Otter Creek Baptist
1837-1873
This church was organized in 1837
previous to September 23rd, the church being received
on that date into the Bethel Association. The church was in all
probability organized by Anderson Woods who was the pastor of the
Paris Baptist Church and who was also the first pastor of this
church.
It was received into the association as a
newly constituted church and reported having 6 members, it
reported no additions by letter or baptism and, perhaps, was
constituted with 36 charter members.
When it was received into the
association, the messengers appointed to attend the association
were: W. Rucker, D. Wills, and L. Steele.
In 1842 it erected a “Meeting House”
on land lying in Section 35, township 55 and range 9. The land was
deeded to Presly Wilkerson, Joseph Goss, and Jonas B. Reavis as
trustees for the use and benefit of the United Baptist Church on
Otter Creek.
The deed was made on February 22nd,
1842 by Thomas Poage and Mary Poage, his wife, the consideration
was $1.00 and embraced an acre and a half.
This would locate the church six miles
east and two miles north of Paris, or three miles south and two
miles west of Stoutsville and about five miles west of Florida and
a little north. The Digest of Church Letters in the minutes for
1873 states that the church was considering the property of
dissolution because, “she is overshadowed by another
denomination.” The Statistical table for this same year shows
that she dismissed 19 by letter but still had 20 members on the
roll. The church never again appears, having been dropped from the
roll of church in 1874.
Some of the members became members of the
Stoutsville (New Hope) church and perhaps some also became members
of the Elk Creek church that worshipped in the Powers School House
and in 1879 was reorganized into the Lebanon church and used the
church house conjointly with the Christian church at Victor. J.M.
Pollard was a member at New Hope, the Gillaspys were members at
Lebanon: these had members of Otter Creek. The Otter Creek church
never attained a very large membership, it had 36 members when it
was constituted, twice it had 59 members in the years 1847 and
1870. The church baptized 71 persons in the 36 years of her active
life: the largest number of baptisms being 18 in 1843.
The names of the persons appointed by the
church to attend the associations is given that we may know who
were some of the members of the church. Each is person is named
only once but several of them represented the church several
times. The list is as follows:
W. Rucker
D. Wills
D. Steele
Isaac Bates
J. Dickson
J.B. Reavis
J.H. Curry
Joseph Goss
Mr. W. Rencher
J. Dooley
S.M. Patterson
A.G. Haines
G. Goss
N. Dooley
John Long
M.F.Kennett
James Scobee
W. Reavis
S. Dooley
B.G. Reavis
M. Dooley
J.M. Pollard
W.M. Tipton
D.H. Gillaspy
T. McKinzie
B.P. Waltz
H. Goodrich
To this list can be added the name of
Presly Wilkerson trustee, W. Beachamp, Sunday school
Superintendent, T.F. Burnett, once clerk.
The pastors of this church were as
follows:
Anderson Woods 1837-1841
Norman Parks 1842-1847
Bartlett Anderson 1848-1849
None in 1854 & 1856
S.A. Beauchamp in 1856
D.V. Inlow 1857-1861
None during the Civil War period,
1862-1866
A.C. Goodrich 1867-1872
None in 1873.
It is doubtful if the church ever
produced a preacher, there is no indication in the minutes that it
did.
The church was never a very large
contributor to missions and yet in the Mission Controversy that
rent some churches from the association in the years 1837-1839
this church remained with the churches in sympathy with missions
and Sunday Schools. All her Mission offerings were for District
Missions and for all the years amounted to only $21.80. There may
have been offerings for other denominational missions but were not
reported and it is but just to say that the associational minutes
for the earlier years were very defective in statistics.
Only once in 1870 did the church report
having a Sunday school which had 7 teachers and 40 students. Wm.
Beauchamp was the Superintendent.
Eternity alone will reveal the good this
church accomplished in those early days when the country was first
being settled. The “Meeting House” erected in 1842 stood for
years after the church disbanded, until destroyed by fire.
Note:
above history was sent to Miss Lena Louise Scobee in January 1932.
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