The Night the Jail House Shook in Brevard, NC

In the summer of 1945, Pastor A.L. Gardin, from the Rossman Church of God asked my father, Rev Carl Cox, to organize a Church of God in Brevard, NC.  In order to do so, a Tent Revival Meeting would be scheduled.  In those days many churches especially in warm climates were organized from an old fashion Revival under a Tent.  The new church would be organized from the people saved in the meetings.  They would meet under the tent until the church could be built or a building found. 

The tent was set up one block from Main Street on Caldwell Street in Brevard.  The lot that tent was placed on nestled around the large brick buildings from the city.  A great location for all to see and be intrigued to what was happening.  Very large crowds would attend in the beginning.  The music program lead by Pastor Gardin, was outstanding.  Weekend services had special group singers, like E.D. Randolph and a ladies quartet, and my mother would play the piano.

These revivals, like most in the Church of God back then, were very lively.  Being Pentecostal people they would hollar as they say it in the mountains, and jump and dance, as the Holy Ghost would come upon them.  Running the isles, screaming as they were delivered from their sins, running down the street speaking in tongues.  My mother was part Cherokee Indian and when the Holy Ghost would fall on her, she would let out a Cherokee War Cry from the piano.  This revival went on for several weeks and as you can imagine it started stirring up devils in the community as well.

The mayor of the town of Brevard contacted dad and asked him to come to his office for a meeting.  During that meeting the mayor proceeded to tell dad that the meetings were to loud and the people were to loud and he would have to shut down the meetings.  Dad said to the mayor, I cannot shut this meeting down; it’s not my meeting but God’s meeting.  The Mayor got into such a rage that dad said he begin to fear for his safety so he got up and left.  The Mayor contacted the Transylvania County Sheriff that day and told him to go shut the meeting down.  The Sheriff came to dad and told him he could not hold the meeting on that Monday.   Dad immediately contacted the NC Church of God State Overseer and asked him what to do.  He told dad, don’t stop the meeting, continue tonight, I’m sending my State Evangelist to preach for you tonight. 

That night the tent was packed and overflowing.  Dad said it was one of the largest crowds he had during that meeting.  The Mayor and Sheriff had of course been talking and the town people that labeled us Holy Rollers came to see what would happen.  Pastor Gardin started the music for the night and during Worship the power lines to the tent were cut so the lights went out and the Microphones were silenced.  Some of the men attending the meeting went to get their cars and surrounded the tent with their lights turned on so people could see.  They continued the service.  After the worship service was the Evangelist was preaching pretty heavy that night and during his preaching, dad notice that 4 Sheriff’s cars drove up and parked along the street outside the tent and got out of their cars and grouped together right outside the tent.  The Evangelist started preaching hard right at the Sheriffs, he was telling them they would have to clean that jail up before they could arrest these people and put them in jail, these were clean people.  Dad said his heart sunk when he was preaching, he wanted to just reach out and grab his coat tail and tell him to take it easy, these guys were already mad as hornets with us, don’t go egging them on.  But he could do that to a State Evangelist.  See my dad was a very humble man.

The Sheriff told one of his Deputies, a large man of stature to go into the tent and arrest those preachers.  The Deputy, with a cigar in his mouth, preceded to walk about a quarter of the way into the tent, stopped and started scanning the congregation.  He then took a puff of his cigar and blew it out and turned around and walked back to the Sheriff.  He took his badge off and handed it to the Sheriff and said I will turn my badge in before I arrest these people.   The Sheriff and all his Deputies got back in their cars and left the meeting. 

Bro Richardson continued preaching and they had a great service, many more people saved.  After the meeting a group of men came up to dad and told him they had the money to pay his bail, if they arrest him and take him to jail.  That blessed him so much.

Later dad told me that the icing on the cake to this story was the Jailer and his wife, that lived above the jail and took care of the jail stated that that night the jail house shook, the pots & pans on the walls shook, the windows shook, and they were scared.  The next day the Brevard Daily News printed a story that the Jail House Shook, and it was reported that there was no documented earthquake.  It was a mystery as to why this happened but it brought a reverent fear of the Lord to that town that people talked about for years.  Needless to say, the Revival kept going and the Sheriff and Mayor left daddy alone. 

In several weeks dad organized the Brevard Church of God.  I visited Brevard with my family many years ago and saw a new beautiful church building.

My dad later went on to be State Overseer in the Church of God for Iowa & Nebraska.