By Randy Willis, Special to the Message
[img_assist|nid=8089|title=Louisiana Bicentennial|desc=|link=none|align=right|width=640|height=320]Editor’s note: To mark the 200th anniversary of Baptists in Louisiana, the following comes from “Joseph Willis: The Apostle to the Opelousas,” written by Randy Willis, fifth great-grandson.
Joseph Willis’ tombstone reads: “First Baptist Preacher of the Word West of the Mississippi River.” He was also the first evangelical to preach the first Gospel sermon west of the Mississippi River.
His life reads as a history book and a dramatic play performed on the stage of what was at the time a hostile and mostly unexplored foreign land. He first crossed the Mississippi River into the Louisiana Territory before October 1, 1800, the date Napoleon secured the Louisiana Territory from Spain. The Louisiana Territory extended from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains. The territory was vast and largely unexplored with many hidden and not so hidden dangers.
[During the Revolutionary War,] Joseph joined General Francis Marion, the “Swamp Fox.” Marion operated out of the swampy forest of the Pedee region in the lower part of South Carolina. His strategy was to surprise the enemy, cut his supply lines, kill their men and release any American prisoners found. He and his men then retreated swiftly to the thick recesses of the deep swamps. They were very effective, and their fame was widespread.
The lessons learned [and the men he served with] with Marion would serve him well his entire life. Loyalty was a trait of Joseph Willis that would be displayed throughout his life; loyalty to his country, loyalty to his family, and loyalty to his Savior, Jesus Christ.
It was in South Carolina with the Marion men that Joseph would become a friend with Richard Curtis, Jr. Curtis was to play a major role in Joseph’s decision to go West. Later, in 1791, Curtis would become the first Baptist minister to establish a church in Mississippi. Ezekiel O’Quin would later follow Joseph to Louisiana as the second Baptist minister west of the Mississippi River in Louisiana.
Joseph lost two wives in only six years. Forty-five years old, alone with five children Joseph Willis decided to venture west into a land full of uncertainty and danger. He would sell everything and spend it all sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He would deliberately place himself in harm’s way to share this message. Personal tragedies, prejudice, and rejection by his father’s family [because his mother was his father’s Cherokee slave] would have disheartened most men from their calling to preach Jesus.
The First Great Awakening [was] a driving force that would greatly influence Joseph Willis’ determination to carry the Gospel of Jesus Christ where no preacher of the Gospel had gone before. [During] a 1798 trip to Mississippi with Richard Curtis, Jr., [Willis possibly was included because he could speak Cherokee,] a church was started near Woodville, Miss., due east of Bayou Chicot, Louisiana, where Joseph would organize his first church west of the Mississippi River, Calvary Baptist. Joseph returned for his family by 1799.
When Joseph Willis crossed the mighty Mississippi River into the Louisiana Territory the Code Noir, the “Black Code,” ruled the Louisiana Territory. This decree from King Louis XIV, among other things, regulated the condition of slavery and the activities of free people of color. It also restricted religion to Roman Catholicism, forbidding the exercise of any other religion. The Black Code was in effect by law until the Louisiana Purchase on April 30, 1803. In reality it was a hindrance to the preaching of the Gospel for many decades after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Joseph Willis would be hated because of his defiance of it. After crossing the mighty Mississippi, he would head first into the heartland of the Black Code, south Louisiana; that daring move would almost cost him his life.
In January 1797, the governing authorities issued regulations that made it mandatory for children of non-Catholic emigrant families to embrace Roman Catholicism and also forbade the coming of any ministers into the territory except Roman Catholics. Joseph Willis defied this most terrifying rule of law by traveling as far south as Lafayette, Louisiana, preaching the Gospel.
The exact date that Joseph preached in the Louisiana Territory west of the Mississippi River is not known, but what is known is it was almost three years before April 30, 1803; the date of the Louisiana Purchase and in fact even before October 1, 1800; the date Napoleon secured Louisiana from Spain.
There are three facts that confirm the above statements: 1. Joseph sold all his property in South Carolina in 1799 and is not found there in the 1800 census; 2. In 1813, historian David Benedict wrote in his book A General History of the Baptist Denomination in America and Other Parts of the World, “… Joseph Willis … has done much for the cause, and spent a large fortune while engaged in the ministry, often at the hazard of his life, while the State belonged to the Spanish government.” That would place Joseph Willis in Louisiana before October 1, 1800; 3. In 1854, the Louisiana Baptist Associational Committee wrote in Joseph Willis’ obituary, “The Gospel was proclaimed by him in these regions before the American flag was hoisted here.” That would have been before April 30, 1803. David Benedict was a contemporary of Joseph Willis and wrote his book only thirteen years after Joseph Willis preached west of the Mississippi River.
In violation of the Code Noir, the “Black Code,” and at the risk of his life Joseph Willis preached the Gospel west of the Mississippi even before Lewis and Clark began their historic journey by traveling up the Missouri River in May of 1804. He preached Jesus west of the Mississippi – first evangelical minister to do so – almost a decade before Abraham Lincoln was born.
Next issue: Louisiana Baptists grow under the influence of Joseph Willis.