Found this old  clipping from a Lake City newspaper.

THIS PRAYER ANSWERED FAST	

by James A. Rogers

	St. Paul Methodist Church near Coward habits beginning in an earthquake. 
At least, that's the story told by T. E. Matthews of Florence, an
86-year-old retired railroad man.
	It was August 1886, the year and month of the "big shake" and T. E.
Matthews was a 13 year old boy.
	The Rev. Daniel Durant, a Methodist minister, had secured permission from
the Rev. Bob Gause, a Free-will Baptist, to hold a meeting in Gause's
church.
	There were few churches and religion wasn't prospering.  The area around
Coward, then in Williamsburg County, was thinly settled and big tracts of
land were the rule.
	During the searing days of August, with the crops laid by and the farm
population enjoying a breather, the Methodist Durant approached the
Free-Will Baptist Gause requesting permission to do some preaching the
Baptist meeting house. It was granted.
	Things weren't going so well on the night of August 31 when Preacher
Durant called for prayer. The audience was as cold as a frozen cuke. The
altar call went unheeded. The preacher's words flew back in his face like
shafts of steel.
	It was then that the "big shake" came, right in the middle of his prayer.
It was first a small tremor, then it came like roaring thunder.
	In the fervor of his prayer, the preacher had warmed to the occassion.
Tears trickled down his face out of compassionate concern for lost souls.
	The floor of the church heaved slightly and the walls jerked sharply. The
preacher felt the Spirit working. 
	"Shake  'em again, Lord." he shouted. "Shake 'em again."
	From the deep bowels of the earth, the thunder rolled upward. The meeting
house shook and swayed. The congregation went through the windows and doors
in terrified flight. They'd never known such quick and devastating answer
to a prayer. It had come like the crack of doom.
	That was the real beginning of the reval. All else had been prelude. After
that, there was hardly kneeling room at the altar.  Confessions were loud
and sincere. Young and old presented themselves for church membership,
including 13 year old T. E. Matthews.
	Sometime after that the Free Will Baptist church was torn down and St.
Paul Methodists built themselves a church. It still stands to day, its
hand-dressed lumber as sound and solid as the confessrions that follwed the
crack of doom on the fearful August night in 1886.
	That's the story told me by the 13 year old boy who is now 86.


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