THROUGH
MOUNTAIN MISTS
Early Settlers of
Their
Descendants...Their Stories...Their Achievements
Lifting the
Mists of History on Their Way of Life
By: Ethelene Dyer Jones
Many have
gone out from the hills and valleys of Union County
and made distinctive contributions in many professions.
The Rev. John Wesley Twiggs of Choestoe had
two sons who, like himself, became Methodist ministers.
Last week we got an insight into the early
life of Walter Mondwell as he went with his father at age seven across
the
Logan Turnpike to the market in Gainesville in 1885.
Walter was the younger of the two preacher
sons. Lovick Marvin, eight years older
than Walter, became an ordained Methodist minister, outstanding in
Georgia. Both Choestoeans contributed
greatly through long lives of service.
This week we will continue with the life and work of the Rev.
Walter
Mondwell Twiggs. Next week we will look
at contributions made by the Rev. Lovick Marvin Twiggs.
When Walter Mondwell Twiggs was born
March 27, 1888 in Choestoe, Georgia to the Rev. John Wesley Twiggs and
his
second wife, Georgia Elizabeth Westmoreland Twiggs, he had six
half-siblings to
welcome him. Their mother, Sarah
Elizabeth Hughes, had died June 2, 1885.
Rev. John Wesley Twiggs married Georgia Elizabeth Westmoreland
of White
County on February 4, 1886. She was
a
good step-mother to the “first set” of John Wesley Twiggs’ children: Edwin Paxton, Nancy Elmira, Emma California
(Callie), Mary Frances, Lovick Marvin and Nellie Margaret.
Georgia Elizabeth and John Wesley
Twiggs had three children: Kitty who was
born and died in January, 1887; Walter Mondwell (1888) and Erwin Eugene
(May
13, 1890). In his memoirs, Rev. Walter
Mondwell Twiggs pays great tribute to the closeness between him and his
half-sister, Nellie Margaret, whom he says was “like a little mother to
me,” and to his brother Lovick Marvin
who was an inspiration to him. The
distinction of half- brothers and sisters went unnoticed.
Mrs. Twiggs loved all the children. Walter,
writing of her, noted: “At night mother
would sit around the open
wood fireplace, never idle, but patching garments, sewing on buttons,
darning
socks and otherwise providing for the large family.”
Walter Mondwell Twiggs graduated from
Young Harris College. While there at the
age of 17, he was strongly impressed with a call to the gospel ministry. But he says he resisted the call for several
years, teaching school and then studying law.
In 1913 at age 24, he was licensed to preach by the Rev. Bascomb
Anthony, then presiding elder of the Dublin, Georgia District, where
Walter had
gone to teach school. He taught at
Powelton, Georgia, an early consolidated schools. He
was principal of the Stillmore High School
in Emanuel County. It was there he met
his future bride who was a member of the faculty.
He and Claudia Lenora Thompson were
married June 8, 1916 in Lyons, Georgia. They
had three children, two daughters and one son.
Phronia Webb Twiggs was born September 9, 1917 in Monticello, Ga. Sara Elizabeth Twiggs was born August 7, 1919
in Atlanta, Georgia; and John Wesley Twiggs (named after Walter’s
father) was
born and died January 7, 1925 in Atlanta, Georgia.
The places of the children’s births show some
of the locations of churches where the Rev. Walter Twiggs was pastor.
Shortly after his licensing to the
Methodist ministry, he entered Vanderbilt University in Tennessee where
he
studied theology during 1913 and 1914.
He was able to pay his way by a scholarship and through working
as a
janitor and operating the dormitory telephones.
While there, he gained experience as assistant pastor at a
Methodist
church in Nashville’s west end.
In 1915 he enrolled in the Candler
School of Theology of Emory University.
While there, he was assistant pastor of the Asbury Methodist
Church,
1914-1915. After graduation from
Candler, he was assigned to the Monticello Methodist Circuit in 1915
and served
there until 1920. He was ordained an
elder by Bishop Warren A. Candler. His
subsequent charges read like a roll-call of Georgia towns.
Some of the places he served and the dates
were: Lithonia, 1920-24; Patillo
Memorial, Decatur, 1924-29; Hapeville, 1929-1933; Trinity-on-the-Hill,
Augusta, 1933-35; Presiding Elder, Griffin
District, 1935-39;
West Point, 1940-43; District Superintendent, Lagrange District,
1943-49;
Cartersville, Sam Jones Memorial, 1949-1953; Bethany, Atlanta, 1953-56. He retired in 1956, lived in LaGrange,
Georgia and worked for a time with the Manget Foundation.
It was always a joy to the
people of
Choestoe District and Salem Methodist when their native son, Rev.
Walter
Twiggs, returned to speak at homecoming or hold a revival.
Rev. and Mrs. Walter Twiggs became the
first residents of the Wesley Woods Towers in Atlanta, a senior citizen
retirement home which the Rev. Twiggs had worked diligently to
establish. They lived there from April,
1965 through
September, 1972 when they went to their daughter Phronia Smith’s home
in
Griffin. There Mrs. Twiggs died July 27,
1973. Rev. Twiggs spent his last years
in Griffin writing his memoirs and speaking or teaching occasionally at
churches.
Rev. Walter M. Twiggs was a gifted
speaker, an evangelist and a fundraiser, with an unusual talent for
raising
money for benevolent and church causes.
He served on committees in the North Georgia Conference which
brought
about innovations in ministerial pensions, establishment of Wesley
Woods
Towers, and erection of church structures.
He was a trustee both of the Georgia Conference of the Methodist
Church
and of LaGrange College.
He died quietly in the Brightmoor
Nursing Home, Griffin, Georgia, on October 13, 1984 at age 96. He was laid to rest beside his beloved
wife
at the Forest Lawn Cemetery, Newnan, Georgia.
The tall man from Choestoe, measuring
well over six feet in height, cast a long shadow and touched many lives
through
his work and ministry. In one of his
last “Memoirs” letters written to his niece Barbara Allison Crawford
(his
sister Nellie’s child) he noted a quotation that had helped him at an
early age
to shape his philosophy of life:
“To each is given a bag of tools –
A shapeless mass, a book of rules.
And each must make ‘ere life is flown
A stumbling block or a stepping
stone.
Rev. Walter Mondwell Twiggs who went
out from Union County made of his “bag of tools” many stepping stones
to help
others along the way of life.
[Ethelene Dyer
Jones is a retired educator,
freelance writer, poet, and historian. She may be reached at
e-mail edj0513@windstream.net;
phone 478-453-8751; or mail 1708 Cedarwood Road, Milledgeville, GA
31061-2411.]
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