The good people at St. John’s Episcopal Church on Durham Road are trying to put together a history of the church — and it appears there was an earlier Episcopal congregation and then St. John’s, with a pause in between.
The Wake Forest Baptist Church has published the book about the history of that church, and it is a wonderful addition to the story of Wake Forest the town and the church itself. Now St. John’s wants to know how it came to be an active congregation in town.
The scraps of information we have include:
— Today’s church was formed as a mission church and then became a parish. It met in a small white church building on South Main Street — currently being used by a different church — before it bought the land and built the present church.
— Any information about the two buildings would be appreciated — rent at the first location? Any problems or good news during the building of the second?
— Does anyone have photos, or any memorabilia about those early days? There is a box of photographs somewhere that Durward and the late Shirley Matheny had collected. Do you know where it is?
— Are you a former congregant? Can you share some memories?
Please send your memories or thoughts to the editor, Carol Pelosi, at cwpelosi@aol.com, and she will send them on to the committee.
The editor is interested in any information about the earlier congregation, formed before 1789, when it and three other congregations joined to build a church building that would serve each one Sunday in each month. It was built just south of Wakefields, the home of Colonel Ransom Sutherland who donated the land.
The Wake Union Baptist Church history says the Episcopal (called ‘High Church’ then) dropped out early and the Methodists and Presbyterians never participated in the rotation of congregations.
But, in 1915, Zua Mitchell Davis, wife of Priestley Davis, wrote in a letter that her grandfather, Calvin Mitchell, had been the clerk of the Episcopal congregation at a monthly church meeting in a church about two miles west of Wake Forest. She remembered him driving a wagon to the church with all his slaves for the services.
After her grandfather died, Zua said, Priestley’s father, also named Priestley, was then serving as the clerk and was upset that she and her husband had decided to attend Wake Forest Baptist Church, just up the street, because the college faculty and many prominent townspeople were members.
Wake Forest native Murray Greason had an aunt, Sarah Greason Callaghan, who remembered in the 1920s and 1930s having an Episcopal priest from Louisburg coming regularly for Sunday dinner at noon and later officiating at communion for the family. The house is on North Main at the corner of Pine Avenue, and was built by the Royall Cotton Mill for its superintendent, George H. Greason, hired in 1905 and serving through the 1930s. His son, Murray Greason, was the Wake Forest College basketball coach until his untimely death.
Were the Davis family members and other Episcopalians invited to these services? What happened to the earlier congregation?
And, where is the Mitchell cemetery? I remember it being on Oak Grove Church Road, a square stone wall near the road with several burials. I do not remember if Calvin Mitchell was buried there, but it seems likely.
All the Davis family is buried in Wake Forest Cemetery in a large lot with a very large pink marble standing monument with names and dates on it.
Zua lived in the house where she and Priestley had lived, sending her three girls to Meredith, taking in single college professors as boarders, and donating some of her land to the adjacent Holding Park after the Dr. Solomon Holding house was demolished and the land donated for a park.
Anyone with more information about an old Episcopal congregation, please email Carol Pelosi at cwpelosi@aol.com.
###
