 | A history of Caroline county, Virginia |  |
CHARLES A. LEWIS
The son of Charles A. and Catherine Lewis was born in Caroline
county about the close of the eighteenth century. He acquired
a splendid English and classical education, being for a
time a student in the University of Virginia. Upon the completion
of his education, he married the widow of his cousin Colonel
William Woodford, of Caroline and accepted the headmastership
of Rappahannock Academy, which position he filled with distinction
for three years. After he had been absent for four years
he was prevailed upon to again head the school, and during the
two years of his second term he raised it from a declining to a
prosperous condition and during his second term at the Academy
he united with the Liberty Baptist church and was baptized by the
pastor, Elder Lawrence Battaile. Not long afterward he decided to
preach and so gave himself to the study of the Scriptures and being
able to read the language in which they were originally written he
became remarkably proficient in the Sacred writings. It is said
that for a time after uniting with the Baptist church he used the
Prayer Book of the church in which he had been brought up and
that he was always remarkably charitable to all religious bodies
regardless of theological differences. He was a warm hearted
and generous natured man and had profound sympathy for the
unfortunate. His messages were marked by a great tenderness
and had a profound effect upon those who heard them.
He preached extensively in Eastern Virginia and served
Providence, County Line and Waller's churches as pastor. During
his last years he preached for Zoar and Flat Run churches in
Orange county and for Crooked Run church in Culpeper county.
He was in advance of his generation in many things, one of these
being his conviction that abstinence from intoxicating liquors as a
beverage should be made a test of fellowship in the church. His
wife died during his second term at Rappahannock Academy and
he placed his six year old daughter with her maternal grandmother
life. His last sermon was preached at Liberty church in Caroline.
He contracted a cold from over-exertion, hemorrhage followed
and he died early in the spring of 1847.
| A history of Caroline county, Virginia | |