Howard College in the years 1917 through 1921 was greatly unsettled by the war in Europe. J. M. Shelburne took a leave of absence from Howard's presidency in order to serve in the military. After his resignation in March 1918, Howard's trustees appointed dean of faculty John C. Dawson to serve as acting president. But Dawson, too, was soon granted a leave of absence to serve in the U.S. Army Education Corp in France. Mathematics professor Theophilus R. Eagles then served as acting president (or acting-acting president) until the trustees finally secured a new president in mid-summer 1919.
On paper, at least, North Carolina native Charles Bray Williams seems to have been an ideal choice for the presidency of Howard College. According to his daughter, Charlotte Williams Sprawls, Williams was "the scholar in a farm family of six children," who lashed his Latin book to the handles of a plow so he could study while working. By 1919, Williams had made a name for himself as a pastor and as a highly respected scholar and veteran professor of Greek and New Testament. His translation of the Greek New Testament, in progress while he served Howard, was an influential and important work, and remains in print. But, for all that, the Williams administration ended abruptly and bitterly.
