George Hewes tried his hand at farming in the early years in Illinois. Of this time M.A. Hewes writes, “There was no good market for farm products and he had a hard time financially. “I have heard him say that he hauled good wheat 30 miles to Warsaw and Nauvoo, the Mormon city, for $.35 per bushel, and dressedhogs for $1.50 per 100 lbs. One year the prairie fire ran through his place burning the corn in the field and wheat in the stack.”
“There were no churches in that section then, but the Methodist itinerant came along and Grandpa Avise opened his house for preaching and he and wife, my mother and I think an older brother Thomas Avise and wife with probably some others joined the M.E. Church and formed a class in Grandpa’s house. Probably during the 5th or 6th year of his residence here Father was converted and joined the church, and I can just remember his baptism and that of my brother Sam, then a babe, by a Methodist minister named Poole.” M.A. Hewes
M.A. relates a story from his childhood visit to his Grandpa Avise. During these years Grandfather Avise had moved to Carthage and was working at his trade of shoemaker. When I was some six years old they left me at Grandfather’s to attend school where I remained some six weeks. My teacher was A.W. Blakesley who afterward married Mother’s sister Hannah. When Father and Mother came to Carthage for me, they said I crawled under the table and laughed and cried for joy at seeing them again. I remember that Uncle Blakesley punished me once by splitting a quill pen and putting it astride my nose had me sit facing the school. Yet I have two cards in his handwriting certifying that Avise Hewes is a good boy in school.”
Matthias Avise writes about his own conversion. “…the time of my conversion was about the middle of March 1851.” Rev. Jesse Cromwell was the preacher on the Payson Circuit at the time. He was a Kentuckian, not a great preacher but a fine exhorter and held a fine meeting at the time mentioned. He had good social qualities, but was a slave to his pipe and tobacco. Mrs. George Sinnock left the Baptist church and joined the Methodists at that meeting. I had felt for months that I ought to be religious, and one night at this meeting as Bro. Cromwell was closing for the evening he warned the congregation not to slight the wooings of the Holy Spirit. I went forward two nights and on the second was to my own mind clearly and consciously forgiven my sins”.
Matthias Avis went on to become a preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church serving churches in northern Illinois until his death in 1904.