Ann Wallace Stewart and Matilda Stewart were baptized by proxy after their death.

Map of Flat Shoals, Stokes County, North Carolina

From the "Historical Atlas of Mormonism", p. 30
     Another pioneer missionary was Jedediah M. Grant.  In 1837, he initiated
missionary work in Delaware and Maryland.  Then, in 1838, he became the first elder
to enter the state of North Carolina.  There he preached for about six months in
Rockingham, Stokes, and Surry counties, baptizing at least four people.  In 1840 he was
joined by other missionaries and they soon brought six or eight more converts into the
Church.

Jedediah M. Grant
by
Mary G. Judd

(Deseret News Press: Salt Lake City, Utah; 1959)
(pp. 45 - 47)

JEDEDIAH'S THIRD MISSION

     Jedediah remained at Kirtland for only three months and then set out upon his third
mission in which he revisited many of the places where he had previously labored in the
East.  Later he went to the Southern States where his most intensive and successful
efforts were to be.

     On this mission he labored alone for the most part and worked with such intensity that
he found little time to record the results or his labors. At times a long period is recorded
in only one or two sentences.

     He was the first Mormon missionary to preach in North Carolina, as is made clear in   
a letter written from there under date of May 18th, 1838.

     "I have no doubt when I say there can be a large church built up in this country, but
that you know is a very hard thing for one alone . . . to start the work in a State where the
sound has never been heard save by false reports. Perhaps no part of the United States has
heard as many false reports from the mob in Missouri."

     "When I introduced the Gospel into this country, there had been no preaching by the
Latter-day Saints within 200 miles of this country (Surrey County, North Carolina).

     "You may well suppose that the people had a great curiosity to hear the Mormon
preacher; so much so that they came out by the hundreds from every direction of the
country, inviting me to go East, West, North and South.  When they found that I could
not travel extensively enough on foot to satisfy them, they soon made up a hundred
dollars and bought me a horse and equipage suitable for traveling.  My circuit soon
became very extensive, but I still had three requests for preaching where I could only
fulfill one.

     Do not suppose, however, that Jedediah no longer met with opposition. "The priests
were very much enraged" he wrote after being in South Carolina for a short time, "and
endeavored to keep the people from hearing the truth, but without effect. I established a
small branch of the Church in Patrick County, Virginia, which bounds Stokes County on
the North.  I preached in Stokes, Surrey and Rockingham Counties, North Carolina. My
labors were so extensive that I did not baptize many, but I laid a foundation for a great
work.

     "I preached in their courthouses and chapels in all parts of the country.  I had large
congregations  wherever I held meetings.   I held some debates with the Methodists, all of
which resulted in favor of the truth and in the Glory of God, our Heavenly Father.

     "The people in North Carolina and Virginia were kind indeed to me. They gave me a
beast to ride and clothing in abundance.  They also gave me money to bear my expenses
to Far West."

LINKS