son Stewart's first congregation at that place.

When they were accorded their freedom about the year 1865, they chose
their permanent location in the Oak Hill neighborhood, about fifteen
miles eastward. Parson Stewart followed them, and began to hold
occasional services at the home of Henry Crittenden. He became the first
elder of the Oak Hill church, when it was organized in 1869, and during
the remaining 25 years of his life rendered a zealous and faithful
service.

Henry Crittenden enjoyed the reputation of being a "master mechanic."
During the slavery period, he was trained as a blacksmith, tinsmith and
carpenter, and later acquired the art of repairing jewelry. Soon after
he located on the Crittenden land, he built a shop. His intelligence and
skill as a workman enabled him to attract customers from long distances.
He was industrious and economical, and accumulated savings more rapidly
than any of his neighbors.

He was a firm believer in the Bible and a regular attendant at church.
He encouraged the establishment of the Oak Hill Sunday school, of which
J. Ross Shoals, his son-in-law in 1875, became the first teacher. He
furnished most of the materials for the first frame school house in the
Oak Hill district in 1878, and in 1887, when it was used in the erection
of a larger building near the "Old Log House" and since known as Oak
Hill Academy, he covered the deficit on the building estimated at
$100.00.

[Illustration: HENRY CRITTENDEN]

[Illustration: SIMON FOLSOM]

[Illustration: ELIJAH BUTLER]

[Illustration: MRS. PERKINS STEWART]

[Illustration: REV. C. L. PERKINS]

[Illustration: MRS. R. D. ARNOLD]

[Illustration: JOHNSON W. SHOALS]

[Illustration: JAMES G. SHOALS]

[Illustration: ISAAC JOHNSON]

[Illustration: MATT AND MRS. BROWN]

[Illustration: THE TEACHERS, 1899
Photo by Mottle Hunter]

He and Parson Stewart were the most influential of the Choctaw Freedmen,
in securing the establishment of Oak Hill Academy, as a training school
for teachers. He manifested his joy, not only on the day of its lowly
establishment by Miss Hartford in February 1886, but at every successive
enlargement of its work, while he lived. He knew better, than many of
his fellow Freedmen, the value of youthful training, and was
enthusiastic in his zeal, to have every family far and near take
advantage of its open door. An early teacher, who frequently heard him,
writes: "He was a dear, good old man, a remarkable m