A Personal Remembrance

Click here to hear excerpts from a traditional spiritual sung as a choir processional during the 11:00 a.m. service on September 3, 2006: "Children of God,

keep on marchin',

for one of these days,

we shall be free..."

(MP3 format)

Featured voices are the Senior Choir and Men's Choir of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site), with the Rev. Ronald Cooper singing the lead

The building of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site) on the corner of Sophia and Hanover streets

in Fredericksburg, Virginia, as it appeared in the mid-1920s

A Personal Remembrance

of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site),

with an Emphasis on the Years

of 1921 Through 1946

Written in 2004 by Mrs. Jeane W. Winston,

who was a member during that period

UNTIL 1918, MY SISTERS AND I attended Shiloh Baptist Church (New Site), where our parents belonged. But in 1918, our mother, our aunt, and our maternal grandmother all died of the flu.

For the next two years, my sisters (Claudia and Elaine) and I lived with various relatives, in and out of Virginia. Finally we decided to return to Fredericksburg to live with our paternal grandfather and his lovely wife Lucinda. None of us three girls realized that when Grandpop remarried, he had moved from his former Wolfe Street address to Moma Lou's address on Amelia Street. It was quite a surprise.

We landed on Grandpop and Moma Lou's doorstep sometime in the afternoon of the third Sunday in June 1921. The house was on Amelia Street, directly across from what used to be Shiloh Old Site's parsonage.

Rev. B.H. Hester, pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site), as he appeared in the mid-1920s, early in his long pastorate

So from the day we arrived until we left to go our separate ways, we didn't miss a thing that went on at Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site), day or night.

The three of us joined Shiloh Old Site and were baptized in March 1922. Rev. B.H. Hester had been called to pastor the church, but he wasn't yet in residence. So Rev. Pearson baptized us. He was serving as an interim minister for Rev. Hester.

Both Rev. Hester and Rev. Pearson ate their meals at mom's until their lives took other turns.

Moma Lou loved children. Although she never had any biological offspring, she raised five children -- and treated each one as her own. She even organized a children's prayer service at Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site). It met just prior to the adult service on Wednesday nights.

As I grew older, I became more and more involved in the activities of the church. All three of us sisters sang in the choir. I taught a Sunday school class, and I also served as secretary of the Sunday school for thirteen years. When I moved from "the Burg," my sister Elaine took over as secretary.

I remember one time when the Rappahannock River overflowed its banks. The water was up to the ceiling on the ground floor of the church.

In 1946, the year Moma Lou died, I moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma, and joined First Baptist Church of North Tulsa by letter from Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site). The letter had indicated all the areas in which I'd been involved at the church, so in my new church, I was immediately put to work in the same ways.

In fact, even though I'm now in my nineties, I'm still singing (or trying to sing!) in the church choir, and I'm still teaching a Sunday school class. I am also involved in my church's board of Christian education and in "Trail Blazers," which is a group of folks who have been members here in North Tulsa for fifty years or longer.

During 2004, First Baptist of North Tulsa celebrated 105 years as a church. That's not quite as long a history as Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site), but it's still significant. Our senior pastor, the Rev. Terry L. Buxton, has been with us for three years. He is a young man in his thirties with a wife and three teenagers. He has quite a vision for the church, all for the better.

I pray that God will grant Shiloh Baptist Church (Old Site) another 150 years of "standing in the gap." I missed the 150th Anniversary Homecoming at Shiloh Old Site, though I've made quite a few homecomings in the past, even while I've been living in Tulsa. I continue to think of and refer to "the Burg" as home, for that's where my roots are!

-- Mrs. Jeane White Winston

This very lightly edited remembrance was solicited from Mrs. Jeane W. Winston by Deacon Gilbert Coleman, a member of the church's 150th Anniversary Committee as a part of the church's anniversary celebration.

For an exact photographic reproduction (in Adobe PDF) of the remembrance exactly as it was submitted by Mrs. Winston, click here.

For an overview of our church's whole history, click here.

For audio visual clips from recent services, click here.

For directions on how to find the church, click here.

For information on our regular Sunday schedule, click here.

Last update for this page: 10/25/2007

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