Martha Davis Clark
Martha Davis Clark
For 52 years the beloved wife of
Rev. Horace Clark
She passed to rest January IX, MDCCCXCVI
She lived to love on earth; she rests in love eternal.
By her bereaved husband and children this is
lovingly inscribed
Dedicated to her revered memory
Photo Credit: Rosa G. Gonzales
1. Article or reference in The Handbook of Texas online
2. News item
Martha Davis married Horace Clark on March 30, 1844, Macoupin County, Illinois. She was the mother of three children. Information is presently available on two: Mary Katherine and Horace. The following are excerpts from Carroll's book, A History of Texas Baptists. Horace Clark&married Miss Martha Davis, the daughter of a Baptist minister, who had gone to the West as a missionary from New York. She was a graduate of Monticello Seminary, at Upper Alton, a kind of sister school to Shurtleff College. After their marriage, they went to
Georgetown, Kentucky, where he taught for something like five years in Georgetown College. The young teacher became while there a prominent figure in the intellectual life of the school town. He began his work at Baylor August, 1851, wholly without school equipment. A small four-room building was his only building of any sort. He had no dormitories. The school was turned over to him and his wife and Miss Harriet Davis. Clark moved to Houston, and in the fall of 1871 opened Clarks Academy , a private school for young ladies, which he successfully
maintained for seven or eight years. In 1877, without any announcement, even to his own immediate family, and to the surprise and amazement of his friends and family, he went on
Sunday to an Episcopal service and was confirmed as an Episcopalian. His wife remained a Baptists to her death, but she was devotedly loyal to him. She helped him all that was possible in his new lines of labor. In January of 1880, Clark accepted the position of rector of the Episcopalian Church at Corpus Christi. We frequently visited the rectory, mainly to see Sister Clark, who remained a Baptist. We never urged her to unite with our little church. Her wifely devotion was beautiful. She was a devout Christian and unstintedly gave the powers of
her Christian influence to the uplift of all about her. In 1896, at Corpus Christi the devoted wife passed over the river. The lonely husband was never wholly the same after her departure.
Research: Msgr. Michael Howell
Transcription: Geraldine D. McGloin, Nueces County Historical Commission