A traveling church

Another church on the move

Excerpt from “Baptists of Denton County to Hold Golden Jubilee Celebration,”

Denton Record-Chronicle, Wednesday, May 27, 1936, page 2

The republic is no more

“Many a head was bowed, many a broad chest heaved, and many a manly cheek was wet with tears when that broad field of blue in the center of which, like a signal light, glowed the lone star, emblem of the sovereignty of Texas, was furled and laid away among the relics of the dead republic.”

Written by Noah Smithwick, a blacksmith in attendance at a ceremony lowering the Republic of Texas flag at the republic/state capitol, February 19, 1846. (The Evolution of a State, or, Recollections of Old Texas Days, p. 283)

After the Texas flag was lowered from its place and folded, Anson Jones, last president of the republic, stated, “The Republic of Texas is no more.”

Dossey preachers in early Texas

I am saving the clip below for historical reference. In his 1846 travels, Z. N. Morrell mentions two brothers named Dorsey who had a church near Springfield in Anderson County. Morrell is probably spelling their surname as it sounded to him, and through my research I have concluded that these men were “Dossey” rather than “Dorsey” – Thomas Franklin Dossey and William Pinkney Dossey, possibly sons of William Greenberry (or Greenberry William) and Mary Dossey (but possibly relatives, misunderstood by Morrell to be brothers). Except for the slight difference in surname spelling, the Dosseys fit the statement provided by Morrell. Though the Dosseys were in Limestone County, Springfield in Anderson County was well within an area a Baptist preacher would travel to preach in that day. Thomas Franklin Dossey (Sr) was born about 1810 in Franklin County, Tennessee, and died in Texas in August of 1871. He is buried in the Faulkenberry Cemetery near Groesbeck in Limestone County, Texas. William Pinkney Dossey was born about 1815 in Tennessee (probably Franklin County) and died probably in Texas (unless he died in Civil War service away from home), at least before 1870. He married Ellen H. Acock in Morgan County, Alabama in 1832. Thomas married Lavinia Curry in 1835 in Morgan County, Alabama.

Flower and Fruits from the Wilderness, Z. N. Morrell, 1872, pp. 227-228

Thomas Washington Cox

Thomas Washington Cox was born in Tennessee, and labored as a Baptist minister in Alabama and Texas (and perhaps Tennessee), before defecting to the Campbellites.

He was the son of Greenberry Cox and Temperance Cross, and born circa 1803.[i] He married Melinda D. Bradford August 22, 1823 in Rutherford County, Tennessee. They had at least 9 children (her obituary suggests 9 children survive her). After the death of Melinda, he married Mrs. Mary Linzey in Fayette County in September 1848. However, she does not appear with him on the 1850 census.

In 1833, Thomas W. Cox served on a committee of 5 appointed by the Alabama Baptist State Convention to establish a seminary (“Baptist Literary Institution”) on the “Manual Labor Plan.” He served on the Board of Directors at least until 1835. Cox preached at Ebenezer/ Tuscaloosa City (Holcombe, p. 149), Hebron in Jefferson County (p. 232), Good Hope in Talladega (p. 254), and perhaps Elyton in Jefferson County (p. 234; if the “W” was incorrectly inverted to an “M”). In 1835 he was on the “Committee of Vigilance” of Tuscaloosa, a group opposing vices such as gambling.

The Democrat, Thursday, September 12, 1833, p. 4

“Elder Thomas W. Cox lived here some time; and went from here to the province of Texas. Mr. Cox was an intelligent man, and might have been useful in the cause of the Master; but he engaged in the mercantile business, as too many preachers have done, and failed—then studied law, and it is probable, is practicing in Texas. He was, like many other ministers, rather arminian in his doctrinal views; but was highly respected as a minister of the gospel, until those misfortunes came his way; or rather, until he put himself in the way of them. Mr. Cox, has preached a great deal in Alabama.” Holcombe, p. 254

An Early History of Fayette County Texas by Leonie Rummel Weyand & Houston Wade (LaGrange, TX: LaGrange Journal Plant, 1936, pp. 49-52, 140, 172, 220, 224, 285, 297) has an interesting account of Cox, but gets some things wrong about him. (Such as saying he was born in Alabama in 1785, and that he came to Texas in 1822 with Austin’s 3rd Colony. He was not born in Alabama, was not that old, and if he came to Texas in 1822, he did not stay.)

Cox owned (apparently due to his military service) 640 acres in Fayette County, 13 miles east of La Grange.

It is not certain, but perhaps Cox was no longer active in the ministry after his exclusion from the church at LaGrange in 1841. He practiced law in Texas. He died February 6, 1852, of congestion of the brain, and is buried in an unknown grave – mostly likely the Rutersville Cemetery, but possibly in La Grange.[ii]

T. W. Cox served on the “Texas Monumental Committee,” the group that published the newspaper The Texas Monument (published at LaGrange, Texas), as well as collected funds to build a monument to the Mier Expedition prisoners.

In the La Grange Journal newspaper, 1937, 1938:

• The Fighting Parson 
• War with Mexico (also footnote, p. 6)
• Mier Expedition, Thomas Washington Cox 
• Mier Expedition, Thomas Washington Cox (continued)

T. W. Cox is mentioned in Flowers and Fruits from the Wilderness by Z. N. Morrell, a history of early Texas Baptists. Morrell and Cox were Baptist ministers, and contemporaries in the Union Baptist Association. Morrell advised the church of which Cox was a member and pastor about his Campbellite doctrine and recommended that they take action against him.

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[i] There are some discrepancies on his birth year, but 1803 seems to come closest to all the best-attested facts. The Thomas Cox in 1830 in the Davidson County, Tennessee census is probably him.

https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/8058/records/687568

[ii] His wife Melinda was buried at Rutersville, and this is probably in general where or close to the area where they owned the 640 acres.

Index for the Journal of Texas Baptist History

An index that might be useful for researchers, especially if they are looking into Texas Baptist history:

“Index for the Journal of Texas Baptist History, Volumes I-XX,” Courtney Lyons, pages 175-200.

The Texas Triangle

The Texas Triangle (also dubbed the Texaplex by author David Winans) is the triangular region framed by the cities of Austin, Dallas–Fort Worth, Houston, and San Antonio (and the Interstates 10, 35, and 45). This region contains about 60,000-square-miles, the state’s five largest cities (see above), and over half of the state’s population.

Image by Spaceboyjosh - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, (licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license) https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48170414

Recommended, with reservations

Historic Churches of Texas: The Land and The People, Frank A. Driskill and Noel Grisham. Burnet, TX: Eakin Press, 1980

This is a book about churches in Texas, and their church buildings. I was excited when I found I could borrow this book at Archive.Org. The excitement quickly dissipated, and overall I was sadly disappointed. The work contains many mistakes, some perhaps of only a typographical nature, but others are errors in fact. For example:

• On page 1, Driskill and Grisham introduce the famous Baptist preacher Z. N. Morrel (sic). When they refer to him again on page 3, he becomes J. N. Morrell. On the same page (3), the real Isaac Reed becomes “Isaac Read,” J. S. Milstead is “J. M. Milstead,” and M. Melton becomes “W. Melton.” If there are this many typographical errors in the first three pages, no doubt the book is filled with them. 
• The name Union Church is claimed to be so because the house was used by Baptists, Methodists, and Primitive Baptists (a sort of “union,” I suppose). On the other hand, the house itself already had name – Liberty School House – and there is no evidence of any Methodists or Primitive Baptists meeting there in 1838 when the Union Baptist Church was formed. Union is the name of the church – the congregation – not the building.
• The constitution of this church, the first of its kind in East Texas, was a “union” of Baptist believers in covenant, organized by a presbytery of ordained Baptist ministers. It took that name at its very beginning, in the conference conducted after the church was constituted – “Church met for business – chose bro. Green moderator, -- named the church Union…” The church, not the building. No other explanation need be devised.
• At the bottom of page 3 we “learn” that the “earlier migrant Pilgrim Baptist Church was organized near Nacogdoches in 1824.” Actually the “migrant Pilgrim Baptist Church” was organized in Illinois in 1833, and moved as a congregation to Texas, arriving in January 1834.

I have some questions about which churches were chosen, and which were left out, and why, but I suppose that is a matter of an author’s purpose and perspective. There is some interesting stuff in this book, all collected in one place. Nevertheless, the reader should be keenly aware that, because of the nature of some of the mistakes, that details must be verified by more reliable sources. Read with caution, and check the work.

General Sam Houston

Z. N. Morrell (1803-1883), a Tennessee and Texas Baptist preacher, was an acquaintance and admirer of General Sam Houston (1793-1863), and mentions Houston quite a bit in his autobiography Flowers and Fruits from the Wilderness. He wrote this regarding Houston’s baptism (p. 342).

“During this year, the ‘Hero of San Jacinto’ appeared upon the field again; not to drive the Mexicans and Indians from the soil of his adopted State, but to enroll his name among the believers in Christ and lend his influence in extending the conquests of religion. In November, 1854, he presented himself as a candidate for baptism to the church at Independence, and after a few simple statements as to the change God had wrought in his heart, he was approved by the church as a proper subject for baptism. On the nineteenth day of the same month, he was buried in baptism by Elder R. C. Burleson, the pastor of the church. It was his delight afterwards to attend our general meetings, whenever his official duties would permit, and give the benefit of his counsel to his brethren in the mission and educational enterprises of the denomination. His speech on one occasion before the Baptist State Convention on the Indian mission was one of the masterly efforts of his life, and did ample justice to his reputation as an orator.

“He remained a consistent member of the church until his death, in the town of Huntsville, on the twenty-sixth of July, 1863. It was my privilege to visit him a few days previous to his death. Calmly and deliberately he spoke of the passage he was about to take across the river, and expressed the strongest confidence in Christ.  Thus General Sam. Houston passed away, whose memory so many of us love to cherish.”

Many years ago I had the privilege of visiting the place in the pasture where Houston was supposed to have been baptized (although at the time I went, there was not a pool of water there in the creek large enough to baptize someone).

In memory of Wiley Palmer Jones

The writing below is an excerpt from the funeral discourse for Wiley Palmer Jones (1844-1912), by Methodist minister George S. Wyatt. Wiley Jones’s brother Milton Henry Jones, Jr. was a Baptist preacher here in Rusk County, Texas. When I was a child I went to church with Ophelia Jones Woolverton, and as an adult Eugene Lorenzo Jones was once my pastor – niece and nephew of Wiley Jones, respectively. Wiley Jones’s singing “and as I pass along, I’ll sing a Christian song, I hope to live forever” became the impetus and inspiration leading to my tune Wiley, which I named in honor of him. I want to preserve the discourse information and make it easy to find. All below is from Wyatt’s discourse.

A FUNERAL DISCOURSE

ON THE DEATH OF

WILEY PALMER JONES

DELIVERED BY

REV. G. S. WYATT

Childress, Texas, March 12, 1912

TEXT: And he was a good man and just – Luke 23:50

Other scriptures read – Psalm XC. I Cor. XV.20-58

SONGS SUNG

Asleep in Jesus

Oh, Come Angel Band

I Saw a Wayworn Traveler

The one whose memory we come to honor today, Bro. Wiley P. Jones, was born in Houston County, near Crockett, September 12, 1844. He was raised in Rusk County and moved with his father to Johnson County in 1860. He enlisted in the Confederate army in the company of Capt. W. G. Veal, Parson’s regiment, in 1861 and was discharged in 1862 and shortly hereafter re-enlisted in Capt. Samuel Carruthers’ company, Gurley’s regiment. He embraced religion in the army in 1863 and united with the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, at Auburn, Texas, in 1865, soon after the close of the war.  He was married to Miss Harriet Anderson Gilmore of Ellis County, Texas, on January 28th, 1866. From this union there were three children, two of whom, our highly esteemed and respected townsmen, J. H. P. and Will P. Jones, survive.

While living at Cleburne with his father-in-law, John P. Gilmore, they made a trip together to dispose of some horses, taking cattle in return, and had some very thrilling experiences in imagining that they were being attacked by Indians, all of which proved to be “False Alarms.” He gave his experiences of this trip in a write-up under the caption “False Alarms,” years later. I quote just one paragraph from this entertaining paper: “I want to remark right here that we had recently passed through the four year’s struggle between the states, during which time we had often stood face to face with the enemy where every inch of the ground was strongly contested: had often stood as a lone sentinel by the roadside where we counted the enemy on the march when they numbered up into the thousands; had also lain in line of battle in fair view of the enemy as the balls and shells played their part in keeping us interested, but during all these four years of war, we don’t remember ever to have felt so lonesome and nervous as we did at times while we were standing guard around our stock, with the constant expectation of an attack by the Red-Skins. We, somehow, had learned to regard them with a holy horror.”

From Johnson County he moved to Acton in Hood County, and was in business there for a number years, where he lead in the work of a Sunday School, and was also a leader in church music, using the old “Sacred Harp,” the songs of which moved with wonderful power the souls of the people and often in his last sickness, when his mind would wander, he would whistle, when he could no longer talk, some of these old tunes especially this,

“and as I pass along, I’ll sing a Christian song, I hope to live forever.”

He repeated the first verse of “Asleep In Jesus,” and asked his wife to repeat for him the other verses, as he could not speak them.

He moved from Acton to Young County when it was a wild unsettled country and engaged in the stock business. He also taught school in order that his boys might have advantages in their young days, and organized the first Sunday school that was organized in old Eliasville. He moved from there to Stephens County, where he remained for only a short time, moving to Hall County in 1888 and to Childress County in 1889, which would make him a citizen of Childress County for twenty years, save the eight years he had made his temporary home in Matador. In Childress he was a County Judge for two terms, was also in business – running a general merchandise and exchange business, in which our fellow townsman, J. H. P. Jones, received his training for the banking business. It was here that a great sorrow came into his life, the death of his first wife, who died January 19th, 1901. He was married again to Mrs. Lou Humes on August 11th, 1901, with whom he lived most happy till the day of his death. He also organized, and was the first Superintendent of the first Methodist Sunday school in Childress. These are but the salient points in the history of this great life, the details of which would make a very remarkable record. He died about 12:35 P.M., March 11, 1912.

He went out as a child falling to sleep in the arms of its mother, without a struggle, just a perceptible shortening of the breath, then on long breath, and all was over here; no, not over here. We say he is dead, and yet he lives. I have no doubt should some inhabitant from another world drop down to ours just as the sun was hiding himself behind the western hills, as he looked upon him disappearing from view, he would say “Gone, gone forever.”  But not so.  He shines on the myriad of stars in the heavens above, and still more beautifully in the moon, the queen of the night.  So with our dear brother, he is dead but lives, lives in the lives of his children, of his wife, and of his friends, and will live on till the end of time, gathering in influence and power until the might river created by his blessed life shall empty itself in the fathomless ocean of eternity.

A Bit of East Texas History – LeTourneau

I grew up about 40 miles south of Longview, Texas. My oldest sister and brother-in-law lived there several years – right behind LeTourneau College. A trip to their home always took us past the large and unusual landmark domes of LeTourneau Manufacturing. Both the college and the manufacturing were born of the mind of Robert Gilmour “R. G.” LeTourneau. As a child his name meant little to me, though later I would learn he was a well-known and well-respected Christian businessman and philanthropist.

Over 50 years later I learned the history of the “domes.” Known to me as the home of his manufacturing, the original dome was actually built in 1953 for a friend of R. G. LeTourneau – Billy Graham. The structure was built as a tabernacle to seat 12,000 for Graham’s crusades. Graham intended to ship one to England for a crusade there. However, a recent local news piece quoted a company spokesman (now owned by Komatsu Ltd.) saying that England refused to allow the structure to be erected there. “It was built specially for (the Rev.) Billy Graham. It was never supposed to be here,” unofficial company historian Dale Hardy said, explaining the American evangelist wanted a portable, 12,000-seat venue for his crusade in England during the early 1950s. “England turned him down from a permit standpoint,” Hardy said.

Nevertheless, Mr. LeTourneau apparently liked the design. The company eventually built and used five of them for the manufacturing business in Longview.

The Kilgore News Herald, June 22, 1953, p. 6

Fredonian Declaration of Independence

The Fredonian Declaration of Independence was signed December 21, 1826. Martin Parmer signed this document as President. Brother Haden and Benjamin were principal leaders. Interestingly, Parmer had only recently arrived in Nacogdoches. The rebellion and accompanying independence failed.

The Fredonian Declaration of Independence

Whereas, the Government of the Mexican United States, have by repeated insults, treachery and oppression, reduced the White and Red immigrants from the United States of North America, now living in the Province of Texas, within the Territory of the said Government, into which they have been deluded by promises solemnly made, and most basely broken, to the dreadful alternative of either submitting their freeborn necks to the yoke of an imbecile, faithless, and despotic government, miscalled a Republic; or of taking up arms in defence of their unalienable rights and asserting their Independence; They—viz:—The White emigrants now assembled in the town of Nacogdoches, around the Independent Standard, on the one part, and the Red emigrants who have espoused the same holy cause, on the other, in order to prosecute more speedily and effectually the War of independence, they have mutually undertaken, to a successful issue, and to bind themselves by the ligaments of reciprocal interests and obligations, have resolved to form a Treaty of Union, League and Confederation.

    For the illustrious object, BENJAMIN W. EDWARDS and HARMAN B. MAYO, Agents of the Committee of Independence, and RICHARD FIELDS and JOHN D. HUNTER, the Agents of the Red people, being respectively furnished with due powers, have agreed to the following Articles.

   1.   The above named contracting parties, bind themselves to a solemn Union, League and Confederation, in Peace and War, to establish and defend their mutual independence of the Mexican United States.

   2.   The contracting parties guaranty, mutually, to the extent of their power, the integrity of their respective Territories, as now agreed upon and described, viz: The Territory apportioned to the Red people, shall begin at the Sandy Spring, where Bradley's road takes off from the road leading from Nacogdoches to the Plantation of Joseph Dust, from thence West, by the Compass, without regard to variation, to the Rio Grande, thence to the head of the Rio Grande, thence with the mountains to the head of Big Red River, thence north to the boundary of the United Sates of North America, thence with the same line to the mouth of the Sulphur Fork, thence in a right line to the beginning.

   The territory apportioned to the White people, shall comprehend all the residue of the Province of Texas, and of such other portions of the Mexican United States, as the contracting parties, by their mutual efforts and resources, may render Independent, provided the same shall not extend further west than the Rio Grande.

   3.   The contracting parties mutually guaranty the rights of Empressarios to their premium lands only, and the rights of all other individuals, acquired under the Mexican Government, and relating or appertaining to the above described Territories, provided the said Empresarios and individuals do not forfeit the same by opposition to the Independence of the said Territories, or by withdrawing their aid and support to its accomplishment.

   4.   It is distinctly understood by the contracting parties, that the Territory apportioned to the Red people, is intended as well for the benefit of the Tribes now settled within the Territory apportioned to the White people, as for those living in the former Territory, and that is incumbent upon the contracting parties for the Red people to offer the said Tribes a participation in the same.

   5.   It is also mutually agreed by the contracting parties, that every individual , Red and White, swo has made improvement within either of the Respective Allied Territories and lives upon the same, shall have a fee simple of a section of land including his improvement, as well as the protection of the government under which he may reside.

   6.   The contracting parties mutually agree, that all roads, navigable streams, and all other channels of conveyance within each Territory, shall be open and free to the use of the inhabitants of the other.

   7.   The contracting parties mutually stipulate that they will direct all their resources to the prosecution of the Heaven-inspired cause which has given birth to this solemn Union, League and Confederation, firmly relying upon their united efforts, and the strong arm of Heaven, for success.

   In faith whereof the Agents of the respective contracting parties hereunto affix their names.  Done in the Town of Nacogdoches, this twenty-first day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and twenty-six.

B. W. EDWARDS

H. B. MAYO

RICHARD FIELDS

JOHN D. HUNTER

  We, the Committee of Independence, and the Committee of the Red People, do ratify the above Treaty, and do pledge ourselves to maintain it in good faith. Done on the day and date above mentioned.

MARTIN PARMER, President

RICHARD FIELDS,

JOHN D. HUNTER,

NE-KO-LAKE,

JOHN BAGS,

CUK-TO-KEH,

HADEN EDWARDS,

W. B. LEGON,

JNO. SPROWL,

B. J. THOMPSON,

JOS. A. HUBER,

B. W. EDWARDS,

H. B. MAYO.

Heedless Happy History

When researching and then relating Baptist history, one division often ignores the other as non-existent. For example, the Old North Church in Nacogdoches is often called the oldest Baptist Church or oldest existing Baptist church Texas.[i] I love the history of the Old North Church, its founder, and its families. Nevertheless, the above claim simply is not true. The Pilgrim Church at Elkhart is older, both when it was organized, when it arrived in Texas – and it still exists too.[ii] Missionary Baptists make such claims with blinders, and Primitive Baptists are more than happy to return the favor (of dismissing the historical claims of “the other side”). Even if one claims non-relation in the present, it is nevertheless not accurate regarding history. In early Texas history, it can be demonstrated from church and associational records that quite a few preachers, members, and churches moved back and forth between various factions.

In some cases, Daniel Parker would be a case in point, the move had to be sanctioned by a “restoration of order” and maybe sometimes even baptism, but in other cases where the shibboleth was not quite as strict, people moved more freely between. The old Sabine Association demonstrates this. When organized, it originally was an association made up of churches that held both “missionary” and “anti-missionary” viewpoints. Daniel Parker organized Bethel Church, one of the churches in the constitution of the Sabine Association in 1843. Thomas Hanks, who followed Daniel Parker as pastor at Pilgrim, was once a member of the Union (Old North) Church in Nacogdoches. William Sparks, before the Union Church was formed in 1838, was a deacon in the Hopewell Church in Nacogdoches County, one of the original churches in Parker’s Union Association. If I remember correctly, Bowley C. Walters (later a preacher) served as a delegate at the formation of both the Union (Parker) and Sabine Associations.  Asa Wright worked with Daniel Parker in the Union “Anti-Missionary” Baptist Association, with Isaac Reed in the Sabine “O-Missionary” Baptist Association, and with Z. N. Morrell in the Union “Missionary” Baptist Association![iii]

This may be history that both sides would prefer to forget. It is documented history, nevertheless.

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[i] For the most part historians make allowances for and differences in “continuously existed” versus “continuously met” – as in some churches may have missed regular meetings for a time, meetings were sometimes disrupted and flocks scattered in early years; but the books were kept and the church did not dissolve – so usually would still be considered a “continuous” church from its time of organization.

[ii] Pilgrim Church was organized in Illinois. In 1834 the state of Coahuila y Tejas relaxed state regulations in order to not molest a religious gathering of those who were not otherwise causing any harm. Afterwards – also in 1834 – Abner Smith and Isaac Crouch organized a Baptist Church called Providence, near Bastrop. It is often forgotten because it does not still exist today. It was the first Baptist Church organized on Texas soil.

[iii] Using terms I do not like, for effect. J. M. Carroll uses “Omissionary” (ill-advisedly, in my opinion) to refer to Isaac Reed in A History of Texas Baptists (p. 115).

“Admirers of Campbell giving us trouble”

In his documentary history Flowers and Fruits from the Wilderness (page 189), Elder Z. N. Morrell wrote of early Baptist problems in East Texas.

While in the association and among the churches west of the Brazos the admirers of Alexander Campbell were giving us trouble, the brethren east of the Trinity were suffering sorely in consequence of the anti-missionary element.[i]

Morrell would continue by writing concerning the Sabine Baptist Association, “The anti-missionary and free-will elements, went off into small and separate organizations.” Further, he notes in the minutes of the Free Will Missionary Baptist Association of October 1850, “that it met with the Ayish Bayou church, in San Augustine County, Elder G. W. Slaughter as moderator.” Morrell makes no further mention of G. W. Slaughter. Nevertheless, Slaughter abandoned the “free-will elements” and became a leading minister and missionary in the Baptist State Convention of Texas.[ii]

Morrell seems unaware that “the admirers of Alexander Campbell were giving us trouble” in East Texas as well. However, that is exactly what was happening in Sabine and San Augustine counties. The leading men appear to be Peter Eldridge and G. W. Slaughter, though joined for a time with B. E. Lucas and B. F. Burroughs. At least Slaughter and Lucas were Methodists who had been converted to Baptist views on baptism. All four were members of the Jackson Masonic Lodge near Milam near Sabine County. Jesse Witt, a recent missionary arrival to San Augustine, sensed a problem.

In the spring of 1848 Benjamin F. Burroughs asked that Southern Baptist missionary Jesse Witt assist in ordaining Slaughter and two other men, J. B. Packer and R. Meador [or Meadow]. Witt initially consented and spent the night at Slaughter’s house along with Packer and Meador and examined them. The next morning he declared that he could take no part in the ordination, “saying to them almost with tears in his eyes, that they were as rotten in doctrine as rotten could be.” He did not mean to hurt their feelings and loved them dearly as Christians, but “went back to church and preached for them with great warmth and feeling.” Much to the surprise of the church and the whole county, Witt talked with them freely about their “Open public advocacy of apostasy and open communion,” and “told them he was conscientious in the matter, and could not participate in their ordination.” Since all the church members were unfamiliar with church rules they were critical of Witt because they knew no better at the time.[iii]

Strangely, Witt nevertheless spoke of the exclusion of the open communionists from the Sabine Association in a derogatory manner. He noted this gave the “antis” a majority to control the association.

I attended the meeting of the Sabine Association last week. This body was composed of churches, some of which were missionary in sentiment, others anti-missionary, and some open communionists. The latter were excluded. This gave the anties a majority, who, forthwith declared non-fellowship with all missionaries, Masons, Sons of Temperance, &c., &c.[iv]

Witt was generally critical of East Texas churches, at least the ones with which he was familiar. He wrote, “I have not found one church, thus far, in a wholesome condition.” He found “errors in doctrine and disorder in practice.”[v] Doubtless, some of Witt’s criticisms of East Texas reflected his own prejudices. However, it will become abundantly clear that most Baptists found general disorder in the churches associated with the Eldridge-and-Slaughter faction. Eldridge and Slaughter almost united with the Campbell movement – even to the point of agreeing on “baptism for remission of sins.” At least this was the understanding of Restorationist William DeFee.

San Augustine County, Texas, July 22, 1847.

I have just returned from Shelby county, Texas—that notable place for wickedness, for “regulating,” and poisoning. Brother M. R. Withers, and myself preached on last Sunday, and we organized a church at Richard Hooper’s house. He has been a Baptist, his wife a Presbyterian; they both joined the church! The church is called Zion. It is the first Christian church ever organized in that county. We organized with 8 members—four males and four females. Several others have been immersed for the remission of sins—two on the same day. The following is the Constitution of the church, viz. –

“We, the Christians of the Church called Zion, have met together this day, the 18th of July, 1847, and give each other our hearts and hands, and all agree to take the Bible as the only infallible rule of faith and practice.”

We had a meeting twelve days ago, in Sabine county, with brothers Peter Eldridge and G. W. Slaughter, Baptist preachers, on union and creeds, and agreed to unite on “one Lord, one faith, one baptism for remission of sins.”

We want you to do all in your power to send a preacher well recommended, to set things in order. Much good might be done now in these parts.
                                      WILLIAM DEFEE.[vi]

B. F. Burroughs was carried away with the dissimulation. He later attributed his deliverance to J. R. Graves and The Baptist.

In a long and interesting private letter, Bro. B. F. Burroughs, of Leon county, Texas says he must ever thank God that The Baptist fell into his hands thirty-odd years ago, since by it he has steered clear of Campbellism, which had well nigh wrecked him.[vii]

Years earlier, in an obituary sent to The Tennessee Baptist in 1853, Burroughs explained that the Bethel Baptist Church in Sabine County, Texas in April 1850 “became in gross disorder, being lead away into the doctrines commonly known as ‘Campbellism,’ apostacy and free communion, by their pastor, Rev. Peter Eldridge, who left Barbour county, Ala., in disorder, but that fact was not known to the church then.”[viii] In May 1853, those who withdrew from Bethel Church went into the organization of the New Hope Baptist Church. What became of Bethel is unknown.

The “official” and predominant record cites the Sabine Baptist Association as “anti-missionary.” If by anti-missionary Primitive Baptist is meant, that is incorrect. If by anti-missionary the opposition to the Southern Baptist Convention and auxiliary societies of the day is understood, that is correct. The following of Eldridge and Slaughter at the time were “missionary,” as well as favoring membership in fraternal societies. In 1848, the Sabine Association ended their relationship with these preachers and churches. At the session meeting at the Hamilton Baptist Church in Shelby County in October 1848, the Hopewell and Hamilton churches brought an inquiry to the Association whether open communion would be tolerated. The Association answered:

Whereas, the Bethel Church, Sabine county, the Bayou and Milam churches, have adopted the practice of open communion, which we consider contrary to the word of God, and in direct opposition of the sentiments and practice of Baptists, and the Constitution of this Association—

     Resolved, That in conformity with the 5th Article of the Constitution of this Association, we withdraw from these churches, as heterodox in doctrine and practice.

This was followed by consideration of non-fellowship with Missionary Baptists, Free Masons, and Sons of Temperance – for all of which they declared non-fellowship.[ix]

The continuing agitations proved too much for the health of the Sabine Association, which, on recommendation of the Mt. Zion Church of Nacogdoches County, voted to dissolve at its 1849 session. Another Sabine Association – in Louisiana – but with ties back to the area of Eldridge and Slaughter, were fraught with concern over the baptisms performed by Eldridge and his “Campbellite” disciples. In their meeting in Sabine Parish in October 1854, the Big Sandy Creek Church queried:

Would it be legal for one of your churches to receive a member into fellowship, who having been baptized by Peter Eldridge, (now of Texas) or his followers, without re-baptism? Your committee, in regard to the above query, would respectfully state, that it would not be order, for we do not consider such to be really baptized, one essential element of baptism being wanting, viz: a legal administrator.  And we have reliable evidence, both from Georgia and Alabama, that he left those States in bad disorder; besides oral testimony, of his acknowledging it in this country, and he never having been restored.[x]

Despite these concerns, it is likely that the concerns became lost in the years – and that “Eldridge followers” who had been admirers of Alexander Campbell strewed their baptisms across Texas. According to Ellison, “Frontier historians James Cox and Zane Mason state that Slaughter organized more churches and ordained many deacons and more preachers than any other person in Texas.”[xi]

No longer should we think that “Z. N. Morrell and the Baptists in the West” were the only ones who had “the admirers of Alexander Campbell giving us trouble.”[xii] We anti-missionaries who some thought they were “suffering sorely in consequence of” can point the finger at the Campbellites too! We might even stick out our tongues at the “missionaries” as well. J

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[i] Flowers and Fruits from the Wilderness, page 189.

[ii] G. W.’s son, C. C. Slaughter, became a chief financier of Convention matters.

[iii] “The East Texas Baptist World of George Webb Slaughter, 1844-1852,” by Ron Ellison, citing information from Texas Baptist & Herald, March 19, 1896, p. 9.

[iv] The Southern Baptist Missionary Journal, Vol. III, No. 8, January 1849, p. 187.

[v] The Southern Baptist Missionary Journal, Vol. III, No. 1, June 1848, p. 18. In an unique twist, Witt first wrote, “Open communion had been introduced into some churches and greatly disturbed their peace. I think the practice is measurably abandoned.”

[vi] The Millennial Harbinger, Series III, Vol. IV, Alexander Campbell & W. K. Pendleton, Bethany, VA: Printed by A. Campbell, 1847, p. 534.

[vii] The Baptist, Saturday, September 4, 1880, p. 6/198.

[viii] The Tennessee Baptist, Saturday, October 29, 1853, p. 4.

[ix] Minutes of the Sabine Baptist Association, held at the Hambleton Church, Shelby county, on Friday and Saturday before the third Lord’s day in October, 1848, p. 5.

[x] A History of the Baptists of Louisiana, Paxton, p. 396; See also The Tennessee Baptist, Saturday, December 2, 1854, p. 4. The report to The Tennessee Baptist states, “the following is a true copy of the report as handed into the Association from the committee on documents” and bears some minor differences from the text printed by Paxton. It also mentions that the report of the committee was “unanimously adopted.”

[xi] “The East Texas Baptist World of George Webb Slaughter, 1844-1852,” p. 37. Though admitting he did not have full access to the facts, W. E. Paxton stated concerned the Sabine (Louisiana) Association report: “Our best authorities agree that the fact of his being an impostor and an excluded person, would not necessarily invalidate his acts if authorized by an orderly church.”

[xii] It seems in East Texas that those in the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement had a church organized before any Baptists, other than the Pilgrim Church brought from Illinois to Texas. The state historical marker at Antioch Church near San Augustine says that the Antioch Church of Christ began in 1836. “William P. DeFee, a medical doctor, arrived in Texas in 1833 and began preaching in homes. In 1836 he began this congregation. They met in a dirt-floored, log building on Rhoddy Anthony’s property. The name Antioch was chosen because the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch. Anthony was selected elder and served for 50 years. About 1870 a new sanctuary was built on this land belonging to Stephen Passmore. The building served as a schoolhouse and community meeting place. This structure was completed in 1938.”

Fleeing U.S. for Texas

In its early days, Texas (the Mexican state and the Republic of Texas nation) was a place of escape for some folks fleeing the United States who wanted to leave their past behind. Some availed of the opportunity and made new lives. Others could not or did not outrun their past.

The missionary Baptists had three notorious “bandits” who escaped the law in the United States by fleeing to Mexican Texas: Thomas Washington Cox, Peter Eldridge, and David Lewis. Z. N. Morrell suggests the same for Robert G. Green, of a more anti-missionary flavor. At least Green apparently wound up derelict, as far as Morrell knew.[i]

Cox helped found the first Baptist Association in Texas, then flew the Baptist coop to the Campbellite Restoration movement – finally, quitting preaching altogether.[ii] Eldridge adopted apostasy and open communion, probably destroying several churches in the Sabine and San Augustine counties region.[iii] His violations were egregious to the point that associations discussed the propriety of churches even receiving members who were baptized by Eldridge – but eventually he made a happy reconciliation with the Southern Baptists.[iv] Lewis failed in Indian missions and helped split the Sabine Baptist Association, before moving on to be a state missionary for the Baptist State Convention of Texas. He then disappeared to who knows where.

For most, other than historians and genealogists, these names are long unnoticed and forgotten. Nevertheless, they are integral parts of the founding of the Baptist churches in the state of Texas.

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[i] Green arrived Texas in 1838, and helped organize two or three churches. He was soon overtaken by “John Barleycorn,” as Morrell puts it. Flowers and Fruits from the Wilderness, Z. N. Morrell, pp. 200-201.

[ii] Rev. T. W. Cox in A History of the Rise and Progress of the Baptists in Alabama, Hosea Holcombe, pp. 71, 148-149, 232, 254. See also, “Texas Baptists, Their Beginnings” in the Jacksboro Gazette, Thursday, November 19, 1908, p. 2.

[iii] In July of 1847, Campbellite minister William DeFee wrote the The Millennial Harbinger that we “had a meeting twelve days ago, in Sabine county, with brother Peter Eldridge and G. W. Slaughter, Baptist preachers, on union and creeds, and agreed to unite on ‘one Lord, one faith, one baptism for remission of sins.’” (Series III, Vol. IV, A. Campbell and W. K. Pendleton, Bethany, VA: Printed by A. Campbell, 1847.) Slaughter went on to become an extremely popular minister in the Baptist State Convention of Texas. Eldridge and Slaughter clearly headed toward the Campbellite position, but apparently drew back at the last.

[iv] The Tennessee Baptist, Saturday, December 2, 1854, p. 4.

Elder Levi A. Durham

Levi Allen Durham 

Levi Allen Durham was born February 27, 1792 in Montgomery County, North Carolina, to Thomas Durham and Rebecca Allen. His father Thomas was pastor at Jersey Settlement, Rowan, North Carolina in 1803, but was pastoring in Tennessee by 1808.[i] Levi married Elizabeth Harwick (or Hardwick) circa 1820, and they had at least nine children.[ii] He was ordained by the Brush Creek Church, Smith County, Tennessee, in 1827, moved to Mississippi in 1835, and arrived in Texas by around 1838. Levi A. Durham died in Texas (probably Jasper County) on October 7, 1846. As Grime wrote in 1902, “where his dust sleeps, we do not know.” Sometime after his death, Elizabeth married widower Hilliard Durdin. She is buried at the Tidwell Cemetery near Thornton in Limestone County, Texas.

From History of Middle Tennessee Baptists, by J. H. Grime, pages 185-186.

The subject of this sketch was the son of the lamented Elder Thomas Durham.

As to the date of his birth and early life, we have no means of knowing, further than that he was brought up on a farm situated at the southern limits of the present town of Hickman [Hickman Co., Tennessee, rlv], the home of his father during his stay in Tennessee. After entering into life for himself he became a member of Brush Creek Church, and it was under her watch-care that he began the ministry. He was ordained to the ministry by this church in June 1827, by the following Presbytery, viz.: Elders John Jones, Cantrel Bethel, Presley Lester, H. W. Pickett, Miles West and Thomas Hooker. Though young in years, he was soon reckoned among the leading ministers of his time and section. Such was his fame that people would come for a score of miles to wait on his ministry. Soon after his ordination he was called to the care of Round Lick and Hickman’s Creek Churches, and probably others. In doctrine he was a strong Calvinist, emphasizing the doctrine of God’s sovereign electing grace. He was an important factor in the work of the Association as long as he remained in the State, once preaching the introductory sermon and once acting as moderator.

In the spring of 1835 he resigned his charges and moved to the State of Mississippi, where the curtain falls, and his name is lost. Where he fell and where his dust sleeps, we do not know. But in the morning of the resurrection, when God shall gather his elect from the four winds, we shall see this noble saint of the Lord and hear him tell with a new tongue the victories of the cross.

From Flowers and Fruits from the Wilderness, by Z. N. Morrell, pages 190-191.

In 1844, a convention was called by the regular Predestinarian Baptists of the East, which met with the Antioch church, in Jasper County, on the eighth day of November. Five churches were represented in this convention, viz.: — Antioch, Louisiana; and Salem, Antioch, Harmony and Mount Olive, Texas. This convention appointed, the same day, a committee to report articles of faith and a constitution, which report was read and adopted on the morning of the ninth. The caption of the report read as follows: — “The Articles of Faith of the Louisiana and Texas Regular Predestinarian Baptist Association.”

Elder Levi A. Durham was their first moderator. He was a man of great originality; thought strictly for himself on all questions of theology, and boldly preached what he believed. I have met but few men in life so well versed in the Scriptures. He was a man full of zeal in advocating his views, and during my intercourse with him, I was favorably impressed with his personal piety. In 1845, about a year after the organization just alluded to, I met him at Owensville, in Robinson County, during the session of the court, brother R.E.B. Baylor presiding as judge. We preached alternately for several nights, and in these sermons discussed fully those points of doctrine relative to which we differed. The judge and the bar manifested much interest in this discussion, giving us their regular and earnest attention. Elder Durham opposed, with all his might, all secret organizations, benevolent societies, and missionary boards, giving his special attention to Baptist organizations that granted membership upon a moneyed basis. While he thus opposed the plans upon which we proposed to send missionaries into destitute fields, in the very midst of his opposition he would occasionally manifest as earnest a missionary spirit as those who clamored loudly for boards and money. He was not opposed to spreading the gospel, but the plan upon which we proposed to do it. That the association over which he presided should oppose missionary organizations, we would naturally expect. The eleventh article of its constitution reads as follows: — “Having for years past viewed the distress that the following institutions or societies have brought upon the churches, that is to say, Missionary Effort Societies, Bible, Baptist State Conventions, Temperance, Sunday-school Unions, Tract, Ministerial, Education Societies, and, in a word, all the human combinations and societies of the day, set up in order to advance the Redeemer’s kingdom, as inimical to the peace of Zion, and calculated in their nature to cause schism; we therefore declare non-fellowship with all such.”

The sixth annual meeting of this body makes a showing upon its minutes of only six churches, with a total membership of seventy-three; Elder B. Garlington, moderator. The minutes of its tenth session, held with Salem church, Tyler County, show the same number of churches, and a smaller membership; Elder R. F. Gibson, moderator. It is painful thus to witness the decline of churches, over which good and true men have the oversight. But as Christ when on earth was led by a mission spirit, and infused the same into his early followers, we should ever be impressed with the great truth that the Christian spirit is aggressive and consequently missionary.

After his ordination in 1827,[iii] Levi A. Durham pastored Round Lick Church near Watertown, twelve miles east of Lebanon, Wilson County, Tennessee, 1827-1835.[iv] He pastored Hickman’s Creek at Hickman, Smith County, Tennessee, during this period, but the exact dates are unknown.[v] He probably pastored other churches. He preached at and served as moderator of the Salem Association. In 1835, he moved to Mississippi.[vi] Currently we have no record of his service there, and his stay there must have been brief. If the accuracy of the 1850 Jasper County, Texas census can be trusted, his daughter Joicy was born Texas about 1838 – indicating the Durham family had arrived in Texas by that time.

Laboring in Texas, Levi A. Durham sided with the so-called “anti-missions” movement. In his record, Morrell admits that Durham “was not opposed to spreading the gospel, but the plan upon which we proposed to do it.” He led in and was the first moderator of the Louisiana and Texas Regular Predestinarian Baptist Association. On March 11, 1846, Elder Durham penned an intriguing letter to the editors of The Primitive Baptist. In it he says there “are two little Associations of the Regular Predestinarian Primitive Baptists, in this country” (Union, the other) and that there “are but two preachers of that faith and order” in the bounds of the Louisiana and Texas Association (Durham and R. T. Gibson) “and they live a hundred miles apart.”[vii] At the time of his death, Levi A. Durham pastored both Antioch churches in this association – one in Louisiana and one in Texas.[viii]

His labours ended his trials past; he has reached his home at last.

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[i] The Baptist (Nashville, Tennessee) Saturday February 13, 1847, page 11/395. Thomas Durham baptized John Wiseman, of whom Grime wrote, “Perhaps the name of no man is more cherished by the Baptists of Middle Tennessee than that of John Wiseman.”

[ii] Levi was appointed postmaster of New Durham, Smith, Tennessee, January 10, 1834.

[iii] Durham was ordained by the Brush Creek Church, by a presbytery consisting of John Jones, Cantrel Bethel, Presley Lester, H. W. Pickett, Miles West and Thomas Hooker.

[iv] History of Middle Tennessee Baptists, p. 41.

[v] History of Middle Tennessee Baptists, pp. 56-57.

[vi] The 1850 census gives the birth of daughter America as Tennessee about 1836. However, the 1860 census says she was born in Mississippi, which corresponds with Grime’s account.

[vii] The Primitive Baptist, Volume 11, No. 6, Saturday, June 6, 1846, pp. 83-86.

[viii] Letter (dated Aug. 7, 1847) from Alfred Lyons to the editors of The Primitive Baptist, Volume 11, No. 22, Saturday, October 2, 1847 pp. 350-351. Lyons mentions Durham “died in a few days after” the meeting of the Association in 1846.