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Perryville Baptist Church

Winnsboro, Wood County, Texas

Marker Inscription

In June 1884 five neighbors gathered to organize the County Line Missionary Baptist Church of Wood County. One month later charter members W. F. Bailey, J. M. Richards, S. M. Lindsey, Mrs. L. T. Bailey, and Mrs. Martha Cartwright chose J. O. Carnes as their first pastor. Services were held in the local school building for several years, until a church building was erected. In June 1908 the church was called the Missionary Baptist Church of Christ at Perryville. The name became Perryville Baptist Church in 1925. Descendants of charter members remain active in the church. (1986)

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

In June 1884 five Wood County neighbors gathered to organize the County Line Missionary Baptist Church, calling their first pastor a month later. For years they worshiped in the local schoolhouse until a church building was raised, and the congregation took the Perryville name in 1908, revised to Perryville Baptist Church in 1925. Descendants of the charter members remain active in the church today.

Why it matters

The church illustrates the deep continuity of rural Texas congregations, where founding families and their descendants have sustained a single fellowship across more than a century.

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Related people

  • · J. O. Carnes
  • · W. F. Bailey

Themes & tags

Nearby & related markers

Perryville Methodist Church

Winnsboro, TX

Thirty-eight charter members organized this rural East Texas congregation in 1879 as the Marvin Chapel Methodist Episcopal Church, with the Reverend A. K. Hughes as first pastor. A donation of land in 1887 gave it a permanent home, and church buildings rose in 1887 and again in 1915. For generations the church anchored the Perryville area as a place of revivals, Sunday singings, and community gatherings.

Soules Chapel Methodist Church

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Shady Grove Cemetery

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One of the oldest burial grounds in Wood County, Shady Grove served the pioneer community of the same name, whose leading settler Reuben Elledge arrived around 1845 and helped organize the county as a commissioner and judge. In 1850 he donated land for a school and Methodist church, and an acre was later set aside for this cemetery, where young Bobby Scoggins—drowned in 1855—may be the earliest burial. Rock cairns, obelisks, Woodmen of the World stones, and graves of Civil War veterans mark the site of early settlement.

Little Hope Missionary Baptist Church

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