M.
N. Adams, one of the missionaries to the Sioux, to devote his time to
their spiritual needs. He complied and founded a white Presbyterian
church and it is one of the strong Protestant organizations of Southern
Minnesota.

In 1843, also the Pond brothers established a station at Oak Grove,
twelve miles west of the Falls of St. Anthony. It was never abandoned.
For many years it was the center of beneficent influences to both races
for miles around. It developed into the white Presbyterian church of
Oak Grove, which still stands as a monument to the many noble qualities
of its founder, Rev. Gideon Hollister Pond. On the Sabbath scores of
his descendants worship within its walls. The surrounding community is
composed largely of Ponds and their kindred.

In 1846, a mission was established at Red Wing by the Reverends J. F.
Aiton and J. W. Hancock, and another in 1860, at Red Wood by Rev. John
P. Williamson.

In 1858, a church was organized at Red Wing with twelve members. This
was swept away by the outbreak in 1862.

Dr. John P. Williamson, who was born in 1835, in one of the mission
cabins on the shores of Lac-qui-Parle, who has spent his whole life
among the Sioux Indians, and who with a singleness of purpose, worthy
of the apostle Paul, has devoted his whole life to their temporal and
spiritual uplift, thus vividly sketches missionary life among the Sioux
in his boyhood days: "My first serious impression of life was that I
was living under a great weight of something, and as I began to discern
more clearly, I found this weight to be the all-surrounding
overwhelming presence of heathenism, and all the instincts of my birth
and culture of a Christian home set me at antagonism to it at every
point.

"This feeling of disgust was often accompanied with fear. At times,
violence stalked abroad unchallenged and dark lowering faces skulked
about. Even when we felt no personal danger this incubus of savage life
all around weighed on our hearts. Thus it was day and night. Even those
hours of twilight, which brood with sweet influences over so many
lives, bore to us, on the evening air, the weird cadences of the
heathen dance or the chill thrill of the war-whoop.

Ours was a serious life. The earnestness of our parents in the pursuit
of their work could not fail to impress in some degree the children.
The main purpose of Christianizing that people was felt in everything.
It was like garrison life in time of war. But this s