BEWLEYVILLE

The physical features of the landscape in the area from old Bewleyville to Irvington on the east side of Sinking Creek is a thing of natural beauty.  In traveling east on Highway 60, after going down Sinking Creek hill, one runs abruptly out of the type soil which covers much of the western coal field. East of Sinking Creek the soil
is of the Hagerstown Fredrick type. This is the same type soil that is found in the Nashville Basin and runs through the Pennyroyal Region south of the Dripping
Springs Escarpment and on into the Blue Grass region. In this region is found some of the best farms in Kentucky and the soil is second only to that of the
Maury-Hagerstown found in the inner Blue Grass.

This section of our county, from Webster to Bewleyville is a series of ridges and valleys with an occasional miniature mountain standing off to itself for no apparent
reason. These ridges and hills are gently rolling and rarely are they too steep to cultivate. One such hill around which is centered some of the early history of
our county is Summer Seat. This is not the same Summer Seat that belonged to Richard Stevens and upon which was erected the light tower for directing wayfarers
between Hardin Fort and Hines Fort. This Summer Seat lies about four miles west of Irvington, on the old Edgar Bennett farm in the Basin Springs area, this hill or
knob rises about one hundred fifty feet above Sinking Creek and the fields of the valley east of it. This hill is now covered with cedar trees and is sometimes
referred to as Cedar Hill. This hill overlooks the valley east and south, Sinking Creek to the north, and east of the valley rises Pilots Ridge.

Some time before the Civil War, Mr. Edgar Bennett bought the farm and opened up a rock quarry on Summer Seat. Mr. Bennett was one of the best stone masons
in Kentucky and for a number of years he shipped stone to many different places. It was he who quarried out the stone for the foundation of the old courthouse in
Hardinsburg. He also built the jail at Hartford and the one at Calhoun, and in 1860, he built the old stone dam across Rough Creek at the Falls of Rough which is
as sturdy today as it was the day it was built. Many of the bridges in this part of the state were the product of his work.

The old Dents Bridge over Sinking Creek on the old Hardinsburg-Bewleyville Road was built by Mose Bennett in 1856. In the early days of the Whitemans History
of Breckinridge County there were several covered bridges, but like everything else they have all fallen to the sickle of Father Time. Dents Bridge was the last of
these to go that way. And indeed it was a pity that it was not preserved. At the time that it was torn down, however, it seemed that everything and everybody was
dead bent to progress, and the Korean War created so much worry in the minds of the people of the United States that one was hardly responsible for making such a mistake. At any rate the last of these representatives of that bygone age was destroyed. If this old bridge could rehearse the ales of its history it would be much
more interesting reading that than this compilation. There would be stories of joy and sadness and of the Civil War days when armed soldiers used it to cross the
waters of Sinking Creek. Many of the county most noted citizens passed through this bridge. The Moormans, Deans and Owens went over this old bridge to Bewleyville from Planters Hall and Long Lick. Edgar Bennett crossed it going to Rock Lick to court Miss Kate Lewis. Dave Moorman came this way from Long
Lick courting Miss Della Hardaway. Jess Moorman and Eli Dean must have used this old bridge going to and from Mr. John Fishers. The Hardaways, Stiths,
Washingtons, Chicks, Jordans, Bewleys, Bandys, Footes, Hendersons, and many others traveled over it on their way to the county seat. The stage from
Hardinsburg to Muldraugh dashed through it and John Wallace&rsquos Circus came to old Bewleyville by way of this old bridge in the early 70's. Tons of tobacco
were hauled over it enroute to Stephensport or Cloversport to be shipped to market.

Wedding parties and honeymooners crossed here in the moonlight, and funeral processions wound their way up the hill to the old Dowell Cemetery. These were sad
journeys and the old bridge could tell of many such ones. Perhaps in the stillness of the night the tired country doctors rode through here on their missions of mercy.
The old Circuit riders used this bridge to keep a preaching appointment and often times to say some comforting words over the grave of one who died and was
necessarily buried before a minister could be had. These old bridges made a place for picnics on Sunday afternoons and a refuge for travelers when caught in a
thundershower or where one could elude the heat of the noon-day sun. It seems a shame that just one could not have been preserved, but old bridges, like old men,
must go.

In later years Mr. Edgar Bennett went into business in Bewleyville. He and his brother, Alonzo, bought and dried annually about 300,000 lbs. of burley tobacco.
This was a lot of tobacco considering the fact that there were no railroads or trucks to haul it to market. It had to be transported to Stephensport and loaded on
boats to be shipped to market. Mr. Bennett married Miss Kate Lewis of Glen Dean. Before his death, Mr. Bennett hewed his tomb out of stone in his quarry on
Summer Seat and requested that he be buried there. At death he was put to rest in his own tomb, the spot that he loved best   In recent years, however, his
descendants removed him to the Irvington Cemetery. Garard Foote, at the present time, owns the Basin Springs farm just north of Summer Seat. Garard is the
grandson of Ludwell Foote, who was known as the Sage of Pilots Ridge, for many years. Ludwell Foote, was the cousin of Governor Foote of Mississippi, who
defeated Jefferson Davis for governor of that state just before the Civil War. The Foote Family has played a leading part in the religious and civic affairs of the
Bewleyville community since its beginning.

Bewleyville is a beautiful little community lying in the eastern end of our county. It is about seven miles south east of Irvington, near the Meade County line. Sinking
Creek runs through the edge of this community and it is about three miles from the post office that the old Dents Bridge stood. The soil is all fertile and rolling.
To those of the flat level plains or those who are accustomed to the river bottoms might refer to certain places as being hilly. There are no swampy places
even in the swags, and the soil yields it&rsquos fertility readily. The first settlers to come to the Bewleyville community a little before the turn of the 19^th century
were the Stiths, Bewleys, Sanders, Jordans, Hardaways, Blanfords, Jollys, Chicks, Bandys, and Washingtons.

Like all other frontier communities, Bewleyville's early industry was strictly agriculture. Being completely isolated, all of life's necessities had to be derived from the
soil or gathered from the forest. A few old spinning wheels and hand looms may still be found as mute evidence to the way these pioneer women provided for their
families. Like all the rest of the settlements on the frontier, they saw the necessity of a church in which they could worship God as they chose and about which they
could centralize the spirit and needs of the community.

In 1804, Mr. Thomas and Rhoda Stith, William and Nancy Stith, Richard and Betty Stith, Matthew Sanders, Mrs. Jordan and her two daughters, Lucy and Katy, Little Dick Stith and his wife and Betsy Hardaway met at the home of Thomas and Rhoda Stith and laid the plans for the first Methodist Church ever to be built on
Breckinridge County soil. The Rev. Jesse Walker, a Methodist Circuit Rider from the Hartford Circuit met with them and helped them to establish the church.
This first old church was built of logs and stood about four miles south of the present one. By 1835, this old church had become inadequate and a new and larger
one had been built. This was a frame building and was moved to within about a quarter of a mile of the present one. The name was also changed to the "Old Liberty
Church" and it lived up to its name, as any other denomination was permitted to worship there too. The pastor of this church from 1834 to 1850, Rev. James Taylor,
was truly a great man. He pastured this church, administered to the spiritual the sixteen years there, he married eight hundred and twenty four (824) couples. In the
minutes of the church kept by G. A. Foote it is said of him, "He followed the Lord through the forests of Breckinridge County like Moses followed the pillars of faire
through the wilderness." Mr. James Stith and G. A. Foote kept an accurate record of the happenings in this church since it was first formed in 1804, until after the
turn of the century. A Mr. A. H. Payne now is continuing the records. I don't suppose the church door has ever been opened but what an entry was made in the
records.

Brother Taylor must have found a great deal of satisfaction in just doing a good job. Other than this inner-self satisfaction, he received for his services for performing
these 824 weddings, anything from a ham, bushel of sweet potatoes, a frying chicken, to, on one occasion, a red bandana hankerschief wrapped full of pretty red
apples. These early circuit riders and preachers played more than one role in the community in which they served. Many times they performed medical service in the
absence of the doctor. They were also a constant source of information, and carried messages from one community to the other - indeed it would be difficult to try
and describe the faithfulness and service of these circuit riders and early frontier pastors.

The fissure that was dividing the North and the South and eventually led to the Civil War was ever widening. In the election of 1844, the piercing influence of politics
and the arguments over slavery and states rights penetrated even the Bewleyville Methodist Church. The congregation was split into two factions. There was a Mr.
Duncan who moved into the community and joined the church. He was a zealous church worker and an ardent Yankee. By 1850, he had succeeded in splitting the
church a little less than half in two and, with the smaller segment of the congregation, started a church of his own and affiliated with the Baptist. For many years
following the Baptist in that community were referred to as Duncanites. The old parent Methodist Church affiliated with the Methodist Church South. Soon after
the Civil War was over and before the bitterness had completely subsided, the church burned down, but the general opinion among the members was that it was no
accident. This was in 1870. Again the members rose to meet the occasion and in 1871, a new church was erected. It stands today as a symbol of the devotion of
its present and past members, from 1804, until, and including the present. The Bewleyville Masonic Lodge was chartered in 1851. The lodge hall was upstairs over the Baptist Church.

The first Master of the lodge was a Brother John Gaston. Since that time the lodge has been served by the following Masters.

Past Masters of the Bewleyville Lodge