USA > West Virginia > Preston County > A History of Preston County, West Virginia, V.1 > Part 17
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The constitution of 1873 restored the old county court, and by an amendment in 1880, there was a reconstruction of the same, the number of members being reduced to three. In 1887, by special act, Preston was given a county court of eight members, one for each district. It is the only county except Ohio and Pendleton that possesses a court of more than three persons.
We have heretofore called attention to the fact that prior to 1852, the citizens of Preston chose by popular vote only the members of the state legislature. This limited power of exercising the privilege of vot- ing was calculated to induce an apathy, which when coupled with the existence of a property qualification, will doubtless account for the small size of the election figures of that period.
The party founded by Jefferson was received very kindly by the backwoodsmen of the West for the reason that it made a strong appeal to the Americanism of what are termed the "common people." The . Jacksonian type of Democracy had its stronghold in the growing West and was sufficiently powerful in 1828 to elect a president after its own heart in the person of Andrew Jackson. Unlike what is true of certain of the American states, the people of the Appalachians are steadfast in their partisan fidelity when once a political attachment has been formed. The county that declared its adherence to the party of Jefferson and Jackson could scarcely be moved unless in a whirlwind campaign like that of 1840. On the other hand, the county that pronounced for "Harry of the West" was equally firm in its devotion to the Whig party, even to the extent of carrying its partisan antipathy through the fiery scenes of the secession war and then accepting the Republican party, regardless of the disfavor which has been the portion of that political faith in the Lowland South.
Beginning as a Democratic fortress, Preston held to its creed so
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firmly as to adhere in 1860 to the pro-slavery wing of that party. Im- movably hostile to disunion when the war of 1861 arose, the county then swung as a logical result to the party which most unequivocally stood for the other extreme. The change once effected has been quite steadfastly maintained. In presidential campaigns there seem to have been no off years with the voters of Preston.
Party lines have almost invariably been closely drawn. If the hurrah is somewhat less in evidence than in the earlier and more emotional years, the floating vote is still a small percentage of the whole. If a candidate is more than usually popular or unpopular, he will lead or fall behind his ticket, accordingly, though seldom in a very marked degree.
Since the war period the relative size of the Democratic vote has been lessening slowly, and that creed is no longer able to elect district officials, save when there is a great defection in the support of the nominee of the dominant party. Yet there is no disintegration, and the Democratic minority includes many of the most able, wealthy, and influential citizens.
The vote of Kingwood district was nearly a tie in 1871, and Grant and Pleasant were Democratic fastnesses in 1874. One the other hand, Reno and Valley have long been noted for their huge majorities in favor of the Republican ticket.
Below are some of the election results prior to 1860:
1818 (congressman) Pindall, 173; Mckinley, 27.
1840 (presidential) Harrison, 396; Van Buren, 446.
1844 (presidential) Clay, 332; Polk, 504.
1848 (presidential) Taylor, 460; Cass, 527.
1852 (presidential) Scott, 647; Pierce, 923.
1856 (presidential) Buchanan, 1230; Fillmore, 719; Fremont, a few votes.
In 1876, when post-bellum conditions had become quite stable, the vote for Hayes was 2183, and that for Tilden was 1224. In 1900, the Republican ticket had a plurality of 2479 votes out of a total of 5175. In 1904, on the presidential ticket, the Republican candidate received 3955 votes, the Democratic, 1242, the Prohibition, 87, and the Socialist, 63.
In the election of 1908, Taft had 3928 votes and Bryan had 1454. The Republican candidate for governor had 3748 votes and the Demo- cratic candidate had 1643. The highest Republican vote for any county officer was 3976, and the highest Democratic vote was 1516. The Pro- hibition party received 143 votes, the Socialist party, 81, and the Inde-
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pendence League, I. In the vote for president, the Republicans carried every one of the 44 election precincts.
The schism in the Republican party shown in the election returns of 1910, did not fail to manifest itself in Preston county. It was apparent in a considerable stay-at-home vote among the Republicans, and not in a very conspicuous defection to the Democratic column. The one ex- ception, and a very striking one at that, was that 3118 votes were thrown for the Democratic nominee for congress against 2108 for his opponent. The only Democratic county official since the war period seems to have been Benjamin H. Elsey, who in 1889 was chosen superintendent of schools in a triangular contest, his plurality being 708.
The Republican primaries are of much interest in local politics, since the nominee by the primary election nearly always wins in the general election. The Democrats hold no primaries.
The Whig party was stronger west of the Cheat than it was on the east side, and it is significant that the Republican majorities are larger in the former section.
The only president of the United States to make the county a visit was John Tyler, who made a political speech in the courthouse during the log-cabin landslide of 1840. He was then, it is true, a candidate for the office of vice-president only.
Preston has sent three of her native born citizens to the lower house of congress; William G. Brown, Sr., in 1845 and 1847, James C. Mc- Grew in 1868 and 1870, and William G. Brown, Jr., in 1910 and 1912. William M. O. Dawson, a citizen though not a native, has successively been secretary of state and governor. William G. Conley, a native Prestonian, is at this writing the attorney general of the state.
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CHAPTER XIX
THE CHURCH IN PRESTON.
Religion in Pioneer Days - Sects Represented Here - Their History - Preston Preachers.
Although a desire for religious freedom led to the founding of more than half of the American colonies, it would be a great error to suppose the American people were generally religious at the time the settlement of Preston began. A religious feeling was not prevalent in a very vital form during the entire Revolutionary epoch. The saying which was recently current that God was not recognized beyond the Missouri, might once have been applied to the whole country west of the Alle- ghanies. At any rate religious baggage seems little in evidence in that which was taken across the mountains by the very early settlers. The wild freedom of the frontier wilderness was little inclined to observe the salutary restraints of either law or religion. Yet this spirit was only a passing cloud, for the backwoodsman was not so perverse as he pre- sents himself to us of the present day. After the year 1820, there was a very marked change for the better, not only in the West but in the East also.
The following extract from the journal of Bishop Asbury tells of his visit to Morgantown in 1788:
"O how glad should I be of a plain, clean plank to lie on, as preferable to most of the beds. * * * This country will require much work to make it tolerable.
* Savage warfare teaches them to be cruel. Good moralists they are not, good Christians they cannot be, unless they are better taught. *
* It is a matter of grief to behold the excesses, particularly in drinking, which abound here."
The denominational preferences of the settlers of Preston are capable of ready explanation when we look at the characteristics of the elements that peopled the county.
The first arrivals were mainly of the Scotch-Irish, and this people came to America as Presbyterian. It is to them that the existence of this denomination in Preston is assignable. The very numerous German element was primarily Lutheran, German Reformed, or German Baptist, and all these sects were represented. Members of the Reformed Church were few as compared with the Lutherans, and were absorbed by the latter. The Methodist Church arose in America shortly before the
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Revolution, and its peculiar fervor struck a very responsive chord, especially in the South. That it heavily predominates in Preston is thus a matter of course. The Methodist Protestants are an offshoot of the parent Methodist Episcopal Church, and the United Brethren and the Evangelicals are also so similar that no special remark con- cerning them is here necessary. The Baptists have always been a strong and aggressive branch of Protestantism, and it would therefore be strange not to find this denomination present. The Disciples Church is of American origin, and its founder lived in West Virginia, not 60 miles from the nearest corner of Preston, and did not slight this county in his traveling work. The Roman Catholic Church had in colonial times no English-speaking adherents except the English Catholic ele- ment of southern Maryland, and this seems unrepresented among the Preston pioneers. The church was numerically weak in the United States until after the flood of immigration which actively began about 1847. Its presence in this county since 1838 is due to the German colony that settled around Howesville, and to the Irish attracted here by the building of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad. As to the African Methodist Episcopal Church, it goes without saying that its representa- tion is due to the lingering presence of the quondam slave.
Prior to 1787, we have no record of the active preesence of any denomination. In that year the Rev. John Stough came with a little German colony to Carmel, and founded the Salem Evangelical Lutheran church of that place. In 1792, or soon afterward, a log church was built, and it was the first special house of worship in the county. This pioneer church was destroyed by fire, and in 1842, the present handsome frame building took its place. For many years the preaching was in German. The records were kept wholly in that tongue until 1828, then for several years both languages were used, and after about 1833 the English idiom had a clear field. The church at Carmel is the parent of about a half dozen other organizations on the plateau of Union, all forming a strong circuit.
Another area of Lutheranism is found in the east and center of Grant, the east of Pleasant, and the extreme north of Portland. It was brought first to the Craborchard of Portland by German-born immigrants, and later to the northern section by the German-American influx from Somerset and other counties of Pennsylvania. The colony in the Crab- orchard gave rise about 1817 to the church at Lenox. The first preach- ing in Grant was by Philip Mockenhouse who came about 1820. A
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succeeding preacher walked 29 miles through a snow-storm to fill an appointment at Willett's. In 1843, the church at Glade Farms was organized. About 1852, the Mount Zion brick church was erected. The Lutheran organizations in these three northern districts constitute a circuit which compares in number of societies and in strength with the one in Union.
In 1786 several families of Friends settled in the valley of the Big Sandy, and these were so soon followed by others that a church organi- zation must have been of speedy occurrence. On the written betrothal of John Forman and Sarah Morton we find the names of 49 witnesses. The church was on the farm of L. H. Frankhouser. It was succeeded after a few years by a large hewn-log building that stood on the "mud pike" a mile and a quarter east of Brandonville and near the Willett cemetery. Strong for a number of years, the organization shrank in membership to such an extent as to close its doors in 1847. In 1868, the building was torn down. Among the older citizens of the vicinity are some who have not forgotten the Quaker speech. The leading families of the now extinct band were the Formans, Connors, Brandons, Mortons, Smiths, McCulloms, and Willetts.
In the same year that the first Quakers appeared in Grant, the three itinerant preachers of the Redstone Methodist circuit in Fayette county traveled up the Monongahela as far as settlements had been made. In 1788. Jacob Lurton and Lashley Mathews of the same circuit extended their preaching eastward into the "sparce settlements" among the moun- tains, and formed a society at the home of William Waller in the Sandy Creek Glades. In 1791 Bishop Asbury is said to have visited the county in one of his almost innumerable horseback tours, officiating at the wed- ding of Samuel Crane and Abigail Roberts. A mile east of the court- house at Kingwood and on the now abandoned road leading to Green's Run, the Methodists built the third church in Preston county. It was a comfortable log building, and was erected not later than 1815. It disappeared many years ago, and there is scarcely anything to indicate the site. In 1819 a class was formed at the house of William Michael in Grant, the Michaels and Shaws being prominent members thereof. The first Methodist church in this district was a frame structure at Brandonville that was later converted into a dwelling and still exists though in a ruinous condition. It was superseded by the present large brick church dedicated on Christmas day in 1850. In Union, the Metho- dists appeared between 1820 and 1825. This denomination has churches in every district, and is particularly strong in Reno, Portland, King-
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wood, Pleasant, and Grant, the first named district heading the list with 12 buildings. The church edifice in Terra Alta is the most costly of any in Preston.
In Lyon, Reno, and Valley are organizations of the Prottestant Methodists. The Bethlehem church in the south of Valley dates from about 1848.
The United Brethren denomination appeared in 1873, and is found in Kingwood, Lyon, Portland, Reno, and Union.
The Preston circuit of the Evangelical Association was organized in 1835, or shortly afterward. It is represented by four churches in the four districts of Kingwood, Pleasant, Portland, and Valley.
The Presbyterians have town churches at Kingwood and Terra Alta and a rural church between Masontown and Reedsville. The last or- ganization is the oldest, and began in the house of Samuel Graham, whither the Rev. C. B. Bristol of Fairmont came once a month. The society joined with the Methodists and Baptists in building a frame church that stood on the farm of Sanford Watson. This was sold to the Methodists in 1836, and in 1859, the Pleasant Valley church was erected. The Rev. Mr. Bristol also organized the church at Kingwood. This was made possible through the efforts of Mrs. Israel Baldwin and Mrs. William G. Brown. In 1869, the church at Terra Alta was organized. Its new building is very tasteful. In early days there was a Presby- terian congregation at Laurel Run in Grant and more lately another at Newburg.
The Baptists are found in every district save Union, and seem first to have appeared on Scotch Hill, where the Rev. Kidd Smith preached as early as 1800. A church of the "Ironside" Baptists was built there about 1818, and given the name of Eden. It went down in 1856. The organization at Independence arose in 1841, the Ebenezer church at Gladesville in 1845, and Hazel Run in Grant appeared about 1852.
The German Baptists are most numerous in Grant and Union, but have organizations in Pleasant, Portland, and Reno. The parent church in Grant is the Salem, which dates from about 1848. The Maple Run church near Eglon was organized in 1856.
The Amish sect is represented by a few families around Aurora. It appeared with the arrival of the Rev. Daniel Beachy in 1853.
The Disciples Church is represented by the single organization at Bruceton. This derived its impulse through a sermon preached by Alex- ander Campbell in 1823 in the little wooden mill of that place. In re- cent years the services at the church are infrequent.
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The German and Irish Catholics built St. Joseph's church near Howesville in 1845. The cornerstone of the present substantial edifice was laid in 1877. From the elevated site the spire of 80 feet becomes a conspicuous landmark. The church is the house of worship of a num- erous rural congregation. After the coming of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, there was a large increase in the number of Catholic families, and in the railroad towns five more churches were built.
In the early history of the county, there were very few buildings used exclusively as churches. The more usual place of worship was the schoolhouse or some room in a private house. The schoolroom is even yet occasionally used. All the early log churches and a number of the later frame houses are now entirely gone, and not in every instance has a substitute appeared on the spot.
The census of 1850 reported that the Methodists had II churches, the Baptists 6, the Catholics 2, and the Presbyterians, each, I. There were also three Union churches, but there is no mention of the number belonging to the Lutherans. The aggregate seating capacity was 4,500, and the value of church property was $13,325.
A very recent enumeration shows that the Methodist Episcopals have 54 buildings, the Lutherans II, the Baptists 10, the United Brethren and the German Baptists, each, 7, the Methodist Protestants and the Roman Catholics, each, 6, the Evangelicals 4, the Presbyterians 3, the Disciples and the African Methodist Episcopals, each, I, thus making a total, including the union churches, of 113. There is also a considerable num- ber of parsonages, the Methodist parsonage at Kingwood being a very handsome brick residence of modern architecture.
Mention should be made of the Rev. George Hagans, the founder of Methodism at Brandonville, and of David Trowbridge, William Sigler, and Abner Ravenscraft, who were the fathers of the Methodist church at Kingwood. Trowbridge was a local preacher for 61 years, and Sigler's home was an ever-ready place of worship or entertainment to the traveling preacher. We need also to mention the Rev. Jesse M. Purinton, who established a Baptist colony at Etam, and the Rev. Jacob Thomas and the Rev. John Boger, pioneers of the German Baptist Church in Grant.
The Rev. John J. Dolliver, father of Senator Jonathan P. Dolliver of Iowa, lived many years near Kingwood, and his stentorian voice could be heard a long distance from the church or schoolhouse in which he was speaking. The Rev. Henry Clay Dean both taught and preached at Kingwood in 1843. A score of years later he had become famous in
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the political field, though not in a way to commend him to the prevail- ing creed of the Prestonians. Near the same time the Rev. Samuel J. Clawson was preaching here. He was known as the "wild man," and when he talked about the abode of the lost, he became so fiery and so realistic as almost to make the hair of the auditor stand on end. As an excuse for not going to conference in a certain year, he reported he had "just been grubbing out ten acres of hell."
Among the older preachers who are identified with Preston by birth or residence, we find among the Methodists, Moses Titchnell, William C. Wilson, James P. Cobun, Joseph B. Feather, F. G. W. Ford, D. Cool, and George W. White. The house of Conrad Ringer of the same sect was the Gretna Green of many an espoused couple. Of the Baptists we find Felix Elliott and David W. Rogers; of the Evangelicals, Jacob Bower, Isaac B. Cobun, and Jacob Hyde; of the German Baptists, James Ridenour, Flemen C. Barnes, and Solomon and George Bucklew ; of the Methodist Protestants, Solomon P. Hawley; of the Lutherans, William D. Beerbower ; and of the Catholics, J. J. Gocke.
There were formerly several well-known campgrounds in Preston, but the only one now actively maintained is the Tunnelton Campground near the town of Tunnelton. It was started in 1877.
The first Sunday school in Preston was organized at Aurora in 1825 by the father of the late James H. Shaffer. Another was established at Kingwood in 1829 by William Sigler and Elisha M. Hagans. Sunday schools are now universal throughout the county.
At least three missionaries have gone out from Preston. The Rev. James M. Homes graduated from Columbia College in 1857 and sailed the same year for China. He obtained great influence over the people he labored among, but in 1861 he was killed by mistake by a party of rebel Chinamen. The Rev. George H. McGrew was a missionary a number of years in India, and Miss Julia Bonafield is still in active work in China.
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CHAPTER XX
THE PROFESSIONS IN PRESTON.
Old and New Conditions - Attorneys - Physicians.
In the early days, when population was sparse and towns and villages small and infrequent, there was perhaps a smaller proportion of attorneys and physicians than there is now. As a matter of course, the residence of the lawyer was seldom far from a courthouse, and his practice was likely to cover a wide radius. Neither was it to the interest of the doctor to be remote from some center of population.
The routine of the lawyer was comparatively simple, being that which would grow out of the needs of a community poor in ready money and overwhelmingly rural in its complexion. A small shelf of well known books was sufficient for his professional needs. The "fifteen shilling lawyer" was the one who in ordinary matters charged the usual fee of $2.50.
The case is quite different in our own time. The complexity of modern life and the very large urban population have so widened the field of legal procedure, that many an attorney is constrained to special- ize. In any event he must continually be adding plump, high-priced volumes to his professional library. Yet the rewards of the successful attorney are far greater than in the olden times.
Human nature persists in being the same from generation to gen- eration, and the legal profession is noted for its conservative spirit. It has therefore undergone no such change as has been experienced in medical practice. The doctor of a former day was not a graduate of a medical college. He had as few books as the lawyer if not fewer. His knowledge of antiseptics and anesthesia was elementary in the extreme. He was ignorant of the real nature of many diseases which have since been explained. He compounded his own nauseous concoctions, which he administered in heroic doses. If disposed to be perfectly frank, the doctor of long experience would assert that it was necessary to fill one graveyard before learning how to practice. The physician of today looks back upon those times with a sense of horror. Yet his prede- cessor could not be blamed for not availing himself of knowledge which has only since his day been discovered. If conscientious, and also gifted
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with a professional intuition, he was fairly successful, although often- times groping in the dark.
The lawyer as well as the doctor received his preliminary training in the office of a practitioner of some experience and repute. To study law or medicine in this manner was the only substitute for the professional school. Licensing regulations were much less efficient than they are now. Consequently the pettifogger and the quack throve almost with impunity. Though steadily being forced to the wall, their tribe is by no means extinct, and the advertising "doctor" fattens upon the credulity of the public, as the modern advertising column bears witness.
If the legitimate physician was not formerly held in high esteem, it was partly because of the greater prevalence of quacks, and partly because the "granny doctor" of the neighborhood was quite as efficient in cases of not too grave a nature.
In a simple age the number of distinct professions was fewer than now. Thus dentistry, such as it was, was a "side line" with the regular physician.
Owing to the considerations we have named, we can scarcely expect any mention of resident lawyers or doctors until after the organi- zation of Preston in 1818. Thus James McGee and Eugenus M. Wilson, the first to fill the office of prosecuting attorney, came from Monongalia. But as a settled district, the county had already an age of more than half a century, and natives of the very soil were shortly in evidence among the local attorneys. William G. Brown, Sr., was admitted to the bar in 1822, his brother Thomas in 1824, and their nephew, John J., in 1849. William G. Brown, Jr., followed in 1879. James A., son of Thomas, was admitted in 1859, and Charles E., another brother, in 1878. Thomas P. R., a third brother, removed from the county. Other native attorneys who, as a rule, remained, have been James H. Carroll, Mar- cellus B. Hagans, Charles Hooton, Charles J. P. Cresap, Asbury C. Baker, Henry C. Hyde, Neil J. Fortney, Patrick J. Crogan, and David M. Wotring. Edward S. Elliott practiced mainly in Chicago.
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