HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY                          397

the Snoddy cemetery, attended by the Masonic Lodge of Bowling Green,
when a sermon was preached by Rev. Joseph G. Foster, who had, in
former years, been a minister in the Primitive Baptist church. Rev.
William C. Brooks, of Terre Haute, of the same faith, preached the
funeral sermon of William Robertson, at the Zenor school-house, on Birch
creek, in 1853.
    Rev. B. F. Foster, Rev. M. G. Lee, Rev. H. E. Pope, and Rev. J. C.
Pitrat preached occasionally at Bowling Green. Within the period of
forty years past the following ministers of the Universalist faith have
preached at Brazil: W. W. Curry, B. F. Foster, D. R. Biddlecome, T. J.
Vater, Thomas Abbott, W. Y. Emmet, Samuel Binus, Daniel Rose, Henry
Jewell, C. L. Haskell, Miss Prudy Le Clerc. The Rev. Marion Crosley
once held a series of meetings at Mount Olivet. The following have
preached at Beech Grove, either occasionally or as regular pastors: M. L.
Pope, F. T. Lathe, Charles F. Bushnell, H. C. Beckett, Ira B. Grandy,
J.  B. Fosher, John K. Dillon, Dennis Morrison, M. L. Pope, who had
previously preached at Ashboro, delivered the funeral sermon of James
Thornton Moss in the month of August, 1896.
    Some of these had previously been teachers and ministers of the
Partialist faith, which they renounced to espouse that of the Universalist.
    On the Clay-Sullivan county line, a mile and a half northwest of the
present town of Coalmont, was a United Brethren church, built about
the time of the Civil war, which was nick-named “Squat,” for which
scarcely any other name was ever heard. For reasons which do not now
appear, the ranks of the congregation which worshiped here became so
depleted that this house fell into disuse and after the period of perhaps
the third of a century was sold. It was built of first-class poplar lumber,
most of which was used in the construction of the Cochran store building
at Coalmont. The long benches, or seats, served the purpose of cornice
and finishing lumber for several residence buildings of the town.