Rev. A.P. Ashurst, Pastor of the Seventh Day Baptist Church, died Tuesday, March 16, 1915, at his residence on Coleman Avenue. The funeral was held Wednesday afternoon at the Seventh Day Baptist Church, conducted by the Hammond Ministers' Association, of which he had been president for a number of years. The church was packed and the service was fitting and impressive. The music, which was particularly appropriate, was rendered by a mixed quartet consisting of Misses Bertha McCoy and Carey Hemby and Messers A.J. Caldwell and M.H. Ragsdale. Interment was made in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Andrew Park Ashurst was born at Eatonton, Ga., July 2, 1846. He was the only son of Colonel John Milton Ashurst, a lawyer, of Eatonton, Ga., who at the time of his death was a solicitor general of Ocmulgee circuit. His mother's maiden name was Sarah G. Park, of Eatonton, Ga. He was converted and joined the church at Hamilton, Ga., when about 13 years of age. He spent a number of years as salesman in a dry-goods store in Columbus, Ga., after which he attended the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He was also for a short time at Mercer University at Macon, Ga.
Mr. Ashurst was married to Miss Roda Miller, of Buena Vista, Ga., in 1874, and began to preach to some country churches about that time. He was pastor of churches in Georgia, Alabama, and Florida for several years. He was the founder and editor of the Florida Baptist Witness, still published in Florida, and the organ of the Baptists of that state.
Elder Ashurst was converted to the Sabbath in 1894. he served the Second Seventh Day Baptist Church, of Alfred, N.Y., during the years of 1895 and 1896. He returned to Georgia as general missionary of the Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society in 1897-98. From 1899 to 1903 he represented the American Sabbath Tract Society, as the manager of the southern branch office located in Columbus, Ga. During that time he collected about 30,000 names of heads of Baptist families and distributed among them over one million pages of Sabbath tracts. On July 29, 1903, his wife, who had been an invalid for several years, died.
On May 10, 1905, he was married to Mrs. Ida Stillman, who survives him.
In October of 1903 he received a call to become pastor of the Hammond (La.) Seventh Day Baptist Church, which he accepted and became pastor October 30.
