HISTORICAL COMMENTS BY GEORGE CHEVALLIER

Allen Memorial Baptist Church

The history of the Baptist Church is not something I want to attempt here. But, I do have a few interesting facts about the local Allen Memorial Baptist Church. It was originally founded as the New Light Baptist Church with 12 members on September 29, 1859. The first pastor was the Rev. O.F. Flippo. They bought the Presbyterian Church building on North Division Street for $1100.00 and named it the Division Street Baptist Church. The church is pictured above in the lower right hand portion of the picture. In 1936, they built another new building to replace this one. It is pictured on the postcard on the upper right.

         

This is where the mystery begins. George Corddrey states in his History of Wicomico County that the Church was renamed the Allen Memorial Church in memory of Walter K. Allen. He was a son of Walter F. Allen, the prominent agriculturalist whose extensive lands are now covered by much of Salisbury University. W. K. Allen was ordained in the Division Street Baptist Church and became a missionary for the Baptist Church and traveled to India, where he died of typhoid fever in 1925. As the Church Directory of 1928 shows, however, the Church was named the Walter F. Allen Memorial Baptist Church. It is now known as the Allen Memorial Baptist Church and is located in a large new facility on Snow Hill Road. According to Erica Henry at Allen Memorial, the actual name of the Church is the Walter K. Allen Memorial Baptist Church. Apparently the Church Directory of 1928 was incorrect. This could have been a printing error by a well-meaning printer who used the more familiar name of Walter F. Allen. That is why it is so important to look up and seek out many sources before putting the history of anything to paper. The daughter of the pastor, James N. Stewart, in 1928 was Audrey Stewart, a long-time educator in Wicomico County.

         

The members of this congregation were different from the Old School Baptist Church, whose building is still standing on the corner of Church and Baptist Streets, although it is no longer a church. There was also the Forest Grove Baptist Church, which belonged to the Old School Baptists. My great-grandmother belonged to the Old School Baptist Church and is buried, according to her wishes, at Forest Grove. This was contrary to the plans of her daughters to inter her next to her late husband in Parsons Cemetery. She declared that she wanted to be buried “next to Momma at Forest Grove”. When her daughters exclaimed that they thought she would want to be with her late husband, Frank, she told them that she had lain next to him for 40 years and wasn’t going to lie next to him for all eternity.

         

Now, there are several Baptist Churches in the Salisbury area. It seems that a very few people can form their own church and meet anywhere they want.