thisday.pcahistory.orgThis Day in Presbyterian History · Daily devotional readings in Scripture, the Westminster Standards

, & Presbyterian history. This Day in Presbyterian History Daily devotional readings in Scripture, the Westminster Standards, & Presbyterian history. Subscribe to feed April 8: Rev. Charles Ware Stewart 8 April, 2022 in Calendar 2022 by archivist | No comments See also: The Choctaw Freedmen https://archive.org/details/choctawfreed00flick https://www.accessgenealogy.com/native/biography-of-parson-charles-w-stewart.htm Biography of Parson Charles W. Stewart Updated: May 5, 2012 | Black Genealogy , Native American | 0 | Parson Charles W. Stewart, pioneer circuit rider of the Choctaw Freedmen came forth from a period of slavery, to the Choctaw Indians in the wilds of Indian Territory that covered the first 42 years of his life. His home was afterwards located near the Kiamichi River, seven miles west of Doaksville . He grew to manhood and always lived in an unimproved, sparsely settled timber country in an obscure and inaccessible corner of the world. Taking John the Baptist, as his ideal of a good Christian worker, he became the leading herald of the gospel message to his people, first in the valley of the Kiamichi, and then going forth in every direction in the larger valley of Red river, he established a monthly circuit of preaching stations, that included the most thickly settled neighborhoods of the colored people in the territory, now included in Choctaw and McCurtain counties. Like John, he seems never to have sat before a camera long enough to leave the world his portrait, and, though serving faithfully as a minister more than 25 years he never enjoyed the privilege and pleasure of attending a meeting of the General Assembly. Judging him, however, by the results of his work, the circle of Churches established and acceptably served for an unusually long period of years, and the number of talented young men, whom he discovered, in the communities visited, and enthused with the longing desire and ambition to become leaders of their race especially useful and efficient teachers and preachers of the gospel, he proved himself worthy to be rated as one of the most aggressive and successful of the early leaders of his race. A man he was to all the country dear, Remote from towns he ran his godly race, Nor ever changed, nor wished to change his place.” Period Of Slavery, 1823-1866 Charles W. Stewart was a native of Alabama, and, at the age of ten in 1833, was transported with the Choctaws, to whom as a slave he belonged, to the southeastern part of Indian Territory. John Homer was then his master, and he located about three miles northeast of the present town of Grant, His first marriage occurred, while he was serving Homer. The wedding of one of Homer’s daughters occurred a few years later, and his wife was assigned to serve in the home of the newly married daughter. She located in a distant part of the reservation, and he was thus deprived of his first wife, Charlotte Homer. Charles Stewart, a white man, keeping store at Doaksville, soon afterwards became his owner, and his previous name, Homer” was then changed to Stewart”, after the name of his new master. About the year 1860, Samson Folsom, a Choctaw who lived eight miles southeast of old Goodland, became his new and last owner. Period Of Freedom, 1866-1896 He began to hold religious meetings as early as 1856, when he belonged to Stewart, and lived at Doaksville. Mrs. Stewart, who had been a missionary teacher, encouraged him to learn to read and furnished him with books for that purpose. Rev. Cyrus Kingsbury, pastor of the Choctaw Church, gave him the instruction in the Bible that fitted him for the work of the ministry, and accorded to him the privilege of holding meetings in the Church, for his people, on occasional Sabbath afternoons. He was accorded ordination by the Presbytery of Indian (southern) in the fall of 1870, and was then officially assigned the pastoral care of the congregations he had previously developed at Doaksville and its vicinity, and at Wheelock, or Oak Hill. He greatly appreciated the recognitions accorded to him by the Presbytery, which had previously given him a license to preach; and he endeavored to magnify his office, as an evangelist, by going to the regions beyond,” as fast as the door of opportunity opened for him. During the early sixties he gathered new congregations for worship at his home on the Folsom farm and in the Horse Prairie neighborhood. The Oak Hill appointment was established soon after he was accorded his freedom. During the year 1883, the evangelistic work among the Freedmen in Indian Territory, was voluntarily transferred by the Southern to the Northern Presbyterian Church, with the conviction the latter was better prepared to successfully prosecute it. At the time of this transfer Charles W. Stewart was enrolled as an ordained minister and designated as the Stated Supply of the following organized Churches: Beaver Dam, Hebron, New Hope, Oak Hill and St. Paul. During the next two years three more of his appointments, Mt. Gilead, Forest and Horse Prairie were enrolled, as the fruit of his labors, and added to his circuit. At this early date he had also a preaching station at Caddo near Durant, and the distance across his circuit of appointments, from Caddo eastward to St. Paul at Eagletown, was 118 miles. In 1886 when the Synod of Indian Territory was formed by the union of three Presbyteries having 24 ministers, his circuit included 8 of the 43 Churches that were then enrolled. He continued to serve all of these Churches four more years. Previous to this latter date, 1890, he was the first and only Presbyterian minister that preached the gospel to the colored people of Indian Territory. During that period, he laid the foundation for most of the Churches that are now enrolled in the Presbytery of Kiamichi and give employment to a half dozen ministers. He was now advanced in years and beginning to feel the infirmities of age. He relinquished, in favor of two new men from a distance, all of his circuit of Churches, except Oak Hill and Forest, which he continued to serve three more years, or until 1893. He was then at the age of 70 honorably retired by the Presbytery, after a long and remarkably successful career in the gospel ministry. Circuit of Churches The following exhibit of the Churches he established and served is as nearly correct as it is possible at this date to make it. Post office Church Services began Church organized Work dropped by Stewart Members Years of service Doaksville 1856 Pine Ridge 1858 Caddo 1860 Horse Prairie 1863 1870? 1890 27 Wheelock Oak Hill 1868 1869 1893 30 25 Goodland Hebron 1868 1872 1890 12 22 Frogville New Hope 1869? 1872? 1890 38 21? Grant Beaver Dam 1874 1881 1890 15 16 Eagletown St. Paul 1877 1878 1890 18 13 Lukfata Mt. Gilead 1883 1885 1890 25 7 Wheelock Forest 1885 1887 1893 7 8 145 About 1890, he moved to a home near Forest Church, and died there at 73, April 8, 1896; after an aggressive ministry of more than twenty-five years after his licensure, which had been preceded by nearly ten years of earnest volunteer service for the betterment of his people. He was buried in the Crittenden grave yard. He left three children, the offspring of his marriage to Catherine Perry, namely, Thomas, Betty married to Benjamin Roebuck, and Harriet, married to Rev. Pugh A. Edwards. In 1886, after the death of Catherine, he married the widow of Jeffers Perkins, and she died at 65 in 1905, survived by seven of twelve children by her first marriage, namely, Charles and Louis Perkins, Mrs. R. D. Arnold, Fredonia Allen, Virginia Williams (d. 1913), Fidelia Murchison and Jane Parrish. Characteristics As A Preacher Charles W. Stewart was a man of medium height and rather stout build. The rugged features of his face suggested a man, possessing strong and sturdy elements of character. He grew to manhood under circumstances and changes that made an early education impossible. His education, which was very limited was acquired by the...