| 4. | Rev Nehemiah Bonham was born on 1 Nov 1765 in Maryland (son of Hezekiah Bonham and Mary M. (or Marcy) Bonham); died on 5 Nov 1846 in Haywood Co, North Carolina. Other Events and Attributes:
- Census: 1840, Haywood Co, North Carolina
Notes:
Licensed to preach 1790, studied theology under Rev. Paul Henkel, New Market, Shenandoah Co., VA
Rev Nehemiah Bonham and Tennessee Synod
Rev. Nehemiah Bonham, an English Lutheran preacher of Tazwell County, having appeared since the opening of this session, and expressed a desire to be received into Synod; and presenting a petition from his congregations, in which they testify to the Christian walk and conduct of said Bonham, and ask to be received into Synod, besides other evidence of his good character, after examination he was received into Synod by the extension of the right hand of brotherly fellowship, and his congregations were also received..
Henkel, Socrates, The History of the Evangelical Lutheran Tennessee Synod, Harvard University, 1890. p.64..
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Church
The Early Churches of My Direct Ancestors
From the Notebook of Lilly Carter Hoffman: (Sept 1968)
William Carter and Wife Sarah including Samuel Carter came to the Mt. Creek section in about 1751. Robert and Elizabeth Stoker were pioneers in the Mt. Creek section also. The Carters attended the Primitive Baptist church known as "Old Mt. Creek." It was organized by the early settlers after 1751 and was the only one at that time. Since then a new brick church has been built in a different location and that is why the first church known as Mt. Creek is now referred to as "Old Mt. Creek Primitive Baptist Church".
Jacob Efird, Henry Furr, Frederick Peck, David Coble, John Bushart were of the Lutheran faith, all having either descended or had arrived on different ships that had sailed from Holland as the German people had to first go to Holland and stay there until they could get passage to England. Jacob Efird organized the St Martin's Lutheran Church in his home about 1821. The congregation was made up of people in the community. A traveling Lutheran minister would visit the church congregation in Jacob Efird's home and perform the rites of baptism, communion, etc that Jacob Efird couldn't do. ...The people worshipped in his home for several years until a small log church was built on about 20 acres given by Jacob Efird. St. Martin's Lutheran Church is still in the same location. Records in a diary show that the visiting minister often rode horse back from Virginia to Lancaster County, SC and stopped to serve the St. Martin's Congregation. Sometimes he spent the night with my direct ancestor Jacob Efird and sometimes with another ancestor, David Coble who had been reared in Coble's Lutheran Church...
Rev. Nehemiah Bonham, a traveling Lutheran minister of Tazewell County, Virginia recorded many visits to and services held in Jacob's home. His diary shows: Aug 19, 1827 - I left Mr. George Goodman's and started to Cabarrus County and went on to Mr. Jacob Ifords ( see exerpt from diary of Nehemiah Bonham)......Long Creek is a creek which flows through the Efird and Coble Community and when Rev David Henkel, a traveling Lutheran minister of New Market, Va. speaks of Long Creek, he is speaking of meetings held in the Jacob Efird home.
From his diary:
"Sunday June 11, 1814 at Long Creek.
Thursday, May 15 1817 at Long Creek baptized one infant and one adult.
Wednesday June 7, 1820 at Mr. Ephert's and baptized three infants.
Thurseday, June 28, 1821 at Iferds and baptized two infants."
Rev Mr. Henkel's diary shows a total of thirty-five infants and three adults, one of whom was Mrs Ifirt (Elizabeth Dove Eifrd, wife of Jacob); administered communion nine times to congregations ranging from eighteen to thirty persons. confirmed fifty persons and held catechetical classes several times on one occasion for an entire week.
Rev Henkel's diary shows on "Sat. May 17, 1817 at Long Creek, administered the communion to thirty; confirmed eighteen" It is believed that is the occasion of the organization of St. Martin's Lutheran Church in Jacob Efird's home. The corner stone of the present St. Martin's Church stated that the church was established in 1831. It is now generally conceded that this is in error.
Rev Adam Miller in his journal:
"June 6, 1822( he and Rev David Henkel) preached at Mr. Jacob Iferd's and administered the Lord's Supper to about 30 communicants in Mont Co,. Bro David Henkel about two years ago congregated these people. The prospects appear promising."
Before St. Martin's was established some of the early Efirds attended other Lutheran Churches. There are records of their sponsoring infant baptism in Rowan County at Organ and St. John's. Adolph Nussman 1739-1794 pioneer minister and founder of the Lutheran church in NC.
Henry Furr, another direct ancestor lived in Cold Water Creek about 6 miles from Concord. The Furrs, Pecks and Busharts worshipped at Old Bethel(Bear Creek) Evangelical and Reformed Church in Stanly Co near Mt. Pleasant. I gave the history of Bethel Lutheran Church in the first Chapter of this notebook. When Paul Furr and Rosinah Peck moved to Stanly Co. they worshipped at Flat Rock Lutheran Church. The Church building is not there now but the cemetery is still kept in good condition.
Flat Rock Lutheran Church was organized in 1835. My Furr ancestors Paul Furr II and wife Rosinah O. Peck and family lived on a farm nearby and raised their nine children. Their daughter Lavinia Furr married Daniel Efird and their daughter Mary Ann Catherine Efird mariried Ephraim Coble, grandson of David Coble and Martha Bray whose daughter Elizabeth Coble married Robert Allen Carter, my parents. The Paul Furr II family attended Flat Rock Lutheran Church but when Lavinia Furr married Daniel Efird in 1827 and Eliza Furr her sister married his brother Soloman Efird in 1829, the two Furr girls moved their membership to St. Martin's Lutheran. When my grandfather Ephraim Coble grew up, he took a leading part in the church. The Coble slaves attended services and they sat in the balcony. I remember George Coble, a slave. He came to see my mother in Albemarle one day. I remember seeing him as he stood at the gate. I don't know which one was the happiest to see the other, my mother or George. (She invited him in for tea)
Later Sandy Creek Baptist Missionary Church, the first Baptist Church in NC, started in Randolph Co. near Liberty by Shubal Stearnes, a yankee preacher who came south. In 17 years, Sandy Creek had become the mother of 42 churches and 125 ministers. The Baptists began to decline after the Battle of Alamance. Sandy Creek dropped in membership from over 900 to 14. The cause of this was the abuse of power by the Gov't.. Gov Tyron declared that the Baptists were enemies of the mother church of England ... (he) tried to supress the Regulators which were suppose to be mostly Baptists. Stearnes preaching along with other Baptist ministers prompted them to form the Regulators. The Battle of Alamance took place May 16, 1771 and the Regulators were defeated. This caused about 1500 families to leave NC . The Sandy Creek people went largely to TN, SC and Georgia to worship as they pleased. The Baptist became divided over the issues of education and missionaries. Primitive Baptist Churches were soon organized in Stanly County Meadow Creek has already celebrated it's 200th anniversary. Sandy Creek was organized in 1755; Little River Church near Troy was organized 1758. Churches were also established on Rocky River and Jones Creek in Stanly County. My ancestors Samuel Carter and wife Letitia Morgan were buried in the Old Mt. Creek Cemetery.... There were only two missionary Baptist Churches in the area west of the Yadkin River, Rocky River was organized in 1776 and Kendall's in 1830.
In 1851 Rev Baldy Henderson Carter, son of Clement Carter and grandson of Samuel Carter came to Kendall's Church for a revival meeting and organized the Pleasant Grove Baptist Church with seven charter members and two deacons, Jesse Morton and William McLester.
Rev. B.H. Carter, a first cousin of my grandfather, Richard Carter, was born Dec 8, 1808 died April 26, 1896. He married First Jane Maskens who bore him 15 children; his second wife was Minty Holt, whose father was Soloman Holt, brother of David Holt who married Eliza Sophronia Rummage, d/o Franklin and Sarah Elizabeth Rummage( Robert Carter's twin sister). Minty Holt and B.H. were buried at Prospect Baptist Church near where they had lived on a 300-400 acre farm about 3 miles north of Albemarle near the homeplace of his father Clement Carter and grandfather Samuel Carter. He served many churches, never asking them to help him financially ... He made his own way by farming, raising hogs, sheep and grain and vegetables. Besides his children he reared Caroline Sloan and Betty and David Littleton. One of the deacons in Pleasant Grove Church, William McLester married Nancy Carter, my father's sister. In 1885 Pleasant Grove became one of eight churches to form the Stanly Association.
{My grandmother Nancy Marshall, d/o Henry and Susannah Tomlinson Marshall......married Richard Carter......(Nancy's sister) was Rebecca Clay Marshall married Nathan Rummage}
After Nancy and Rebecca married they lived south of Albemarle and were loyal members of Bethesda Methodist church as shown by the Class Book 1853-876. Copies of the Class Book can be seen in the Rowan Co. Library and Stanly Co. Library. The Original is in Raleigh at the NC Archives.
My grandfather Richard Carter was a Baptist but after many years joined the Bethesda Methodist church. In later years, Bethesda and Zion Meth merged and built a new Meth church on the original Richard Carter farm and named it Union Methodist Chapel Church but after the Stanly County Courthouse was built in 1842 and the village of Albemarle began to grow, a Methodist church was built of logs and after many years became Central Methodist Church. When I was a child there was a church for colored people on the road near Seago home. I was told it was the old Methodist Church building but if I remember correctly it was a frame building; in the beginning it could have been made of logs and later weatherboarded. It had either been sold or donated and moved about a mile from the present location. The church was the only one there for a number of years. Some of the people were Eben Hearne; Davidson Hearne; C.A. Underwood; A. C. Freeman; Henry Marshall; Elisha Moss; Dr. P.W. Wooley, J. M. McCorkle; T. B. Haskell; R.J. Mebane; Daniel Mayer; David Austin; John Rhyne; Richard Burris; J.M. Bivens; J.O. Ross; and M.S. Parker.
The Albemarle Church was made a station in 1890. In Dec 1886, Dr. J.C. Rowe followed Rev. Paul Franklin Winfield Stamey (my husband, Joe Hoffman's grandfather) as pastor of the nine churches on the Albemarle Circuit, one of which was Central Methodist.
William A. Bivens in the High Point Enterprise:
"When I had reached the age of 14, I was elected sexton of the church. I appreciated the honor, but was astounded when I was told by the chairman of the board of stewards that the office paid only $5 per year. My duties were: cleaning and filling the swinging church lamps with kerosene every Saturday; sweeping floors; dusting and polishing benches, pulpit, tables and organ; collecting and storing song books and hymnals after every service, and distributing them before the service; building fires in the wood stove; ringing the church bell twice before every service and tolling it as funeral processions moved off toward the cemetery; filling vases with flowers; and caring for the lawn. So, with as many things to do, I would have given up the office after a month had it not been for one thing; I liked to ring the bell and even more, to toll it for funerals. For the later task I would muffle a hammer with a canton-flannel,climb into the belfry and strike the bell, timing the strokes according to the dying reverberations. highly pleased with myself over the doleful sounds I created, Poe's "The Bells" beat in my brain in a mixed sort of way.
"How they shiver with afright at the melanchloly menace of its tone. For every sound that floats from the rust within its throat is a groan. And the sexton, he that sits up in the steeple all alone and who tolling, tolling, tolling, in that muffled monotone, feels a glory in so rolling on the human heart a stone" But ah, the day came when a girl I had known in school, at play, in song servides and at parties-who had been the life of every group-was dead-yes, I tolled the bell as usual but I felt no glory, in fact, my tears fell thick and fact as I beat out that dreadful monitone"
Submitted by Jodie Gee
Collins-Moore-Graham-Lewis Family Tree: Ancestry.com tree
Census:
Name: Nehemiah Bonham
Home in 1840 (City, County, State): Haywood, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - 15 thru 19: 1
Free White Persons - Males - 70 thru 79: 1
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29: 2
Free White Persons - Females - 60 thru 69: 1
Persons Employed in Mining: 4
Free White Persons - Under 20: 1
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49: 2
Total Free White Persons: 5
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves: 5
Died:
obituary, Rev. Nehemiah Bonham
p. 120 Twenty-eighth session of the Synod, Solomon's Church, Shenandoah County, Virginia, September 30, 1848. .
Obituary of Rev. Nehemiah Bonham.-" The following is an abstract of the facts collected by the Rev. George Easterly and D. Forester, in relation to our departed brother in Christ, the Rev. N. Bonham : .
The Rev. N. Bonham was born on the 1st day of November, 1765. He studied theology under the care of the Rev. Paul Henkel, and received license to preach in the year 1790 being 25 years of age; and in the year 1791 he was ordained pastor by the Rev. John George Butler, a member of the Maryland and Virginia Synod. In the year 1824, he attached himself to the Tennessee Synod, and continued an active member of the same until the year 1844, when he was thrown from his carriage and severely wounded, by which he was disabled from rendering further services to the church, as he never recovered from the injuries he received by the fall. .
He departed this life on the 5th of November, 1846; aged 81 years and 4 days, of which about 54 years had been devoted to the ministry. His death was lamented by an affectionate wife and eight children, and also by the little flock which he had gathered at Morning Star Church, Haywood County, North Carolina, at which place his remains were solemnly deposited.
Collins-Moore-Graham-Lewis Family Tree: Ancestry.com tree
Nehemiah married Rachel Kerr (or Carr) on 6 Sep 1791 in Wythe Co, Virginia. Rachel (daughter of John Carr and Margaret Hood) was born on 14 Nov 1769 in Wythe Co, Virginia; died on 11 Apr 1873 in Haywood Co, North Carolina. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]
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1846 - Aft 1870 (25 years)