Located North of Blackville in Barnwell County, South Carolina

This history page is a personal hobby of mine, and it is not affiliated in any way with Healing Springs Baptist Church. - Lawrence M. Hunter Jr, September 2002

Healing Springs Baptist Church (1995)

Healing Springs (1995)

Click the photo to the left (or click here) for an Adobe Acrobat copy of the complete program prepared for the 200th Anniversary Celebration of the Healing Springs Baptist Church in October, 1972.  This program contains detailed information on the history of the church and the local area.

A History of Healing Springs Baptist Church by Leila Celestia Walker (1887-1970)

: Leila (left) and Edith Walker, circa 1905)

This article was written in 1958 for the centennial celebration of the present Church sanctuary.  

I have been asked to read for this occasion the history of Healing Springs Baptist Church. In connection with the story, I shall need to tell something of the life of the founder and first pastor of the church, the Reverend Nathaniel Walker.

He was a native of England, but came to America with his father and seven brothers and settled in a Northern colony. In early life with two of his brothers he came south and for about ten years moved from one Baptist community to another, working as a deputy surveyor for King George III. It was from the settlement around Beech Branch Church in Beaufort District that he came to this neighborhood. Here between what is now Blackville and the South Edisto river and from Reeves' Creek for about three miles toward the East he received grants of several tracts of land so that he came to own a large acreage, a part of which land his descendants own today. He made his home on a hill above Reeves' Creek (ed.- listed on some maps today as Whaley Branch).

Meanwhile, the settlers who had come into this community feeling the need of a Baptist Church nearer their homes than Beech Branch which was forty miles away obtained from the Beech Branch Church letters of dismissal for the purpose of organizing a church.

Under the leadership of Nathaniel Walker these brethren organized a new church in 1772, with Nathaniel Walker as the first pastor. That was the beginning of the present Healing Springs Church. But at first the members met for worship not at Healing Springs but near Reeves' Creek, up the creek and across a branch from the present Walker Graveyard. Just how long they continued to worship there we do not know.

The ten years after the founding of the church saw the trying times of the Revolutionary period. This neighborhood was divided in its sympathies. Among those who were strong patriots were Nathaniel Walker and his two brothers. There was a Tory band under an active leader. There occurred the terrible surprise attack by the Tories on a band of patriots at the Slaughter Field, as the place has been called since. Many patriots were killed, whose names are not known but the name of one man killed there has come down through the years, the name of Patrick Cain.

When peace finally came, the church must have been weakened by the loss of members. The settlers had long known of the beautiful spring which the Indians said had healing powers. But the first proof of interest in the land near the spring is found in a paper which should be on record in the State House in Columbia -- a paper of which I have a certified copy. It states that in 1796, Nathaniel Walker surveyed and obtained a grant for his wife of 500 acres of land on Windy Hill Creek. It is probably on this land that the first church near the present church was built, a log house. The church records were destroyed in some way in 1830(?) but the story is that the log house was burned and a small frame building took its place.

But we are particularly interested today in the church now standing, in this its centennial year. It was built in 1858. Israel Walker, a descendant of Nathaniel Walker, designed and helped build the new church. He was a skilled worker and did all of the lathe and molding work himself. The following story has been told of the work. At the Thomas Old Mill, near where the Haskell Davis house is today, there was a saw run by water power. The logs were sawed by a vertical saw into wide boards and small timbers. The sills and heavy timbers were hewn out by slaves with broad axes. The wide boards used for the ceiling were planed by hand and all of the interior finish was done the same way. The church was built on a brick foundation, with the four brick columns supporting the front portico. The bricks were made a short distance from the church, and they stand in wonderful condition today. The four large columns which support the ceiling were turned by hand there on the church grounds. The beautiful pulpit was made by Israel Walker, one of the deacons. This pulpit was placed near the center of the church and the slaves were to be seated at the sides and back. After the slaves were freed, the pulpit was moved to the rear of the church where it now stands. The names of all the builders are not known. Probably some of you could tell of a grandfather or great-grandfather who was one of the builders. That they did skilled and faithful work we know and we will do well to honor them in 1958, when we see the handsome Healing Springs Church Building which has stood without change for one hundred years.

Pastors of Healing Springs Church -

The Reverend Nathaniel Walker
The Reverend James Sweat
The Reverend Henry Hand
The Reverend Francis Walker
The Reverend Thomas DeLeach
The Reverend Darling Peeples
The Reverend Thomas Dawson
The Reverend B. W. Wilder
The Reverend Mr. Childers
The Reverend John K. Johnson
The Reverend J. J. Ray
The Reverend S. B. Sawyer
The Reverend Arthur Buist
The Reverend D. W. Crosland
The Reverend G. N. Askew
The Reverend H. J. Snider
The Reverend M. M. Benson
The Reverend H. T. Garrett
The Reverend C. E. Burts
The Reverend John Childs
The Reverend J. H. Simpson
The Reverend G.W.D. Heckle
The Reverend A. J. Foster
The Reverend G. N. Tolar
The Reverend B. B. Jernigan
The Reverend Roy Davis
The Reverend A. J. Foster
The Reverend Lewis M. Kirkland
The Reverend George Walker
The Reverend J. K. Killebrew
The Reverend A. J. Foster
The Reverend Lewis Mc Cormick

Leila Walker was a teacher of Latin for many years until her death in 1970.

  Click here for an article authored by her entitled "The Women Who Influenced The Lives of Cicero, Caesar, And Vergil."