time they edited a column in the Hoosier State. The present official board is the same as the first, except that Mrs. Lydia Hepburn is Recording Secretary, viceMrs. Sallie Carter, deceased.
An Equal Suffrage Club was organized at Perrysville July 21, 1882, by the election of Mrs. Sarah S. Spotswood, President; Rev. J. S. White, Vic-President; Lillie Kirkpatrick, Recording Secretary; Icabenda Hain, Treasurer; Executive Committee -- Anna McClintick, Honorable J. F. Compton, D. C. Smith, Mrs. Lucy Maynard and Mrs. Sarah Smith. The club "immediately went down."
The Methodist Episcopal Church has of course an eventful history, extending back to pioneer times, which is difficult to trace. At present it is a strong and influential society of 133 members, besides probationers. Class-leaders, B. O. Carpenter and J. F. Compton; stewards -- David Smith, Mrs. Rebecca K. McNeill, Mrs. Mary C. Moffatt, Mrs. Hannah B. Johnson, Mrs. Sophia S. Rudy, B. O. Carpenter, J. F. Compton and Mrs. Amanda M. Ferguson. Rev. J. H. Mills is a local preacher. Sunday-school all the year, with an average attendance of seventy-five, superintended by B. O. Carpenter. In connection with the church here are several auxiliary societies, -- missionary, social, etc. The house of worship, built of brick, was erected in 1843, and its outside measurements are 44 x 52 feet. Value, $3,000, though that money would not build it now. Locality, southwest-central part of town. A good parsonage exists on the adjoining lot east.
Rev. W. P. Hargrave, the pastor since the fall of 1884, is a son of the late celebrated Rev. Richard Hargrave, so well known throughout the State of Indiana as the trumpet-voiced Gabriel of the same church, in which he was for many years a presiding elder. He had the best voice for the pulpit, and was probably the most eloquent of all in the United States. He published a volume of sermons, which passed through several editions. He died in 1879, near Attica, this State, and his wife, nee Nancy Porter, died in 1871. The subject of this sketch was born in 1832, in Crawfordsville, Indiana; learned harness-making; taught school; entered Asbury University in 1849, graduating in 1854; practiced law until 1880, when he joined the Northwest Indiana Conference as a Methodist minister. In the practice of law he enjoyed great success, and during that time he was a resident of Vincennes and Evansville. While at the latter place he was circuit judge for six years and a half; was also prosecutor for seven years. During the last was he volunteered his services as a soldier; was elected Captain of Company G, Ninety-first Indiana Volunteer Infantry; was on detached duty during most of the time of his services, when his official station was generally equivalent to the rank of brigadier-general; and toward the close he was chief commissary of musters at Knoxville, Tennessee. Mr. Hargrave was married September 25, 1860, to Miss Martha Erskine, a native of Vanderburgh County, Indiana, who died October 18, 1886, in Perrysville.
A Presbyterian Church was once organized at Perrysville, and after struggling along with a precarious existence for a number of years, it became utterly dissolved, when it counted about fifteen or sixteen members. Their house of worship, which they bought of the Universalists, became unsafe, and was sold in 1882, for $150, and afterward torn away. The trustees were D. C. Smith, John E. Robinson and H. S. Collier. Mr. Smith was also ruling elder. pastors or supplies were Revs. john Hawks, Mr. Steele, R.
Wells, William Buffert, etc.,, and the last one serving was Rev. Tarrance, who was at the time (1872-'73) a resident of Covington, Indiana. There has been no regular preaching since 1873, when there were twenty-one members. There are now probably about half a dozen members.
The United Brethren Church at Perrysville was organized many years ago. The present membership is about eighty. Classleader, John Patterson; stewards, Mrs. Sarah Smith and Mrs. Rose Hain. Sunday-school is maintained throughout the year, with an attendance of sixty to seventy, superintended by Rev. J. S. Brown, who has also been the pastor of this circuit for the last three years. He is a native of Parke County, this State; at the age of sixteen years he came to this county and worked on a farm two miles southwest of Newport; entered a school in Ohio in the fall of 1881, graduating in the spring of 1884, since which time he has held his present relation, as a member of the Upper Wabash Conference. He occupies the parsonage at Perrysville, in an extremely retired portion of the village, in the north-western part, and has three or four appointments in his circuit.
The church edifice at perrysville, a frame, 34 x 48 feet, erected twenty-five or thirty years ago, is a neat building, centrally located.
At Perrysville also resides the presiding elder, Rev. H. Ellwell.
The Cross-Roads United Brethren Church, two miles west of Perrysville, was organized over forty years ago, and a large frame church built also in early day. The membership there numbers about seventy-five, of whom the leader is Mrs. Sarah Park, and stewards, Jacob Brown and Richard Spandau. Sunday-school throughout the year, with an average attendance of about eighty, superintended by John Park.
Mount Chapel, United Brethren, 30 x 40 feet, erected ten or eleven years ago, is located three miles and a half north of Perrysville. The class, now comprising about forty members, was organized eleven or twelve years ago: leader, Mrs. Jane Mitchell; steward, Nathan Jacobs. Sunday-school during the summer, of about fifty pupils probably, superintended by the class-leader, Mrs. Mitchell.
A "Christian" church, with about a half dozen members, was organized at Perrysville five or six years ago, by Elder Gilbert Lane Harney, of Indianapolis, but they kept up services only a few weeks. The leading members were C. S. Brummett and wife, John Emanuel Sinks, Sarah Bailey, Mrs. Hettie Lacey, and others.
The Universalist Church at Perrysville was organized in 1842, and afterward erected a house of worship, a frame about 36 x 50 feet in size, but, being unable to pay for it, they finally, in 1850, sold it to the Presbyterians, and subsequently disbanded. They numbered as high as fifty or sixty members at one time. Among the ministers are prominently remembered Revs. E. Manford, the celebrated editor, a resident of Terre Haute at the time, B. F. Foster, of Indianapolis, George McClure, of Dayton, Ohio, but an itinerant, and Mr. Babcock, of some poiint east of Indianapolis. The minister organizing the church was Rev. Marble, of Fountain County, who preached once a month for about a year. The leading members were Robert J. Gessie (trustee and mortgagee!), Dr. Thornton S. Davidson, Dr. Porter, Messrs. Lawless, Watt, etc. They had a flourishing Sunday-school.
The village of Gessie, on the railroad three miles northwest of Perrysville station, was
laid out in 1872 by Robert J. Gessie and named for him. (See sketch of Mr. Gessie elsewhere in this volume.) The population of the village is now 140.
The business men of the place are J. C. Stutler, general store; L. A. McKnight, general store and grain; D. M. Hughes, drugs and groceries; John Cade, postmaster, drugs and groceries; A. Van Sickle, blacksmith; Silas Hughes, wagon and repair shop and wood-work; C. L. Randall, painter and jobber; John Haworth, station agent; David Hughes, William Saltsgaver and David Metzger, stock dealers; H. C. Smith & Co., proprietors of tile factory. This mill was built by Smith, Strausser & Stutler in 1884, who made in one year about $6,000 worth of tile. In 1885 the firm name became H. C. Smith & Co.
Dr. William Isaiah Hall, who purchased the first lot in Gessie and built the first house, is still a practicing physician of the place. Dr. James Barnes, who was for a time in partnership with Dr. Hall, is also practicing here.
The United Brethren Church at Gessie was organized about 1879, by Rev. F. E. Penny, of Danville, Illinois, who moved to this place the following year. The trustees were L. A. McKnight, Charles Hay and Harvey Hughes; and Isaiah Thompson the class-leader. There are now seventeen members; class-leader, J. C. Stutler; steward, J. C. Stutler and Katie Goudy. The Sunday-school is maintained most of the year, with an attendance of forty pupils; superintendent, John Haworth. The pastors have been Revs. J. A. Smith, of Gessie, J. Knowles, of State Line, Kaufman, of Perrysville, S. C. Zook, who lived below Newport, J. R. Horner, who lived here, and Van Allen, who lived a mile south of Cayuga. The church building was erected by the Christians, about 1877, a frame 24 x 40 feet, at a cost of $1,000, and in 1879 they sold it to the United Brethren.
The Union Sunday-school in Gessie is maintained independently of denominational supervision, and its existence of course diminishes the attendance at the United Brethren Sunday-school. it has been running since January, 1887, and L. A. McKnight is superintendent.
Howard Chapel, Methodist Episcopal Church,two miles north of Gessie, is a brick building 30 x 50 feet or more in dimensions built over thirty years ago. The society has been in existence since pioneer days. There are now about thirty members, with Joseph Nichols as class-leader. Stewards, James J. Lewis, Meredith Lewis, Henry Saltsgaver, David Bennett and Dr. W. I. Hall. Mr. Saltsgaver is also Sunday-school superintendent. Pastor, Rev. Warren, of State Line, where the parsonage is. Among the ministers of the past the most prominent in memory are Revs. Cooly Hall (father of Dr. Hall), Wilson Beckner, Samuel Beck, Whitefield Hall, etc.
The chapel is named after Joseph Howard, who donated the ground and led the enterprise of building the church, and was afterward trustee, etc. He resided there util 1866, and moved West, and finally died in Nebraska. His wife has since died. Mr. Howard was buried in Nebraska, although his monument is in the graveyard here. None of his people reside at present in this county. On coming here from Ohio, about 1825, he settled on the farm now occupied by John Fox; was very poor, a cooper and farmer by occupation, but by economy he at length became wealthy, maintaining all the while an unsettled reputation.
A few years ago a portion of the above society organized a small class in Gessie and began the erection of a small church; but,before it was completed, it was blown down and the little band returned to Howard Chapel.
Hopewell Baptist Church, a frame building about two miles north of Gessie, is the place of meeting of a society which was organized many years ago by the Rabourns. Among the prominent early members were Wesley and Reese Rabourn, Fielden Rabourn, Mr. Blankenship and others, and of the ministers the most prominently remembered are Revs. James Smith, John Orr, Mr. Whitlock, Mr. Stipp and Samuel Johnson. Mr. Stipp was a Freemason, and some of the members of the church, not believing that freemasonry was consistent with Christianity, seceded, under the leadership of Elder Johnson, so that since that time two small societies are weakly sustained at the same place of meeting, called respectively the "Stippites" and the "Johnsonites." Elder Stipp is now dead. Elder Johnson came from Fountain County in 1871, purchasing the old Joseph Howard residence. Ehud Hughes, Philander Goff, Samuel Johnson and Ephraim Shute are official members.
In 1877 Byron Stevens, a "Christian" residing near Lowe Chapel, about three and a half miles southwest of Gessie, with the assistance of his friends built the church in Gessie which two years afterward they sold to the United Brethren, as before stated. He was a minister, and he and James Prather were trustees. They organized a small church society at Gessie, which soon ran down. Elder Myers preached regularly for them for a time.
Rileysburg, formerly called Riley, is a flag station two miles northwest of Gessie, where there are a postoffice, a store and a tile-mill.