There are small churches all over the United States with seemingly small footprints. They are too new for the history books and are not mentioned enough in the local newspaper to glean a history. If they eschew social media, then it’s even harder to research their history. The House of Refuge seems to be one of those churches. It is located on White Sulfur Road, just outside Gainesville, Georgia. According to tax records, the building was constructed in 1955. I am not sure if it has always been a church, but the building with its tall steeple caught my eye as I was driving through Gainesville, so I pulled over to catch it in the fading sun.
Overlooking Clemons United Methodist Church near Lula, Georgia is the church’s cemetery. At the top are two well-maintained grave houses. Grave houses are structures, usually wooden, that built over a grave. They are mostly found in the southern United States.
Usually, there are visible headstones, but neither shelter has a visible one. I am not sure if they are under the leaf litter or not. I looked at the photos and could not find the grave houses. I did not open up every memorial to see if they could be in additional photos.
The congregation for Clemons Chapel United Methodist Church began in the 1880s. After their first sanctuary burned, land was donated to build a new church. The church opened in 1903. A fuller history of the church can be found on their website.
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