Midway Baptist Church
Cemetery
Midway, (Bullock County) Alabama
The community of Midway, Alabama, is located on US highway 82, between
Union Springs and Eufaula. This is the beautifully maintained Midway Baptist
Church that is located (about what would be a couple of city blocks) north
of US 82 and is visible from the highway. The cemetery is located
directly behind the church. This photograph was made facing west.
Text Version of the Historic Marker
Midway Baptist Church
Organized July 28, 1852
Midway, a part of Barbour County in the mid-19th
century, was also known as Five Points, a small community of a handful
of dwellings, two stores, and a Methodist church of logs. In this
Methodist church, Joel Willis, J.M. Thornton, Robert G. Hall, M.B. Johnston,
W.J. Coleman, and Lorenzo Faulk met in the summer of 1852 to organize the
Baptist Church of Five Points. Articles of Faith and Decorum were approved
August 31 and Joel Sims was called as the first pastor. By April 1855,
the Five Points church was being referred to in its own records as the
Baptist Church of Midway.
The southwest corner of Feagin’s field was
selected as a building site in December 1852 and, in February 1853, a frame
structure with glass windows, but no steeple, was dedicated. A steeple
and bell were added to the building in 1859 and gas lamps replaced candles
in 1869. In 1872 the Church was rebuilt with the original materials at
hand. Renovations in 1902 and 1930 added stained glass windows, Sunday
School rooms, restrooms, and a kitchen but the structure has retained some
of its original building materials and rests upon its original site.
The Church has been actively associated with
other congregations since its beginnings in the Salem Association of Barbour
County to the Bullock Centennial Association of the present. It has been
associated with the Baptist State Convention and the Southern Baptist Convention
since early in its history.
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Midway, Alabama, was Alexander Franklin Dix's destination when he left
New York and headed south. He joined his cousin, Milton Butterfield,
who was already teaching school there. Alexander and his wife, Nellie,
had their first stint in Midway was from 1860 when he arrived, through
1871, at which time they had their first five children. On August 22, 1871,
their fourth child, Nellie Butterfield Dix, affectionately known
as "Daisy" died at the tender age of two years. Her modest
gravestone is pictured below. The tiny marble marker has had a brick
and mortar "enhancement" added in what seems to be an effort to make the
marble stone more visible.
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DAISY
2ND DAUGHTER OF
A.F. & N.B. DIX
BORN
OCT.10, 1869
DIED
AUG.22, 1871
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Perhaps, because of the unbearable grief, the family moved to Winchester
Tennessee, the following October, where their remaining five children were
born. In 1883, the family returned to Midway.
Hattie Lillis Dix, "Dimple",
married
James Hall of Midway on October 20, 1892 at the Dix home in Pine
Grove, located just south of Midway. They lived in the same home and
raised their eleven children and lived their entire lives there.
When they died, they were buried in the Midway cemetery. Their graves
are on the opposite side of the cemetery from Daisy's grave.
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Hattie Lillis (Dix) Hall, "Dimple"
April 18, 1867 - |
The the only grave of any of Dimple and James' children that I could
find here is that of Elhannon Winchester Hall & wife, Amanda.
HALL
Elhannon W.
Dec 5 1894
Jan 18,1967 |
Amanda E.
Oct 28, 1896
Apr 26, 1952 |
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F. C. Hall
born
Jan. 30, 1844
died
Nov. 4, 1930
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Emma T. Johnson
Wife of
F. C. Hall,
Nov. 7, 1848
died
Oct. 17, 1914
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