Church History

By John Harvey

I have for a long time been interested in the history of the early churches in our area - how circuit riders came into the area west of the Oconee River in the late 1790's and set up missions in what later became our county and surrounding counties for the Methodists.  How the Baptist Association that covers our county and surrounding counties was founded in the 1820's to become possibly the first set up in the state.  How the Presbyterian Synod of Hopewell that covered Georgia, South Carolina and the south eastern part of North Carolina was formed after the Revolution.  How Catholic and Jewish Churches were found only in the cities on the coast.

Recently, I read an article eon the churches in the Southeastern United States just before and shortly after the Revolutionary War.  Before the Revolution, the church denomination favored by the British Government was the Episcopal Church.  According to the author, all the "Dissenter Denominations" along g the frontier organized a one body in little churches along the frontier and each denomination used the same building for its services; Methodist one Sunday, Baptist the next, Presbyterian the next, and so on.

After the Revolution, as the groups spread out across the various states, they built their own churches.  One of these early "dissenter churches" was Hopewell Church in Chester South Carolina.  It later became  Presbyterian Church.  An account of its history says that its early records are in tact and deposited in the historical records building in Montreat, North Carolina.  These are some of the records I hope to be reading this week.

In our county, Hopewell Baptist Church by tradition has in its history that it was once shared by the Baptist and Presbyterians.  Later as the Presbyterians came to be centered in Monticello and used the building les and less, they turned their interest in the building over to the Baptist.

As the early immigrants from the Carolinas and Virginia spread across the South looking for fortunes in cotton lands, they named their churches for where they a had come from.

Additional Comments:
Transcribed by Suzanne Forte (suzanneforte@bellsouth.net) April 2005,  from copies of articles contained in the Monticello News. There articles were prepared by Mr. 
John Harvey and published in this newspaper during the 1970's and 1980's time frame. Some were under the title "Jasper Reflections", others "Bicentennial Bits".
Permission has been granted by Mr. Harvey for use of these very valuable and informative articles.

Copies of articles provided by Benny Hawthorne.