Chapter 2

Church & Singings

Social life in the valley centered around the churches.  I don’t know when the Baptist Church at Union was established, nor by whom, but I understand that Christian Church at Macedonia was organized by my great grandfather, Wych Elder.  The Church of Christ at Mt. Zion was established before or during the Civil War.

During the Civil War, a meeting was held in a clearing at the edge of the woods.  Uncle Joe Carter, AWOL from the war, was hiding in the woods.  He would come to the meeting every night, staying in the edge of the woods, so no one could see him, but near enough to hear the preaching and singing.  One night he came out, down through the congregation to give the preacher his hand and God his heart, was baptized into Christ, and from that day forward lived a faithful Christian life.

When Papa was nearly grown, a preacher conducted an outdoor revival at Union in a clearing at the edge of the woods.  The preacher wore a frock-tail coat and was the rip-roaring, exhorting kind, running back and forth, leaping into the air, and flinging his arms as he preached.  While clearing the ground for a meeting, a small piece of root had been left sticking up directly in the preacher’s path.  One night when he had reached the very zenith of activities, he hung his foot on the root and made a dive for the ground with his arms outstretched before him and his legs spread wide.  His coat flew over his head as he hit the ground.  He got up, brushed himself off and went on preaching.

Campbell Carter, who was later my uncle, and was about grown, was sitting near the front.  He became so tickled he was about to explode.  Turing to a boy sitting next to him, he started to whisper, “Let’s go get some wa- wa-“, then he exploded, “Water”, ending up at the top of his voice.  He and the other boy got up and hit the trail to the spring, where they rolled and hollered until they were exhausted.  Thinking they were through with laughing, they returned.  When they came to the edge of the clearing, the preacher said loudly, “Well, I see Brother Carter’s coming back.”  The boys exploded again, ran back down the trail to the spring, laughing as they went, and stayed there until services were over.

There were other preachers who came to Union, but the only one I can recall was preacher Jim Shaddix, an old man who was blind and wore a long beard, and preached very long sermons.  They used hymn books in this church, thick, long black books, with no notes, only words.  Mr. Tol Shaddix and Mr. Greenberry Shaddix were the song leaders.  The leader would get up and announce the song title, tell the page it was on, and the meter to sing it in, then he would read the words to a line or two.  The congregation would sing those words and he would then read the next line and they would sing again.  Their songs were “Amazing Grace”, “How Firm a Foundation”, and other old hymns, many of them in minor key.  They sang very forcefully, some with quavering voices, sweet and touching.  Sometimes there was shouting as they sang.  Seems that I can hear them singing “I am Bound for the Promised Land” in the minor key, with Grandma Sarah Strickland shouting at the top of her voice.

The preachers I can remember at Macedonia Christian Church were Mama’s cousin, Whit Elder of Chambers County, a Mr. Lyman and Mr. Langford, also from Chambers County.  Papa and Mama were members of this church for a long time, Mama was raised in it.  Theirs was an arousing religion that played heavily on the emotions.  There was shouting in this church and foot washing.  Mama didn’t like shouting.

Services were held at Mt. Zion every Sunday.  I don’t know whether they were at the other churches or not.  Each church had preaching only once each month—at Union the 2nd Sunday, Macedonia the 3rd and Mt. Zion the 4th.  They always had it this way.

Mr. Arch Preston of Delta was the minister at Mt. Zion when Papa and Mama were young.  Papa said that for a long time he thought Mr. Preston a very dull and uninteresting preacher, never putting any enthusiasm into his sermons, talking more like a teacher than a preacher.  He could never get interested in his sermons, but he believed that all churches were right and went to all of them.

A preacher came into the valley and held a meeting at Union.  He said that he was a “dyed-in-the-wool Baptist” and he preached the Baptist doctrine.  He later held a meeting at Macedonia and preached an altogether different doctrine, shouting loudly from the pulpit, “Don’t call me a Baptist, I’m just a flat-footed, piney woods Christian.”

This started Papa thinking—he had never noticed that different churches preached different doctrines.  They couldn’t all be right—and maybe none of them were right.  He thought “If there is a right way, the Bible will teach it and if the Bible teaches it, I’m going to find it.  Let God be true, but every man a liar.”  He didn’t have a Bible, but Mama had a pocket size New Testament.  He began reading it.  He read nearly all the time when he was at home, and when he plowed the fields he carried the Testament in his pocket.  He would read a portion of the scriptures, then ponder on them as he plowed another round, he read the Testament two or three times, thinking about it as he read, and memorizing a large part of it.

He kept going to church, to Union on the 2nd Sunday, Macedonia the 3rd, and Mt. Zion the 4th Sunday of each month.  Mr. Preston’s preaching became interesting.  He could follow right along with the sermon as it was being preached and it was plain as could be.  He was preaching the Bible just as it was.

On the 4th Sunday in April, being April 28, 1895, Papa was baptized into the Church of Christ, and in 1903 he entered the ministry.  He began preaching for the congregation at Mt. Zion in 1904, was minister there for five years, building up and strengthening the church, then leaving it to come to Texas.  He preached at other places also, Liberty in Randolph County, Erin, the Hobbs settlement, Campbell’s Cross Roads.

The first Christian Church in Oxford wanted Papa to preach for them, offering to put him through college if he would, but he would not.  There was not, at that time, a great a difference in the Church of Christ and the First Christian Church and this was a temptation to him.  He yearned for an education, but remained true to his convictions.  I might add here that he had this same offer made to him any years later in Texas.  One day, the president of the bank in Valley Mills, Texas, and another man, both leaders in the First Christian Church in Valley Mills, came to the field where he was working and told him he was too good a preacher and too smart a man to spend him time working in the fields.  They said if he would preach for the Christian Church they would support him and his family and sent him to Texas Christian University in Fort Worth.  This was during the Depression years when it was hard to make a living, but still he would not.  I don’t think he was even tempted.

It took Mama a while to make up her mind that the Church of Christ was right.  Her Grandfather Elder was a minister of the Christian Church, having established the first church of that kind in Alabama.  Her father and mother were very devoted to that church and had raised her to love it.  She studied hard before making up her mind.  I don’t know the date of her entry into the Church of Christ, but she was a faithful Christian ever after.  She loved to read the Bible.  She and Aunt Beulah Strickland used to sit flat on the floor with our family Bible and big topical Bible open before them studying the scriptures.  Aunt Beulah was baptized the year we came to Texas.

Mt. Zion was the only church in the valley with a steeple and bell.  We could hear the bell on Sunday mornings, ringing out clear and sweet, calling the people to worship n tones so loud they could be heard the full length of the community when the atmosphere permitted.  As I listened to the ringing of the bell, my spirits soared as if on wings of angels.  Sundays were such heavenly days for me.  The sun shone with a softer, mellower glow.  The bird songs were sweeter, and the fragrance of the roses and honeysuckle more glorious.  Sundays were special days.

How happy on Sunday morning, Mama getting up ready for church services, putting on our prettiest clothes and shoes and ribbons in our hair.  In the summer, our pretty folding fans hung from our necks on baby ribbon.  We girls wore hats with streamers—Chester in his best pants and shirt; Papa singing as he shaved, shined his shoes and dressed.  Mama, rushing around, getting herself ready and seeing that everybody was just right.  The smell of good food in the kitchen that she prepared for company.  There was always company if we went home.  Papa used to say that he was born on Sunday and he wondered if that way why he always loved Sunday so much.

The Mt. Zion church bell was also used for another purpose.  Sometimes as we went about our daily lives we would hear the bell tolling.  Everyone would stop and listen, count and wonder, knowing it was a death knell.  Someone in the valley had died.  The bell tolled slowly, giving the age of the person—one toll for each year.

Mr. John Carter was the sexton, or bell ringer.  Sometimes when we lived nearby, on Sunday mornings Papa would ring the bell for him.  Once he let me help.  He started it ringing and gave me the rope.  It lifted me off the floor as it swung back and forth.  How exciting!  And what a thrill it gave me to be ringing this bell whose tongue shouted out Shinbone’s joys and sorrows in tones so loud and clear.

Aunt Sarah Carter, Mama’s sister, is one I always think of when I think of Mt. Zion.  She had a houseful of boys and girls, from grownups to babies, but she was there every Sunday morning if she was able.  Either she, or Dora, the oldest girl, fixed the communion table before services and took it up afterwards.

One thing I remember about Aunt Sarah was she always had in her satchel a piece of “sweet bread” she would take it out and give to her little ones and all the little ones near her.  How good it was.  Dear, sweet Aunt Sarah, she was truly a wonderful Christian woman.

No, I shall not forget Mt. Zion and all the wonderful people who made up the church, people I knew and loved from infancy.

Mt. Zion was the first church in the valley to adopt the seven shaped note song books.  The first book of this kind used there was “Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs”, and I think the next was “Perennial Songs”.  For a time they used a little book of soul-stirring songs, “Windows of Heaven”.  The last year we were there they began using “Sweetest Praise”, a beautiful red-backed book of the sweetest songs this side of heaven—“Heavenly Sunlight”, “Music in Heaven”, “In the Morning of Joy”…

A Brother Linley from Texas preached a meeting that summer, and a Mr. Dyson taught a singing school.  It seemed that almost everyone in the community attended this school, and Oh, how the music rang!

Papa was always popular in the community, from young boyhood on.  As a young minister of the gospel and song director, it seemed everyone, even members of the other churches, trusted him and looked to him for counsel and guidance.  Somewhere about this time, the Union Church decided to get song books with notes and to use seven shaped notes.  The leaders came and consulted with Papa about the type of books that would be best.  The old sacred harp strings were all held at Union, and the seven shaped note singings at Mt. Zion.  Papa was a leader in both, having started leading when he was fourteen years old and there were a number of good leaders in both seven and four shaped.

What wonderful times we had at the singings.  Everybody sang as hard as they could for awhile, then had a thirty minute recess.  All that wanted went to the well or spring, boys walking with girls, carrying their parasols over them and fanning them—always plenty of sparking and everybody was happy—then, back into the house for more singing.

The Sacred Harp Conventions met on both Saturday and Sunday, and sometimes there were three day conventions.  Everybody sang to their heart’s content then, and no one ever seemed to get tired.  And what food, served spread out on table cloths on the ground, sometimes on benches, but “dinner on the ground” in the shade of the trees—fried chicken, chicken pies that were out of this world, apple pies fit for a king, cakes and custards, and everything good.  Lemonade stands under the big trees at Union sold “ice cold lemonade, made in the shade, and stirred with a spade” by the gobletfulls.  Oh, how delicious and cooling!  Sometimes watermelons were cut and eaten.  Some of the finest melons in the land grew in the valley.  Mothers sat in the shade of the trees caring for their children, fanning and talking while the other children ran and played.