of Menard and Mason Counties
By T.G. Onstott
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CHAPTER XLII Page 387 The Baptist and Methodist churches were organized in Havana about the same time, but we will notice the Baptist first. In 1846 Mrs. Lydia Hancock, a very excellent woman, opened her house for preaching and Sunday school. She had moved here from Dearborn county, Indiana, and there being no churches she held services in her dwelling. The first preacher was John L. Turner, who lived in Crane Creek. Mr. Turner farmed all week and preached somewhere within a radius of fifteen or twenty miles on Sunday. Turner had a fairly good education and preached the gospel because of the love he had for it. He was very liberal in his views and seldom preached a whole sermon on the mode of baptism. He had not read Shakespeare nor the poets much, but with the bible J.L. Turner was well acquainted from Genesis to Revelations, hence his sermons fairly glittered with quotations from the holy writ. Everybody like him and he seldom had a light attendance when he preached. He died on Crane Creek, where he always lived. He was a man who preached and earned his living beside. We wish there were more John L. Turners. There were three brothers that lived in Mason and Fulton counties about this time named Bawlding. John was the oldest and lived in Fulton county. He was a very eccentric character. They had their share of common sense but not much book learning. They had not the holy tone or whang doodle style that many of the early Baptist preachers affected but simply preached like other people. John Bawlding had a hatred for dogs and could not bear the sight of one in the house while he was preaching. One Sunday while he was preaching in the old schoolhouse in Havana, Mrs. George Robinson, who had a little rat dog that followed her wherever she went, came into church and of course the dog was with her. Mrs. Robinson took her seat near the door and the dog crouched at her feet. Scarcely anybody noticed it but John evidently saw the dog or smelled it. Stopping short he said: "Brethren there is a dog in the house and you know the price of a dog was not allowed to be brought into the sanctuary in olden times and I don't think the animal himself should be allowed to come in. I would therefore thank you to take it out as this meeting cannot proceed while the dog is in the house." The men sat and looked at each other and the boys of my size giggled and laughed but nobody put the dog out. The suspense soon began to grow painful, when finally Judge Rockwell, a very precise old gentleman, who was always well dressed, came to the rescue and went for the dog. He thought he would just motion the dog out with his cane but the dog was not built that way. He took it that the Judge was about to make war on his mistress and so made a charge on the Judge and tore a piece out of his pants leg. The Judge retreated crestfallen while the congregation laughed hilariously and Mrs. Robinson indignantly left the church with her dog. James Bawlding lived near the mounds at the mouth of Quiver Lake. He farmed through the week and preached on Sunday, and was not much of a success at either. He was always trying to find some way to make work easier. We recollect one spring he used his sleigh to cross the ground for corn. It made two rows at a time. The neighbors were nearly ready to mob him as they said it was laziness which made him make his poor horse haul him back and forth across the field. But Bawlding was making two rows to their one. Seba Bawlding lived in town and fished during the fishing season and made some very large hauls. He moved to California in an early day. Seba would preach on Sundays whenever there was an opening for him and was about as good a preacher as either of his brothers, except that he murdered the English language terribly and would give a learned preacher fits. On one occasion he said Paul was not a learned man. "Why," he said, "Paul said himself that he was brought up at the foot of Gamel Hill and who ever heard of a college at the foot of Gamel Hill?" At another time he quoted from the Apostle "Jim", to shorten the name we suppose. The Bawldings were all good honest men and preached the gospel in its simplicity. There was another Baptist preacher named Norton who worked at the shoemaker's trade with Osborn. He belonged to the hard shell variety and had the holy tone. He would work himself up so bad that sometimes it would take him several days to get over it. And yet no person who was acquainted with him ever doubted his Christianity. He was raised and educated in the whang doodle style. John McDaniel preached occasionally in Havana about the time the war broke out. The Rev. F. Ingmire also preached some in Havana about the same time. He was an intensely loyal man and prayed for the success of the union arms. At one time he had an appointment in the country. It was sacrament day and an old Baptist deacon had the elements prepared. He brought the bread and wine and set them on the table. Ingmire opened up with a song and then prayed and as usual asked the Lord to knock the Southern Confederacy into a cocked hat, to destroy slavery and let the oppressed go free. This was more than the old deacon could stand and he crawled on his hands and knees and got his basket off the table. When Ingmire finished his prayer the deacon was on his way home at a 2:40 gait. Ingmire took in the situation and informed his congregation that owing to circumstances over which he had no control there would be no Lord's supper that day. The occurrence was published in the county papers at the time and widely copied by the neighboring press.
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