A Record of the Decision to Constitute Bullittsburg Baptist Church By James R. Duvall "At a Church Meeting held at the Great Crossing [Scott County, KY] the 1st Saterday in June, 1794
Brother R[obert] Johnson Moderator" "At the Request of Sundry Breathren on the ohio [River] to become a Constituted Church Breathren Joseph Reding [the pastor -- often spelled Redding] William Cave & Bartlet Collins are apointed to Visit them & Comply With their request If to them, on the Necessary Inquires It shall apear right 1
The Great Crossing Baptist Church was established from the Blue Run [also called Rapid-ann] Baptist Church in Orange County, VA which was one of the earliest Baptist churches established in that state in December, 1769 and was pastored by Elijah Craig at one time. 2
William Cave was a charter member of the Great Crossing Baptist Church 28 May, 1785, having come from Virginia. Cave and his wife requested a letter of dismission 5 March, 1796 when they moved to northern Kentucky, where they joined Bullittsburg. Collins, though appointed, did not assist in the constitution. 3
John Taylor says that he also was there to help in the constitution of the church and that most of the original members were from the Clear Creek Baptist Church near Versailles, KY where he had been the pastor. 4
______________________ Notes
Meyer was a professor of history at Georgetown College at that time.
1 Leland Winfield Meyer, editor, "The Great Crossing Church Records, 1795-1801," in The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, 1936, Vol. 34, p. 189. This church was organized in 1785. There are a few pages of records from 1793 and 1794 in this collection. The entire article in The Register is on pages 3-21, 173-
2 Robert Semple, History of the Rise and Progress of the Baptists in Virginia, 1810, pp. 8, 378 & 415, via Meyer, The Register, p. 3.
3 Meyer, p. 5
4 John Taylor, A History of Ten Baptist Churches, 1823; reprint, 1968, p. 81.
[The grammar and spelling are unchanged.]
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