USA > North Carolina > Sketches of North Carolina, historical and biographical : illustrative of the principles of a portion of her early settlers > Part 13
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No minister of religion accompanied the first emigrants in 1746 and 1747; nor is it known that any came with any succeeding company till the year 1770, when the Rev. John McLeod came direct from Scotland and ministered to them for some time, though he was not the first preacher. This fact, that no minister of reli- gion came with these people, many of whom were pious, and all of whom were accustomed to attend on public worship, cannot easily be accounted for ; and it had an unhappy effect upon the emi- grants and upon their children. Without public ministrations of the ordinances of the gospel a sense of religion will soon begin to pass away from the public mind ; and the fire will be kept burning only on here and there a private altar. The wonder is that in the circumstances of these colonists the sense of religion was so well maintained under the ministrations and labors of one solitary preacher, James Campbell, who pursued his laborious course alone among the outspreading neighborhoods in what is now Cumberland and Robeson, from 1757 to 1770.
This worthy evangelist, the Rev. James Campbell, was born in Campbelton, on the peninsula of Kintyre, in Argyleshire, Scotland. Of his early history little is known ; and too little has been pre- served of his pioneer labors in later life. About the year 1730 he emigrated to America, a licensed preacher in the Presbyterian Church, and landed at Philadelphia. He soon became connected with a congregation of Scotch emigrants somewhere in Pennsyl- vania, and labored in the ministry with them for a time. His mind became clouded, and his heart full of fears, on the subject of his
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call to the ministry, and even of his own personal piety ; and he ceased to perform the duties of a minister, believing that it was wrong for him to preach. In this state of mind he heard the fa- mous Whitefield preach, as he was traversing the country, and sought an interview with him. This eminent servant of God heard him state his case, removed most of his difficulties, and encouraged him to resume his ministry. He labored for a time in Lancaster county, on the Coneweheog, where the Rev. Hugh McAden visited him, as is recorded in his journal. His attention being turned to his countrymen on the Cape Fear, Mr. Campbell emigrated to North Carolina in the year 1757, and took his residence on the left bank of the Cape Fear, a few miles above Fayetteville, nearly opposite to the Bluff church.
For a long time he held his Presbyterial connection with a Presbytery in South Carolina, which was never united with the Synod of Philadelphia. About the year 1773 his connection with Orange Presbytery was formed, and in that connection he con- tinued till his death in the year 1781. Mr. Campbell left behind him no papers or memoranda from which anything can be gleaned respecting his religious exercises, or ministerial labors ; but he has left traditions which sprung from the experience of the people of his charge, that he was a zealous laborious man, who never wearied in his work, from the time he came to Carolina, but spent his days in affectionate and unremitting efforts to bring men home to God through Christ. His labors had no bounds but his strength. It is probable that, for a time, he supplied the Scotch population at the rate of a Sabbath once in three or four to a neighborhood, the people going in many instances a long distance to attend the ministrations of the sanctuary, and glad to hear, even at distant intervals, the gospel of Christ.
It would be greatly gratifying to the church and the public generally could some pages of history, formed from the accredited doings of this laborious minister, be presented to the world. But for want of documents less place is given than his memory de- serves. God has been pleased to leave much of his doings covered up from posterity, to be revealed when the veil is taken off from all things.
His preaching places appear to have been three, for regular congregations, on the Sabbath, besides occasional and irregular preaching, as the necessities of the country required. For ten or twelve years he preached on the southwest side of the river below the Bluff, in a meeting-house near Roger McNeill's, and called
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"Roger's meeting-house." Here Hector McNeill (commonly called Bluff Hector) and Alexander McAlister, acted as Elders. After the death of Mr. Campbell, and about the year 1787, the "Bluff Church" was built, and Duncan McNeill (of the Bluff, Hector being dead) and Alexander McAlister, and perhaps others, officiated as Elders.
Soon after his removal to Carolina, Mr. Campbell commenced preaching at Alexander Clark's, and continued his appointments for a number of years. About the year 1746, John Dobbin, who had married the widow of David Alexander in Pennsylvania, and had resided in Virginia, near Winchester, about a year, removed to Carolina ; and, while the Alexander families that came with him took their abode on the Hico or the Yadkin, he fixed his residence on the Cape Fear, somewhat against the inclinations of his wife and step-daughter. The situations on the river being esteemed less healthy than those more remote, Mr. Dobbin and others took their abode on Barbacue ; and about the year 1758 Mr. Campbell began to preach at his house, and continued so to do till the " Barbacue Church" was built, about the year 1765 or 1766. The first Elders of this church were-Gilbert Clark, eldest son of Alexander Clark, and step-son of John Dobbin (having married Ann Alexander), one of the first magistrates of Cumberland county, under the Colonial Government,-Duncan Buie, who early in the Revolutionary war removed to the Cape Fear River, nearly opposite the Bluff Church,-Archibald Buie of Green Swamp,- and Daniel Cameron of the Hill. These men were pious, and devoted to the cause of religion and their duties as Elders ; and for their strict attention to their duties got the name of " the little ministers of Barbacue." The congregation, like the others under the care of Mr. Campbell, were trained in the old Scotch fashion of reading the Bible, attending church when practicable, and repeat- ing the Catechism; and were accustomed to follow the minister in his proof texts. It was of this congregation the Rev. John McLeod said, " he would rather preach to the most polished and fashionable congregation in Edinburgh than to the little critical carls of Barbacue." Not that they were so particularly captious about his manner and delivery, for he was esteemed an eloquent man, but they were so well-informed on the doctrines and usages of the church, that it required great particularity in his sermons to avoid their criticism. The kind of sermons demanded by that people might now seem novel or antiquated, but would be found full of instruction ; and even their length would be no objection in
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congregations that can hear the gospel but once in a month or six weeks.
Barbacue church was the place of worship of Flora McDonald, while she lived at Cameron's Hill, and though the congregation is less extended and flourishing than in former years, it is still in existence. May it revive and flourish !
Mr. Campbell also began to preach soon after his coming to Carolina, at McKay's, now known as Long Street, one of the places visited by Mr. McAden in his first journey through Caro- lina. A church was built about the year 1765 or '66, the time at which Barbacue was built. The first elders were Malcom Smith, Archibald McKay, and Archibald Ray. This congregation is still in existence, and though much curtailed in extent and numbers, flourishes.
These three congregations were the principal places of Mr. Campbell's preaching, and for a time accommodated the greater part of the Scotch settled in Cumberland. As the emigration continued new neighborhoods were formed, and the limits of these congregations contracted : and one after another the numerous churches in Cumberland, Robeson, Moore and Richmond, and Bladen, were gathered, some of which now surpass in numbers these ancient mothers.
At the time Mr. Campbell labored in Cumberland, the larger number of the people used the Gaelic language ; some could use both that and the English ; and there were some Lowland Scotch, and a few Scotch-Irish families, and some Dutch that could not use the Gaelic : divine service was therefore performed in both languages. Mr. Campbell, to accommodate his hearers, preached two sermons each Sabbath, one in English and one in Gaelic ; this he did in all three of his churches. In a few congregations, in the Presbytery of Fayetteville, this practice of preaching in the two languages is still continued. The influence of this language has been great upon the Scotch settlements in Carolina. There have been some disadvantages attending it, and the language is fast passing away. But for a long time it was a bond of union, and a preservation of those feelings and principles peculiar to the Scotch emigrants, many of which ought to be preserved for ever. The change has been so gradual in putting off the Gaelic, and adopting the English, that the people of Cumberland have suffered as little, from a change of their language, as any people that have ever undergone that unwelcome process. They have retained the
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faith and habits of their ancestors, things most commonly thrown away or changed by a change of the common dialect.
Mr. Campbell, for a few years, had an assistant in the ministry. The Rev. John McLeod came from Scotland some time in the year 1770, accompanied by a large number of families from the Highlands, who took their residence upon the upper and lower Little Rivers, in Cumberland county. Barbacue and Long Street were part of the places in which he preached during the three years he remained in Carolina. In the year 1773, he left Ame- rica with the view of returning to his native land ; being never heard of afterwards, it is supposed that he found a watery grave. He was a man of eminent piety, great worth, and popular elo- quence.
With this exception it is not known that he had any ministerial brother residing in Cumberland, or the adjoining counties, that could assist him in preaching to the Gaels. McAden, who. preached in Duplin, could give him no assistance where the lan- guage of the Highlanders was the vernacular tongue.
How the congregations of the Scotch maintained so much of a spirit of piety and true religion, can be accounted for on no other principles, than the pious, devoted labors of Mr. Campbell and his elders, accompanied by the blessing of the Holy Spirit. The children were taught the catechism, and called to frequent exami- nations by the church officers ; and the Bible was much read ; and family religion very generally maintained. These forms were kept up even after the spirit of godliness had much decayed, in the old age of Mr. Campbell, and by the confusion and strifes and bloodshed of the Revolution, which were felt in all their terrors on the Cape Fear.
Since the Revolution the congregations of the Scotch have been much better supplied with ministers than previously ; but it is doubtful whether family government and religion are as carefully attended to now as in former days. One reason of the small supply of ministers, before the Revolution, may have been in the fact, that the emigrants, while in Scotland, had been accustomed to the division of the country into parishes by the civil authority, and the collection of the ministers' support by law, in some pa- rishes having a qualified voice in the choice of their pastor, and in others possessing no right of choice worth naming. In Carolina, all interference of law was to divide the county into parishes for the establishment of the English National Church, to which these emigrants were greatly averse. After the revolutionary war,
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necessity led the Scotch to voluntary efforts for the support of their ministers, and these efforts were attended with success ; and their descendants ei joy gospel privileges in as high a degree as any section of the southern and western States. The Scotch-Irish had been more accustomed to these efforts in Ireland, being left to provide for their own ministers by voluntary gifts, after they had paid what the law required for the national clergy. They were more active in Carolina, before the Revolution, than the Scotch ; after that event, the efforts of both are worthy of high commen- dation®
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CHAPTER XI.
THE POLITICAL OPINIONS OF THE SCOTCH EMIGRANTS.
THE Scotch, never, in the land of their fathers, or in the United States of America, have been inclined to radicalism, or the prostra- tion of all law. In their warmest aspirations for the liberty of choosing their own rulers, or framing, or consenting to the laws, by which they should be governed, they always acknowledged the ne- cessity of law and order; in fact, they never asked for anything else. The general run of Scottish history shows the nation to have been in favor of a government of sufficient strength to control its subjects in the exercise of their passions, and defend them from aggression and violence.
They have ever been strenuous that their rulers should govern according to some established law, well known and understood, to which reference should be had in cases of dispute among themselves, or with their rulers ; and to the decision of this law, fairly inter- preted, there should be no opposition while the law was unrepealed.
They contended that there is of necessity an agreement between the rulers and the people, the one, to govern by these fixed laws, and the other, to obey the directiona given by the constituted au- thorities.
They ever contended that there is a conscience towards God, paramount to all human control ; and for the government of their conscience in all matters of morality and religion, the Bible is the storehouse of information,-acknowledging no Lord of the consci- ence, but the Son of God, the head of the Church, Jesus Christ ; and the Bible as his divine communication for the welfare and guide of mankind.
They have held that tyranny and usurpation may be set aside by force ; that, in extreme cases, revolution by force is the natural right of man ; not a revolution to throw down authority, and give license to passion, but a revolution to first principles, and to the unalienable rights of man.
On these principles, they formed their various Covenants. The first made in 1557, Dec. 3d, and the second on 31st of May, 1559; in both of which the leading men, and many others, bind themselves
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to maintain their religion against all opposition from any and every quarter. The first National Covenant of Scotland was drawn up by John Craig, and sometimes has been called Craig's Confession ; was publicly owned and signed by the king himself, his household, and the greater part of the nobility and gentry, throughout the kingdom, in 1581; the signing of it being greatly promoted through the country by the ministers of religion. The same cove- nant, with many additions, was publicly signed, with great solem- nity, by the people in Edinburgh, Feb. 28th, 1638. By this, they all bound themselves to preserve, at all hazards, their religious rights and liberties against opposers. And finally, the SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT, drawn up by Alexander Henderson, and read by him in the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, on the 17th of August, 1643, and was received and approved, with emotions of the deepest solemnity and awe, with whispered thanks- givings and prayers. It was then carried to the Convention of States, and by them unanimously ratified; subsequently, it was sent to London, where, on the 25th Sept. of the same year, it was accepted and subscribed by the English Parliament and the Assem- bly of Westminster Divines ; and afterwards carried over to Ireland, and taken generally, by the congregations of Presbyterians, in Ulster province. The services attending the signing of this import- ant instrument were solemn and protracted, not only in Scotland, but in England and in Ireland.
This Solemn League and Covenant, so generally taken, bound the United Kingdoms to endeavor the preservation of the Reformed Religion in the Church of Scotland, in doctrine, discipline, and government,-and the Reformation of Religion in England and Ireland according to the Word of God, and the example of the best. reformed Churches,-the extirpation of Popery and Prelacy,-the defence of the King's person, authority, and honor,-and the pre- servation and defence of the true Religion and Liberties of the kingdom, in peace and quietness. Hetherington, a writer of note, in his History of the Church of Scotland, thus writes : "Perhaps no great international transaction has ever been so much misrepre- sented and maligned, as the Solemn League and Covenant. Even its defenders have often exposed it, and its authors, to severe cen- sures, by their unwise mode of defence. There can be no doubt in the mind of any intelligent and thoughtful man, that on it mainly rests, under Providence, the noble structure of the British constitu- tion. But for it, so far as man may judge, these kingdoms would have been placed beneath the deadening bondage of absolute despot-
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ism ; and in the fate of Britain, the liberty and civilisation of the world would have sustained a fatal paralyzing shock. This con- sideration alone might be sufficient to induce the statesman to pause, before he ventures to condemn the Solemn League and Cove- nant. But to the Christian, we may suggest still loftier thoughts. The great principles of that sacred bond are those of the Bible itself. It may be that Britain was not then, and is not yet, in a fit state to receive them, and to make them her principles and rules of national government and law; but they are not, on that account, untrue, nor even impracticable : and the glorious predictions of the inspired Scriptures foretell a time when they will be more than realized, and when all the kingdoms of this earth shall become the kingdoms of Jehovah, and of his anointed, and all shall be united in one solemn league and covenant under the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And who may presume to say that the seemingly pre- mature and ineffectual attempt to realize it by the heavenly-minded patriarchs of Scotland's second Reformation, was not the first faint struggling day-beam piercing the world's thick darkness, and reveal- ing to the eye of faith an earnest of the rising of the Sun of Right- eousness ? A sacred principle was then infused into the heart of na- tions which cannot perish ; a light then shone into the world's dark- ness which cannot be extinguished; and generations not remote may see that principle quickening and evolving in all its irresistible might, and that light bursting forth in its all-brightening glory."
" It has often been said the Covenanters were circumvented by the English Parliament, and were drawn into a league with men who meant only to employ them for their own purposes, and then either cast them off, or subdue them beneath a sterner sway than that of Charles. Were it even so, it might prove the treachery of the English, but would expose the Covenanters to no heavier accu- sations than that of unsuspecting simplicity of mind. They ought to have first ascertained, men say, what form of church government England intended to adopt, before they had consented to the League. And yet the same accusers fiercely condemn the Scottish Covenanters for attempting to force their own Presbyterian forms upon the people of England. The former accusation manifestly destroys the latter. That the Covenanters did not attempt to force Presbyterianism upon England, is proved by the fact, that they entered into the league without any such specific stipulation, be- cause it was contrary to their principles either to submit to force in matters of religion, or to attempt using force against other free Christian men. It argues, therefore, ignorance both of their prin-
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ciples and of their conduct, to bring against them an accusation so groundless and so base. They consented to lend their aid to Eng- land in her day of peril, in which peril they were themselves in- volved ; but they left to England's assembled divines the grave and responsible task of reforming their own church ; lending, merely, as they were requested, the assistance of some of their own most learned, pious, and experienced ministers, to promote the great and holy enterprise. For that they have been and will be blamed by wit- lings, Sciolists and Infidel philosophers ; but what England's best and greatest men sought with earnest desire, and received with re- spect and gratitude, Scotland need never be ashamed that her vene- rable covenanted fathers did not decline to grant."
" And let it be carefully observed, that the difference between the conduct of the English Parliament in the great civil war, and of the Covenanters in their time of struggle, consisted in and was caused by this-that in England it was essentially a contest in de- fence, or for the assertion of civil liberty,-in Scotland for religious purity and freedom. England's fierce wars for civil liberty laid her and her unfortunate assistant prostrate beneath the feet of an iron- hearted usurper and despot. Scotland's calm and bloodless defence of religious purity and freedom secured to her those all-inestimable blessings, broke the chains of her powerful neighbor, revealed to mankind a principle of universal truth and might, and poured into her own crushed heart a stream of life, sacred, immortal, and divine."
The famous book Lex Rex, by Rev. Samuel Rutherford, was full of principles that lead to republican action, as the Scotch generally have understood republicanism,-to be governed by rulers chosen, and by laws framed according to the will of the people,-and reli- gious liberty untouched.
These great principles the Scotch brought with them to America ; they are still held by their descendants, who differ from their parent stock in insisting on and enjoying the form of government, which, while it protects the citizens, is elective, and is executed by the same persons but a short time in continuance. On the other side of the water, the Scotch enjoy but an implied choice in their here- ditary monarch, and but in part that freedom of conscience, and that liberty from legislative interference in matters of religion, they aimed at in their National Covenant.
James I. had signed the first National Covenant, and Charles II., on his being crowned at Scone, by the Scotch, January 1st, 1651, heard the National Covenant and the solemn League and Covenant
1
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read, and solemnly swore to keep them both; and when the oath to defend the Church of Scotland was administered to him, kneeling and holding up his right hand, he uttered the following awful vow : " By the Eternal and Almighty God, who liveth and reigneth for ever, I shall observe and keep all that is contained in this oath."
Now with men who had felt that it was right to bind a heredi- tary monarch by a solemn covenant, to which they bound them- selves, and who, in emigrating to North Carolina, had come, some of them of their own free will, with the expectation of enjoying more liberty and acquiring more property, and some on compulsion, to save their lives after the rebellion of 1748, and loaded with a solemn oath of allegiance as part of the conditions of pardon ; and in Carolina kept a part of them in ignorance of the real state of the country, and imposed upon by the representations of the Gov- ernor, in whom they trusted,-it is not at all strange there should be difference of opinion and action as the revolutionary struggle came on. Some were ready to carry out their principles at once,- and were republicans, doing away at once all hereditary claims to the throne or chair of state. Others had not felt the evils com- plained of in Carolina to any great degree, and were not hasty to enter into a contest. Others felt themselves bound to obey the king, to whose government and person they had taken the solemn oath of allegiance, as a condition of their spared lives. And some were so convinced that the king's forces could not be successfully resisted,-and from what they knew or heard from their nation's ex- perience, they had some cause to fear,-that it was better to bear the evils they endured, than to suffer greater after a crushed rebel- lion. One man, William Bourk, was heard to say in the winter of 1776, that " we should all be subdued by the month of May, by the king's troops ; that General Gage ought to have let the Guards out to Bunker Hill, and it would have settled the dispute at that time ;" and for this he was brought before the provincial council, March 2d, 1776, and acknowledged his words, and added,-" he wished the time would happen this instant, but was sure the Americans would be subdued by the month of August ;" whereupon he was sent to Halifax and committed to close gaol till further orders.
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