Porter, Herschel S, Dd

Porter, Herschel S., D.D.

a Cumberland Presbyterian minister, was born in Butler County, Kentucky, February 12, 1816. After studying at various academies, he was licensed to preach in May 1835, and in September 1837, was ordained at Glasgow, Kentucky. He spent about four years as an itinerant in Kentucky, travelled also for some time as an agent for Cumberland College; then served a year as pastor at Fayetteville, Tennessee; subsequently made an extensive preaching tour, passing through most of the Southern States, returning to Kentucky in 1843. He spent several months of that year in Western Pennsylvania, then went to Philadelphia to organize a congregation, and remained there until the spring of 1851. In the fall of that year he settled in Memphis, Tennessee, and labored there until the latter part of 1855. He died there October 5 of the same year, professor of natural history in the Memphis Medical College. In 1853 he was moderator of the General Assembly. Dr. Porter was devoted to science, and was proficient in astronomy and geology. He published a series of Astronomical Sermons, 400 pp.: — The Atonement: — and a work on the Foreknowledge and Decrees of God. See Beard, Biographical Sketches, 1st series, page 307.