Church History

In the mid 1920’s the holiness church was introduced to the Berkeley County area. The gathering toop place in the Russellville Community in a small area called the Camp Quarters.  There was not a formal structure but the saints went from house to house having prayer and tarry services.  Prayer services started in Mother Mary Davis’ house, which is how the church got its name.

  Two Elderly people, Elder Gamble and Mother Rivers came through Russellville South Carolina in 1927. Two different denominations were having church; the Baptist and the Methodist.  One church had Tuesday Night and the other had Wednesday Night.  Elder Gamble decided to draw up some papers to see if he could get a Holiness church set up.  

  People signed the petition to express their interest in establishing the Holiness Church.  Elder Gamble became the pastor of the church.  The people prayed and prayed, and the Lord blessed.  People from Sumpter and other places started coming to the services.  They had a meeting for one month.  The church was blessed so much they moved the services to Cross, South Carolina. They did not have musical instruments.  All they had were washboards and sticks.

After the sale of Camp Manufacturing Company to Georgia Pacific, most and eventually all the residents of the Camp Quarters had to move since the church was built for the community by the company.  According to Deacon Harvey Lessington, the church was given to him and the congregation.

  In 1972, under the leadership of Elder John Steven, St. Mary’s was moved to the then named Union Hall Road, later renamed Peru Road.  One half acre of land was purchased from Reverend Joseph Gadsden.  The structure was repaired several times. 

  In 1989, Hurricane Hugo damaged the back end of the church.  Under the leadership of, Elder Sandy Wilson, Jr. a new addition was made to the original structure which housed; the pastor’s office, a secretary office, ladies lounge, two classrooms, and a restroom.   A baptismal pool was installed and also there was remodeling of the kitchen and pulpit. 

  After much discussion and prayer the pastor and congregation decided to build another church.  The first idea was to build at the  location  on Annie’s Lane, but Berkeley County informed us that the land was not large enough.  We looked at many sites before the Lord directed us to Highway Fifty-two.  In July of 2008 this site was purchased from Mr. David Wrenn.

 Since that time, we have worked hard to make our dream a reality.  We marched into this new edifice on July 10, 2011.  We have had a few challenges since we came here.  Water from a flooded toilet damaged the entire building in February of 2014.  The Lord allowed us to redo the sanctuary and things were back in order that you could not perceived anything had happened.  The Thousand Year Flood of 2015 put us back in the situation that we had previously suffered; damage to the interior of the church.  Hurricane Matthew came in 2016 and we had to do the same renovations that we had done earlier.   Thank be on to God and the leadership of Pastor and First Lady Wilson along with the congregation that we were able to continue restoration without delay.  God had allowed us to persevere in the midst of adversity. 

We are also thankful to God for his omnipotent favor that he allowed us to survive Hurricane Florence without any sign of damage.  We were able to walk into our church and have service without having to think about repairing anything.  For that we are eternally grateful.

  We have had several pastors since the inception of the church, Elder Gamble, Elder Curtis Townsend, Elder Theodore Anderson, Elder Cromedy, Elder Black, Elder Stevens, Elder Isaiah Ferguson, Elder Walter Ferguson, Elder Sandy Wilson, Sr., Elder Ernest Gethers, Elder Johnson, Elder Burgess, Elder Bryant, Elder Peterson, Elder Robert Barnes, Elder Brian Williamson, Elder Sandy Wilson, Jr, and now as of September 29, 2024, Elder Lavar A. Wilson.