Bethlehem Lutheran Church

Front: This church, with its origins in services held in the 1780s at nearby Wicker's Camp Ground, was formally organized in 1816 with Rev. Godfrey Dreher as its first pastor. A log meeting house was built on this site soon afterwards. In 1830 its third pastor, Rev. John G. Schwartz, founded the first Lutheran seminary in the South here in Pomaria, at the home of Col. John Eichelberger. Reverse: In 1855 the S.C. Synod met here and voted to establish a Lutheran college at Newberry. Among the notables buried in the churchyard are Col. John Eichelberger, veteran of the American Revolution; Rev. John G. Schwartz; and Rev. Thaddeus Boinest, who encouraged the German settlement of the Dutch Fork region. The present church, built in 1881-82, was remodeled in 1942 and 1966.