Civil War Articles by Julian WilliamsRev. Wilson Conner And Black Pastor Share Same Frustrations
This article was compiled by Julian Williams.
Wilson Conner couldn't for the life of himself figure out how things had to be so difficult. In 1829 at the Georgia Baptist Convention in Milledgeville the Baptists had wanted more paperwork on the work he had done on the missionary circuit. Now he had to keep up with the miles he and his horse traveled. There would be lots of 'em. He'd better sharpen his pencil.
He pleasantly reflected on being able to go to Milledgeville that year. Not only were the Baptists growing (but splitting more and more), but the town that had become the capital of Georgia was growing too. There were about 1,600 souls in the place at the time. Jacksonville, Georgia, and Hartford, over on the Ocmulgee River, were still very active, but much smaller. Milledgeville, on the Oconee, had beaten Hartford out for the capital site by one legislator's vote. There was a story that Hartford would have been the capital if two legislators had not gone fishing the day of the vote. Probably just as well though. Hartford, evidently, was not in the best location, and when the Indians were dispersed, most folks moved their stores and houses across the river to the higher, healthier bluff we know today as Hawkinsville. Hawkinsville was to be an important town in the life of Brother Wilson Conner because he would receive credit for his hard work in starting the First Baptist Church of Hawkinsville, Georgia. In fact, the church actually started, like the stores and houses, in old Hartford in 1830. Wilson Conner started a lot of Baptist churches - he and The Lord.
As Preacher Conner noticed a black man dressed in his Sunday clothes he was encouraged because he believed "missions" had to reach the black man and the Indians. He didn't know it at the time but he was going to have to work real fast to do any missionary work with the red man. In about eight more years he would be officially gone from Georgia. But some hid out and stayed. But a lot of folks did not concur with Preacher Conner's stand on missions. In fact, they weren't too high on missions at all.
But Wilson Conner was to see black clergymen come to the forefront of the great cause he had given his life to. In Milledgeville in 1829 there was talk at the Georgia Baptist Convention about the "church for coloreds" that was gaining momentum. The very next year this dream of a church of their own became a reality for some of the black people of Milledgeville. Wilkes Flagg (1802-1878), a slave from Virginia, founded Flagg Chapel Baptist Church. Progress was being made.
Wilson Conner knew that there were good men and bad men. And he knew that there was some bad in good men and some good in bad men. He was glad he didn't have to sift them out.
About the time he was in Milledgeville, a young black minister named Robert Anderson was only a boy but by 1839 the young man had united with the Methodist Church. This was alright with Wilson Conner because he had shared the pulpit on many occasions with Methodist preachers. It was common practice for Baptists and Methodists to share services and visit their allies in faith. I even remember as a boy going from Blockhouse Baptist to Jacksonville Methodist when we weren't having services. Then we went "full-time" and we pretty well had a full schedule of church going at our own place. I had one uncle, a Methodist, who went to church about once a month. Another uncle, a "full-time Baptist" would wonder aloud to him about the long intervals between one worship hour and the next. The Methodist uncle quickly informed him "that he wasn't so mean that it took that much church to keep him in the path."
But the journeys of the Rev. Robert Anderson, black pastor and writer, seemed to parallel those of Rev. Conner, the two encountering some of the same types of people. Rev. Anderson gives us this passage which reflects his concern for the spiritual condition of his fellowmen:
"Three weeks have passed since my arrival in this city, and, after looking at everything, my conclusion is that if the people of this place are saved at the day of judgment (after what my own eyes have seen), there will be a chance for the antediluvians and for the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah. These eyes have seen the grog shops and places of debauchery carried on in this city on the Lord's day. There is plenty of dancing and cursing, too. My tongue cannot tell how many bar rooms are open on that holy day. A colored man said to me yesterday:
"My expectation is, after death, to sit on the front seat in heaven."
Now, this man keeps open a restaurant on Sunday, has a billiard table in his house, and a room where men can come and play cards if they feel so disposed; while he plays the bass violin. If he is entitled to a seat in heaven, as he claims, there is no use for me to be trying all my days to get there; it would be a waste of my time, if men could do just as they pleased, and still secure the front seat in the glory land. He believes a lie, that he might be d--. (You know what that "d--" stands for.) Surprising it is that men living in a Bible country should suffer themselves to be so deluded by the devil. Such a doctrine will never be believed by me. Thank God! the responsibility of it does not lie with me. My best has been done in trying to save people."
Wilson Conner looked on his homemade map and itinerary which listed his "appointments." He hoped all the preachers had announced him but he knew some had not. Some would be like the Northern minister encountered by the Rev. Robert Anderson when he ventured out of Georgia. Plain ornery and did not want him in "his church." But The Lord would deal with that. It was up to him and his horse to go, notwithstanding the mileage.
As the lamp on the table grew dimmer into the late of night, Wilson Conner with high expectations for good traveling weather and gracious reception by the congregations on the circuit, began to mumble the names of his destinations: Louisville, Ga., Warrinton (Warrenton) in Warrin (Warren) County, Washington in Wilks (Wilkes), Oglethorpe, the Baptist State Convention in Bethesda (Greene County), Lexington, Eatonton in Putnam County, Monticelle (Monticello), Forsyth, Thomaston, Talbotton, Knoxville, Perry.
Anyone familiar with the geographic distribution of those places knows it is quite a ways for an automobile in 2001 to go. Think about what it would have been to ride a horse to those places in 1830! And Wilson Conner did it. And when he left Hawkinsville coming toward Jacksonville he knew the home stretch toward Dead River wouldn't take long. And he could be home with his family again.
As he rode toward home he thought again of Milledgeville and the prospects of the black church there started by a slave. And he thought of one of the fine homes there, built between 1820-1830, and inhabited at a later time by one John Wilcox. There were Willcoxes (Wilcoxes) in Jacksonville, Ga. So I suppose it is alright to have some up at Milledgeville. Which reminds me of another interesting Wilcox story with some part of it in Milledgeville. In World War II, Rear Admiral John W. Wilcox, flag officer of the USS Washington, was lost at sea. He became the only admiral in the U.S. Navy ever lost at sea. If you visit old Memory Hill Cemetery in Milledgeville you will see a memorial marker for him. But that is another story and we will tell it later.
Credits:
"Longpondium";
Peg Conner Corliss for notes on Wilson Conner;
Fussell Chalker for Pioneer Days Along The Ocmulgee;
Gene Barber for The Way It Was;
Rev. Robert Anderson for "The Anderson Surpriser" in Documenting the American South;
Chronology of Milledgeville, Ga.
