FROM THE ARCHIVES

( By Stephen Kelley from the People’s Defender 1984)

One of the earliest organized Christian denominations in Adams County was the Presbyterian Church. Several families who lived in the old fort at Manchester were of this faith. After peace was made with the Shawnee in 1794, many of these Presbyterians settled on the East Fork of Eagle Creek, Straight Creek and Red Oak Creek, the latter two streams now located in Brown County. In time, three loosely organized congregations formed in these areas and affiliated with each other. Although there are no written records to substantiate it, it is believed that they began holding worship services in one another’s homes as early as 1795-96.

In April, 1798, the congregations on Eagle Creek, Straight Creek and Red Oak Creek petitioned the Transylvania Presbytery of Kentucky for official recognition as one congregation to be known as Gilboa. This was approved and the Gilboa congregation was placed unto the newly organized Washington (Kentucky) Presbytery in October of that same year.

Again, no records are available for documentation, but it was shortly after this that the Eagle Creek sector of the Gilboa congregation grew in membership to the point where they apparently formed their own separate congregation. It is believed they were able to erect a log church ca.1798 on the Thomas Kirker farm in present-day Liberty Township. The exact location of this building has been lost to time but it apparently was very close to where the Kirker Cemetery is situated today.

The Eagle Creek congregation continued to meet in this building until 1804 or ‘05 when the church relocated in the newly settled county seat of West Union. That congregation is still meeting today in the old stone church erected in 1810 on Second Street.

Despite the presence of a large number of Presbyterians in the vicinity, up to this point in time no congregation had officially organized at Manchester. Those individuals in the Manchester area who wished to worship with a Presbyterian congregation were compelled to travel to either the Red Oak or Eagle Creek Church. As the population of Manchester and its Presbyterian citizenry continued to grow, the need for a local church was realized.

Once again, early records are either non-existent or lost and the precise year the Manchester Presbyterian Church was formed is unknown. According to local tradition, it apparently was established about 1805-06 under the pastorate of the Reverend William Willamson who was then serving the West Union (formerly Eagle Creek) and Cabin Creek (Kentucky) congregations. Just at the Eagle Creek church had grown out of the Gilboa congregation, the Manchester church formed out of the West Union congregation.

The first Presbyterian church building in Manchester was erected near the site of the present church on Second Street (U.S. 52) adjoining the old cemetery. This was a log structure which evidently served the people until 1845 when a more substantial edifice was constructed. The Manchester church was legally incorporated by an act of the Ohio Legislature on January 19, 1814. The incorporators were the Reverend William Williamson, Israel Donalson, William Means, Richard Rounsville and John Ellison, Sr.

In 1845 the congregation had outgrown the little log church and plans for a new frame house of worship were advised. Reynolds and Daughtery were contracted for the construction of the new church which cost eleven hundred dollars. This was a simple but elegant building of Greek Revival architecture. It was used until 1904 when it was moved and replaced with the present Gothic Revival brick structure. The old frame church was moved to the southeast corner of Sixth and Washington Streets where it was used as warehouse for the Manchester Roller Mills, then being owned and operated by the Farmer’s Co-operative Milling Company. It remained standing until destroyed by the flood waters of the Ohio River in 1937.