In the years 1806
and 1807 there came from the island of Guernsey, Europe,
Thomas Sarchet, William Ogier, James Birchard, Thomas
Lenfestey, Daniel Ferbache, and Thomas Naftel,
with their wives and children, who settled in Cambridge and
vicinity. All these parents were members of the
Methodist society when they left Guernsey. Cambridge,
and the country surrounding it at that time, was little less
than an unbroken wilderness. In the year 1808 the
above named emigrants, and their wives, were organized into
the Methodist Episcopal church of Cambridge, by the Rev.
James Watts, a preacher of the Western conference.
This was, as far as can be ascertained the first church
organized within the limits of the present county of
Guernsey.
Perhaps no church in the country was more peculiar in
its origin than the Methodist Episcopal church of Cambridge,
Ohio. Like the Pilgrim church, it was transplanted
from beyond the sea to the wild forests of America.
Seventy years have gone, and all the original members have
departed, and very many others who united with the church in
subsequent years. Quite a company of devoted
Christians have gone from its communion to their rest and
reward.
The religious services of the infant church, for the
first few years, were held at the house of Thomas Sarchet,
on the corner of Main and Pine streets - afterwards at the
court-house, and the lower room of the Masonic hall, a
building then upon the lot opposite the Prebyterian church.
In the latter part of 1831 the trustees, Jacob Shaffner,
James Bichard, John Blancpied, Nicholas Martel, Joseph
Neelands, Joseph Wood, Joseph Cockerel, Joseph W. White,
and Isaiah McIlyar, purchased a piece of ground
[Pg. 551]
sixty feet square, where the Simons Brothers' foundry
warehouse now stands, for which they paid fifty dollars.
On the site a frame church, forty by fifty feet, was built,
and which was dedicated in the autumn of 1833, by Rev.
Joseph M. Trimble. On the 15th of January, 1854,
Rev. Andrew Magee preached in this house for
the last time as a Methodist church, the Baptist church, to
whom it had been sold, then taking full possession.
The present church was erected in the years 1852-53, and the
audience room was occupied for divine service for the first
time on the 21st of January, 1854, Rev. James G. Sansom,
presiding elder, preaching the dedication sermon. The
session of the Pittsburgh conference for 1858, Bishop
Baker presiding, was held in this church.
The Methodist Episcopal church of Cambridge has been
within the bounds of four annual conferences. From
1808 to 1812 in the Western conference; from 1813 to 1840 in
the Ohio conference; from 1840 to 1876 in the Pittsburgh
conference; and since 1876 in the East Ohio conference.
Its circuit and station relations have been as follows:
In Wills Creek and Tuscarawas circuits up to 1812; from 1813
to 1833 in Zanesville circuit; from 1834 to 1844 in
Cambridge circuit. From 1845 to 1848 inclusive,
Cambridge was a station, and again constituted a station in
1857. Since the year 1849 one of the districts of the
Pittsburgh and East Ohio conferences has borne the name of
Cambridge.
The presiding elders who have served the church of
Cambridge, from its origin to the present time,
respectively, are as follows: John Sale,
James Quinn, David Young, [eleven years],
Jacob Young [nine years], Jonathan Stamper, Charles
Waddle, L. Swormstedt, J. Ferree, Robert O. Spencer, E. H.
Taylor, S. R. Brockunier, James C. Taylor, James G. Sansom,
John Moffit, William F. Lauck, William A. Davidson, James
Henderson, S. F. Minor, A. L. Petty, John Williams, and
A. H. Norcross.
The preachers from the Western
and Ohio conferences, who were appointed to the circuit, of
which Cambridge society formed a part, are in the order of
their appointment, as follows: James Watts, William
Young, James B. Finley, John Strange, J. Mills, William
Mitchell, John Clingan, William Dixon, J. Kinkead, William
Knox, John Waterman, Thoams Carr, John Tivis, S. Glaze,
Thomas A. Morris (afterwards Bishop), Charles
Elliott, S. R. Brockunier, James Cooper, A. McElroy, L.
Swormstedt, M. M. Henkle, B. Westlake, William Cunningham,
Ellis C. Springer, J. Callahan, Joseph Carper, William B.
Christie, A. M. Lorain, Gilbert Blue, J. Delay, William
Young, J. W. Gilbert, Levi P. Miller, C. C. Lybrand, James
McMahon, Samuel Harvey, Cyrus Brooks, David Young, Henry
Whiteman, Gilbert Blue, Moses A. Milligan, Benjamin F.
Myers, Andrew Carroll, Harvey Camp, Jeremiah Hill, L. H.
Allen, John M. Read, and Isaac N. Baird.
The following named preachers were appointed from the
Pittsburgh conference: James Drummond, J. Grimm, t.
Winstanley, Thomas Ruckle, J. D. Rich, Ludwell Petty, R.
Steveson, David Cross, J. Phillips, E. G. Nicholson, D.
Trueman, Isaac N. Baird, Robert Boyd, J. D. Rich, A. J.
Blake, J. A. Swaney, J. D. Knox, S. P. Woolf, Alex,
Scott, James McGinnis, Andrew Magee, William Gamble, Thomas
J. Taylor, A. Insley, John Huston, F. W. Vertican, William
Devinney, James L. Deens, William B. Watkins, T. Davidson,
James Henderson, Edward Ellison, A. L. Petty, J. D. Vail,
Samuel Crouse, and J. H. Conkle. From the
East Ohio conference, James H. Hollingshead and
Ezra Hingeley.
Bishops McKendree, Hedding, waugh, J. O. Andrew,
Hamline, Morris, and Thompson, in their
journeyings, stopped and preached to their brethren of
Cambridge, and Bishop Simpson delivered his lecture
on his Travels in the East, in the present church.
While the Methodist Episcopal church of Cambridge has
been honored and blessed by the ministrations of such a long
array of faithful and devoted servants of the Master, its
latty has not failed to fill many positions of
honor in the church, as well as in the civil government of
the State and Nation. Within the past forty years
three of its members have been sent to Congress, and one of
the late United States Senators from Nebraska was for some
years a member of this church. It is perhaps difficult
to find another church in the land that has reaped political
honors so largely.
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* By C. J. Albright. |
