Richville, Missouri

Gotlieb Meyer. David Templeton and family, also from Indiana, were among the very earliest settlers of Nodaway Township, as was also Colonel John W. Kelley, afterwards the first attorney admitted to the bar of Holt County. David Templeton arrived in the county with four sons. Monroe Templeton located near the site of what was afterwards the town of Richville. John Norvel, a native of Tennessee, but directly from Kentucky to this state, settled in Nodaway Township in 1847.

Passage source: History of Holt County, Missouri : from the Time of the Platte Purchase to the End of the Year 1916 : Preceded by a Short History of Missouri : Supplemented by Biographical Sketches of Prominent Citizens, published 1917.

One of the earliest religious organizations in Holt County, was effected in Nodaway Township, in 1840. This was a Missionary Baptist Church, of which the Rev. Ebo Tucker was first pastor. This church, at the period of its original organization, had thirteen male members, beside their families. Among these were John Norvel, Willis Brockman, Shelton Arterbury and Thomas Wickham, also Levi Ruhl, John Robinson, Lewis Jones, John McFadden and Preston Ham. The records of this primitive church are lost, and it is impossible to obtain much more extended information of the original membership. The first meetings of this church were in groves in the summer season, and, as the country advanced, in school houses, which the intelligent pioneers, lost but little time in erecting, after their arrival in the country. In 1860, they built a brick church, on land then owned by Francis Nickols, and donated by him for that purpose. This building stands near the south boundary of the southeast quarter of section 8, township 60, range 37, west, on an eighty acre tract, now owned by the Gotleib Meyer heirs. It was originally styled Nickol's Grove Church. At the breaking out of the Civil war, the church was not entirely completed. It was, however, occupied and used for religious purposes by the one hundred and fifty-two members who composed the organization. These members were nearly, if not all, southern sympathizers and, as a natural consesuence, the church, by the fortunes of war, went down. After the rebellion a number of emigrants, chiefly Germans from the State of Ohio, settled in the neighborhood, as the original settlers and members of the pioneer church moved away, or had failed to return after the proclamation of peace. The building stood for many years and verging upon dilapidation, a monument of the religious enterprise of the early days. It finally was torn down and the site on which it stood used for agricultural purposes. The congregation, greatly reduced in numbers after the Civil war, worshipped for a time in a school house in Richville.

Passage source: History of Holt County, Missouri : from the Time of the Platte Purchase to the End of the Year 1916 : Preceded by a Short History of Missouri : Supplemented by Biographical Sketches of Prominent Citizens, published 1917.

The Methodist Episcopal Church at Richville, was organized about the year 1840, shortly after the Baptists. The Templetons and Evanses were among the original organizers of this church. The building, a brick structure, 40x30 feet, was erected about 1855, some five years before the village of Richville, in which it now stands, was laid out. The first Methodist preacher to exercise his calling in this township was Rev. James Baker. About 1844 the Methodists held a camp meeting in section 27, township 60, range 27, on a farm at that time owned by David Templeton, one of the earliest settlers of the county, and the first county surveyor appointed.

Passage source: History of Holt County, Missouri : from the Time of the Platte Purchase to the End of the Year 1916 : Preceded by a Short History of Missouri : Supplemented by Biographical Sketches of Prominent Citizens, published 1917.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Nodaway Township - it names this place 1 more 1 time.