SHOCKY FERRY BAPTIST CEMETERY, Anderson County, SC a.k.a. > Version: 3.0 Effective: 20-Oct-2006 Text File: A354.TXT Image Folder: A354 ******************************************************************************** It's believed that the usage of any original work submittals contained within these webpages such as articles, compiling, photographs or graphics, conform to Fair Use Doctrine & Copyright Guidelines. COPYRIGHT NOTE: (1.) Works published before 1923, are considered to be public- domain. (2.) Works published 1923-1977 without a copyright notice, are considered to be public-domain. (3.) Unpublished non-copyrighted works will have Author permission for public-domain. Facts, names, dates, events, places & data can not be copyrighted. Narration, compilations and creative works can be copyrighted. Copyright law in the U.S. does not protect facts or data, just the presentation of this data. REPRODUCING NOTICE: These electronic pages may only be reproduced for personal or 501(c) Not-For-Profit Society use. Use the following names, if, you would like to give any author compiling credit. AUTHORS: Paul M. Kankula-NN8NN & Gary L. Flynn-KE8FD *********************************************************************** 05-01-15 CEMETERY LOCATION: ------------------ > GPS = Latitude N x Longitude W CEMETERY HISTORY: ------------------------ HISTORY OF ANDERSON COUNTY Salem Baptist Church, an arm of Shockley Ferry Baptist, was organized in 1798. Rocky River Church, first called Wilson's Creek Baptist, was organized in 1790. Mountain Creek Baptist in 1796. It, like Shockley Ferry Baptist, was probably organized by James Chastain. It was in that church that the Saluda Association was formed. Gleaned From: Traditions & History of Anderson County by Louise Ayer Vandiver o----------o HISTORY OF ANDERSON COUNTY The best remembered of Shockley Ferry pastors is Cooper Bennett. In the old days it was not Presbyterians alone who believed and taught the Calvinistic doctrine of election; that was likewise a tenet of the Baptist church, but one to which Mr. Bennett could not subscribe. A man of big loving heart, he believed and preached that Jesus Christ died for all mankind, and that any and all could and would be saved, if they chose to be. For such heresy he was excluded from the Saluda Association, and his church withdrew with him. He was its pastor for forty years. But as age laid its heavy hand upon him, his congregation scattered, and about 1826 the last years of his life at the home of his son, near Greenville. When too feeble to stand to talk to a congregation, the gentle old pastor, confined to a chair, his silver hair falling upon his shoulders, like to gather a few about him, and like St. John of old, talk about Christian love. Dipping Branch church, near the site of the old Shockley Ferry, bears in its name the history of the spot. The church in Anderson is indirectly an offshoot of Shockley Ferry. As the old congregation disintegrated the remains were gathered up by William Magee, and Big Generostee was formed with Mr. Magee its pastor. He served that congregation for over thirty years. About 1860 the church became involved in a serious controversy which divided its members into hostile camps. One Saturday the congregation met and wrangled all day long, dispersing only as night fell, with the agreement to meet early the next day, Sunday though it would be, and renew the argument. When they arrived Sunday morning to their consternation they found that during the night their church building had been literally split in two, the roof and overhead timbers having fallen in. The phenomenon was taken as a warning from God that a house divided against itself shall not stand; so the quarrel was adjusted. However, the shock to the superstitious was too great, and the church in that locality never again flourished. In 1859 it was reorganized at Shockley Ferry, but the name Shiloh was given to the new place of worship. When the nineteenth century was twenty years old, Pendleton District had become thickly settled, and there were numbers of people of the Baptist faith living between Shockley's Ferry and Big Creek churches to whom attending either meant quite a journey. James Burriss, a Scotch- Irishman, settled land along Generostee Creek; a devout man and a Baptist, he felt the burden of these sheep without a shepherd press upon his heart; and largely from Shockley Ferry members he established a congregation which gathered under a bush arbor near where Orr Mill is now located to hear him expound the scriptures. In 1821, with assistance of the mother church of which Mr. Burriss himself was a member, a log house replaced the bush arbor, Mt. Tabor was the name given to the new church. Reverend Sanford Vandiver became its pastor, and he served it until his death in 1841. On a bright Sunday afternoon in the fall of 1917. Colonel J, N. Brown, a grandson of Mr. Vandiver, accompanied a party of interested people to the spot where that old church stood. He pointed out in the forgotten grave yard which remains hidden away in the woods near the busy mill, the graves of James Burriss and his wife, Susan Cage, marked only by rough stones of the field. At that site, located now by a great flat stone, which must have been the door stone of the old Mt. Tabor building, the venerable old gentleman stood with bared head, and told of the old days and the people of that elder time which hallowed the spot. The little memorial service was the outcome of a thought born in the heart of a woman, a great grand daughter of James Burriss, who wished to see the graves of her ancestors, and do honor to the memory of James Burriss and his wife, as much as the ancestors of her beloved First Baptist Church, as of her self. Knowledge of the gathering somehow became bruited about, and quite a number of people of carious religious complexions, yet all Andersonians of long standing, were present. It was an impressive occasion, that impromptu meeting on the woods to do honor to people long dead who in their day had done what they could for their church and their community. Those pioneer preachers were heroes, they lived hard and worked hard, and preached from strong convictions, without enough pay to feed the horses that carried them to the meetings. A lady who died a few years ago over ninety years old, said she remembered her mother telling how in her young days she used to see Reverend Jacob Burriss, a son of Mr. James Burriss, making his way from his home near the town to preach at Mountain Creek where he was pastor; walking, leading a horse upon which his wife sat holding a baby in her arms, with two children mounted behind her. Gleaned From: Traditions & History of Anderson County by Louise Ayer Vandiver TOMBSTONE TRANSCRIPTION NOTES: ------------------------------ a. = age at death b. = date-of-birth d. = date-of-death h. = husband m. = married p. = parents w. = wife >