"A superb study of Primitive Baptist belief and practice in a specific region of the South. Expands our knowledge of an often neglected group."--Bill Leonard, Dean, School of Divinity, Wake Forest University Between 1819 and 1848, Primitive Baptists emerged as a distinct, dominant religious group in the area of the deepest South known as the Wiregrass country. John Crowley, a historian and former Primitive minister, chronicles their origins and expansion into South Georgia and Florida, documenting one of the strongest aspects of the inner life of the local piney-woods culture. Crowley begins by examining Old Baptist worship and discipline and then addressing Primitive Baptist reaction to the Civil War, Reconstruction, Populism, Progressivism, the Depression, and finally the ferment of the 1960s and present decline of the denomination. Intensely conservative, with a strong belief in predestination, Old Baptists opposed modernizing trends sweeping their denomination in the early 19th century. Crowley describes their separation from Southern Baptists and the many internal schisms on issues such as the saving role of the gospel, the Two Seed Doctrine, and absolute as opposed to limited predestination. Going beyond doctrine, he discusses contention among Old Baptists over music, divorce, membership in secret societies, sacraments administered by heretics, and rituals such as the washing of feet. Writing with insight and sensitivity, he navigates the history of this denomination through the 20th century and the emergence of at least twenty mutually exclusive factions of Primitive Baptists in this specific region of the Deep South.

Much that is commonly accepted about slavery and religion in the Old South is challenged in this significant book. The eight essays included here show that throughout the antebellum period, southern whites and blacks worshipped together, heard the same sermons, took communion and were baptized together, were subject to the same church discipline, and were buried in the same cemeteries. What was the black perception of white-controlled religious ceremonies? How did whites reconcile their faith with their racism? Why did freedmen, as soon as possible after the Civil War, withdraw from the biracial churches and establish black denominations? This book is essential reading for historians of religion, the South, and the Afro-American experience.

In this book the fullness of the Baptist experience in Christian higher education is explored, charted, and analyzed. Beginning with the establishment in 1756 of the Academy and reaching to the present the author explores the need for Baptists to pursue education and the types of schools they founded. Included are colleges, universities, manual labor schools, literary and theological institutions, theological schools, and bible colleges. Special attention is given to women and higher education and the Black Baptist achievements. Details are provided about what makes a Baptist school Baptist: charters, trustees, presidents, support, church accountability. Chapters at the end of the typological and chronological narratives ponder the meaning of denominational education at present, with suggestions about the future of faith-based institutions and the failure of contemporary literature to attend properly to Baptist idiosyncrasies.

Supplying a wealth of material from locales and a time for which few primary sources exist, Baptist Faith in Action brings to print the writings of Maria Baker Taylor (1813-1895), a strong-minded plantation mistress who spent her life in South Carolina and Florida. The granddaughter of Richard Furman, South Carolina's foremost nineteenth-century Baptist minister, Taylor was a well-educated and sophisticated member of South Carolina's second-tier planter class. She was also a most fervent Baptist. Notable for its geographical and temporal breadth, this collection of letters, diary entries, essays, and poems affords an unmatched view into the life of a woman living on the South's interior frontier during the nineteenth century. Born in Sumter County, South Carolina, Maria Baker married John Morgandollar Taylor in 1834. Throughout their marriage the couple lived on the geographical frontier, first in Beaufort District, South Carolina, and then in Marion County, Florida. The mother of thirteen children, Taylor taught her children and grandchildren at home, devoted large amounts of time to church work, and read voraciously. She also wrote voluminously, keeping diaries, exchanging letter

Rivers' biography of Page is an important addition, and corrective, to our understanding of black spirituality and religion, political organizing, and civic engagement.

No scholarly reference library is complete without a copy of Ancestry's Red Book. In it, you will find both general and specific information essential to researchers of American records. This revised 3rd edition provides updated county and town listings within the same overall state-by-state organization. Whether you are looking for your ancestors in the northeastern states, the South, the West, or somewhere in the middle, ""Ancestry's Red Book has information on records and holdings for every county in the United States, as well as excellent maps from renowned mapmaker William Dollarhide. In short, the ""Red Book is simply the book that no genealogist can afford not to have. The availability of census records such as federal, state, and territorial census reports is covered in detail. Unlike the federal census, state and territorial census were taken at different times and different questions were asked. Vital records are also discussed, including when and where they were kept and how""

This book is unique. There is no other tribute like it. The church is the people. The people who are true Christians are listed in Gods Book in heaven. This church has survived for 100 years because of small groups of people. There is no church history book that lists over 100 pages of testimonies from people about how their church has blessed them. Their testimonials are a book in itself. One cannot read the testimonial section and not be blessed. True Christians, for the first time, have been given the opportunity to speak for God as a testimony to the world about one of His universal churches. This book lists some of the great sermons of the ministry leaders of the church. The many problems that Gods people and the church must face the next hundred years are listed. The churches in America are in a spiritual declined in influence and numbers. The people must act! Probably the only known course for this to happen is in the summary of this book. There is only One Church that will be exalted and glorified during the End Times. Gods church, founded by Jesus Apostles 2000 years ago, is based on the teachings of Christ Jesus. The First Baptist Church of Brandon was brought into existence by men of God based on New Testament teachings. 700 years before Jesus was born there were fifty prophecies about Jesus in Isaiah alone. Some scholars call Isaiah The Fifth Gospel after Matthew Mark, Luke, and John. (46, p. 187) Love your neighbor as yourself. (Lev. 19:18) was written 1400 years before Christ. John describes Jesus at the Creation. In the beginning was the Word ,and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (John 1:1) This tribute is a model for any church.