A Relation of My Experience

 

A Relation of My Experience

By Mary Beckley Bristow, 1857

. . . I was born in Bourbon County, Kentucky, on the 18th day of November 1808. My parents were at that time both baptists, and from observation and my own experience, must say that professing parents at that time were much more particular in raising their children than they are at present — not teaching them religion nor even attempting anything of the kind — but they were taught to respect its Author and religious persons, particularly the preachers, and were strict attendants of their parents’ meeting. I am of opinion that parents and children would be equally as well off if those lessons were taught at the present time. Parents might there-by be spared some bitter tears. But enough of this.

The first serious impressions made on my mind that I have any recollections of were produced by hearing old Father Ambrose Dudley1
Ambrose Dudley
preach the funeral sermon of Aunt Sally, Uncle James Clarkson’s first wife,2 and upon examining the date of her death, I find that I was then in my eighth year.3 This sermon must have made a deep impression on my young mind, for though so many years have elapsed, I have a perfect recollection of his appearance, the solemnity of his manner, the place where he stood in my Grandfather’s house.4 It seems I can almost hear the sound of his pleasant voice this quiet morning, as he repeated his text, “Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.”5 I remember he exalted the character of God, and one expression of his I shall not forget until memory becomes extinct. It was this, “Oh, Eternity, Eternity, awful, solemn thought! If a little bird was to come once a year and take one grain of sand away until every grain on earth was gone, eternity would be just begun.” So great was the awe inspired in my mind by those solemn words that I trembled from head to foot. Nor was the impression lost for years, but often when I would find myself alone, if that solemn word, eternity, came into my mind, I would immediately run to find company. From that time I was subject to deeply serious impressions, particularly if I heard of the death of anyone near my own age. As I had been sickly from my birth, I greatly feared death and the lonely grave, and worse than either that dread eternity beyond. As I grew up my health improved a little, and I was beginning to enjoy the world, forgetful of eternity.

When about sixteen years old, I with a large party of young relatives were gathered at the house of an Aunt to take leave of her eldest son, who the next morning was to leave home to go into business.6 In the midst of our enjoyment (we had scarcely noticed the very dark cloud that had gathered), a flash of lightning, accompanied by a clap of thunder that seemed to make the whole earth quake, struck the chimney. Several were thrown from their seats, and every one in the room more or less felt the shock. The room was so entirely filled with soot and smoke that one could not tell for a time what had been the fate of those nearest to them. The first thing I saw was my little nephew Robert Ellis7 lying prostrate on the floor. My Uncle James Clarkson,8 who was there and so much shocked that he could not rise, told some one to take him out in the rain that was falling in torrents. Every one of us followed, and after getting very wet we repaired to the kitchen. Aunt White,9 who had been a baptist and a sincere christian, I have no doubt, from her eleventh year, preached us a sermon on the goodness and mercy of God in sparing our lives. The goodness and mercy I could not at that time understand, but felt humbled down to the dust at this awful display of his power and majesty. . . . I felt less than nothing, and during the balance of the evening and for many days afterward, I could scarce restrain my tears. I made some solemn resolves to be prepared for death, let the dread monster come when he would, and when the sun was shining and the wind was calm, [I] felt I was getting along very well, but the sound of far distant thunder would shake my foundation of good works, and down would tumble the whole superstructure and leave me naked before an Awful God. Often I found myself repeating some verse I learned at school,10

“Tis He who bids the storms arise,
And rolls the thunder through the skies.
His voice the elements obey;
Through all the earth extends his sway.
His goodness all His creatures share,
But man is His peculiar care.
Then while they all proclaim His praise,
Let man his voice the loudest raise.”

I think I felt under obligations at such times to praise God, but did not know where to commence. I at times feared God, but did not love him. Not long after the thunderstorm, the great Mr Campbell11
Thomas Campbell
passed through the neighborhood, and what was called the reformation commenced in good earnest, for it really seemed for a time that all the world was going after him, except for a few old baptists.12   Now being a reformer by birthright, I was pleased and delighted by the system, firmly believing Mr Campbell, in the greatness of his might, was coming to evangelize the world. I soon became exceedingly zealous, as all his followers are, or were at that time. I became a subscriber for the “Millennial Harbinger13 and soon got very wise, and was in my own estimation sufficiently well-informed to debate with the oldest preacher in the country. I had been reared to respect the old baptists; indeed, I regarded those advanced in years as something to be held in reverence, and thought myself to be a believer in the doctrine they preached. Now I was, as far as my power extended, a persecutor, and Saul of Tarsus never had more venom in his heart against the church of Christ than I had. But for those baptists and an occasional thunderstorm I should have got on very well. The storm would make one a coward. To hear an old baptist preach would at any time make me so angry it would take me some time to catch up again. They were a source of real vexation and annoyance.

Their professing to be so weak, ignorant, and so sinful in their own esteem, and then see them so perfectly confident and well satisfied with their system, was a problem I could not solve. I was not so much astonished to hear a weak-minded woman or an ignorant negro tell what they called an experience, but [with] persons of intellect, and particularly a man, it looked to me very silly. “Is it not strange,” said I to cousin Eliza Stamps14 one day, after hearing Elder Thomas P Dudley give a relation of his experience, “to see such a fine looking, intelligent man as Mr Dudley sit up in company, cry like a baby, and tell such a foolish tale?” (The fact is I had seen her shedding tears freely whilst he was telling the foolish tale, and I was disposed to tell her what I thought of her folly.) As a man and as a preacher Mr Dudley was a favorite, but I really felt mortified for him and attributed his weakness to the peculiarly distressing circumstances under which he labored at that time, the insanity of his wife. It seemed to me I never got my system well built up and came to the conclusion to join the reformers, but some of the baptists would come along and spoil my work.

Every feeling of my soul rose up in arms against the doctrine of predestination, nor do I believe any human heart ever hated that precious truth more than I did. I would often say, if that doctrine was true, God was an unjust Being and unworthy [of] the adoration of intelligent creatures, and though most of my dearest friends were baptists, there was at times bitter hatred in my heart towards them as a denomination.

In my nineteenth year, it was the pleasure of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own Will to take from us our favorite brother in his fourteenth year.15   He had been sick for several days, but it was not thought to be dangerous. [He] still walked about the house. The day of his death, I stepped into his room very early in the morning. He had his arms around my Mother’s neck, begging her to pray for him. [He] told her he was going to die and go to hell, he was such a sinner. She told him she had tried often to pray for him; he must try to pray for himself. He said he did not know how to pray. She said, “Ask the Lord to have mercy on you.” He caught the words from her lips, and with clasped hands and eyes raised to heaven, repeated again and again, “Lord have mercy on me, a poor sinner!” Every feature expressed intense agony for two or three hours, but whilst all the family and many friends were standing around his bed with streaming eyes, we witnessed an instantaneous change from despair to real joy. “I am dying,” said he, “and going to heaven with Jesus. Come, all of you, and go to heaven with me! How beautiful you all look!” calling each one of us by his name. “Everything is beautiful.” A calm, sweet smile illumined his dying features, and though he had many hard spasms, that smile and the security of mind remained until he was relieved from suffering. The deathbed sense of this dearly beloved brother cured me in a great measure of Campbellism. I was convinced baptism alone would not do. Still I was an arminian, but concluded that if I would do the very best I could, the Lord would surely do the balance, and I should by this means be prepared to meet my brother in a better world.

Lines On A Brother’s Grave 16
Beneath this grassy mound doth lie
A young and gentle head,
As lovely a bud as e’er did die
Sleeps in this narrow bed.
His mortal part is resting here,
His soul has flown to worlds on high
To heaven where no obtruding care
Shall cause his breast to heave a sigh.
Then, Mother, why those briny tears
Which course each other down your face?
Remember him for whom you weep
Is now in heaven, that happy place.
He has left this world of sin and woe
For greater joys above.
Then, Mother, weep for James no more;
He’s blest beyond a Mother’s love.
           — Mary B Bristow

Now for some years I was a wandering star. I tried every grade of arminianism,17 fatalism,18 and even deism,19 but was at all times a pharisee,20 thinking myself naturally far better than anyone I knew and wondering that the Lord did not appear to do some good thing for me. I remember that my sister21 came home from meeting at Elizabeth22 and told me my Cousin Jane McConnell23 had been baptized the day before. I was impious enough to think that the Lord and Elder T P Dudley had made a strange mistake in making a christian of her in preference to me, for I felt assured I was much the best of us two [sic]. . . .

In October
An Heirloom Rose
1831 my parents removed from Bourbon to Boone County, Kentucky, [and] purchased a farm seven miles below Covington on the Ohio River;24 and although I had left my birthplace, the scenes of all my youthful enjoyments, the graves of my loved ones, and was subjected to many inconveniences I had never known before,25 yet surrounded by the picturesque River scenery, which to my untraveled eyes was sublimely grand, I said in my heart, when we get a new house built, and those shrubs and flowers transplanted from my childhood’s home grow up to gladden my heart with their beauty, I shall be perfectly content, the world forgetting, and by the world forgot.

My ideas of happiness were at that time purely selfish. I expected to live almost alone, books and my own thoughts my chief companions, and whenever I desired a peep at the world beyond, an hour or two would take me to the Queen City.26   I soon found a place that suited me exactly, to sit and read on a pile of rocks on the point of the bluff, underneath which reposed the bones of the former monarchs of the forest. Often have I sat thinking of those quiet sleepers, until a bird flitting through the branches of the lofty trees, the lonely hooting of an owl, the plaintive notes of the whippoorwill, would startle me, and I would almost fancy I heard the stealthy steps of an Indian warrior behind me. With a fluttering heart, I would steal away to the house behind me, which was not more than a hundred yards distant, though entirely concealed by the dense forest. I spent the spring and summer of ’32 so quietly that I began to think there might be happiness found in this world after I got a few things more to my notion.

In the fall of the same year, the cholera first made its appearance in our country, and we heard the most distressing accounts from the City and Steamboats every day.27   And now I came to a strange conclusion: [I] was not afraid of the cholera, but it had seemed to me for several years previous that there was some strange fatality attached to our family, my parents having but four children living out of thirteen.28   I was afraid my parents and brothers would be taken and I left alone, and so strongly had this impression taken possession of my mind that I was really unhappy if one of my brothers left home for one hour. But as the weather became cold the cholera subsided, and we were all spared.

From that time I was subject to gloomy, restless feelings that I could neither account for nor get clear of. Sometimes I felt as lonely as though there was not a living creature on earth but myself. There seemed to be no green spot left on earth for me to set my feet on. Books, the beautiful River scenery as the spring advanced, the society of my best loved friends, only pleased me for a moment. Then those gloomy feelings of condemnation would return. I sometimes set myself anxiously to enquire the cause of my unhappiness. I was perfectly willing to admit that I was a sinner, but not such a great sinner as many I knew. I had never in all my life sworn an oath nor committed any act that could be called crime, had always been too proud to envy, too independent to utter falsehood. Hypocrisy and deceit I abhorred, and to crown all I had such a good, noble, generous heart — at least a shade better than any body I knew. Why then was I haunted with such a feeling of guilt and misery, I could not tell. Then would I strive to get rid of these feelings, fearing as their [sic] seemed to be no cause for them, [that] if indulged [they] would produce insanity. So I resolved to go more into company, to be as gay as the gayest and have all those gloomy phantoms chased away.

I was here reminded of an expression I heard an old baptist man use when I was a child. He and my mother were, I suppose, talking on the subject of religion as I passed through the room. I heard him say he had no power to control his own thoughts. Thinks I to myself, “What an old fool you are.” I really thought any person of even common sense could reflect on just what subject they pleased. Now, I found that not withstanding all my vain boasting, that I was just as apt to be beset with those gloomy feelings of guilt and condemnation in a crowd as when alone, and I was as apt to feel cheerful, and think I would soon get clear of trouble at home as when abroad, and as I was very fearful that my countenance would betray me, I resolved to stay at home, not even going to meeting. My poor health was a good excuse; neither had I reaped any benefit from going to meeting. When I heard the reformers I found myself answering every thing they said, and when they got through I would say to myself, “I have tried your system. It is all nonsense. It will not do.”

When I went to Sardis to hear Uncle Billy Hume, I would often conceit that everybody and particularly the preacher was watching me and saw my guilt and misery and was telling me of it or tormenting me before my time. Often I could not restrain my tears and thus I was betraying myself. So I would go no more. I had been from childhood an occasional Bible reader, had often read aloud for my Father. Now I was ashamed to let anyone see me with it in my hand, and if I saw my parents regarding me attentively I thought they knew my desperate situation and were pitying me. Immediately I would leave the room, strike up some gay song to deceive them. In the meantime tears were rolling down my cheeks. I often set out with the full intention of getting clear of my distress by my own good deeds, but always failed. I had one powerful enemy to contend with in my naturally high temper that I never had much idea of controlling, believing I never got angry without cause I had thought I was justifiable. Now I found I had the worst tounge [sic] when set in motion that I knew of. I determined to govern it better, but found it a much harder task than I had imagined. Very often I would have to run to keep from speaking sarcastic and bitter words. Often would my tounge gain the victory. I thought if I could only get the control of this wretchedly mischievous member, I could get along very well.

I recollect one night, sitting, singing to a little niece I had taken to raise.29   She was sick, and I was fearful that she would die, for sometimes I thought that the Lord had taken and would take all that I loved from me because I was such a great sinner. I sung my thoughts, “Thou knowest I am guilty, Thou knowest I am vile, Thou knowest I am filthy, And quite throughout defiled. Yet thou, Oh God, canst cleanse me, Canst make me white as snow.” I could go no farther, for how this cleansing was to be performed I knew not. I am not sure that I was not trying to bribe the Almighty by this confession to share my idols.

* * * * *

I really felt I wished to know the worst of my case, and it did seem to me that I certainly grew worse daily, and at length I concluded that there was no such thing as religion in the world, that each denomination was striving for the mastery, and I would throw the whole matter away and care no more about it. I said in my heart there is there is no God, no heaven, no hell, but the death of my little Mary Jane convinced me there was a God who had the power in his own hands to accomplish all his pleasure. I now was the most restless, peevish, unhappy mortal that ever existed. The world and things I had formerly loved afforded me no pleasure nor comfort. Their was and [sic] indifference in my heart towards my own family as if they had caused my wretchedness that I cannot account for to this day. And how they made out to bear with me I cannot tell. The most horrid oaths was [sic] in my heart, but as I had been taught from my infancy that no virtuous woman would swear, I did not give them utterance. The truth is I feared nothing, I cared for nothing, and I have since thought that if ever his Satanic Majesty reigned uncontrolled in any human heart without a rival, it surely was in mine then.

One Sunday morning in July, eighteen thirty-three, my Mother called me and told me she believed she was dying, she felt so awfully strange. Instead of feeling alarmed as I had always been before when any of the family were sick, their [sic] was a feeling of anger sprang up in my heart. Well, let her die. I can bear that or anything else. Nearly all I have loved has been taken from me, why not her? However, she soon got better and fell asleep. I left a servant with her and walked out to the Indian Grave. . . .

The next day, an uncle (A E Clarkson) came to visit my mother. They were talking of the cholera and seemed to be very much alarmed at its ravages. (It was at this time spreading all over the country.) I looked at them with astonishment. “Oh,” thought I, “If I only had the hope you have, what would I care for cholera or death in any shape.”

* * * * *

Thus fearing and doubting, and sometimes at ease (or rather careless), I got along until May ’36. We had then moved from the River, my Father giving the place to my brother Reuben and purchasing near Union.30
Some[time] in May, as above mentioned, my Brother Reuben sent for us; he was very sick. Now for the three following weeks, the anguish of mind I suffered is not easily described. Nor do I believe my naturally weak frame could have borne up under the agony of my mind and the constant fatigue I had to undergo if I had not been sustained by a higher power than any possessed by me. For those three weeks the life of my beloved brother was despaired of, and, Oh, what misery it was to hear him in the pits of delirium swearing the most bitter oaths. I had lost many of my nearest and dearest friends, but not one had died without expressing a hope of happiness after death. Now to look at him I so dearly loved, whom the physicians had given up to die, so entirely thoughtless, it really seemed more than I could bear. . . .

My dear father, who from my infancy up had been my oracle, was a zealous reformer. My Mother was as equally staunch an old baptist. This division in sentiment caused to me sometime painful dissentions as I was but a child in spiritual things (if indeed a child at all). I was often at my wits end to know what was right. Sometimes I would think, “Can it be possible that my Father, who seems not to talk, read, nor think upon any other subject but religion, is wrong?” Then something would say, “Have you not tried that system?” “Yes, but maybe I was not sincere, did not persevere in the matter. . . .”

* * * * *

Several of my relatives were down from Bourbon, and I returned home with them. Whilst at my Brother Julius’ in Georgetown, I wrote to my parents giving them a short relation of my experience. I done this because I had got in the notion of going forward and giving the reason of my hope to the Church at Brians, and if thought worthy to be baptized by Elder Dudley who had baptized both of my deceased sisters, and for that cause I wished him to baptize me. Before the monthly meeting at Brians, I attended Licking Association held with the Church at Stony Point. Monday night I staid at Aunt White’s in company with Elders Dudley, Waller, Reece, and Tabor.31   Several brethren and Sisters were there also. I had opened my heart (for the first time that I had ever spoken to any person on the subject of my life in Christ) to Aunt White as we travelled up together. Therefore I was not so much astonished when called on to relate my experience. I felt perfectly willing to do so, but, Alas, my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth, and I could not tell but little, and was perfectly astonished to see the brethren and Sisters shedding tears, for I felt sure I said nothing worth a tear, and concluded they either thought me a hypocrite or a poor deceived creature, though at parting they all advised me to join the church. That was a miserable day to me.

In the evening Aunt White and I went to see and [sic] old aunt of mine, My Father’s half Sister.32   Whilst there, Aunt White got her to talking on the subject of religion. She had been blind for years and was so entirely childish that she did not know her own brothers, yet she could tell her experience that she had received as a young girl, repeat the text the preacher was preaching from (his name was Fristoe).33   She told all about it — no symptom of childishness in that matter. Nothing I had ever heard had so great an effect on my mind. My faith was greatly increased; my hope was brightened. Although her sight and memory were gone, she had not forgotten Jesus. I left her with the firm determination not to join at Brians — I now believed that would be wrong — but to come and join the people with whom I should have to live. I did so and was received by the church at Sardis and baptized by Elder William Hume the fourth Saturday and Sunday in October 1836. This [is] a history of my inner life, but the half is not told.

 

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Notes:

[Click on footnote number to return to text.]

 

1 Ambrose Dudley (1752-1825) was a leader in establishing “Particular Baptism” and the Licking Baptist Association in competition with the “Regular” Elkhorn Association in 1809-1810. He served as Moderator of the group until his death. At least two of his sons, James and Thomas Parker Dudley, followed him into the ministry.

2 According to family records, Sarah Barber (Barbour?) Clarkson, not otherwise identified. If Mary is correct about the date, poor Sally was still a newlywed, having married James on 8th Feb 1816. Two years later, 12 Nov 1818, he married a second wife, Patsy Young Neal, in Bourbon County. (See above, letter, Nov 1850.)

3 1816. Whatever records Mary consulted are now lost, leaving many vital details about the Clarksons and their numerous in-laws obscure.

4 Julius Clarkson (1749-1831) He had settled in southwestern Bourbon County in 1789, near what is now the little village of Clintonville, but I have not traced the exact location. (See below, 17 Dec 1859.) See my Clarkson Notes.

5 Matthew 11: 28.

6 Not identified. The eldest of Mary’s Clarkson cousins was Julius Clarkson McConnell, who would have been about 19. Dabney Dickerson and John White would have been about Mary’s age, a little young to go into business, but their mothers had been widowed, so they are possible candidates.

7 Robert H. Ellis (1819?- ), son of Robert Ellis and Mary’s sister, Jane Shelton Bristow. His brothers and sisters figure in Mary’s Journals, but nothing more is known of young Robert.

8 In 1824 Mary’s Uncle James ran successfully for the lower house of the Kentucky legislature. We can only wonder what influence the lightning bolt had on his political activity. (See letter above, Nov 1850.) See a handbill from the campaign.

9 (See above, letter to Polly B. White.)

10 Source not identified.

11 Alexander Campbell (1788-1866) together with his father, Thomas Campbell (1763-1854), who had been a Scottish Calvinist minister, led one of the many religious reform movements sweeping America in the early 19th century. Mrs Frances Trollope, mother of the English novelist, witnessed part of a marathon debate in May 1829 at Cincinnati between Alexander Campbell and Robert Owen of the utopian New Harmony community on the truth of revealed religion. She describes Thomas, “the aged father of Mr Campbell, whose flowing white hair, and venerable countenance, constantly expressive of the deepest attention, and profound interest, made him a very striking figure. . . .” The Campbells and their supporters later broke with the Baptists and Presbyterians to form the Disciples of Christ, now much less contentious and a part of mainstream Protestantism.

12 The reformers did make inroads into the existing churches. The Elkhorn Association, which was the Regular Baptist group covering the Bluegrass, lost about half its membership and half its churches to the new movement. Those Baptists who were not sufficiently pure in their beliefs were expelled, as was Mary’s father. (See below, 17 Dec 1859. For one view of the schism, see William Dudley Nowlin, Kentucky Baptist History, 45, 90ff.)

13 The Campbellite newspaper, established in 1830.

14 Elizabeth Sandidge McConnell (b abt 1806), who had married Thomas Shore Stamps 5 May 1827 in Bourbon county. She was a sister of Samuel Willis McConnell, whose wife was Elizabeth Dickerson, known as Betsey. (See above, 27 Mar 1855.)

15 James Bristow (1813-1828), Mary’s second-youngest brother. His passing was noted in the Paris, Kentucky, Weekly Advertiser of 9 Aug 1828, on “the 24th ult.” at age 15.

16 Written sometime in the intervening thirty years and transcribed in 1857.

17 A set of beliefs opposed to the doctrines of Calvinism, especially predestination and election (i.e. all of history, down to the minutest detail, and the choice of those who will be saved were determined by God before Creation). Named for the Dutch theologian Jacobus Arminius (1560-1609).

18 A belief that events are fixed in advance beyond human influence. Predestination by accident.

19 Popular in the generations before Mary’s, deism postulated a god remote from creation, likened by some to a cosmic watchmaker who wound up the universe and then left it alone.

20 A self-righteous, censorious hypocrite. See the Synoptic Gospels.

21 It could have been either Jane (Mrs Robert Ellis) or Sally (Mrs Thomas Roberts Benning). (See below, 18 Nov 1858.)

22 A Particular Baptist church in southern Bourbon County, where Mary’s Mother was a member. (See below, 17 Dec 1859.)

23 Probably Jane Shelton McConnell (1807-1876), another of the children of Mary’s aunt, Elizabeth Butts Clarkson, and John McConnell.

24 The farm was on 106 acres at the mouth of Dry Creek, just west of the Boone-Kenton county line. (See Boone Deed Book I:6.) Thanks to the Corps of Engineers’ locks and dams, the old river bank is now under water. The place is now called Anderson’s Ferry from the name of a subsequent owner. The ferry still operates, giving motorists headed to Ohio a more tranquil trip north than on the Interstate highways through Covington and Cincinnati. The population of Covington had just passed the 700 mark in 1830.

25 From Alexander Pope’s “Eloisa to Abelard.”

26 Cincinnati, Ohio. With a population of about 25 thousand in 1830, the city opposite Covington had become the metropolis of the central Ohio valley. Hyperbole and boosterism came early to the frontier. The phrase “Queen City of the West” is attributed to Horace Greeley, later editor of the New York Tribune, who is better known for his advice, “Go west, young man!”

27 Cholera is an acute intestinal disease, caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae, spread by lack of adequate sanitation, especially through polluted water. If untreated, the mortality rate can pass sixty percent. Onset ranges from a few hours to five days after infection, with terrifying symptoms of severe dehydration, diarrhea, vomiting and muscular cramps. Modern treatment is simple, just replacing lost body fluids and salts. Antibiotics are seldom needed. The epidemic came south from Montreal, Canada, where it had first appeared in June, 1832, brought by Irish immigrants. Major outbreaks occurred the following spring, first in Cincinnati (where the death toll passed 300 by mid-August), then spread in May and June to the Bluegrass, where death rates in some areas exceeded ten percent of the population. Panic struck Lexington, where two-thirds of the citizens fled the town, and the fatalities topped 500. The disease raged through the farms and villages of Bourbon county, in one case taking nineteen from a single family. (See John S. Chambers, The Conquest of Cholera.)

28 The survivors were Mary and three brothers: Julius Clarkson, Reuben Lewis, and Anselm Wadkin. We do not know the names of four of Mary’s siblings, who likely died in early childhood. She recalls the five who died over a brief period in the entry for her fiftieth birthday, 18 Nov 1858.

29 Probably one of her brother Benjamin’s children, Mary Jane. (See next paragraph and below, 18 Nov 1858.)

30 The transfer was recorded 19 Sep 1836 in Boone Deed Book K: 503.

31 George Waller and Albertus Rice appear among a list of preachers at Elizabeth Church. Mr Tabor not identified.

32 A daughter of Margaret Clopton (1729-1805?) and her first husband, a Thomas Pasley (1724- abt 1763). A Mary Passlay appears on the membership list of Stony Point Baptist Church. [Transcript. Kentucky Historical Society.] She is listed immediately after Margaret Bristow, #s 6 & 7, following the founders (all men). In 1836 she would have been about eighty. Nothing more is known of her.

33 William Fristoe was born about 1748 in Stafford County, Virginia. He was preaching at 19, and moderator of the local association at 26, etc. Willam Taylor Thom, The Struggle for Religious Freedom in Virginia: The Baptists, (Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Politcal Science, 18th Series, 10-12, 1900), 33 [509].

 


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