Siloam Primitive Baptist Church, Henderson

Siloam Primitive Baptist Church

• Other names: Henderson Primitive
• When organized: July 4, 1883 (or 1882)
• Charter members: S. M. Carlton, Nancy Satterwhite Carlton, and six others
• First pastor: Possibly Charles Holcomb
• Location: Corner of East Main and North High, Henderson

A church that probably fits somewhere in the mix of the history of the Mt. Ararat Church is Siloam in Henderson. This church may have merged with Mt. Ararat. This is a guess based on the fact that Mt. Ararat moved to Henderson, and the S. M. Carlton is mentioned in the Mt. Ararat minutes.

“agrees to let Brother S. M. Carlton Sell one Meeting House in henderson together with the lot it stands on by his agreeing to pay to us the value of the frame of the older house and that J. E. Hardie and J. J. Peters is set apart by this conference to Make a deed to said property when Solde and Money paid to them” Saturday before the third Sunday in November 1887 (p. 6).

The February 1888 Mt. Ararat conference records sending a committee “to brother Carlton to make a contrack about some benches and lumber” (the rest is hard to read; p. 6). The next month meeting says the committee reported, but does not record what they reported. The church also “moved and second that we send a committee to locate a plase to build a church house.” In April 1888 the committee reported “finding a plase 9 miles South west off Henderson” (p. 7)

An article in the Henderson Daily News (May 7, 1940, p. 8) reprinted an article from the Rusk County News, 1882, which mentions that the church house was recently built on “East Street.” Dr. S. M. Carlton was instrumental in having it constructed. Another “looking back” article in the Henderson Daily News (January 30, 1940, p. 3) adds the editorial comment that this building was at a corner of North High and East Main. Without further information, it is simply unclear to me how these two Primitive Baptist churches in Henderson fit together. Perhaps further research into deed records will clarify the issue.

According to his biography, Dr. Snider Miles Carlton moved from Panola County to Henderson in February 1879. He wrote that he, his wife, and six others constituted a church called Siloam in Henderson, Texas on the 4th day of July 1883. Perhaps he got the year wrong, or the Henderson Times got the year wrong, or simply they built the building on East Main before they actually organized as a church. Dr. Carlton left Henderson sometime after the death of his wife in 1890. She is buried in the Old City Cemetery downtown. Carlton says he was baptized by Charles Holcomb July 1, 1883, and went into the constitution of Siloam Church July 4, 1883 (p. 378). He also describes Holcomb as the moderator of the Little Hope Association (“was and is now,” p. 4).