The Bush River Baptists are known to have been Separate Baptists from a will prepared by Samuel Newman on November 12, 1770. Newman and Phillip Mulkey founded the Bush River Baptist Church in 1771 and Newman was its first minister. Newman built a meeting house on his property before the church was formed and willed two acres of land ". . . where the meeting house now stands for the use of the Sepparate [sic] Baptists. . ." Thus, Newman's will clearly establishes the Bush River Church as a Separate congregation.

The majority of early South Carolina Baptists entering the back country were at first known as Separates which is a name derived from the withdrawal from the Congregational Churches of New England after the Great Awakening. Shubal Stearns led the Separates into the South settling in North Carolina, and Phillip Mulkey carried the Separates message to Newberry County in 1762.

"The Baptists of Bush River, like the other Separates in the back country, were sternly puritanical. In a raw society, they endeavored to supply moral standards needed to improve society. Drinking, gambling, dancing, card playing, failing to attend church meetings, overreaching in trading horses, speaking disrespectfully to other members, and the use of profanity all brought severe condemnation and sometimes excom- munication. Heresy - embracing beliefs not sanctioned by the church - meant dismissal as did adultery. In short, this church actively sought to regulate the behavior of its members and to improve that of the community."

Anyone familiar with the early history of Ocmulgee Baptist Church will recognize a connection between that congregation and the Bush River Church. Both were involved in monitoring the behavior of their members and disciplining offenders of the church's moral code. The Ocmulgee Church is in every sense the spiritual legacy of the Bush River Church, and an inheritor of the Separate Baptist theology and practices.

As shall be seen later, Charles Crow and other early members of the Ocmulgee Church came to know God at Bush River. They brought their ideas about God and how to conduct church business from Bush River to Ocmulgee. That they should apply what they learned at Bush River should not surprise anyone. It was at Bush River that Ocmulgee founders formed their ideas and learned the lessons taught by the Separate Baptists.

Although founded in 1771 with nine members, the Bush River Church did not dominate the region's Baptists until after 1802 - over three decades later. In 1794, the church had a membership of only thirty- four, which is a growth of twenty-five members in twenty-four years or one member per year. By 1800, the membership had reached forty.