Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 39.djvu/94

 82 Southern Historical Society Papers.

of South Carolina, and that she in the charm of her widow- hood may have won the heart and hand of Evan Davis. Upon reflection it appears more likely that the Emory family in ques- tion may have belonged to South Carolina, than to Georgia or Pennsylvania.

Assuming that Evan Davis tarried for a season in South Carolina, it is pertinent to inquire after the special attraction that could have induced him to remove to Georgia. The re- ligious sentiments of Welshmen are apt to be very profound and controlling. The Davis family seem to have been no ex- ception to this rule. In the year 1755, when the Scotch-Irish migration was moving Southward, Shubael Stearnes and Daniel Marshall, a couple of Baptist ministers, joined the procession at Winchester, Va. Stearnes halted in North Carolina, but Marshall followed the procession all the way to Georgia, and when their work had been completed there were many Scotch- Ifish Baptists in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

Marshall had advanced as far as Edgefield District, South Carolina, in 1767, where he founded Horse Creek Church, about fifteen miles north of Augusta. In the year 1771 he transferred his residence across the Savannah, about twenty miles north of Augusta, where he established Kioka church, whose members resided both in Georgia and South Carolina. The fame of Kioka went abroad into every quarter of the country; it be- came a great center of influence. The religious magnet probably drew Evan Davis more strongly than any other. He seems to have been pleased with the temperature of the Scotch-Irish religion, and to have removed his home and membership from Welsh Neck to the church at Kioka. It is likely that he settled in Georgia before the year 1771. Samuel Davis was fifteen years old at this time, and it may be that he. too. had become a communicant of Kioka church before the outbreak of the Revolution.

Samuel Davis was nineteen years of age at the opening of hostilities. Mr. Davis reports that the young man entered the