I was looking something up today and much to my surprise couldn't find a link on my blog. So this post is a place to organize my links and my information. Below is part of what I have written in my data base for Lewis Craig (son of Tolliver and Mary Hawkins Craig). I have taken this from the Franklin County, Kentucky website (see link):
Lewis Craig was born in Orange County, Va about the year 1737. He was raised on a farm, receiving very limited education, and, in early life, was married to Betsy Landers. He was first awakened to a sense of his guilt and condemnation about the year 1765 under the preaching of Samuel Harris.....there are several pages of information on his preaching in Orange....During a revival in Upper Spotsylvania, in 1776, over one hundred were added to its membership (referring to Dover Association) This church prospered as long as Mr. Craig remained with it in its first location....He was now in the vigor and strength of manhood--a little under 45 years of age. He had been fourteen years in the ministry, had enjoyed extraordinary success, and had had a wider and more varied experience than most men have in a life-time.
Mr. Craig continued to serve Upper Spottsylvania church as pastor, til 1781 when he moved to Kentucky. So strongly was the church attached to him, that most of its members came with him. At exactly what time in the fall they started has not been ascertained. But Mr. Craig was on the Holsten river on the road leading from his former home, by way of Cumberland Gap, to his destination in Kentucky on the 28th of September, 1781, for on that day, he aided in constituting a church at that point, then the extreme western settlement in Virginia.
Dr. S H. Ford, in the Christian Repository of March, 1856 says of Craig and his traveling charge: “about the 1st of December, they passed the Cumberland Gap....and on the second Lord’s day in December 1781, they had arrived in Lincoln (now Garrard Co.) and met as a Baptist CHurch of Christ at Gilberts Creek. Old William Marshall preached to them, with their pastor, the first Sunday after their arrival.” ....there is more good information on Lewis Craig in this book.
I actually bought a copy of Mr. Ranck's book via amazon just now so it should be in my library. However, it is available on-line at the URL above.
In July of 2020, I was chatting with Roger Hardesty about our "twin blogs". His post, ‘Condemned to a life eternal?’ at Hard Honesty, has lots of information about the traveling church that I did not already know
In July of 2020, I was chatting with Roger Hardesty about our "twin blogs". His post, ‘Condemned to a life eternal?’ at Hard Honesty, has lots of information about the traveling church that I did not already know
2 comments:
Thanks for linking to my post!
Setting Elder Lewis Craig (c1737 – 1825) and his 'Separatist' Baptists beside Brother Robert Elkin (1745 – 1822) and 'Regular' Baptists can be enlightening. It appears Craig ordained Elkin in the near-wilderness of Black’s Fort on the Holston River. ‘Travelling Church’ is a title associated with both parties; who in the winter of 1780-1781 converged there as both went west along Wilderness Road (depicted in your post Settlements in the Wautauga/Nolichucky area in the 1700s). I now contend Craig’s body deserves the depiction.
Ranck explains Craig brought his congregation “in a body” from Virginia. "The moving train included church members, their children, negro slaves and other emigrants ... between five and six hundred souls." Elkin, on the other hand, sort of emerged as Chaplain in a family venture.
“Nearly everything … pertaining to Craig's Church was going,” observes Ranck. “Its official books and records, its simple communion service, the treasured old Bible from the pulpit …” Those are the accouterments of a church body.
It also became apparent that Craig’s Upper Spottsylvania congregation had ‘hustle’ that those travelling with Elkin did not. Elkin’s group had halted for an entire growing season when Craig and the others found them wintering in at the fort. Craig’s group went westward, having faith they’d survive depredations while Revolutionary War made the road ahead dangerous. The body Elkin pastored to hung back another two years!
Think of the industriousness! When the follow-on contingent in the spring of 1784 arrived at Craig's Station, near what is now Lancaster, Kentucky, "they found empty cabins awaiting them. Craig and his colony of Baptists had moved near Lexington, Kentucky."
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