same source: p. 84 Baptists Bush River, Enoree and Lower Duncan's Creek are the three earliest Baptist churches in Newberry County and the only ones established before 1800. As Townsend points out in her scholarly an perceptive study of early South Carolina Baptists, the majority of that sect entering the backcountry were at first known as Separates. This name derived from the withdrawal of the New Lights from the Congregational Churches of England after the Great Awakening engendered by Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield. The Reverend Shubal Stears, "a peculiarly passionate and moving exhorter is claimed by all Baptist historians to have led the Separate New Light movement into the Southern colonies." From his settlement at Sandy Creek North Carolina, the movement spread in all directions throughout the South. One of those carrying the new Gospel into the Fork between the Broad and Saluda was the Reverend Philip Maulkey who was ordained in 1757 and whose influence was far-reaching. Settling finally at Fairforest, on a branch of Tyger River in 1762, he established the most influential Baptist church in the upcountry. One of the branches of this church was Enoree which, according to Townsend, claimed 1768 as the year of its beginning, and which had a meetinghouse built in 1771. It was said to have been originally erected at Littleton's ferry on Enoree River on Major Jesse Maybin's plantation. Later it was moved to it present location not far from Keitt's Crossroads. No records survive from its first years, but in 1781 the Reverend Jacob King was pastor and served, with the assistance of the Reverend Jesse Owen, until after the turn of the eighteenth century. During this decade the congregation consisted of considerably less than one hundred members. Located in the northeastern section of the country, it never equalled Bush River Church in numbers or influence. ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com