Chapter one
But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace. Psalm 37:11
the first land: october 02, 1902
On October 2, 1902, Maryatt Walker and his wife Bettie Elizabeth Walker deeded two acres of land to the trustees of Saint John Missionary Baptist Church, then formally known as Saint John M.B. Colored Church, for the sum of $18.00 —a modest amount today, but a significant investment for a community only a generation removed from bondage. In that transaction, two acres of Mississippi soil were transformed into a sanctuary.
The Original Footprint: Section 6
The legal description of this 1902 deed places the original church in the Southeast Corner of Section 6, Township 5, Range 11 East. This location sits approximately five miles northwest of where the church stands today on Lawrence Bethel Road.
Crucially, this original site was situated on or near Mt. Moriah Road, placing the sanctuary in the immediate heart of the families it served. This location explains the physical proximity to the Evans Cemetery, which served as the primary burial ground for the congregation’s pioneer generation. For the families of “Old Altare,” the church and the cemetery were not distant points on a map, but a unified landscape of spiritual and ancestral life.
The Walker Connection
Maryatt Walker was the son of William Walker (1824–1879) and the grandson of Benjamin Josiah Walker (1789–1864), a lineage that directly connects Saint John’s founding land to families whose land history reflects the transition from slavery-era ownership to post-Civil War landholding. This transfer of land—documented, intentional, and witnessed—marks a significant moment in the re-purposing of property toward Black religious autonomy.
Trustees and the Fabric of Kinship
The land was conveyed to three trustees who represented the “human infrastructure’ of the ridge:
- Lawrence Rogers (1853–1939)
- Nelson Dukes (1864–1943)
- Samuel Evans (1852–1920)
These men were not symbolic figureheads. They represented interconnected family networks that would shape Saint John’s early membership and leadership. For example, Samuel Evans, was married to Sena (Senie) Evans (1848–1914), who is documented as a land donor for the local Presbyterian Church. This overlap reveals a critical truth: many early Saint John members shared roots with the Presbyterian congregation or were linked to them by blood or marriage.
Similarly, Lawrence Rogers’s daughter, Sarah Rogers, married into the Evans family, reinforcing the pattern seen repeatedly in Saint John’s early history: church membership followed kinship lines. While the Rogers surname eventually faded from the church’s burial rolls, their DNA remained woven into the congregation through these intermarriages.
Charter Families: families, not individuals
The foundation of Saint John was built upon family clusters. Census records and burial records at the Evans Cemetery on Mt. Moriah Road confirm that the church was an extension of the home for families such as:
- Luke Walker (1842–1912) and Lydia Evans Walker (1855–1890)
- Augustus “Gus” Evans (1847–1926) and Melissa Ann Evans (1851–?), as well as Gus’s second wife Iley Jane Evans (1860–1955)
- Peter Evans (1831–1900) and Clara McCray Evans (1836–1920)
- Samuel Evans (1852–1920) and Sena Evans (1848–1914)
These families appear repeatedly across church, census, and burial records, establishing Saint John as a family-anchored institution rather than a transient congregation.
Other surnames—Bender, Chapman, Donald, Wesley, Hill, Moncrief, and others—entered Saint John largely through intermarriage with the Evans and Walker families, reinforcing the church’s role as an extension of family structure.
Growth and relocation
As the congregation grew, the physical needs of the church expanded beyond its original footprint. While the original 1902 deed conveyed two acres, a 1933 trustee notice indicates that Saint John had expanded to four acres. This growth reflects a congregation that was outgrowing its original Section 6 footprint.
In 1938, according to church tradition and signage, Saint John was relocated to its current site on Lawrence Bethel Road. This move likely followed the shifting population centers of the community and the need for better accessibility to emerging roadways. However, the move did not sever the connection to the original site; the “pioneer” graves on Mt. Moriah Road remain the silent witnesses to the church’s first thirty-six years of life.
This first deed established not only a church site, but a pattern—of land, kinship, and faith—that would define Saint John for generations.
Setting the Stage
Understanding the original 1902 location allows us to see Saint John not as a building, but as a territory of faith. It stood on a ridge where the Evans and Walker families had claimed their worth through land ownership. It was a space defined by pews before plots, but always anchored by the red clay of Section 6.