Presbyterians In Space: The Problem Of Disconnected Presbyterians On The American Frontier (C. 1782–C. 1800)

By Andrew M. Mcginnis

Space or physical distance, a seemingly neutral phenomenon, has in fact had a significant impact on the contextualization and spread of Christianity in America. [1] In the early Republic, as populations pushed westward and began establishing new settlements in largely unpopulated areas like Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, major denominations struggled to keep up with the rapid growth and expansion. [2] This dissemination of new settlements presented unique challenges to churches with a connectional polity. The mobility and adaptation of Methodists to this spacious frontier context has been noted often. [3] However, the ways in which Presbyterians experienced and addressed the problem of distance remains a neglected area of study. This analysis will consider the Presbyterian experience of the problem of distance both from a national perspective, by looking at synod and General Assembly records, and from a local perspective, by examining the records of Transylvania Presbytery in Kentucky. How Presbyterians experienced and sought to address the problems that physical distance posed to Presbyterian polity and ministry in the early-Republic period will be explored. I hope to contribute to further understanding not only of Presbyterianism on the American frontier, but also of the significant role that geographical distance plays in the contextualization of Christianity in America.

Of the challenges facing Presbyterians on the American frontier, the revivals of the so-called Second Great Awakening have received nearly exhaustive historical discussion. [4] I will not retread that well-worn path here. Another challenge, the shortage of Presbyterian ministers on the frontier, while frequently acknowledged, has received only occasional scholarly attention. [5] Certainly the Presbyterian churches on the frontier in the ante-bellum period were crying out to their presbyteries and synods, “Send us ministers!” Yet, at the same time, the presbyteries, synods, and General Assembly were equally crying out to the frontier churches, “Send us your ministers!” That is to say, “Send your commissioners to the local, regional, and national assemblies of the church so that we may properly conduct the ministry of the church.” This call—a kin call for ministers in reverse—highlights the fact that the spread of churches to remote regions presented a growing problem to Presbyterian polity and ministry. With respect to the General Assembly and regional synods, these church assemblies wrestled with the poor attendance of ministers and elders. Attendance at these meetings was particularly difficult for members of remote presbyteries for whom travel to synod and General Assembly was not only extremely hazardous, but also arduously long and prohibitively expensive. With respect to the local context, ministry within Transylvania Presbytery was impacted by the distance between settlements and churches. This local problem of distance, as we will see, changed the practice of settled Presbyterian ministry to a de facto itinerancy.

“Afflicted At The Circumstances Of Distance”: The Problem Of Distance At The National And Regional Levels

Prior to the 1789 restructuring of the church and formation of the General Assembly, the Presbyterian Church was governed at the national level by synods—two of which combined to form the Synod of New York and Philadelphia in 1758. It is not surprising that this Synod drew the bulk of its commissioners from the traditional strongholds of Presbyterianism in mid-Atlantic and northeastern cities, with additional significant representation from churches in Virginia and North Carolina. However, from as early as the 1780s, Synod noted the challenge of rapid expansion and the difficulty of organizing dispersed members for meetings.

In 1783, the Presbytery of Orange (North Carolina) was so dispersed that it was unable to meet in one place. Furthermore, in one instance the presbytery reported to Synod that it could not even cite a particular minister to appear since he lived at “so great a distance.” [6] Additionally, in the roll for 1785, the minutes of Synod report the absence of all the members of the distant presbyteries of Hanover (Virginia), Orange, and South Carolina. These absences led Synod to send a letter to these presbyteries regarding their lack of attendance. [7] The letter expressed concern “that for several years past, very few members have attended, from some of our distant Presbyteries,” and communicated the importance that Synod placed upon the connected nature of the church and ministry:

We [Synod] are very sensible that your great distance, & the difficulties of the times have rendered an attendance very inconvenient. [B]ut they cannot refrain from expressing their apprehensions, lest, if such non-attendance continue, the members of the Body may become entire Strangers to each other; & the general interest of the Churches under our care sustain damage, thro’ want of proper information & Joint council respecting the State of Affairs in the various parts. [8]

Although we should be careful not to draw too strong a connection between the events, it is notable that a few days after this letter was approved an overture was brought to Synod for the reorganization of the Presbyterian Church into multiple synods under a General Assembly. In the original overture, the problem of distance was not explicitly stated. However, the stated rationale for the reorganization was “for the better management of the Churches under our care,” which implies that the expanding national church had become in some sense unmanageable for Synod, and it is safe to assume that the problem of distance and poor attendance was a motivating factor in the reorganization. This assumption is confirmed by Synod’s rationale expressed the following year, that it was the “number and extent of the Churches under their care” that necessitated the restructuring. [9] Ultimately, Synod’s attempt to spur the ministers of the remote presbyteries to better attendance seems to have had little effect. Attendance at Synod by members of the presbyteries of Hanover, Orange, South Carolina, Abingdon (Virginia and Tennessee), and the newly formed presbyteries of Lexington (Virginia) and Transylvania (Kentucky) remained sparse up to the restructuring. [10]

Little appears to have changed after the restructuring. At the first meeting of the General Assembly in 1789, the Assembly noted the problem of distance and the corresponding poor attendance at the first meeting. In a letter encouraging the full participation of the synods and presbyteries, the General Assembly characterized itself as “afflicted at the circumstances, both of distance, and perhaps of poverty.” Furthermore, the physical separation resulting from such circumstances was understood to tend toward what was perceived to be a more dangerous kind of separation. As the Assembly put it, “Division of sentiment, and, perhaps, in the end, alienation of mind, will result from division of counsels, and the want of concert, in that great source of power, which ought to pervade and unite the whole body.” In an effort to avoid continued physical separation—and the feared ideological separation that it entailed—the Assembly recommended that each synod set up a fund, or see that the presbyteries set do so, in order to defray the costs that ministers would incur by travelling to General Assembly. [11]

However, such attempts to facilitate stronger attendance were unsuccessful. For example, the next year, the Assembly reported that only two of the four synods had complied with its letter—namely, the northeast synods, the Synod of New York and New Jersey, and the Synod of Philadelphia. The other two synods, Virginia and the Carolinas, had not complied. In fact, the Synod of Virginia said that it had never received the letter, and there was no information available about the Synod of the Carolinas since none of its members were present at the Assembly. [12] In 1791, the Assembly reported more compliance with its call for stronger attendance, and the Synod of the Carolinas, with one representative present, expressed its desire to fully comply but noted the particular difficulty it faced: “It has given us no small degree of anxiety that distance and other circumstances have rendered it so inconvenient for our several Presbyteries to send up a more full and respectable representation to our supreme judicatory.” [13] This synod would continue to have great difficulty conveying commissioners from its presbyteries to the Assembly. In 1794, the Assembly noted that “the Presbyteries of Abingdon and South Carolina [members of the Synod of the Carolinas]...had not sent commissioners to the General Assembly for several years past.” The Assembly could only once again state that such attendance was “expected and required.” [14]

The Synod of the Carolinas continued to express its regret at this failure, and, in 1798, it again begged the Assembly’s pardon, but this time said that it was nearly impossible for it to comply:

The Synod of the Carolinas having found from past experience the very great difficulty and even almost impossibility of the Presbyteries under their care being fully represented in the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, and being persuaded that it arises not from a want of an earnest desire to comply with their duty in this respect; but that the very great distance at which the meetings of the General Assembly have hitherto been, the length and expensiveness of the journey to Philadelphia, and the inconvenience of being so long absent from their families and charges, have generally discouraged those who would otherwise have attended. This Synod do therefore earnestly request...that you would...relieve us from this great inconvenience, by appointing your future meeting at some place as far southerly as may be thought expedient. [15]

This practical suggestion to move the meeting place of the General Assembly further south reflected not only Synod’s desire for a more convenient location, but also the reality that the membership of the Presbyterian Church was in the midst of a great shift to the south and west, and thus Philadelphia could no longer be considered the geographic center of the national Church. Perhaps in response to Synod’s request, the Assembly met in Winchester, Virginia, the following year (1799), some 200 miles west-by-southwest of Philadelphia. This change was short-lived, however, as the Assembly returned to Philadelphia the next year and continued to meet in that city for the next two decades.

Of all the distant presbyteries that struggled to participate in the Presbyterian Church’s national judicatories, the Presbytery of Transylvania likely struggled the most. Formed in 1786 in the lead-up to restructuring, this presbytery was part of the church’s response to frontier expansion and the corresponding problem of presbyteries becoming “too extensive in their limits.” [16] Covering the entire region of Kentucky and all the settlements along the Cumberland River, the Presbytery of Transylvania first met at the courthouse in Danville, Kentucky, on October 17, 1786, with five ministers (David Rice, Adam Rankin, Andrew McClure, James Crawford, and Terah Tamplin) [17] and five ruling elders. [18] That these men had a desire to participate in the Presbyterian system at the national level is clear from their minutes and communications. However, equally clear is that they were often prohibited from participating by the extremely long and hazardous journey that faced them if they wanted to attend assemblies in Philadelphia.

From the minutes of its first meeting it is evident that the Transylvania Presbytery was informed of the actions of the national church and that it sought to comply with the orders of the higher judicatory. It possessed a copy of the proceedings of the 1786 meeting of the Synod of New York and Philadelphia, and therefore was aware of the plan of restructuring the church under a General Assembly. Furthermore, the Presbytery was aware of Synod’s concerns regarding the many vacant congregations and Synod’s recommendations that these congregations should be properly organized and regularly catechized. [19] With respect to the latter recommendation, the Transylvania Presbytery took action in a manner adapted to their frontier circumstances. Synod’s recommendation that vacant congregations be catechized assumed that this would be the work of ordained ministers. The Presbytery, while agreeing that ministers should pursue this task as they were able, began appointing laymen as “catechists...for the purpose of instructing the young and ignorant.” [20] Thus, from the beginning, the Transylvania Presbytery showed some level of adaptation in the implementation of the orders of higher judicatories.

As for sending commissioners to the national assemblies of the church, the Transylvania Presbytery showed a desire to do so, even if it was not always able to fulfill that desire. At the first General Assembly, they were able to send minister Adam Rankin as an unofficial representative, though, in what was perhaps a comical scene, Rankin arrived late and stated that Presbytery had not received the news of the Assembly’s meeting in time for it to make a proper appointment. While the minute on Rankin’s late arrival gives few details, one cannot help but imagine him running in to the meeting out of breath and bedraggled from the 650-mile journey. [21] It would not be until 1795 that the Transylvania Presbytery was able to send official commissioners to the Assembly, and did so only infrequently thereafter. In several instances, a commission of the Presbytery was appointed to attend the Assembly, but, for reasons that are not recorded in the minutes, they failed to attend. [22] Though they also made some efforts to report to the Assembly by letter, as late as 1802, the Assembly was still largely ignorant of the state of the churches under its Presbytery’s care. [23]

As these several examples show, the geographic expansion of the church caused problems for Presbyterian polity at the national and regional levels. What we do not see, however, are any unusual or creative responses to this phenomenon on the part of the national judicatories. As I have suggested, the restructuring of the Presbyterian Church into four regional synods under a General Assembly was at least in part a reaction to the growth of the church and the great difficulty of maintaining national participation of all of the presbyteries, particularly those at the greatest distance from the traditional centers of Presbyterian strength in the cities of the mid-Atlantic and northeast. This restructuring may be understood as a kind of adaptive measure given the church’s new circumstances, but it certainly did not abandon or greatly modify traditional Presbyterian connectedness. The one attempt to relocate the meeting place of the General Assembly further south and west seems to have been another effort to address the problem of distance; it is unclear why this idea was abandoned.

It is notable, however, that the church did in fact recognize that physical separation was not a neutral factor. In the Assembly’s opinion, physical separation was closely related to ideological and doctrinal separation. The Assembly felt the anxiety of separation and appealed to the biblical imagery of the church as a body in the hopes of maintaining its unity. [24] Hence, in the Assembly’s view, the inability of ministers to meet together for fellowship and discussion of their churches threatened church unity on a much higher plane than mere geographic proximity.

Transylvania Presbytery: Local Challenges And Adaptations

We have already looked at the Transylvania Presbytery from the perspective of national-level church involvement. This presbytery, however, which at its organization was one of the most isolated presbyteries in the whole church, also offers a unique lens through which to view the problem of disconnected Presbyterians at the local level. I suggest that the situation of a rapidly growing church and the dissemination of the congregations over a wide area was a factor in the Transylvania Presbytery’s adoption of a kind of itinerant ministry.

Prior to the formation of the Transylvania Presbytery in 1786, Presbyterian ministry in Kentucky had been conducted as a mission work mostly under the direction of the Presbytery of Hanover, which had begun to send several ministers into Kentucky around 1783, when David Rice first journeyed to the region. [25] Even at the time of the establishment of the Transylvania Presbytery, the mass emigration of European-Americans into Kentucky was still in the early stages, with most settlements being less than twenty years old. [26]

It is difficult to know precisely how many Presbyterian congregations were in Kentucky prior to 1795, the year when the Transylvania Presbytery delivered its first report to General Assembly. [27] In fact, given that settlers were forming Presbyterian congregations before the arrival of any Presbyterian ministers in Kentucky, [28] and assuming that this process of laity-led church formation continued for some time, [29] it is fair to say that even the first members of the Transylvania Presbytery did not always know exactly how many congregations were within their bounds. In his short history of the presbytery, R. A. Johnstone identified over a hundred different preaching locations listed in the minutes prior to 1799. [30] Despite the enormity of the task, the Presbytery was devoted to meeting the ministerial needs of every congregation. In the minutes of its first meeting, it committed itself to “seek after and give proper encouragement to the members of our society scattered up and down in small settlements: to assist in organizing and supplying them [with preaching and the sacraments] as far as our circumstances will allow.” [31]

As for the scattered churches that the Transylvania Presbytery was committed to supplying, the precise distances between them are difficult to determine in many cases. Until comparatively late in its history, this Presbytery did not record the names or precise locations of the churches under its care. Rather, it identified congregations in its lists of supply preaching assignments, and most of these vacant churches were identified according to their proximity to various geographical features, especially creeks and rivers. Using the early map by John Filson and the approximate locations of congregations recorded in the minutes, we can estimate that most of the congregations at the founding of the Transylvania Presbytery were located within an area of about 350 square miles. Yet, we also know that within a few years congregations were spread across the region of Kentucky almost as far west as the Mississippi River. The minutes indicate that, by 1810, the ministers of the Presbytery had traversed a massive area, preaching in congregations throughout Kentucky and in parts of what are now Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee. [32]

The task of supplying every vacant congregation with regular preaching and administration of the Lord’s Supper dominated the early ministry of the pastors in the Transylvania Presbytery. This had the effect of changing the Presbyterian practice of settled ministry to a de facto itinerant ministry. Of course, most of the ministers of Presbytery were settled—that is, most of them functioned as the regular pastor of particular congregations and received payment for their service. Some, like David Rice, served as the settled pastor of multiple congregations in an area. Nevertheless, every minister also served as a supply preacher in addition to his regular duties. Lists and schedules of preaching assignments for ministers are regular features of the minutes of the Transylvania Presbytery to 1800 and beyond. [33]

To see what this ministry looked like in practice, we will look briefly at Terah Tamplin. Tamplin (or Templin) was a minister in the Transylvania Presbytery from his reception as a member at its first meeting in 1786 until his death in 1818. Originally licensed in the Hanover Presbytery, Tamplin was ordained as a minister sine titulo (“without title”) at either Danville or Cane Run around 1785. He then organized several churches in Washington County (southeast of Louis­ville) and was a regular supply preacher. [34]

What is notable about Tamplin is that in the minutes his name does not appear to be associated with only one congregation. It is thus unclear as to whether he was ever a “settled” minister, especially since we are not told what church or churches he served when he was not serving as a supply. At most he only preached about two supply assignments per month, but we simply do not have enough information to reconstruct his monthly schedule. What we do know, however, is that, between 1786 and 1800, Tamplin was assigned to preach in fifteen different locations, some of which included multiple congregations.35 The precise locations of his supply preaching appointments are not always clear. For instance, the 1786 minutes record the generic assignment of preaching in the “vacant churches in Jefferson & Nelson counties.” [36] Most often he preached in small settlements located in the area between the towns of Louisville, Lexington, and Danville. What is more striking, however, is that he spent significant time in what was the western-most county in Kentucky, Livingston County, which then extended to the Mississippi River and whose settlements were over 250 miles from Lexington. [37]

Tamplin’s ministry was not unusual among the members of the Transylvania Presbytery. Although the minutes record regular presbytery duties such as deciding church disputes and discipline cases and the process of training, licensing, and ordaining ministers, the amount of attention given to supply assignments is remarkable. [38] Certainly it would be false to say that the Transylvania Presbytery had abandoned traditional Presbyterian ministry for some Methodist version of itinerancy. The evidence does not support such a conclusion.

Yet the records do suggest that Presbytery was operating in a kind of emergency situation in which the shortage of ministers combined with the large number and wide dissemination of the congregations required adaptation to the frontier circumstances. The Presbyterian adaptation was to, as it were, unsettle the settled ministers through a scheduled itinerancy designed to meet the preaching and sacramental needs of each congregation. In typical Presbyterian fashion, this was done decently and in order, and by order of the Presbytery. Furthermore, this practice was not an innovation of the Transylvania Presbytery, but rather represented a contextualization of the traditional practice of presbyteries sending ordained missionaries into new areas, as the Hanover Presbytery had done some years earlier in sending their ministers into Kentucky.

Disconnected Presbyterians: A Few Conclusions

The challenge of geographical separation was part of a complex network of new realities facing Presbyterians in the era of westward expansion—realities such as rapid emigration into new regions, the struggle to develop and sustain new towns in dangerous frontier circumstances, and the inadequate number of Presbyterian ministers to meet the demands of rapid church growth. The problem of distance is by no means an independent phenomenon. Yet, as I have suggested, the problem of distance and the experience of Presbyterians in this era is worthy of further attention, particularly since it was a problem noted in the official records of the church and addressed through some adaptive measures.

Among the major denominations of American Protestantism, Presbyterians have at times been depicted as ill-equipped for the realities of westward expansion. In some cases, they have been criticized for being inflexible, lacking creativity, or having little ability when it came to adapting to the frontier circumstances. [39] While American Presbyterians have seldom led the charge of ecclesiological innovation, the examples we have seen of their responses to the problem of separation suggest that they were not inflexible, uncreative, or lacking in ability. Instead, the restructuring of the church in 1789, the attempts to address attendance problems, and the adaptive measures of the Transylvania Presbytery all suggest that Presbyterians responded to the problem of separation within the traditional parameters of their system of church polity. Of course, this kind of restrained creative adaptation may simply remind us of the truth that one denomination’s creativity may be another denomination’s traditionalism.

There is certainly room for further historical analysis of disconnected Presbyterians. For example, the problem could be pursued from the perspective of particular congregations and their relationship to the whole church, or from the perspective of ministers who attempted to overcome the challenge of physical distance. Another intriguing line of study would be Presbyterian responses to the Great Revival in Kentucky and the resulting divisions in the church. Was the problem of geographical separation a significant factor in the failure of the Transylvania Presbytery to maintain unity among its churches and ministers in the era of the so-called Second Great Awakening? Such questions have yet to be explored and may further indicate that the seemingly neutral phenomenon of physical separation was, as the first General Assembly noted, a kind of “affliction” that threatened the doctrinal and ideological unity of American Presbyterians.

Lastly, the experience of disconnected Presbyterians in the era of westward expansion causes us to think more deeply about geographical separation and its impact on American Christianity more generally, especially since we now live in a world in which technology has, in some sense, reduced the disconnectedness that geographical distance traditionally entailed. Perhaps technology has introduced a different kind of isolation, but travel and communications are such that churches in America now have unprecedented ways of staying connected. For example, Presbyterians may now watch the proceedings of the General Assembly online, and ministers and elders may now have session meetings by phone or video-conference call. In the early days of American Presbyterianism, Francis Makemie (1658-1708) noted that healthy Presbyterian churches depended on physical nearness and the ability to gather together easily for worship and instruction. For Makemie, settled towns and communities were essential to the development and maintenance of strong Presbyterianism and fervent Christian piety. [40] From the perspective of Christians living in colonial America, the problem of distance loomed large since to be separated by distance was to be separated entirely. As we have seen, the situation was no different in the early-Republic period. However, these observations may lead us to question whether or not distance continues to have such an impact. I suspect that it does continue to be a powerful factor in American Christianity, but whether it continues to be an “affliction” to churches, or whether distance plays a more positive role, are lines of inquiry that are worth tracing out.

Notes

1. Sidney E. Mead, “The American People: Their Space, Time, and Religion,” in The Lively Experiment: The Shaping of Christianity in America (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), 1-15; Andrew F. Walls, The Missionary Movement in Christian History (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1996), 229-30; Rhys Isaac, The Transformation of Virginia, 1740-1790 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982); Amy DeRogatis, Moral Geography: Maps, Missionaries, and the American Frontier (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003).
2. John B. Boles, The Great Revival (1972; repr., Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1996), 43.
3. See, e.g., Nathan O. Hatch, The Democratization of American Christianity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989), 81-93; John H. Wigger, Taking Heaven by Storm: Methodism and the Rise of Popular Christianity in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 21-38, 56-62; Richard P. Heitzenrater, “Connectionalism and Itinerancy: Wesleyan Principles and Practice,” in Connectionalism: Ecclesiology, Mission, and Identity, eds. Russell E. Richey, et al. (Nashville: Abingdon, 1997), 23-38.
4. See, e.g., Robert H. Bishop, An Outline of the History of the Church in the State of Kentucky, During a Period of Forty Years: Containing the Memoirs of Rev. David Rice (Lexington: Thomas Skillman, 1824); Robert Davidson, History of the Presbyterian Church in the State of Kentucky (New York: Robert Carter, 1847); Wesley M. Gewehr, The Great Awakening in Virginia, 1740-1790 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1930; repr., Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1965); John Opie, “James McGready: Theologian of Frontier Revivalism,” Church History 34/4 (1965): 445-56; idem, “The Melancholy Career of ‘Father’ David Rice,” Journal of Presbyterian History 47/4 (1969): 295-319; Boles, The Great Revival; idem, Religion in Antebellum Kentucky (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1976); Louis B. Weeks, Kentucky Presbyterians (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1983); Marilyn J. Westerkamp, Triumph of the Laity: Scots-Irish Piety and the Great Awakening, 1625-1760 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988); Paul K. Conkin, Cane Ridge: America’s Pentecost (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1990); Hatch, Democratization; Ellen Eslinger, Citizens of Zion: The Social Origins of Camp Meeting Revivalism (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1999); Leigh Eric Schmidt, Holy Fairs: Scottish Communions and American Revivals in the Early Modern Period, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001); Andrew M. McGinnis, “Between Enthusiasm and Stoicism: David Rice and Moderate Revivalism in Virginia and Kentucky,” The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 106/2 (2008): 165-90.
5. For a survey of the history of this problem in American Presbyterianism, see Barry Waugh, “The Ministerial Shortage Problem in Presbyterian History & George Howe’s Appeal for More Ministers,” The Confessional Presbyterian 4 (2008): 43-51.
6. Minutes of the Synod of New York and Philadelphia (1758-1788), 21 May 1784, p. 588. These minutes are found in the collection: Minutes of the Presbyterian Church in America 1706-1788, ed. Guy S. Klett (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Historical Society, 1976), 339-638. Hereafter cited as Minutes of Synod, and followed by the date of the record and the page reference in Klett’s volume.
7. Minutes of Synod, 18 May 1785, p. 590. One member of the Presbytery of Orange, Daniel Thatcher, did eventually arrive and gave sufficient reasons for his late arrival and for failing to attend in previous years (Minutes of Synod, 19 May 1785, p. 591).
8. Minutes of Synod, 19 May 1785, p. 593.
9. Minutes of Synod, 23 May 1785, p. 597; 19 May 1786, p. 603.
10. Minutes of Synod, 17 May 1786, pp. 599-600; 16 May 1787, pp. 614-616; 21 May 1788, pp. 630-631.
11. Minutes of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America from its Organization A. D. 1789 to A. D. 1820 Inclusive (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, n.d.), 25 May 1789, pp. 9-10.
12. Minutes of the General Assembly, 20 May 1790, p. 22.
13. Letter from Synod of the Carolinas to the General Assembly, Minutes of the General Assembly, 18 May 1791, p. 32.
14. Minutes of the General Assembly, 17 May 1794, p. 84.
15. Letter from Synod of Carolinas to the General Assembly, Minutes of the General Assembly, 19 May 1798, p. 142.
16. Minutes of Synod, 22 May 1786, pp. 608-609.
17. Thomas Craighead was also one of the constituting members, though he was absent the first meeting and frequently absent during the early years of the presbytery. Terah Tamplin (or Templin) was a minister in the Hanover Presbytery but was received as a member at the first meeting.
18. Minutes of Transylvania Presbytery, 17 October 1786. The manuscripts of the minutes of Transylvania Presbytery (hereafter cited as MTP, followed by date of the record) are available on microfilm and held at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary. Extracts have been published in William Warren Sweet, Religion on the American Frontier, 1783-1840, vol. 2: The Presbyterians (New York: Cooper Square, 1964), 129-281.
19. MTP, 17 October 1786; cf. Minutes of Synod, 23 May 1786, p. 612.
20. MTP, 17 October 1786.
21. Minutes of the General Assembly, 21 May 1789, p. 2. Rankin, it should be noted, had personal motivations to attend. He wanted to present his case against congregations singing Watts’s Psalter.
22. Minutes of the General Assembly, 21 May 1795, p. 94; MTP, 6 October 1790, cf. Minutes of the General Assembly, 18 May 1791, p. 30; MTP, 4 October 1791, cf. Minutes of the General Assembly, 17 May 1792, p. 49; MTP, 9 October 1795, cf. Minutes of the General Assembly, 19 May 1796, p. 107.
23. MTP, 24 February 1790; Minutes of the General Assembly, 21 May 1790, p. 25; 22 May 1802, p. 241.
24. Minutes of the General Assembly, 25 May 1789, pp. 9-10.
25. Davidson, History, 65, 79; Bishop, Outline, 65-67; William Henry Foote, Sketches of Virginia: Historical and Biographical, 2d series (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1855), 47; McGinnis, “Between Enthusiasm and Stoicism,” 174-77.
26. On the settlement and development of Kentucky, see the fascinating early work by John Filson, The Discovery, Settlement And present State of Kentucky: And An Essay towards the Topography, and Natural History of that important Country (Wilmington: J. Adams, 1784). For a more recent history, see Stephen Aron, How the West Was Lost: The Transformation of Kentucky from Daniel Boone to Henry Clay (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996).
27. Minutes of the General Assembly, 26 May 1795, p. 106. Here Presbytery reported thirty-two total congregations, which included 21 vacant churches. Even this total may not be the precise number of local congregations since it was the practice of Transylvania Presbytery to not count a church as officially vacant unless it testified to Presbytery that it was able to support a minister (MTP, 20 April 1789).
28. Bishop, Outline, 65-67.
29. This is suggested by the requests for supply preachers that were brought to Presbytery from new congregations. See, e.g., MTP, 17 October 1786; 6 October 1789; 4 October 1791; 24 April 1792; 12 April 1796.
30. R. A. Johnstone, An Historical Sketch of the Presbytery of Transylvania, Kentucky (Louisville: Bradley & Gilbert, 1876), 21.
31. MTP, 17 October 1786.
32. Filson, Discovery, map between pp. 112 and 113; Johnstone, Historical Sketch, 20-21.
33. In his extracts of the minutes, Sweet omits most of these lists after the year 1790.
34. Bishop, Outline, 164.
35. According to MTP, Tamplin supplied at the following locations: “Jefferson & Nelson counties,” Hopewell Church, Wilson’s Creek, Rowland Fork, Pennsylvania-Run, “the neighborhood of Hopewell,” Simson’s Creek (or, Symson’s Creek), Baregrass (or, Beargrass), Baird’s Town (or, Beardstown), Forks of Dick’s River, Cane Run, Pisgah, Green River, Danville, and Livingston County.
36. MTP, 17 October 1786.
37. MTP, 9 April 1799. Here he was assigned to preach “two sabbaths in Livingston county.” Bishop also records that Tamplin was “regular supply to several churches” in this distant county and implies that Tamplin resided in the area for some time (Bishop, Outline, 164). For maps of Kentucky’s early counties, see Aron, How the West was Lost, 83 and 128.
38. With respect to ordaining ministers, the ordination of James Kemper (or, Camper) may reflect some adaptation to the frontier circumstances. Not only was Kemper an early catechist (see above discussion), but he was also “examined on Geography” during his probationer’s exam. This was not unusual in the sense that presbyteries throughout the church examined prospective ministers on general subjects one would learn in their studies for the bachelor’s degree. The context, however, leads one to think that Kemper was probably not examined in geography in general, but local geography, in order that he would not get lost while travelling to the dispersed congregations (MTP, 22 July 1789)!
39. Opie, “Melancholy Career,” 303; Boles, The Great Revival, 43-44.
40. D. G. Hart, “Francis Makemie and the Meaning of American Presbyterianism,” The Confessional Presbyterian 2 (2006): 72-73. For similar points, see D. G. Hart and John R. Muether, Seeking a Better Country: 300 Years of American Presbyterianism (Phillipsburg, N.J.: P&R Publishing, 2007), 24-32.