Daniel Marshall

Background

Daniel Marshall was born in 1706 in Windsor, Connecticut. He was the son of Thomas and Mary (Drake) Marshall and the grandson of Samuel Marshall who was settled at Woodbury in 1637.

Career

Converted at the age of twenty, he joined the Congregational Church. He took his religious duties with such seriousness that he was soon elected deacon, a position which he held for twenty years. He became a prosperous farmer. When Marshall was thirty-eight years of age he came into contact with George Whitefield, under whose influence he was completely transformed and incited to spend the remainder of his life in religious work. Convinced that the second coming of the Lord was at hand, he left his comfortable farm and rushed off, with others, to preach the gospel to the Mohawk Indians located on the upper reaches of the Susquehanna. He remained in the Indian country for some eighteen months, but was finally driven out by strife among the Indians. After a short time spent elsewhere in Pennsylvania, he went southward into Virginia, settling near Winchester, where his brother-in-law, Shubael Stearns, had preceded him. Stearns had been a Congregationalist, but as a result of Whitefield's influence he had become a "New Light, " or "Separate, " and finally a "Separate Baptist. "Marshall and his wife, the latter a remarkable woman, full of energy, herself an excellent preacher or exhorter, now accepted Baptist views, and joined a Baptist church. Marshall was soon licensed to preach and henceforth devoted himself with consuming zeal to extensive evangelism. There were already Baptists of the Philadelphia type, later known as "Regulars, " in northern Virginia, but they were rigidly Calvinistic in theology, and dignified and orderly in their preaching and methods; consequently they were not altogether friendly to these newcomers from the North who were highly emotional, noisy, suspected of Arminianism, and disposed to allow women prominence in religious work not generally sanctioned. Accordingly, the "Separates" moved southward again to Guilford County, N. C. , where in 1755 they established the Sandy Creek church. Marshall and his wife were among the constituent members. The former soon established Abbott's Creek church, some thirty miles distant, over which at the age of fifty-two he was ordained pastor by his brothers-in-law, Stearns and Ledbetter. From this center the "Separate Baptists" spread with wonderful rapidity over much of Virginia, the two Carolinas, and Georgia. Marshall, who was but poorly educated and not highly endowed, made up for all other deficiencies by zeal and activity. Churches sprang up and men were called into the ministry wherever he went. In a few years he moved to South Carolina, settling a few miles north of Augusta, on Horse Creek, where he very quickly formed a church. His eyes were on Georgia, however, into which colony he extended his itinerating tours. On one of these trips he was arrested for preaching "in St. Paul's parish" contrary to a law of 1758. When haled into court at Augusta he defended himself with such meekness and firmness that both the constable and the magistrate were soon afterwards converted. In January 1771 he removed to Georgia and settled on Kiokee Creek about twenty miles northwest of Augusta, where he spent the remainder of his life. During the Revolution many of the preachers fled from the state, but Marshall remained with the people, sharing their hardships and dangers and affording the comforts and encouragements of the gospel. After the Revolution the Baptist cause flourished, and before his death Marshall saw six churches formed, and presided at the organization of the Georgia Association in 1784.

Achievements

• Marshall was the only pastor to remain in Georgia throughout the Revolution. He helped form the Georgia Baptist Association shortly before his death on November 2, 1784. He founded the Kiokee church, the first Baptist church in the state, organized in 1772 and in 1789 formally incorporated as "The Anabaptist Church on Kioka. "

Connections

On November 11, 1742, married Hannah Drake, who died after she had given birth to one son. His second wife was Martha Stearns, whom he had married on June 23, 1747, they had three children.

Father:

Deacon Thomas Marshall

23 February 1663 - 8 November 1735

Mother:

Mary Drake Marshall

29 January 1666 - 2 December 1728

child:

Rev Abraham Marshall

23 April 1748 - 15 August 1819

child:

Lucy Eunice Marshall Pittman

18 July 1760 - 17 October 1821

Brother:

Samuel Marshall

23 July 1691 - 1749

Sister:

Mary Marshall Wilson

22 February 1688 - 11 February 1772

Wife:

Martha Stearns Marshall

18 August 1726 - 24 October 1771

Wife:

Hannah Drake

References

• A sermon preached at the opening of the new chappel, called, St. George's Chappel in Queen square in the parish of, St. Andrew Holborn, ... upon Whitsunday May 12. 1706. By J. Marshall ...
• Annals Of The American Pulpit Or Commemorative Notices Of Distinguished American Clergymen Of Various Denominations V6: Baptist Part Two