They were the best and most faithful assistant to every preacher in Virginia Baptist life. They likely were his only assistant. Without them, preachers could not have done their work. Indeed most of the churches could not have existed without them. They were present in large numbers for Sunday services and they waited patiently in the churchyards until worshippers concluded their all-day meetings. Indeed this group came to church every time the doors opened yet was never allowed inside!
Fred Anderson
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They were unpaid assistants; and when ready for retirement, they literally were put out to pasture. Because of them, churches located near rivers, creeks or runs. In order for a Baptist meeting to be held, their basic needs had to be provided. Indeed this group had to have food and water even if the church members did without!
The first state missionaries of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board were given these assistants and without them they never could have undertaken two years of missionary journeys. Luther Rice, the minister who got the Baptists motivated for missions, could never have made his missionary journeys up and down the Eastern seaboard without his assistant. Today one would be hard pressed to ever see a single one at any Baptist gathering.
These indispensible assistants were horses. They carried the preachers and the worshippers. They took all those country preachers on their rounds between the scattered churches on “their field.” They pulled buggies, carriages and wagons.
In the churchyards there were hitching posts or hooks driven in tree trunks. The horses required sources of water and, therefore, Baptist churches were located near streams more for the horses’ sake than for baptizing.
When delegates went to district association meetings at country churches, they had to consider provisions for their horses for three or four days of meetings. When they went to annual meetings of the General Association, local Baptist hosts often would supply livery stables for the visiting delegates’ horses. Daniel Witt, one of the leading Virginia Baptist ministers of yore, quipped that this was “horse-pitality.”
Colporteur Billie Britton on his horse, Nellie.
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Of course the coming of the Iron Horse helped facilitate meetings in the towns and cities. But imagine what it must have been like in 1771 at the Baptist meeting in Orange County which supposedly attracted between 4,000 and 5,000 persons! The only transportation was horseback or horse and mule-drawn conveyances. Imagine the number of animals to be fed and watered! Imagine the great meeting for the 50th anniversary of the General Association in 1876 in Richmond which attracted 10,000 persons. Many came by railroad but many also would have come by horse. Imagine the traffic jam on the streets of Richmond!
Nearly every minister had a horse. William E. Hatcher, a Richmond pastor, had one named for his church, Grace; and when the stresses of his city pastorate at Grace Street Baptist Church became too much, he would take Grace out into Chesterfield for a day of leisure.
James Davis and Joseph Harrison were close friends while serving as pastors in Southwest Virginia. When traveling together the two preachers preferred “going at a good speed” on their horses. They never would have admitted they were racing. Davis named his horse John Bunyan after the English Baptist hero and Harrison called his John the Baptist.
Noah Baldwin, a pioneer preacher in Southwest Virginia, rode his horse from Abingdon to Richmond to attend the annual meetings of the General Association. Nothing seemed to deter him. His step-daughter once recalled, “He would baptize people in the winter, even breaking the ice over the water to wade in, then he would mount his horse and ride home with shoes freezing to the stirrups on his saddle.”
Billy Britton, a colporteur (or religious book and Bible distributor) had a horse named Nellie who carried him across the rough roads of Smyth, Washington, Grayson and Buchanan counties in Southwest Virginia. Nellie was a traveling bookshop, carrying saddlebags loaded with books which otherwise were unavailable to backwoodsmen. In one year alone, Nellie took her owner across nearly 3,000 miles.
In 1779 John Leland, the famous preacher, had preaching appointments scattered from Orange to York counties, a distance of some 120 miles. “As I had sold my horse to pay for my house, I concluded to go on foot,” wrote Leland. “I had a pair of new shoes that pinched my feet. I found I must either go barefoot, like the old Apostles, or purchase a horse. I chose the last, and promised the Lord if he would aid me to pay for the horse, I would spend it in his service. I gave my note for the beast and pursued my journey. It so happened that when I returned home, I had more than money enough to pay for my mare; and many thousands of miles she carried me to preach.”
In 1823 the General Association equipped its first state missionaries, Jeremiah Bell Jeter and Daniel Witt, with horses for their missionary journeys as “the Bedford plowboys.” Jeter once described the day of their departure as they were “mounted on strong steeds with well-stuffed saddlebags and overcoats and umbrellas strapped behind.”
While serving on a rural field of churches outside Roanoke, George Braxton Taylor had a horse which he simply called Frank. He rode Frank to make pastoral visits — sometimes nine or 10 in a given day; and in 1912 on his 10th anniversary on the Enon field, he was given “a handsome buggy and harness.”
In 1923, when the time came to part with Frank after 20 years of service, he “rubbed his ears and gave him some sugar and could have hugged him.”
The pastor’s assistant was replaced by automobiles. In Taylor’s case, he never learned to drive automobiles and scotched any effort by his church to present him with one of the new-fangled machines. He claimed that he never hitch-hiked, but he constantly accepted rides with anyone headed in his direction, including the milk deliveryman. Maybe he should have kept Frank!
Fred Anderson ([email protected]) is executive director of the Virginia Baptist Historical Society and the Center for Baptist Heritage and Studies, P.O. Box 34, University of Richmond, VA 23173.