PENCADER PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

GUIDED BY FAITH FOR 300 YEARS
1710-2010

A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF PENCADER'S HISTORY

1701 – Grant of 30,000 acres by William Penn to William Davies, David Evans, and William Willis, known as the Welsh Tract.

1706 – Probable date of first Meeting House, a one-story frame building sharp peaked roof, 20 x 26.  Moved to southern part of village.  Burned 1913.

1710 – Church organized: Welsh Tract Presbyterian Church.

1719 – First use of name Pencader, a Welsh term meaning “chief chair or seat.”

1732 – Martha Davis (Davies) accused of “carrying unconnected pieces of what was talked about in the Church (baptist) to the Presbyterians to have their opinions upon them, and putting it in the power of the enemies to blaspheme, . . . . .for which causes she was put out of the church March 4, 1732.”  Martha’s son later becomes President of Princeton College.

1742 – Plot of grounds (1 acre 38 perches) conveyed by Margaret Williams, “for the purpose of allowing full and peaceable liberty to the Presbyterian Congregation belonging to the Meeting House that is builded on said tract of land for the true worship of God in said place according to the Presbyterian Rule, discipline and doctrine and will be submissive to the rules and direction of the Presbytery of Newcastle and the Synod of Philadelphia while the said Presbytery and the Synod walk according to the said rule.”

1777 – Church used as a hospital by the British after Battle of Cooch’s Bridge.

1782 – Second building erected (site now occupied).  Low brick building, brick floor, high pews, high pulpit east end.  No chimneys, no facilities for heating.

1813 – Women’s Missionary Society Organized.

1852 – Present building erected.  Cost $5,000.

1917 – Pencader Cemetery Association organized and incorporated.

1960 – Two Hundred Fiftieth anniversary of the organized Church.

1977 – Pencader Presbyterian Church listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

2002 – Hundred Fiftieth anniversary of the current Church Building.  To mark the occasion a historic marker was dedicated on October 6 and presented by State Senator Steve Amick.