Other ARPs went to Southeast Arkansas and organized churches around Monticello. The Monticello ARP Church, now called Wood Avenue, was organized in 1855. Short- ly after the Civil War, the minister and many members of Monticello left to join the Presbyterian Church, US (PCUS), though the remaining congregation survived as an ARP church. Walter Moffatt, in his recollection of Monticello, recalls one Sabbath during the days


when the ARPs still sang only Psalms when his mother, the organist, had him play his trumpet to accompany the music. An elderly Scottish lady of the congregation was so offended that, according to him, she never came back to church again. The McQuiston family of Monticello were successful in business and funded the building of McQuiston   preached in the historic congregations located around Monticello.


Four congregations were established west of Monticello.


   • Saline, founded in 1861 by descendants of Scottish Covenanters. • Camp Creek, organized in 1875, begun by members from York County, SC, but


        


- torical Journal recounted the story of a single family of Covenanters from Scotland who, over the course of eight generations, moved from Scotland, through Ireland to the US,  Beauvoir College was begun in 1897 by John Jefferson Lee Spence as the Drew Nor- mal Institute. Mr. Spence became a member of the Saline church while President of Beau- voir. The Rev. J. W. McCain, pastor of the Saline Church and Erskine graduate, served as a professor at Beauvoir. This college was an example of a private/public partnership in which the town provided some money, Mr. Spence provided some, and students paid  small-pox epidemic and changes to the Arkansas education opportunities, the college  college, now the University of Arkansas at Monticello. In the 1920’s, the closure of im- portant area sawmills caused the population to scatter and the Saline church to decline. It joined the PCUS and eventually closed. To the north of Monticello, Mt. Zion, and Ebenezer churches were established. Mt. Zion was organized in 1858. This church was founded by transfers from Tipton Coun- ty, TN, and Chester County, SC. The pastor and most of the men enlisted in the Confederate States Army, and most did not return. After the war the church left the ARPs to join the PCUS. Ebenezer then started to replace Mt. Zion and had some of the same members before it declined and closed. Other ARP settlers went to


Little Rock/Highland Heights Church which is now Emmanuel Baptist and on the National Register of Historic Places.


May/June 2023


Pottsville’s old building that burned in 1959.


Fulton County in northern Arkansas. They organized the Prosperity and New       The minutes of Prosperity Church are available online and contain the story of the growth and decline of these churches up to the closure of Prosperity in 1913. Even the towns where these churches       here we also have ancient and hallowed ARP names. The founders were from Pis- gah ARP in North Carolina. Rev. John Pat- rick and Rev. Monroe Oates both supplied here. The Chesnut and Nisbet families were prominent. The name Nisbet ought to be well known to ARPs. During the Killing Times of the late 1600’s in Scotland the Nisbet family was very prominent in their role as defenders of the Reformed Presbyterian understanding of faith. Despite the promising beginnings of


the ARP Church in Arkansas, the Civil War was devastating. Disruption of the rural economy by the movement of peo- - ing hymns and musical instruments, and numbers of people joining other churches caused the Arkansas Presbytery to merge with Memphis Presbytery in 1931. Arkansas currently has three historic


churches and one new mission church in Little Rock. The mission work, River City,  in Little Rock.


Rev. William Holiman is a retired Chap- lain in Mississippi Valley Presbytery.


23


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