Elder N. Conner

Elder N. Conner probably never lived in Rusk County, but he did pastor at least one church here. He is listed as the pastor of the Mt. Carmel Church in southern Rusk County in 1858.

He served as the first clerk/secretary of the Mt. Zion Baptist Association, formed in 1857 while meeting at the Mt. Zion Church at Lawsonville in Rusk County. He probably was a member and/or pastor of the New Salem Church near Douglass in Nacogdoches County, since he attended the association as a delegate from the New Salem Church. (The pastors are not named in the 1857 minutes book.) In 1859 Conner was pastor of the New Salem Church, as well as the Baptist Church at Melrose (in Nacogdoches County).

His first name remains unknown, as does what happened to him. Early in 1859 he was engaging to go on a trip back to South Carolina to visit his old home, family, and friends. Perhaps he never returned to Texas.

Conner was ordained at the \Anderson Baptist Church, by John Scott Murray and Amaziah Rice. The Anderson Church House was located about 1-1/2 miles south of Anderson, Anderson County, South Carolina. The statement that “Conner’s labors as a Baptist minister have been confined to Texas ever since his ordination” implies that Conner was ordained and shortly after left for Texas.

Note: The New Salem Church mentioned below was in Nacogdoches County, not Rusk County.

Tennessee Baptist, Saturday, March 12, 1859, p. 1

There as some minutes of the Anderson Baptist Church online, HERE, 1868-1875.