DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it — and it's a story worth tellin'. Before Ellis County even had a name, before it had borders on any map, there was a congregation. Twenty members.
A charter date of July 25, 1847. Two full years before the county itself came into being, the Shiloh Cumberland Presbyterian Church was already holding things together out here on the Texas frontier. The man who set it all in motion was the Reverend Finis E.
King — a pioneer area minister, the marker calls him, which is a polite way of saying he was doing the Lord's work in places the Lord hadn't finished making yet. He didn't do it alone. The Reverend J.C.
Provine rode in from Paris, up in Lamar County, to lend a hand with the chartering. Two preachers, twenty souls, and a whole lot of open sky. Now, in those early days, there was no building to speak of.
Worship services were first conducted under a brush arbor — just cedar branches and determination holding back the Texas sun. But that didn't last forever. A man named Matt McElroy, along with his eight sons — eight — got to work and raised a cedar log tabernacle.
Eight sons with axes and ambition. That's not a construction crew, that's a force of nature. The congregation kept growing, kept gathering, and by 1872 — during the pastorate of the Reverend D.G.
Molloy — the present frame sanctuary was completed. J.P. Laughlin built that structure, and he didn't use just any lumber.
He hauled it in from Cherokee County, way out in East Texas. Someone made a long trip so that this church could stand properly. And stand it did.
Reverend King himself shepherded this congregation from its very first day of organization all the way until his death in 1859 — more than a decade of ministry in a place still finding its footing. Later, the Reverend E.M. White came through and left his own mark, instrumental in the formation of several Ellis County churches beyond just this one.
Since those earliest days of settlement, the Shiloh Cumberland Presbyterian congregation has led in the development of Ovilla and the surrounding area. They were here before the county. They'll probably outlast whatever comes next too.
What the marker says
The first organized church in Ellis county, the Shiloh Cumberland Presbyterian Church congregation was chartered with twenty members on July 25, 1847, two years before the formation of the county. The church was begun under the leadership of the Rev. Finis E. King, a pioneer area minister, with the assistance of the Rev. J.C. Provine of Paris in Lamar County. Worship services were first conducted under a brush arbor and later in a cedar log tabernacle constructed by Matt McElroy and his eight sons. In 1872, during the pastorate of the Rev. D.G. Molloy, the present frame sanctuary was completed. J.P. Laughlin built the structure using lumber from Cherokee County in East Texas. Ministers here have included such prominent early Presbyterian preachers as the Rev. King, pastor from the church's organization until his death in 1859, and the Rev. E.M. White, who was instrumental in the formation of the several Ellis County churches. Since the earliest days of settlement, the Shiloh Cumberland Presbyterian congregation has led in the development of Ovilla and the surrounding area.