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Slavery, Secession, and Sin: Religion and Dissent in the Upcountry South, 1820-1865

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Slavery, Secession, and Sin: Religion and Dissent in the Upcountry South, 1820-1865 University of Mississippi eGrove Electronic Theses and Dissertations Graduate School 1-1-2013 Slavery, Secession, and Sin: Religion and Dissent in the Upcountry South, 1820-1865 Douglas R. Porter University of Mississippi Follow this and additional works at: https://egrove.olemiss.edu/etd Part of the History Commons Recommended Citation Porter, Douglas R., "Slavery, Secession, and Sin: Religion and Dissent in the Upcountry South, 1820-1865" (2013). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 1427. https://egrove.olemiss.edu/etd/1427 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at eGrove. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of eGrove. For more information, please contact [email protected]. SLAVERY, SECESSION, AND SIN: RELIGION & DISSENT IN THE UPCOUNTRY SOUTH, 1820-1865 A Dissertation presented in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History The University of Mississippi by DOUGLAS R. PORTER, JR. April 2013 Copyright Douglas R. Porter, Jr. 2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT Despite decades of scholarship illuminating divisions within Southern society during the nineteenth century, religious historians still imply that white Southerners collectively supported slavery, secession, and the Confederate war effort, choices they believed to be inherently just and holy. This dissertation challenges this notion by highlighting religious dissent in the South during the antebellum and Civil War eras. It argues that antislavery and anti-Confederate white Southerners imagined their lives and times, and justified their social and political choices, with as much religious urgency as their proslavery and pro-Confederate neighbors. Recognizing Protestant diversity rather than evangelical uniformity, this study insists that there was no religious consensus among whites in the South during the antebellum and Civil War eras. Traditional religious “others,” particularly Quakers, are major players in this dissertation, but so too are an array of folk Protestants, ranging from “old ship” Methodists to Primitive Baptists. Often locally-minded, they cared little about the mainline churches’ social and political agendas. The geographic focus of this analysis is primarily on western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee, and southwestern Virginia. This dissertation argues that this section of the upcountry was a distinctive area within the South where a variety of religious dissenters lived and interacted. This facilitated a regionally-specific socioreligious exchange that fostered dissent from the social and political mainstreams in the South during the antebellum and Civil War eras. ii To Meghann & Cooper iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First of all, I would like to thank my advisor, Dr. Charles Reagan Wilson, for his inspiration and encouragement, as well as his willingness to work with me over the past few years, despite an already overbooked calendar. Upon entering graduate school, I had no intention of becoming a historian of Southern religion. However, I was “born again” into Southern religious history while taking an independent study with Dr. Wilson in my third semester of doctoral coursework. Over the course of those few months, to use the words of Hank Williams, “I saw the light.” I would also like to thank my committee members who graciously devoted their time to my project. Dr. Deirdre Cooper Owens has been a mentor and friend since I first arrived at the University of Mississippi. Dr. April Holm boldly agreed to serve on my committee, even though it was her first year as a faculty member at the University of Mississippi. Likewise, Dr. Kathryn McKee took time out of her busy schedule with the English Department and Southern Studies program to serve as a reader. I value your comments and contributions. Each has helped open my eyes, and will direct my research and writing moving forward. Many thanks. I would also like to thank the librarians and archivists who have helped me along the way. Staff members at the Archives of Appalachia at East Tennessee University, the Southern Historical Collection at the University of North Carolina, and the Virginia Military Institute Archives were particularly helpful, as were archivists in Special Collections at Duke University and Virginia Tech. Their willingness to scan and send documents via email made the research iv process, at times, seem a bit too easy. I would especially like to thank Gwen Erickson at the Friends Historical Collection at Guilford College whose preparation and attention made a whirlwind research trip one of the most fruitful. Most importantly, I would like to thank my family, starting with my parents, Doug and Arlette Porter, whose unwavering love, encouragement, and support have allowed me to pursue the path less traveled, and whose examples as parents and people I will strive to emulate for a lifetime. I thank my sister, Andrea Kittrell, and the whole Kittrell clan, who have been tremendously supportive over the years, as well as my in-laws, Randy and Anne Smith, who have enthusiastically cheered me on. I would also like to thank my grandmother, Ruby Lambert—a true product of the upcountry—who has shared her love of place and vast knowledge of family and local history with me for the past thirty-seven years. Above all, however, I want to thank the two nearest and dearest to me. Cooper, my two year old buddy and the coolest kid around, you won’t remember much about your time in Mississippi, but know that you have been by your dad’s side through the highs and lows, always a constant source of laughs, inspiration, and hope. Thanks for being my wing man. You’re loved more than you’ll ever know. Finally, most of my appreciation goes to Meghann, my wife of nine years and best pal since we met in a bar in Athens, Georgia on Saturday, September 11, 1999 around 9:30 pm. This project would not have been possible without your willingness to uproot and spend a four year stint in the far reaches of the Deep South, a strange place over a day away from family, friends, and anything familiar, including real barbecue. I owe you everything and more; I don’t even know what to say. I love you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................ ii DEDICATION ................................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iv INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................................................1 I. “HELPMEETS TO EACH OTHER THRO LIFES UNEVEN JOURNEY”: UPCOUNTRY PROTESTANTS & SEEDS OF DISSENT .......................................21 II. “I INTEND TO STICK TO THE OLD SHIP”: RELIGIOUS DISSENT & SLAVERY .......................................................................74 III. “MINGLED MADNESS AND FOLLY”: RELIGIOUS DISSENT & SECESSION .................................................................131 IV. “THE UNHOLY CAUSE”: RELIGIOUS DISSENT AND THE CIVIL WAR...................................................156 V. “PRAY TO GOD TO BRING THIS UNHOLY WAR TO A CLOSE”: RELIGIOUS NETWORKS & INTERDENOMINATIONAL ACTIVISM .............196 CONCLUSION: “‘BABYLON IS FALLEN, IS FALLEN,’ AND THANK GOD FOR IT” ..........................................................227 EPILOGUE: “THY KINGDOM COME” ......................................................................243 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................251 VITA ................................................................................................................................269 vi LIST OF FIGURES 1. Map of the Upcountry ....................................................................................................14 2. Regions within the Upcountry .......................................................................................14 3. Location of Wachovia ....................................................................................................29 4. Primary Areas of Quaker Settlement in the Upcountry .................................................39 5. Friends Meeting House at New Garden .........................................................................58 6. The Holston Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church .......................................67 7. Levi Coffin .....................................................................................................................83 8. Catherine Coffin.............................................................................................................83 9. Wesleyan Methodism in the Upcountry ......................................................................101 10. The Mayo Primitive Baptist Association and its “Sister Associations” ...................172 11. Elder Calvin Blackburn & Martha (Harper) Blackburn, c. 1875 ...............................173 12. Jesse Virgil Dobbins ..................................................................................................206 13. Primitive Baptist Elder John Jones ............................................................................226 14. Quaker Vestal Hutchens ............................................................................................228
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