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Subject: [MSJEFFER-L] Re: Rev. John C. Johnson
Date: Sun, 14 May 2000 20:36:05 EDT
Here is a little on the lineage of Rev. John C. Johnson Ann Brown
REV. JOHN CLEM JOHNSON1
Submitted by Ann Brown
John Clem Johnson, the son of Jonathan and Rachel Johnson, was
born in Pennsylvania August 19, 1782. When John was four his
father died and by the time he was eight his widowed mother moved
her family to Kentucky. He was converted July 20, 1800 at a camp
meeting jointly conducted by the Presbyterians and the Methodists.
He joined a Kentucky Presbyterian congregation and although he
thought about it frequently he did not immediately enter the
ministry. He had been brought up under frontier conditions in a
modest home. He did not have a formal education or some of the soc-
ial graces required by the ministry in the church of Presbyterians.
He seems to have come to Mississippi without the other members
of his family and settled around Selsertown and Greenville. He was
thought of in those areas as a wild and godless youth.
In 1805 somehow he got into the Spring Hill area and was re-
awakened in spiritual life. He united with the Methodist Episcopal
Church there under the influence of Bro. Newt Vick.
It is known that it was the Thomas Owens, Sr. and the Bald-
ridges who put young Johnson to work for the Lord in the local
Society. With them he attended prayer meetings and class meetings
and later he led these creative sessions with vigor and spiritual
success. He became an exhorter and then a local preacher.
On 24 December 1807 he married Deborah Spence Baldridge, the
daughter of Francis and Elizabeth Turrentine Baldridge. Deborah
joined the Spring Hill Church in 1808.
John C. Johnson's preacher's license was granted in 1812. He
continued to study in a heroic effort to overcome the disadvantages
of his youth. He spent many hours before a pine knot fire reading,
reading and reading. Desperately and sincerely he wanted to be a
workman for the Lord that needed not to be ashamed of the way he
lived or presented the glowing accounts of the claims of God to the
lives of men! Years passed in this fashion and in 1844 at the age
of sixty three he was admitted into Elders Orders and two years
later, 1846, he was received into Full Connection.
One of the first appointments John C. Johnson served was the
Cool Springs Church near Union Church. He also served as a Circuit
Preacher and worked largely with the Negro congregations. He was on
one of these trips when he became ill with typhoid fever. He died
on September 3, 1851 in Claiborne County and is buried in the
Elveton Cemetery. His last audible sentence was "My home is in
heaven."
Deborah died on the 7th of October in 1885 and is buried in
the Bethel Cemetery on Pine Grove Road in Jefferson County. Her
obituary states that she had eleven children and eight had lived to
maturity. They are
1-1 William Baldridge Johnson 1808 - 21 Jul 1896
married to Mary Ann Osborne Hunt
1-1-1 Tennessee Deborah Johnson 02 Mar 1835 - 13 Dec 1868
married Joseph D. Davenport
1-1-2 Osborne Johnson 1842 -
1-1-3 Mary Fletcher Johnson 11 Mar 1844 - 23 Nov 1923
married James C. Stowers
1-1-4 Wm. Boles Johnson 15 Jul 1848 - 23 Nov 1930
married 1st Addie Dennis
2nd Rosa Fleming 12 Mar 1861 - 16 Oct 1921
1-1-5 Laban Bradford Johnson 16 Mar 1852 - 06 Jul 1925
married Lavenia Millsaps
1-2 Rachael Johnson 01 Oct 1813 - 04 May 1903
married 1st John Ritchey
2nd Nathaniel Guice
1-3 Jonathan Garrettson Johnson 1815 -
married Maria Pelena Ritchey
1-3-1 John Clem Johnson II 04 Nov 1840 - 27 Jun 1849
1-3-2 Stephen Spencer Johnson 07 Nov 1842 -
1-3-3 James Jefferson Johnson 22 Oct 1844 -
1-3-4 Frances Ann Johnson 27 Feb 1847 - 08 Sep 1878
1-3-5 Laban Ewell Johnson 27 Oct 1849 - 05 Nov 1849
1-3-6 John Clem Johnson III 18 Nov 1850 - 30 Jan 1931
married 1st Melissa Phillips
2nd Emma Scott
1-3-7 Thomas Benton Johnson 15 Dec 1852 - 09 Feb 1856
1-3-8 George Washington Johnson 12 Jul 1855 - 05 Mar 1882
1-3-9 Wm. Garretson Ritchey Johnson 27 Oct 1858
married 1st Alice McPheran
2nd Kizziah Shoemaker
1-4 George Washington Johnson 1817 -
married to Elizabeth Osborne
1-5 Louise J. Johnson 1820 -
married to James Smiley
1-6 James Johnson 1825 - 09 Oct 1846
Unmarried
Died in Matamora, Mexico in Spanish-American War
1-7 John Wesley Johnson 1829 - 1845
Unmarried
1-8 Virginia Mary Johnson 1830 -
married 1st Osborne Segrest
2nd Ephraim Woods
There are lots of blank spaces in this listing. If anyone has
information to fill in those blanks, I would appreciate hearing
from them with the data.
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