USA > Missouri > A History of Northeast Missouri, Volume I > Part 17
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* This department of matter contributed includes "A Hundred Years of Metho- dism in Missouri," by Bishop E. R. Hendrix, and sketches of some Methodist people closely identified with Northeast Missouri. The writer has drawn largely from "The Centennial Volume of Missouri Methodism," the copyright to which he holds, and permission for the use of the same is hereby given for this History of Northeast Missouri. Much more could be added, but I have exceeded the space allotted already, in all probability .- Contributing Editor.
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conference embraced what are now the states of Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, to say nothing of Arkansas and Missouri, which were taken in that year. There were in it five districts, some embracing more than one state. Strong men belonged to the Western conference, which never had a western boundary except the Day of Judgment. The General conference was content with simply naming the eastern, southern and northern boundaries, so as not to interfere with other conference lines, and gave the Western con- ference all west to the setting sun and everything beyond it, if the itinerant wanted to go there. The Western conference was a name never absent from the annals of Methodism for a long period at a time and even when it disappeared at the last session of our General confer- ence the name still survived by request in the "Western district." Among the honored names on the roll in 1806, when John Travis was appointed to the Missouri circuit, were those of William McKendree, James Axley, Jesse Walker, Peter Cartwright and Learner Blackman.
After a year's work in the territory of Missouri, so recently acquired as part of the famous Louisiana purchase, John Travis reported in the fall of 1807 at the Western conference, which met at Chillicothe, Ohio, that he had organized two circuits, one north of the Missouri river, which he called the Missouri circuit, and one south, that he called the Meramec circuit, and that, together, they numbered one hundred and six mem- bers. Travis ever had a warm place in his heart for this, his first work, for he had just been admitted on trial when appointed to it. He returned from his remote appointment in the Mississippi district the next year to attend a camp meeting near St. Louis, in company with William McKendree and Jesse Walker, who walked forty-five miles to reach here. That was a notable company of preachers at the first camp meet- ing held in Missouri, and where they witnessed forty conversions. Mc- Kendree had been an officer in the Revolutionary war and was present at the surrender of Cornwallis, and as the first native-born American bishop, was to become its Chief Justice Marshall as well, the expounder of its constitution. Jesse Walker, who succeeded - Travis as preacher in charge of the Missouri circuit, was the Daniel Boone of Methodism, of whom it was said, "He was never lost and never complained," de- lighting to go where no white man had gone before him, a hero who, in the midst of the dense Romanist conditions of the Spanish and French population, was to pray St. Louis Methodism into existence nearly four -. teen years after Travis began his work in the country. It was the privilege of Jesse Walker also to plant Methodism in Chicago. John Travis was a fearless man of vigorous mind who, after nine years of itinerant service, married and located, practicing medicine in Kentucky until some fourteen years before his death, when he became totally blind, still doing service as a local preacher and thrilling all in public and private with the story of his itinerant life.
Not until 1814 was the "Missouri district" formed, with 804 mem- bers, and two years later the General conference in Baltimore created the "Missouri conference," bounded on the north by the Ohio confer- ence, on the east by the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, on the south by the Arkansas river, and on the west by nothing. In 1819 the first substan- tial and finished Methodist church ever erected in Missouri was built in Cape Girardeau county, two miles from Jackson; and here was held the first session of the Missouri conference that was ever held within the present limits of the state, Bishop George presiding.
When Missouri was admitted as a state in 1821, it had a population of 66,518, of whom 10,222 were slaves. The Methodists numbered 1,543. It was not until 1836 that the Missouri conference was confined to the
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limits of the state. The first General conference of the Methodist Epis- copal Church, South, divided the state into two conferences, so that the name "Missouri conference" was given to all that part of the state north of the Missouri river, as today. In the Methodist family there are now nearly 200,000 Missouri Methodists.
One of the principal agents in the planting of Methodism in Mis- souri, William McKendree, in whose district the whole territory of Missouri was placed at the session of the Western conference, in 1806, lived to preside over some four sessions of the Missouri conference, the last as late as 1824, eight years after the death of Asbury. Bishop Asbury, with a rare sagacity in selecting leaders, had sent McKendree in 1801 across the mountains from his native Virginia to be presiding elder of the Kentucky district and to have a sort of general superintend- ence of the large Western conference. Always in the van and on the firing line, MeKendree was chosen again by Asbury, in 1806, to preside over the new district, which was to embrace all the inhabited part of the Louisiana purchase, it being attached to the Cumberland district, which included much of middle Tennessee and some of Illinois. Mc- Kendree was a man of genius, to whom the conquest of the Mississippi valley for Christ is largely due, and the numerous "McKendree" churches and chapels, reaching from Missouri to the Atlantic seaboard, are the monuments of his labors in many states that were only territories in his day.
But what shall we say of Francis Asbury, who, like Moses, looked . over into the promised land, so recently acquired from France and Spain, but himself never entered it. His heart was ever with his "beloved Mckendree" as he fondly called him. At the session of the Western conference, where he presided in 1806, and appointed the first preacher to the Missouri circuit, his journal records with zeal for the frontier work in these simple words: "The brethren were in want, so I parted with my watch, my coat, and my shirt." We naturally ask what did he have left out of his $64 a year salary. Who can question that his heart went with his gift ? "Silver and gold I have none," well might this apostle say, "but such as I have give I unto thee." We claim Asbury, too, as among the founders of Methodism on this side of the Mississippi. "In diligent activity no apostle, no missionary, no war- rior, ever surpassed him. He rivalled Melancthon and Luther in bold- ness. He combined the enthusiasm of Xavier, with the far-reaching foresight and keen discrimination of Wesley." His mantle fell upon McKendree, who survived him nearly twenty years, but their names are inseparable, as was their work. "My fathers, my fathers, the chariots of Israel and the horsesmen thereof !"
Honored names are they of ministers and laymen who, during the past hundred years, have been connected with Methodism in Missouri. Some have become bishops of the church and educators and editors, and some have been governors and United States senators and members of congress. Others without public office have been the foremost citizens of their counties, always interested in every good word and work. Large gifts have come to our Methodism from those not of our communion in the belief that we would wisely administer them. The largest is a bequest by the late Robert A. Barnes of St. Louis, who married Miss Louise De Mun, a daughter of a leading Roman Catholic family, who was in hearty sympathy with him in his purpose to found a great hospital under Methodist auspices. For this there has already been purchased the finest site in St. Louis, having a frontage of some 1,200 feet on Forest Park, and it is, the intention of the trustees to retain not less
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than $1,000,000 of the bequest as an endowment after completing and equipping the best hospital of its kind in the land.
METHODIST LEADERS
The sketches of twenty-five Methodists, ministers and laymen, repre- senting the church in Northeast Missouri had been selected for publi- cation in this chapter. The limitations of space compel the omission of sketches of the Rev. Dr. Joseph Henry Pritchett, Prof. Richard Thompson Bond, David Kyle Pitman, the Rev. Moses Upshard Payne, Thomas Shackleford, the Rev. Dr. William F. McMurry, Prof. T. Berry Smith, the Rev. William B. Wheeler, the Rev. Jesse Andrew Wailes, the Rev. Solomon Harman Milam, William Omar Gray, Arthur Ferdinand Davis, the Rev. Charles Bernand Duncan, the Rev. Howard Lorenzo Davis, the Rev. Wesley W. McMurry, Judge Lloyd H. Herring, the
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POLY
BIBLE
ENOCH M. MARVIN, D.D. L.L.D.
Rev. Dr. J. P. Nolan, the Rev. Dr. O. E. Brown, Thomas E. Thompson, William McMurray, John J. Hewitt and Prince Dimmitt. Sketches are appended, however, of the two great bishops of the Methodist church, Enoch M. Marvin and Eugene R. Hendrix, whom Northeast Missouri has given to the world.
BISHOP ENOCH MATHER MARVIN
Enoch Mather Marvin was born in Warren county, Missouri, June 12, 1823. Catherine Mather was the mother of his grandfather, Enoch Marvin. Both families were of English descent, Reinold Marvin, who came to America about 1637 from Essex county, was baptized in St. Mary's church, Great Bently Parish, England, June 7, 1593. This old church was built in 1089 by Alberic de Vere, a favorite of William the Conqueror, and founder of the family long enjoying the title of Earl of Oxford. At first a private chapel, it came at last by successive as- signments under the patronage of the Bishops of St. Albans. Here
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many of our ancestors worshiped and their bones rest about its conse- crated walls.
Amid the rude surroundings of a Missouri farm near a century ago Enoch Mather Marvin was reared. His parents were lovers of learning and he early evinced a longing for books. Awake to nature, too, every voice of earth or sky struck a responsive chord in his sensitive soul. In person tall and angular, long of neck and limb, leaning forward as he walked; large feet, slender white hands, pale face, rather high cheek bones, eye between hazel and gray, slightly drooping eyelids, black hair, high forehead, voice full and deep, yet mellow.
His mental grasp was quick, strong, comprehensive; the organizing and executive faculties were not wanting. Both the analytic and syn- thetic seemed to be the natural mode of his mind's working and his contemplative disposition carried him into the highest regions of human thought.
At times his preaching became rapturous and was laden with a strange, magnetic influence that cannot be described and a pathos whose power was irresistible; yet all the while one felt that his thoughts had been guided by a sober judgment and his emotions had not borne him beyond the limits of self-control. His imaginative powers he kept under strict surveillance and in his most enthusiastic moods was economical with language. Betrayed into no wild flights of fluent fancy, he packed his thoughts into the fewest words and every sentence became a glowing picture.
In the social circle his rich humor often gave forth "flashes of merri- ment that were wont to set the table on a roar." Too sincere to be adroit, he yet, in his dealing with men, avoided many difficulties by a tact that was born of love.
For family and friends he would have given his life; to an enemy generous, yet prompt to condemn what he thought unjust and, while sensitive to a wrong, he was above retaliation.
Unselfishly and humbly, yet faithfully and fearlessly he sought to do his life work. His love for God and men was the heart-throb of his being and the flame of his zeal consumed his life. Stricken with pneu- monia at his home in St. Louis, he sank gently into his last sleep about 4 o'clock on Monday morning, November 26, 1877.
Perhaps the greatest work of his useful life was what he did for Central College, Fayette, Missouri.
BISHOP EUGENE RUSSELL HENDRIX
Bishop Eugene Russell Hendrix was born in Fayette, Missouri, May 17, 1847. He was born and reared in a Methodist home, both parents, Adam Hendrix and Isabel J. Hendrix, being members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. He was converted during a great revival held in Fayette, Missouri, March 14, 1859, and joined the church the same date under the ministry of the Rev. S. W. Cope. He was the first penitent in the great revival held at Fayette that spring; he had been under conviction since the previous spring, but supposed he was too young to ask for the prayers of the church; his mother knelt by him as he gave his heart to God. His religious life was deeply quickened when he felt called to preach the Gospel and his life as a student for forty-five years has led him ever nearer to God. He was licensed to preach in Middletown, Connecticut, when a student at the Wesleyan University from 1864 to 1867 the Rev. J. J. Pegg being the preacher in charge. He was recommended for admission on trial by the Quarterly conference at Leavenworth, Kansas, where he was serving as a supply
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in the summer of 1869, and was received into the Missouri conference in 1869, the Rev. W. M. Rush, D. D., presiding elder, and Bishop Geo. F. Pierce, presiding. He was ordained deacon by Bishop Pierce in his room at Chillicothe, Missouri, in 1869, the Bishop being unable to preach or attend the public services on that day; was ordained elder by Bishop H. N. McTyeire in September, 1870, at Leavenworth, Kansas. The appointments filled are : Leavenworth, Kansas, 1869-1870; Macon, Mis- souri, 1870-1872; Francis street, St. Joseph, Missouri, 1872-1876. Mis- sionary tour around the world, 1876-1877; Glasgow, Missouri, 1877-1878. President of Central College from 1878 to 1886. Elected and ordained Bishop in 1886. Several hundred persons were received into the church under his ministry while pastor from 1869 to 1878 and he has ordained more than one thousand deacons and elders. He attended Central Col- lege until it was suspended during the Civil war, then the Wesleyan University at Middletown, Connecticut, where he was graduated in 1867; he attended also the Union Theological Seminary, New York, graduat- ing from there in 1869. He was married to Miss Anne E. Scarritt, June 20, 1872, and his children are : Mrs. Evangeline I. Waring, Mrs. Mary M. Simpson, Nathan Scarritt Hendrix and Helen C. Hendrix. He considers the founding of the Korean Mission as being possibly the most important event in his life.
PRESBYTERIANS AND PRESBYTERIANISM . By the Rev. John F. Cowan, D. D., Fulton
The first preaching of the gospel of Christ by Presbyterians in Mis- souri was in the year 1814, in the town of St. Louis, nearly a century ago. The Rev. S. J. Mills and the Rev. Daniel Smith, Bible agents from the East, visited the little city, sold Bibles and preached as they had opportunity.
The first organized body of Presbyterians in Missouri was the Church of Bellevue in Washington county. This church was organized by the Rev. Salmon Giddings on the 3d of August, 1816. There were thirty members.
The second church organized was also by Mr. Giddings. The organ- ization took place on October 6, 1816. It had sixteen members. This was in St. Louis county and it was given the name of Bonhomme.
The third church organized in Missouri was in the city of St. Louis on November 15, 1817. It had nine members and the organizer was the Rev. Salmon Giddings.
The fourth church, also organized by Mr. Giddings, bore the name of Union Church of Richwoods. It was organized in Washington county on April 17, 1818, and was composed of seven members.
The fifth church was called the First Church of St. Charles and was organized on August 29, 1818, by the Rev. Salmon Giddings and the Rev. John Matthews. The organization of this church marks the date and act of Presbyterianism entering Northeast Missouri.
The beginning of Presbyterian church courts in Missouri was on this wise. The Presbytery of West Tennessee petitioned the Synod of Tennesse, meeting in Nashville October 4, 1817, that a new presby- tery to be called the Presbytery of Missouri be erected and that it hold its first meeting in St. Louis the third Thursday of November follow- ing; that the Revs. Thomas Donnell, John Matthews, Salmon Giddings and Timothy Flint be its initial members; and that the dividing line between the Presbytery of West Tennessee and the Presbytery of Mis- souri be the Mississippi river. When this set time came Donnell and
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Giddings were present, with Ruling Elder John Cunningham from Bonhomme Church, but Matthews and Flint, remote and busy at their work, had not even so much as heard that there was to be a Presbytery of Missouri. So the time was postponed to the third Thursday of December and word was sent to these absent brethren. Mr. Donnell had ridden eighty miles to attend the meeting and was, no doubt, greatly disappointed, but four weeks later he was back again. He and my father were neighbors, only seventy-five miles apart, and helped each other on communion occasions and protracted meetings, unterrified by rain or mud and swam boldly the swollen, bridgeless streams that op- posed their progress. Brother Matthews was present, with Mr. Giddings and Elder Stephen Hempstead of St. Louis church, and then and there the Presbytery of Missouri was constituted and organized Presbyterian- ism made its entrance into Missouri.
The presbytery as thus constituted embraced territorially not only the whole of Missouri but also the western half of the state of Illinois. The presbytery, as appears from the records, was a constituent part of the Synod of Indiana and later of the Synod of Illinois. As a matter of fact, the Presbytery of Missouri grew for a time eastward and not westward. Its meetings not unfrequently were held in Illinois and at least twelve churches in Illinois were on its roll, having been organized by its ministers. In 1828 the Synod of Illinois was erected by the General Assembly, the Presbytery of Missouri being a constituent part of it.
In 1831 the Presbytery of Missouri was erected into a synod and divided into three presbyteries-the Presbytery of St. Louis, embrac- ing all the state south of the Missouri river; the Presbytery of St. Charles, embracing all the state north of said river to the Iowa line and all east of the eastern boundary of Callaway county and a line running from it north to the Iowa line; and the Presbytery of Missouri, embrac- ing all west of the eastern line of Callaway county and north of the Missouri river.
By agreement at the first meeting of the little presbytery, November, 1817, it was agreed that the Rev. Mr. Giddings should spend half his time at Bonhomme, Florissant and Bellfontaine during the winter and the other half in St. Louis. The Rev. Thomas Donnell agreed to spend his time in Bellevue and Mine a Burton. The Rev. John Matthews was to spend half his time at Buffalo in Pike, where his home was, and the other half in the neighboring settlements.
A church was organized in Pike county in 1818. As it is not on any list kept in the records of this little presbytery, it is evidence that it was organized by the Cumberlands. It was still in their keeping until their union, in 1907, with the Presbyterian church, U. S. A. Its name is Antioch.
In April. 1819, while the little presbytery was meeting at the house of the Rev. Mr. Matthews in Pike county, they were joined by the Rev. David Tenny and the Rev. Charles S. Robinson, missionaries sent out from Philadelphia. Things that are cheering and those that are dis- couraging are close together in this life. At this presbytery the Rev. Mr. Flint asked for his letter of dismission to Illinois and it was given.
The Rev. C. S. Robinson was asked to take charge of the church at St. Charles and the surrounding country. He soon organized the Dar- denne church, which has been a shining light ever since, save in a very few dark days, as shown by the records. The writer would like to blot out the records of all church trials. The next move of the little presby- tery was down into Washington county to Richwoods church and to
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worry through a disagreeable trial in which a woman was accused and acquitted.
It will be noticed that for several years no other churches were organized in north Missouri, but the records show that these men were at work over in Illinois. The church of Auburn in Pike county was organized in 1822. The Rev. Jesse Townsend, from the Presbytery of Geneva in New York, joined the presbytery in 1824. John A. Ball was, at his request, taken under the care of the presbytery as a licentiate. This man was a Virginian, an educated lawyer. He had commanded a Virginia regiment in the War of 1812 and was always called Colonel. In 1815 he had settled in the Bonhomme neighborhood and was at one time a representative in the state legislature. Mr. Ball was licensed and ordained as an evangelist. He organized the church at Salem on Big river and also took part in the organization of the church at Troy in Lincoln county. He was stated supply in several churches and was a good and useful man. He died near Buffalo in Pike county, April 12, 1849. At the same meeting of the presbytery in which Mr. Ball was made licentiate, William S. Lacy, a licentiate from Virginia, was received and ordained. He took charge of the Dardenne church and was a useful man. He was the father of the Rev. Beverly Tucker Lacy, D. D., who came to St. Louis to become pastor of one of its churches and afterward was for several years synodical evangelist and still later was pastor of the Mexico church and later of California church.
In 1828 the church of Ashley, in Pike county, was organized. Cyrus L. Watson offered himself as a candidate for the gospel ministry. His first examination was in English grammar, arithmetic and Latin. The subjects assigned him for study were: Thesis, on the Being of God, geography, rhetoric, church history, natural philosophy and evidences of Christianity. He was later dismissed to Illinois. The criticism made on the presbytery's book at synod was that it contained "bad orthog- raphy" and then the critic wrote the word "corryspondingly" (cor- respondingly ).
In 1828 the Rev. Salmon Giddings died and later in the year the Rev. Charles S. Robinson died. The presbytery ordered crepe to be worn on the arm for one month. With Giddings and Robinson dead, with Hollister and Flint and Birch over in Illinois, with Ball and Don- nell and Tenny in south Missouri, matters began to look discouraging. But just then new and splendid workers began to come in. W. P. Cochran. a licentiate of the Presbytery of Huntington, was received and ordained as an evangelist. He was a man of great energy, who did a vast amount of evangelistic work, organized many churches and lived long after his early fellow-workers had passed away. The Rev. Thomas P. Durfee also was a man who was not afraid to work. In this year came also licentiate William S. Potts, who was installed as pastor in St. Louis and later was made president of Marion College.
In Northeast Missouri the churches belonging to the Synod of Mis- souri, U. S., number fifty-two. In this same part of the state the churches belonging to the Synod of Missouri, U. S. A., number 118, that church having gathered into its fold the churches of the former New School and the churches of the former Cumberland body. These churches shall be given with no distinction, except as to the date of organization, and the name of the county in which they are situated.
In 1829 the working force of ministers was increased by the arrival of the Rev. R. L. McAfee from Kentucky, of the Rev. David Nelson from Tennessee, of the Rev. Benjamin F. Hoxie from New England, of the Rev. Alfred Wright, the Rev. Cyrus Nichols and the Rev. George Wood from the East.
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June 1, 1828, the Rev. Thomas P. Durfee organized Auxvasse church in Callaway county. He was its pastor for three years.
In June, 1828, the Rev. W. P. Cochran organized Fayette church in Howard county. Because there was no one to look after it, it soon died. In February, 1843, the Rev. W. W. Robertson and the Rev. R. L. McAfee visited the town, preached and reorganized the church. The church was put under the care of the Rev. David Coulter, who gave it half of
THE REV. W. P. COCHRAN, PIONEER PRESBYTERIAN
his time and the other half he gave to Rocheport. There was no growth, but a loss of members, and the Rev. Mr. Coulter was compelled to go elsewhere for support. The church was then put under the care of the Rev. C. D. Simpson, who preached to it once a month for a while. Again the church died. Four times after this the presbytery appointed a com- mittee to reorganize the church, if the way was clear. It was always reported that the way was not clear and so it remains to this day.
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