William Daniel Best
From BrethrenPedia
William Daniel Best, better known as "Rev. W.D. Best", was a Methodist Episcopal pastor in Petersburg, Virginia that officiated the first wedding held at Matoaca Gospel Hall in Virginia, on Nov. 8, 1899, between Samuel McEwen (Petersburg tailor) and Annie Johnson (of Mataoca), as reported in the Virginian-Pilot newspaper of Norfolk a day afterward. It was also reported that the "Rev. Henry Turner", of Richmond, who was a returning missionary from Africa had given a preceding Gospel meeting that day.
William was a Confederate veteran of the Civil War as a hospital steward on the CSS Beaufort gunboat under the authority of Dr. James Edward Moyler (1841-1909). He was a conscript at Camp Lee, Company A, and finished his duty as a Private.
Best was a native of Sussex Co., but had lived in Petersburg for many years, which is also where he died in 1903, and was one point a member of the Virginia Methodist Episcopal Conference, and had also pastored the Blandford Methodist Episcopal Church. It is not presently known whether he had been converted to the Brethren, prior to officiating the wedding at Matoaca Gospel Hall or not, but this was just a couple years after the opening of the Hall, after spiritually profitable tent meetings from itinerant assembly evangelists.
He was born on July 24, 1835, and married Mary Frances Partridge (1842-1917) on Sept 1, 1859 at Sussex, Virginia. They had three children, Edwin Best (1866-1921), and Mary Daniel Best (1862-1927), neither of which married. The third was Riddick Harwood Best (1879-1948), who married Blanche Mondell. They had one child, Mary Alice Best (b. 1919 Petersburg, VA - d. 2016 Jacksonville, FL) who married Kermit Osborne Bishop (b. 1914 Norwood, GA - d. 1998 Waycross, GA), and they had two children.
It was reported in the June 4, 1903 issue of The Times Dispatch of Richmond that "Rev. W.D. Best conducted the prayer meeting at First Baptist Church" that evening.
Also noted on Sept. 15, 1903 in the Times Dispatch in announcing his death, that he had died at his home on Halifax Street (in Petersburg), the funeral took place that afternoon at Washington-Street Methodist Church, and had been for many years a local Methodist preacher but he had "not been actively engaged in ministerial work for some years", which might lend itself to speculation that it was less advertised ministerial work, as is often more preferential in the Brethren.
