Jul 2009

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Poor Mississippi Preacher

July/31/2009 12:37 Filed in: Recent Finds

The photo shows Al Price next to the grave of Mary Fuqua, mother of E. C. Fuqua. Birth: March 3, 1838; Death: November 26, 1900. Inscription: Wife of Nathan Fuqua & mother of Edward C. Fuqua. For more info, go to http://freed-hardeman.com/buriedinms/page177/page177.html The following letter was written to Walter Howell of Middleton, TN. His daughter, Mrs. Gerald (Gail) Mills, gave me a copy of the letter.

E. C. Fuqua, 5404 Dartmouth, Fort Worth, Texas

Dear Brother Howell:
Your interesting letter and check for $5.00 just received, with sincere thanks for both. Especially my remembrance to Bro. Gus Dunn and his one visit to my Negro Cabin Home in Mississippi. Bro. Dunn and I were both preaching the Gospel around Water Valley, Miss and so far as I knew I was alone--until Gus knocked on my cabin door.

A typical Negro cabin had just one small room, one door, no window, and a "stick and dirt" chimney that we could never warm by--it would catch fire easily. My mother and my Wife tried to live in such a cabin. We had only one bed and Mother had to have that. Wife and I slept on the floor. Mother died a short time before Bro. Dunn visited us.

The cemetery was about 200 yards from my cabin door. I had no horse and no buggy. I preached at Hatton, Miss. 6 months, to the small bunch that attended. From my cabin it was 11 miles to Hatton. I walked the distance (22) miles never failing to show up for services. Some times it was raining. One time I remember I became so sleepy that I pulled high broom sage and made me a bed and never waked up until the sun was up (my Wife was frantic when I did not get home as I never failed before). So far as I can now remember I never received one penny for that 6 months preaching, but a Bro. Hughes came to see me and brought a dozen eggs; and I was given credit at a store to the extent of a small "side of bacon." The eggs and bacon were assembled just a few hours before Gus Dunn knocked on my door. (Was that Providential?) Anyhow, that is how Gus got dinner that day! Bro. Dunn stayed till most night, and we counted our blessings and went to bed (and the floor). The bacon left from supper we put away carefully. But that night, while we were sleeping a mountain Lion came in and tried to carry our bacon to his lair. He got the piece but could not get it through the half-door; the rest he left for us, A couple of neighborhood boys the next day went hunting for that Lion and treed it in a tall sweet-gum. From head to tail that Lion measured 9 feet. In my walks 6 months I feared contact with other beasts but was never actually attacked.

In "sticability" it cost a lot to hold a meeting under such circumstances. No money was exchanged, for there wasn't any; it was dire suffering most of the time. Before moving to this Negro cabin we rented (?) another Negro cabin, at Paris, Miss. It was, to be accurate, a cow shed.

Mother was then living but in very poor health. She was given our only bed and Wife and I slept on the floor, or shreds of corn stalks for a Mattress. Hunger again stalked us until I remembered a Sister some 10 miles away had asked if we needed any food. I kissed my Wife and Mother and marched into the darkness. It was raining. After midnight I reached that Sister home and knocked on the door. When she and her husband heard my voice they dressed and came out. I told my story and they took me to the smokehouse and took down a small side of bacon to take home to a hungry wife and mother in the cow-shed, But when I got home with the bacon there was nothing in the way of food to go with it. So we three ate bacon (minus). I was preaching every night, some 5 or 6 miles from my cow-shed home, and walking as usual.

This account of some of my struggles haunted me for 3 whole years; and I suspect that Bro. Dunn had like success-- if that word truly expresses the situation. I baptized many people and I am quite sure it was not without suffering that attended those baptisms. God knows.

Brother Howell. I'm thankful that you are not suffering so much, and that you will soon be well again. Your checks are deeply appreciated; and while I am not preaching any more, I am all the more appreciate the spirit of your letter. I would like to hear from Br. Dunn.

Yours in Christ Jesus.
E. C. Fuqua

P. S.-I may miss in figures to a small extent, but of facts I am sure and I daily pray for those who, in face of adversity, have sacrificed for Christ and His wonderful Gospel. Utterly unworthy of praise or even thanks, I look forward in love. E. C. F.

Bro Dunn, please return this as I would like to keep it. Thank you. W. H.
Let us be faithful to the end. G. A. D.
FuquaEC-729502

Church Planted by T. B. Larimore

July/28/2009 14:29 Filed in: West Tennessee

This photograph of the Colverport church of Christ building, Colverport, TN, was taken by Gerald and Gail Mills shortly before the building was demolished. A special thanks to them for providing additional history about the church.

Cloverport_Pulpit_01-723460

While a student at Freed-Hardeman, I preached my fifth sermon at the Cloverport church of Christ in Hardeman County, Tennessee on Sunday, December 25, 1966. I went on to preach for the church at Cloverport for almost a year. The church disbanded around 2000. I recently was given the pulpit pictured above which is in my study in Henderson.

I am researching the history of the Cloverport. John Pigg of Jackson, MS did some of his first preaching at Cloverport. William Woodson held a couple of gospel meeting there. Other than that information, I have known little of the history of the Cloverport church.

Recently I was given the following information about the beginning of the Cloverport church from the book, Larimore and His Boys by F. D. Srygley.

On August 25, 1872, he [T. B. Larimore] went to Cloverport, now called Greenwood, Tennessee. We had but one member there - a brother Pyrtle [Pirtle]. The meeting was held under an immense shelter for want of a house. The "straw" in the "altar" was badly worn by a long "mourners bench" revival that had just closed. The meeting continued ten days and resulted in sixty-one additions. Before he preached the first sermon brother Pyrtle said to him: "you call do nothing here now-you have come too late."

The fourth day of the meeting he preached by request of a prominent Presbyterian gentleman from Revelation 6:17. When he closed the sermon and stepped from the platform the Presbyterian brother, perfectly elated by the power of his preaching, caught him in his arms as if he had been a long lost son just found.

A lady who was a sort of sectarian spit-fire and altogether more religious than courteous said to him: "If you are safe, I am too. I have been as deep under the water as you." To whom he replied in his mildest manner - "My dear sister, I hope you are not depending upon water for your salvation. No one can be saved by water alone."

Mrs. Dr. T. J. Rohinson, now of Mariana, Ark., was outspoken and emphatic in her opposition at the beginning of the meeting. She and her husband had worked very zealously for the revival that had just closed when he [Larimore] began; but she declared she would not do any thing to help him in his meeting. She said her husband might do as he pleased, but as for her, she would furnish neither chicken, shelter, nor pie "for that other preacher." About the fourth day of the meeting she hunted up her husband when the invitation song was started and went with him to make the good confession. They have both made good members.

[Larimore] He was called away from that meeting when the interest was at its very best, and when he had every prospect of sweeping the whole country, to marry a couple at Jackson, Tennessee. He felt in duty bound to attend to the marriage, as he had before promised to do; but he has never ceased to regret the untimely break in that meeting. Writing about it years afterwards he said: "Little things should not be allowed to interrupt a good meeting. It would have been far better for a common squire to have married that couple rather than break off that meeting just at that time." A good church was established at Cloverport, as the result of that meeting.

It is proper to state that he engaged to preach for the church at Jackson, Tennessee all of his time during vacation of 1872, so that the two meetings at Cloverport and Pocahontas were mainly projected and directed by the Jackson church.

Larimore and His Boys, 186-87.

Writing in the text of Larimore and His Boys, Mrs. Walter Howell wrote: "My grandmother, Mrs. Andrew Jackson Vernon, was one of the sixty baptized. My mother was born in October 1872 following her [grandmother's] baptism." She also wrote: "I'm sure the old brother Pirtle mentioned was my daddy's father, John B. Pirtle. The writer did not spell his name correctly."

Mrs. Howell wrote in the front of the book: "Page 186 concerns my family. Cloverport church has only a few members, but they still support a young preacher who comes from Freed-Hardeman College every Sunday."

Essary Springs Bell

July/23/2009 15:46 Filed in: West Tennessee

Thursday, July 23, 2009, Tom Childers was tour guide to about 17 people who visited important sites in Chester, Hardeman, and McNairy counties in Tennessee. Officals at Freed-Hardeman gave us a key to the Essary Springs church of Christ with a request to take photographs of the bell, if we could.

One of the elders at the New Hope church of Christ, James Kirk, and his grandson met us at Essary Springs. He brought a ladder. The ceiling entrance to the bell tower was nailed shut and we had to pry it loose to gain entrance to the see the bell. Lyndon Crowley, the slimmest of the group crawled inside the bell tower and was able to take some photos.

The bell was made by The C.S. Bell Co., Hillsboro, Ohio. Here is a link to a Web site which gives the history of the company - http://home.swbell.net/csz_stl/towerbells./HillsboroFoundry.htm.

The question at this point is when was the bell installed? Was it in 1889? or 1895 after Freed left and the school was run by I. N. Rowland and David Nelms? or was it after the school was taken over by Hardeman County in 1913? We could find no cast markings that identified the date of the bell. There appears the numbers 1936 on the outside of the bell near the bottom but this is handwritten and not a part of the casting of the bell. Other markings are 26 and No Yoke.

Freed-Hardeman University has been given the property. At the present a few Christians are still meeting at Essary Springs, but they are making plans to relocate to neighboring congregations.

Charts by Charles Coil

July/22/2009 14:32 Filed in: Recent Finds

Chris Coil loaned me 17 of his dad's sermon charts. I have photographed them and they will be available on a CD which contains over 1,000 photos of sermon charts. A special thanks to Chris for sharing the charts.

North Mississippi Trip

July/09/2009 14:33 Filed in: North Mississippi

Tom Childers visited the following graves in Mississippi.

W. A. Crum, Old Hickory Flat Cemetery, HIckory Flat, MS
W. E. Crum, Old Hickory Flat Cemetery, HIckory Flat, MS
James Perrin Lowrey, Bethesda Cemetery, Senatobia, MS
Rex Chapman, Chapman Cemetery, Ripley, MS
J. Frank Chambers, Jumpertown Cemetery, Jumpertown, MS
H. I. Copeland, Bethesda Cemetery, Senatobia, MS
Lee Brown, Magnolia Cemetery, Coldwater, MS

More details may be found at www.freed-hardeman.com.

_Crum_WA_IMG_2745-782385

East Tennessee Trip

July/08/2009 14:37 Filed in: East Tennessee

Tuesday, July 7, 2009, Chris Coil and Tom Childers visited Jackson and Overton Counties, TN and photographed the following grave sites, churches, and home places:

1. Old Flat Creek Church and Cemetery where B. C. Goodpasture grew up.

2. B. C. Goodpasture Home Place

3. Overton County Courthouse where Basil Overton debated H.C. Vanderpool, a Baptist preacher, on baptism and faith only in 1952.

Old Walnut Grove Cemetery

1. Albert V. Watkins

Holly Springs Church of Christ Cemetery, Hilham, Overton County, TN

1. Willie S. Hunter

2. Washington Lafayette (Fate) Hunter

Allen Cemetery, Jackson Co., TN

1. Marion Harris

Buried in Rob Draper Memorial Cemetery, Livingston, Jackson Co., TN

1. Joe David Neely

2. James Paul Anderson

3. Robert D. Crabtree

4. Robert Carl Gossett

Pharris Cemetery, Jackson Co., TN

1. Hyram Pharris - Oct. 28, 1849 - Sep. 2, 1929 Inscription: Minister of the Gospel
Author of Prayer: An Examination of the Scriptures as to the Rules and Purposes Pertaining to this Part of the Divine Worship, by Hyram Pharris, Gainesboro, Tenn., Gospel Advocate, 1893.

Union Hill Flatt Cemetery, Jackson Co., TN

1. Hiram Way

2. Dowell Flatt

Old-Flat-Creek-705025

Friends at CTS

July/08/2009 14:35 Filed in: Meeting of Friends

Christian Training Series
July 12-16, 2009
Freed-Hardeman University
www.fhu.edu/CTS

Wednesday at 9:30 a.m.
J.W. McGarvey: A Man for All Seasons - Ancil Jenkins

Friends of the Restoration

Chronicling the lives of those who have impacted the Restoration Movement