This Month in Our History…with Fred Anderson

August 2010 Edition

One of the thrilling stories in Virginia Baptist history is the saga of "the traveling church." Nearly an entire congregation removed from Spotsylvania County in 1781 under the leadership of their pastor, Lewis Craig, and planted the first church on the frontier of Kentucky.  It is at once a story of great adventure, of bold expansion and of trusting faith.

In the history mural at the Virginia Baptist Historical society, artist Sidney E. King has captured in vivid colors the expectant, expansive mood of the folks who traveled together for 600 miles. It was a long sweeping wagon train of over 600 people.

They left Upper Spotsylvania Church (now called Craig's) in September, hoping to arrive before winter. They sought a promised land and determined to go as a church body. "How this singular unanimity happened, nobody knows," wrote George Ranck in his little history of the Traveling Church, "but these stouthearted Baptists, once resolved, turned not back."

Craig addressed the vast throng before the departure. Tradition says that he spoke on their endurance during the struggle for religious liberty. Craig himself was imprisoned for his faith.

Their route took them to Orange, southward "by the mountain road" past Gordonsville, Charlottesville, through Amherst, crossing the James "where Lynchburg was to be," passing through "the rolling tobacco lands of Bedford" to the village of Liberty over the Blue Ridge at Bedford's Gap and beheld the mighty and illimitable mountains that rose before them in solemn grandeur as far as the eye could reach."

As they passed through the gap, "some of the women were already in tears when [the captain] quietly spoke to a Negro man whose willing hands began at once to make a well-worn banjo 'talk.' Like magic the signal passed along and soon one of the jolliest plantation songs resounded." The slaves sang, the children "screamed with delight," and "the emigrants descended the mountain road with lighter hearts." The march continued to Ft. Chiswell near Wytheville. Along the New River they held worship services. At Ft. Chiswell they gave up their wagons and proceeded on foot and horseback. Bulky household furnishings were abandoned. Babies were placed in hickory baskets swung from horses. The sick were on litters.

They camped along the Holston and in the Wolf Hills of Abingdon. There they learned of Lord Cornwallis’s surrender at Yorktown. Three weeks had passed and they had survived. But the worst was ahead. Some 250 miles of wilderness waited for them.

Along the way they passed a settlement composed largely of Baptists but without a church. Craig aided this group to constitute a church called Providence.

Craig's own church continued to hold religious services along the way. A black preacher call Uncle Peter was among the group. He became the first black to preach in Kentucky and later founded a church in Lexington.

The journey continued into Tennessee and back into Virginia, following a pioneer route along creeks and rivers to Cumberland Gap. It took three weeks to travel 30 miles! Already snow and ice were on the mountaintops. And Indians were a real threat.

When they finally reached Logan's Fort, the blacks began singing favorite hymns and the whole outfit joined in. They located on Gilbert's Creek near present–day Lancaster.

"There in that lonely outpost on the second Sunday in December, they gathered and worshiped around the same old Bible they had used in Spotsylvania. And so met the first church ever assembled in central Kentucky." Two years later Craig also led in organizing the South Elkhorn Church near Lexington.

Could a church today be as bold as the Traveling Church? Could a people feel led by God to establish new work in a "wilderness"? The Traveling Church is an inspiring story out of the long and deep history of Virginia Baptists.