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Traveling south on Route 272 we climb a steep hill which was named Mount Carmel in years gone by. On the top of this hill a road bears off to the left and, about the distance of a city block away, there stands a little frame building which was also used as a church in the past. This church had a stormy and turbulent past; the name of Mount Carmel is forgotten and today it is known as the Devil's Half Acre.
It appears that in the 1830's the Mount Hope Methodist Episcopal Church was organized near the Buck at the home of Thomas Smith. Shortly after the organization a fourth-acre of ground was purchased from Henry Harmon for $10, and thereon a meeting house was built. It was a rough-sided building about twenty-five by thirty-five feet in size. It had open seats. The first trustees of this church were Thomas Smith, Christian Lefevre, and S. Crawford.
Later in 1856 the Methodists built their present brick building at Mount Hope, which is southwest of Quarryville, and the little building near the Buck was sold in 1863 to William Johnson on behalf of an infant United Brethren congregation near Smithville. The meeting-house was moved to Mount Carmel which is south of Smithville. This congregation had purchased one-half acre of land from Doctor Frick and here was erected the building purchased from the Methodists.
The conduct of some of the members appears to have been like that of the western frontiersmen, and in 1871 the church burned to the ground under very suspicious circumstances. The faithful members, however, let bygones be bygones and collected money for a new building. This building was erected in 1872, but when the treasurer was called upon for the money to pay for the building, he could not produce it because, he said, he had hidden the money in a hornet's nest for safe-keeping and the mice had eaten the nest and the money too. Great doubts and arguments arose as to the size of the mice, and as to whether they were four-legged or two-legged, and the small congregation was split wide open. The faithful members continued against these many obstacles and the new church was dedicated by Reverend Keys and Reverend Riges. Jacob Eshleman and Henry Reese were the first superintendents of the Sunday School and the first pastor was the Reverend Lewis Peters, who was followed by the Reverends Corsey, Lee, Carpenter, R. Kaufman, A. Kaufman, I. Baltzell, H. H. Stehman, J. G. Smoker, Shellenberger, Kunkelberger and Stehman. One of the members who survived in more recent years was Frank Finnefrock, a member of the old Lancaster Police force.
During the last services in this church some boys removed the steps from the entrance on the east end of the building, and when the minister came out of the church at night, he fell down and broke his collar-bone. And so because of this kind of antics the name of the congregation and also of Mount Carmel was forgotten, and everyone referred to it as the Devil's Half Acre.
There was one grave, that of a child, at the east end of the church, but today the gravestone has been removed and the where-abouts of the grave has been lost.
Due to financial and other embarrassments the congregation disbanded and today you may still see the little building on the Devil's Half Acre now used as a tobacco shed. Before the advent of the automobile people avoided passing it at night because it was said to be haunted, and many wild tales were told concerning it. These have today subsided and are forgotten but still at night one of the loneliest places in southern Lancaster County is the Devil's Half Acre. This church has entirely disappeared and the site is occupied by a modern dwelling in 1966.(1)
( 1) Lancaster County Historical Society, Vol. LI, No.2.