240 years of history coming soon!

Decades in the making, this book chronicles the

Presbyterians of Harmony, Mt. Bethel, Tabernacle, New Hope, Oakland, Covenant and First Presbyterian.

With extensive endnotes and a thorough index, this will be a resource to historians and genealogists for years to come.

This long awaited volume by Louise Orr, with help from her brother, son and the History Committee of First Presbyterian, examines the beginnings of Greene County, Tennessee as seen through the lens of First Presbyterian Church, one of the oldest congregations in the state.  It illuminates the 240-year life of a church which struggled with a significant theological division that went on to divide the Presbyterian Church nationally.  It documents how its leaders and members were inextricably linked to early educational institutions including Greeneville College, Tusculum College, and what was to become the University of Tennessee.  

The church found itself at the center of and involved in religious, social, and political movements: the Hopkinsian religious controversy, the State of Franklin, camp revivals, the Sunday School/Sabbath School movement, the Civil War, Reconstruction, Temperance, Women’s church leadership, the World Wars, Civil Rights, and current events right up through the present COVID pandemic. More specifically, this volume documents the church division of Mt. Bethel in 1798, follows the resulting churches of Harmony, Mt. Bethel, Tabernacle, New Hope, Oakland, First Presbyterian and Covenant; and documents the rejoining of First Presbyterian and Covenant churches 192 years later.  

Cost and ordering information coming soon!

If you would like to contact the History Committee or receive an email when the book can be ordered, please send your request to firstpresgreenevillehistory@gmail.com.

Thank you for your interest!

Sincerely, 

The History Committee

*Note: The portrait of Hezekiah Balch, above, is painted from the imagination of Tusculum University Art Professor Emeritus, J. Clement Allison.