USA > Virginia > City of Staunton > City of Staunton > The First Presbyterian Church, Staunton, Virginia > Part 21
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The Parish Church was without a rector and without adherents 1
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after the Revolutionary War, and was occasionally occupied by other denominations, especially Presbyterians of whom a small number lived in the town. But let us go back to the beginning.
According to the common belief, white people first settled in the country around the site of Staunton, in the year 1732. They were natives of the Province of Ulster, Ireland, descendants of people from Scotland, and therefore, have been called Scotch-Irish.
They were generally plain, hard-working people; a few of them had been merchants in a small way; others were mechanics; and most of them were cultivators of the soil. They had fled from their native land on account of some degree of religious persecution and hard times there generally, and came here to enjoy freedom of worship and to eke out a livelihood as farmers and graziers. Most of them, if not all, landed on the Delaware River, in Pennsylvania, and in coming to this wilderness region crossed the Potomac River probably near the site of Shepherdstown, Jefferson County. From the necessity of the case their first care was to provide shelter from the weather, and for several years they were occupied in building rude cabins and in clearing the land for cultivation. They cannot be accused of dispossessing the Indians of their land as no Indians then had villages or wigwams in this region. It is not likely that all of them were genuinely pious; but many of them were, and all were, to some extent, God-fearing people and Presbyterians. They brought with them their Bibles, the Confession of Faith and Shorter Catechism and Rouse's version of the Psalms of David. No minister came with them, and for some years they were without the ordinances of religion, having no organized Church or congregation, no preaching or baptisms or observance of the Lord's Supper. Whether neighbors ever met in one or another of the log dwellings to unite in reading the Bible and in prayer tradition does not say.
This state of society could not continue long among a people who appreciated the benefits of religious services, and longed for a min- ister to preach the Gospel to them, to baptize their infant children, and to wait upon and comfort the dying. No minister but one of the established Episcopal Church was then, and for years afterwards, authorized by law to perform the marriage ceremony, and young people wishing to be married had to take long trips abroad to a clergyman who could legally unite them.
Therefore, in the year 1737, five years after the first settlers arrived, the people made "supplication," as it was called, to the Presbytery of Donegal, in Pennsylvania, for ministerial supplies. The Presbytery could not grant the request at that time, but subsequently sent the Rev. James Anderson to Virginia to intercede with the
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Governor of Virginia in behalf of the Presbyterians of the colony, to obtain for them freedom of public worship. Mr. Anderson visited the Valley, and in 1738 preached the first sermon ever delivered in Augusta County, at the house of Col. John Lewis, about two miles east of Staunton.
The people continued their "supplications" to Presbytery for a minister to live among them. Having heard of the Rev. John Craig, a young preacher recently from Ireland, they extended a call to him, which he did not immediately accept; but in the year 1740 the call was renewed and prosecuted before Presbytery by Robert Doak and Daniel Dennison, commissioners, who were sent to Pennsylvania for the purpose. Thereupon, in September, 1740, the Presbytery set apart Mr. Craig for the work of the Gospel ministry "in the south part of Beverly's Manor." As he himself afterwards recorded, he was sent "to a new settlement in Virginia of our owne people, near three hundred miles distant." The country, he says, was "without a place of worship, or any Church order, a wilderness in the proper sense, and a few Christian settlers in it with numbers of the heathen traveling among us."
Mr. Craig probably arrived here early in October, 1740, and in the course of time fixed his residence in the county four or five miles northeast of Staunton. He kept a record of children and others baptized by him, and the date of the first is October 5, 1740. The whole number of baptisms during his first year was one hundred and thirty-three-sixty-nine males and sixty-four females. In order to qualify himself according to law to preach, on February 26, 1741, he appeared before the Court of Orange County, which had then jurisdiction in the Valley, and took divers and sundry oaths appointed by act of the British Parliament to be taken.
Up to the time of Mr. Craig's arrival, no meeting house had been built in the settlement, but soon afterwards, log houses in which to hold religious services were erected, first near the present Augusta Stone Church, and then at Tinkling Spring. Nothing was known at that time of Staunton; there was no town or village here till some years afterwards. The early settlers, as stated, were farmers and did not congregate in towns; they sought rural shades in which to wor- ship God, and consequently all the older meeting-houses in the county ante-date the churches in town-Mossy Creek, Rocky Springs, Bethel and Brown's Meeting House, as well as Tinkling Spring and Augusta or Stone Church. After the first court house was built, in 1745, and a town began to grow around it, the religious people residing here and in the vicinity worshiped at Tinkling Spring.
There is no tradition of Mr. Craig ever preaching in Staunton,
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but probably he did so occasionally, and in the court house. In the Summer of 1755, the Rev. Hugh McAden came this way on his journey from Pennsylvania to North Carolina, and in his diary stated that, on the first Sunday in July, he preached in the court house of Augusta County.
Mr. Craig died on April 21, 1774, having resigned the pastorate of Tinkling Spring some years previously. That congregation, there- fore, had no pastor and only occasional preaching, till about the beginning of the Revolutionary war.
James Waddell came here from Lancaster County, and purchased a farm within the bounds of Tinkling Spring congregation; and by in- vitation of the people preached regularly at Tinkling Spring and also in Staunton. Some years before he removed to the county, he was elected pastor of Tinkling Spring, but declined the call. As far as known, he never was regularly installed as pastor. The unsettled condition of things during the war probably prevented attention to such matters.
In the year 1783, the war being over, Mr. Waddell was formally called to become pastor of the united congregations of Staunton and Tinkling Spring. The original call is in my possession. It is dated May 1, 1783, and was signed, in behalf of the Staunton people by Alexander St. Clair and William Bowyer. I may be permitted to re- mark that the minister was my paternal grandfather, and that one of the signers of the call was my mother's grandfather. The call par- ticularly specified the duties required of the pastor-to preach on al- ternate Sundays in town, to catechise, reprove, and administer the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper to worthy subjects; and the people promised on their part respectful attendance and Christian submission, and to pay the annual salary (both congregations) of ninety pounds Virginia currency, equal to $300.00. But it must be re- membered that $300.00 at that day was worth much more than the same sum at present.
Thus it appears that in 1783 there was some kind of organization in the town, although not a regularly constituted church.
Mr. Waddell declined the call, and in 1784 removed to the neigh- borhood of the present town of Gordonsville where he spent the re- mainder of his life.
The last rector of Augusta Parish died about the close of the Revolutionary war, and it was many years before Episcopal services were re-established here. The Parish Church was left vacant as a place of Episcopal worship, and until the year 1813 was occupied by the Presbyterians, when a preacher could be obtained.
What Presbyterian minister officiated in Staunton from 1784 till
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1791 I do not know. In the latter year, the Rev. John McCue became "stated supply" for Tinkling Spring and Staunton, but he probably preached regularly in the town for only a few years. In 1799, and one or two years afterwards, the Rev. John Glendy, recently from Ire- land, preached occasionally in Staunton, serving several county con- gregations at the same time.
All that has been said heretofore is preliminary-a mere introduc- tion to our history. We come now to the organization of a Presby- terian Church in Staunton.
On Thursday, May 9, 1804, Lexington Presbytery met at "Bethel Meeting House"-so styled in the minutes of Presbytery-and on the next Saturday the following minute was entered: "Presbytery re- ceived a letter from commissioners appointed by the people of Staun- ton, requesting to have that society taken under its care and organized according to the Presbyterian form of government, and also to be regularly supplied until a stated pastor be obtained. Whereupon the Rev. Messrs. John Montgomery and Benjamin Erwin were appointed to assist them in their organization, and to supply them until our next meeting, as often as convenient." Mr. Montgomery was pastor of Rocky Spring, and Mr. Erwine of Mossy Creek.
Messrs. Montgomery and Erwin appear to have made no report to Presbytery of their proceedings and, therefore, the exact date of the organization is not known. But it was prior to November 6, 1804, for on that day, at a meeting of Presbytery at New Providence, "A memorial was presented from the congregations of Brown's Meeting House (now Hebron) and Staunton, requesting leave to present a call to the Rev. William Calhoon, of Hanover Presbytery," which was granted. Mr. Calhoon, however, did not accept the call immediately.
The Church consisted originally of only fifteen or twenty members. The first ruling elders elected and ordained were Joseph Bell, Joseph Cowan, Andrew Barry and Samuel Clarke. Mr. Bell is supposed to have been the Joseph Bell who was born in the county in 1742 and died in 1823, the father of the late James Bell, Esq., Major William Bell and others. He lived about four miles north of town. Mr. Barry and Mr. Cowan were merchants and natives of Ireland. The former removed from this community, or died, before my day; the latter was well known by many persons still living as a genuine specimen of the Scotch-Irish race. Mr. Clarke, a native of Pennsylvania, came here with his parents when he was a child, or youth, became a lawyer, and lived to a venerable age. Only one of his descendents remains in this community-a feeble woman, a member of this Church, who, for the sake of her grandfather, and her own sake, deserves kind treatment at our hands.
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Mr. Calhoon removed to Staunton in the year 1805, and, in August, 1806, at Brown's Meeting House, was installed pastor of the united congregations of Brown's Meeting House and Staunton. The Rev. William Wilson, of Augusta Church and the Rev. John McCue, of Tinkling Spring, were the committee of installation.
The Synod of Virginia met in Staunton on October 18, 1811, and, no doubt, held its sessions in the Old Parish Church.
During Mr. Calhoon's pastorate, in the year 1818, the first Pres- byterian Church building was erected. The Synod met here again in the fall of that year, and the Rev. John H. Rice, a member of the body, states in his diary, that he arrived in Staunton, October 15th, and says: "While in Staunton I experienced the kindness of the people of the place, and had the pleasure of observing that they were in a great degree attentive to the preaching of the Gospel by the members of the Synod. The Presbyterians have a large and very decent house of worship in the town, in a state of considerable forwardness. If completed in the style in which it is begun, it will do credit to the public spirit of the citizens."
The building was originally a very plain brick house, having neither portico or steeple. The tower for the bell, at the north end of the Church, was built some nineteen or twenty years afterwards. As generally known the house is now a part of the Mary Baldwin Seminary, though altered in appearance.
At a meeting of Presbytery, in Staunton, on Thursday, April 27, 1826, the pastoral relation of Mr. Calhoon with this Church was dis- solved, and he thereafter, for many years, devoted his whole time to Hebron congregation. Under his zealous ministrations the number of Church members greatly increased; and it is said that at the close of his term of service nearly every family in the town not connected with the two other Churches (Methodist and Episcopal) was repre- sented in the Presbyterian Church.
Mr. Calhoon was a rigid disciplinarian and stood in awe of no man. While habitually courteous, he did his duty, as he understood it, without fear or favor. Trials before the Session seem to have been of frequent occurrence during his time. I have learned this from a roll of paper handed me by a daughter of Elder Clarke, long after her father's death. Mr. Clarke was probably the Clerk of Session. The trials were conducted with much formality, and the testimony was written down in the manner of legal depositions. I destroyed the manuscripts, but have some recollection of two of the cases tried. One was that of an old lady, who habitually absented herself from Church. She was cited to appear before the Session, and failing to attend, the original charge was dropped, and she was proceeded
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against for contumacy. The other was the trial of a husband and wife for permitting dancing at their home. Nearly all the young society people in town testified as witnesses. According to my recollection, the papers did not show the result in either case, and no other Church records of that time have been preserved.
The next pastor was the Rev. Joseph Smith (afterwards D. D.), a native of Western Pennsylvania, who was installed April 29, 1826. The services on that occasion were conducted by the Rev. Francis McFarland, pastor of Bethel Church, and the Rev. Henry Ruffner, professor at Washington College, Lexington. While pastor of the Church, Mr. Smith also taught a classical school, being principal of the Staunton Academy.
Mr. Smith was relieved from his charge on October 22, 1832. Towards the close of his pastorate, my knowledge of people and things began, and I will relate some personal recollections of the time. Every one knows how permanent and vivid the recollections of childhood are.
The Church building stood a few yards from a plank fence which formed the boundary of the lot on the west side. The ground between the fence and New Street was unenclosed, and being used as a brick yard was one of the most unsightly spots in the town. It was afterwards bought by the congregation, and became a part of the church lot. There were three gates for access to the lot; one in front on Frederick street, and one on each side. The entrances to the church corresponded with the gates. The pulpit was a tall structure which lifted the preacher high above the audience, and in front of the pulpit was a wide aisle extending from door to door. In this aisle the table was spread at sacramental services. Two other aisles extended from the front doors to the cross aisle. There were galleries on each side and at the front of the building, and one of these was assigned to the colored people, many of whom attended the preaching. The bell was hung in the front gallery, and when rung the window opposite to it was hoisted to allow the sound to escape. The noise inside was intolerable to persons who happened to be in the house. For this reason, probably, the ringing was always some time before the congregation assembled. Services in the morning usually began at 11 o'clock; "early candle light" was always announced as the time for evening worship. Tallow candles in tin can- dlesticks suspended against the pillars that supported the galleries, were used at night to light the room, and the sexton went round every twenty or thirty minutes to snuff them. This proceeding also served the useful purpose of rousing sleepy children and others. I well remember the interest with which I watched the movements of
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the sexton, especially when he snuffed a candle out and had to go back to light it. The house was heated in cold weather by means of two large cast-iron stoves near the pulpit, and some old ladies had foot stoves filled with live coals in their pews. To each family a pew was assigned, and all the family, parents and children, usually sat together. At times of prayer most of the congregation stood, and most of them with their backs to the pulpit and the officiating minister (!)
A
I now recall most of the people who composed the congregation, and remember the places they occupied in the Church. In the eastern "amen corner" Mr. Jacob Swoope sat, his hair gathered behind his head in a cue and tied with a black ribbon. He always entered by the eastern side door, and always claimed entire possession of his pew. I have seen him order some persons out and invite others in. Behind him sat Mrs. Harrouff and her daughters, Miss Kitty and Mrs. Brady; and in their rear sat Katy Woolwine and her daughter, Har- riet. In the first pew in the block on the east side of the Church the pastor's family sat. The next pew was occupied by Mr. Jacob Ruff and his family. After them came the family of Mr. David Gilkeson, and immediately in their rear was the pew where I was required to sit, often asleep, with my father and mother and other members of the family. In our rear were Mr. and Mrs. Lease; and after them Mrs. Warden's family. Following them were the Halls, Hartmans, Merritts, Heiskells and John and William Grove.
Across the aisle, in the eastern double block of pews, were, first, the Harper family, and following them were the pews of the Craigs, Mrs. Cuthbert and her sisters, Mrs. Coleman and the Misses Bragg, Misses Nancy and Sally Waddell, Captain Sowers, Mr. Samuel Clarke, Mrs. Coalter, and the Marshall and Paris families, who came from the the country.
On the western side of the Church sat the Bells (Col. Wm. A. and afterwards his father, Mr. James Bell) the Baldwins, Eskridges, Mr. and Mrs. Jefferson Stuart, Kennedys, Sperrys, McClungs, McDowells, Mrs. Williamson, Mr. William Clarke, Mr. William Ruff, the family of Dr. Boys, Col. James Crawford, Mr. James F. Patterson, Mrs. David W. Patterson, the Brooks family, Mr. Lyttleton Waddell, Mrs. Mosby, and Miss Nancy Garber.
The elders were Mr. Cowan, Mr. Samuel Clarke, Mr. Lease, Captain Sowers, Dr. A. Waddell and Col. William H. Allen. During the pastorate of Mr. Smith's successor, Messrs. Lyttleton Waddell and William A. Bell were elected and ordained elders.
There was no choir, but when the hymn was given out, William Cowan, son of the elder, left his father's pew, and standing under the
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pulpit, would raise the tune. There were probably twelve or fifteen tunes known to the congregation. These were of the long, short and common metre sort. But sometimes a strange minister would give out a "particular metre" hymn, and the leader would have to ask him to select another. Of course there were no solos and no voluntaries of the modern kind. Captain Sowers, however, was fond of singing, and, while sitting in his pew waiting for the service to begin, would sometimes start a familiar hymn, and the congregation would join in as best they could.
The singing was considered a part of the solemn worship of God, and there was no attempt made merely to please the ear, the spirit of devotion and sense itself were not sacrificed to sound. The church music of the day was well described by Robert Burns in his poem called "The Cotter's Saturday Night":
They chant their artless notes in simple guise; They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim;
Perhaps "Dundee's" wild warbling measures rise, Or plaintiff "Martyr's," worthy of the name; Or noble "Elgin" beats the heavenward flame, The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays,
Compared with these, Italian trills are tame;
The tickled ear no heartfelt raptures raise; No unison have they with our Creator's praise.
So much for Burns. Another eminent man, no less a person than Walter Scott, wrote as follows:
"I have heard the service of high mass in France celebrated with all the eclat which the choicest music, the richest dress, the most imposing ceremonies could confer on it. Yet it fell short in effect of the simplicity of the Presbyterian worship. The devotion, in which every one took a share, seemed so superior to that which was recited by musicians as a lesson which they had learned by rote, that it gave the Scottish worship all the advantage of reality over acting."
Permit me to cite another authority on this subject: St. Augus- tine, so called, took great delight in sweet sounds, but was almost in- clined to consider any fondness for church music as a sin, unless his pleasure in it was derived exclusively from the words and not from the melody.
Some old-fashioned Presbyterians clung to the old tunes, and ob- jected to the new ones as profane songs. At a certain place in Scot- land, for instance, at one time, when the precentor introduced a new tune, he was left to sing it alone while the people presisted in singing an old one. In this country also, at Pittsburg, more than a hundred years ago, when a new tune was started at public worship, on one occasion, an old gentleman stalked out of the house and never entered
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in again; and an old lady flaunted herself out, exclaiming as she fled : "You're all going to Popery!" Our people, however, adopted new tunes very readily, and I remember that Ortonville and Balerma were received with much pleasure when first introduced here.
But the primitive custom I have described did not continue. Mr. Amos Botsford came from New York to assist Mr. Smith in the Academy, and, being a famous singer, he organized a choir. Since then, in the opinion of most people, Church music has been in a course of constant improvement.
Mr. Botsford removed to Lexington, and a choir was soon organ- ized there. It is related that when on one occasion the pastor exclaimed: "Brethren, why is religion at so low a state amongst us!" a venerable native of the old country, who sat on the pulpit steps on account of his deafness, pointed to the choir in the gallery and cried out in his Irish brogue, "It's because of that thaater up there."
The celebrated Dr. Nettleton spent the winter of 1828-9 in Staunton, and his labors here were productive of much good. He was an able and very judicious man, and under his ministry the Church was greatly built up by the addition of many persons who proved permanent and useful members.
From the dawn of my recollection, a Sunday School was conducted in the Church-first in the audience room and afterwards in the gal- leries. For some years a question book on Bible history, issued by the American Sunday School Union, was used. We had blue tickets and red tickets with texts of Scripture printed on them, but what they signified I do not remember, and nobody living here can tell me.
I may add that in taking up collections in Church, the hat was within my recollection always used; but as I learned from several cloth bags attached to long poles stacked in a corner near the pulpit, those implements had been previously used to receive the contributions of worshipers.
As stated, Mr. Smith resigned his charge and was released by Presbytery October 22, 1832. For more than two years the Church was without a pastor, the pulpit being occupied occasionally by various ministers. The Rev. John S. Watt officiated as stated supply for six months or more.
The Rev. John Steele, a native of Monroe County, was elected pastor in 1834, and on the 20th of June, that year, was ordained and installed by Presbytery. He remained here rather more than two years, the relation being dissolved August 4, 1837, and then emigrated, with many citizens of the County, to the State of Illinois.
During Mr. Steele's residence here, the Rev. Isaac Jones came to this country, fresh from scenes of religious excitement in Western New
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York. After holding meetings in various country churches, he came to town and conducted services here for two or three weeks, using the methods then in vogue. He preached "the terrors of the law," to the exclusion of the Gospel, and some persons in the audience were tempted to cry out, "Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?" Large additions were made to the roll of Church members, but, alas, many of the professed converts soon fell away.
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