First Baptist Church of Marshallville (Macon County, Ga.)

The town of Marshallville was founded in the 1820s by white settlers from North and South Carolina. By the 1840s, Marshallville was at the crossroads of north-south and east-west travel routes, bringing business to the small town. In 1850, the Southwest Railroad laid tracks through the town, helping to establish the emerging community, and by 1854, Marshallville was officially incorporated. Multiple stores, a blacksmith's shop, a public well, and a depot were built in the following years and soon, the community recognized the need for more centralized worship locations. A hardshell church was built in the town where three denominations originally worshipped: the Hardshell Baptists, the Primitive Baptists, and the Methodists. The earlier congregations, which had been established near the plantations that surrounded Marshallville, merged congregations and moved into town where they would meet in this universal church until they built their own structures. In early 1861, the Primitive Baptists completed their own wooden frame building on the site of the current brick structure that stands today. This congregation was formed from the union of three earlier churches, Greenwood Baptist (org. 1848), Gloris Hope Church, and Mount Vernon Primitive Baptist. The original wooden church that the Baptists built in 1861 burned in 1911, but the congregation was determined to build a new, much more impressive place to worship. By 1920, this significant brick church was completed and is still in use today by an active congregation.