Mt. Moriah celebrates 197 years II
BY MARY ALICE CARMICHAEL
HISTORY LONG AGO AND RECENT:
This “little church that refused to die” has had no pastor since Rev. Wm. H. Kamplain served as the last pastor from 1940 to 1941 where he preached his last sermon.
It has not had a single enrolled living member for 54 years when the last enrolled member, Rose Fitzgerald Luckie (Mrs. Claude Luckie) died in 1971.
Its records (text and spelling will be verbatim) and begin: “Fellowship Church Book, May 2, 1828. The founders’ names are: Presbytery: Thomas Trowel, Elias Brown, George W. Nolen; Kedar Hawthorn (Minst). Martha Hawthorn, Leonard Scott (Deacon), Lucinda Scott, Dabney Palmer, Clarissa Palmer, Joel Baggot, Jane Baggot, and Sawney a Col. man of D. Palmer. [Names of several of these founders had long been known as church planters in that area.]
Fast forward 19 years from the 1828 founding to 1847. James K. Polk, (D- TN) was President of the US and there were other significant events that year.
The Capture of Mexico City by U.S. troops during the Mexican-American War and the renaming of the little village near Mt. Moriah that is now called Monterey; the first sale of Samuel Colt’s revolvers to the U. S. government; the great famine continued in Ireland, impacting many lives. Yerba Buena was renamed San Francisco; the United States issued its first postage stamps and Jessee James was born in Missouri.
California became a Territory and John C. Fremont became Governor; the first group of rescuers reached the Donner Party. In addition, the American Medical Association was founded in Philadelphia; Sir James Young Simpson, a British physician, discovered the anesthetic properties of chloroform, and Jefferson Davis was elected to the U.S. Senate in his first political post.
By 1847, 19 years after its founding, new church members from Butler and Wilcox counties as well as from nearby Lowndes, Monroe and Conecuh Counties, had been flocking for some time to this newest “planted” church with their baptisms taking place in a hillside spring behind the church.
The membership had expanded to the point that the Moderator, Kedar Hawthorn announced at the March 6, 1847 Conference: “Resolved that we make an effort to build a meeting house at this place & that J. R. Yeldell, Thomas Jefferson Sen., &Jno B. Scott each have a Subscriptin [sic] for the purpose of raising funds for said house, which are considered due in May 1848.”
For the next year, committees with different responsibilities were selected; In April 1847 five men were appointed Building Committee: Thomas Jefferson, Sr., Jno. Scott, J. J. Thigpen, James Scott &Jno. B. Scott.
In June, the “Brothers” of the church were “authorized to letting of the meeting house to the highest bidder which was accomplished with the “subscription payable in Jan. 1849.”
In January 1848, Br. James Scott was authorized to advertise and sell the old meeting house. By Feb. 5, 1848 the new Meeting House was finished, completely free of debt.
But … “by motion a committee of three brethren be appointed to suppress any disorder that might occur about the Meeting House …” with “brthrs [sic], Jno Snell, Jno W. Campbell &Jno. B. Scott to serve until others are appointed.” In August, “brJno. W. Leslie” was appointed to fill the vacancy of brJno W. Campbell.
Fast forward ten years to Nov. 7, 1857: a committee of “br. W. salter, J. R. Yeldell, and J. B. Scott appointed to have some Repairs done to the meeting house,” which was immediately accomplished.
Fast forward again: between the time the “new church” had been built and worshiped in with both its white and black members, 1828-1861, the world of our country had exploded with major violent upheavals, wreaking havoc on many and freedom on others.
The change had major upheavals for all, and unbelievable “learning curves” for both as they tried to adjust to the “new life.”
The list that is attached below was created before the whirlwind of changes began and added to as time went by.
Much of it is prior to 1848, but the changes made with the bloody conflict of the War Between the States (so named in 1872 by an Act of Congress), the July 1, 1863 Emancipation Proclamation, declared by President of the US, Abraham Lincoln; the April 9, 1865 surrender of General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House; and the official conclusion with President Andrew Johnnson’s proclamation, on August 20, 1866 after all Confederate forces had surrendered.
The former Black members of the Church can be noticed in the list as having left the “Fellowship” Church of their previous owners in 1867, at the final conclusion of the War.
(to be cont’)
