
 more depose a Bishop for slaveholding than it can create a new 
 Church. 
 
 Your Committee deeply regret that these * conservative ' sen- 
 timents did not occur to the majority in the late General Con- 
 ference, and that the apologists of that body, since its session, 
 have given them no place in their ecclesiastical creed, but on 
 the contrary have given fearful evidence that proceedings in the 
 case of Bishop Andrew are but the incipiency of a course, which, 
 when finished, will leave not a solitary slaveholder in the com- 
 munion which be unfortunately under their control. The fore- 
 going sentiments and opinions embody the general views ex- 
 pressed most unequivocally throughout the Conference district 
 since the late General Conference, by the large body of the 
 membership, both in primary meetings and Quarterly Confer- 
 ences. 
 
 The Committee, therefore, offer to the calm consideration and 
 mature action of the Alabama Annual Conference the following 
 series of Resolutions: 
 
 1. Resolved, That this Conference deeply deplores the action 
 
 of the late General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
 
 Church in the case of our venerated Superintendent, Bishop 
 
 Andrew, believing it to be unconstitutional, being as totally 
 42 
 
G50 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 destitute of warrant froiQ the Discipline as from the AVord of 
 God. 
 
 2. Resolved, That the almost unanimous agreement of North- 
 ern Methodists with the majority and Southern Methodists 
 with the minority of the late General Conference, shows thf^ 
 wisdom of that body in suggesting a duality of jurisdiction to 
 meet the present emergency. 
 
 3. Resolved, That this Conference agrees to the proposition 
 for the alteration of the sixth restrictive rule of the Discipline. 
 
 4 Resolved, That this Conference approves of the projected 
 Convention at Louisville in May next, and appoints the follow- 
 ing brethren as a Delegation to the same: — 
 
 5. Resolved, That this Conference most respectfully invites 
 all the Bishops to attend the proposed Convention at Louisville. 
 
 6. Resolved, That this Conference is decided in its attachment 
 to Methodism as it exists in the Book of Discipline, and hopes 
 that the Louisville Convention, will not make the slightest alter- 
 ation, except so far as may be absolutely necessary for the for- 
 mation of a separate jurisdiction. 
 
 7. Resolved, That every preacher of this Conference shall take 
 up a collection in his Station or Circuit, as soon as practicable, 
 to defray the expenses of the Delegates to the Convention, and 
 the proceeds of such collections shall be immediately paid over 
 to the nearest Delegate or presiding elder; and the excess or 
 deficit of the colle(jtion for the said expenses shall be reported 
 to the next Conference, which shall take action on the same. 
 
 8. Resolved, That the Friday immediately preceding the ses- 
 sion of the Convention shall be observed in all our Circuits and 
 Stations as a day of fasting and prayer, for the blessing of God 
 upon its deliberations. 
 
 9. Resolved, That while this Conference fully appreciates the 
 commendable motives which induced the Holston Conference 
 to suggest another expedient to compromise the differences ex- 
 isting between the Northern and Southern divisions of the 
 Church, it nevertheless cannot concur in the proposition of that 
 Conference concerning that matter. 
 
 10. Resolved, That this Conference fully recognizes the right 
 of our excellent Superintendent, Bishop Soule, to invite Bishop 
 Andrew to share with him the responsibilities of the Episcopal 
 oflGice, and while the Conference regrets the absence of the for^ 
 
 The 2Iefhodists of Alabama in the Crisis of 1844. 651 
 
 mer, it rejoices in being favored with the efficient services of the 
 latter— it respectfully tenders these 'true yokefellows' in the 
 Superintendency the fullest approbation, the most fervent 
 prayers, and the most cordial sympathies. 
 
 Thomas O. Summers, 
 A. H. Mitchell, 
 E. V. Le Vert, 
 J. Hamilton, 
 E. Hearn, 
 W. Murrah, 
 J. Boring, 
 G. Shaeffer, 
 C. McLeod." 
 The members present and representing the Alabama Confer- 
 ence in the Convention at Louisville, Kentucky, beginning May 
 1, 1845, were Jefferson Hamilton, Jesse Boring, Thomas H. Ca- 
 pers, Eugene V. Le Vert, Elisha Calloway, Thomas O. Summers, 
 Greenberry Garrett. 
 
 The appointments received at the Conference at Wetumpka, 
 Alabama, March 5, 1845, were the last appointments made in 
 the State under the jurisdiction of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. At that time there were in the State, in round num- 
 bers, thirty-two thousand white and fifteen thousand colored 
 members. That embodied the interest which at that time had 
 to be conserved in Alabama. Nearly one-third of the members 
 were slaves, and the reason appears at once for the establish- 
 ment of an ecclesiastical jurisdiction free from the interference 
 of abolitionists. Sometimes a state of things is reached in 
 which action is imperatively demanded, and the alternative is a 
 choice between evils. In Alabama the organization of a sepa- 
 rate jurisdiction was accepted almost unanimously, and with 
 great enthusiasm, and the change was made in such manner as 
 not to disturb the on-going of affairs. The change was almost 
 imperceptible, though it is not to be denied that the agitation 
 and sharp controversies created and persisted in by the aboli- 
 tionists retarded the peaceful work of Methodism, and did great 
 harm to the general cause of Christianity. 
 
 The Alabama Conference held a session in Mobile, Alabama, 
 be"-inning February 25, 1846, in which the final action was had 
 concerning the separate jurisdiction. A number ci. resolutions 
 
652 
 
 Histonj of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 bearing on the subject were adopted. One resolution declared 
 that the Alabama Conference heartily approved the action of 
 the Louisville Convention, and their adherence to the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South. It was also resolved to conform all 
 the proceedings, journals, and records of the Conference to the 
 name and style of the Church under the new jurisdiction. The 
 Conference also elected delegates to represent them in the first 
 General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, 
 to meet in Petersburg, Virginia, the first day of May, of that 
 year. Said delegates were: Thomas H. Capers, Elisha Callo- 
 way, Eugene Y. LeVert, Jesse Boring, Jefferson Hamilton, 
 Greenberry Garrett, Thomas O. Summers. At that time were 
 made the first appointments in Alabama Conference of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 
 The white and colored members increased in Alabama in 
 about the same ratio from the time of the organization of the 
 Southern jurisdiction until the time of the effort to establish a 
 Confederacy of the slaveholding States and the time of the 
 abolition of slavery by the proclamation of the President of the 
 United States. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 The Work of Methodism in Alabama under the New 
 Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 
 
 FOE the series of years beginning with 1846, when the 
 Southern jurisdiction went into operation, and running to 
 the time of the civil war between the States, the Tennessee 
 Conference had in the State of Alabama two entire Districts, 
 the Huntsville and the Florence, the last sometimes called 
 Tuscumbia. The membership in the two Districts, including 
 both races, aggregated something over six thousand. There 
 was from year to year some fluctuation in numbers, though the 
 variation for all these years was not very great. 
 
 The leading preachers who occupied in the two Districts in 
 the beautiful Tennessee Valley during a decade and a half of 
 years were: The Kevs. Samuel S. Moody, Thomas Maddin, W. 
 G. Hensley, Henry P. Turner, Thomas W. Randle, James W. 
 Allen, Justinian Williams, Adam S. Riggs, Finch P. Scruggs, 
 W. D. F. Sawrie, W. E. J. Husbands, Moses M. Henkle, Ander- 
 son G. Copeland, A. F. Driskill, J. D. Barbee, Alexander E. 
 Erwin, Pleasant B. Eobinsou, J. E. Plumer, Wellborn Mooney. 
 
 The Eev. S. S. Moody was born in Virginia, in 1810, and 
 died May 5, 1863. His last work in Alabama was the Florence 
 Station. A hard worker, calm and saintly, he was classed as 
 one of "the bnghtest and the best" of the preachers of the 
 Tennessee Conference. 
 
 The Eev. Thomas Maddin was born in Philadelphia, Penn- 
 sylvania, February 13, 1796, and he died in Nashville, Tennes- 
 see, in 1874. His father was a Eomanist, and trained him in 
 that faith, but he was brought into a saving knowledge of the 
 grace of God by the Methodists, whom he found in his native 
 place, and he, in the midst of bitter opposition, cast his lot with 
 that people. He was licensed to preach in 1818, and continued 
 a preacher till his exit to the skies. Endowed with somewhat 
 of the poetic gift, he was ever charmed with the beautiful and 
 
 (653) 
 
654 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 grand in nature and the pure and sublime in the moral world. 
 In speech and address he was both pleasing and winning. He 
 was agreeable in spirit, devoted in life, and steadfast in faith. 
 He did much good work in North Alabama. 
 
 Much good was wrought in the common cause, and many 
 leading appointments were filled in North Alabama by the 
 Eev. Finch P. Scruggs, who was a native of Virginia, and who 
 died at Holly Springs, Mississippi, September 28, 1881, in the 
 eighty-first year of his age. 
 
 Eleven years of the long ministerial life of the Kev. W. D. 
 F. Sawrie were given to North Alabama, eight of them in the 
 work of presiding elder. He was a man of intense zeal and of 
 unfailing fidelity. He was a native of North Carolina, and died 
 in the city of Nashville, Tennessee, November 27, 1884, in the 
 seventy-third year of his age. 
 
 The Kev. Moses M. Henkle joined the Ohio Conference on trial 
 at Cincinnati, in August, 1819, and located in September, 1822, 
 being only a deacon. The next time he appears as an itinerant 
 is at the session of the Tennessee Conference in October, 1855, 
 when he was appointed to the Huntsville Station. He served 
 that Station till October, 1856, and he was Agent for Endow- 
 ment Fund of the Chair of Biblical Literature and Ecclesias- 
 tical History in Florence Wesley an University from the close of 
 his pastorate at Huntsville till October, 1858. He was a native 
 of Virginia, and was eminent as a scholar, a theologian, and a 
 preacher; and he was an author of no mean pretensions. "He 
 died in Kichmond, Virginia, in 1864, whither he had been sent 
 from Baltimore, by the military authority of the Federal Gov- 
 ernment." 
 
 The Kev. Alexander K. Erwin followed Dr. Henkle in the 
 Station at Huntsville. He filled that appointment for two 
 years, and then for a year he was Agent of the Book and Tract 
 Society and member of the Huntsville Station Quarterly Con- 
 ference. In the latter part of 1859 he assumed the duties of 
 President of the Huntsville Female College, but in a few brief 
 months he resigned his charge. He died of consumption, Jan- 
 uary 10, 1860. He lacked two days of being forty years old 
 when he died, and he had been a preacher about twenty years. 
 He was a native of Louisiana, was of tall and slender stature, 
 with blue eyes and cheerful countenance. Piety and power 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 655 
 
 i — ■ 
 
 characterized him as a Christian and a preacher. He was true 
 in life and triumphant in death. Within a short while of his 
 last expiring breath he said: "I see the pillars of the eternal 
 city. I shall soon be in Abraham's bosom." He left the 
 blessings of the triune God upon his children. His two boys 
 entered the ministry, one of them in the Tennessee Conference 
 and the other in the North Alabama. The children of the 
 righteous are blessed. 
 
 Perhaps the Kev. Pleasant B. Kobinson, M.D., did as much 
 for Methodism in Huntsville, Alabama, as any other one man. 
 He worked there in charge of the flocks devoted to one calling, 
 and he worked there also as a local preacher, and administered 
 medicine for many years, having an extended business, doing 
 good to both the bodies and souls of men. In November, 1827, 
 he was admitted on trial in the Tennessee Conference, and for 
 ten years he devoted himself exclusively to the work of the min- 
 istry, and then located. He was re-admitted into the Tennessee 
 Conference at its session in Huntsville, Alabama, in October, 
 1856, and was appointed to the Huntsville Colored Charge. Dur- 
 ing the year following he served West Huntsville Station, and 
 then after that he served another year on the Huntsville African 
 Mission. He was then one year Agent of Huntsville Female 
 College, and at the end of that year he was given a supernumer- 
 ary relation. He resigned his spirit to God who gave it at his 
 home in Huntsville, Alabama, October 2, 1861. He was a vigor- 
 ous, active man, possessing zeal, piety, and pathos. He was an 
 able preacher, and he led the hosts in great revivals. To the af- 
 flicted, the poor, and the outcasts he was ever a friend. His 
 Christian life encompassed the demonstration of divine adop- 
 tion, an unmistakable call to the ministry, and an ecstatic de- 
 parture to the realms of endless glory. 
 
 In 1843, about the time he was admitted to the profession of 
 law, William Basil Wood, though not then a member of the 
 Church, asked and obtained permission to organize a Sunday- 
 school in the Meeting House owned and used by the Methodists 
 of Florence, Alabama. The Sunday-school was organized, and 
 in that commenced the active religious work of that capable 
 young man. Some time after he opened that Sunday-school 
 he joined the Church. His name was recorded on the Class 
 Book of Florence Station for 1846, the oldest Class Book of that 
 
656 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Station now at hand. He was a leader and a pillar in that So- 
 ciety for four and a half decades. He was born October 29, 
 1821. Before he was a year old his father moved to Florence, 
 Alabama. There he grew to manhood. To the religious wor- 
 ship and public service of the Church William B. Wood gave a 
 large i:rart of his time, and to tlie support of the enterprises and 
 agencies of the Church he gave large portions of his worldly 
 substance. Through every channel open to the furtherance of 
 the kingdom of God accessible to him he distributed his worldly 
 goods. Generous and genial, he dispensed a bounteous hospi- 
 tality at home and at Camp-meetings for many years. He and 
 Levi Cassity married sisters, and were attached to each other. 
 For five years they were partners as tent-holders at Cypress Creek 
 Camp-ground, and they had many religious enjoyments together 
 at the Camp-meetings held there. On a Thursday of Septem- 
 ber, 1850, they packed and loaded preparatory to moving next 
 morning following to Cypress Camp-ground. During the night 
 of that Thursday a congestive chill seized Brother Cassity and 
 annulled his purpose to tent on the sacred ground where so often 
 he had met God and received his benediction. On the after- 
 noon of the following Sunday he, without a cloud intervening, 
 and without a doubt or a fear distracting, passed to " the undis- 
 covered country, from whose bourn no traveler returns." 
 Brother Cassity was a modest man, not ambitious of public sta- 
 tion. He was loving, tender, and kind. He would not lead in 
 public devotions, but he was a fine singer, and often, under deep 
 emotion, in a quiet mood, shed tears freely in the time of holy 
 worship. He was a steward for the Society at Florence, Ala- 
 bama, for a great many years. In his parting words to Brother 
 Wood he said: " We expected to be at the Camp-meeting to-day 
 enjoying it as we have so often done, but we will never go there 
 again together. You may be there with other friends next 
 year and for many years; I am going to the great meeting above 
 where we will never break up. I shall watch for you to come 
 and join us. Take care of my family and bring them with you.'* 
 By the death of Brother Cassity, as also by the death of one of 
 his daughters, Miss Sarah Elizabeth Cassity, who died while a 
 pupil at the Tennessee Conference Female Institute at Athens, 
 Alabama, in 1851, Brother Wood was sorely bereaved and greatly 
 afflicted. Miss Cassity, though only a school girl at her death, 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 657 
 
 was a radiant and happy Christian, in whose association her un- 
 cle found great pleasure and profit. In her dying message she 
 spoke of the world of glory to which she was going to be happy 
 
 for evermore. • 
 
 W. B. Wood was a local preacher, active and efficient. He 
 preached much and well. He was a man of fine personal pres- 
 ence. He was hopeful, and energetic, and successful. He filled 
 places of honor and of trust. In politics he was a whig, and 
 active in the service of his party. He filled the office of Judge 
 of Probate of his County for a number of years, and was on the 
 bench as Circuit Judge for quite awhile, being repeatedly chosen 
 to that position. He was the Colonel of the sixteenth Alabama 
 Kegiment in the Confederate service. He was in a number of 
 battles, and did valiantly, and won distinction and promotion. 
 In one engagement he commanded the brigade to which he be- 
 longed. He was transferred from the colonelcy of his Regiment 
 to the presidency of the military court of Longstreet's corps, in 
 which position he continued until the court expired with the 
 Confederacy. He bore the titles of Reverend, Judge, and Col- 
 onel, and honored them all. His wife, Mrs. Sarah B. Wood, was 
 a worthy companion; in social worth, and in piety, and m be- 
 nevolence fully his equal. He died, at his home at Florence, 
 Alabama, April 3, 1891, having served his generation well. ^ 
 
 Huntsville, Madison, Athens, Limestone, Tuscumbia, Chicka- 
 saw, Russellville, Franklin, Cypress, Florence, Trinity, Somer- 
 ville, Decatur, and a few works to the colored people were the 
 appointments which continued through the years. Larkins- 
 ville. West Huntsville, Courtland, Rogersville, and Driskill's 
 came in as appointments later on. The addition of pastoral 
 charges through twenty years was not very rapid 
 
CHAPTEE XXXIII. 
 
 The Bascom Female Institute at Huntsville, Alabama. 
 
 IN the dosing year of the fifth decade of this nineteenth cen- 
 tury the Methodist congregation at Huntsville, Alabama, 
 was the most refined, intelligent, wealthy, and influential of any 
 congregation of any denomination in all the Tennessee Valley. 
 In tlat year the Eev. Edward C. Slater, than whom a more ele- 
 gant, competent, and popular preacher was rarely found, had 
 chari^e of the Huntsville Station. He, or some one else, at that 
 time conceived the idea of establishing at Huntsville, Alabama, 
 an Institution of high grade for the education of females. Dr. 
 Slater led in the agitation of the enterprise, and general interest 
 ensued. When formulating the plans of the proposed Institu- 
 tion it was decided to place it under the patronage and fostering 
 care of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. It was an ac- 
 knowledged fact that Huntsville needed greater facilities for 
 the education of the girls of the place than were then accessible, 
 and it was thought that the place had attractions which would 
 commend it as an educational center; and it was supposed that 
 under such stimulus the fund for the building and equipping 
 the School could be easily secured. Voluntary contributions 
 were expected in great numbers and large amounts, but when 
 the effort to secure funds had been exhausted only about ten 
 thousand dollars had been secured, and some of that in doubt- 
 ful subscription. Thirty-five hundred dollars were paid out in 
 the purchase of grounds for the School, and the plans adopted 
 for buildings, furniture, instruments, apparatus provided for an 
 outlay of about fifty thousand dollars. The friends of the ad- 
 venture were surprised, embarrassed, and mortified. Absolute 
 failure seemed inevitable. In the extremity Daniel B. Turner, 
 Thomas S. McCalley, William H. Moore, and William J. McCal- 
 ley proposed to take charge of the Institution and manage it 
 for eighteen years, erect all necessary buildings, provide or- 
 namentations, instruments, and everything necessary to the 
 (658) 
 
 The Bascom Female Institute at Huntsville, Alabama. 659 
 
 on-o-oing of the School, and keep all in repairs and order 
 for "the term of years, and educate free of charge eight pupils, 
 and the Board of Trustees were to turn over to the said four 
 crentlemen the uncollected subscription and pay to them by cer- 
 tain process four thousand dollars. That proposition was ac 
 cepted by the Trustees and was carried out by the four men 
 named and making it. The permanent College buildings were 
 ready for occupancy by the opening of 1853. That contract be- 
 tween the Trustees and the men who built the house and man- 
 aged the School was made in 1852. 
 
 The General Assembly of Alabama by an act approved Jan- 
 uary 27, 1852, incorporated the School as the Bascom Female 
 Institute to be located in or near the town of Huntsville in the 
 County of Madison. The Trustees named in the act of incor- 
 poration were: Pleasant B. Eobinson, Thomas McCalley, William 
 A Thompson, AVilliam Sandf ord, Kobert S. Brandon, William H. 
 Moore, Benjamin S. Pope, Samuel B. Turner, W. D. F. Sawrie, 
 Irvin Windham, Richard Angell, John B. Trotman, Archibald 
 E. Mills, Eobert A. Young, David P. Bibb, and William 
 McDowell. By an act of the General Assembly of Alabama 
 passed December 21, 1855, the name was changed to Huntsville 
 
 Female College. 
 
 The School was opened in temporary quarters, with tempora- 
 ry provisions, and with inadequate outfit. Mrs. Jane H. Childs, 
 who has been mentioned in another part of this History, and who 
 had charge of a private School at the time in Huntsville, took 
 charge of the Bascom Female Institute at its first opening in 
 the f^'all season of 1851, her School making the nucleus of the 
 Institute, and acted as Vice-President. When she had charge of 
 the Institute the Rev. Robert A. Young was in fact the President. 
 He was appointed to that position in the first part of Novem- 
 ber, 1851, at least he was announced for that position at that 
 time as a preacher of the Tennessee Conference. 
 
 At the opening of the next session in the latter part of 1852, 
 the Rev. Joseph Cross took charge of the Institute as Presi- 
 dent. 
 
 At the opening of the session of the Institute in the latter 
 part of 1855, just a few months before the General Assembly of 
 the State by enactment changed the name to Huntsville Female 
 College, the Rev. George M. Everhart, a member of the Tennes- 
 
660 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 see Annual Conference, assumed the duties of President. He 
 continued in the discharge of the duties of that position till 
 some time in 1859, when he withdrew from the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, South, and joined the Protestant Episcopal 
 Church. While President of the College he, through some 
 means, became possessed of a financial claim, which, in after 
 years, through the courts of the country, he secured, and which 
 so embarrassed the College as to result in alienation from the 
 
 Church. 
 
 The Eev. Alexander R. Erwin succeeded Everhart as President 
 of the College, but lived only a few months. The Rev. John G. 
 Wilson, an excellent scholar and a magnificent preacher, suc- 
 ceeded to the Presidency of the College upon the death of Dr. 
 Erwin, and continued in that position till the College was sus- 
 pended by the prevalence of the war between the States. After 
 the war was over he re-opened the College, and continued in 
 charge of it for quite awhile. 
 
 Through all the years from the time it was permanently opened 
 to the time of the interruption by the civil war the College did 
 good work, and prospered, and sent forth from its halls many 
 daughters sufficiently polished to adorn palaces, and sufficiently 
 cultured to be the companions of princes. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 The Wokk of Methodism in Alabama under the New 
 Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 
 
 ON February 25, 1846, the Alabama Conference commenced 
 a session in Mobile, Alabama, which lasted a week or 
 more. Bishop James O. Andrew in descending the river by 
 Steamboat to the seat of the Conference was detained and be- 
 lated a couple of days. The Rev. Elisha Callaway was elected 
 President of the Conference and presided over the deliberations 
 of the body till the Bishop arrived. The business went on 
 well, the Conference received a good class of recruits, and on 
 Sunday the Bishop ordained twenty-three deacons and twelve 
 
 ftlders 
 
 The Church in the bounds of the Conference had done wMt 
 was considered the handsome thing in Missionary work The 
 collections of the year aggregated over six thousand dollars. 
 At Saint Francis Street Church on Monday evening, March A 
 was celebrated the anniversary of the Conference Society, ihe 
 Eev. Jesse Boring, D.D., presided over the meeting, and the Kev. 
 William Murrah conducted the opening devotional exercises 
 The usual reports of the Board of Managers were presented 
 and the usual business transacted. Addresses were delivered 
 bv the Kev. Thomas H. Capers and the Eev. A. H Mitchell, 
 D D The address of Dr. Mitchell was powerful and impress- 
 ive and under its influence enthusiasm ruled the hour. At 
 the conclusion of the addresses, it was enthusiastically proposed 
 to raise two hundred dollars to insure the establishment of a 
 Mission in China. The sum proposed for the purpose was sup- 
 posed to be commensurate with large benevolence and ample 
 resources The amount was contributed almost exclusively by 
 the preachers, and was made up faster than the Secretary could 
 write the names of the contributors. A woman in the audience 
 asked that the women present be allowed to contribute one 
 hundred dollars to the enterprise, and as soon as the Treasurer 
 
 (661) 
 
662 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 could count the five-dollar bills which went flying from all 
 parts of the house the amount was in hand. Then Dr. Jeffer- 
 son Hamilton proposed that the amount for China be brought 
 up to five hundred dollars, and immediately twenty persons 
 contributed ten dollars each, making the amount proposed. 
 One hundred and fifty dollars were added to that before the 
 meeting adjourned. A few evenings previous at the anniver- 
 sary of a Female Missionary Society in Saint Francis Street 
 Church three hundred dollars were given, and at a similar 
 meeting at Franklin Street Church two hundred dollars were 
 given. That anniversary meeting of the Conference added a 
 measure of zeal to the Church in Alabama, gave an impetus to 
 the cause of Missions, and added a note to the song of the ever- 
 increasing hosts of the redeemed. 
 
 The Kev. Jesse Boring was appointed presiding elder of the 
 Mobile District, and three preachers were appointed to the city 
 charges as follows: Saint Francis Street, Thomas O. Summers; 
 Franklin Street, Thomas W. Dorman; West Ward, John W. 
 Ellis, Jr. 
 
 The preachers who served the various charges in the city of 
 Mobile, including the District, the Stations, and the Missions, 
 from 1846 to 1864 were the following: The Kev. Charles McLeod, 
 one year; the Rev. T. W. Dorman, ten years; the Rev. C. C. 
 Gillespie, two years; the Rev. C. D. Oliver, one year; the Rev. 
 O. R. Blue, one year; the Rev. Ebenezer Hearn, five years; the 
 Rev. T. P. C. Shelman, one year; the Rev. Jefferson Hamilton, 
 seven years; the Rev. AV. H. Milburn, three years; the Rev. T. 
 P. Crimes, one year; the Rev. J. J. Hutchinson, one year; the 
 Rev. S. O. Capers, one year; the Rev. Greenberry Garrett, three 
 years; the Rev. Jacob S. Hughes, a part of one year; the Rev. 
 Augustus H. Powell, a part of one year; the Rev. John W. 
 Starr, Jr., a part of one year; the Rev. P. P. Neely, two years; 
 the Rev. James A. Peebles, three years; the Rev. William M. 
 Lovelady, one year; the Rev. T. J. Koger, two years; the Rev. 
 Matthias Maass, one year; the Rev. Edwin Baldwin, four years; 
 the Rev. William M. Motley, one year; the Rev. Joshua T. 
 Heard, four years; the Rev. A. McBride, three years; the Rev. 
 T. C. Weir, two years; the Rev. G. R. Talley, one year; the 
 Rev. Mark S. Andrews, two years; the Rev. Charles Qiiell- 
 maltz, one year; the Rev. Allen S. Andrews, two years; the 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 663 
 
 Rev. Abram Adams, three years; the Rev. B. B. Ross, five 
 years; the Rev. A. H. Mitchell, two years; the Rev. John B. 
 Baldwin, two years; the Rev. William Spillman, three years; 
 the Rev. J. G. Rush, ons year; the Rev. S. H. Cox, four years; 
 the Rev. T. Y. Ramsey, two years; the Rev. Robert B. Craw- 
 ford, two years; the Rev. William Shapard, one year; the Rev. 
 R. K. Hargrove, two years; the Rev. James W. Glenn, one year. 
 In Mobile, in 1853, there was solicitude and sadness, lamenta- 
 tion and death. The yellow fever prevailed there that year as 
 an epidemic, and cut down the virtuous and the vicious to- 
 gether. In the month of September of that fatal year three of 
 the Methodist preachers in the city, the Rev. Augustus H. 
 Powell, the Rev. Jacob S. Hughes, and the Rev. John W. 
 Starr, Jr., and in the order here named, fell before the dreadful 
 destroyer. 
 
 The Rev. Augustus H. Powell, who was a native of Virginia, 
 and who was educated at the Military Institute, in his native 
 State, and who was admitted to the Alabama Conference on 
 trial in January, 1847, and who was reputed studious and pious, 
 competent and faithful, had just passed into his twenty-seventh 
 year by a few weeks when he was released from earth's toils 
 and hasted to the courts of God. 
 
 The Rev. Jacob S. Hughes was also a native of Virginia. He 
 commenced preaching when about twenty-four years old, and 
 was about thirty-seven years of age when he died. It was said 
 of him that he was " a man of rare philanthropy and tenderness 
 of heart, a useful and often eloquent preacher, and a most dili- 
 gent and successful pastor." He had charge of Franklin Street 
 Church when he was discharged from earthly service. 
 
 The Rev. John W. Starr, Jr., a native of Georgia, was on 
 trial in the Alabama Conference, was in charge of Wesley 
 Chapel, in Mobile, and was nearly twenty-three years old, when 
 .he died. He was amiable, pious, and educated. He accom- 
 panied the bodies of Powell and Hughes to their graves, and 
 eight days after joined their glorified spirits on the other shore. 
 No preacher in his day was more securely enthroned in the 
 affections of the Methodists of Mobile than the Rev. Dr. T. W. 
 Dorman. He was kind in his associations and fervent in his 
 attachments. Others may have excelled him in pulpit elo- 
 quence and in pulpit eminence, and in the achievement of far- 
 
664 
 
 History of Methodism in Alahama, 
 
 reaching results. His negative virtues rather than bis con- 
 structive talents may have challenged admiration, and there 
 may have been about him a measure o£ display in excess of his 
 actual achievements, yet he secured and held most firmly the 
 confidence and esteem of the people whom he served with such 
 system, punctuality, and industry. He was born in Maryland, 
 brought up in the District of Columbia, lived m Yirgmia, 
 where he realized acceptance with God, and was licensed to 
 preach, and afterward settled in Montgomery, Alabama. In 
 January, 1840, he was admitted on trial into the Alabama Con- 
 ference ' He filled for years the leading appointments m the 
 Alabama Conference. He was for years the Secretary of the 
 Alabama Conference, and a most efficient one. He died m 
 Mobile, Alabama, at the age of sixty-four, July 2, 1869. He 
 surrendered to death in anticipation of eternal life and endless 
 rest His grave in the cemetery at Mobile is marked by a 
 monument made of marble on which are engraved suitable 
 mottoes. His children honor him. 
 
 The Eev. Jefferson Hamilton, D.D., was a factor m Mobile 
 Methodism. He was a native of Massachusetts. He joined the 
 New England Conference, at Springfield, Massachusetts, in 
 May 1831, then in his twenty-sixth year. In June, 1837, he 
 was transferred to the Mississippi Conference, and was sta- 
 tioned at New Orleans for 1838. At the close of 1838 he was 
 transferred to the Alabama Conference, and stationed for 1839 
 at Mobile. These dates are correct, all other statements to the 
 contrary notwithstanding. He died at Opelika, Alabama, De- 
 cember 16, 1874 While delivering his dying messages to and 
 for his friends and kindred he said: "I have never been a 
 boastful Christian, have entertained humble views of myself, 
 but I do profess to have a clear knowledge of the doctrine of 
 salvation by faith, and a conscious experience that the blood of 
 Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin. I believe that sanctifica- 
 tion, or holiness is a doctrine taught in the Bible, as separate 
 and distinct from justification, received and retained by faith; 
 and trusting these truths, I die and go to God. Tell my chil- 
 dren and my grandchildren never to bring a reflection upon the 
 Methodist Church, for in the end it will be found to be an im- 
 portant portion of the true Church of God, and to have trans- 
 lated from earth to heaven a vast multitude of sanctified spirits." 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, 665 
 
 In the period beginning with 1845 and extending to 1865 
 there was a decrease in the number of white members in Mobile 
 of one hundred and forty-three, while for the same period there 
 was an increase in the number of colored members in that city 
 of fourteen hundred and fourteen. Being ignorant of the 
 characteristics and incidents of the various administrations of 
 that period, as well as of the delicate and complex combina- 
 tions, and the conflicting and competing influences of that time, 
 it is impossible to state here the causes of the decrease in the 
 white membership, or the causes of the remarkable increase in 
 the colored membership. No conjecture can divine the causes. 
 At the session of the Alabama Conference beginning Jan- 
 uary 26, and closing February 3, 1848, the Eev. Nehemiah 
 A. Cravens and the Eev. Otis Sexton were appointed to the 
 Cahawba Circuit The town of Cahawba, at the confluence of 
 the Alabama and Cahawba Eivers, was then one of the aj)- 
 pointments of that Circuit, and there was then only one 
 house of worship at the place, a house built by the contribu- 
 tions of the citizens, and occupied in common by all the 
 denominations. At that date there were not a dozen Metho- 
 dists at Cahawba, though the town had existed more than a 
 quarter of a century. Mr. Jacob Hoot and Mrs. Catharine Hoot, 
 husband and wife, Mr. John Gwin and Mrs. Jane Gwin, hus- 
 band and wife, Mr. Joseph E. Luker and Mrs. Luker, husband 
 and wife, Mr. Julius Snead, and Mrs. Leecy Wood, are all that, 
 can now be named as Methodists in that town at that time. 
 That Mrs. Wood was the mother of Hon. P. G. Wood, an active- 
 member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and for 
 some years Judge of Probate of Dallas County, Alabama. 
 
 On the night of September 4, 1848, there was closed at Ca- 
 hawba a most intensely interesting meeting, which had contin- 
 ued eighteen days, and resulted in eighty-two professing the 
 attainment of pardoning mercy, and seventy-three white and 
 one hundred and one colored persons joining the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South. On Sunday morning, September 3, 
 of that meeting, a Lovefeast was held which was an occasion of 
 great spiritual power. The young converts and the old Chris- 
 tians related personal experience, and spoke so promptly and so 
 feelingly, and the time was so closely occupied, that there was 
 neither opportunity nor occasion to sing a line. At the close 
 43 
 
666 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 of the Lovefeast twenty-four persons were baptized by the usual 
 mode, and at 5 o'clock in the afternoon nine persons, enamored 
 of the idea of modes, were immersed in the Alabama River, in 
 the presence of almost the entire town. On Monday evening 
 following the Lord's Supper was administered, the young con- 
 verts participating, and the entire audience were overwhelmed 
 with the demonstrations of the divine presence. The preachers 
 of the Circuit, Cravens and Sexton, were assisted in that meet- 
 ing by the Revs. J. J. Hutchinson, J. A. Heard, W. W. Thomas, 
 Stedman, and McDaniel. It is supposed that Stedman was 
 John Stedman of the Methodist Protestant Church. That 
 meeting gave Methodism a commanding influence in Cahawba. 
 The Rev. Otis Sexton devoted his entire time to Cahawba from 
 that meeting till the session of the Conference in the next Jan- 
 uary, and Cravens took care of the other appointments of the 
 Circuit. 
 
 At the close of that ecclesiastical year Cahawba was set up as 
 a Station, and the Rev. James L. Cotton was appointed to it for 
 1849; and at the end of the year there were in the Society there 
 eighty-three white and one hundred and fifty colored members. 
 The Rev. James L. Cotton was returned there for 1850, and 
 that year there was a decrease in the membership of twenty- 
 three white and two colored members. 
 
 On April 14, 1849, William Curtis and his wife, Ann L. Cur- 
 tis, of Cahawba, Alabama, made a deed to a lot, fifty by seventy- 
 five feet, on Mulberry Street, in the town of Cahawba, on which 
 was to be erected a house of worship for the use of the mem- 
 bers of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. The lot was 
 given to the Church by the jmrties making the deed. Mr. Cur- 
 tis at that time was not a member of the Church. Alanson 
 Saltmarsh, Joseph Babcock, Enoch G. Ulmer, Abner Jones, 
 "William Gwin, Joseph L. Bassett, and Benjamin F. Saffold 
 were the Trustees named in that deed. Immediately on the 
 securement of that lot by deed a house of worship was erected. 
 It was a substantial brick house, ample in its dimensions, con- 
 venient in its arrangements, and comfortable in its outfit. That 
 house of worship stood in a good state of preservation and was 
 occupied by the white congregation until Cahawba was aban- 
 doned after the war between the States. 
 
 June 4, 1850, a deed was made to another lot in the town of 
 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 667 
 
 Cahawba, by Joel E., George W., Thomas M., and Peter E. 
 Matthews, and on that lot was erected a large frame building 
 for the use of the colored members of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South. The preacher who ministered to the white 
 people also preached to the Negroes. On Sunday afternoon 
 the Negroes had their services in such instances. 
 
 There were usually in the charge at Cahawba seventy odd 
 white members, and one hundred and eighty odd colored mem- 
 bers. The highest number ever reported of white members 
 was eighty-three, and the highest number of colored members 
 ' was three hundred and forty. At the close of 1849 and at the 
 close of 1858 there were eighty- three white members, and at 
 the close of 1863 there were three hundred and ^forty colored 
 members. The lowest number of white members ever reported 
 in connection with that charge was forty-six, and the lowest 
 number of colored members was one hundred and thirty-five. 
 At the close of 1859 there were one hundred and thirty-five 
 colored members, and at the close of 1864 there were forty-six 
 white members. The membership fluctuated according to the 
 circumstances of the times and the administrations of the 
 years. 
 
 During the period from first setting off Cahawba as a Station 
 to 1865 the preachers in charge of it were: the Rev. J. L. Cot- 
 ton four years; the Revs. J. A. Heard, W. M. Lovelady, D. Car- 
 michael, AV. W. Thomas, W. H. McDaniel, T. P. Crimes, and J. 
 S. Moore, each one year; the Revs. B. S. Williams, R. S. Wood- 
 ward, and J. Barker, each two years. 
 
 The house of worship built by the citizens of Cahawba for 
 the common use of the various denominations was erected about 
 1840. Previous to that date public worship, when had, was held 
 in the Courthouse. For a long while the only Methodists in 
 the town of Cahawba were Jacob Hoot and the members of his 
 family. Joseph Babcock and a number of the persons compos- 
 ing his family were baptized at the same hour, and he became 
 noted for his piety, and was a pillar in the Church. Dr. Alan- 
 son Saltmarsh contributed in building the house of worship lib- 
 eral sums, and afterward, at one time, gave fifteen hundred dol- 
 lars to liquidate the debt on the house; and he was liberal in his 
 contributions in meeting the current expenses of the pastoral 
 charge. Hiram Francis and William Gwin were class leaders 
 
668 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 of the Society. Mrs. Catherine Hoot, Mrs. Lethea, or Leecy 
 Wood, the mother of Judge P. G. Wood, Mrs. Jane Gwin, Mrs. 
 Luker, and Mrs. Bush were women of marked piety, and the ex- 
 tensive work of grace had in 1848 was traceable to a prayer- 
 meeting held by those true and godly women. 
 
 The w^ork of saving the souls of the people went on success- 
 fully in the year 1846 throughout Alabama. There was a pro- 
 found religious awakening, divine power prevailed, and there 
 was an extensive ecclesiastical ingathering. At Centenary In- 
 stitute, in the month of May of that year, a meeting was held in 
 which forty students claimed to experience the renewing of the 
 Holy Ghost. In one meeting on the Tombecbee Circuit, held in 
 July, twenty-one persons were regenerated, and twenty-five were 
 inducted into the Church. At Warsaw, in Sumter County, 
 there was a number of accessions to the Church. Thirty-one 
 were received into the communion of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, at Marion, Perry County. In July over thirty 
 were added to the Church on Prairie Hill Circuit. At Eutaw, 
 Greene County, was held a meeting of twenty days' duration, in 
 which seventy converts were numbered. On Gaston Circuit 
 over sixty were received into the membership of the Church in 
 four weeks. In July sixty-six were inducted into the commun- 
 ion of the Church on the Autauga Circuit. There was a sweep- 
 ing work on the Troy Circuit. In all there were admitted to 
 the fellowship of Christians on that Circuit four hundred and 
 sixty-five. At Jones's Society, on that Circuit, twenty-six 
 joined, a large number of whom professed regeneration. At 
 another place fifteen joined, and at Kennon's seventeen gave in 
 their allegiance to the cause. In the Pike County Valley in 
 that Circuit seventy-four found peace, and joined the Church. 
 There was a sublime work at Blountsville that year, and over 
 one hundred and thirty were gathered into the fold in the 
 bounds of Blount Circuit. In August a meeting was held at 
 Talladega in which twenty-five made profession, and twenty-one 
 joined the Church. At Oak Bowery many found peace. At 
 Monroeville and at Puryearville, in the Bellville Circuit, great 
 revivals prevailed. Religious influence swept over the Harpers- 
 ville Circuit At Harpersville, Clear Creek, Weogufka, and 
 Chapel were witnessed pentecostal times. At a Camp-meeting 
 at Chapel there were upward of one hundred conversions, and 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 669 
 
 seventy-nine assumed the vows of the Church. In eight weeks 
 on that Harpersville Circuit there were over two hundred 
 added to the Church, and a much larger number than that con- 
 verted. 
 
 The above are specimens of the work as it went on through- 
 out the bounds of the State, and yet the actual gain in num- 
 bers for the year was only two hundred and thirty-one white 
 and sixteen hundred and fifty-nine colored members. 
 
 A session of the Alabama Conference was held at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, beginning January 27, and closing February 4, 1847. 
 The Rev. John C. Keener was then closing his second and last 
 year at that place, and on him fell the duty of providing and as- 
 signing homes to the preachers. The Conference was then a 
 mounted brigade, and the care of all the horses was no small 
 charge. Bishop Joshua Soule was two days late in reaching 
 the seat of the Conference, arriving there on Friday, or in time 
 to preside over the Conference that day. During his absence 
 the Rev. Elisha Calloway presided over the deliberations of the 
 body. Bishop Soule's friends then lamented that the infirmi- 
 ties of age were coming fast upon him, and yet he lived more 
 than twenty years after that. 
 
 At that session of the Conference the Rev. Giles P. Sparks 
 was assigned to Tuskaloosa Station for that year, and at the 
 next session held in Montgomery, Alabama, beginning January 
 26, and closing February 3, 1848, he was returned to Tuskaloosa 
 for that year, but he was not able to do much work. He left 
 Montgomery, the seat of the Conference, after the appointments 
 were announced, for his home in Tuskaloosa, with a cold, which 
 developed into pneumonia before he reached home, and during 
 the remaining months of his life he was under physical disabil- 
 ities. Feebleness and suffering prevented his doing more than 
 preaching a few times during the months of that year. He died 
 at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, September 26, 1848. The physicians 
 and the people of Tuskaloosa attended him with assiduity and 
 supported him with great cheerfulness and liberality during his 
 afilictions, and attended his funeral as true mourners. He was 
 a native of North Carolina, and was about thirty-three years old 
 when he died. He was educated at Oxford and La Grange, 
 Georgia. He was a local preacher a few years, and for some 
 time taught in East Alabama. He was endowed with fine 
 
670 
 
 Historij of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 671 
 
 mental powers, and a sensitive disposition, and he acquired stu- 
 dious habits. He was a popular preacher, chaste in diction, and 
 graceful in manner. He left a wife and two sons. His wife, 
 Mrs. Ann E. Sparks, the daughter of Eichard Burt, of Georgia, 
 died at Tuskaloosa, Alabama, August 2, 1853, in her thirty-sec- 
 ond year. Her sons were nine and eleven when she died. She 
 was a woman of great faith and deep piety; an example of holi- 
 ness. 
 
 Tuskaloosa had another session of the Alabama Conference 
 December 7-15, 1853. Bishop Eobert Paiae, who was to preside 
 over that session of the Conference, was absent, being detained 
 at home by affliction in his household. The Eev. Greenberry 
 Garrett was elected President, and presided over the entire 
 business of the occasion, and did the work well. 
 
 One of the noted events of that session of the Conference was 
 the holding of a Memorial Service for the brethren who had 
 fallen during the year. Nine of the preachers of the Conference 
 had brushed the dews and passed the crossing on the dark river, 
 and had joined the innumerable throng who encompass the 
 throne on high, and look upon the face of God. These men 
 who had fought the last battle and achieved the final victory, 
 and had received their royal robes and fadeless crowns were: 
 The Eevs. John Boswell, William Weir, Thomas H. P. Scales, 
 Jacob S. Hughes, Wesley E. Eounsaval, Augustus H. Powell, 
 David W. Pollock, Thomas W. Manning, and John W. Starr, 
 Jr. By apppointment of the Conference on Sunday afternoon 
 the Eev. E. V. LeVert preached a sermon in memory of these fal- 
 len and ascended heroes. It was a time of mingled sorrow and 
 joy. It was a time of great weeping. Tears are associated with 
 joys reached through sufferings. Crowns are won by crosses 
 borne. 
 
 The Missionary Anniversary held on the evening of the fourth 
 day of that session of the Conference was an event redolent of 
 hope and of happiness. The Eev. Thomas O. Summers, filled 
 with high aims, delivered an address, on the occasion, of thun- 
 dering sound and learned length. Then Dr. Benjamin Jenkins, 
 a member of the South Carolina Conference, and at that time a 
 Missionary to China, delivered a lecture on the Celestial Em- 
 pire. At the close of that Lecture, the Eev. James S. Belton, 
 who had just been admitted, without the usual years of trial, into 
 
 full connection in the Alabama Conference, and elected to 
 deacon's and elder's orders, not ordained because the Bishop 
 was absent, and who was getting ready to leave as a Missionary 
 for China, stated to the audience the considerations which in- 
 duced him to devote himself to the China Mission. After listen- 
 ing to the sublime statement in which was presented the potent 
 reasons which induced him to make direct effort to disenthrall 
 the heathen, the audience, by a donation, made him a life-mem- 
 ber of the Parent Society, and subscribed over three hundred 
 dollars to pay his passage to China. Dr. Jenkins also obtained 
 a good sum to secure a press for the use of the Mission. A 
 thousand dollars was raised at that meeting. Twenty-two 
 thousand dollars was the amount of the collection for Missions 
 for the year in the bounds of the Conference territory. The 
 Methodists in Alabama at that time were beginning to realize 
 what was involved in the work of Missions. The savage is de- 
 spoiled and enthralled. Naught at his command can bate a jot 
 the dire evils of his lot. The barbarous tribe dwells in a moral 
 waste where the good is interdicted, where the fragrant is no 
 sooner blown than blasted. Truth divine and power omnific 
 only can bring release from such a fate. The deadly gloom and 
 fearful grief of such a State should quicken the sympathies of all 
 Christians, and the Church should speed on her rapid course to 
 reclaim the lost, and to disseminate among them the joyous rays 
 of the heavenly world. 
 
 One of the darling ideas of Dr. Summers was that by their 
 baptism children are matriculated in the school of Christ, and 
 that pastors of congregations should so recognize, and that 
 the Church should take oversight of and care for tbe matricu- 
 lates. At the Conference at Tuskaloosa, in December, 1853, he 
 gave emphasis and prominence to his idea, and fair promises 
 were made and strong resolutions were adopted pledging fidelity 
 on this behalf in the future. There were in the bounds of the 
 Alabama Conference at that time two hundred and thirty-seven 
 Sunday-schools, all provided with Superintendents, eleven hun- 
 dred and fifty-nine teachers, and eight thousand three hundred 
 and ninety-four scholars. 
 
 A discussion was had before the Conference on the subject of 
 Education, and Landon C. Garland, then Professor in the Univer- 
 sity of Alabama, and afterward for many years President of the 
 
672 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 same Institution, and also for many years a member of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church, South, at Tuskaloosa, and in point of in- 
 tellectuahty and intelligence, principle and piety, was seldom sur- 
 passed, was called on for his views on the general subject, and, 
 although he responded reluctantly, he delivered a masterly ad- 
 dress full of philosophy and wisdom. 
 
 The preachers who administered the affairs of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South, at Tuskaloosa from the time of the 
 decease of Brother Sparks till the close of 1865 were- The Kevs 
 F. G. Ferguson, C. D. Oliver, J. J. Hutchinson, Samuel Arm- 
 strong, and John Matthews, each one year. The Kevs. T P C 
 Shelman and J. B. Cottrell, each two years. The Rev O K 
 Blue four years, and the Rev. T. O. Summers, D.D., three years. 
 Cottrell had some friction with members who were supposed to 
 be gay, disorderly, and immoral, but possibly not more than was 
 often had with others at other places. Blue left the pastoral 
 charge before his second year of his second term was out He 
 left the charge at Tuskaloosa for some sort of position with the 
 military forces of the Confederate States. His career in connec 
 tion with the military service was as brief as it was brilliant He 
 found by actual personal experience that it was easier to advocate 
 secession with ballots than to defend it with bullets. In a few 
 months after his departure for the army he was back at the ses- 
 sion of the Conference for an ecclesiastical appointment. Hence- 
 forth lie stayed out of the military service. He has been a true 
 preacher, able and efficient. He was popular at Tuskaloosa. 
 
 In 1865 the Society at Tuskaloosa had one hundred and sev 
 enty-seven white members, fifty-nine less than there were twenty 
 years before and five hundred and three colored members two 
 hundred and forty-one more than there were twenty years be- 
 fore. A good increase of colored members, and a fearful de- 
 crease of white members that. 
 
 The Alabama Conference held its session at Montgomery, Ala- 
 bama, beginning January 26, and closing February 3 1848 
 Bishop Robert Paine presiding. The Rev. John Christian 
 Keener at that time closed one year in charge of Montgomery 
 Station, and severed his connection, under Episcopal prero^a 
 tive, with the Alabama Conference. He had already displayed 
 talents and worth which suggested him for larger cities wider 
 fields, and more important posts. He was too gifted to be sac 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 673 
 
 rificed out of consideration to those who would reject and crush 
 one because " with feelings of mingled indignation, disgust, and 
 pity " he had exposed " the meanness " of those who would com- 
 mand ministerial service without fee or other compensation, and 
 who would rudely treat the minister of the gospel, and consign 
 him to rude quarters and expose him to unnecessary fatigue for 
 their own convenience and pleasure. He had already exhibited 
 gifts as a writer. While in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, he wrote three 
 Letters addressed to the author of a *' Discourse on the Dangers 
 and Advantages of Protracted Religious Efforts." Said Letters 
 were published in the Southern Christian Advocate. They were 
 in defense of special and protracted efforts for quickening the 
 Church, and saving those who are under condemnation. At 
 that session of the Conference, at the close of his one year in 
 Montgomery, he was transferred to the Louisiana Conference, 
 and Stationed in Poydras Street Church, New Orleans. There 
 in that Conference, in various relations as a Methodist preacher, 
 he worked until he was ordained a Bishop in the Methodist Epis- 
 cox^al Church, South. 
 
 For that year 1848 Montgomery was left to be supplied, and 
 it has been said that the Rev. W. F. Samford, a local preacher, 
 was the one depended on to supply it, but that in fact the Rev. 
 William H. Milburn filled the Station that year, and he was 
 there beyond all doubt the next year. 
 
 After the Rev. W. H. Milburn, the Revs. Joshua T. Heard, C. 
 D. Oliver, O. R. Blue, T. AV. Dorman, A. H. Mitchell, James A. 
 Heard, Edwin Baldwin were each in charge of Montgomery Sta- 
 tion two years, and in the order in which they are here named. 
 The Rev. Dr. H. N. McTyeire was in charge of that Station 
 three years, or on the third year till he was consecrated a Bish- 
 op in the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 
 At the close of 1853 the colored people in Montgomery were 
 separated from the white charge and for four years the Rev. 
 James W. Brown served the colored charge, then the Revs. B. 
 S. Williams and C. N. McLeod served it each one year, then it 
 was supplied one year; then the Rev. R. B. Craw^ford served it 
 one year: then for two years it was under the pastoral care of 
 the preacher in charge of the white congregation; then it was 
 separated from the white congregation in Montgomery, and 
 served by J. W. Jordan. 
 
674 
 
 llistovy of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 There is on record a statement to the effect that Dr. Summers, 
 on Sunday morning, December 18, 1853, had the pleasure of ad- 
 dressing the Sunday-school and also of preaching in the base- 
 ment story of a mammoth Church then verging to completion in 
 the city of Montgomery, Alabama. That mammoth Church was 
 finally completed, aud was dedicated March 3, 1856, Bishop 
 George F. Pierce preaching the sermon on 1 Corinthians i. 23, 
 24, to a throng which crowded every available spot where stand- 
 ing and seeing could be had. 
 
 The membership at ^Montgomery in 1845 was two hundred 
 and twelve white and three hundred and twenty-five colored 
 members; and in 1865 was two hundred and fifty white mem- 
 bers, and the colored members, including those at Stone's Chap- 
 el, were twelve hundred and forty-three. The increase in the 
 white members duriug the twenty years was exceedingly small, 
 while the increase of colored members during that period was 
 very gratifying. 
 
 The revival influences were not as great in the bounds of the 
 Alabama Conference duriug 1847, the statistics of which were 
 reported at Montgomery at the session above noted, as they had 
 been in other years. At some points, however, the arm of the 
 Lord was gloriously revealed, and he bestowed on the Church 
 according to the multitude of his loving-kinduesses, and the 
 people were redeemed. At the village of Arbacoochee, near the 
 line of Randolph and Benton Counties, thirty-six were added to 
 the Church. At Mount Pleasant, in Monroe County, a dozen 
 were converted and a larger number added to the Church. At 
 Ebenezer, in Centerville Circuit, there were seventy-five conver- 
 sions, and to the Societies at the different points in the Circuit 
 more than one hundred were added. At Village Springs, on 
 Jones's Valley Circuit, there were forty-eight conversions and 
 forty-nine accessions, and at Pleasant Hill, on the same Circuit, 
 there were between fifty and sixty conversions, and at other 
 points on that Circuit there were added ninety-six white and 
 forty-eight colored members. At Bethel, on Talladega Circuit, 
 there were fifty-seven added to the Church, and at Cold Water, 
 on the same Circuit, there were sixty conversions and forty- 
 three accessions. In one quarter of the year one hundred and 
 forty were added to the Church on the Blount Circuit. At the 
 town of Tuskegee forty-five were converted and twenty-seven 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 675 
 
 added to the Church, and at Enon, in Macon County, fifty were 
 added to the Church. 
 
 In that same year 1847 a new Camp-ground was estab- 
 lished at Wesley Chapel, four miles from Socopatoy, in Coosa 
 County, and in October of that year a Camp-meeting was held, 
 under the superintendence of the Rev. Andrew S. Harris, which 
 lasted eleven days, and resulted in forty-eight conversions. 
 Camp-meetings were held there annually for seven years. 
 Wesley Chapel Society was kept up till after the civil war be- 
 tween the States. It is said that Mrs. Ann Jordan gave the 
 land on which that Camp-ground was built, and that she was 
 one of the principal tenters while the meetings were continued. 
 She died in 1888, at the age of ninety-two. The other princi- 
 pal tent-holders at that place were: Aaron Spiney, John Dris- 
 kill, a local preacher and the father of the Rev. Ambrose F. 
 Driskill, James Prather, Richard Plunkett, Robert W^ood, Wil- 
 liam Norwood, Ephraim Spiney, and William Garrett. The hos- 
 pitality of said tent-holders secured desirable results in the meet- 
 ings at that place. 
 
 W^illiam Lowther, in the year 1847, obtained part in the in- 
 heritance of the saints, and united with the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church, South, at Mount Zion in the Crawford Circuit, a 
 Circuit long called by that name, though previously called Rus- 
 sell. Mount Zion is north-west of Columbus, Georgia, aud not 
 more than nine miles from that place. Mr. Lowther was a na- 
 tive of Georgia, and became a citizen of Alabama in 1841, and 
 died, in the same community in Alabama in which he first took 
 up abode in the State, June 30, 1889, at the age of seventy-three. 
 Through all the years from 1847 to 1889 he was a member of 
 the Society at Mount Zion. Ever free from malice and guile 
 and hypocrisies and envies, he was a pillar in the Church of 
 God. He was a faithful steward during the time of his con- 
 nection with the Church, and was an active Sunday-school 
 teacher and officer through a long period of service. Perhaps 
 no man in that section of the State exerted a better influence 
 and did a more faithful part than the sweet spirited and saintly 
 William Lowther. He was affable without levity, and sedate 
 without moroseness. He was contented and happy, and never 
 sought public notoriety or applause. He was of sound judg- 
 ment, just, and tolerant. He was attentive to the sick, kind to 
 
676 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 the poor, and gentle toward all men. The delicacy with which 
 he bestowed his alms made them doubly welcome and doubly 
 valuable. He was well reported of for good works, and h© laid 
 up for himself a good foundation, and has laid hold on eternal 
 life. 
 
 The Crawford Circuit was continued in its original boundary 
 until the close of 1857, when it was divided into two Circuits, 
 one still called Crawford, and the other Russell. During the 
 years before that division that Circuit had from thirteen to fif- 
 teen appointments extending over the country from the neigh- 
 borhood of Opelika to the neighborhood of Seale and from Wa- 
 coochee to Mount Olivet south-west of Uchee, and during the 
 years previous to the division the white meaibers within the 
 bounds of the Circuit numbered from six to more than nine 
 hundred. That Crawford Circuit, covering the area above 
 mentioned, was the first Circuit to which the author of this 
 History was appointed. There in the relation of junior preach- 
 er he commenced his itinerant work. It was in that Circuit, in 
 1857, he first knew the Aliens, Bakers, Bankses, Barnetts, Ben- 
 netts, Borums, Boykins, Bullards, Byrds, Calhouns, Cappses, 
 Cherrys, Coles, Dunlaps, Edwardses, Faulkenberrys, Frazers, 
 Greens, Gibsons, Harrises, Hayses, Himeses, Hurts, Johnsons, 
 Keetings, Laneys, Lockharts, Lowthers, McTyeires, Pages, Per- 
 rys, Prestons, Smiths, Tates, Threadgills, Trotters, and Wil- 
 liamses. Men and women of these names were pillars in the 
 Church of God, and saints in the household of faith. 
 
 The Alabama Conference held its annual session at Greenes- 
 borough, Alabama, January 17-24, 1849. Bishop Robert Paine 
 was delayed by sickness and reached the seat of the Conference 
 one day late. In his absence the Rev. Jefferson Hamilton was 
 elected President. At the Missionary Anniversary, held on 
 Monday evening of the Conference session, the Rev. A. H. 
 Mitchell, D.D., and the Rev. W. H. Milburn, then lately come 
 from Illinois, made addresses in the interest of the cause in 
 band. 
 
 Throughout the territory of the Conference during that ec- 
 clesiastical year then closed, the year 1848, the unction from on 
 high rested on the Church, and large numbers of souls had a 
 happy transition from nature to grace, and affiliated with the 
 people of God. At Asbury, Hamilton, Mellard's, Rehoboth, and 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 677 
 
 ©ther points on the Autauga Circuit there was a manifestation 
 of living power, and over one hundred whites and a number of 
 blacks joined the Church. At Bethlehem, on the Coosa Circuit, 
 a fine class was received into the Church, and a number were 
 happy in the experience of regeneration. On the Harpers ville 
 Circuit there were more than sixty accessions to the Church in 
 six weeks. On the Cedar Bluff Circuit the work was extensive. 
 Throughout the Talladega Circuit, which embraced Tallassee- 
 hatchee, Chockolocko, and Talladega Valleys, the work was pro- 
 found and extensive. Throughout the Randolph Circuit there 
 was a deep current of divine influence, and scores were inaugu- 
 rated into the divine favor. At Auburn and at one other place 
 on the Auburn Circuit over ninety joined the Church. At 
 Mount Meigs there were fifty justified, and more than that 
 many accessions. The Choctawhatchee Circuit had twenty-two 
 appointments, and at Abbeville, Clayton, Dawkins's Camp- 
 ground, Epworth, Elizabeth Chapel, and Wright's, on that Cir- 
 cuit, there was a divine work which resulted in a large number 
 of accessions. Over two hundred were added to the Church on 
 Columbia Mission. There were more than seventy conversions 
 on Oak Grove Circuit, and the Lower Peach Tree Circuit had 
 great times, while on the Havana Circuit seventy white and 
 fifty colored persons were received into the fellowship of Chris- 
 tians in one quarter of the year. The region between the 
 Tombigbee and Warrior Rivers was visited by divine influences, 
 and at Clinton, Ebenezer, Eutaw, Pine Grove, Sardis, and 
 Springfield there were grand times, and the refining fire there, 
 as at other places, purified the Church. Selma, Dayton, and 
 Demopolis received the unction from on high, and at each of 
 said places souls were made inexpressibly happy. In the 
 bounds of the Conference the increase that year was reported 
 at two thousand two hundred and forty-seven whit« and eight 
 hundred and sixteen colored members. 
 
 Greenesborough Station had a noble set of men and women 
 connected with it through all the period from 1845 to 1865. 
 Dr. Joseph A. Moore was a steward there from 1841 till 1849, 
 and Dr. Pleasant W. Kittrell was a stevvard there from 1844 till 
 1850. These two men were active, punctual, and efficient in 
 Church work until 1849, when they both became somewhat de- 
 linquent Some time after that Dr. Kittrell moved to Texas. 
 
678 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 John Du Boise and Joseph W. Houck. and their wives, who 
 were sisters were pillars in the Church of God. They were 
 members at Greenesborough from 1835 till bevond the period 
 
 mtnl o T :r^ "'" ""''''■ ^» ^'^•-' -ho has often been 
 mentioned in these pages, was a local preacher, and Houck was 
 
 cTosS /h 1«««''"*^,-*'^"^ ""'''' ^^^'--g --'^ island 
 closing with 1868 one hundred and thirty-two Quarterly Con- 
 
 W Hon r\'f '°' Greenesborough Station, and JosepL 
 
 th^nT W ' """' P""'""* ** °°« ^'"'^'^^ a'ld eight of 
 
 toem. He was a man of God, and after the type of Willian- 
 Carrosso, the noted class-leader of England 
 
 Ch?rcr! ?■ '^°''r°° '''"^ " ^""S '^-"^ association with the 
 Church at Greenesborough. In 1835 he contributed fifty dol- 
 lars for the support of the ministry, at that place, and in 1836 
 he was the class-leader there, and for seventeen years after that 
 he was steward, and subsequently he was Superintendent of the 
 ounday-scnool. 
 
 J. W. Walton a native of North Carolina, and a man of sound 
 judgment, joined the Methodist Episcopal Church at Greenes- 
 boroi^h, under the ministry of the Kev. James M. Boatwright. 
 in 1839, and was steward there for more than twenty years be 
 ginning .,th 1847. In the Canebrake region of Akbama he 
 made large property and possessed great wealth. He con- 
 
 Sv T "iSr/'"" ^''""'^ ^""^ '"l^'P ^^^ Southern Univer- 
 sity In 1869 he moved to Gallatin, Tennessee. He now, in 
 1892, lives near Birmingham, Alabama, seventy-five years old 
 and m penury. He has children to relieve his wants 
 
 Mrs. Ehzabetli Hunt were received into the Society at that 
 place by certificate, and the first Quarterly Conference for that 
 year elected Gideon Nelson a steward. While in itself not a 
 promise of accession of power, and while not a revelation of 
 we conceived plans to be executed in great advancements, and 
 while not o be recorded here as one of many fabulous d^eds 
 yet It is a fact that at the Quarterly Conference held for that 
 S ation ,n September, 1847, Sam Dillard, a colored member, was 
 brought forward as a candidate for the ministry. No re;om! 
 mendation had been secured from either the Society of which he 
 
 quired, and for that reason the case was indefinitely postponed. 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 679 
 
 Dr. William Thomas Webb was elected steward for Greenes- 
 borough Station, in 18-18, and he continued in that office until 
 the close of 1850, when Henry A. Stoleuwerck was elected to 
 that position in his place. Three or four years later he was 
 again elected steward, and then in about two years he tendered 
 his resignation, and it was accepted. 
 
 Stolenwerck continued in the office of steward for more than 
 fifteen years, and beyond the time to be recounted in this His- 
 tory. He died in 1891. His first wife was the daughter of Dr. 
 Gaston Drake, of Greenesborough, Alabama, and his last wife 
 was a daughter of Dr. Thompson, of Camden, Wilcox County, 
 
 Alabama. 
 
 Warren E. Kennedy, than whom a more excellent man sel- 
 dom appeared in the Church at that place, was elected steward 
 in the first part of 1849, and continued in that office far beyond 
 the time to which this History extends. 
 
 Dr. Gaston Drake, a man of great personal worth, was elected 
 steward, in May, 1851, in place of David Berkley, who had re- 
 moved to Texas, and he was continued in that office till beyond 
 the time reviewed in this History. He was industrious, prompt, 
 
 punctual, and useful. 
 
 As an indemnification in a ministerial crisis, at the Quarterly 
 Conference in January, 1853, on motion of T. M. Johnson, a 
 Kesolution was adopted pronouncing it absolutely expedient to 
 found a District Parsonage. What further was done toward 
 the work in that good cause this deponent saith not. 
 
 R G. Hammill was a local preacher in that Station for a 
 number of years, and R. S. Hunt was a class-leader, and in 
 1853 these two worthy brothers were appointed to superintend 
 the Sunday-school of the colored people. That bestowed honor 
 and rank, and was an award to modesty, integrity, and worth. 
 
 John H. Y. Webb appeared in official position in connection 
 with that Station as early as the first part of 1855, and, though 
 more than a third of a century has elapsed, he is, in 1892, still 
 • there, faithful, true, and honored. 
 
 At a Quarterly Conference held at Greenesborough, Decem- 
 ber 1, 1855, the Rev. James K. Armstrong was recommended to 
 Alabama Annual Conference for admission on trial, and the 
 Conference at its next session admitted him. 
 
 December 1, 1855, according to a detailed report made to the 
 
6H0 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Quarterly Conference, though the ideal standard was still un- 
 attained, the Church at Greenesborough was in a firm and 
 healthy state. The stewards, so it was claimed, were men of 
 ability, enterprise, and efficiency; and the current expenses of 
 the Church were liberally provided for, and cheerfully and 
 promptly liquidated. It seems, however, that the Church at 
 that place had long indulged the liberty and the luxury, if 
 liberty and luxury it was, of debtor, for it is stated in the re- 
 port above referred to that "the old debts have all been paid, 
 and this Church for the first time in its history is free from 
 debt." Credit may be necessary to commerce, and commerce 
 may be the signs and the means of opulence, and debit and 
 credit may be words peculiar to civilized and Christian nations, 
 but debt is not assuring to a Church. Public worship at that 
 time was well attended, though the prayer meetings and class- 
 meetings were greatly neglected, and were, evidently, treated 
 as of little utility by the majority of the members of the So- 
 ciety. Singing, which is an important part of divine service, 
 may have been good or indifferent. The report states that the 
 music was specially engaged in with spirit and pleasure, and 
 had been greatly improved by the concentrated efforts of several 
 brethren who had taken that part of worship under their own 
 paternal care. There was a well regulated Sunday-school in the 
 charge, having connected with it the Infant Class and the Bible 
 Class. That Society, at that time, was composed of gentlemen 
 and ladies of gre»)t personal worth, and yet that was a season 
 of profound tranqu-illity, that sort of tranquillity which prevails 
 where zeal and ardop have disappeared. There was a tendency 
 to gayety rather than to pensiveness and piety. There was a 
 tendency to conformity to the world just in the measure that 
 religious sociability was lacking. Pastimes were rather sought 
 and relished than class-meetings and religious interviews. 
 
 At the Quarterly Conference, July 5, 1856, the names of the 
 Trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, in Greenes- 
 borough, were entered on the record, and said Trustees were 
 ordered not to allow the Church to be used, after that date, for 
 other than religious services, and meetings under the control of 
 the Church and the Southern ministry. There had been usur- 
 pation and there had been desecration of the sacred place; and 
 there was a rally of authority for rescue and protection. 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, 681 
 
 Through the period now under review there was the same 
 fluctuation in the white membership at Greenesborough as at 
 other places. In 1846 there were one hundred and seventy 
 white members, five years later there were only one hundred 
 and thirty, and in 1864 there were two hundred and twenty- 
 eight, counting probationers. The colored members increased 
 throughout the period: two hundred and thirty in the begin- 
 ning, and four hundred and thirty-three at the close, counting 
 
 the probationers. 
 
 The Alabama Conference held a session at Columbus, Missis- 
 sippi, January 16-24, 1850. The Eev. Ebenezer Hearn, by ap- 
 pointment of the Bishop, presided over the deliberations of the 
 first day. Bishop William Capers presided the remainder of 
 the time. Bishop Eobert Paine was present most of the Ses- 
 sion. At that day there was no such thing as a Joint Board of 
 Finance, but each Conference had authority to adopt and 
 recommend such plans and rules as to them appeared necessary 
 to raise supplies for the respective allowances recognized by 
 the Discipline; and the Conference appointed annually a com- 
 mittee to estimate the sums requisite for necessitous superan- 
 nuated ministers, widows, and orphans. At that session of the 
 Alabama Conference there was adopted a Financial Plan, and 
 it was enacted that: " There shall be a Joint Board of Finance, 
 composed of one lay member from each District in the Confer- 
 ence, an equal number of ministers and a chairman." That 
 Plan embodied substantially what, many years afterward, was- 
 put in the Discipline providing for a Joint Board of Finance. 
 The illustrious lay members elected at that time on that Board 
 were: Charles Gascoigne, of Mobile, B. O. Glover, of Demopo- 
 lis, William Godfrey, of Gainesville, T. C. Billup, of Columbus, 
 Alfred Battle, of Tuskaloosa, J. G. L. Huey, of Talladega, 
 Daniel Pratt, of Prattville, J. Thorington, of Montgomery, and 
 A. McGehee, of Eufaula. 
 
 The Delegates elected then to the General Conference were: 
 T. O. Summers, W. Murrah, J. Hamilton, A. H. Mitchell, T. 
 W. Dorman, E. Calloway, G. Garrett, and J. T. Heard. The 
 Eeserves: E. Hearn, G. Sheaffer. 
 
 At the next session of the Annual Conference, and which was 
 
 held at Auburn, Alabama, January 8-15, 1851, Bishop Capers 
 
 again presiding, and at which the Kev. James E. Glenn, then 
 44 
 
682 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 venerable in years, was present, the new Financial Plan approved 
 itself by the achievements attained under its operations. Pre- 
 vious to that year the claimants on the Conference Collections 
 had been paid about forty cents on the dollar, under the new order 
 at that time they were paid about seventy cents on the dollar. 
 That session of the Conference was the first ever held in the 
 State further east than Montgomery. Though Auburn was 
 then only a small country town, it was a pleasant place, and the 
 hospitality of the citizens was unbounded, and the Conference 
 was admirably entertained. 
 
 The Missionary Anniversary at that time and place was 
 marked by enthusiasm. Impromptu speeches were features of 
 the occasion, and some of them were most felicitous, and pro- 
 duced most admirable effects. At that anniversary, at Auburn, 
 the ladies of the congregation made Thomas Eady, a member 
 of the Church at that place, and who for ,many years was the 
 sexton of the Church, a life member of the Missionary Society, 
 by a contribution of twenty dollars; and a School girl who had 
 been favored with the pastoral care of the Kev. Thomas Y. 
 Ramsey when she was a pupil at Centenary Institute, at Sum- 
 merfield, made him, by a contribution of twenty dollars, a life 
 member of the Missionary Society. Twelve thousand seventy- 
 one dollars and thirty-nine cents were collected that year just 
 then closing for Missions in the bounds of the territory em- 
 braced in the Conference. Enon Circuit, in the Eufaula Dis- 
 trict, paid that year to Missions one thousand and twenty-two 
 dollars, and Franklin Street Church, Mobile, paid for the same 
 object one thousand seven dollars and forty-five cents. 
 
 About that time unusual enterprise began to show itself in 
 the cause of Missions in the Alabama Conference, distinguished 
 attention to the work followed, and the Methodists of Alabama 
 enlarged their contributions for carrying the gospel to the 
 regions beyond. Tuskegee Circuit had nineteen places for 
 preaching in it in 1851, and the First Quarterly Conference for 
 that Circuit for that year resolved to hold missionary meetings 
 of two days continuance at every appointment in the Circuit, 
 and that in addition the best hour at all the Camp-meetings on 
 the Circuit be devoted to the cause of Missions. The resolu- 
 tions thus adof)ted were carried out. The Crawford Circuit, 
 with sixteen appointments, adopted and carried out similar 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 
 
 683 
 
 resolutions. The Glennville Circuit, with eight appointments, 
 had the same kind of meetings for the same purpose, and the 
 Enon Circuit, with Chunnenueggee in it, held similar meet- 
 ings. Enthusiasm was intense, as attested by the results, 
 which were infinitely greater than had been anticipated. The 
 amount collected for Missions in the bounds of the Conference 
 was twenty-five thousand eight hundred thirty-one dollars 
 and sixty-five cents. Enon Circuit, in the Eufaula District, 
 still held the Banner, having paid twenty-nine hundred and 
 seventy-five dollars. The Tuskegee Circuit, in the Montgomery 
 District, pressed hard for the prize, paying into the treasury 
 twenty-nine hundred and twenty dollars. Tuskegee Circuit at 
 that time consisted of the following places, each one of which 
 contributed to that great sum; Loachapok*, Soule Chapel, New 
 Hope Providence, Franklin, Notasulga, llocky Mount, War- 
 rior Stand, Baldwin's, Perry Chapel, Society Hill, Mount Nebo, 
 Asbury Chapel, Segrests, McKendree, Pay^ie Chapel, Fort 
 Hull, Mount Zion, and Texas. Auburn, which wae then a Sta- 
 tion, contributed the largest amount for Missions that year of 
 any Station in the Conference: it paid four hundred and eighty 
 dollars. At the session of the Conference held in Mobile, Ala- 
 bama, January 7-14, 1852, Bishop James O. Andrew presiding, 
 at which these sums for Missions were reported, it transpired 
 that the Alabama Conference had gone beyond all the Confer- 
 ences of the connection in the amounts contributed to Missions, 
 and had taken the honor which hitherto the South Carolina 
 Conference had possessed. But that solitary grandeur was not 
 all in which the Alabama Conference rejoiced. The work had 
 prospered in other respects during the year 1851, the year just 
 then closed. Great revivals had swept through the State, and 
 there had been an increase of twenty-seven hundred and twenty- 
 six members. The Sunday-schools had flourished, and the 
 esprit de corps was admirable. 
 
 It became necessary at that session of the Conference to in- 
 vestigate the conduct and the theological teachings of the Rev. 
 William H. Milburn, who had been in Alabama three or four 
 years, and had been in Mobile two years. He was once a mem- 
 ber of the Illinois Conference, and located in September, 1847. 
 That investigation was the only thing at that time to disturb 
 the tranquillity of that occasion. It seems that Mr. Milburn 
 
684 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 liad been guilty of some erratic conduct, some questionable as- 
 sociation, not suited to one occupying the position of a Metho- 
 dist preacher. In some way he associated with and participated 
 in a ball, a sort of pantomime, a celebration at New Year's by a 
 Mobile club. It seems also that he had given utterance to such 
 doctrines as induced the charge of heresy. For these he was 
 called to answer. He was so euamored of scientific exactness, 
 and had so entangled himself in the meshes of his own re- 
 searches and his speculative abstractions, that he spurned all 
 systematic arrangement of theological doctrines, and he knew 
 nothing as he ought, either of science or theology. When 
 called to answer for his conduct in connection with the New 
 Year's pantomime he put in a plea of good motive. When 
 called to answer for his theological vagaries, he asserted, in de- 
 fense of himself, that the preaching of theology was the bane of 
 the Church and the curse of the pulpit. But he made such plea 
 of good motives in the matter of the ball had by the club, and 
 he made such explanations of his theological views as induced 
 the Conference to condone both his questionable conduct and 
 his theological errors. 
 
 About the time of that session of the Conference in January, 
 1852, the Kev. P. P. Neely, D.D., preached two sermons in the 
 city of Mobile. He had then just closed a term of two years in 
 the Station at Columbus, Mississippi, and had been just three 
 years in the Alabama Conference, having been transferred from 
 the Tennessee Conference. There was a sojourner in the city of 
 Mobile at the time here referred to, and, attracted by the fame 
 of Dr. Neely's eloquence, said sojourner joined the auditors who 
 sought to hear the sermons. That sojourner wrote an account 
 of the sermons and the preacher, and as said production con- 
 tains the best portraiture of Dr. Neely that can be had it is 
 transferred to these pages. Notwithstanding a deep shadow 
 fell upon Dr. Neely and continued to rest upon him till his sun 
 went down in death, he continued in the ministry, and main- 
 tained his reputation for eloquence, and attracted multitudes to 
 his ministry as long as he lived. But here is the calm and dis- 
 passionate estimate of the man: 
 
 "About the time of the late Conference here, the Kev. P. P. 
 Neely, D.D., preached two sermons; and as his fame had 
 reached me, I, of course, heard him. How one is often disap- 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 685 
 
 pointed in the appearance of a person of whom we have often 
 heard. Before seeing him, I had pictured Dr. Neely as a slight, 
 graceful man, of spirituelle expression; but he is tall, and large- 
 framed, florid complexion, light eyes and hair. His voice is 
 soft, sweet, yet withal a little husky. He reads the hymns and 
 Scripture lessons pleasantly, but not impressively. And upon 
 standing up to preach, you are grieved to perceive what appears 
 to be a manuscript volume before him. With the exception of 
 the eye in the main kept book-ward, you would scarce guess he 
 was reading. He has a good deal of action, and his voice has 
 all the cadences suited to the passage. His style is elaborate, 
 but not finished; ornate, but not elegant; it has copiousness, 
 but not precision; abounds in finely conceived attenuative pas- 
 sages, but lacks the bullet-like accuracy and telling power of the 
 short, terse sentences. The smooth, liquid sounds predominate. 
 He does not seem to have made the harsh, grating sounds a study. 
 His voice, together with the effects he produces by it, is aston- 
 ishing. It has no compass of tones, and its volume is limited, 
 yet i^s influence over you is very great. It propitiates, then 
 wins you. You cannot resist its soft and touching sweet- 
 ness. It blends too in beautiful accord with the style and mat- 
 ter of the discourse. I am mistaken if much of his power does 
 not lie here. His view of a subject is marked by adaptation to 
 popular apprehension, rather than original or profound thought. 
 It is not a bold and comprehensive grasp of it, but rather an 
 embellished reproduction of what has been already thought 
 and said. His presentation of it tends to excite emotion more 
 than to stimulate reflection, and hence he is effective. It is no 
 mean office, so to reclothe old thoughts, animating them with 
 the breath of a rich life, bringing them again to our acquaint- 
 ance as unknown and yet well known. The passions he awak- 
 ens are admiration, pity, and love; rarely fear, never terror. 
 His passion is his strength, without it his adornment would be 
 tinsel, his moving appeals but as ' sounding brass or tmklmg 
 cymbLl;' his rhetoric faulty to the last degree, and his whole 
 discourse but a declamation. 
 
 To sum him up, I should say he has more fancy than imagi- 
 nation; excelling in embellishment rather than creation; more 
 feeling than thought, passion than reason; less cultivation than 
 natural vigor; prolixity without condensation; greater afflu- 
 
686 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 ence of language than finish of expression; more power than 
 you can well account for. His genius is luxurious, not ascetic: 
 it singing robes, but not the purged ear or the rapt vision; dis- 
 porting itself in descriptions, never girding up its loins for a 
 pilgrimage in the pathless realms of thought; delighting in sen- 
 timent more than principles: breathing dulcet sounds of melo- 
 dy, but never reaching the lofty pitch of harmonic sublimity." 
 
 With Bishop William Capers presiding, the Alabama Confer- 
 ence met at the classic town of Marion, Perry County, Alaba- 
 ma, December 1, 1852, and continued in session eight days. 
 The year was noted as a year of success. The patient labors of 
 the men of God had been rewarded with satisfactory results. 
 Great ingatherings were had in many pastoral charges, and 
 there was an increase of twenty-one hundred and thirty-eight 
 white and two hundred and seventy-three colored members dur- 
 ing the year. The interest in education increased, the Sunday- 
 schools flourished, and the zeal in Missions continued, though 
 the amount collected on that account was not quite as much as 
 the preceding year. Twenty-one thousand one hundred nine- 
 ty-six dollars and eighty-eight cents had been gathered for the 
 cause. A large class of preachers was admitted on trial, thirty- 
 one in all. 
 
 Noteworthy events transpired on the Cedar Bluff Circuit dur- 
 ing the year 1852. Though contrary to the list of appointments 
 published in the Minutes, yet it is a fact that the Rev. Thomas 
 P. Crymes was in charge of the Cedar Bluff Circuit that year. 
 That Circuit at that time had in it the then village of Gadsden, 
 and that village was at that time in Cherokee County. The 
 Second Quarterly Conference for that Circuit for that year 
 was held at Gadsden, in July. The meeting was continued for 
 twelve days, and twenty-five persons professed justification, and 
 thirty were received into the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 The Third Quarterly Conference for that charge for that year 
 "was held at Spring Creek Camp-ground, in September, in con- 
 junction with a Camp-meeting. One hundred conversions and 
 fifty accessions to the Church were reported as the result of that 
 meeting. But notwithstanding all that revival work one of the 
 most unseemly things occurred at Gadsden that same year. The 
 Methodists and the Cumberland Presbyterians preached and 
 worshiped in the same house at that place, each denomination 
 
 The Work u nder the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, 687 
 
 having its days and hours for its own service. On one occasion 
 there was a most fearful collision of these two denomma ions; 
 the Cumberland Presbyterians occupying the house and utilizing 
 the hour, and the Methodists claiming the hour as theirs by the 
 stipulations in force. The Rev. T. P. Crymes, the preacher was 
 present, and, bold in the maintainance of his right, claimed his 
 hour. The Cumberland people, aggressive m their movements, 
 claimed to be in actual occupancy of the house and the hour. 
 Crymes arose at his place in the house and made announcements 
 of his services for the remainder of the day. Words and menace 
 ensued and the scene was not assuring, was not religious Itie 
 C^rbe'rland Presbyterians appeared before the Grand Jury o 
 the County of Cherokee and obtained an indictment against the 
 Rev Thomas P. Crymes for disturbing public worship. He 
 ^Z^Lo the indictment and was actually tried for t^e crime 
 alleL^ed in the court-house in the town of Center While he 
 had counsel, he acted as his own attorney, made the speech m 
 his own defense. He was persistently prosecuted and bi terly 
 persecuted, but he was acquitted by the verdict of the Court, 
 ^he autclous and revengeful conduct of the enemies of Mr^ 
 Crymes did their cause no good, and they ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
 have reaped the fruits of their own doings. The Methodists 
 have evef been in advance of the party who led that unrighteous 
 assault upon the Rev. Thomas P. Crymes. 
 
 The mention of Gadsden gives opportunity for the introduc- 
 tion of "he name of one of the most noted Metliodists ever m 
 that sec ion of the State. General 1). C. Turrentme lived m the 
 ^1 ty^^^^^^ for nearly four decades, and died there Sep- 
 
 leXr 11, 1883, in his seventy-sixth year. He was a native of 
 G^org a! His n.ra^ first appeared on the records of Alabama 
 Me'Ssm in the Wills Valley Circuit. L. M. Nicholson, David 
 Methoaism m^^^^^tine, a Committee of arbitration in a 
 
 SLIf iL'sy be^en Brothers Bristo and Watt, of WillB 
 Valley Circuit, on July 24, 1841, rendered a dec.sion winch is 
 on ecord in tU Journal of that Circuit. Upon moving to the 
 "cinTty of Gadsden General Turrentine organized a Sunday- 
 Tchoo with five scholars, and he continued in the Supenntend- 
 8CU001 w „ , ijooi there for thirty-four years. Who 
 :Sh ll he posUion of Superintendent of a Sunday-school 
 longer than that? lu that position he was distinguished and 
 
688 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 successful It was an humble position which he filled, and routine 
 work in which he engaged, but, in conducting a Sunday-school 
 and teaching and training the children, committed to his care, 
 in the doctrines of the Bible, he did a work grand in its import 
 and far reaching in its results. He was a man of great firmness, 
 persistence, and energy. Mrs. Caroline Turrentine, the wife of 
 General Turrentine, was a woman of much worth, a member of 
 the Church, a thorough Methodist, and a devoted Christian. 
 She performed her part in the drama of life punctually and well. 
 At the Camp-grounds in the section of the State in which he 
 lived General Turrentine had provision for tenting, and he 
 helped to entertain the crowds who had to be entertained at the 
 Camp-meetings. He and his wife were fine Camp-meeting sing- 
 ers, and great workers at a Camp-meeting sei-vice, and they would 
 sing and pray for, and talk with penitents, who were seeking the 
 pardoning mercy of the Lord Almighty. At the house of Gen- 
 eral Turrentine was dispensed as generous, and graceful a hos- 
 pitality as was ever bestowed anywhere, by any one. He kept 
 open house, and it was no uncommon thing for the preacher and 
 his family, with a most cordial welcome, to stay at General Tur- 
 rentine's home weeks at a time. Firm as the everlasting hills, 
 unyielding as the everlasting rocks, these two, General D. C. 
 Turrentine and his wife, Caroline Lucy Turrentine, adhered to 
 their principles, maintained the faith, and went to their reward 
 in full triumph. 
 
 The preachers who had charge of the Station at Marion and 
 who dispensed the gospel to that congregation from 1845 to 1865 
 were: the Eev. T. H. P. Scales, John M. Vestal, T. P. Holman, T. 
 Y. Kanisey, E. J. Hammill, P. P. Neely, James A. Peebles, Josiah 
 Bancroft, T. W. Dorman, W. Shapard, A. H. Mitchell and W. 
 C. Harris. Neely was there four years, Kamsey three, Dorman 
 and Shapard two, and the others one. Peebles and Bancroft 
 served in the capacity of junior preachers, and sometimes Ham- 
 burgh was associated with Marion. At the close of 1845 there 
 were at Marion one hundred and fifteen white and seventy-two 
 colored members, and at the beginning of 1865 there were one 
 hundred and one white and two hundred and fifty-three colored 
 members, the members at Hamburgh included. 
 
 The twenty-third session of the Alabama Conference convened 
 at Talladega, Alabama, December 13, 1854, and continued the ses- 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 689 
 
 sion until December 21, Bishop James O. Andrew, presiding. 
 That was a very important session of the Conference. Twenty- 
 three preachers were admitted on trial; eighteen were continued 
 on trial; sixteen were admitted into full connection; three weBe 
 re-admitted; the Kev. Edmund Baldwin, an elder in the Methodist 
 Protestant Church, applied for admission according to the pro- 
 visions of the Discipline, and was received into the Conference; 
 ten were discontinued; four located; one, the Eev. Stephen Olm 
 Capers, was expelled; three, the Eev. Thomas J. Campbell the 
 Eev Lewis S. Oslin, and the Eev. John Gross, had died. There 
 had been a magnificent work of grace that year, the Lord had 
 appeared in his glory to the worshiping assemblies, and there 
 had been an increase of sixteen hundred and sixty-seven white 
 and seventeen hundred and fifty-three colored members, and 
 seven local preachers. Four thousand three hundred thirty- 
 five dollars and sixty-nine cents had been collected for the Su- 
 perannuated Preachers, and the Widows and Orphans of Preach- 
 ers and to make up the deficiencies of those who had not received 
 the'ir regular allowance. Ninety-two cents in the dollar was the 
 amount paid the claimants. Twenty thousand nine hundred 
 seventy dollars and ninety-five cents had been contributed for 
 Missions. Eleven hundred seventeen dollars and fifty-five cents 
 had been contributed for the purchase of Sunday-school Books. 
 Twelve hundred ninety dollars and thirty cents had been con- 
 tributed for the American Bible Society; that amount was re- 
 ported in some instances the Agents failed to report the amount 
 raised for that purpose. Two hundred and thirty-nine Sunday- 
 schools were reported. Eight hundred and thirty dollars were 
 collected at the Missionary Anniversary at Talladega. 
 
 The Conference gave considerable attention to the subject of 
 education evinced great enthusiasm on the subject, and adopted 
 aggressive measures for the establishment of Colleges and the 
 
 fostering of Schools. . „ ^ v i, i, ^ 
 
 The Eevs. Thomas J. Campbell and Louis S. Oslin, who had 
 
 died during the year, had died of consumption. They died in 
 
 peace and triumph. ^, _ . . 
 
 The Eev. T. H. Foster was transferred to the Louisiana 
 Conference and died during the next year. The Eev. W. Monk 
 was transferred to the East Texas Conference. The Eev. C. C. 
 Gillespie and the Eev. E. S. Finley were transferred to the 
 
690 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Texas Conference. The Rev. J. W. Ellis, Sr., and the Rev. J. 
 C. Stewart were transferred to the Pacific Conference. 
 
 A sermon was preached before the Conference on the second 
 day of its session by the Rev. A. H. Mitchell, D.D., on Denomi- 
 national Education: the Text Deuteronomy vi. 7. The tradi- 
 tion is that the sermon was preached in the chapel of the 
 Synodical Female Institute, which was under the auspices of 
 the Presbyterians. The sermon is still in existence, having 
 been published. There is a sentence in the sermon in which 
 occur the words "to be fed upon the husks of Calvinism." The 
 Rev. Mr. McCorkle, who then, and for more than a quarter of a 
 century, was pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Talladega, 
 was present, and heard the sermon. Dr. Mitchell had an en- 
 gagement to dine with Brother McCorkle that day. Mr. Mc- 
 Corkle was full of humor, wit, and satire. Dr. Mitchell and 
 the other guests of the occasion having reached the residence 
 of Mr. McCorkle, were seated, possibly, in the preacher's study. 
 Dr. Mitchell observed a large number of Newspapers in the 
 room, and remarked: " Brother McCorkle, I see you have and 
 read an array of Newspapers." Brother McCorkle replied: 
 "Yes, Doctor, I supply myself with them 'to be fed upon the 
 husks of Calvinism.' " Dr. Mitchell did not pursue the con- 
 versation further. Very soon they repaired to the dining-room 
 where the repast of the hour was served and enjoyed. 
 
 The various preachers who served Talladega during the 
 period from 1845 to 1865 were: The Revs. O. R. Blue, one year; 
 T. H. P. Scales, one year; E. J. Hammill, three years; Joseph 
 Phelan, one year; J. W. Starr, one year; D. Carmicheal, two 
 years; J. C. McDaniel, one year; J. S. Moore, one year; B. B. 
 Ross, one year; T. P. Crymes, one year; James^S. Lane, a local 
 preacher, one year; T. F. Mangum, two years; C. W. Miller, a 
 preacher from Kentucky, a part of one year; T. J. Gouch, a 
 preacher from Missouri, the part of the year after Miller left; 
 R. B. Crawford, two years. Talladega was in a Circuit till the 
 close of 1857, when it was made a Station. At the close of the 
 first year as a Station it had one hundred and forty-three white 
 members, and sixty-five colored members. At the beginning of 
 1865 there were one hundred and five white and one hundred 
 and four colored members. 
 
 Than the Rev. E. J. Hammill no more popular preacher was 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 691 
 
 ever at Talladega, hence he was returned there two or three 
 different times. Notwithstanding his popularity, on one occa- 
 sion, and by one man, he was treated most unseemly and beaten 
 most unmercifully. The first Trustee named in the deed to the 
 first lot conveyed to the Methodist Episcopal Church at Talla- 
 dega, Alabama, was James M. McCann, and he it was who 
 maltreated the man whose office it was to minister in holy 
 things in the very house of worship of which he had been a 
 Trustee. There were some reports in circulation in the com- 
 munity detrimental to one or more of the members of the 
 Church, and the matter was of such a serious nature that it was 
 absolutely necessary to take cognizance of it. Mr. Hammill, 
 as a faithful pastor of the flock, had the matter investigated as 
 the ecclesiastical law to which he was amenable directed. 
 When the unsavory report was traced to its origin and the mat- 
 ter was adjusted upon its merits, the guilt was attached to Mrs. 
 McCann, one of the members of the Church, and the wife of 
 James M. McCann, and by the decision of the ecclesiastical 
 court she was put under penalties due to her untoward conduct. 
 That enraged Mr. McCann, and he proceeded to avenge himself 
 on Mr. Hammill, the preacher. He waylaid Mr. Hammill, and 
 in the darkness of the evening, as Mr. Hammill was on his way 
 to the Church, where a congregation was assembling for divine 
 service, an4 a Sunday evening it was, just as Mr. Hammill 
 reached the corner of the block in which the Church was located 
 ' and was turning down to the Church, Mr. McCann came upon 
 him in a cowardly and dastardly way, and delivered upon him 
 indignity, and numerous, furious, and dangerous blows. Even 
 after he had been made to suspend his blows, by some persons 
 who happened to come upon the scene, and after he had prom- 
 ised to desist from further assaults and indignities, he returned 
 to Mr. Hammill, and gave him a number of most violent blows. 
 Mr. Hammill was a meek man, and held the doctrine of non- 
 resistance. He believed that violence should never be resisted 
 by force, and on that occasion he acted according to his creed^ 
 and he made no effort to repel his assailant. He was so 
 wounded and prostrated that he could not proceed on his way, 
 and he was conveyed to the house just at hand, where he was 
 cared for. James M. McCann, the miscreant, received condign 
 punishment, the divine vengeance recompensed him. He died 
 
692 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 in the poor house in the County of Talladega, Alabama. He 
 lived in odium and died in poverty. He lived in sin, and died 
 in shame. 
 
 The Kev. E. J. Ham mill was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 
 1818. When an infant he was carried to the city of New York, 
 North America. It was the purpose of his father to make him, 
 through the proper channels, a priest in the Church of Kome, 
 and to that end he sent him to the Romish Church Schools in 
 the city of New York; but, before he reached his majority, he 
 went to Columbus, Georgia, and there he was justified, joined 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, and was licensed to preach. 
 He professed the attainment of Christain Perfection. After 
 that he went to Irwinton, Alabama, where he was recommended 
 as a suitable person to be admitted on trial in the traveling 
 connection, and in December, 1841, he was admitted to that re- 
 lation by the Alabama Conference, and appointed, for 1842, to 
 Talladega and Mardisville. For twenty-seven years he worked 
 in Alabama as an itinerant preacher, filling good appointments 
 and responsible positions. He married a Miss Simmons, whose 
 father lived at the time at Hillabee, in the bounds of the Coosa 
 Circuit, which Circuit Mr. Hammill served one year. Mr. 
 Hammill thought, spoke, and gesticulated very rapidly. He 
 was a man of intense and enthusiastic nature, and a man of 
 faith, prayer, and consecration. He was a man of intense po- 
 litical convictions, and the course of conduct and the tide of 
 events in the South did not please him. He was conscientious- 
 ly opposed to the doctrine of Secession as advocated and adopted 
 by the leaders of the Southern people. He was bitterly op- 
 posed to the purpose and effort to establish a government of 
 Confederate States in the South. His political alliances made 
 him offensive to those who held the prevailing sentiments in 
 the South, and, under the pressure, in 1869, he left Alabama, 
 and went to Missouri or Illinois, and united with the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, and preached as an itinerant in his new 
 field. He died in the communion of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. He was in a Rail Road car in transit from Illinois to 
 Alabama, and died suddenly, in the early part of 1892. 
 
 The Rev. Joseph Phelan located and lived in the bounds of 
 the Talladega Circuit. The Rev. John C. McDaniel, in 1857, 
 withdrew from the Methodists and united with the Baptists. 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, 69ii 
 
 The principal persons and officials at Talladega during the 
 period now under review were the Rev. James S. Lane, a local 
 preacher and a man of much worth, James G. L. Huey, Sunday- 
 school Superintendent and class leader, A. J. Cotton, George Mil- 
 ler, James S. Chambers, J. W. Martin, class leaders, John B. Huey, 
 H. H. Hammill, John L. Harris, Thomas J. Cross, John A. Win- 
 bourn, Charles Carter, Joseph H. Johnson, C. M. Shelley, W. J. 
 Rhodes, J. B. M. Landers, Abner Jones, J. H. Vandiver, stew- 
 ards, William H. Thornton, steward and class leader. Some of 
 these men were there through all that period from 1845 to 1865, 
 others were there only a part of the time. 
 
 As the lives of these men whose names are here grouped are 
 reviewed the conviction is reached that it is not a pleasing act 
 nor an easy task to transfer to the written page all the facts of 
 history. Men do not always appear to as good advantage in 
 groups as they do apart and alone. The aggregated follies of a 
 community present a scene appalling. The real life and final 
 end of even men who have avouched the Lord to be their God 
 admonish of frailty in human nature and of contingency in hu- 
 man destiny. An ideal excellence is not always maintained, 
 and a happy exit is not always secured. 
 
 The Rev. James S. Lane was for about six years a member of 
 the Georgia Conference. He located in December, 1847, and 
 moved to Alabama, and made his home in Talladega. He was 
 associated with the town of Talladega from 1848 till 1864. He 
 was a member of the Alabama Conference for the year 1855, but 
 he did not leave Talladega. The last record made of him on the 
 Quarterly Conference Journal for Talladega Station bears date 
 October 29, 1864, "character of J. S. Lane, L. E., passed." 
 About that time, or a few months thereafter, he moved to Tex- 
 as. He was about forty-seven years old when he left Tallade- 
 ga. He was associated with several Schools in Texas, and did 
 much for education in that State. He inspired an interest in 
 the citizens of Georgetown and vicinity in the Southwestern 
 University; he canvassed in the interest of that Institution. 
 He was re-admitted to the traveling connection in the North- 
 west Texas Conference in November, 1869. He did efficient 
 work in the ministry in Texas. He was a man of social attain- 
 ments, and in conversation he was wise and instructive. He 
 was s'trongly attached to the views and principles of the South. 
 
694 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 He was free from sordidness and selfishness. He was full of ar- 
 dor. He had dark eyes and black hair. He died December 8, 
 1882, and was buried at Georgetown, Texas. His remains were 
 buried a long way from his native land of Georgia. 
 
 On January 1, 1838, James G. L. Huey, a native of South Car- 
 olina, and then in his twenty-fifth year, cast his lot with the 
 denizens of Talladega, Alabama, and on a beautiful Sabbath in 
 the flowery month of May, 1842, he presented himself at the al- 
 tar of the little Meeting House which stood on the hill above 
 the magnificent Spring in the town of Talladega, a candidate 
 for membership in the Methodist Episcopal Church. By proc- 
 ess provided, he was received; and he was immediately selected 
 by the women who had hitherto guided the affairs of the Sun- 
 day-school, to take charge of the Sunday-school as Superintend- 
 ent. He was the Superintendent of that Sunday-school from 
 then till 1867. He was also one of the class leaders of the So- 
 ciety. He kept up a good Sunday-school through all the years 
 in which he managed its affairs. It was a good Sunday-school 
 not only in the numbers constituting it, but in the character of 
 its pupils and teachers and in the work performed. For suffi- 
 cient reasons it is impossible to catalogue the teachers and pu- 
 pils connected with that School through the quarter of a centu- 
 ry its destinies were guided by Brother Huey, but a few ought 
 to be named. Miss Susan Dixon was a tower of strength in that 
 School. She was endowed with the powers of investigation, and 
 furnished with stores of Biblical knowledge, and she had firm- 
 ness of will, and personal influence. Mrs. S. F. Kice, Mrs. Re- 
 becca Moody, Miss Mary Jane Douglass, Miss Charlotte Walker, 
 Miss Sarah J. Shelley, Miss Mary C. Shelley, Miss Alabama 
 Stephenson, Miss Martha Stephenson, were noble women of 
 brilliant lives who rendered valuable aid in the good Cifuse. 
 James E. Shelley, Charles M. Shelley, Henry E. Shelley, H. H. 
 Hammill, John B. Huey, and William H. Thornton were men 
 who wrought well in the sublime work. However pleasant and 
 profitable it might be to study the political systems of extinct 
 empires, and to search for the beauties of ancient classics, a 
 sublimer work was enterprised in that School. The Bible was 
 studied, expounded, and revered. The Bible was considered not 
 the symbol of power, but power itself, not the semblance of truth, 
 but truth itself. • 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 695 
 
 James G. L. Huey was of French and Irish extraction, and 
 blended in himself the various characteristics of his ancestors, 
 the generous and impulsive predominating. Evidently he had 
 the elements of stability in him or he could not have continued 
 in the routine work of Sunday-school Superintendent for a quar- 
 ter of a century. He served the general interests of the Church 
 with fidelity and liberality. He was ever ready to assume re- 
 sponsibility for the Church and act in her interest whenever 
 and in whatever her cause was to be advanced and protected. He 
 not only guided her Sunday-school work, but was prompt and 
 prominent in her class-meetings, prayer meetings, and general 
 public services. He was ready, if need be, to render even police- 
 duty in the interest of the divine cause. An instance, attesting 
 the truth of this averment, is on record. In the days when such 
 a thing as police force was not known in Talladega, and when 
 the men and women sat apart in a Methodist audience, a special 
 meeting was in progress at the old Meeting House. During 
 one of the services of that meeting two wicked persons, in a 
 state of intoxication, moved around on the outside of the 
 Church and with boisterous speech disturbed the congregation. 
 Finally they walked up to one of the windows on the side of the 
 house occupied by the women and poured forth a volley of in- 
 solent utterances. Huey sprang up instantly, and with deter- 
 mined bearing and rapid step passed out of the house and to 
 where the insolent disturbers of the peace were standing. Ja- 
 cob D. Shelley, a man of extraordinary worth in the communi- 
 ty, and a very pillar in the Church, actuated by the same motives 
 which moved Huey, went with him. These two class leaders, 
 having provided themselves with suitable cudgels, chastised the 
 base fellows in real good style. They felled them to the 
 ground with quick and heavy blows. The culprits plead for 
 mercy, and were permitted to depart with their wounds and 
 their shame ; and were left to reflect upon their relation to mor- 
 al suasion and the effectiveness of physical force. Huey and 
 Shelley returned to their places in the congregation, and par- 
 ticipated in the divine worship as complacently as if they had 
 been to join angels in a hymn of praise. General Huey was 
 public spirited, and held a commission as General of Alabama 
 troops, and was commissioned to act as a visitor to the United 
 States Military Academy at West Point previous to the war be- 
 
696 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 tween the States. He was the trusted Fiscal Agent and Deputy 
 Treasurer of the Confederate States. He was a member of the 
 Senate of Alabama from Talladega County, in 1845. He was 
 one of the moving spirits in the building of the East Alabama 
 Female Institute at Talladega; and, after the Masons and Meth- 
 odists had both failed in the effort to sustain it as a Female 
 School, he was the chief agent in inducing the State of Alabama 
 to take it for a Deaf Mute Institute. He abstained strictly from 
 the use of all intoxicants. The destitute shared his alms; and 
 the sick shared his kind offices; and he visited and tendered his 
 sympathies to the grief stricken mourner; and he was at the 
 obsequies of even the humblest. He was twice married, and 
 his first wife was the mother of seven children, all of whom, ex- 
 cept two, preceded him to the grave. Hon. Benjamin M. Huey^ 
 distinguished as a Senator in the General Assembly of Alaba- 
 ma, from Perry County, is his son. General Huey left Talla- 
 dega about the latter part of 1867, or the first of 1868, and spent 
 the remainder of his days in Perry and Bibb Counties, Alaba- 
 ma. He died at his country home in Bibb County, Alabama, 
 March 20, 1887, and was buried at the town of Marion. 
 
 William H. Thornton, a native of Wilkes County, Georgia, 
 when seventeen years of age entered the mercantile business, 
 and continued in that line of business until he was forty years 
 old. Being a man of business, he studied and learned the prac- 
 tical things of life, and did not spend much time reveling in the 
 domain of speculation. While living at Bluff Springs, Alaba- 
 ma, in 1856, he was elected Judge of Probate of Talladega 
 County, and immediately moved to Talladega, where he resided 
 till he passed to the grave. He held the office of Judge of Pro- 
 bate of Talladega County from the time he was first elected 
 thereto until the acts of reconstruction went into force after 
 the close of the war between the States. In 1876 he was re- 
 stored to, or reinstated in the office, and then he held it until 
 impaired health caused him to resign in 1884. He professed 
 religion and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1838, 
 and shortly thereafter he erected his home altar, and kept up 
 worship with his family with great punctuality until impaired 
 health disqualified him for conducting religious services. He 
 was a man of strong religious convictions, and did his duty 
 in the Church of his choice faithfully and well. He was in 
 
 HON. WILLIAM H, THORNTON. 
 
 45 
 
 <696) 
 
The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 697 
 
 his place at the house of God, and was ever in the front 
 rank as a worker in the divine cause. He was a man of solid 
 piety, who both knew and loved Methodist doctrine and disci- 
 pline, and had natural and acquired abilities to transact the 
 temporal business of the Church. He had positive convictions 
 and steady purposes. He mingled firmness with gentleness, 
 persistence with kindness, and assertion with meekness in most 
 admirable harmony. It is said that his most noticeable errors 
 in judgment were committed in excessive efforts for peace and 
 friendship. It is quite possible to sacrifice right on the altar 
 of friendship, and in what is supposed to be the interest of 
 peace. Judge Thornton's hospitality was boundless, making 
 him, in dispensing it, literally the servant of the people. He 
 kept open house. Never did preacher have a wiser counselor, 
 a firmer friend, and a more willing and efficient comforter than 
 was found in William H. Thornton. He married Miss Emeline 
 E. White, a most admirable woman, and a fit companion. She 
 was a Methodist and a Christian. To them were born ten chil- 
 dren, and that household was a model. Judge Thornton died 
 May 17, 1888, and his wife followed him in less than three years. 
 There was never any family in Talladega who gave more 
 strength to Methodism than the family of Judge William H. 
 
 Thornton. 
 
 Than Dr. J. H. Vandiver no man was ever more firmly at- 
 tached to the principles of Methodism. Under every ordeal he 
 resisted every overture to desert the Church at whose altar he 
 was dedicated to God. Steady, tried, and true he ever stood to 
 his post. The Church ever had his personal presence, his best 
 counsel, his warmest sympathy, and his benevolent contribu- 
 tions. Under his roof the Methodist preacher and his family 
 found shelter and hospitality. Whether or not his physical 
 make-up and peculiarities answered to the descriptions given of 
 those of melancholic temperament, he was oftener in a state of 
 melancholy than in any other. The melancholy mood seemed 
 to be his normal mood, and yet the most mirthful youth whose 
 heart beat high with hopeful anticipations was never more san- 
 guine than he was at times. If merit there is in the inveterate 
 use of the noxious weed called tobacco, then Dr. Vandiver 
 possessed merit in a high degree, for he was a devotee of the 
 quid. It would be esteemed exaggeration to state the facts in 
 
698 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 bis use of tobacco. In all other habits he was strictly temper- 
 ate. For a long while he was a physician in active practice* 
 afterward he was a druggist. He lived at Alexandria and ad- 
 ministered medicine in that section before he moved to Talla- 
 dega. 
 
 In 1861 Mrs. Mary Ann Harris, Sister Savery, Sister Hogan, 
 and Miss Lizzie Frazier died in peace and triumph. In 1862 
 Mariah Whittaker died; and in 1863 Col. J. J. Woodward, an- 
 other of the members, was killed in the army; and in the same 
 year Mrs. Margaret Kennedy and Mrs. A. T. Plowman went 
 hence. In 1864 J. W. Martin and Eliza Markham closed their 
 earthly pilgrimage. George McLane was killed in the army. 
 
 In the latter part of 1860 the order of things carried Mrs. 
 Eachel M. Duncan, the wife of the Rev. Daniel Duncan, to Tal- 
 ladega, where she became a member of the Society, and where, 
 on Decemder 29, 1891, she ended her pilgrimage. She was a 
 woman of great piety. 
 
 The space at command forbids a record of the many pious 
 and worthy members who wrought righteousness and added 
 strength to the divine cause. On the roll of worthy ones might 
 be placed the names of J. T. Adams, Mrs. Carroll, Mrs. Cham- 
 bers, the mother of Miss Marcy, Mrs. Donahoo, Mrs. John B. 
 Huey, Mrs. Harvey Joiner, Mrs. Martin, Mrs. Scott, Mrs. Ste- 
 vens, Mrs. Thompson, Mrs. Dr. Vandiver, and Mrs. Dr. Whit- 
 son. Mrs. Jane C. Parsons, the wife of Governor Lewis E. Par- 
 sons, an ideal woman in practical sense and in personal worth, 
 was long a working member of the Methodist Church at Talla- 
 dega, and died there in the faith. 
 
 The name of Mrs. Emily A. Johnson, the wife of Dr. Joseph 
 H. Johnson, must go on the calendar. Dr. Joseph H. Johnson 
 and his wife deserve a monument. They wrought in the field 
 assigned them in great modesty, and wrought that which shall 
 endure in endless splendor. Call it a figure of speech if you 
 will, but they gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and 
 speech to the dumb! Patriotic and philanthropic hearts will 
 ever swell with gratitude upon every review of what these two 
 achieved in educating the unfortunate ones committed to their 
 care. The Alabama Deaf and Dumb Asylum, a Scliool for the 
 education of the indigent deaf-mutes of Alabama, was located 
 at Talladega in 1858, and Dr. J. H. Johnson was chosen to take 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 699 
 
 charge of its affairs. The blind were also admitted to the 
 School. Dr. Johnson was admirably fitted for the work and po- 
 sition assigned him, and met every emergency and every expec- 
 tation. It is no disparagement of Dr. Johnson to say, that 
 from the opening of the Institution, his wife, Mrs. Johnson, 
 was a light, a guide, a strength, and a benediction in the Asy- 
 lum for the deaf, dumb, and blind at Talladega, Alabama. It 
 is true that the Institution was always under the auspices of the 
 State, and not of the Church, but it is the glory of the Metho- 
 dists of the city of Talladega that of their number there were 
 those capable of filling such a philanthropic and noble position, 
 and capable of acquiting themselves with such credit in such 
 
 humane work- 
 There is on record in Book sixteen in the County Eecords of 
 the County of Talladega a warranty Deed to a parcel of ground 
 therein described. The Deed is made and signed by John T. 
 Morgan, and is made to James G. L. Huey, Alexander J. Cot- 
 ton, and William H. Thornton, Trustees for the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, South, at Talladega, Alabama, and bears date Oc- 
 tober 10, 1857. The description is as follows: " Part of Lot No. 
 156 in Talladega, Alabama, commencing. at the North-west cor- 
 ner of said Lot, and running thence east ninety-five feet along a 
 street in front of the New Methodist Episcopal Church, thence 
 one hundred and thirty feet at right angles with said street run- 
 ning in a southerly direction, thence west at eighty angles with 
 the last mentioned line to the street, thence one hundred and 
 thirty feet to the commencing point; being the same Lot on 
 which the New Methodist Episcopal Church Edifice is now 
 standing." The facts of a house being built on the Lot before 
 it was secured by Deed, and its being described as the New Meth- 
 odist Church edifice are explained by an item of history. 
 
 One bleak Sunday morning in the first months of 1854, at the 
 close of a class-meeting, John T. Morgan and James G. L. Huey 
 lingered at the door of the old Church after the other members 
 of the congregation had dispersed. Morgan, looking up and sur- 
 veying the old house, said: " The Methodists must have abetter 
 house of worship, and this location will not do." Huey con- 
 curred in what Morgan had said, and added: "There is a place 
 near this just suited to our wants." The two then walked to the 
 place referred to, and after satisfactory inspection, they resolved 
 
700 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 701 
 
 to obtain possession of the Lot, and hold it as the site for the an- 
 ticipated better house of worship for the use of the Methodists. 
 Before the dawn of another Sunday they had purchased the Lot, 
 and it was deeded to John T. Morgan, hence after the house of 
 worship was erected on it he had to convey it to Trustees as the 
 property of the Church. Morgan moved away from Talladega 
 before the new Church was erected, but to him and Huey belong 
 the honor of inaugurating the enterprise of a new Church. 
 These men both attained titles in after years. For years Mor- 
 gan represented Alabama in the United States Senate. The 
 new Church was erected in the period between the time of the 
 incident and the date of the Deed above recited, and is the 
 Church now in use by the Methodists of Talladega. The corpse 
 of Leroy Huey was the first one ever carried from the altar of 
 that new Church. 
 
 The Rev. Silvester E. Swope served the cause of Methodism 
 in Alabama for many years. His influence and labors as a local 
 preacher extended over the country from the Georgia line to the 
 Coosa Eiver, in the original large Counties of Randolph and 
 Talladega. He was the most noted man in the Fish Valley and 
 the Hillabees. He was a native of Kentucky, commenced the 
 Christian life in the State of Georgia, and it seems he was con- 
 nected with Methodism in Alabama from 1843 till his death. He 
 served Randolph and Hillabee Circuits and Coosa Mission as a 
 supply. He had a warm place in the affections of the people 
 amoug whom he labored and preached so long. He died at the 
 age of eighty-six, in 1890, at Anniston, Alabama. 
 
 While many faithful Christians were at Jacksonville, Alabama, 
 during the period from 1844 to 1865, E. L. Woodward and J. F. 
 Grant were the two most active and liberal men in the support 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. They were men of 
 great worth. Woodward was a thrifty merchant. Grant was an 
 Editor of ability and success. He was the Treasurer of the 
 State of Alabama for one term, and he maintained his integrity 
 and his religion. Though busy with the duties of his responsi- 
 ble office, he found time to attend the public services of the 
 Church. He attended the class-meetings regularly. Wood- 
 ward was the Superintendent of the Sunday-school for many, 
 many years at Jacksonville, and was successful in that work. 
 
 The twenty-fourth session of the Alabama Conference of the 
 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, South, commenced at Eutaw, Ala- 
 bama, December 5, 1855, and continued ten days. The reports 
 made to the Conference showed the total increase in the mem- 
 bership for the year to be fourteen hundred and eighty; and 
 that the amounts necessary for the Superannuated Preachers, 
 and the Widows and Orphans of Preachers, and to make up the 
 deficiencies of those who had not received their regular allow- 
 ance were settled at sixty-two cents in the dollar; and that 
 twenty-three thousand two hundred eighty-four dollars and 
 twelve cents was collected during the year for Missions. 
 
 With benevolence abounding, and philanthropy aglow, the 
 great event of that occasion was the discussion of the question 
 of locating and establishing a College within the bounds of the 
 Conference. The question was intensely interesting, and the 
 discussion was long and warm. It was that discussion which 
 prolonged the session of the Conference to ten days. 
 
 One member of the Conference, the Rev. Charles McLeod, had 
 passed to his reward. He died at the home of Brother Mayhew, 
 near Bridgeville, Pickens County, Alabama, October 19, 1855. 
 He started in the itinerant work in November, 1830, and he was 
 in the local ranks about seven years after that. He was presid- 
 ing elder on the Montgomery, Montevallo, and Tuskaloosa Dis- 
 tricts, and he was the presiding elder of the Columbus District 
 
 at the time of his death. „ , * 
 
 One man, the Rev. William M. Lovelady, was expelled from 
 the connection. Four men located. Bishop Robert Paine pre- 
 sided over the Conference. , ,i .rr. 1 41 
 
 The next session of the Conference was held at Tuskegee, Ala- 
 bama, commencing December 10, 1856, and closing, after dark, 
 December 17, 1856. Bishop George F. Pierce, by some deten- 
 tion did not reach the seat of the Conference till the second 
 day of the session, and the Rev. E. V. Le Vert was elected Pres- 
 ident, and directed the affairs of the Conference for one day. 
 
 At the previous Annual session the Conference resolved to in- 
 crease the Missionary collections during the year, and to raise 
 at least thirty thousand dollars. Thirty-two thousand sixty-one 
 dollars and sixty-six cents was paid into the treasury. 
 
 The increase of the membership that year was very satisfac- 
 tory Thirty-seven hundred and eighty-nine. 
 
 Four members of the Conference, the Revs. Thomas Burpo, 
 
702 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 703 
 
 James M. Wells, Kobert S. Spence, and James S. Belton, had 
 died during the year. 
 
 The Eev. Thomas Burpo was a native of North Carolina, 
 grew to manhood in Tennessee, commenced his ministry in Ala- 
 bama as an itinerant on trial in the Mississippi Conference, the 
 last days of 1823. In November, 1831, he located, in January, 
 1847, he was re-admitted to the Alabama Conference. He was a 
 modest man, and a model Christian. He died at his home in 
 Wilcox County, Alabama, in January, 1856, in the fifty-second 
 year of his age. 
 
 The Eev. J. M. Wells was born, and regenerated in Georgia, 
 and was never out of the ranks of an itinerant preacher. He 
 joined the Alabama Conference on trial in December, 1842, the 
 same month in which he was licensed to preach. He died at 
 North Port, Alabama, January 24, 1856. His wife, who was the 
 daughter of G. and A. Curling, and who was born at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, June 27, 1831, died at North Port, October 30, 1857. 
 Her father, George Curling, who died in Tuskaloosa, in April, 
 1860, was for more than fifty years a Methodist. All these were 
 buried in Tuskaloosa. 
 
 The Kev. Robert A. Spence died at the home of his mother in 
 Kemper County, Mississippi, April 27, 1856, lacking only four- 
 teen days of being thirty-two years old. 
 
 The Eev. James S. Belton was a man of deep experience in 
 religious things. He had a thirst for the acquisition of knowl- 
 edge and grace. He claimed a special call to the mission field, 
 and left his native land for heathen shores that he might be a 
 light to those in darkness and death. He was a native of South 
 Carolina, but in childhood and youth was a resident of Lowndes 
 County, Mississippi. Before he was nineteen he had graduated 
 with distinction at La Grange College, Alabama, having been 
 previously licensed to preach. When only a few months past 
 his majority, having been ordainod deacon and elder under the 
 rules for ordaining those to be appointed to Mission fields, in 
 May, 1854, he sailed for the distant shores of China. His ca- 
 reer was brief. Failing health compelled him to leave the land 
 which he longed to reclaim from the follies of superstition and 
 idolatry. He set his face toward America, and bent his eager 
 steps toward his Southern home. He recrossed the ocean, but 
 death met him and arrested his goings. He died in the city of 
 
 New York, United States of America, March 17, 1856. His last 
 words uttered were: "praise the Lord." Bishop Janes and his 
 wife and other friends in New York attended him during his 
 last illness and administered to his comfort. Brother Belton 
 was lovely in his death, and those noble persons, here named, 
 who gave him such kind words and sweet solace in his affliction 
 were lovely in their deeds. Belton was cut down in young man- 
 hood, but his work, short as it was, still lives, and his memory 
 
 is still precious. . 
 
 One of the special incidents at the Conference at Tuskegee 
 was the presentation of a memorial from the Quarterly Confer- 
 ence for Montgomery Station, praying the establishment of a 
 Eeligious Journal in the city of Montgomery, under the patron- 
 age of the Alabama Conference. A protracted debate on the 
 subject ensued, and the memorial was finally withdrawn. The 
 champion of that enterprise exhibited before Methodism on 
 that occasion for the last time. He has never appeared to 
 
 Methodists since. 
 
 The session of the Alabama Conference at Selma, Alabama, 
 beginning December 2, 1857, and continuing nine full days, 
 was honored with the presence of three Bishops: Joshua Soule, 
 James O. Andrew, and John Early. Bishop Early was absent 
 the first day, and Bishop Soule conducted the affairs of the 
 Conference until his arrival ; and they both preached on Sun- 
 day, at the same hour, in different Churches, and Bishop Soule 
 ordained the deacons and Bishop Early ordained the elders. 
 By the distribution of the work in the plan of episcopal visita- 
 tion. Bishop Early was in charge of the Conference, though all 
 three of them present presided as occasion justified or required. 
 Some of the members of the Conference were displeased, took 
 offense at Bishop Early, and at the next General Conference 
 made complaint against the Bishop's administration. The 
 truth of history requires the statement that the members of the 
 Conference had the advantage of the Bishop in that under the 
 provisions of law they had the opportunity to lodge complaints 
 against him, and he had no opportunity to lodge complaints 
 against them. The truth is he was not guilty of any maladmin- 
 istration. His offense was in the rigid adherence to law. The 
 tones of his voice were naturally short and rough. He was in- 
 flexible. Some of the members of that Conference were as im- 
 
 lii 
 
704 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 The Work under the Xew Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, 705 
 
 pulsive as the Bishop was rigid, and were as irritable as he was 
 persistent, and they treated him with insolence. An instance 
 may be stated: Bishop Early, at a certain stage of the proceed- 
 ings of the Conference, demanded that the Conference take ac- 
 tion and appoint the month within the Conference year in 
 which the missionary collections should be taken up through- 
 out the bounds of the Conference, and that the action and the 
 month designated should be according to the law on the subject 
 in the Discipline. Objection was interposed to the action sug- 
 gested. The Bishop urged that the action be had at once, and 
 that its provision conform to the law, and, to a member, who 
 was on the floor opposing the proposed action, he responded, 
 and said: " This is the law, Brother.'* The member of the Con- 
 ference, with flushed face, with irritated tone, and in defiant at- 
 titude, said: " Sir, we know no law, and have no law down here." 
 Of course, though he were hard to suppress, the Bishop had no 
 response to that utterance. 
 
 At that session of the Conference one preacher was tried for 
 immorality in the management of his secular affairs, and was 
 acquitted, it appearing that he was only unskillful and not in- 
 tentionally criminal; and a most remarkable debate arose in the 
 case of one preacher who was eligible to membership in the 
 Conference and to deacon's orders, barring the matter over 
 which the discussion arose. Of purpose he failed to appear at 
 the appointed time and consummate a betrothal which existed 
 between him and a lady in Virginia. That was a most serious 
 complication. The feast was furnished, the intended bride was 
 attired, the guests assembled, but the intended bridegroom nev- 
 er came, neither at midnight nor later. The marriage ceremo- 
 ny found in the Eitual of the Church was called into use in the 
 effort to acquit the brother of a charge of breach of marriage. 
 Whether or not the ceremony helped, the brother was acquitted, 
 and passed to membership and orders. He had been simply 
 unsteady. 
 
 So far as the records to hand show, the fir^ bequests to the 
 Alabama Conference were reported at that session. The follow- 
 ing Preamble and Kesolutions were adopted by the Conference: 
 
 "In view of the liberal bequests made to this Conference by 
 the late William McAlister and William Thompson and his 
 wife, Altona Thompson, in their last will and testament, that 
 
 their memories may be perpetuated, as an example of benevo- 
 lence held forth to the living, therefore, 
 
 Kesolved, 1. That we request T. O. Summers to prepare and 
 publish a biographical sketch of each of our deceased friends, 
 in our Church papers, to be embodied in the printed minutes 
 of the Conference for the ensuing year. 
 
 2. That the presiding elder of the Demopolis District furnish 
 Brother Summers with the necessary information of these, our 
 deceased friends, as soon as practicable." 
 
 The Rev. James M. Hood, who died in Pickens County, Ala- 
 bama, in 1864, left a legacy of one thousand dollars to the An- 
 nual Conference, and a Mr. Mahan, and a Mr. Jackson, and a 
 Mr. Harris, of East Alabama, all left legacies to the Conference. 
 These legacies all amounted to about seven thousand dollars, 
 and were paid over to the legal Conference in 1864 in Confed- 
 erate securities, and, as a matter of course, when the Confeder- 
 ate States Government collapsed the securities were gone. The 
 McAlister Fund was never secured until after the Confederate 
 States Government had passed out of existence, as it was se- 
 cured at the end of a contest in the Courts. 
 
 The Conference in session at Selma elected Delegates to the 
 General Conference which was to meet in May, 1858. They 
 were twelve in number, and as follows: T. O. Summers, J. Ham- 
 ilton, O. R. Blue, A. H. Mitchell, F. G. Ferguson, E. Wadsworth, 
 G. Shaeffer, T. J. Koger, J. J. Hutchinson, T. W. Dorman, C. D. 
 Oliver, P. P. Neely. 
 
 Sister Monaghon, the widow of the Rev. Daniel Monaghon, 
 had died during that year, 1857, and the Conference ordered 
 the money due her turned over into the hands of the preacher 
 in charge of Orrville Circuit, to defray her funeral expenses, 
 and to erect over her grave a suitable monument. 
 
 The Rev. L. B. McDonald had died August 23, 1857. He 
 died near Columbiana, Alabama. He had been a faithful minis- 
 ter of the New Testament, and had been eminently useful in the 
 administration of the affairs of the Church. He was a native of 
 Giles County, Tennessee, and was in the forty-third year of his 
 age at the time of his death. He joined the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church in August, 1833, and about the same time entered 
 the La Grange College, where he remained as a student until 
 December, 1837. He was a presiding elder for six years. 
 
 it 
 
706 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 At that Conference Union Springs, with the Hev. William H. 
 Ellison as preacher in charge, was added to the list of appoint- 
 ments, and Dr. Ellison was in charge there for the two years, 
 1858 and 1859. In the first of these two years he organized a 
 Society there, composed of ten women and one man. The Society 
 for a time met in private houses. The first class-meetiug was 
 held in the parlor of R. Powell, and the prayer meetings were 
 held in the residence of Sister Paulk. The great burden then 
 on that new and small Society was the burden of building a 
 house of worship. It is said that Dr. Powell made the first sub- 
 scription, in the sum of five hundred dollars, to the enterprise. 
 In the process of time the Church was erected, the same one in 
 use now, 1892, and was dedicated, by Bishop George F. Pierce, 
 in 1859. The Powells, Brauscombs, and Judge PuUum were 
 amoDg the first members at that place. 
 
 The next session of the Alabama Conference was held at Ma- 
 con, Mississippi, beginning November 24, and closing December 
 3, 1858, Bishop Robert Paine presiding. During the year then 
 reported there was an increase of thirteen hundred and thirty- 
 eight white members, twenty-seven hundred and sixty-seven 
 white probationers, and seven hundred and eighty colored mem- 
 bers, and ten hundred and fourteen colored probationers. 
 
 The next session of the Alabama Conference was held at Eu- 
 faula, Alabama, beginning November 30, and closing December 
 8, 1859, Bishop H. H. Kavanaugh, presiding. At that Confer- 
 ence Robert K. Hargrove was received into full connection and 
 ordained a deacon, with thirteen others. He was afterward 
 elected and consecrated to the Episcopacy. Three preachers 
 had died during the year. The Rev. Francis M. Crain, a native 
 of Autauga County, Alabama, and who had been preaching six 
 or seven years, died near Greenesborough, Alabama, a little past 
 thirty years of age. The Rev. Joseph T. Abeniathy, a native 
 of Alabama, and who was licensed to preach in Macon County 
 in his native State, and who had not yet reached elder's orders, 
 died in the bounds of Socapatoy Circuit. The Rev. Dennis B. 
 Leyne, a native of Ireland, and who was brought up in the faith 
 of the Romish Church, and who was justified in Clarke County, 
 Alabama, and who had been in the itinerant ministry from Jan- 
 uary, 1846, died at the Navy- Yard, near Pensacola, Florida. 
 The Rev. W. E. M. Linfield, and the Rev. Samuel Armstrong 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 707 
 
 were transferred to the Louisiana Conference. Linfield died in 
 Mississippi, and Armstrong in Texas. 
 
 At Montgomery, Alabama, December 12-21, 1860, the Ala- 
 bama Conference held its session, Bishop J. O. Andrew presid- 
 ing, and Bishop Joshua Soule also present. The country was 
 gre'atly agitated at that very time. While the Conference was 
 in session three of the preachers, the Rev. P. P. Neely, the Rev. 
 J. B. Cottrell, and the Rev. William P. Harrison attended po- 
 litical meetings, and delivered speeches in favor of Secession. 
 Cottrell made, so it was said, the most fiery and rousing speech 
 of the occasion. AVhile the Conference was in session the State 
 of South Carolina adopted her order of Secession, and Mont- 
 gomery was wild with excitement. A little fire alarm in the 
 city put everything on nervous tension. There was fearful look- 
 ing for of insurrection and fiery indignation. Bishop Joshua 
 So^ule advised the preachers of the Conference to be dispassion- 
 ate and conservative, and to eschew the subject of the times, Se- 
 
 CGSSIOH. 
 
 Three members of the Conference and one preacher on trial 
 in the Conference had died during the year: The Rev. John 
 Foust, the Rev. R. R. Dickinson, the Rev. J. W. Hightower, and 
 the Rev. Peter J. Walker. 
 
 The next session of the Conference was held at Greenes- 
 borough, Alabama, December 11-19, 1861, Bishop John Early 
 
 presiding. , _, ^ 
 
 At Auburn, Alabama, December 3-9, 1862, Bishop George F. 
 Pierce presiding, the next session was held. Three preachers 
 had died during the year: The Revs. Thomas J. Roger, Le^vnis 
 P. Golson, and James F. R. Brandon. No memoirs were pub- 
 lished, -ii/r- • 
 
 The Alabama Conference held a session at Columbus, Missis- 
 sippi beginning November 25, and closing December 2, 1863, 
 Bishop j'lmes O. Andrew presiding. At that session the Con- 
 ference resolved to divide into two Conferences, one to be called 
 Montgomery and the other Mobile. Bishop Andrew presided 
 at the first session of the Alabama Conference, and also at the 
 last session The Alabama Conference in its existence included 
 a period of just thirty-one years. The lines fixed for the two 
 Conferences were as follows: The Montgomery Conference to 
 include West Florida, except Apalachicola, and all of Alabama 
 
708 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 east of the line beginning at the mouth of Mobile River, thence 
 up that and the Alabama River to the town of Selma; thence 
 up the Alabama and Tennessee Rivers Railroad to Montevallo; 
 thence along the Ely ton road to the Cahawba; thence up said 
 river to the eastern line of Blount County, and along the said 
 line to the Southern boundary of the Tennessee Conference. 
 The Mobile Conference included all the other part of the Terri- 
 tory which had been included in the Alabama Conference. 
 
 The tirst session of the Mobile Conference was held at Tuska- 
 loosa, Alabama, November 23-28, 1864; and the first session of 
 the Montgomery Conference was held at Tuskegee, Alabama, 
 December 7-13, 1864 Bishop James O. Andrew presided at 
 the sessions of both Conferences. The General Conference in 
 session in New Orleans, April 7, 1866, adopted a Resolution de- 
 claring " that, though the division of the Alabama Conference 
 was irregular, we approve of its division into what are known 
 as the Mobile and Montgomery Conferences, the circumstances 
 justifying the separation." 
 
 The last session of the Montgomery Conference was held at 
 Union Springs, Alabama, December 8-14, 1869; and the last 
 session of the Mobile Conference was held at Selma, Alabama, 
 December 15-21, 1869. Bishop Robert Paine presided at both 
 
 sessions. 
 
 By action of the General Conference the territory in Alabama 
 was provided for by the organization of the North Alabama and 
 the Alabama Conferences in 1870. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXyr 
 
 The Work op Methodism in Alabama among the Colored 
 People under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 
 
 THE pleasing opportunity of augmenting the sacramental 
 host, and the animating scene of Ethiopia stretching out 
 her hands to God, inspired the Methodists of Alabama, and, 
 prompted by the generous impulses imparted to them by the 
 Holy Ghost, they went forth evangelizing the Negroes and ele- 
 vating the slaves in their midst. They did much to relieve the 
 wants and woes of the colored people, and to bring them to the 
 observance of the will and word of God. The Methodist 
 preachers followed apostolic precedent, and preached the gospel 
 to the poor, and deliverance to the captives, and recovering of 
 sight to the blind; and many of the converts among the en- 
 slaved race beautifully exemplified the indwelling power im- 
 parted to them. About the time the new ecclesiastical jurisdic- 
 tion was established in the South and was fully under way in 
 the affairs appertaining thereto there were in the State of Ala- 
 bama about eighteen Missions to the people of color. From 
 that time the work was carried on with great vigor, with en- 
 larging liberality, and with ever-increasing good results. The 
 Methodists did more for the colored people in Alabama than 
 any other denomination in the State. 
 
 A long line of worthy men served Missions to the people of 
 color in Alabama. Among them may be named the Revs. T. S. 
 Abernathy, W. B. Adams, Thomas Burpo, James W. Brown, B. 
 F. Blow, Dugal Carmichael, Elisha Calloway, Lewis P. Golson, 
 J. 0. Huckabee, J. W. Jordan, C. N. McLeod, J. W. McCann, 
 Alexander McBride, P. R. McCrary, James M. Patton, W. M. 
 Shockley, Charles Strider, O. B. Stanley, Henry Urquhart, 
 John Williamson, James M. Wells, and F. H. Wardlaw. Others 
 who served a year or two, and a number of worthy local preach- 
 ers, are not named in this list. 
 
 The Mobile State Street Colored Mission had a good brick 
 
 (709) 
 
710 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Church, with a spacious gallery, and at the close of 1856 had 
 five hundred and forty-four members and eighty-nine proba- 
 tioners. The Mobile Little Zion Colored Mission had at that 
 time two hundred and twenty-seven members and ninety-one 
 probationers; and two hundred and seventy-five dollars were 
 paid that year for repairing the house of worship. The Eev. 
 Greenberry Garrett served those two Missions that year. 
 
 As a specimen of the w^ork in its environments and achieve- 
 ments the following statement, which is exact, may be made. 
 Dayton Colored Mission was served in 1856 by the Rev. A. Mc- 
 Bride and the Rev. F. Jeter, who reported fifteen preaching 
 places, five Churches, three hundred and seventy-four members, 
 three hundred and thirty-eight catechumens, fifteen hundred 
 and eighty-three preached to, forty-two adults and forty-three 
 children baptized, fourteen members expelled, six hundred fif- 
 teen dollars and eighty cents received from the Mission on the 
 salaries of the missionaries. There was still some opposition 
 to the Mission, but on the whole it was promising, and the hope 
 was entertained that the planters would give it more efficient 
 support. 
 
 That year, 1856, the work among the colored people was 
 at the highest point of prosperity attained for it, and there 
 were then in the bounds of the Alabama Conference thirty-sev- 
 en Missions to that people. 
 
 About 1855 or 1856 an incident occurred which may serve to 
 show the measure of simplicity, and the standard intelligence 
 on the part of the people and their teachers of that time. The 
 Rev. Charles L. Hays, then a member of the Georgia Confer- 
 ence on the superannuated list, living in Russell County, Ala- 
 bama, was employed ag a preacher on the Uchee Mission, which 
 Mission lay in the bounds of Russell and Macon Counties. An- 
 drew Chapel, in Macon County, where Dr. Calhoun, Benjamin 
 Borum, Mrs. Green, the Threadgills, and others, held member- 
 ship, being in the midst of a Negro population, was one of the 
 preaching places of the Mission. There the venerable preacher 
 dispensed the gospel. In instructing the catechumens he used 
 the Catechism prepared by Bishop William Capers for the use 
 of the Methodist Missions. Just at the Chapel lived the Rev. 
 Richard Webb, a preacher of the Primitive Baptist persuasion, 
 a man who, by creation and creed, by birth and bent, by preach- 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 711 
 
 ing and practice, was opposed to the Methodists and Missions. 
 He seems to have conceived the idea of breaking down both the 
 one and the other. He made the charge and gave out the re- 
 port that the Rev. Charles L. Hays was instructing the Negroes 
 in the doctrines of the Abolitionists, and that the Catechism 
 which he used was replete with the doctrines. The entire Na- 
 tion was, at that time, under intense excitement about the 
 emancipation of the slaves, and conjectures about a general up- 
 rising of the slaves and the escape of fugitives were indulged in 
 the homes and social circles of the land. The charges so em- 
 phatically made and so industriously circulated by the Rev. Mr. 
 Webb created intense excitement in the community immediate- 
 ly concerned. The citizens about Andrew Chapel were in hu- 
 mor to treat the Rev. Mr. Hays as a cullion, and were ready, if 
 the accusations could be established, to inflict upon him indig- 
 nities and banishment, if not something worse. For a man to 
 use his ministry to induce the very people committed to his care 
 to demand emancipation was in their eyes a crime not to be en- 
 dured. Under the tension of the hour a day was appointed for 
 assembling the community and investigating the accusations 
 against Mr. Hays. At the appointed time a large concourse 
 thronged the grounds at Andrew Chapel. Webb was there ta 
 implead. Hays was there to ascertain his doom. Webb pre- 
 sented his bills of indictment, and proceeded to the establish- 
 ment of the same. In a speech of great length, and with ravings, 
 and rantings, he reviewed the Catechism. His whole speecb 
 was very satisfactory to himself, but only his peroration was. 
 pleasing to his auditors. The termination was appreciated.. 
 Precedents, statutes, and tactics were all ignored in his ha-^ 
 rangue, and as he was approaching the collapse of his effort, 
 Mrs. Green spoke in a decided tone and declared she was not 
 convinced that the Catechism contained unsound or unsafe doc- 
 trine, and her slaves should still be instructed therein. About 
 the time Webb caught his breath for the termination of his in- 
 coherent oration, Benjamin Borum, an exhorter in the Church„ 
 and who owned a goodly number of slaves, accosted him with 
 declaration and interrogation: " Wabb, you han't got the sense 
 you ought to ha' been born with! Don't you know Congress 
 has examined that book, and approved it? And don't you know 
 
 they'd not a done it had it had abolition teachings in it?** To 
 46 
 
712 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 these questions Webb responded: "No, I don't know any such 
 a thing." Borum, being bold as a lion, continued: "Well, sir» 
 they have. You turn to the leaf on which the title o' that book 
 is printed, and you'll see that Congress has endorsed its con- 
 tents." Webb turned to the leaf referred to and read: "En- 
 tered according to Act of Congress, in the year, , by Wil- 
 liam Capers, in the District Court of the United States for the 
 
 District of South Carolina." When Webb had finished 
 
 that reading he was dumb! He had not wherewith to answer. 
 He was demolished! He retired from the contest with the over- 
 powering conviction on his mind that he had, without knowing 
 it, set himself dogmatically against a book the contents of 
 which the Congress of the United States had carefully exam- 
 ined and sent forth with official endorsement. Borum's igno- 
 rance gave him confidence, Webb's ignorance brought him defeat. 
 Ignorance ended that battle and settled that contest. Ignorance 
 did what neither logic nor sword could have done, for in that 
 case both logic and sword would have been impotent. The 
 skillful dialectician was not needed in that case. It only re- 
 quired the boldness born of ignorance to meet the ignorance 
 which gave birth to the original attack. Brother Hays was as 
 ignorant as the other two, for when asked what he understood 
 by the words: "Entered according to Act of Congress," etc., he 
 said: "I thought it meant that Congress didn't have anything 
 agin the book." In that instance gross darkness covered the 
 teachers. Here were two preachers and an exhorter, leaders of 
 the people, who had no knowledge concerning the law of copy- 
 right. 
 
 The mention of ignorance recalls a scene in the history of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, South, at the town of Camden, 
 Wilcox County, Alabama. The house of worship in which the 
 scene occurred was built in 1844, at least the deed to it bears 
 date August 21, 1844 In 1861 the Eev. James W. Glenn was 
 stationed at Camden, and he had one of his local preachers ar- 
 rested on the charge of trading intoxicants. The accused de- 
 manded a trial before the whole Society, and with open doors, 
 and the preacher acceded. The hour fixed for the trial was Sun- 
 day morning, and notice was made. The whisky dealer rallied 
 his patrons. The day arrived, a beautiful Sunday it was, and 
 the house was crowded, the sensation was complete. The in- 
 
 The Work under the New Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. 713 
 
 vestigation proceeded. The accused, in pompous and hectoring 
 style, made his defense. He commenced his oration in these 
 words following: "Fellow citizens, Through the ignorance of 
 the preacher I have been arraigned before you this day." When 
 the vote was taken on the question of the guilt of the accused 
 the thundering voices pronounced him innocent, notwithstand- 
 ing his traffic in the alcoholic beverages was as public as his 
 
 trial. 
 
 At the time of manumission there were in the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South, in the bounds of the State of Ala- 
 bama, twenty-five thousand, or more, colored members and pro- 
 bationers. The Methodists of Alabama had a responsibility im- 
 posed upon them in the slave population of the State. The 
 thousands of that people who worshiped at Methodist altars and 
 received the divine word and sacraments at the hands of Meth- 
 odist ministers are witnesses that they met their obligation, and 
 conserved the interests committed to their hands. 
 
CHAPTEE XXXVI. 
 
 Polemics. 
 
 DUKING the entire period covered by this History, begin* 
 ning with the introduction of Christianity into the State 
 and extending to 1865, ecclesiastical controversies prevailed in 
 Alabama. The Methodists were in at the beginning and at the 
 finale. It seems that, in one particular, at least, the Methodists 
 have been like Ishmael; their hand against every man, and every 
 man's hand against them. In the whole of their doctrines, poli- 
 ty, and customs there are none like them; and while the other 
 denominations can never agree among themselves about many 
 things, they agree in antagonizing Methodism. Through the 
 years over which this History extends the Episcopalians and 
 the Presbyterians, naming them in alphabetical order, were too 
 few in number and confined to too few localities to be much in 
 the way of the Methodists. Only in certain localities did they 
 operate. As late as 1865 the Episcopalians and the Presby- 
 terians together did not have in Alabama fifteen thousand mem- 
 bers. Wherever the Episcopalians existed they poured con- 
 tempt on the Methodists as being only a Society, late in arrival, 
 without orders, sacraments, and divine recognition. The only 
 honor which they conferred on the Methodists was to proselyte, 
 wherever they could, their preachers and members. Wherever 
 the Old School Presbyterians existed they were stout and per- 
 sistent in their efforts to demolish the Arminian doctrines of 
 the Methodists. The Cumberland Presbyterians, whose shib- 
 boleth was union, had a way of trying to proselyte the Metho- 
 dists and the Old School Presbyterians to their negative creed by 
 the intimation that they could unite on the doctrines thereof 
 which were neither Arminian nor Calvinistic. All these, the 
 Episcopalians and the Presbyterians, engaged diligently in an- 
 tagonizing the polity and customs of Methodism. They all 
 were of one heart and mind in ridiculing class-meetings, and 
 Lovefeasts, and in pouring contempt on an itinerating ministry. 
 (714) 
 
 Polemics, 
 
 715 
 
 For a number of years the Baptists of Alabama were engaged 
 in a controversy among themselves. In the fourth decade of 
 this century a controversy which commenced with them in the 
 first half of the preceding decade on the subject of Baptist State 
 Conventions, Theological Schools, Sunday-schools, Missionary 
 Societies, Bible Societies, and Tract Societies culminated in a 
 division of the denomination in Alabama. That division of the 
 denomination produced a deplorable state of things among them. 
 Members were, in many instances, excommunicated for their 
 opinions on the matters in controversy. That wing of the de- 
 nomination which fought their brethren on the subject of Mis- 
 sionary Societies, and kindred agencies, and called themselves 
 Primitive Baptists, and were in some sections of the State the 
 strongest party, were in line against the Methodists, and right 
 well did they prosecute the conflict. While contesting the valid- 
 ity of Societies they made unceasing war upon the Arminian 
 creed so tenaciously held by the Methodists. The Primitive 
 Baptists were, in creed, as sound Antinomians as were ever found 
 in Alabama. They wore themselves out trying to demonstrate 
 that human beings could not do anything which would either 
 hinder or help the divine cause. Not until the sixth decade of 
 this century did the Baptists begin to recover from the effects 
 of their own strifes and divisions. About that time the wing of 
 the denomination which adopted Conventions, Sunday-schools, 
 Missions, and Education began to gain strength, and increase. 
 In some places they had already grown very strong; and by that 
 time the Primitive Baptists had already declined. The Mis- 
 sionary Baptists waxed valiant in fight against the Methodists, 
 and the battle went on. The Methodists themselves belonged 
 to the militant host. They had on the armor, that they might 
 be able to stand in the evil day. 
 
 The Methodists preached that the Holy Scriptures set forth 
 all doctrines necessary to be believed and contained all pre- 
 cepts necessary to be obeyed. They instruct in the science of 
 salvation perfectly. The Methodist preacher never failed to set 
 out that Jesus Christ suffered death on the cross for the redemp- 
 tion of mankind; and made there a full, perfect, and sufficient 
 sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world. 
 He never failed to emphasize the universality of the provisions of 
 the atonement. It was constantly held everywhere that because 
 
II 
 
 716 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Polemics. 
 
 717' 
 
 of the corruption of the nature of every man, that naturally ia 
 engendered of the offspring of Adam, every one needed the re- 
 generation of the Holy Spirit. Conviction followed by repent- 
 ance and terminating in faith which secures justification was 
 never lost sight of in the ministry of a Methodist preacher, in 
 the time with which this History deals. The power of all, 
 through prevenient grace by Jesus Christ, to seek God and 
 obtain divine recognition was always set out with great force, if 
 not with technical precision, yet in popular form. That Chris- 
 tians are to maintain good works, and that good works are pleas- 
 ing and acceptable to God in Christ was incorporated into Meth- 
 odist Sermons, and everywhere the injunction " work out your 
 own salvation with fear and trembling " was enforced with great 
 zeal. A conscious experience, in which the Spirit himself testi- 
 fies that the individual is a child of God, was held as an attain- 
 able state. The Methodists have ever held that a Christian may 
 be made perfect in love in this life; and that one may depart 
 from grace given, and fall into sin, and be lost forever; that the 
 punishment of the wicked in a future state, and the reward of 
 the righteous are alike eternal. The diversions which could not 
 be used in the name of the Lord Jesus were denounced as per- 
 nicious. Baptism was administered to adults and infants alike, 
 and by any mode preferred. The Episcopal form of govern- 
 ment was recognized with presiding elders and an itinerant min- 
 istry. A " desire to flee from the wrath to come, and to be saved 
 from their sins " was the only condition required of those who 
 sought admission into the fellowship of Methodists. Class- 
 meetings and Lovefeasts were held, and shouting was a common 
 thing. 
 
 During the period covered by this History a few Campbell- 
 ites and Universalists were in the State. They had little to do 
 but dispute, and they seemed delighted with that occupation. 
 
 Excursions into the State of Alabama were constantly made 
 by the agents of the Mormons for the purpose of gathering re- 
 cruits for the Mormon settlements in the West. Some deluded 
 women, enamoured of the prospect, and some men, of voluptu- 
 ous tendencies, were from time to time converted to the doctrines 
 of polygamy, and induced to emigrate to the land inhabited by 
 the people calling themselves Latter-day Saints. 
 
 The Methodists, engaged to spread scriptural holiness over 
 
 the lovely land of Alabama, and under vow to be " ready with 
 faithful diligence to banish and drive away all erroneous and 
 strange doctrines contrary to God's word," were active champi-^ 
 ons in the polemics of the day. They entered the lists and ex- 
 posed every atrocity and every heresy. Throughout the Stated 
 there were those specially engaged in vindicating Methodist 
 doctrine, polity, and usage. The heterogeneous forces who 
 seemed inspired with the sole purpose to arrest and destroy 
 Methodism were met, and, as far as possible, repelled. In the' 
 regular ministrations of the pulpit, sermons were preached on 
 the various doctrines in controversy. Special occasions, when 
 the multitudes were convened, at such times and places as Quar- 
 terly Meetings and Camp-meetings were utilized in defending 
 the doctrines of Methodists and in refuting the views of assail- 
 ants. Some of the themes on such occasions were: Election 
 and Keprobation; Possibility of Apostasy; Apostolic Succes- 
 sion; Validity of Orders; Terms of Church Membership; Bap- 
 tism; Eestricted Communion, and the Witness of the Spirit. 
 Debates, in which the antagonists would meet and discuss 
 points of difference, were common. The Eevs. E. V. Le Vert, 
 James A. Clement, Walter H. McDaniel, E. J. Hammill, Daniel 
 M. Hudson, and W. P. Harrison were noted controversialists. 
 
 The Rev. E. V. Le Vert rendered long and efficient service in 
 contending for the faith as the Methodists had received it. 
 
 The Rev. James A. Clement, a native of Greenesborough, Al- 
 abama, was, while in the active ministry, a polemic of splendid 
 gifts and superior skill, a master in controversy. He could 
 state the questions of faith with precision, delineate the doc- 
 trines of the gospel with logical clearness, and authenticate 
 them. He could excoriate his antagonist with such dexterity 
 as made the performance almost enjoyable. A book, written 
 and published by him, bearing the title: "Baptist Pretensions 
 to Antiquity," is a work unique and engaging. 
 
 The Rev. Walter Houston McDaniel was endowed with the 
 constitutional elements of a controversialist. He was of Scotch 
 descent, a native of White County, Tennessee. He was about 
 medium height, of stout, square build, and of rough exterior. 
 His hair was red and bristly. His forehead and chin were 
 broad, and his face was covered with discolored spots called 
 freckles. He was educated at the Southern Presbyterian Semi- 
 
718 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 nary at Maryville, Tennessee. Four years and five months he 
 spent at the Seminary, paying his way there with money which 
 he made by splitting rails. He read Greek and Latin readily. 
 He had nothing of the polish and refinement supposed to be ob- 
 tained by acquaintance with literature. He chewed tobacco, 
 and kept his lips discolored and his shirt bosom besmeared with 
 the liquid secreted by the parotid, submaxillary, and sublingual 
 glands. He had a misunderstanding with one of the Professors 
 of the Seminary at which he was educated, and left the School 
 in the middle of the session. He repudiated the Calvinistic 
 doctrine taught in that School. He joined the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church at a place in the upper end of Jackson County, 
 Alabama. In his twenty-seventh year he was licensed to 
 preach at Liberty Church, in Saint Clair County, Alabama, Ash- 
 yille Circuit, Alabama Conference, May 3, 1834. His license 
 was signed by Jesse Ellis, the preacher then in charge of the 
 Ashville Circuit. In December of the year in which he was li- 
 censed to preach he was admitted on trial into the Alabama 
 Conference. In due course he was ordained, and he continued 
 in the itinerant work so long as he lived, though he was super- 
 annuated for some years. He died near Kandolph, Bibb Coun- 
 ty, Alabama. 
 
 He dressed in a niggardly style and was narrow in his concep- 
 tions of the enterprises of the Church. He owned at the begin- 
 ning of the war between the States a fine plantation on the Ca- 
 hawba River, and twenty-five slaves. He would take from the 
 box of shoes purchased for his slaves on the plantation a pair 
 ©f brogans for his own use. As a preacher he went among the 
 people clad in brogan shoes, a dime hat, and other apparel to 
 match. When presiding elder he was known to make speeches 
 in which he would denounce men for preaching for money, and 
 then receive a donation made to him for his speech from some 
 penurious member of the Church who would not do anything to 
 support the institutions of Christianity. He would denounce 
 preachers for being in search of money, and then carry a mangy 
 pig in a sack and drive a lousy calf, which one would give him 
 upon suggestions made in hints, for miles across a whole Cir- 
 cuit and beyond. He did much to retard the development of 
 liberality in the Church, and he did much harm to the cause of 
 Missions. 
 
 . 
 
 Polemics. 
 
 ll^j 
 
 After all he was a magnificent preacher, and a champion in 
 controversy. He served the Talladega District as presiding eld- 
 er for four years, beginning with 1851. There he found Two 
 Seed Baptists, Primitive Baptists, commonly called Hardshells, 
 Missionary Baptists, the two last named very numerous. He 
 opened the battle against all these, and exposed their peculiar 
 dogmas with the merciless logic of truth. In the course of his 
 controversies he had a great many personal experiences. One 
 or two may be related. He was preaching a sermon at Bethel, 
 in Howell's Cove, four miles from the town of Talladega, on 
 Baptism. In the congregation was a woman, dressed in an or- 
 dinary attire and a sun-bonnet, of the Baptist persuasion, who, 
 at one of the first stages of the sermon, responded to a state- 
 ment made by the preacher: "That's a lie." A little further 
 on she again said: " That's a lie." All through the part of the 
 sermon pertaining to Baptism she repeated the language which 
 was so much more direct than polite. After the preacher had 
 finished his argument on the theme in hand, he delivered an ap- 
 peal to the emotions, in an eloquent exhortation, in which, or 
 under which, the congregation broke down in tears. The wom- 
 an who had delivered the emphatic language, calling in question 
 the preacher's veracity, was among those who were in a flood 
 of tears. The congregation retired from the Church, and stood 
 about the yard in groups, and indulged comments on the sermon. 
 The woman who had gained notoriety by her burning and in- 
 dignant utterances, said, and the preacher overheard it: *'I 
 would not have minded it, if, after telling his lies, the confound- 
 ed old fool had not made me cry." 
 
 It was in 1857, perhaps, that he went on a visit to Alexandria 
 Camp-ground in Calhoun County, Alabama, to attend a Camp- 
 meeting. The Baptist Church in the vicinity of Alexandria had 
 a numerous membership, and dominated everything in that sec- 
 tion of the country. There was also a place in that section 
 known as Post Oak, and in that community there was a Baptist 
 Church bearing the name of Poet Oak. About that time 
 ** Post-Oak Circuit,'* a very exquisite little Book respectfully in- 
 scribed to the people called Methodists: to the Jonathan that is 
 in them, was having a sensational notice. It was a book which 
 presented in a very unique manner the subject of Church financ 
 es. Mr. McDaniel, for that reason, did not like the book. On 
 
720 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 Sunday at 11 o'clock A.M., he preached on Baptism to a vast 
 throng, and crowds of them were Baptists. He preached one 
 of his sublimest and profoundest sermons on the subject. The 
 Baptists literally quailed under the master strokes of his logic 
 and his severe castigations of the pretensions, superstitions, and 
 follies held by that sect of people. 
 
 The Kev. Mr. McDaniel thought, in order to appease the 
 Baptists present, to throw in a few mollifying utterances in the 
 close of his powerful sermon, and in* this behalf, with that mag- 
 nanimity which scorns all sectarianism, he stated in a general 
 way that in all the denominations there were some things which 
 he disapproved, and in the correction of which all would be im- 
 proved. He then gave a specific instance in the case of the 
 Methodists. They were, he charged, in their work, pressing the 
 subject of money and Missions too much into notice for the gen- 
 eral good. Then he made special refererence to the book bear- 
 ing the title of "Post-Oak Circuit." Though that book was 
 written by a Methodist Preacher, published by a Methodist 
 Publishing House, and purchased and perused by hundreds of 
 Methodists he denounced it as of mischievous tendency. With 
 great emphasis, he said: "Down with Post-Oak! Down with 
 Post-Oak! " Only a few persons in that vast audience had ever 
 heard of the book bearing that title, while all but a few^ knew 
 of the adjoining community and the Baptist Church in it called 
 Post-oak. Of course, the only thought of that vast assembly, a 
 few persons excepted, was that the preacher referred, when he 
 said: "Down with Post-Oak," to the community and Baptist 
 Church of that name: and, consequently, instead of mollifying, 
 the denunciation only irritated the Baptists more, and intensi- 
 fied their wrath to the very verge of resentment. There was in 
 the audience a short, corpulent woman, a Mrs. Vice, the wife of 
 John Vice, who was a member of Post-oak Baptist Church. 
 About the time the preacher wound up and closed out what he 
 had to say, finishing all with his denunciation of Post-Oak, the 
 dumpy woman, Mrs. Vice, commenced swaying her body back 
 and forth, slapping her hands, and shouting. Swaying, slapping, 
 and shouting, she said: "Glory, glory to God, halleluiah! I live 
 in Post-Oak, I drink water outner spring which runs frum 
 undner post-oak tree, and I'm glad I do; glory, glory to God, 
 halleluiah! I want to know your name, you ol', ugly, freckled- 
 
 Polemics, 
 
 721 
 
 faced preacher you, your name an't in the book. I want to know 
 your name, you ol', ugly, freckled-faced preacher you, glory, 
 glory to God, hallelujah!" A fat Negress, hard by, made ex- 
 clamations in accord with those of Mrs. Vice. The Eev. Mr. 
 McDaniel perceived that things were in a bad plight, and that 
 he did not understand matters. He inquired of Dr. Vandiver, 
 who was sitting by, what the point in the affair was. Dr. Van- 
 diver knew the country, and knew Mrs. Vice, and he took in the 
 situation at once, and gave McDaniel the information which he 
 sought. McDaniel then undertook to explain. He stated that 
 he had no reference to the country or the Church called Post- 
 oak, but to a book bearing that name. His explanation was re- 
 ceived as an invention and a fabrication, and only intensified the 
 rage, and made matters worse. The scene was unparalleled as 
 a scene in religious service. It made things ridiculous, and ef- 
 fectually killed the impression of the sermon of the hour. The 
 Baptists retired jubilant and happy. McDaniel and the Meth- 
 odists retired crest-fallen and defeated. Mrs. Vice was a foe 
 whose prowess he could not meet, he could not withstand, es- 
 pecially in that community. 
 
 About 1854, a series of Letters, written by J. E. Graves, an 
 accredited preacher of the Baptist Church, issued through the 
 columns of the Tennessee Baptist, a Newspaper, at that time, 
 edited by the notorious Graves, and published in the city of 
 Nashville, Tennessee. These Letters were soon published in a 
 book entitled "The Great Iron Wheel;" and The Great Iron 
 Wheel received unlimited praise and unremitting indorsement 
 from the Baptists, and attained an extensive circulation. It be- 
 came notorious not by reason of its beauty and truth, but on 
 account of its repulsiveness. That book so highly prized and 
 so industriously circulated by the Baptist fraternity assaulted 
 the doctrines, polity, and usages of the . Methodists, and de- 
 nounced that people as destitute of piety, integrity, and virtue. 
 By it the Methodist Itinerancy was caricatured, the Methodist 
 Episcopacy denounced and reviled, and John Wesley, the 
 Founder of Methodism, defamed. By that notorious work Mr. 
 Wesley was represented as an arrogant mischief-maker, a tyrant, 
 indulging imperial dictation, and usurping authority over the 
 consciences of his parishioners, a rejected suitor avenging his 
 ire, and, at last, an indicted outlaw fleeing from justice under 
 
 
'722 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 cover of night. Defamation, exaggeration, misrepresentation, 
 and vituperation abounded. The Baptists of the country were 
 jubilant, and seemed to think that the Methodists would actu- 
 ally pass out of existence under the blighting, withering stroke 
 given them by that scurrilous production. About the time the 
 Great Iron Wheel was moving along with its greatest velocity 
 there were in circulation two other volumes, fit companions, 
 which had been sent out by the satellites of Graves, a sort of 
 fifth-rate Novels, which discussed the subject of Baptism in the 
 spirit of sectarian bigotry, the one entitled *' Grace Trueman," 
 and the other " Theodosia Earnest." These two volumes were 
 held in as great admiration by the Baptists as the Great Iron 
 Wheel, and these three books were with the Baptists text-books 
 from which they received their instruction and drew their argu- 
 ments with which they plied their trade of proselyting and gath- 
 ering recruits to their Church. Some of the Baptists in Ala- 
 bama, and, perhaps, in other States, in their enthusiastic appre- 
 ciation of these volumes and their authors, named their children 
 after them. To the boys they gave the name Graves, and to the 
 girls Grace Trueman and Theodosia Earnest. 
 
 The potency of the books herein named was in the uncharita- 
 ble assumption that Methodism was "the mother of harlots and 
 abominations of the earth," and deserved vials of wrath. As 
 ruinous consequences must follow treachery and the vaultings 
 of unholy ambition, those books were ominous of disaster. The 
 Great Iron Wheel, judging from its contents, must have been 
 conceived in bigotry, and worked out in the cause of mischief; 
 must have been the spontaneous product of an evil nature. In 
 that book fact and fancy are made to figure in such manner as 
 to despoil justice and suppress truth; and only distorted views 
 can be obtained from its pages. In that book gall and bitter- 
 ness abound, and nat a ray of charity or a scintillation of hu- 
 mility, not a note of tenderness or an echo of sympathy can be 
 seen or heard. All the moral affinities of the author appear to 
 have been evil, and strife was congenial to his mind and heart, 
 and through his evil affinities and propensities he constantly 
 created the strife so congenial to him. Even his impulses, judg- 
 ing from his writings, were malignant, and his very energies 
 were expended in the execution of unholy purposes. Nothing 
 about him was praiseworthy, except alertness, and diligence, and 
 
 Polemics, 
 
 723. 
 
 these seem to have originated in his venom. If he was ever 
 scrupulous, it does not appear in his book. He had no aptitude 
 to discover the proper limits of a statement. There was in his 
 nature an utter destitution of everything felicitous. He was 
 endowed with a propensity to circumvent and overthrow. He 
 was apt in reviling the saints and accusing the brethren. He 
 seems to have been a man of extreme yanity and of feeble judg- 
 ment, whose mind was never subjected to the authority of con- 
 science, or even to the common instincts of religion, though he 
 assumed the offices of the Christian ministry. 
 
 A Keply and Eefutation of the Great Iron Wheel was writ- 
 ten and published with the following title: "The Great Iron 
 Wheel Examined; or, its false Spokes extracted, and an exhibi- 
 tion of Elder Graves, its builder. In a series of chapters. By 
 William G. Brownlow, Editor of Broicnlow's Knoxville Whig." 
 The Dedication was as follows: "To every honest and impartial 
 reader, who loves Truth and despises Falsehood, whether per- 
 petrated by a Priest or a Levite, for the sake of Fame or money- 
 making: To every Protestant Christian, wlio, to whatever sect 
 or denomination he may be attached, is unwilling to see a sister 
 Church pulled down by a collection of tales, fabrications, and 
 blackguard insinuations, which a decent man should be ashamed 
 to listen to, and utterly too disgraceful for a Minister of the 
 Gospel to repeat and publish, this work is confidently Dedicated 
 by its Author: Who here, most respectfully, as a local preacher 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, apologizes to the 
 Christian public for the seeming severity of this work, in some 
 parts, on the ground that he has performed the painful task of 
 refuting a series of the most scurrilous falsehoods, and a collec- 
 tion of the lowest abuse of the age! " 
 
 The Title and Dedication pages give an insight into the char- 
 acter, purposes, and authorship of the book. The author, the 
 Bev. William G. Brownlow, residing at that time at Knoxville, 
 Tennessee, was well qualified for the work, and well adapted to 
 it, and he brought his talents into- requisition, and did a good 
 work in exposing the fabrications and fallacies of the Great Iron. 
 Wheel, and in administering to the relief of the saints who had 
 been so soundly abused and so vilely slandered. The character 
 of the great Iron Wheel necessarily involved the work of refu^ 
 tation in some phases not exactly tothe liking of a refinedt taste,. 
 
724 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 but, distasteful as it was, better service was never rendered to 
 truth than Mr. Brownlow rendered in refuting the foul asper- 
 sions and infamous calumnies heaped upon the Methodists by 
 the book which he reviewed. When, unanswered, the Great Iron 
 Wheel was making its revolutions over the southern and south- 
 western sections of the United States the Baptists were expect- 
 ing it to exterminate the Methodists, and it was avowed by them 
 to be of great price, but when, by Mr. Brownlow it had been 
 answered, and its bolts and tires loosened, its spokes shattered, 
 and its hub bursted asunder, its merits, in their estimation, de- 
 preciated, and like Edgar, in King Lear, they began to say: 
 "Let's exchange charity." They soon put a flag of truce on the 
 field. The Baptists then put the two books in the same cate- 
 gory, and insisted on relegating them. Then they would, if 
 they could, have passed them to oblivion. They suddenly per- 
 ceived that they did not appreciate that class and style of litera- 
 ture. They felt themselves that damage had accrued to their 
 cause through the Great Iron Wheel. 
 
 Upon any other hypothesis than that the business of the Great 
 Iron Wheel was to indulge malice and perpetrate slander its at- 
 tack upon the character and life of John Wesley is inexplica- 
 ble. Not a man even in the college of the twelve apostles was 
 of nobler mind and heart than Mr. Wesley, and than he not one 
 of them committed fewer mistakes. The very account which 
 Mr. Wesley himself gives of his troubles at Savannah, Georgia, 
 is replete with integrity, honesty, and truth. He abated not a 
 tittle. He gave a statement of the whole affair, even the views 
 expressed of the matter by his prosecutors. No one who has 
 any measure of intelligence, and any degree of insight, and the 
 least of the light of grace, can read Mr. Wesley's account of his 
 unfortunate affairs at Savannah, and come to any other conclu- 
 sion than that Mr. Wesley was honest and without guile; a man 
 sinned against, rather than sinning. 
 
 The Eev. Samuel Henderson, D.D., a minister of the Baptist 
 Church, and the Rev. E. J. Hammill, a member of the Alabama. 
 Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, engaged 
 in a controversy on the Government of the Methodist Episcpal 
 Church, South. The controversy was carried on through the 
 columns of a paper published at Tuskegee, Alabama, under the 
 auspices of the Baptists, and edited by Dr. Henderson. Dr. 
 
 Polemics, 
 
 725 
 
 Henderson, on his part, maintained much the same views on the 
 subject in debate as that entertained in the Great Iron Wheel. 
 He charged 4he Methodist ministry with usurpation, and tyran- 
 ny, and asserted that the Government of the Church was organ- 
 ized in that behalf. He made a virtue of appealing to what he 
 supposed the prejudice of the people of the United States, who 
 had adopted for themselves a Republican form of civil Govern- 
 ment. In 1856, the papers produced in the discussion, by these 
 two men, were published in a book. The discussion intensified 
 the agitation which already existed. 
 
 In 1858, the Rev. William P. Harrison, then a member of the 
 Alabama Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, 
 published " Theophilus Walton, a reply to Theodosia Earnest." 
 That was a work of some merit, and the cause of Methodism in 
 Alabama, as well as in other places, was strengthened by it. Dr. 
 Harrison had a number of oral discussions on the subjects of 
 controversy through the bounds of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 The Rev. Daniel M. Hudson, one of the best scholars in Ala- 
 bama, and who was possessed of one of the largest and most se- 
 lect private Libraries anywhere found, had many personal de- 
 bates with Baptist and Campbellite preachers. He discussed 
 various subjects before public audiences with the best cham- 
 pions the opposing denominations could marshal. 
 
 Many entered the lists in that day, and the public debates 
 were occasions of great interests in which much oratory was ex- 
 pended and much scholarship exhibited. Sometimes acrimony 
 was dominant, but often wit and humor prevailed. He who, in the 
 debate, could maintain his equiblibrium, and exquisitely goad 
 his antagonist, generally had the advantage. Judges were often 
 selected to act as umpires, whose business it was to keep order, 
 enforce the rules of debate, and award the judgment to the suc- 
 cessful disputant. The people were taught, and made parti- 
 sans. 
 
 The Methodists of Alabama were ever ready to respond to 
 any challenge to defend their doctrines, polity, and usages; and 
 they wrought well, and did not spend their strength for naught. 
 They met their antagonists, repelled their assaults, and con- 
 quered a peace. 
 
CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama under the Aus- 
 pices OF Methodism. 
 
 THE Florence Wesleyan University at Florence, Alabama, 
 flourished from the time it was opened at that place until 
 it was interrupted by the War between the States. It was 
 filled with a large number of students the very year the war be- 
 gan. 
 
 Centenary Institute, at Summerfield, Alabama, with its Male 
 and Female Departments, flourished all through the years from 
 its first opening until the date at which this History closes, 
 though, of course, it was under more or less distraction during 
 the four years of the civil War. For some time the Eev. E. D. 
 Pitts had charge of the Male Department, and then for some 
 years more the Kev. D. C. B. Connerly had charge thereof. Dr. 
 A. H. Mitchell was President of the Female Department until 
 the year 1857, when he resigned, and was succeeded by Joseph 
 Montgomery. The Institute improved for a while under his 
 presidency, but soon, for reasons in him, declined. Dr. R. H. 
 Rivers took charge of the Female Department, as President, in 
 1861. At the expiration of its thirteenth year the Centenary 
 Institute had had an average attendance of two hundred stu- 
 dents a year, and there had been an average of forty conversions 
 a year among its pupils. 
 
 The opening dawn of a brighter day, the gathering forces of 
 better work, the splendors of accumulating achievements, for 
 education in Alabama were everywhere perceptible. There 
 was an increasing interest in the education of preachers' chil- 
 dren, as well as the children of others, and an advance upon the 
 old state of things, and extra efforts were being put forth in 
 that behalf. A Convention called in pursuance of a Resolution 
 of the Alabama Conference on Education, and numerously at- 
 tended by preachers and laymen, met at Summerfield, Alabama, 
 July 15, 1848. Robert Daugherty, of Macon County, Alabama^ 
 (726) 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama. J27 
 
 was the President of the Convention, Price Williams, then of 
 Sumter County, Alabama, was the Secretary, with R. H. Powell, 
 of Macon County, Alabama, as Assistant Secretary. 
 
 The Convention did a good work, and reviewed the whole sub- 
 ject. A Committee was appointed to consider and report the 
 number and grade of Institutions of learning to be established, 
 and the extent of Endowment to be secured. The following was 
 
 adopted: 
 
 "Resolved, That this Convention recommend the Alabama 
 Annual Conference, to take under its patronage and direction 
 the Institution about to be established at Oak Bowery, provid- 
 ed that they shall be satisfied that the buildings and grounds 
 are put in good condition, that it be free from embarrassment, 
 and that it be provided with a suitable endowment." 
 
 The Convention also declared that " the support and main- 
 tianance of the Literary Institutions depend mainly upon the 
 efforts of our itinerant ministers." 
 
 The Alabama Conference at its session January 17-24, 1849, 
 took the Oak Bowery Female Institute under its patronage and 
 control, and the Institute opened the second Monday, in Febru- 
 ary, proximo, with the Rev. G. W. Chatfield, President, and 
 Miss Emily Baily, Assistant. John W. Joues, Robert Mitchell, 
 James F. Dowdell, Charles Bilbro, Henry W. Todd, John B. 
 Glenn, and T. J. Williamson were the Trustees, to which were 
 added'the names of a number of the preachers of the Confer- 
 ence. . 
 
 The Oak Bowery Institute closed the examination of its tirsfe 
 
 classes August 2, 1849, and the second session of the Institute- 
 commenced January 13, 1850, the Rev. Thomas B. Russell, late- 
 of South Carolina, President, the Rev. G. W. Chatfield and Miss 
 Emily Baily, assistants, and Miss Mary F. Williams in charge 
 of Music and French. During 1850 a vigorous appeal was 
 made to the Church for money to aid the Institute in its divine- 
 ly appointed work. James Maddux and W. W. Kidd had been 
 confirmed as Trustees of the Institute at the session of the An- 
 nual Conference January 8-15, 1850. ^ 
 
 In September, 1852, the Rev. Thomas B. Russell resigned the 
 Presidency of Oak Bowery Female College, on which occasion 
 Miss Laura Saddler, in a neat speech, presented to the retiring 
 
 President a beautiful Bible. 
 47 
 
728 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 The Eev. W. F. Samford succeeded the Kev. Mr. Kussell as 
 President of the College, and he had the Kev. Alexander 
 Means, D.D.^ to preach the Commencement Sermon at Oak 
 Bowery in the summer of 1853. Mr. Samford retained the 
 Presidency of that College only about one year. He had the 
 talents and the learning, sufficient qualifications, to write a 
 creed of religion, and a code of jurisprudence, had he been 
 minded to do so, but he could not guide successfully the inter- 
 ests of the College in the village of Oak Bowery. The Annual 
 Conference at its session at the close of 1853, and at the close 
 of Mr. Samford's administration, reported that Oak Bowery Fe- 
 male College was in a languishing condition, but that improve- 
 ment was anticipated under the management of the incoming 
 and new President, the Rev. Alexander Speer, and who opened 
 its next session January 1, 1854 At the close of 1856 Oak 
 Bowery College dropped out of the list of Colleges under the 
 patronage of the Conference. 
 
 There was a " Macon Female Institute," at Macon, Mississip- 
 pi, which was under the patronage and direction of the Alaba- 
 ma Conference, at least from the beginning of 1848 till the close 
 of 1855. The Rev. F. G. Ferguson taught in it one year, and 
 the Rev. William Wier was Agent for it in 1852. 
 
 In December, 1852, the Alabama Conference organized a 
 *• Ministerial Education Society," the object of which w^as to aid 
 such young men, in limited circumstances and with limited ed- 
 ucation, as gave evidence of being called of God to devote them- 
 selves to the work of the itinerant ministry, in obtaining such 
 an education as would enable them to discharge acceptably the 
 duties of the sacred office. 
 
 The Alabama Conference also had funds for aiding the sons 
 of the preachers of the Conference in securing an education. 
 That was praiseworthy. The funds were used for a while at La 
 Grange College, and were appropriated to paying the board of 
 the sons of the members of the Conference who were there as 
 students. 
 
 At the session of the Alabama Conference at Tuskaloosa, 
 Alabama, December, 1853, a communication from the Trus- 
 tees of a projected Female College at Tuskegee, Alabama, was 
 received and referred to the Committee on Education. The 
 preliminary steps for that projected College were taken in the 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama. 
 
 729 
 
 autumn of 1852, and the enterprise was pushed with vigor and 
 with good success through 1853. The Rev. C. C. Gillespie, 
 who was stationed at Tuskegee for 1852 and 1853, operated the 
 scheme for the anticipated College with great efficiency, and at 
 the time above stated of the session of the Conference twenty- 
 six thousand dollars had been subscribed for the forth-coming 
 College on condition that the Annual Conference would take it 
 under patronage. In accord with the conditions of the sub- 
 scription in hand, and as they intended to increase the amount 
 to forty thousand dollars, the Trustees desired the business 
 with the Conference consummated at once. The Annual Con- 
 ference acceded to the proposition of the Trustees, and engaged 
 to foster the College. The work then went on. The General 
 Assembly of Alabama, by an Act, approved February 2, 1854, in- 
 corporated The Tuskegee Female College. The Trustees named 
 in the act of incorporation were: David Clofton, Lewis Alexan- 
 der, John B. Bilbro, Robert F. Ligon, James Dent, James M. 
 Alexander, Richard H. Powell, Arnold Seals, D. E. Anthony, J. 
 Bedell, Joshua W. Willis, Job Thompson, Robert H. Howard, 
 William H. Ellison, and Dow Perry. In the spring of 1854, 
 immediately after the act of incorporation, active efforts were 
 made to get forward in erecting the building. 
 
 The work proceeded without ceasing, and in due course the 
 walls were completed and the building finished. A Faculty, 
 with the Rev. Andrew A. Liscomb, D.D., LL.D., as President, 
 was selected. The halls were thrown open for the great work 
 for which they had been erected, and on February 11, 1856, the 
 first pupils matriculated. That was a coronation day in which 
 a dispensation of letters, refinement, grace, elegance, and moral 
 beauty was inaugurated for the fair daughters of Alabama. 
 Before a twelve months had elapsed from the time of opening 
 its halls one hundred and ninety pupils were arranged under 
 its curriculum. The first graduates of the Institution consisted 
 of four young ladies, in the class of 1856. The Rev. Mark S. 
 Andrews was Agent for this College the year before its halls 
 were opened for the work of instruction, and he was one of the 
 Professors in the College during its first session. 
 
 The Rev. Samuel Armstrong was Agent for it during the years 
 1858 and 1859. 
 
 In 1859 the Rev. G. W. F. Price succeeded to the Presidency 
 
730 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 of the College, and continued until the Trustees, under finan- 
 cial pressure, sold the College to the Eev. Jesse Wood, who took 
 charge of the management. In 1863 the Rev. Mr. Wood sold 
 the College to the Rev. C. D. Elliott, an old teacher, who con- 
 ducted the College until 1865, where this history closes. The 
 Rev. Mr. Price continued as one of the Professors in the Col- 
 lege from the time Mr. Wood took control until 1865. 
 
 Tuskegee is one of the most beautiful towns in the State of 
 Alabama, with a refined, liberal, and pious people, and the Tus- 
 kegee Female College has been one of the chief ornaments and 
 principal attractions of the place. 
 
 At its session at Talladega, Alabama, beginning December 13, 
 1854, the Alabama Conference adopted measures for the estab- 
 lishment of a Female High School at the town of Talladega, to 
 be called the "Talladega Conference Institute." A Board of 
 Trustees, consisting of four preachers, J. Hamilton, James S. 
 Lane, D. Carmichael, and O. R. Blue, and five laymen, J. G. L. 
 Huey, John M. Moore, J. E. Groce, John T. Morgan, and A. J. 
 Cotton, was appointed, with powers and restrictions usually 
 conferred upon Trustees, subject to the supervision and control 
 of the Alabama Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South. 
 
 The Masons of Talladega built a fine edifice for School pur- 
 poses at Talladega, and a School was opened under the auspices 
 of the Masonic Fraternity. The School became financially em- 
 barrassed, and it was turned over, as herein stated, to the Ala- 
 bama Conference. The effort was made by the Conference to 
 liquidate debts and make the School, under the management of 
 the Church, self-sustaining, but the effort failed. First the 
 Rev. James S. Lane and then the Rev. Joseph T. Abernathy 
 was appointed Agent for the School. The Rev. B. B. Ross and 
 the Rev. F. M. Grace were put in charge of the School as offi- 
 cers and teachers, but success was not achieved, and in 1858 the 
 property was turned over to the State of Alabama, since which 
 time it has been used as a School for Deaf-mutes and Blind. 
 
 At that same session of the Alabama Conference at Tallade- 
 ga, a resolution was adopted concurring with the Tennessee and 
 Memphis Conferences in the proposed removal of La Grange 
 College to Florence, Alabama; and also a resolution was adopt- 
 ed avowing the purpose to retain and have guaranteed all the 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama. 
 
 731 
 
 original rights and privileges which had been hitherto enjoyed 
 in connection with that Institution. Vested rights and privi- 
 leges tenaciously retained, existing compacts and contracts dis- 
 annulled to the contrary notwithstanding, steps were taken, at 
 that session of the Conference, looking to the establishment of 
 a Male College in South Alabama. 
 
 The subject was brought before the Conference by a memo- 
 rial from the citizens of Auburn, Alabama, and its vicinity. The 
 whole question was thoroughly investigated by an able Com- 
 mittee, and the Conference espoused the cause by the adoption 
 of the following Resolutions: 
 
 "Resolved, 1. That there should be a Male College in the 
 bounds of the Alabama Conference. 
 
 2 That to place such College on a firm basis, it will be neces- 
 sary to secure in good subscriptions the sum of one hundred 
 
 thousand dollars. 
 
 3 That the Conference appoint a Commission, consisting ot 
 Lay and Clerical members from each presiding elder's District, 
 who shall receive propositions for the location of a College 
 within our bounds until the fourth day of July next, when they 
 fihair meet at Summerfield, and fix the location of said Institu- 
 
 The Clerical members of the Commission were: T. W. Dor- 
 man, E. Baldwin, G. Sheaffer, J. J. Hutchinson, C. C. Callaway, 
 A H Mitchell, C. Strider, James S. Lane, O. R. Blue, b. t. 
 Pillev E Hearn, A. S. Dickinson. The Lay members were: R. 
 A. Baker, D. W. Goodman, D. B. Tamer BN Glover R W. 
 Foote, A. A. Coleman, J. T. Sharpe, A. B. Chtherall, L. Q^C. 
 DeYampert, R. N. Harris, W. M. Byrd, Daniel Pratt J^L^Mc- 
 Clanahan, J. E. Groce, William Garrett, N. J. Scott, D. Clop- 
 ton, E. R. Flewellen, J. H. Miller, J. W. Portis, A. C. Ramsey, 
 H. V. Smith, J. P. Nail. r ^ .i, . A 
 
 The Commission carried out their work under the terms and 
 authority of their appointment, and the subject, under the forms 
 which it assumed in the on-going of affairs, was before the Ala- 
 bama Conference at its session held at Eutaw, Alabama, De- 
 cember 5-14, 1855. t^i. ' ^ A^ 
 
 The stipulation for bids to secure the location of the intended 
 College induced, as no doubt was intended, great rivalry, and, 
 during the time allotted for submitting propositions and stipu- 
 
732 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 lating prices in the premises, strenuous efforts were put forth in 
 the cause. It will be necessary to secure in good subscriptions 
 one hundred thousand dollars. That was the manifesto of the 
 Conference. The people of Auburn and vicinity, with whom 
 originated the memorial for a College, firmly believed that Au- 
 burn would furnish the site for the College, and tilled with 
 genuine enthusiasm, and moved by a lofty purpose, they put 
 forth herculean efforts in behalf of their cherished ambition. 
 All East Alabama responded nobly, and liberally. They clearly 
 met the requisitions officially set forth. 
 
 The people of Greenesborough, and vicinity, entered the con- 
 test for the prize, and they worked with dogged persistence. To 
 begin with, Greenesborough had a majority of the Commission- 
 ers on their side. Strange as it may seem the form of the Dis- 
 tricts so governed the selection of the Commissioners as to give 
 a greater number, who, by their alliances, were in sympathy with 
 the interests of Greenesborough. There were a greater num- 
 ber of strong men on that side. Therefore, notwithstanding the 
 people of Auburn had the prestige which inured to them by 
 virtue of the fact that they inaugurated the enterprise for a new 
 College, and notwithstanding they had made a splendid canvass 
 in behalf of the enterprise, and notwithstanding they had se- 
 cured subscriptions and had formulated stipulations which 
 could not be discounted, yet, the Annual Conference in session 
 at Eutaw, Alabama, after much deliberation, determined to es- 
 tablish a College at Greenesborough, Alabama, and appointed a 
 Board of Trustees to manage its affairs, and a Committee to pro- 
 cure for it an act of incorporation, and recommended that the 
 name Southern University be set out in the act of incorporation. 
 The Rev. C. C. Callaway was appointed Agent. 
 
 The General Assembly of Alabama, by an act passed January 
 25, 1856, incorporated the Southern University, naming in the 
 act of incorporation the following persons as Trustees: Robert 
 Paine, J. O. Andrew, E. Wadsworth, T. O. Summers, J. Hamil- 
 ton, A. H. Mitchell, P. P. Neely, T. J. Koger, C. C. Calloway, J. 
 J. Hutchinson, J. T. Heard, T. Y. Ramsey, L. Q. C. DeYam- 
 pert, John Erwin, R. A. Baker, H. W. Hilliard, J. W. Walton, 
 T. M. Johnson, Thomas W. Webb, A. A. Coleman, D. W. Good- 
 man, Gideon Nelson, Gaston Drake. 
 
 Steps were immediately taken, under the direction of the 
 
 Further Histonj of Education in Alabama. 
 
 733 
 
 Trustees, to erect the University buildings. The corner-stone 
 was put in place June 11, 1856. Finally, the buildings com- 
 pleted, and equipped, and a Faculty selected, the halls of the 
 Institution were opened for the reception of students, October 
 3, 1859. The number of the matriculates in the University, tak- 
 ing a number of years, did not average very high. 
 
 The Rev. William M. Wightman, D.D., was Chancellor of the 
 University from the time of its opening till he was elected to 
 the Episcopacy in 1866, immediately after which he ^f^f'^^ 
 The members of the first Faculty were: The Rev. Edward Wads- 
 worth, A.M., D.D., Professor of Moral Philosophy; Oscar t. 
 Casey, A.M.. Professor of Ancient Languages; the Rev. J. 0. 
 AVills' AM Professor of Mathematics; N. T. Lupton, A.M., 
 Professor of Chemistry; the Rev. J. A. Reubett, A.M., Professor 
 of Modern Languages and Hebrew. These, except peThaps, 
 Mr. Reubett, continued through the time of Dr. A\ightmans 
 administration as Chancellor, and after. That was an able Fac- 
 ulty: the men composing it were worthy of commendation, for 
 both their mental endowments and moral qualities. ^ 
 
 It has been estimated that in 1861, the Southern University had 
 an Endowment of over two hundred thousand dollars. The Rev. 
 C C Callaway was Agent for the University from the beginning 
 of 1856 to the close of 1861. Much of the original Endowment 
 was in the form of subscriptions and notes, and was never col- 
 lected It has been asserted that Greenesborough paid for the 
 Southern University buildings, and furniture, and apparatu^m 
 the beginning, one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. 1 he 
 statement, of course, includes the contributions made by per- 
 sons in the vicinity of Greenesborough and surrounding coun- 
 
 %he Departments of the University were never all opened. 
 There was never any teaching in the department of Law, though 
 a Law Faculty was organized. This History of the Southern 
 University closes with the close of the War between the States, 
 
 ^^The session of the Annual Conference at Eutaw, Alabama, 
 continued ten days, three days of which were occupied almost 
 exclusively in debating the question of locating a College. The 
 Rev O R. Blue, possessed, as he was, of courage, coolness, de- 
 liberation, and persistence, great elements in a debater, was the 
 
734 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 master spirit in that great discussion, and was the actual and 
 acknowledged leader of the party who advocated the claims of 
 Auburn as the place for the proposed College, and he held the 
 field against the horde of antagonists who coufronted him. 
 While he could not induce the Conference to adopt Auburn as 
 the place for the College, he could detain the Conference from 
 and arrest action favorable to Greenesborough. Unable to 
 break his power, the Conference, finally, by formal action, de- 
 cided to decline all propositions on the subject and all cogni- 
 zance whatsoever of the enterprise. Upon that status Blue 
 changed his tactics, marshaled his forces, and acceded to the 
 proposition to establish a College at Greenesborough ; immedi- 
 ately the Conference rescinded its action, and, as stated on a 
 preceding page, determined to establish a College at Greenes- 
 borough, Alabama. That final action of the Conference, in- 
 duced by Blue, though against Auburn and in favor of Greenes- 
 borough, anticipated, and meant, a College at both places. 
 
 That discussion on the College question was fiery and excite- 
 ful, and engendered strife never allayed, and inaugurated divi- 
 sion never arrested. Dr. A. H. Mitchell was on the side of 
 Greenesborough, and was, no doubt, perfectly sincere in all he 
 did and said, but was injudicious and unwise, and he made ut- 
 terances which gave mortal offense to the people of East Ala- 
 bama. He taunted the people of that section. He ridiculed 
 their claims, stigmatized them as paupers, and denounced the 
 idea of their building a College as preposterous. He had, at 
 some time, made a journey through East Alabama, and must 
 needs refer to that pilgrimage, and, throwing up his hands, and 
 assuming the attitude and tone of exclamation, he said: "Every- 
 where I went, i)overty stared me in the face!" The people of 
 East Alabama never forgave him, and for a long while not one 
 of them would have experienced any special pleasure in extend- 
 ing to him even common hospitality. Not one of them was dis- 
 posed to put poverty under contribution for that purpose. 
 
 To every people there comes an epoch, a period remarkable 
 for events, a time accumulative of events which will have great 
 subsequent influence. Such a period had come to the people of 
 East Alabama, and they were at the crisis, and in a dilemma. 
 They had conceived the idea of establishing, in their midst, a lit- 
 erary Institution of high grade. In the prosecution of their com- 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama. 
 
 735 
 
 mendable ambition they had aroused their latent forces, put 
 under contribution their energies, and called into requisition 
 their resources. Manifestly the work, in its inception and de- 
 sign, in its outline and detail, in its execution and progress, was 
 under intelligent guides and active agents, and was not the out- 
 come of day-dreams, wild reveries, and idle rhapsodies. Indus- 
 try and liberality had been shown which merited success, and 
 means had been accumulated which, so far as finances were con- 
 cernedj guaranteed success, and they had with them moral 
 force and popular influence. Withal, they had contested for 
 the prize of an Institution of learning in their midst, under the 
 auspices of the Annual Conference, and, according to the letter 
 of the action, had lost. They had been put under an embargo, 
 they had been estopped. They had been rebuffed. They were 
 to be pursued, assaulted, and rebuked. An impetuous crusade 
 against them was impending. The people at Greenesborough 
 and the other friends of the college to be built at Greenesbor- 
 ough, claimed chartered and exclusive rights in the premises, 
 and denounced any and every purpose and effort to establish a 
 literary Institution and secure patronage at any other place. 
 A constellation of circumstances admonished that if the enter- 
 prise was persisted in there would be severe conflict and a long 
 struggle. The people of East Alabama, however, had been driv- 
 en from, and were fully detached from the people of the con- 
 tending section, and were united among themselves, the whole 
 section of East Alabama stood ready for the enterprise. Nor 
 hard speeches, nor adverse decisions, nor rebuff, nor rebuke, nor 
 impending crusade could abate the interest of the people of 
 East Alabama for a College in their midst. 
 
 After so much time devoted to the cause, so much talent de- 
 veloped in its advocacy, and so much money gathered for its 
 use, it was a moral impossibility to refrain from the work. The 
 materials so copiously gathered could not be abandoned, and 
 left to disintegrate and disappear. The day for caution and 
 procrastination was gone, decision and promptitude were in or- 
 der. Loyalty to Conference action, so-called, could not be in- 
 duced by the railings of prejudice or the revilings of caprice. 
 A good conscience could not be bound by the requirements of 
 diplomacy. Audacious and versatile reiterations about pains 
 and penalties to be visited upon devoted heads, cut a very sor- 
 
736 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ry figure in arresting purposes born of pure benevolence. Hec- 
 toring could not terrify men engaged in the promotion of a pub- 
 lic benefaction. Men could not be convicted of departing from 
 pure doctrines and true principles because they declined to 
 unite on some particular enterprise and to take care of some 
 special local interest; enterprise and interest upon which there 
 could not be infallible pronouncements. Fiery assault and per- 
 sistent crusade advertised the cause at Auburn, revealed and 
 developed strength in its behalf, and united its agents and abet- 
 tors, and made them persistent. A gale of enthusiasm swept 
 the friends of the College for Auburn on in their grand work. 
 The taunts which they received, the scoffing allusions made to 
 their poverty, helped to stir the humblest plebian among them. 
 The friends of the enterprise, acting in accord with the facts 
 and purposes already indicated, moved forward with the work 
 in hand, and on February 1, 1856, just seven days after the pas- 
 sage of the act incorporating the Southern University, an act of 
 the General Assembly of Alabama was passed incorporating the 
 " East Alabama Male College." The Trustees named in the act 
 of incorporation, forty-nine in number, were: John B. Glenn, 
 N. J. Scott, A. Frazer, J. M. Carlton, J. B. Ogletree, W. T. Da- 
 vis, Isaac Hill, C. Raiford, J. F. White, F. W. Dillard, John 
 Darby, J. W. Jones, Wesley WilKamsj Simeon Perry, Edwin 
 Reese, W. A. McCarty, O. R. Blue, Mark S. Andrews, Samuel 
 Armstrong, C. D. Oliver, W. B. Neal, F. G. Ferguson, W. H. 
 McDaniel, Lewis Dowdell, E. J. Hammill, Daniel Pratt, J. E. 
 Groce, William Garrett, E. R. Flewellin, J. F. Dowdell, Samuel 
 Harris, A. A. Lipscomb, David Clopton, J. AV. Willis, Robert 
 Daugherty, R. A. Baker, Duke W. Goodman, N. B. Powell, W. 
 H. EllisoD, J. B. Banks, J. Cunningham, Arnold Seals, John 
 McTyeire, Frank Gilmer, John B. Tate, John P. Nails, Thom- 
 as H. Watts, E. G. Richards, and J. M. Jennings. 
 
 If that was not a working Board, it was, nevertheless, suffi- 
 ciently large to contain a sufficient number of working mem- 
 bers, and was evidently intended for an influential Board. 
 
 In the year 1857, the corner-stone of the College building was 
 put in place. Bishop George F. Pierce was the orator of the 
 occasion, and right well did he sustain the interests of the hour. 
 That was an event in the history of that section. The condi- 
 tions were all propitious, the circumstances all auspicious, the 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama. 
 
 737 
 
 incidents all inspiring. It was a time of benediction. Every- 
 thing was radiant with cheer. The very air emitted charming 
 sounds; the atmosphere was full of music. The impulse in- 
 spired by the hour lasted through the struggle made to com- 
 plete the building and furnish the outfit for the literary work 
 anticipated. As those benevolent men laid in the corner-stone 
 of that beautiful building which they had designed and com- 
 menced for the furtherance of sanctified learning, and as they 
 contemplated the good which would be achieved by their benefi- 
 cence there might justly come to their minds visions of " The 
 golden crowns of life, due to the saints '* who work righteous- 
 ness and dispense benefits. 
 
 The building constructed, even complete in its towers and 
 furnishings, and a Faculty selected, the youths of the land were 
 invited to enter the halls of the East Alabama Male College, 
 for the study of classical and scientific lore under Christian 
 auspices. It was in the beautiful autumn of 1859 that the first 
 persons were matriculated, the first classes formed, and the first 
 lessons taught in that College. 
 
 The session of the Alabama Conference was held at Eufaula, 
 Alabama, November 30 to December 8, 1859. A long session. 
 The Conference assembled with the prospect of a fiery discus- 
 sion during the session. The Southern University, at Greenes- 
 borough, and the East Alabama Male College, at Auburn, had 
 both, just a few weeks before, opened their first session. That 
 was a new order of things in the Church in Alabama. The 
 Southern University was already, by formal action, under the 
 patronage and control of the Annual Conference. The East 
 Alabama Male College was a College de facto, and had most 
 flattering prospects. Perhaps, no College in the South, or in 
 the whole country, had ever opened with so large a patronage. 
 Its best friends were surprised at the unprecedented numbers 
 which crowded its halls immediately upon its opening. Its 
 patronage largely exceeded that of the Southern University. 
 Its Trustees asked the Annual Conference to take it under the 
 supervision and control of the Conference. That proposition 
 renewed, in a different form, the issue between Greenesborough 
 and Auburn. The proposition was before the Conference in 
 due form and had to be acted on. 
 The special friends of the Southern University exerted them- 
 
738 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 selves to prevent favorable action on the proposition to foster 
 the East Alabama Male College. Speeches countless, if not 
 brilliant and beautiful, were made in the Conference on the 
 subject. On Friday night, the last night of that prolonged ses- 
 sion, the discussion culminated and terminated, and the issue 
 was settled by final action. That evening the Eev. Christopher 
 C. Callaway, the financial Agent of the Southern University, 
 who, by virtue of his relation to that Institution, had a substan- 
 tial reason for the faith which was in him, made what might be 
 termed the final oration on the subject. His speech consumed 
 one hour or more in its delivery, and was as full and strong as 
 he could make it. His speech was really a homily on the au- 
 thority of conscience, the inviolableness of contracts, the sacred- 
 ness of plighted faith. He maintained that the Alabama Con- 
 ference was, by official action, voluntarily taken, committed to 
 the exclusive support of the Southern University, and that con- 
 science and contract prohibited the assumption of an obligation 
 to foster the East Alabama Male College, and that it must, in 
 fidelity, be denied recognition and patronage, and that it should 
 be rebuked as an arrogant intruder encroaching upon the rights 
 of others. His was the most persistent effort of the occasion, 
 and he, and others, attaching importance to his speech, expect- 
 ed, of course, labored and lengthy replies to it. The Confer- 
 ence and spectators, the moment he closed, were on the qui vive, 
 and expectant. A long and labored argument in response was 
 anticipated. The Kev. O. K Blue, the friend and champion of 
 the East Alabama Male College, arose, and said: "This Confer- 
 ence can keep its conscience on this subject, we are ready for 
 the vote." The vote was immediately cast, and the issue set- 
 tled, and, by an inspiring majority, the East Alabama Male 
 College was taken under the supervision and fostering care of 
 the Alabama Annual Conference. All this was done so quick- 
 ly, that all was finished before the echoes of the Kev. Mr. Calla- 
 way's voice had fairly died away. Such cruelty! an oration in 
 response to his labored effort would have been a mercy to him. 
 Never was a speech so completely punctured, never did a man 
 so thoroughly collapse! The battle was now ended, and the Al- 
 abama Conference had under its fostering care more than one 
 Male College; and why not? 
 
 The Rev. William Jeremiah Sassnett was the first President 
 
 Further History of Education in Alabama. 
 
 739 
 
 of the East Alabama Male College, and he was President down 
 to the period, when, under the influence of the distracting and 
 destructive War between the States, the College had to suspend 
 operations, and he was nominally President down to the time of 
 his death, November 3, 1865, at which period this History closes. 
 His name and talents made the College popular, and enabled it 
 to hold the large patronage with which it commenced until the 
 War called the young men of the country to the army. 
 
 The Rev, E. J. Hammill wa^ appointed Agent of the East 
 Alabama Male College in 1856, and continued in that position 
 without intermission until the close of 1862. He was as com- 
 petent an Agent as ever went out in the interest of a cause. He 
 had hope in his cause, the hope which made him not ashamed, 
 and he was diligent, persistent, and devout. It was said that 
 when he solicited a .contribution for the College and the per- 
 son addressed declined to give to the cause he would have him 
 kneel and pray about it, and he would lead in prayer, and when 
 the prayer was ended he would zealously press the claim for 
 a contribution; and it was currently reported that in that way 
 he did succeed in securing gifts. He was thoroughly conse- 
 crated to his work, and he succeeded most admirably until a 
 devastating war made things unpropitious. 
 
 Tnskaloosa, La Grange, Summerfield, Athens, Oak Bowery, 
 Huntsville, Tuskegee, Florence, Greenesborough, and Auburn 
 were the educational centers in Alabama under the auspices of 
 Methodism, during the years included in the period from 1825- 
 to 1865. 
 
CHAPTER XXXYIIL 
 
 JFuRTHER History of the Methodist Protestant Church 
 
 IN Alabama. 
 
 THE history of the Methodist Protestant Church in Alabama, 
 being here resumed, shall be briefly traced from the mid- 
 dle of the fifth to the middle of the seventh decade of this pres- 
 ent century. 
 
 There were in the bounds of the Alabama Conference of the 
 Methodist Protestant Church for 1845, two Stations, eleven Cir- 
 cuits, and four Missions. The Stations were: Montgomery, and 
 Hayneville and Lowndesborough. The Circuits were: Mont- 
 gomery, Mount Jefferson, Union, Benton, Kocky Mount, Ca- 
 hawba. Cedar Creek, Sumter, Cotfeeville and Washiugton, Coosa, 
 and Lowndes. The Missions were: Florida, Pea River, Pick- 
 ens, and Talladega. The appointments here given show the 
 sections of the State to which that Church was mostly con- 
 fined. The strongest following of that denomination was in 
 Autauga, Butler, Coosa, Dallas, Lowndes, Montgomery, and Wil- 
 cox Counties. The whole membership in the bounds of the 
 Conference for Alabama for that year was tweiity-eight hundred 
 and seventy-two white, and eleven hundred and fifty-seven col- 
 ored members, and fifty-three itinerant preachers. The preach- 
 ers adhering to that Church in the State of Alabama, so far as 
 catalogued, at the close of 1845, were: W. W. Hill, Peyton S. 
 Graves, Benjamin Dulany, W. Rice, James Holly. John B. Per- 
 due, Samuel Oliver, Sen., Jesse Mings, Samuel Johnston, John 
 Jenkins, James Jenkins, Zachariah Williams, O. L. Nash, E. My- 
 ers, M. E. Murphy, F. Freeman, James Meek, Samuel M. Meek, 
 John Steadman, W. C. Marsh, C. Kelley, A. D. Stewart, J. M. D. 
 Rice, J. W. S. Deberry, O. H. Shaver, Thomas Shaw, C. S. V. 
 Jones, J. L. Wright, Stephen Williams, D. B. Smedley, A. Rober- 
 son, A. A. Lipscomb, Mark Howard, T. F. Selby, F. W. Moody, B. 
 S. Anderson, J. L. Clarke, W. A. Bently, W. Mozingo, A. C. Pa- 
 tillo, R. P. W. Balmain, J. F. Burson, C. F. Gillespie, J. J. Bell, 
 (740) 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church. 741 
 
 W. Coleman, R. F. Perdue, Luther Hill, W. B. Sims, G. W. 
 Yest, D. A. Murdock, E. W. Sewell, W. J. Stanton, John T. 
 Mings, W. Luker, J. F. Smith, Luke Brooks, G. Royster, William 
 Bowden, W. W. Chapman, Dempsey Dowling, D. Henderson. 
 
 As related in another place, the Rev. Samuel M. Meek died in 
 May, 1846; and as related on another page, the Rev. Peyton S. 
 Graves, after notice given that a motion would be made to expel 
 him from the Conference was given permission to withdraw on 
 December 14, 1847, and he withdrew with charges pending 
 against his moral character. The Rev. Dempsy Dowling was re- 
 ceived by the Methodist Protestant Church into the traveling 
 connection, November 24, 1845. He had been a member of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. The Rev. James Jenkins died in 
 1849. The Rev.* Benjamin Dulany died in 1852. The Rev. 
 John Jenkins died in 1854. The Rev. Zachariah Williams 
 joined the Baptists in 1856. The Rev. James F. Smith, one of 
 their most zealous preachers, withdrew in 1857, and united with 
 the Protestant Episcopal Church, aiid during that same year, 
 the Rev. Oscar H. Shaver, one of the most intelligent, pious, 
 and useful preachers among them, died. The Rev. John Stead- 
 man, who, when about twenty-two years of age joined the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church, and went off with the Seceders, died in 
 1862, having passed his three score years. 
 
 The Rev. J. J. Lazenby was received, by them, as a preacher 
 into the traveling connection, so far as they had any traveling 
 connection, in December, 1846; and the Rev. John W. Skipper 
 in December, 1847; and the Rev. C. C. Howard, the Rev. D. J. 
 Sampley, and the Rev. S. N. Graham, in November, 1849, and 
 the Rev. Samuel E. Norton was received by transfer from the 
 South Carolina Conference at the same time. The Rev. C. C. 
 Howard voluntarily surrendered his credentials in November, 
 1855. The Rev. Alexander McCaine was received, and recog- 
 nized by the Alabama Conference of the Methodist Protestant 
 Church, upon a certificate of good standing from the South 
 Carolina Conference, in November, 1850. He was a man of note, 
 and he died in 1857. In November, 1850, the Rev. Edwin Bald- 
 win, the Rev. D. A. M. Ferguson, the Rev. James Lindley, and 
 the Rev. R. F. Perdue were received as itinerant preachers. 
 
 In December, 1854, at Talladega, Alabama, the Rev. Edwin 
 Baldwin, an elder in the Methodist Protestant Church, applied 
 
742 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 for admission into the Alabama Conference of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South, and, under the provisions of the Dis- 
 cipline, was received. He remained with the Methodist Protes- 
 tant Church, as a preacher, but a short time, and for the simple 
 reason that the field furnished him under the auspices of that 
 Church was not equal to his gifts. He filled the first Stations 
 in the Methodist Episcopal Church in Alabama, such as Mont- 
 gomery, Mobile, and Selma. He was a native of Georgia, and 
 was only thirty-eight years old when he died. He died at Selma^ 
 Alabama, January 9, 1866. When attending the ministry of the 
 Eev. Joshua T. Heard and the Eev. Josiah Barker, at Hayne- 
 ville, Alabama, he obtained justification, and immediately en- 
 tered the ministry under the auspices of the Methodist Protes- 
 tant Church. In the organization of the work, in the adminis- 
 tration of ecclesiastical afi'airs, he never took much part. He 
 had no talent for such work. In preaching was his strength. 
 He was not famous for his knowledge of the Arabic, and the Cop- 
 tic, the Sanscrit, and the Syriac, but he was earnest and eloquent, 
 brave and brilliant, and made a polished use of the English lan- 
 guage. He had a purpose in all his work; it was his purpose 
 to irradicate vice, and vindicate virtue. Direful prospects and 
 melancholy retrospects never affected him in the discharge of 
 duty. Vicissitudes, however great, and battles, however san- 
 guinary, never daunted him. The preaching of the gospel might 
 irritate the weak and exasperate the wicked, invective might be 
 poured forth in the full measure of folly, but he moved on like 
 a warrior bent on success and marching to victory. He main- 
 tained a virtuous life, and a spotless character. The hospitality 
 of his home was tendered to his friends; his finances, though 
 limited, were expended, in part, in alms; and his calumniators 
 were treated with the silence and his enemies with the forget- 
 fulness which their deeds merited. 
 
 The Eev. E. F. Perdue, mentioned above, left the Methodist 
 Protestant Church, and united with the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, as an itinerant preacher, in December, 1869. 
 He continued in the itinerant work of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, until his death, March 10, 1875. 
 
 The Eev. John E. P. Cowart was received into the pastoral 
 work in November, 1851; and at the same time the Eev. S. E. 
 Hoagland was received by transfer from Illinois. In November, 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church. 743 
 
 1853, the Eevs. W. W. Tupple and W. F. Bonham were accept- 
 ed as itinerant preachers. 
 
 In November, 1854, the Eev. F. L. B. Shaver, formerly a mem- 
 ber of the Virginia Conference of the Methodist Protestant 
 Church, and wJio had been in South Carolina, Missouri, and in 
 Louisiana, presented himself at the session of the Annual Con- 
 ference of the Methodist Protestant Church of the Alabama 
 District, and was received as a member. He served as Presi- 
 dent of that Conference, much of the time he was eligible, from 
 November, 1857, till December, 1869, when he left the Metho- 
 dist Protestant Church, and united with the Methodist Episco- 
 pal Church, South. He continued in the itinerant work of that 
 Church until he was superannuated, and he was a member of 
 the Alabama Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South, at the time of his death, January 4, 1880. He died at 
 Fort Deposit, Alabama. He was a man of solid attainments, 
 and of pleasant manners and was useful through his ministry. 
 He filled prominent places among the Protestant and the Epis- 
 copal Methodists. In 1870, he was presiding elder of the La 
 Fayette District. The strength of his years was given to the 
 Methodist Protestant Church. Why did he leave the Church 
 of his youth and manhood? Did he think it a waning Church? 
 The questions are suggestive. 
 
 The Eev. Joseph E. Nix was received into the Methodist Prot- 
 estant Church as a traveling preacher in connection with the Ala- 
 bama Conference November 10, 1855, from the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, South, he having been also a Baptist. The Eev. 
 William H. Grace was accepted that day as a traveling preacher, 
 and the Eev. C. C. Howard tendered his credentials which were 
 accepted. The Eev. James W. Harper and the Eev. George 
 S. Mouchett were also received under the stationing authority 
 two days later. November 8, 1856, the Eevs. John Henning, 
 James M. Scott, William C. Norris, J. E. Johnson, A. J. Jenkins, 
 and James S. Jarratt were received into the itinerancy. On 
 that same day the credentials of the Eev. W. W. Supple were 
 demanded, by the Conference, and he was returned to the ranks 
 of the laity, on the confessed charge that he had been intoxica- 
 ted in a drinking shop. 
 
 The Eev. James M. Scott, a tall, dark-skinned man, left the 
 Methodist Protestant Church in December, 1869, and was re- 
 48 
 
744 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 ceived as a traveling preacher into the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, and appointed to the Farmersville Circuit, in 
 Lowndes County, ALabama, a better Circuit than the Church he 
 left had for him. He was an efficient preacher on a Circuit and 
 a good man. 
 
 The Eevs. James Collins, W. J. A. J. Hilliard, E. C. Odum, 
 J. C. Weaver, and Angus K. McDonald, were received into the 
 itinerancy in November, 1857. 
 
 The Eev. E. C. Odum, a pale-faced man, a Christian of zeal, 
 a minister of much usefulness, left the Methodist Protestant 
 Church, in which he was brought up, and joined the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South, in December, 1869. For two years, 
 1870 and 1871, he was appointed to Fayetteville Circuit, in Tal- 
 ladega County, Alabama, a better Circuit than the Church he 
 left had for him. His excessive labor on that Circuit, labor 
 self-imposed, literally wore him out, and he died there in 1871. 
 In his zeal he forgot moderation. He was a good preacher, 
 and was only about thirty-seven years old when he died. He 
 was buried at Childersburg, Alabama. 
 
 The Kevs. G. A. McAllister, James Cisk, W. Smith and Ax- 
 ford were received under the stationing authority in November, 
 1858. The Revs. William Luker and James Cisk were expelled 
 in 1859. The Eev. T. W. Matthews voluntarily surrendered his 
 credentials to the Conference November 10, 1859. The Eev. 
 George A. McAllister died in 1859, in Pickens County, Alaba- 
 ma. The Eev. George H. McFaden was received by the Alaba- 
 ma Conference as a regular transfer from the Maryland Confer- 
 ence, and recognized November 11, 1859. He was in every fiber 
 a member of the Methodist Protestant Church. However, in 
 November, 1888, he withdrew from the Alabama Annual Con- 
 ference of the Methodist Protestant Church, and in a short 
 time united with the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and 
 was, in the course of twelve months, recognized as a local elder 
 in the Church. He lived then in Autauga County. 
 
 Prominent laymen in the Methodist Protestant Church dur- 
 ing the period from 1845 to 1865, were, to name them alphabet- 
 ically: M. B. Abercrombie, B. S. Bibb, James K. Benson, E. H. 
 Cook, C. E. Crenshaw, Albert Crumpler, C. W. Dunham, P. P. 
 Daniel, A. N. Ellis, Peyton T. Graves, F. M. Gilmer, Boiling 
 Hall, J. H. Howard, Leonid as Howard, E. T. Houser, John A. 
 
 Furl her History of the Methodist Protestant Church. 745 
 
 Houser, C. M. Howard, Edmond Harrison, Edwin Jenkins, Seth 
 Little, William Little, J. J. Little, Abner McGehee, C. Ma- 
 thews, W. A. Oliver, A. F. Posey, L. Eobertson, S. Bobbins, E. 
 Eobinson, Eobert Eussell, D. M. Smith, John Steele, D. C. 
 Shaw, James H. Smith, P. B. Smith, J. M. Stoudenmire, Ezekiel 
 Salter, T. F. Smith, B. J. Saffold, Benjamin F. Tarver, A. W. 
 Townsend, Daniel Turnipseed, William Taylor, E. Watson, Wil- 
 liam N. Williams, B. B. Wilson, H. H. Wlietstone. There were 
 others of equal standing and zeal. A few names of the honor- 
 able women who labored for the futherance of the gospel are 
 found on the EecorcL Here they are: Mary McGehee, Nancy 
 D. Long, Sophia L. A. Bibb, Elizabeth Eeese, Eebecca L. Mel- 
 ton, Mary Smith, Ann Elmore, Silvia Stone, Mary L. Peebles, 
 Mary Crenshaw, and Sarah Crenshaw. There were, doubtless, 
 other women among them of equal virtue and fidelity. 
 
 So far as is now known, these men and women here named were 
 all, without an exception, persons of worth, and many of them 
 were possessed of wealth. They were representative persons in 
 the communities in which they resided, and they did that which 
 was pleasing in the sight of the Lord, shunning the abomina- 
 tions of the wicked. Some of these have already been named in 
 a preceding chapter. 
 
 The wealthiest man among them was Abner McGehee. He was 
 warmly attached to the principles of the Methodist Protestant 
 Church, and in the support thereof he made frequent and, what 
 was considered, munificent donations, and consequently he was 
 considered by his brethren a man of piety and of enlightened 
 liberality. In 1855, being venerable in years, he laid down his 
 body and his worldly cares, and his spirit went to God who 
 gave it. 
 
 John Steele, James H. Smith, William Little, Boiling Hall, 
 B. S. Bibb, William Taylor, F. M. Gilmer, Peyton T. Graves, and 
 John Tipton contributed liberally to some of the enterprises 
 which the Methodist Protestant Church attempted; though it is 
 true that the Church never enterprised many things in Alaba- 
 ma, and some of the few things she did attempt never culmina- 
 ted in success. 
 
 At the close of 1851, after a career of more than a score of 
 years, time sufficient for reaching from birth to majority, that 
 Church had in Alabama eighty-nine houses of worship, and two 
 
746 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 parsonages, all valued at thirty-one thousand eight hundred and 
 fifty dollars, making each, on an average, worth three hundred 
 and fifty dollars. The house of worship and the parsonage in 
 the city of Montgomery were valued at eight thousand five 
 hundred dollars, and there were five houses of worship on the 
 Yellow River Mission, all valued at forty dollars. The highest 
 salary paid to a preacher among them that year was eight hun- 
 dred dollars, and the lowest salary paid that year was thirteen 
 dollars. The average of the salaries was a few cents less than one 
 hundred and fifty dollars. The whole collected on deficiencies 
 in the entire Conference was eighty dollars and five cents. These 
 statements compass the entire of material substance in the whole 
 realm of the Alabama District; except, that there was in existence 
 a subscription, made by seventy different persons, amounting to 
 four thousand eight hundred and forty dollars, for a nucleus, 
 around which an effort was being made to gather ten thousand dol- 
 lars, for what was called the Samaritan Fund. The Samaritan 
 Fund was to be used, when the subscription reached ten thousand 
 dollars, in the interest, the principal remaining forever un- 
 touched, in supplying the deficiency in the receipt of the allow- 
 ance of the itinerant preachers, and in the support of superannu- 
 ated preachers, and the orphans and widows of deceased preach- 
 ers. 
 
 A permanent move in providing the Samaritan Fund was 
 
 made at the session of the Annual Conference in December, 
 1846. At that session the Conference determined to make an 
 effort to raise said Fund, and ordained rules, methods, and 
 agents to govern and accomplish the work. The subject met with 
 favor, at least from a few, who were steadfastly minded to go 
 on to the consummation of the good work, and while it was a 
 long time before anything was accomplished calculated to do 
 much good, yet, through the liberality of Abner McGehee, and 
 B. S. Bibb, there was accumulated, in the on-going of things, a 
 Fund sufficient to yield a measure of relief to a few deficient 
 ministers and the widows and orphans of deceased preachers. 
 
 Abner McGehee donated to the Samaritan Fund, in the Mont- 
 gomery and West Point Bail Boad Stock, ten thousand dollars, 
 which was paid to the Treasurer of the Fund some time after 
 the death of the donor. B. S. Bibb, about the same tiifae, do- 
 nated to the Samaritan Fund, in similar Bail Boad Stock, five 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church. 741 
 
 thousand dollars. Liberal donations to the Fund, about the 
 same time, by Mary McGehee, and Sophia Bibb, and others, en- 
 larged the Fund, so that in November, 1857, the sum of it was 
 twenty-one thousand nine hundred fifty-seven dollars and forty- 
 five cents. The interest on that amount would yield relief in 
 the case of several destitute ones. It is presumed that the fif- 
 teen thousand dollars in Bail Boad Stock evaporated, finally, as, 
 in after time, the Samaritan Fund was reported to be less than 
 six thousand dollars. 
 
 Outside of supporting the preachers and Missionaries em- 
 ployed in the State, the Methodist Protestant Church had no 
 benevolent enterprises in Alabama, down to the period at which 
 this History closes. In November, 1810, under the influence, 
 and leadership of Boiling Hall, the Annual Conference set out 
 a declaration in favor of literature and science, and, in further- 
 ance of the same, and with the purpose of finally establishing a 
 College, authorized the establishment of a Male High School, at 
 Bobinson Springs, Alabama, and clothed with authority to su- 
 pervise the Institution a Board of fifty-five Trustees. In obe- 
 dience to the action of the Conference, the Board of Trustees 
 went to work immediately, settled such questions as were before 
 them, and appointed the Bev. O. H. Shaver, Agent to secure 
 subscriptions for the contemplated School. At the next session 
 of the Annual Conference those having the matter in hand, re- 
 ported that "seventy-two dollars cash, and the gross sum of 
 seventeen thousand, nine hundred and eighty-two dollars, in 
 subscriptions, as also, ten thousand dollars Bail Boad Stock, by 
 Abner McGehee" had been secured. The parties interested 
 were induced to believe that there would be still further re- 
 sponses, and that the amounts in a reasonable time would be 
 largely increased. A certain site in the community of Bobinson 
 Springs was recommended as the permanent spot on which to 
 locate the School. It had been determined to call the School 
 The Snethen Institute, but it was recommended to the Trustees 
 to change the name to McGehee College, as a memorial of grati- 
 tude to Abner McGehee, for his liberal donation in aid of the 
 cause, and for his zealous advocacy of its interest. It was rec- 
 ommended also that the Georgia and Mississippi Conferences 
 of the Methodist Protestant Church be requested to co-operate 
 in the building and equipping a College. The Annual Confer- 
 
748 
 
 Historii of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 ence adopted all tlie measures recommended in the premises, 
 and there seemed to be great enthusiasm on the subject, but 
 thrift did not attend the enterprise. At the Annual Conference 
 in November, 1853, held at Autaugaville, Alabama, it was re- 
 ported that the project of building a College at Robiuson 
 Springs, did not entirely meet the views of the Conference, and 
 that it was then invested with such embarrassments as to ren- 
 der its prosecution impracticable. At the same time there was 
 before the Conference from the citizens of Auburn, Alabama, a 
 proposition to buikl a Male College at that place. The Confer- 
 ence considered the proposition with favor, and there was insti- 
 tuted a contest between Auburn and Robinson Springs. The 
 question then was, will the friends of Robinson Springs still ad- 
 here to that locality, or transfer the subscriptions and the en- 
 terprise to Auburn. From the contest inaugurated distractions 
 ensued. The burning sands of a desert do not more surely 
 drink up the streams which descend upon them from the moun- 
 tains, than do contests dissipate interest in public enterprises. 
 The enterprise utterly failed, as did also the project of build- 
 ing a Female College in the city of Montgomery, Alabama, in 
 
 1859. 
 
 Through the belligerent spirit, which has ever been peculiarly 
 strong in the adherents of the Methodist Protestant Church, 
 that people were prompted to attempt to go up, and cover the 
 earth with followers; but the very elements which gave exist- 
 ence to that tribe limited achievements; and while that Church 
 had in Alabama a number of intelligent and enterprising fami- 
 lies, the main body of the membership thereof were not of that 
 type, and there were never in Alabama a sufficient number of in- 
 telligent members among them to prosecute any large benevo- 
 lence to a successful issue. 
 
 The Methodist Protestant Church in Alabama suffered no lit- 
 tle from the characteristic weaknesses of its adherents, as well 
 as from the weaknesses of its cherished principles. It is the 
 task of the historian to record such items of detriment and 
 notice such elements of weakness as were apparent, and such 
 as made the history, and of which the leaders of the Church 
 themselves complained. 
 
 Much damage was suffered by premature and injudicious no- 
 tice of malicious reports involving the character of ministers 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church, 749 
 
 and members, and so extensive was the evil that measures were 
 adoi3ted and committees appointed, by the Annual Conference, 
 to arrest it. Much detriment was incurred by putting ministers 
 and members on trial upon charges trivial in themselves and 
 notoriously false. That evil had to be checked. An irrespon- 
 sible and an untrained membership had too much control in the 
 administration of affairs. 
 
 The Annual Conference was without authority and without 
 power to keep the preachers at their legitimate work, and make 
 them efficient in the prosecution of their divine calling. That 
 fact came out, ever and anon, in the utterances of the Annual 
 Conference from time to time, and was manifested in many 
 ways. There was constantly a list of unstationed preachers; 
 some left in the hands of the President of the Conference, and 
 for whom he had no places; and others were left without ap- 
 pointments at their own request, and the whole order origina- 
 ting in inefficiency. Governed by the peculiar principles which 
 prevailed, and the special circumstances which existed, and, yet, 
 goaded by the desperation which could not be ignored, the An- 
 nual Conference would from time to time attemi3t an utterance, 
 in which the inefficiency of the administration in the reception 
 and control of the preachers of the Conference would be de- 
 clared in more ways than one. A Report, made by a Committee 
 to the Annual Conference, at Shiloh, Autauga County, Alabama, 
 November 17, 1849, and acted on two days later, gives testimony 
 on the subject. A portion of the Report transferred to this 
 page is as follows: "The results of our modified itinerancy in 
 this District, are too obvious to escape notice; they may be 
 summed up as follows: 
 
 1. The power of the Conference is so weakened over its own 
 Ministers, as to be incapable of proper legislation for the 
 Church. 
 
 2. A large, and valuable class of Ministers, known to us as 
 unstationed Ministers, is made to occupy a position not recog- 
 nized in the Church law. 
 
 3. The regular Itineracy of the Church is so affected in its 
 operations, as to be but partially effective in its legitimate work. 
 
 4. The wants of the Church are not met, and cannot be met, 
 where, in arranging ministerial work, so many in their fixed re- 
 lations to home and business, have to be cousulted and suited. 
 
750 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama, 
 
 Other ejBfects might be mentioned. The working of the sys- 
 tem is, however, known to us all; and we believe there is a gen- 
 eral feeling that a change, by returning to the regular plan 
 prescribed by our Law, is most imperatively demanded." 
 
 When the Eeport came up, two days after it was read, for 
 final action, a motion that "So much of the Eeport as relates to 
 the Itinerancy, be laid on the table," prevailed by a vote of 
 thirty-three to thirteen. On a subsequent day of the session of 
 the Conference twenty of those who voted to lay the paper on 
 the table felt constrained to explain their vote in the following 
 composition: 
 
 " We, whose names are hereto subscribed, being desirous that 
 our votes to lay on the table so much of the Report of the Com- 
 mittee, appointed by last Annual Conference to prepare busi- 
 ness for this, as relates to Itinerancy, should not be misunder- 
 stood, beg leave of this body, to spread the fact upon their 
 Journal, that our vote was given from prudential considerations, 
 connected with the subject at this time, and not from any ob- 
 jection to the sentiments of the Eeport." 
 
 Wild, profligate, and baleful as it was, the Quarterly Confer- 
 ences, in many instances, ignored, not to say rejected, the 
 preachers appointed to the pastoral charges by their own chosen 
 Stationing Committees, and employed other preachers, and gave 
 the employees the stipends of the Church. It seems that a 
 Committee, composed of one in the ordinary grade of elder and 
 of laymen, and elected by and from the constituency, for sta- 
 tioning preachers, lost its enchantment in the annihilation of 
 distance, and could not please, in all instances, even the liberty- 
 loving Methodist Protestants. The practice of ignoring the 
 regular appointees, and hiring one of their own choosing by the 
 Quarterly Conferences, became so prevalent, as to endanger the 
 very existence of one of the very few things in the system of 
 the Fathers of Methodism which the Methodist Protestants 
 would have, the Itinerancy, and to call out an expression of 
 alarm and complaint on the subject. The practice was too 
 prevalent, and too far reaching in its consequences to be con- 
 sidered immaterial, especially by those who had direct interest 
 in the treasure involved. The matter came up for consideration 
 in the Annual Conference, and the pious and the sufferers were 
 sufficiently numerous to give a majority vote in rebuke of the 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church, 751 
 
 reckless profanation of the cause of liberty and stipends, but 
 the vote and the rebuke could not dispel the reproach, nor alto- 
 gether arrest the impolitic practice. 
 
 The last analysis in the liberal form of Church government 
 was presented in the Alabama Conference of the Methodist 
 Protestant Church in the form of constant complaints that the 
 liberal government was not respected, and obeyed, and con- 
 formity to its laws maintained. The preachers were well-nigh 
 hedged out from any participation in the management of Church 
 affairs. They could scarcely claim authority to do anything. 
 By law, it was made the duty of the Quarterly Conference to 
 "appoint the advisory Committee to the Superintendent;" and 
 the superintendent, who was the preacher, or the minister ap- 
 pointed to the pastoral charge, had to obtain the consent of the 
 " advisory Committee " before he could preach on special sub- 
 jects; so it was expressed by a paper adopted at one of the ses- 
 sions of the Annual Conference. By law provided, some of the 
 preachers were appointed to labor under the direction of the 
 Quarterly Conferences. The freedom of the divine heritage 
 from ministerial authority was so carefully guarded that the 
 Annual Conference would not retain a Eesolution authorizing 
 ministers to attend Camp-meetings and Protracted-meetings in 
 their own Circuits. That it was their privilege to do so, was the 
 most the Annual Conference would maintain on the subject. 
 The members of the Churches, and it seems to have been the 
 rule, arranged, and carried on affairs at their own option, ob- 
 livious of the preachers in charge of the Circuits. The power 
 to admit persons into full membership was vested in the mem- 
 bers of the Church, and not in the preacher. Such was the 
 liberty of the sons of men in that communion. 
 
 That liberty which is a source of weakness in the administra- 
 tion of human affairs may be rejected as no liberty, and as not 
 a whit better than imperiousness. To deprive one of making 
 achievements by placing over him arbitrary power is not any 
 worse than preventing the achievements by placing him under 
 inadequate laws and inefficient agencies. Liberty may not, un- 
 der any pretext, be contravened. Liberty may not be circum- 
 scribed, curtailed, diminished, restrained, suppressed, eliminated, 
 transferred, under any conditions, by any laws, for any purposes. 
 To deprive a man of doing that which he should do, or of 
 
752 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 enjoying that which he should enjoy, or to make him do that 
 which he ought not, or to make him suffer that which he ought 
 not to suffer, is evidently oppression, but it is not opj^ression to 
 demand that which should be bestowed, nor is it oppression to 
 prevent the doing of that which ought not to be done. Author- 
 ity divinely reposed is, as all must admit, rightful autiiority, and 
 to exercise authority so reposed, as is self-evident, neither 
 abridges nor annuls liberty. The exercise of authority and the 
 demand for a recognition and maintenance thereof cannot be 
 considered the perpetration of tyranny, any more than the de- 
 mand for redress of personal injuries, or the demand for resto- 
 ration of stolen property could be considered striking against 
 the divine law. To take and carry away feloniously in order to 
 reimburse one who had been robbed, and to redress injuries by 
 the infliction of injuries would not be more obnoxious to the 
 divine law than removing authority from its proper deposit, than 
 taking it from hands where by divine appointment it reposes. 
 Tyranny, oppression, and injustice can never promote good. 
 That which impinges the law of God is not liberty, but usurpa- 
 tion. The wise and prudent should not make the fatal mistake 
 of confounding these, as they should not make the fatal mistake 
 of confounding might and right, and as they should not make 
 the egregious blunder of enthroning might as the supreme ar- 
 biter in the administration of human affairs, and as they should 
 not perpetrate the error of supposing that private liberty and 
 public rights antagonize. Any assumptions concerning liberty, 
 or conscience, or freedom from civil or soclesiastical restraints 
 which tend to enervate the divinely Cxiosen agencies, for carry- 
 ing forward the work of the Kedeemer must be false and perni- 
 cious. " Whosoever resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance 
 of God," and there is nothing more pernicious, and criminal, 
 *'and they who resist shall receive to themselves damnation." 
 No one is endowed with liberty to work evil or produce mischief 
 in any state or in any wise. No law can restrain the exercise of 
 liberty, but there are some things which are not involved in lib- 
 erty. Liberty no more involves the right to indulge passion, 
 and avenge wrath, or impinge justice, than truth confers the 
 right to perpetrate falsehoods. Law restrains, but it does no 
 violence to liberty. The liberty which exists under the law of 
 God is simply the right and power to act the part of a moral be- 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church. 753 
 
 ing. Liberty exists and acts within the realm and limit of mor- 
 al law. That is no more a restraint upon liberty in man than 
 the impossibility for God to lie is a restraint upon his actions, 
 and a limit of his perfections. 
 
 The champions of ecclesiastical liberty in Alabama were nev- 
 er famous for literary work, or literary attainments. They 
 founded no Schools, though, as related above, they made a few 
 free efforts in that behalf. They published but little, and that 
 of a fugitive complexion, nothing very classical, and nothing re- 
 flecting any special credit. In literature, learning, and erudition 
 they were not adepts. In poetry, music, and the fine arts they were 
 not proficients, and they were not skilled in things profound. 
 It is but just, however, to state that they did not have among 
 them more than their just proportion of those who consider 
 learning both useless and pernicious. There is certainly a 
 beauty in the simplicity of Christianity which makes the frip- 
 pery, pomp, and pageantry of gorgeous ceremony and adventi- 
 tious rites revolting, but in the adoption of a Ritual so inferior, 
 this sect, which had removed the dazzlings of human power so 
 far away that the suffrages of presbyters and people were sel- 
 dom sought, not more than once a year, surely overdid the mat- 
 ter in getting rid of ostentation, and ecclesiastical embellish- 
 ments. Men who made a pious boast of rejecting ecclesiastical 
 adornments would not be apt to seek personal embellishments 
 and high order of literary refinements. 
 
 The Eev. Alexander McCaine was a man of talents and attain- 
 ments, and he did some literary work, work which made him no- 
 torious, but he completed his literary work, or most of it at least, 
 before he came to Alabama, and he was in the State of Alabama 
 only a brief while, and that in age and feebleness extreme. 
 
 The Eev. Andrew A. Lipscomb, who had conferred upon him 
 the degree of Doctor of Divinity, and the degree of Doctor of 
 Laws, for forty-five years, and, perhaps, for a longer period, 
 had his official relation with the Alabama Conference of the 
 Methodist Protestant Church. Though he was out of the State 
 a part of the time, for many years he was intimately associated 
 with the work of his Church in Alabama, and though for much 
 of the time he was on the unstationed list, he was for some years 
 in the pastoral work and the active ministry. He was a man of 
 good talents, excellent scholarship, and of unblemished reputa- 
 
754 
 
 History of Methodism in Alabama. 
 
 tion. Though he had native gifts, and though he acquired learn- 
 ing, he was by his temperament, by his aptitudes, disqualified 
 for distinguished leadership. No one who knew him would 
 have selected him to suppress a riot, or to guide a revolution. 
 No one would have chosen him to issue a proclamation, or to 
 formulate a Confession of Faith. He was not the man to find 
 and touch the springs of public life, or to enterprise matters, 
 and make things potent and illustrious. There was nothing 
 bold, or dashing, or aggressive about him, he was not capable of 
 impetuous daring. He was of a soft mold, and gentle disposi- 
 tion, and more docile than vigorous. He was not the man to 
 participate in stirring events. He was better suited to tranquil 
 times. He was, by nature, disqualified for the task of soldier 
 or surgeon. It is judged that in a University he would have 
 been more in place as a Professor than as a Chancellor. He was 
 as free from artifices as he was destitute of the positive elements 
 which make a warrior and a leader. In several of the Institu- 
 tions of Learning in the country, he had, for a time, place and 
 rank. For a short while he was connected with the University 
 of Georgia, and likewise with^he Female College, at Tuskegee, 
 Alabama, under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church] 
 South, and, then, also, with the Yanderbilt University, at Nash- 
 ville, Tennessee. In all these Schools he as honored. He was 
 an author, and was regarded a forcible writer, with pleasing 
 style, and classical taste, perhaps, more polished than profound. 
 He penned prose, invoked the Muse, and attempted rythm and 
 rhyme. His poetry was printed and praised, but never reached 
 the stately and sublime heights and popular plaudits of Pope's 
 verses and Milton's poems. He was the author of a number of 
 Essays, on various subjects. Essays of merit, though none of 
 them comparable to the Essays of John Locke. A book, bear- 
 ing the title " Studies in the Forty Days between the Resurrec- 
 tion and Ascension of Jesus Christ," which was published in 
 1884, six or eight years before his death, was considered, by 
 some, his most valuable production, though it is not as pro- 
 found, nor as engaging, nor as helpful as the treatise " On the 
 Eule and Exercises of Holy Living," by Jeremy Taylor. Among 
 all the Methodist Protestants in Alabama to the date of which 
 this History takes cognizance Dr. Lipscomb stands pre-eminent, 
 if not alone, as an author. 
 
 Further History of the Methodist Protestant Church. 755 
 
 The last statistics published by the Methodist Protestant 
 Church in Alabama, prior to the close of the War between the 
 States, and which can now be found at hand, were published at 
 the close of 1860. Said statistics show that that Church had, at 
 that time, in Alabama, three thousand two hundred and sixteen 
 white members, and one thousand seven hundred and sixty-five 
 colored members; and eighty-five houses of worship, and three 
 parsonages, all valued at ninety-one thousand three hundred 
 and seventy-five dollars; and ten Sunday-schools, with forty 
 teachers, and two hundred and eighty-four scholars. There was 
 not a member of the Methodist Protestant Church in any place 
 in Alabama at that time a city, except Montgomery. The prin- 
 cipal towns in the State at which there were any members of 
 that Church were Autaugaville, Greenville, Lowndesborough, 
 and Robinson Springs. 
 
 The End. 
 

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