1909-1912

Rev. W. J. Carswell of Savannah, Georgia gave the information for this biographical sketch.

Dr. Taliaferro was born on November 21, 1877 at Evergreen, Alabama, about eighty miles southwest of Montgomery. His father, Dr. Charles Thomas Taliaferro was born in Carolina County, Virginia. His mother was Mary A. Ashley of Alabama. In his youth he assisted his father in his drug store.

After attending grammar school and high school at Evergreen, Dr. Taliaferro entered Howard College, now Stanford University. He was on the honor roll there in 1895, and was an assistant instructor in 1897 and 1898, and received the Degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1898.

Following this, he spent two years, 1898-1900 as a student at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky. He completed the courses in Biblical Introduction, English Old Testament, English New Testament, Homiletics, and Systematic Theology. He did not receive a degree. While there he served as pastor of the Baptist Mission at Glenville, near Louisville, and for this work he was ordained at Glenview at three o’clock in the afternoon on Sunday October 1, 1899. T. T. Eaton, pastor of Walnut Creek Church, and editor of the Western Recorder, preached the sermon, L. T. Mays presented the Bible, W. J. May led the ordaining prayer and A. F. Gordon delivered the charge.

Dr. Taliaferro’s home church in Evergreen licensed him on August 26, 1894.

He is found next in South Alabama where he became pastor of a field of rural churches in the vicinity of Furman. Among those were Bethsaida and Fellowship in Wilcox County. Furman, Pleasant Hill, Mt. Moriah, and Monterey are mentioned, but the writer stated that it was difficult to determine in each case whether it was the name of a church or of the community where one of the churches was located.

On October 3, 1900, Dr. Taliaferro married Nannie Granberry, daughter of John and Sarah McIver Granberry of Brewton, Alabama. To this union three sons were born, W. A., Jr., John, and George

Mrs. Taliaferro was trained at Judson College, Marion, Alabama and at Emerson College, Boston Massachusetts.

On January 12, 1902, Dr. Taliaferro delivered two sermons before the congregation of the Baptist Church at Greenville, Alabama, following which he was called as pastor and served there from 1902 until 1905. In 1906 he went to the church at Opelika, Alabama where he served until 1909.

On December 1, 1909 Dr. Taliaferro became pastor of the Dublin Baptist Church. There he served until June 1913 when he became field representative for the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board engaged with others in the task of raising contributions for the Judson Centennial Fund, which the Southern Baptist Convention authorized in 1912 as a celebration of one hundred years of Baptist Foreign Mission work. His annual salary for this was $2,500.00. He resided in Macon, Georgia during this period.

On September 1, 1916 Dr. Taliaferro accepted the pastorate of the Second Baptist, Savannah, Georgia, originally known as the Duffy Street Baptist Church, and then later this church was to change the name to become the Bull Street Baptist Church. He served there until October 1, 1943, when he accepted a smaller church at Blue Ridge, Georgia and served there until his retirement in 1949. Then he and Mrs. Taliaferro made their home in Blue Ridge on an apple Orchard farm he had owned since before leaving Savannah.

Dr. Taliaferro’s greatest work was done in his Savannah pastorate. He took a church of 652 members and became God’s instrument in building it into one of 3,438 members. By June 12, 1927 a magnificent house had been built in a new location.

In Georgia he served as a member of the State Convention Executive Committee, a trustee of Mercer University, Mary P. Willingham School at Blue Ridge, and as President of the former Baptist Assembly. He served the Southern Baptist Convention as a trustee of that Institute, and New Orleans Bible Institute.

Because of his outstanding service, William Ashley Taliaferro was honored by the bestowal of the Degree of Doctor of Divinity by Howard College.

Dr. Taliaferro died at Blue Ridge, Georgia of a heart attack. His funeral was held at Blue Ridge Baptist Church on March 14, 1949 with Dr. B. Frank Cochran , pastor of the church officiating, assisted by Searcy Garrison, then pastor of Bull Street Baptist Church, and H. C. Whitenere, secretary of evangelism of the Georgia Baptist Convention. He was buried in the Resthaven Cemetery, Blue Ridge. Later Mrs. Taliaferro was buried beside him.