A History of Hopewell Presbyterian Church,
Lafayette County, Mississippi
(1839-1981)
by Robert Milton Winter, Ph.D.,
Historian, St Andrew Presbytery
On October 7, 1839, the Presbytery of Tombeckbee, meeting at Ebenezer—a congregation,
which after 1841 changed its name to College Hill, took action to appoint “Rev. D. L. Russel &
Rev. A. McCallum and elders Eli Neely & R. H. Buford. . .to organize one or two churches in the
eastern part of Lafayette County.” According to Hall’s Index of American Presbyterian Congregations, the organization was completed under the authority of the Presbytery of Clinton
[Miss.].
The sessional records of the Oxford Church, of which D. L. Russel was pastor, show that a
church was organized in October 1839, called Hopewell, on Woodson’s Ridge, about six miles
east of Oxford, and in those records in December 1840, name members who were dismissed to
form this new congregation.1 These included:
Kenneth Clark
Daniel Clark
Eliza Clark
Emelia Clark
George McFarland
Ann McFarland
Daniel McFarland
Oliver Harper Wiley
Ann Wiley
Katherine J. Wiley
M. Kimmons
A. E. Kimmons
Mary Barringer
Elias Rambo
2
The other congregation to be organized in obedience to the original directive of Tombeckbee
Presbytery was the church called Lebanon, now located in the village of Toccopola, in extreme
western Pontotoc County.2 At times Hopewell shared a minister with this congregation, and many
members were exchanged between the two churches in the passage of years.
Hopewell Church was briefly under the care of the Presbytery of Clinton (Miss.)—1840-1841—
which then had authority for territory in the northern portion of the state and, in 1842, was placed
by the Synod of Mississippi under the care of the newly formed Presbytery of Holly Springs. The
Holly Springs Presbytery took the name Chickasaw in 1843, and the Hopewell congregation was
a member of this body until transferred to the Presbytery of North Mississippi in 1908. This presbytery was in turn consolidated with parts of the East and Central Mississippi Presbyteries in
1961 to form St. Andrew Presbytery, in which the Hopewell Church held membership until the
congregation was dissolved in 1981.
According to a history of its churches prepared by a committee of Chickasaw Presbytery—the
Revs. Daniel L. Gray and Samuel Hurd (who had organized the Oxford Church in 1837):
“The church at Hopewell on Woodson’s Ridge was organized by Bishop 3 A. McCallum, and occasionally supplied by him, till they secured the pastoral labors of Bishop J. Weatherby, who is
now their pastor.”4
Land for the church was given by George McFarland, one of the founding members. McFarland
had, in turn, purchased his land from the Indians.5
The settlers were mostly from North Carolina, of Scots-Irish background and stock. There were
many marriages among the various families. Daniel McFarland (1809-1888), one of the congregation’s first elders, for example, married, May 16, 1839, Abigail Erixna Kimmons (1816-1894),
daughter of John and Margaret Morrison Kimmons. Their son Daniel K. McFarland (1848-1893),
grew up to be one of Hopewell Church’s eleven ministerial sons. Most of the members were
farmers, but one, Hugh Harvey Kimmons (1818-1890), also a child of John and Margaret Kimmons, a longtime member of the session, was a physician. H. H. Kimmons married Cornelia Jane
Hope (1829-1863), and their son Levi Hope Kimmons (1852-1898) was another of the church’s
ministerial sons. Sons and daughters of the Kimmons line married McCorkles, Newells, and Wileys, forming an intricate tapestry of kinship and faith. These relationships are too numerous to
trace, but such was the story of almost every country church across the developing Presbyterian
frontier. A child of the covenant had many kinfolk, and the ties of church and family were rich
and unfolded across the generations. In the neighborhood surrounding Woodson’s Ridge, Hopewell Church occupied a place at the center of it all.
Angus McCallum (1801-1885), Hopewell Church’s organizing pastor, was the new presbytery’s
first moderator. He was born in Robeson Co., N. C., and received his theological education at
Union Theological Seminary—then located at Hampden-Sydney, Va. He was ordained in 1831
by Fayetteville Presbytery in North Carolina, where he served the Euphronia and Buffalo Churches
(1831-1838), prior to coming to Mississippi, where he was stated supply at Waterford (the church
there was originally called Greenwood) and Hopewell at various times between 1839 and 1848.
He was the organizing pastor of the church at Chulahoma in western Marshall County (1839).
McCallum then to the southern part of the state, principal among them the historic congregation
at Union Church, located between Brookhaven and Fayette. He ministered in Mississippi Presbytery until his retirement from active service in 1881.6
3
Another of Hopewell’s early ministers was James Weatherby, a scholarly man well-known in
Mississippi. A native of Philadelphia, Pa., James Weatherby had been educated at Princeton College and Seminary, where he was regarded as one of the most gifted in his class. As was the
custom of the era, wherein the brightest and most energetic were exhorted to go to the mission
fields, he came south, serving pastorates in North Carolina and at and Tuscumbia, Ala., before arriving in Mississippi in 1841. He served the churches at Oxford and Hopewell (1841-1845), also
heading the Oxford Female Academy. A noted educator, he was later principal of the highly regarded Holly Springs Female Collegiate Institute (1845-1848), and also served the churches at
Hudsonville, Lamar, and Waterford—all then in Marshall County. He was the first moderator of
the Synod of Memphis in 1847, of which the Chickasaw Presbytery was a part. Elected the first
stated clerk of the Presbytery in 1842, he held that office until 1854. Later he was president of the
Female College in Aberdeen, and died there, January 19, 1856.7
Although always a small congregation, Hopewell Church played its part in the life of the larger
Church. The Presbytery met at Hopewell Church, October 3, 1844, with the Rev. William A.
Gray, who soon thereafter entered upon a long pastorate at Ripley, Miss., as moderator. While
sessional records from Hopewell from the early years have not survived, the early records of
Presbytery reveal these elders among the elders at Hopewell who served the congregation as commissioners to Presbytery: John Kimmons, T. W. Kimmons, H. H. Kimmons, O. H. Wiley, D.
Miller, John Foster, Daniel McFarland, and Dr. R. S. Stewart.
The session presented its record book for examination at the presbytery, and it seems to have
been kept in good form, except in the year 1847, when “The committee on the records of Hopewell Church reported, which report was received and approved, and is as follows, viz:—Your
committee report that the book be sent back to the session8 to be remodeled.”9 Elders were given
little guidance in those days as to how to keep their records, but old church rolls from that era
form an important link to the past. In spite of the loss of the early sessional register, most of the
principal Hopewell names are well known.
Even after he resigned as pastor of Hopewell, James Weatherby seems to have given the church
some of his ministerial attention. From time to time the presbytery assigned him, along with the
Rev. A. W. Young10 to spend an occasional Sabbath preaching to the little flock.
Hopewell in this era was neither the largest nor smallest church in the presbytery. Assessments to
reimburse commissioners for their travels to and from the annual meetings of the General Assembly (usually held in Philadelphia, Pa.), ranged from $2 to $8 per congregation based upon the
financial and numerical health of the congregation. Hopewell was usually asked to contribute
about $5 (later the assessments were raised to as much as $15, with Hopewell assessed about $7).
The records of presbytery show that Hopewell paid its assessments as requested.
The other cause for which the presbytery raised money locally—the education of candidates for
the ministry—attracted Hopewell Church’s interest. In 1848, the congregation contributed $25 for
this effort—a not inconsiderable sum in that era.11
In 1845, a tiny congregation called Nazareth, organized in 1841 by the Rev. Thomas C. Stuart,
longtime minister at Monroe in neighboring Pontotoc County, located in the vicinity of Hopewell,
was dissolved by Presbytery, and its members directed to connect themselves with Hopewell.12
On April 14th, 1849, the Hopewell extended a call through Presbytery to the Rev. Franklin Patton
to become their pastor. Because the examinations to which he was subjected were typical of those
4
conducted by presbyteries in that day, the process is recounted here in its entirety, as extracted
from the minutes of Presbytery:
“Bro. Young presented Mr. Franklin Patton to Presbytery, as a candidate for the gospel ministry,
whereupon, Presbytery proceeded to examine Mr. Patton, a member of the Chulahoma Church, on
his experimental acquaintance with religion, and his motives for desiring to enter the gospel ministry, which examination being satisfactory, he was received under the care of Presbytery, as a
candidate for the ministry. . . .
“Presbytery proceeded to examine Mr. Patton on English Literature, the languages, and mathematics,13 all of which were sustained as parts of trial. Presbytery assigned Mr. Patton, as a theme
for Latin exegesis “Quomodo probatur Deum existere.”
“Having an exegesis prepared on that subject it was read before presbytery and committed to the
Committee on Languages.
“After recess Presbytery proceeded to business. Six verses of the 6 th Chapter of Hebrews from the
first to the sixth verse inclusive were assigned our candidate Mr. Patton as a critical exercise, as a
part of trial. And he was directed to prepare for examination on the first five chapters of the Confession of Faith.14
“The committee appointed to examine the Latin exegesis of Mr. Patton, reported recommending
its approval, as a part of trial, which report was adopted and accepted.15
“Presbytery proceeded to examine their candidate Mr. Patton, who read a critical exercise which
was received and put into the hands of the Committee on Theology.
“The Com. on Theology reported that they had examined Mr. Patton’s critical exercise and recommended that the same be sustained as part of trial. Which report was accepted and adopted.
“Presbytery proceeded to examine Mr. Patton on the first five chapters of the Confession of Faith
which was sustained as parts of trial.
“Resolved, unanimously, that Presbytery recommend Mr. F. Patton to take at least [a] one-year
course in a Theological Seminary and we pledge ourselves to support him while there. 16 The first
Psalm was assigned Mr. Patton as a subject for a lecture.” 17
After a period of study at the Presbyterian Seminary in Allegheny City, Pa., near Pittsburgh, during which Chickasaw Presbytery paid eighty dollars for his tuition,
“Presbytery proceeded to the further examination of Mr. Patton, which was resumed at the point
where it had been suspended. The examination of Mr. Patton in Theology, Church History & the
Hebrew language having been completed, [it] was on motion sustained as parts of trial. Mr. Patton
then read his lecture, the roll was called, remarks made, and on motion was sustained as part of
trial. It was made the order of the day for 7 ½ [o’clock p.m.] to hear the popular sermon of Mr.
Patton from Jno. 17:11, “Holy Father” &c. After hearing the sermon of Mr. Patton the roll was
called, remarks made & on motion, it was sustained.
“Presbytery then proceeded to license Mr Franklin Patton to preach the gospel.” 18
In the spring of 1849, when Hopewell presented its call for Mr. Patton’s services as their pastor,
Presbytery used the following procedure to accomplish his ordination and installation:
“Resolved that when the presbytery adjourns it adjourn to meet at the Hopewell Church on Tuesday before the meeting of Synod at 11 o’clock, then & there if the way be clear to ordain and in-
5
stall Mr. F. Patton. Rev’d W. V. Frierson to preach the sermon. Rev’d T. C. Stuart to preside and
give the charge to the people. Rev’d W. A. Gray, to give the charge to the minister.”19
The presbytery convened at College Hill, where Patton preached a sermon on the topic previously
assigned to him. Next, it was:
“Resolved that Presbytery now proceed to take necessary steps for the ordination of Mr. Franklin
Patton, and that he now preach the sermon assigned him upon the 9 th verse of 17th Chap. of Jno.
The sermon having been preached, the roll was called, and it was unanimously sustained a part of
trial. Mr. F. Patton having gone through all the parts of trial preparatory to ordination, it was
Resolved to ordain him forthwith with a view to his installation as pastor of the Hopewell Church.
The Moderator to preach the sermon & preside & put the constitutional questions—Bro. Weatherby to deliver the charge to the newly ordained minister. Presbytery took recess until 11 o’clock.
“After recess Presbytery resumed business, the sermon being preached, Mr. Patton was ordained
by the laying on of the hands of Presbytery, 20 according to the order presented in the book, and
Mr. Patton’s name was enrolled as a member of this Presby. Resolved that Brethren Weatherby
Waddel & Reid be a committee to install Bro Patton pastor of Hopewell Church, on Saturday before the 4th Sabbath in November—Bro Weatherby to preach the sermon, preside & put the constitutional questions, Bro Waddel [to] deliver the charge to the minister—Bro. Reid [to] deliver the
charge to the people.”21
Franklin Patton (1820-1895), was born in Washington County, Mo., and attended Marshall College (1844). He was at the time he first appeared before Presbytery a member of the church at
Chulahoma, Miss., in western Marshall County—probably serving in the town’s male academy as
a teacher. After his time as pastor of Hopewell (1848-1851), and later as stated supply at Sarepta
and Lebanon (1851-1857), he spent the next two years as pastor in Cape Girardeau, Mo., returning to Chickasaw Presbytery to serve once more at Lebanon (1859-1871). He then was pastor in
Tupelo (1872-1880), along with ministry as stated supply at Zion and Corinth during part of this
period. Mr. Patton then crossed the Mississippi to serve at Helena, Clarendon, and Holly Grove,
Ark., and died in Dardanelle, Ark., in March 1895. The University of Mississippi awarded him an
honorary doctorate in 1874.22
The opening of a second generation in the life of Hopewell Church may be marked with the
beginning of a new session book, which began September 1, 1860.23 The pioneer era had closed,
the early settlers were now well-established and had reared families. A younger generation was
making its professions of faith. In the opening pages of this book, the following are found as
elders: Daniel McFarland, R. S. Stewart, H. H. Kimmons, O. H. Wilie, and John Foster. Mr. Foster was Clerk of Session.
At the first meeting of the session for which we have record, the elders disciplined two members
of the congregation—slaves who were communicant members, reflecting the fact that nineteenth
century Presbyterian churches in the South were interracial assemblies, albeit gathered on a highly unequal basis. By record of the session, acting as a court of the Church:
“Session proceeded to examine Sandy, servant boy of Mrs C. G. Kimmons on breach of the eighth
commandment, and Jo, servant boy of John Foster on breach of the seventh commandment, both
of which acknowledged their guilt and were suspended for an indefinite time.”24
Occasions for discipline, while they did not dominate the session’s work, were nonetheless not
infrequent. Several years later, the session met “To investigate the charge of unchristian conduct
in Mrs. ___.25 The session, after consultation, believing that sufficient evidence could be pro-
6
duced to sustain the charges, issued citations to Mrs ___ and her mother, Mrs ___ to appear before the session on the 7th day of May, and answer to the charges preferred against them, viz.
Against Mrs ___: a breach of the seventh commandment, together with a strong suspicion of
infanticide, and against her mother, Mrs. ___ , as an accomplice in the crime above mentioned
and also for non-attendance on the ordinances of God’s House.” A black member was also cited at
the same time to answer the charge of drunkenness and profanity.
The next month, the black member met the session and “acknowledged that he had been drunk
and whilst under the influence of liquor had used profane language.” The session being satisfied
with the reality of his repentance admonished him and exhorted him to a more consistent and
Christian course of conduct. The accused woman and her mother failed to appear, but the elders,
“being fully satisfied from the evidence before it,” that the women were guilty of the charges
against them, “and also for contumacy” excommunicated them from the privileges of the Church.26
Most shocking was a charge, lodged by a female member of the congregation in 1880, that her
father had repeatedly committed incest against her, with intimidation to deter her from informing
against him. The elders cited the accused man, and when he failed to appear, heard the testimony
of witnesses. The matter was grim, so much so the session clerk (responsible for making a careful
record, in case the matter was appealed to the higher courts of the Church) remarked in his minutes that, “the evidence is such that I do not care to record it, and will risk the censure of Presbytery.”27
Sometimes the session was an agent of reconciliation. In January 1870, the session of Hopewell
Church met at the call of the Moderator. At the request of the session Dr. Waddel (then the pastor
at Oxford) moderated the meeting. The object of the meeting was “to consider the complaint of
Mr Allen Shive in reference to some charges made against him by Mr D. McFarland on the 2nd
Sabbath of Nov 1868 publicly in Hopewell Church and endeavor to reconcile the parties.” The
parties made their statements and the difficulties were amicably settled, with the two men signing
a paper declaring this as fact.28
In reading such proceedings, it should be remembered that the session was not simply an administrative body, but a judicatory of the Church. In frontier times, the session was a civilizing force.
The elders of Presbyterianism asserted themselves for decency and order. They meted out discipline with a severity that often exceeded that of civil authorities. Moreover, because Church law
required that disciplinary actions be announced from the pulpit, the responsibilities of Church
membership took on a public character, and the loss of privileges became a social disgrace.29
In time, Presbyterians would come to see their ministers as officers in more compassionate roles,
and pastoral counseling and supportive therapy gradually replaced punitive action as the churches
confronted inappropriate behavior among their members. Still, the sessional records of Hopewell
Church indicate that throughout the nineteenth century church membership was not to a casual
undertaken, and that those who assumed the covenantal obligations of a Christian profession were
held responsible both for the sincerity and fidelity of that undertaking. On more than one occasion, for example, the Hopewell elders deferred the acceptance of professions of faith—perhaps
judging the young people involved as too immature to understand the commitments they were
proposing to make.
Reflecting the war hysteria that enveloped Mississippi following the state’s secession from the
Federal Union on January 9, 1861 the Hopewell Session, meeting September 20, 1861, “took action on the subject of secession from the General Assembly of the United States, viz., whereas the
question of severing our ecclesiastical relations with the General Assembly of the United States &
7
organizing a new Assembly for the Confederate States, will be considered by our Presbytery at
the next stated meeting of that body:—Therefore resolved 1. That this session is in favor of the
ecclesiastical change & new organization indicated above. 2. Our reasons for advocating such
change is a sincere belief that the peace, unity, and greater prosperity of the Southern Church
demand it, owing to the existence of two distinct governments hostile to each other, within the
limits of the present Assembly’s jurisdiction, and owing especially to the unfriendly, schismatical
and unconstitutional resolutions passed by the last Assembly at Philadelphia, adjourned.”30
Dr. Hugh H. Kimmons of the Hopewell session was elected a commissioner of the Chickasaw
Presbytery to attend the meeting of the Organizing Assembly of the Confederate Church which
convened at Augusta, Ga., December 4, 1861.
The Civil War does not seem to have affected Hopewell Church as such, although as Maud Morrow Brown has noted, “when the Federal soldiers came to Woodson’s Ridge, they emptied every
smokehouse and raided the residences except that they left in haste when they dashed into the
home of Mr. H. H. Kimmons and found his family of eight in bed with the measles.”31 J. A. Bigger, a member of the congregation, kept a diary during his service in the war, which preserves an
interesting account of events from the perspective of a native son of Woodson’s Ridge.32 Two
sons of John and Margaret Morrison Kimmons served in the war, James McEwen (who later was
pastor of the church) and Robert Hall. Robert died while in the service.
The Hopewell Church—originally constructed of logs—was burned accidentally soon after the
war. According to a history of the church compiled for the Presbyterian Historical Foundation at
Montreat, c. 1934, was erected soon after the fire, near the spot where the old church had stood.33
This church, a simple 30 x 60 foot structure with double doors on the east, and three large windows on each side, and covered with clapboard and a shingled roof remains, serving as the chapel
of Camp Hopewell, preserved very much as it was built. Membership, as reported to by the
presbytery to the General Assembly and published in its statistical reports for 1866 was 159.34
The presbytery convened at Hopewell at the spring meeting of 1868. Meetings of the presbytery
were typically three-day affairs, convening on Thursday morning and extending through Saturday
afternoon. Commissioners were boarded in the homes of church members, with members of other
churches in the neighborhood offering their hospitality in a cooperative effort. At this meeting the
presbytery endorsed a request from the Tupelo Church to the General Assembly’s Committee of
Sustentation for funds to erect a house of worship.35
In the autumn of 1868, John Foster resigned as Clerk of Session and was succeeded by H. H.
Kimmons who served in that capacity for many years.36 In 1869 the church reported eighty-seven
members, with $210 contributed for congregational expenses, $50 for foreign missions, and $213
for “Sustentation,” that is, home missions. N. W. Shive and James Bigger were ordained and installed as elders on September 24, 1870.
As in many churches across the South, some who had been the property of white slave owners
when they made professions of faith, retained membership in their customary places of worship
after emancipation in the Civil War. Those black persons who were Presbyterian seemed also to
give deference to discipline when it was exercised upon them by sessions in such churches. For
example, on October 15, 1870, the Hopewell session met:
“for the purpose of investigating the fight between Alfred & Elam Kimmons (colored) and was
constituted with prayer. Members present: Rev F. Patton, Jas Bigger and H. H. Kimmons. After
hearing the evidence of both parties the session being satisfied that Alfred acted on the defensive
8
and that Elam was the aggressor and his conduct being very culpable, suspended him from the
privileges of the Church until satisfied with his repentance. After admonishing Alf to a more
Christian course of conduct and exhorting Elam to repent the session adjourned.”
The elders, of course, were white, but over the years, Hopewell Church included a fair number of
African Americans among its membership. Forty-six names appear on a roll of “Colored Members.” Names would have been familiar to the wider community: Stewart, Shive, Kimmons, McFarland, Patton, Borrum, McCorkle, Barr, Mooney, Newell, and Clarke.
Rural congregations generally had a larger portion of their membership in slaves during the antebellum period than did Presbyterian churches in the towns and cities. The Hopewell Church did
not have a gallery for “servants,” as did some country congregations of the Presbyterian Church,
such as Old Philadelphia, near Red Banks and the church at Hudsonville, both in nearby Marshall
County. (White church leaders, conveniently following the wording of the King James New Testament, typically referred to their property in human flesh as “servants” instead of calling their
bondsmen slaves.)
At Hopewell, as in nearby Oxford, black worshipers sat in the rear of the church. The church at
College Hill did have a gallery, the doors to which may still be seen high on the front wall of the
church under the columned porch. Reached by a stair, the gallery was removed when repairs were
made to the church early in the 20th century. Several black persons lie buried in the wooded area
that separates the church from the portion of the cemetery that lies across the Hopewell Road
from the present church grounds, a melancholy reminder of the separations that were enforced,
even in death, among those who had power and those who did not during that long-ago and lamentable era.
In many locales, as for example, Pontotoc, black Presbyterians withdrew after the war to form
separate congregations. Some of these were organized under the care of the presbytery, others
affiliated with predominately black denominations. Later entries in the Hopewell session book
indicate that although black persons attended sporadically, gradually congregation’s the black
members died or slipped away, so that by the early twentieth century, Hopewell’s congregation
was entirely white in its racial composition.
Despite the inequalities, all received the Holy Communion from a common cup. Blacks received
a name and dignity in baptism, and the recording of names of black members who received the
sacraments in the session’s baptismal and communicants’ registers, in many instances, provided
one of the few records of these people’s lives, so that Presbyterian session books form a precious
resource for students of black history. The Hopewell elders were careful in recording such information.
Communion seasons at Hopewell were held once or twice a year. As was the custom in rural and
Southern town churches throughout the nineteenth century, the occasions involved preparatory
services on Friday and Saturday, culminating in the administration of the communion on the Sabbath Day. The session would meet before each service, and this was a customary time for those
interested in church membership to present themselves for examination and reception by the elders. The sessions would remain open throughout the period of the meeting to receive any who
felt ready to present themselves for examination and make their professions of faith. Those who
had disciplinary accounts to settle typically also took opportunity to express contrition and be readmitted to church privileges. One may guess that there was a good deal of socializing and visiting, and accounts of these occasions from other sources indicate that there were often large congregations in attendance.
9
Presbyterians of the present era are often surprised to learn that churches did not generally receive
offerings of money during the Sunday services of worship in this era. When a special offering
was called for, gifts might be presented for the cause. But subscriptions for the minister’s upkeep
or quotas to meet the askings of Presbytery were normally paid directly into the hands of the deacons or elders. Indeed, there seems to have been a sense that it was not proper to handle money in
the Lord’s House.
Failure to pay pastoral salaries seems to have been the chief reason ministers moved away. Often
presbyteries forbade congregations to engage a new minister until they settled their arrears with
previous ones. Development of “systematic benevolence” was a major concern of the second half
of the nineteenth century, and offerings of money during the service came to be seen as acts of
worship. Accordingly, in November 1870, the Hopewell session “resolved to introduce boxes into
the church, and to take up collections as often as the congregation may meet for worship.”
It was also resolved to collect and pay over the minister’s salary “semi-annually by the 1st of Jan
and the 1st of July.” Presumably to keep the congregation apprised of their compliance or noncompliance in subscriptions for the pastoral salary, the Hopewell session made a standing rule,
November 26, 1870, “that the minister be required to read before the congregation the statistical
report to Presbytery at the time it is made out or as soon after as possible” prior to the report’s
being sent up to Presbytery.37
Roads in the vicinity of Woodson’s Ridge were unpaved and often impassible, and Hopewell
Church was not heated or perhaps warmed only by a stove. A heavy rain could discourage even
the most devout. In one instance, the elders had missed two members for quite awhile and
launched an inquiry. “J. A. Bigger was appointed to visit some members of the church and learn
their reasons for not attending the ordinances of God’s House.” Some weeks later Mr. Bigger
reported that Mrs. D___ and Mrs. M ___ , “gave as reasons, their inability from ill health and
want of conveyance at the same time expressing their sorrow in these privations of privilege and
their unabated attachment to the cause of Christ and to the Church.”38 Though the inquiries seem
to have been undertaken with the idea of censure rather than through pastoral concern, it can be
understood that both elder and parishioner understood, even if they did not excuse, the difficulties
that the times imposed on regular church participation.
In the spring of 1871, the Rev. Franklin Patton accepted a call to serve the churches at Tupelo and
Zion, and Dr. John N. Waddel, chancellor at the University of Mississippi, added care of Hopewell Church to his many duties. When the presbytery convened at Hopewell on May 24, 1872, it
did so to examine Daniel K. McFarland, a son of Hopewell Church and a recent graduate of the
University of Mississippi as a candidate for the ministry and receive him under the presbytery’s
care. Some months later, Hopewell Church extended a call to Mr. McFarland, which he accepted.
Having been baptized and reared in the congregation, he was the first of three of its ministerial
sons to serve as pastor. Daniel Kimmons McFarland was the son of Daniel and Abigail Kimmons
McFarland. His sister Flora was well known as the teacher of the one-room school that stood for
many years next to Hopewell Church.39
10
The one-room school which stood next to Hopewell Church. Flora McFarland stands at right.
The presbytery held an adjourned session at Hopewell, September 27, 1873 to accomplish Mr.
McFarland’s ordination and installation. The day before he preached a trial sermon before the
presbytery, and was sustained in examinations on Hebrew, church government, and the sacraments.40
The young man was gifted and soon gained notice as a preacher. Two years later, on June 11,
1874, Daniel McFarland asked the session to call a congregational meeting to dissolve his pastoral relationship with the Hopewell Church, and on July 2, the presbytery complied with this request, hearing that the congregation had voted unanimously to concur with their pastor’s desire.
He went from Hopewell to the First Church of Savannah, Ga., where he was highly regarded as a
preacher and pastor, surviving a case of yellow fever during one of the frequent epidemics in that
humid port city. After his recovery, he was recalled to Mississippi to be pastor of the Oxford
Church (1882-1886), after which he went to the historic First Church of Staunton, Va. He died
February 28, 1893. He was stated clerk of North Mississippi Presbytery (1884-1885).
For the next two years, Dr. Waddel again cared for the congregation and moderated meetings of
the session. Beginning in the autumn of 1876 and continuing into the following year, the Rev.
Theodore Hunter, a minister from South Alabama, served the Hopewell congregation, later becoming minister of the church at Okolona, after which he was dismissed to the Presbytery of
Central Mississippi.41
The Rev. John McCampbell, D.D., pastor at Grenada, served Hopewell during part of the year
1877, just prior to Grenada’s devastating trial by yellow fever, in which Dr. McCampbell died.
The Rev. James W. Graham, minister at Oxford also conducted services for Hopewell during this
time.
11
The Rev. James Williamson Roseborough (1852-1941), was Hopewell’s minister, part-time, beginning in 1878, and was installed as pastor, for half his time, beginning in 1881. (He also served
the church at Water Valley.) A native of Sardis, Miss., he was educated at Wofford College in
Ohio and Princeton Seminary, and was ordained in October 1878 by the Presbytery of North
Mississippi. He left Hopewell in 1881 for Missouri, where he was pastor at Cape Girardeau and
Jackson, Mo., returning to Mississippi to serve the First Church at Columbus (1888-1894). He
spent the rest of his life in pastorates in Missouri, Alabama, and Florida, always active in evangelistic work and serving small churches.42
In the autumn of 1881 and the winter of 1882, two area ministers, the Rev. E. E. Bigger and E. C.
Davidson moderated the Hopewell session and conducted services for the congregation. Bigger
was, of course, a son of the congregation, and served his home church prior to his departure from
Mississippi to serve a congregation in Memphis.
In the spring of 1883 the church engaged the services of the Rev. William I. Sinnott (1855-1936),
a native of Mobile, Ala., who had received his education at the University of Mississippi and
Princeton Seminary. As a licentiate he had served at Mt. Hermon and Durant Churches in Central
Mississippi Presbytery. Upon his reception into the care of Chickasaw Presbytery, calls from
Hopewell & Tallahatchie Churches were presented, the former for half his time, at a salary of
$350, the latter for one-fourth his time at a salary of $100.43 He served at Hopewell and Tallahatchie (near Etta) for three years, after which he went to the Second Presbyterian Church of
Birmingham, spending the rest of his ministry in Alabama and South Carolina.44
No reference to a Sunday school appears in the early extant records of Hopewell Church, and if
the omission reflects fact, the congregation was not unusual among rural Presbyterians of the day.
As time passed greater emphasis was placed on the Christian education of the young, and on May
25, 1884, the Hopewell session chose J. M. Kimmons Superintendent of Sunday school and J. A.
Bigger his alternate.
Sessions of this era were expected to submit an annual Narrative of the State of Religion their
congregations for review by Presbytery. These were in turn submitted to the Synod and General
Assembly. One such narrative from the year 1886 is preserved in the minutes of the Hopewell
session and is printed in its entirety.
“We have had preaching twice a month (except when hindered by Providential events) and Sabbath School has been held every Sabbath. During August there was a special blessing bestowed
upon the church in the addition of seven persons to church membership upon confession of their
faith in Christ. Two others have been added on examination since & two by letter which makes
nine in confession & two by certificate. No intemperance or worldly amusements have been observed in our midst & Sabbath observance is very good. In the grace of worshiping God with our
substance there has been little change in either direction. Family worship is observed in a number
of families & perhaps more than half observe this custom. There are twelve colored persons in full
communion with the church, though their attendance at worship is irregular.” 45
Throughout this period the church was very isolated. The session was careful in its efforts to elect
commissioners to meetings of the presbytery and synod and received reports from the delegates
as to their fidelity in attendance. Still, the trips on horseback or in a buggy must have been arduous, and sometimes impossible. In an undated entry from the session book in the spring of
1867, it was noted that, “Session in their deliberations concluded not to elect any members to
Presbytery owing to the bad state of the weather, roads, and other circumstances.”
12
By the following autumn, conditions had improved, and Dr. Stewart was elected delegate to
attend Presbytery at Pontotoc, with Daniel McFarland alternate, and John Foster to attend Synod
at Trenton, Tenn. Some years later, on September 17, 1874, the session recorded that “The delegate appointed to attend Presbytery last spring [O. H. Wiley] reported, that he was unable to
attend the meeting of Presbytery, account of high waters. His report was received and approved.”
photo from The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi
N. L. Lowrance
Those added to the eldership in the second half of the nineteenth century included J. A. Bigger,
W. L. Lowrance, J. M. Kimmons, N. L. Lowrance, J. M. Saunders, and W. H. Wiley. Minutes
from May 8, 1886 give a sense of the sort of business that sessions transacted, as well as recording the solemnities connected with the installation of the new officers:
Hopewell Church, May 8, 1886
Session met & was constituted with prayer. Present Mod. W. I. Sinnott and Ruling Elders D. McFarland and J. A. Bigger; absent H. H. Kimmons. Mary Dale Kimmons, a baptized, non-communicant of this church upon examination & confession of her faith in Christ was admitted to the
full fellowship of the church. Louisa Ray (col.) upon examination & confession of her faith in Christ
was baptized & received into the fellowship of the Church. Session took recess until after night
sermon.
Night Session
Session resumed its sitting in the presence of the congregation. J. M. Kimmons & N. L. Lowrance
who had been elected ruling elders by the congregation on the previous day were ordained with
laying on of the hands of Presbytery [that is, the Session], & installed. J. E. McCorkle who had been
elected deacon on the same day was ordained & installed. J. S. Furr deacon-elect was installed only,
as he had been ordained deacon previously in another congregation. Session closed with prayer.
H. H. Kimmons, C. S.
13
photo from The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi
The W. H. Wiley family, 1913. (left to right, front row) Hugh Christopher, Mittie Mae Wiley Black,
William Henry Wiley, Mattie Lou Wiley, William Oliver Wiley. (second row) Dinkie Etoy Wiley,
Lawson Waddel Wiley, Daniel Elton Wiley and Baxter Julian Wiley.
In small congregations, the office of deacon was filled usually by only one or two persons at a
time. Those who served at Hopewell were: Dan McFarland, Arm Shives, J. M. Kimmons, J. E.
McCorkle, J. S. Furr, W. L. Kimmons, Baker Cromwell, and H. L. Kimmons.
John Foster became Clerk of Session in 1860, and was succeeded by H. H. Kimmons on October
24, 1868. N. L. Lowrance was elected clerk on February 26, 1888, and J. A. Bigger on November
8, 1891.
In this era, virtually every church in the presbytery shared its minister with one or more congregations, and Hopewell was always linked with some other—in most cases, Lebanon, at Toccopola.
This meant that preaching was had only on those Sundays the minister was available and, since
travel on the Lord’s Day was prohibited by strict interpretations of the fourth commandment,
ministers customarily resided with a church family on both the night before and night following
their appointments at outlying preaching points. Moreover, each minister was required to spend
one or two Sundays between each meeting of Presbytery furnishing “destitute places” with a supply of preaching. Thus Hopewell Church was often quiet more Sundays than it was filled, except
when classes in the Sabbath School were kept up, or the elders convened the people for divine
service. At Hopewell, as in most locales, this effort was minimal, though on May 6, 1876, the
church record reveals that, “Session determined to comply with the requirement of our Confession of Faith and convene the congregation every Sabbath for worship.”
In 1887 the following Narrative on the State of Religion in Hopewell Church was approved:
14
“Our Pastor has discharged his official duties with commendable earnestness & fidelity. . . .The
other officers and private members are harmoniously performing their relative duties, without any
unbecoming zeal for S.S. or other church work. We have not been blessed with any special outpourings of the Holy Spirit, having had but two additions to our communion upon confession of
faith in Christ. Our church members are punctual in their attendance upon the duties of the
Sanctuary—their Christian deportment is good & their growth in grace, we hope, healthy, if not
vigorous. We have no weekly prayer meeting and the family altar is not erected in every household. All the various enterprises of the Church have been presented & responded to with an increased liberality of eight & a half per cent. The Sabbath is well observed. Our community is remarkably exempt from intemperance & sinful amusements. We have no special services in behalf
of the colored people. The deacons were instructed to employ some one to do the duties of a sexton at a salary of $5.00 per annum.”
The remarks about “unbecoming zeal” may reflect a debate then under way in the Presbyterian
Church over the propriety of pursuing Sunday school and other church work outside the control
of the session. It had been decided by vote of the General Assembly in 1879 that all church
activities must be subject to the review and control of the elders, and that the session had the right
of appointment of all superintendents and teachers in a congregation’s Sabbath school work. Accordingly, on August 28, 1887, the elders recorded that, “Our Sabbath school is small, but regularly attended. It is under the supervision of the session and three of our elders are constant attendants.” The following spring H. H. Kimmons was elected superintendent of the Sunday school.
Report of Deacons of Hopewell Church for 1888
Monies Received
Sustentation
Evangelistic
Invalid Fund
Foreign Missions—regular collection 26.70—free will 14.00
Education
Colored Evangelistic
Presbyterial
Pastor’s Salary
Congregational
$16.50
9.25
6.80
40.70
2.65
12.25
9.00
385.00
14.00
Respectfully submitted,
J. E. McCorkle and J. S. Furr, Deacons
A son of the church was engaged as Hopewell’s pastor in the spring of 1888, as noted in the following call:
“At a congregational meeting held on the above day a unanimous call was made for the pastoral
services of Rev. J. M. Kimmons.
Call
“We the Church of Hopewell being well satisfied of the ministerial qualifications of you Mr. J. M.
Kimmons and having good hopes from our past knowledge of your labors, that your ministrations
in the Gospel will be profitable to our spiritual interest, do earnestly call you to undertake the past-
15
oral office in our congregation, promising you in the discharge of your duty, all proper support,
encouragement and obedience in the Lord. And that you may be free from worldly cares and avocations, we hereby promise and oblige ourselves to pay you the sum of three hundred dollars
annually during the time of your being and continuing the regular pastor of this church.
H. H. Kimmons and N. L. Lowrance, Elders
“This 8th day of April 1888.
“Attested by J. A. Bigger, Moderator of Meeting.
“I do hereby certify that I presided at the above congregational meeting at which a unanimous call
was made for the pastoral services of Mr. J. M. Kimmons and that the persons signing said call
appointed for that purpose by a public vote of the church and that the call has been prepared as
directed by our form of government.”
The Rev. James M. Kimmons
James McEwen Kimmons was one of the three Kimmons men who entered the ministry from
Hopewell Church. He was born at Rocky River Church, near Concord, in Cabarrus County, N.C.,
April 27, 1828, the son of John and Margaret Morrison Kimmons, who were pioneer founders of
Hopewell Church. John Kimmons served in as an elder in the congregation for many years. The
family moved to Yalobusha County, Miss., in 1837, coming the next year to Lafayette County.
James was graduated from Hanover College, Indiana in 1851, and returned to his home where he
combined teaching with farming for many years. In 1854 he married Miss Martha Falls McCorkle. He was in the Confederate army. After the war, he was elected a deacon in Hopewell Church,
which office he filled faithfully, also taking an active part in the Sunday school as teacher and
superintendent. He was then elected an elder, and after a time, sensed a call to the ministry. He
16
was licensed to preach, December 15, 1887, and ordained to the full work of the gospel, April 21,
1888, by Chickasaw Presbytery, subsequent to his call as pastor in Hopewell Church. For the
remainder of his life he served Hopewell and, in addition, at various times he supplied Spring
Creek, Lebanon, and Tallahatchie Churches. He was called “Jimmy,” and his wife “Bright.” They
had four sons, one of whom, Willie Walt Kimmons, was an elder in Hopewell Church. James M.
Kimmons died March 9, 1905.46
photo from The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi
Martha Falls McCorkle Kimmons
By 1890, as the country entered a serious financial panic, the elders noted a serious decline in the
church’s membership and activity. The elders noted:
“Congregations smaller than ever before. 4 additions by certificate. 3 dismissed and 5 or 6 moved
far beyond our bounds without letters. Gradual growth in grace without any marked zeal. We have
8 [colored] members but they scarcely ever attend Church.”
A trend was beginning, whereby church families moved to larger towns nearby in search of employment and better schools for their children. In the year following, fourteen members were
dismissed to other churches, including the entire family of W. B. Newell. Not one united with the
church during this time. Such was the case in rural congregations all through the region. The
country church’s survival was a point of great concern.
For its part, the remaining Hopewell members were faithful in the best ways they knew. Even
though most churches in towns and cities had begun to celebrate the communion at least quarterly, the members of Hopewell continued their old sacramental seasons, usually held in the warmest months of the summer. In time, the occasions became less an opportunity for evangelism as
for the reunion of old friends and the reception of the church’s own young people into the full
privileges of communicant membership.
17
The church retained and strenthened a strong concern for interests beyond its bounds. As the elders noted on March 24, 1889, “We think the congregation liberal in their contributions to the benevolent schemes of the church, an opportunity being afforded every day of preaching.” Among
these “benevolent schemes” were sustentation, education (church colleges as well as candidates
for the ministry), evangelistic work in the presbytery, foreign missions, publication, the General
Assembly’s invalid fund (for disabled ministers and their widows and orphaned children), and the
Tuscaloosa Institute (now Stillman College), for the education of black ministers. In 1889, the
congregation contributed $122.35 to causes in the wider church in comparison to $342.85 for the
support of its pastor and other local expenses.
The congregation took special pride in the fact that Dr. J. N. Waddel, former pastor at Oxford and
chancellor of the University of Mississippi, and lately chancellor of Southwestern Presbyterian
University in Clarksville, Tenn., who had come to Hopewell’s aid on many occasions, was making a return visit to the area. On June 9, 1889, the session minutes report that, “It was moved and
carried unanimously that we have no preaching on the 4th Sabbath of June that Pastor and congregation may go in to hear Dr. Waddel preach the commencement sermon at Oxford.”
It may be assumed that these Presbyterians sang, but accounts of their worship are scanty. As
with most country churches, the hymns were probably raised a capella, as theological opposition
to instrumental accompaniment remained strong well into the 1890s. But on May 7, 1892, the
session “ordered a congregational meeting immediately after service for the purpose of electing a
leader of the ch. music,” and Mrs. W. B. McFarland was chosen.
The congregation’s one admission of neglect was in its responsibility to its black and neighbors.
The presbytery made a yearly inquiry of all its churches as to what each was doing “on behalf of
the colored people,” and yearly Hopewell’s elders replied as they did in 1895, that: “There are yet
a few colored people that are members of our church and attend the preaching service, yet the
most of them seem to prefer their own churches of their own color.”47 Moreover, they went on to
say: “We do not feel that there are any spiritually destitute in our vicinity, all are in reach of some
church and generally attend.” It was an era of seeming religious conformity enviable in a later
age. Hopewell Church reported forty-nine communicants that year.
Some clues about church life are gained from the 1900 church narrative. “Our members that live
convenient to the church attend well.” A few non-members from outside the bounds of the church
family also attended. Family worship, much-stressed in the injunctions of the church’s higher
governing bodies, was observed “by probably a majority of our members or households.” The
Sabbath school program stressed memorization. “Scriptures are repeated at roll call and the catechism taught in our School.” Finally, “The fidelity of God’s people in worshiping the Lord with
their substance and giving to the support and extension of the Gospel is comparatively good.” In
fact, the congregation was remarkable in the level of its financial contributions. This was attributable to the relative prosperity of the members, but also to the fidelity of the pastors in encouraging the grace of giving.
On June 16, 1901, young Howard C. and Fred S. McCorkle, sons of John E. and Willie Kate
Kimmons McCorkle, came before the session to make their confessions of faith. They would play
important roles in Hopewell Church, Howard as one of its respected elders and Fred as a ministerial son.
18
photo from The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi
The John E. McCorkle family.
Front row: Fred Stewart, Mrs. John E. McCorkle, John E. McCorkle holding James Bright, Mary
Wirt McCorkle, Howard Crawford McCorkle. Back Row. John E. McCorkle and Samuel McCorkle.
On June 18, 1905, in an endeavor to attract a minister, the congregation voted to build a manse,
which was erected on the north side of the church building, near the spot where the Camp Hopewell swimming pool now is located. The following September, the Rev. R. L. Nicholson was
called as pastor, also serving the nearby Tallahatchie Church.
The Hopewell manse, c. 1950
Robert Lee Nicholson was born in Newton County, Miss., March 3, 1870, and was educated at
Mississippi A. & M. College and Southwestern Presbyterian University, where he engaged in
theological studies at its divinity school. After evangelistic work in Texas, where he was ordained
to the ministry, he returned to Mississippi, serving at Ackerman and Pontotoc, before assuming
charge of the Hopewell group of churches, of which he was pastor from 1906 to 1909. Later he
served the Black Jack Church near Batesville, before going to fields in Arkansas, Missouri, and
Texas. He retired at DeKalb, Miss., where he died, May 20, 1951.48
19
Hopewell Church had long lain on the boundary between Chickasaw Presbytery to the east and
North Mississippi Presbytery to the west. In particular, the church had been separated by the
judicatory line from its closest neighbors, the First Church of Oxford and College Hill Presbyterian Church. A proposal came before the Synod of Mississippi in November, 1907, to transfer the
congregation from Chickasaw to North Mississippi Presbytery, which was done, April 14, 1908,
opening the way to more fruitful groupings for future pastoral service.
Through the years, most who joined Hopewell from other churches were Presbyterian, with the
odd member from the Methodist (then known as the Methodist Episcopal) Church. The Methodists
and other mainstream churches recognized each other’s ministries and granted letters of transfer
as, of course, Presbyterians always do. However, on March 28, 1909, a report came before the
elders that a member and his daughter had joined church whose practice it was not to recognize
other communions, and hence no letter of transfer from the Hopewell session had been requested.
When it became known, that Mr. P ___ , and his daughter, “having on their own accord without
letter or advice from Session united with the Primitive Baptist Church,” the clerk reported that
“their names are hereby erased from our ch. roll.”
Hopewell did its part to help with the organization of a new congregation on the outskirts of
Oxford, called Central Church, which was enrolled in Presbytery April 14, 1909. Mr. Nicholson
was pastor of this congregation as well as Hopewell. The little church, which began with twentyfive members, two elders and a deacon, faltered during the Great Depression, and on April 18,
1939, it was dissolved and its members transferred to the Oxford Church.49
Meanwhile, Hopewell’s life continued apace. On March 13, 1910, Howard McCorkle, who
farmed the land next to the church was appointed Superintendent of the Sunday school, with J. M.
Saunders as assistant. Miss M. M. McFarland was appointed teacher of Ladies Bible Class, with
Mrs Willie McCorkle as assistant. J. M. Saunders was appointed Clerk of Session. Two years
later, June 16, 1912:
“at a Congregational Meeting at the call of the Session, Elder W. H. Wiley was elected chairman
& J. M. Saunders, sec. Mr W. W. Kimmons & H. C. McCorkle were duly elected elders of Hopewell Church. D. B. Cromwell was duly elected Deacon of Hopewell Church.”
photo from The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi
The J. M. Saunders family. (from lest) Roy Saunders, James M. Saunders, Helen Saunders,
Corinne Baird, Paris, Tex. (niece of J. M. Saunders), and Mary Saunders.
20
1
See Maud Morrow Brown, History of the First Presbyterian Church of Oxford, Mississippi, July 15, 1837-March 31,
1950 (Oxford: First Presbyterian Church, 1952): 8. Cf. C. W. Grafton, “A History of Presbyterianism in Mississippi,” unpublished manuscript, commissioned by the Synod of Mississippi, 1927.
2 According to the records of Presbytery (March 23, 1842), “A Presbyterian Church organized by Bishop Weatherby in
the S.E. part of Lafayette Cy. called Lebanon was on application taken under the care of Presbytery.” The church
was moved some distance from the original site on property owned by Tobias and Allison Furr, who moved to
Toccopola, a Chickasaw Indian settlement built on land owned by Betty Love Allen, a Chickasaw woman who had
married John L. Allen. Soon after the Furrs arrived, a number of Scots-Irish families arrived from Cabarrus County,
N. C. and settled south of Yocona Creek. Their first consideration was a church and school, and soon they built a log
church and a less pretentious schoolhouse nearby. The congregation was formally organized and received under care
of Presbytery in 1841. In 1850 ten acres of land was deeded to the church, part of which is still rented and cultivated,
bringing a small income to the church to the present day. About 1882, the church was moved to its current location
in the village of Toccopola.
3 Presbyterians in this era used the term “bishop” as a sign of their rejection of the Episcopal and Roman Catholic distinction between presbyters and bishops, and to insist that their ministers, also being bishops, were properly equipped
to receive members into the church, even though the parish clergy of the Episcopal and Roman Churches were not so
authorized. It was the refusal of some Episcopalians in the era previous to recognize the validity of Presbyterian orders that occasioned this defensive behavior. After 1846 the Form of Government deleted the term, and the General
Assembly recommended that Presbyterian clergy be referred to as “ministers” not bishops. See Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (October 2, 1846).
4 Ibid. (March 24, 1842).
5 Margaret G. Jones, “McFarland Family,” The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi (Oxford: Skipwith Historical
and Genealogical Society, 1986): 450.
6 Ministerial Directory of the Presbyterian Church, U. S., 1861-1941, compiled by the Rev. E. C. Scott, D.D., Stated
Clerk of the General Assembly, Published by Order of the General Assembly (Austin, Tex.: Von Boeckmann-Jones,
1942): 446; Robert Milton Winter, Shadow of a Mighty Rock: A Social and Cultural History of Presbyterianism in
Marshall County, Mississippi (Franklin, Tenn.: Providence House, 1997): 128-29
7 Southwestern Presbyterian (July 23, 1891); Biographical Catalogue of Princeton Theological Seminary (1909);
Alumni Records of Princeton Theological Seminary; “Presbyterians Build Early Churches,” Oxford Eagle, 90th Anniversary Edition (August 22, 1957): 5; History of the First Presbyterian Church of Oxford, Mississippi, 48; Shadow of
a Mighty Rock, 52.
8 The presbytery was not reticent to assert is prerogative to see that the churches conformed to basic standards for
recordkeeping. Several years later the book belonging to the Ebenezer Church session was rejected on the ground
that it was “defective.”
9 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (April 3, 1847).
10 Young’s first assignment was at Philadelphia Church in Marshall County, after which he was pastor at Chulahoma
(1846-1848) and Edmiston (1849-1852), after which he was Stated Supply at Ebenezer in DeSoto County (18541856), and Panola, now Batesville (1857-1859). He then was a teacher in Memphis (also serving the church at
Raleigh, Tenn. during the Civil War years). He served other churches in the Memphis Presbytery, and died in Memphis in 1878 or 1879. Ministerial Directory (1941): 802-03.
11 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (April 14, 1848).
12 Ibid. (October 3, 1845).
13 Before the emergence of standard colleges with an accredited curriculum, presbyteries had to satisfy themselves as to
the scholarly qualifications and attainments of their probationers for the ministry. As typically the most learned
member of a rural community in the pioneer era, a Presbyterian minister was expected to be a scholarly person, and
so knowledge of English literature, mathematics and philosophy, as well as the natural sciences, was considered a
foundational prerequisite for entry into the specialized studies of scriptural exegesis and theology. Knowledge of the
arts and sciences was also essential in the pioneer setting that nineteenth century Mississippi was, because in addition
to their preaching duties, Presbyterian ministers of that era often kept a school—hence, the examinations in algebra
and astronomy before Presbytery detailed frequently in presbytery minutes of this period. Knowledge of the Bible’s
content in English translation was assumed, and courses on the actual content of the Bible were not added in either
collegiate or seminary curricula until the late nineteenth century.
14 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (October 2-3, 1846).
15 Ibid. (October 29, 1846).
16 During this period, except in extraordinary situations, ministers were required to have a theological education,
although they did not have to attend a seminary to obtain it. Ministerial directories of the era often note that certain
persons had “studied theology privately”—that is under the tutelage of a learned person and at the direction of Presbytery. Most candidates did pursue at least a year’s course in a standard theological seminary of the Church. See
21
Elwyn A. Smith, The Presbyterian Ministry in American Culture: A Study in Changing Concepts, 1700-1900 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962).
17 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (April 2-3, 1847).
18 Ibid. (April 14-15, 1848).
19 Ibid. (August 31, 1849).
20 Typically, to emphasize that ordination was an act of Presbytery, the ceremony of the laying-on-of-hands was performed in sessions of Presbytery. Installations of pastors could, however, be carried out by an administrative committee.
21 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (October 17-18, 1849).
22 Ministerial Directory (1941): 560.
23 These are the oldest sessional records of Hopewell Church known to the present writer.
24 Sessional Records of Hopewell Presbyterian Church (September 1, 1860).
25 The use of a courtesy title assures the reader that the person in question was white. Mississippi’s Blacks were denied
such respect, and by the same token, white persons, even if held in low regard by the community, were accorded
such courtesies in the written records of white-controlled churches of this era.
26 Ibid. (April 23, 1868); (May 15, 1868). While modern readers are often startled to read that Presbyterians once pronounced sentences of excommunication upon their members, it should be remembered that the Church, after due
process, had (and has) this power. Unlike medieval practice, the use of excommunication in Reformed Churches involved only the suspension of participation in the Lord’s Supper and other like privileges, and did not presume to
judge whether the person being punished would be barred from blessing in eternity. Indeed, since the sentence was
executed to prompt repentance, it may be assumed that such judgments were not implied.
27 Sessional Records of Hopewell Presbyterian Church (July 23, 1880).
28 Ibid. (January 22, 1870).
29 For example, in the minutes of the Hopewell session (October 13, 1872), “The charges of drunkenness and profanity
having been presented against him and the fact of his guilt being fully and legally established, it was, on motion,
resolved that K ____ C ____ be and he is hereby excommunicated from the Church, and that the sentence and action
of the Church Session in the case be this day made known to the members of the Church in public by the Moderator
in accord with the directions laid down in the Directory of Worship, Chapter X. Italics added for emphasis.
30 This minute, dealing as it does with political matters, is rare in the ecclesiastical records of Mississippi Presbyterianism. Except for early records dealing with the Indians, one seldom saw references to the government for matters
other than, say, resolutions calling for legislation forbidding the operation of railroad trains or the delivery of mail on
the Sabbath. Thus, the uniqueness of the proceedings dealt with at the October 1861 meeting of Presbytery cannot be
overemphasized. By the time the Old School Assembly had convened, May 16, 1861, nine states had withdrawn
from the Union and war had been under way for a month. Thirty-three of the sixty-four presbyteries in the South and
border states were unrepresented in the Assembly. Not a single commissioner came from the Carolinas, Georgia,
Alabama, or Arkansas; though sixteen attended from the deep South. Some commissioners cited the war as a reason
not to travel, others had already subscribed to the idea of a separate southern church. Thomas C. Stuart, of Monroe,
however, represented Chickasaw Presbytery at this Assembly. In earlier years he had been a commissioner at meetings of the Assembly, but surely this was the most memorable. When the Assembly began its deliberations, there
was effort to defer discussion of slavery and sectional issues, for most Old School Presbyterians took pride that theirs
was the last great American institution to remain united at this critical moment. The Rev’d John N. Waddel, who had
recently left Oxford to teach in the Presbyterian Synodical College in LaGrange, Tenn., addressed an open letter to
the Rev’d Gardiner A. Spring, D.D., pastor of the Brick Presbyterian Church in City of New York, who sponsored
resolutions calling on all church members to support the Federal government, “deploring the introduction of “a set of
resolutions of the most incendiary nature” in an hour which demanded forbearance. At the Assembly the venerable
and highly influential Dr. Charles Hodge, of Princeton, with fifty-seven others, protested the Spring Resolutions. But
the Spring Resolutions were passed by a seventy per cent majority, and this settled the issue for many. The resolutions urged by the elders of Hopewell indicate that this was also the case for them.
31 Maud Morrow Brown, “Lafayette County, 1860-1865: A Narrative” (unpublished typescript), John D. Williams Library, University of Mississippi, Special Collections, 35.
32 The diary is preserved in the John D. Williams Library, University of Mississippi.
33 No reference to the burning or replacement of Hopewell Church appears in its sessional records.
34 See R. Milton Winter, Thy Dwellings Fair: Churches of St. Andrew Presbytery (Lafayette, Calif.: Thomas-Berryhill
Press, 2000): 10, 39.
35 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (April 18, 1868).
36 Sessional Records of Hopewell Presbyterian Church (October 24, 1868).
37 Ibid. (November 26, 1870).
38 Ibid. (August 15 and August 24, 1872).
39
Margaret G. Jones, “McFarland Family,” The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi, 450.
40 Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (September 4-5, 1873 and September 26-27, 1873).
41 Ministerial Directory (1941): 340.
22
42
Ibid., 621.
Minutes of Chickasaw Presbytery (January 28, 1884).
44 Ministerial Directory (1941): 654.
45 Sessional Records of Hopewell Presbyterian Church (April 11, 1886).
46 Margaret G. Jones, “Kimmons Family,” The Heritage of Lafayette County, Mississippi, 402.
47 As late as 1901 the congregation reported four black members. The congregation’s last black member, Welley Clark,
was granted a letter of dismission in 1910. He was dismissed to Central Church…
48 Ibid. (1941): 538; (1967): 416.
49 Fred R. Graves, North Mississippi Presbytery: A History (Sardis: Southern Reporter, 1941): 18.
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