For the Christian Recorder.

CHARLESTON CORRESPONDENCE.

Progress of the new Organization of the South Carolina Conference - Interesting Scenes - The Enthusiasm of the People - Ordination of Deacons and Elders - Rev. T.W. Lewis of the M.E. Church - His efforts to Discourage the People, and to Prevent them from Joining our Church - He takes the Property, and closes the Doors of Old Bethel against us:

MR. EDITOR: - The new era has dawned, the sun has lit up the horizon, and humanity is rising to a just appreciation of the crisis. Monday, May 15th, 1865, marks an epoch in the history of our race in this country. Forty years ago the African M.E. Church was established in this city. Morris Brown, the second Bishop of our connection, was one of its founders. A house was erected, in which the lovers of Christ and of religious liberty, bowed in humble acknowledgment of God's mercy to them. For six years the little church continued to prosper, under the benign influence of the Lord, when the hell-hatched demon, slavery, conspired to sweep it from the earth.

<< Denmark Vessey>> , (immortal name,) conceived the mighty idea of liberating his race. The consonance of his great thought of liberty with the ultimate end and workings of the A.M.E. Church, placed her in juxta position to his plans, and her destiny was sealed with the fate of his enterprise. He suffered, and all who had any thing to do with him, as martyrs to human liberty. Our Church was demolished and blotted out of existence, and from that day to this our people have had to wear the accursed yoke of religious bondage; paying for all the church property belonging to the Methodists, and supporting the bloody-handed ministers, who have administered unholy doctrines.

The fall of this city opened the way for the return of Joseph, in the person of Bishop Daniel A. Payne, to his brethren, he having been made ruler over all the Church in the land of Abraham. He returns to establish Zion in his native city. Conference opened on the 15th. The bending heavens seemed propitious; the hearts of the people were moved, while their souls magnified the Lore, because He had manifested his loving kindness to his Church, and fulfilled his promises. Many old mothers, bending towards the ground, came to the Conference very morning, and listened with rapturous delight to their deliberations, and when some remarks were made presenting the greatness of God's mercy, in bringing them deliverance, their joy was unbounded, and they would lift up their voices in fervent thanksgiving. When Conference was over, they would come forward and embrace us, and pour blessings upon us, and even kiss our hands. Never did a class of people, situated under similar circumstances, so universally rise to the full comprehension of God's hand in their deliverance.
The ordination of Deacons was one of the most impressing ceremonies I ever witnessed. - The house was crowded to its utmost capacity during the performance of the rites of ordination, by an intensely interested audience. Bishop Payne, inspired by the importance of the occasion, rose with the dignity characteristic of a great mind, while the brethren, deeply impressed with the solemnity of the occasion and the importance of their high mission, moved in harmony with their venerated chief. The scene was sublime beyond description and will be long remembered by the people of this place.
On Sabbath day, at 10 1/2 o'clock, A.M., Bishop Payne, D.D., preached the ordination sermon, in Trinity Church, Hazel street. Revs. J.H.A. Johnson and Theophilus G. Stewart were ordained Elders. This service was quite as imposing as that held in Zion Church. The impression made on the people was very great, and altogether, brought our Church and her tenets into great favor.
The Rev. T. Willard Lewis, who has assumed to be the pastor of all the Methodists in Charleston, and who had been received and honored in our Conference, and who had invited the Bishop to have the ordination in this Church, seeing the impression made on the minds of the members, called them all down into the basement and harangued them with a tirade of abuse against the African M.E. Church, and besought the people to have nothing to do with it, but to wait until things became more settled, stating that our Church was based on the distinction of color; that we were another denomination; that in the North there was no distinction I the M.E. Churches; that colored people have the same rights and privileges as the whites, and that if they left him they would lose their Church property; that the property belonged to the M.E. Church, and that he would hold it for that body. His whole effort was to distract the minds of the people, and create the impression amongst them that our organization was founded on the principle of all black people, to the utter exclusion of white, and brown, and mulattoes. I never listened to a man who took such particular pains to misrepresent a cause, and gave utterance to such a string of falsehoods. I arose from my seat with feelings of mingled pity and contempt for such a prodigy - such a wolf in sheep's clothing. But to crown all, at night he visited Old Bethel to hear brother James A. Handy. His discourse was masterly, and consoling, touching the deep Christian feelings of our people. Here again this miserable creature began his old practice of abusing and traducing us, simply because we had come here to look after the welfare of our people. He forbid them holding any meetings in their Church without consulting him, and acted more like Barnwell Rhett with his slaves, than a minister of Christ.
Such has been the conduct of this Judas, who comes here to rule over our people with his Yankee rod of iron. And what intensifies this wrong still more is, that all the time he protests that he has nothing against our establishing a Church here, and while he is declaring openly that he will do all in his power to forward the good work, he is secretly plotting to hinder us from accomplishing any good. He has given the colored people the old churches, and reserves New Bethel for the whites, yet tells them they are equal with the whites in all things! But, if the colored people go to New Bethel Church, they must go up into the gallery as they formerly did.
Such is New England Methodism, as carried out by the Rev. T.W. Lewis, of the M.E. Church, in Charleston, South Carolina. But Bethel is formed, and forty leaders have identified themselves with her, and over a thousand members will enroll themselves under her banner, to be swelled to five times that number in this city, while all the islands adjacent will attach themselves to us, under their respective leaders, possibly bringing the number of members up to ten thousand in the aggregate. The people are now poor, but when their crops shall be gathered and placed in the market, things will move along more smoothly.
More anon,
R.H.C.