History
Strasburg Presbyterian Church has maintained a faithful witness to the saving claims of Jesus Christ for nearly two centuries. Here are several photographs of historic interest.
From a postcard mailed from Strasburg in July 1908. Notice the dark color of the window shutters, the two-tone paint on the bell tower, and the fence. Signal Knob is in the background at the left. Courtesy of the Powars family.
Text from picture at right. "PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, STRASBURG, VA., was organized May 1824 as the Union Church of Shenandoah, Winchester Presbytery, Presbyterian Church in the United States of America by the Rev. William Henry Foote, D.D., celebrated author of Foote’s Sketches of Virginia. It was separated from the Woodstock congregation in September, 1826, to form the Strasburg charge. The lot was deeded by Isaac Longacre to Anthony Spengler for use of the 'English Presbyterian congregation', June 29, 1827. The building was dedicated May 16, 1830, and was used as a hospital by Federal troops during the Civil War."
Civil War Obelisk 1896 - "IN MEMORY OF OUR FALLEN COMRADES NUMBERING 136"
Celebrating 186 years of Congregational History.
A THOUGHT TO PONDER: “Faith can get you through the long dark nights….”
Thomas Jonathan Jackson
Presbyterian Elder, General CSA
We thank Marie Spence, Church Historian, for compiling this history for the Strasburg Heritage Association.
- An official AMERICAN PRESBYTERIAN AND REFORMED HISTORICAL SITE, and a House of Faith, Heritage, and Service.
- Oldest surviving church building in town, and oldest brick church ever constructed in Strasburg.
- In 1824 a small group of Christians formed in Woodstock and Strasburg under the leadership of the Rev. Dr. William Henry Foote, a Princeton trained minister, to hold English language services in a mostly German speaking area. In 1827, a hand-written legal deed from Mr. Isaac Longacre and wife, Elizabeth, to Captain Anthony Spengler, first Elder and Trustee of “the English-speaking Church” was filed for a property of approximately four acres for a total sum of five dollars, with the condition that such property be exclusively used for a church and cemetery.
- Sanctuary built of local materials by largely local craftsmen in the simple but beautiful Scots Presbyterian style. The Church was dedicated in 1830.
- Original main entry steps on north side at center of the porch facing the main sections of the town, but were changed to the west side in 1876.
- Strasburg Presbyterian Church has had a total of 24 official pastors. The Rev. Dr. William H. Foote was the first pastor, and the most recent is the Rev. David D. Howard, who celebrated ten years here in August, 2006.
- Two of the Church’s longest serving ministers, the Rev. A. Gibson Link and the Rev. Dr. A. Harry Crim are both interred in the nearby Riverview Cemetery at their request.
- Only House of Worship in Strasburg to survive the destruction brought by the American War between the States. The Sanctuary was used as a hospital for the wounded and dying for both Union and Confederate soldiers following the Battles of Cedar Creek and Fisher’s Hill. On the east side of the Church sanctuary is the cemetery dating from the 1830’s, there stands a twenty foot tall obelisk marking the final resting place of the remains of 136 Confederate fallen. Slightly closer to the Church lays a veteran of the War of 1812, and an ancestor of three living generations of current church members.
- Dr. George Loring Porter, a young man with his doctor’s degree, reported for duty to Major General Banks at Strasburg on May 10, 1862. Fifteen days later, the Union Army retreated down the Shenandoah Valley, and Doctor Porter was captured by Col. Ashby of the Virginia Cavalry. Stonewall Jackson at once placed him in charge of the prisoners, requesting him to care for the Confederated wounded also. This Presbyterian Church became the hospital; in the pews the wounded and sick were cared for; Dr. Porter “occupied” the pulpit. Even though he was a prisoner, the Doctor made many friends. The young Union Officer cared not only for his Union comrades, but also for Confederate wounded men. His prison term was short – as the Union troops moved back up the Shenandoah Valley. “Fifty-three years later, he was invited by remembered ‘enemy-friends,’ he visited Strasburg and once again ‘occupied’ the pulpit and thanked the people because in the long-ago he had been permitted to use their beloved church ‘for healing and saving men’s bodies.’” We also know this about Dr. George Loring Porter: after the assassination of President Lincoln, the young doctor was the only commissioned officer present at the secret midnight burial of John Wilkes Booth; he had medical charge of all prisoners suspected of being implicated in the crime; he was officially present with Doctors Woodward and Otis to pronounce dead Mrs. Surratt and the three men who were hung; he was sent still in medical charge to deliver Dr. Mudd and three other men to the prison authorities at Dry Tortugas; he was two years after the Civil War sent to the Indian County in Montana. (The above is taken from the book, The Surgeon In Charge, Mary W. Porter, 1949).
- As the 20th Century opened, the Church received some federal monies as reparations for damages done while used as a hospital. These monies were used to construct the church manse which has stood directly on the northeast side of the sanctuary since 1912. All ministers’ families have lived in the manse since.
- In 1870, Bethel property four miles southwest of town on the west bank of the Shenandoah River was used as a school house, and from 1938 until the early 1990’s was the location of services and fellowship for both “town and country” Presbyterians.
- There have been five restorations of the church sanctuary including: 1870’s, 1962, 1970’s, and 2003; three organs; a pump organ, first pipe organ (1920s), in floor organ (1994).
- In 1926, a two-storied educational facility with basement was constructed. Most Church members and many in the community excitedly turned out to watch the excavation of the basement with horse-drawn equipment.
- The Men’s Westminster Brotherhood was formed in 1947, while the first organized group of Women of the Church dates from 1850, and Sunday School has been held regularly since the late 1860’s.
- In 1977, a fire escape was added on the South side of the building and the Pastor’s Study was moved to the second floor of the educational Wing.
- Also during the 1970’s, the church green space that also serves as a parking lot, was officially purchased from the Shenandoah County School Board that had earlier procured it from the estate of the late Lucy Stickley. She had a house where the present road to Sandy Hook is located. Church members donated the $4,000 to obtain this multi-use space.
- In 1980, a Celtic cross made of walnut by a local craftsman was dedicated and attached to the pipe organ façade in the sanctuary.
- A brick exterior signboard was constructed in 1981 on the west side of the Church lawn.
- During the 1990’s, the church library was extensively expanded in volumes.
- The sanctuary interior has a decorative pressed tin ceiling with two antique glass chandeliers, wine hued carpet and pew pads, eggshell colored walls, with gleaming white trim, clear glass windows, a handsome walnut communion table and baptismal font; two commemorative wall plaques –one listing church members who joined the U.S. Armed Forces at the beginning of the Second World War, and another honoring four decades of loving service by the Rev. Dr. Abram Harry Marshall Crim.
- In 1994 the Sanctuary choir loft was expanded, the new organ installed, and the pulpit moved four feet forward. In 1904 the original pulpit had been removed and given to Mt. Hope Presbyterian Church in rural Coal Mine Hollow where it remained until destroyed by fire in 1994.
- In 2001, the circa 1870’s bell tower was renovated through congregational giving.
- In 2003, the Sanctuary underwent a complete renovation, and for several months worship services were held in the Fellowship Hall.
- In 2005, the Sanctuary shutters at 125 years of service were repaired or replaced.
- In 2006, a church bus was purchased.
- Throughout our congregational history and heritage this house of God has survived, and into the 21st Century continues to be, a place of Christian worship, service, fellowship, support, encouragement, food, and uplift in times of happiness, challenge, or sorrow.
- This is a house of Worship where JESUS IS LORD, AND EVERYONE COUNTS.
A THOUGHT TO PONDER: “Faith can get you through the long dark nights….”
Thomas Jonathan Jackson
Presbyterian Elder, General CSA
We thank Marie Spence, Church Historian, for compiling this history for the Strasburg Heritage Association.
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