A small group of interested citizens took a walk through Kingstree on Saturday, April 21, stopping along the way to offer prayers for local institutions ranging from government, to business, to education.
Participants in the Prayer Walk gathered at Town Hall at 10 a.m. Saturday, April 21.
The walkers then proceeded down Brooks Street.
At Kingstree Town Hall, Pam Tisdale offered prayers that all local government officials receive guidance in making wise decisions for the residents of Williamsburg County. She also asked for guidance and protection for all law enforcement officers and emergency first responders. The group then proceeded down Brooks Street to the West End Barbershop where Anthony Page prayed for the prosperity of every business in the community, rebuking poverty in the name of Jesus, and requesting that new businesses that can benefit the community be drawn here.
Anthony Page offers prayers for businesses.
Prayers for all educational institutions were offered at the
Williamsburg County School District Administrative Offices
The group then moved down Brooks Street to Academy, where it turned left and Mike McKenzie prayed for the county's religious community at a point between Kingstree First Baptist Church and Williamsburg Presbyterian Church. He prayed for the churches in the county to come alive in a revival that promotes unity. At the administrative offices of the Williamsburg County School District on School Street Phyllis Underwood prayed that all educational institutions set high standards, that drugs and violence be banished from schools, and that the halls of each become places of friendship and camaraderie.
Residents of Kingstree have long believed in the power of the Almighty to protect the town. In an article published in the November 19, 1933, issue of the Charleston News & Courier, local correspondent Laura C. Hemingway wrote that it had long been a legend in Kingstree that the early settlers built churches at the three entrances to guard the town from the devil. "Some of the older citizens of the town still remember having heard their forbears declare Kingstree had built a church at each entrance to the town in order to keep Satan from entering," she wrote.
The Presbyterians formed a congregation on July 2, 1736 and had secured land from Roger Gordon on which to build a church by 1738. That church, known as the Williamsburg Meeting House, sat in what is now the Williamsburg Cemetery on the eastern edge of the Town of Kingstree. The original church, a log structure, was replaced by a more substantial building in 1746, which was doubled in size in 1770. According to W.W. Boddie, it was the largest building in town until the American Revolution. The church moved to Academy street in 1890, where the congregation met in a frame building until a new, brick church, still in use, was constructed in 1913.
The first Williamsburg Meeting House was situated in what is today
the Williamsburg Cemetery, facing east.
The 1890 Williamsburg Presbyterian Church on Academy Street.
Williamsburgh Historical Museum
Just as the Presbyterian meeting house was built on the extreme eastern edge of town, the first Baptist church was built on the extreme western edge. The lot deeded to the trustees of the Baptist Church by William Staggers for $10 was considered the prettiest in town, sitting on the high bluff overlooking Black River not far from the spot marked by the original King's Tree. The church they constructed there served the congregation until February 16, 1875, when the congregation moved to a little frame church it constructed on a lot it bought from R.C. Logan, also on Academy Street. The Baptists built a brick church in 1913, which they used until a newer church was built in the 1980s.
The site of the first Baptist Church in Kingstree was once on a high bluff above Black River.
The bluff was cut down to make vehicular access to the bridge easier.
The 1913 First Baptist Church on Academy St.
as it was undergoing demolition several years ago.
The Methodist Church was built on what is now the corner of Academy and Church streets at what was in the 1850s the northern edge of the town limits. On January 31, 1853, Alexander Isaac McKnight donated a lot on the corner of what was then Academy and Second streets to the Methodists. Before that time, the Methodists held services at the Williamsburg County Courthouse. The church built on the lot by Benjamin R. Pendergrass, largely from his own resources, was dedicated in 1857. This building was renovated in 1876, but by 1911, the congregation had risen in number to 270 and had outgrown the building.
The site of Kingstree Methodist Church on Academy Street as it looks today.
The Methodist Church for which the cornerstone was laid in 1911.
Williamsburgh Historical Museum
On May 15, 1911, the church celebrated the laying of the cornerstone for a new building. One hundred and fifty Masons from throughout the state participated in the ceremony in which the silver trowel used to lay the cornerstone was the same one presented to the Marquis de Lafayette in 1825 when the deKalb monument was erected in Camden. The Grand Lodge of South Carolina owned the trowel in 1911. The Methodists worshipped in that building until they moved to the church on Longstreet St., still in use today.
The Rev. William A. Fairy was pastor of the Methodist Church in 1911.
The County Record, August 24, 1911
There were, of course, other churches in town during those years, including the Episcopal chapel on Hampton Avenue, Mt. Zion Methodist Episcopal Church, also on Main Street, and an African-American Baptist Church on the southwest corner of Jackson and Mill streets where postal employees park today.
The April 21 Prayer Walk concluded at Kingstree Seafood on Kelly Street. There, Sister M. Johnna Ciezobka reminded the walkers that we are all God's children and that in order to prosper as a community, we must find unity in diversity. She noted that while railroad tracks often serve as dividing lines of socio-economic status in communities, she prefers to see them as seams binding the community together.
Sister M. Johnna Ciezobka of the Felician Sisters prays
in the parking lot of Kingstree Seafood to conclude the Prayer Walk.
All photos by Linda Brown unless otherwise noted
This marked the second year for the Prayer Walk, and at its conclusion Mayor Darren Tisdale announced that it will become an annual event on the third Saturday in April. Earlier Pam Tisdale noted that a prayer team meets twice a month to pray for the community.
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