Organized from Union by Rev. Lewis Mayers, New Hope was Bulloch’s second Methodist church. Its 1804 trustees were David Kennedy, Josiah Everette, Jarvis Jackson, Burrell Whittington, and William M. Kennedy, and other leaders were Joseph Hodges, Eli Kennedy, and Lydia Anciaux. These leaders kept the Burke and Ohoopee Circuit records, the oldest in South Georgia. In 1806 William McGee Kennedy entered the itineracy, and later William McCall Kennedy, F.M. Kennedy, and H.A. Hodges also did so. Leadership at home and in the connectional church distinguished New Hope as it prepared for its third century.