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ISTORY OF
ST. MARK'S PARISH
CULPEPER CO., VA.
Olin F 232 32 543
CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES ITHACA, N. Y. 14853
JOHN M. OLIN LIBRARY
Cornell University Library
F 232.S2S63
A history of St. Mark's Parish, Culpeper 3 1924 010 323 511 alın
UN
R
Y 9981
IN
D
A
Cornell University Library
The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library.
There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text.
http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924010323511
A HISTORY
OF
ST. MARK'S PARISH
CULPEPER COUNTY, VIRGINIA, :
WITH NOTES OF
OLD CHURCHES AND OLD FAMILIES,
AND ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE
Manners and Customs of the Olden Time.
BY
REV. PHILIP SLAUGHTER, D. D. Rector of Emmanuel Church, Culpeper Co., Va.
AUTHOR OF THE HISTORIES OF ST. GEORGE'S AND BRISTOL PARISHES, VA.
-1877.
2 INNES & COMPANY, 1 Printers, BALTIMORE, MD.
THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
-
The author believes that he was the first person who conceived the idea of writing a history of the old parishes in Virginia upon the basis of the old vestry-books and registers. Thirty years ago be published the History of Bristol Parish (Petersburg), of which he was then rector. In 1849 he published the History of St. George's Parish, in Spotsylvania. His labors were then suspended by ill-health, and he went abroad, never expecting to resume them. This personal evil resulted in the general good. Bishop Meade, the most competent of all men for this special task, was indueed to take up the subjeet, and the result was the valuable work, "The Old Churches and Families of Virginia," in which the author's histories of St. George and Bristol Parishes, and some other materials which he had gathered, were incorporated. The author, in his old age, returns to his first love, and submits to the public a history of his native parish of St. Mark's. The reader will please bear in mind that this is not a general history of the civil and social institutions within the bounds of this parish, and yet he will find in it many incidental illustrations of these subjects. He must also be reminded that it does not
iv
PREFACE.
purport to be a history of Christianity in its varied forms and polities within the lines of St. Mark's. That would open a large field, which the author has not time or strength now to traverse. He means, therefore, no disrespect to other Christian polities and. peoples (among whom are numbered many valued friends and relatives) in omitting all reference to them. In this respect he has followed the example of the parish records, which are the bases of this history, and in which there is not one word about Christians of other names, from the first organization of St. Mark's Parish, in 1731, to the present moment. The vestry abstained in like manner from political allusion ; for while keeping up its organization and records during the whole of the American Revolu- tion, the only allusion to an event which so absorbed men's minds is the following entry :- " Capt. Richard Yancey is appointed a vestryman in place of Major John Green, in Continental service."
Church history in Virginia may be distributed into several eras, the observation of which will make it more intelligible. The first is the Era of the Church of England in the Colony and Dominion of Virginia. This covers the whole period from the first plantation of Jamestown to the American Revo- lution. During this period the Church was in bondage to the State, which never allowed it to organize. For political reasons it was not permitted to have a bishop; and there were no ordinations or
V
PREFACE.
confirmations during the whole colonial term. Can- didates for orders had to make the then costly, pro- tracted and perilous voyage across the sea. Some of them could not pay the expense, and others were lost at sea, while some died of the small-pox in London, which was very fatal before the use of vaccination. The Church was not only denied an executive head, but it had no legislature. It had no authority to pass a law, enact a canon, or inflict a penalty, not even for the discipline of its own ministers and members; and it never performed one of these functions.
The second era may be called the Transition Age, during which the ties that bound it to the State were one by one severed ; and this lasted from 1776 to the first organization of the Protestant Episcopal Church of Virginia, in 1785, when it became free, although its organization was not perfected until the election of its first bishop (Madison).
The next era may be called the Era of Decline, when the Episcopal Church was staggering under the odium of having been an established church, which lasted until William Meade, William Wilmer, William Hawley, Oliver Norris, and such like, came upon the stage, and elected Richard Channing Moore, of New York, to be their leader. Then began the Era of Revival ; after a torpid winter, an awaken- ing spring followed by a fruitful summer. To this season we may apply the words of Shakspeare, but in a higher sense :- 1
vi
PREFACE.
"Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this son of York ; And all the clouds that lowered upon our house, In the deep bosom of the ocean buried " ---
While we recognize and rejoice in the good that has been done by other Christian ministers outside of our fold, we too may be permitted to rejoice that our Virginian Episcopal Roll is " without a blemish "; and that their hands have been upheld by a goodly and growing company of preachers, who have re- kindled the fires upon many an old altar where the sparrow had found her an house, and the swallow a nest for herself, even thine altars, O Lord God of Hosts ! my King and my God.
SUGGESTIONS TO OUR READERS.
In such an almost countless number of names and dates as occur in this book, it must needs be that errors of the pen or of the press will creep in. If those who detect them will kindly communicate them to the author, he will gladly correct them in a new edition ; the proposed first edition having been ordered in anticipation of publication. If the reader will bear in mind the following facts it will facilitate his understanding of this history. In 1720 Spots- sylvania County was taken from Essex, King and Queen and King William, whose jurisdiction hitherto extended to the great mountains. St: George's
vii
PREFACE.
Parish, coterminous with Spotsylvania, was formed by the same Act. In 1731 St. Mark's was taken from St. George. In 1734 Orange was formed from Spot- sylvania. In 1740 St. Thomas was taken from St. Mark's. In 1748 Culpeper was formed from Orange. In 1752 Bromfield Parish was taken from St. Mark's. In 1792 Madison County was taken from Culpeper. In 1831 Rappahannock County was formed from Culpeper, and in 1838 the County of Greene was taken from the County of Orange.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.
Besides the acknowledgments made in the body of this work, the author is under obligations to Isaac Winston, Jr., for volunteering to transcribe his entire manuscript into a fair band-a task almost as difficult as the interpretation of hieroglyphical char- acters by Oriental scholars. I am indebted for a like favor to Rev. Dr. Randolph, of Emmanuel Church, Baltimore, for volunteering to read the proof-sheets as they passed through the press ; and to the Rev. Dr. Dalrymple, the Hon. Hugh Blair Grigsby, Mr. R. A. Brock, of the Virginia Historical Society, Dr. Andrew Grinnan, of Madison, Mr. George Mason Williams, of Culpeper, Col. Edward McDonald, of Louisville, to the gentlemen of the press, and to many correspondents too numerous to be named, for aid and sympathy in his work.
INDEX.
ST. MARK'S PARISH. PAGE
SIR ALEXANDER SPOTSWOOD, Lieutenant-Governor of Virginia : His Ancestry, Birth, Marriage, Administration, Death, Burial, Descendants, and Relation to St. Mark's Parish, 1
ORGANIZATION OF ST. MARK'S PARISH,.
6
FIRST MINISTER OF ST. MARE'S, 16
REV. JOHN THOMPSON,
18
CULPEPER COUNTY,
23
THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CHURCH IN VIRGINIA, 45
REV. JOEN WOODVILLE, 49
REV. JOHN COLE,
.
62
THE SUCCESSORS OF THE REV. MR. COLE, 69
PRESENT STATUS OF THE CHURCHES IN ST. MARK'S,
71
ST. THOMAS PARISH, Orange County,
73
BROMFIELD PARISH,
·
.
79
HISTORICAL EXCURSIONS.
THE KNIGHTS OF THE GOLDEN HORSESHOE, . 83
GERMANNA,
97
DIARY OF CAPTAIN PHILIP SLAUGHTER, beginning in 1775 and continued to 1849, 106
LEWIS LITTLEPAGE,
. 109
THE TOBACCO PLANT, .
114
GENEALOGIES.
THE BARBOUR FAMILY, . 118
THE CARTER FAMILY, 121
THE CAVE FAMILY, 122
THE CLAYTONS,
125
THE COLEMANS,
128
THE CONWAY FAMILY,
129
x
INDEX.
TEE FIELDS, . 130
TEE FRE FAMILY,
. 132
TEE GARNETT FAMILY,
134*
THE GLASSELL FAMILY,
136
THE GREEN FAMILY, .
138
THE LIGHTFOOTS,
142
THE MADISON FAMILY,
144
TRE PENDLETON FAMILY,
148
THE SLAUGHTER FAMILY,
157
THE SPOTSWOOD FAMILY, .
165
THE REV. JAMES STEVENSON,
168
THE STROTBER FAMILY,
169
THE TAYLOR FAMILY, 172
FAMILY OF THE REV. JOHN THOMPSON, 174
THE WILLIAMS FAMILY OF CULPEPER, 177
THE WINSTON-HENRY GENEALOGY, 183
REV. JOHN WOODVILLE, .
192
LIEUT .- GENERAL AMBROSE POWELL HILL, 193
THE BROADUS FAMILY,
.
194
MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS.
TEE BROWN FAMILY, .
195
MEDICAL MEN IN CULPEPER BEFORE THE REVOLUTION, 195
THE LAWYERS,
. 196
TOWNS IN CULPEPER, .
196
Stevensburg ; Clerksburg, not Clarksburg ; Jefferson; Spring- field ; Jamestown.
BRICK MAKING IN VIRGINIA,
. 198
VESTRYMEN OF ST. MARK'S,
. 198
St. Mark's garish.
SIR ALEXANDER SPOTSWOOD, LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR OF VIRGINIA,
HIS ANCESTRY, BIRTH, MARRIAGE, ADMINISTRATION, DEATH, BURIAL, DESCENDANTS, AND RELATION TO ST. MARK'S PARISH.
A history of St. Mark's Parish, in which Governor Spotswood did not have a prominent place, would be like a portrait with the most prominent feature left out. Not only was he a sagacious statesman, a gal- lant cavalier, a brave and dashing soldier ; but he was also a devout Church of England man, ready to enter the lists as her champion against all comers, not excepting the vestries, who were the advocates of the people's rights, and the miniature Parliaments in which the leading statesmen of the American Revo- lution were trained. He was the largest landed proprietor within the bounds of the parish; he founded the first town (Germanna), he developed the first mines, and erected the first iron furnace in America. He. erected, chiefly at his own expense, the first parish church, and organized and equipped, at Germanna, "The Knights of the Golden Horse- shoc," who first passed the Blue Ridge, and blazed the way to the Valley of Virginia, and whose whole
A
2
ST. MARK'S PARISH.
course was within the limits of the original parish of St. Mark's.
Governor Spotswood was the great-grandson of John Spotswood, Archbishop of St. Andrew's, and author of the History of the Church of Scotland. His grandfather was Robert Spotswood, Lord Presi- dent of the College of Justice, and author of the " Practicks of the Laws of Scotland," who was one of the eight eminent lawyers executed by the Par- liament of Scotland, which (according to Sir Walter Scott) consisted wholly of Covenanters. While he was at private prayer on the scaffold (says Sir Walter) he was interrupted by the Presbyterian minister in attendance, who asked if he did not desire bis prayers and those of the people. Sir Robert replied that he earnestly desired the prayers of the people, but not those of the preacher; for that, in his opinion, God had expressed his displeasure against Scotland by sending a lying spirit into the mouths of the prophets. The father of Governor Spotswood was Dr. Robert Spotswood, physician to the Governor of Tangiers in Africa, and his mother had been Mrs. Catherine Elliott. Dr. Spotswood died at Tangiers in 1688, leaving one son, the subject of this notice, who was born in 1676. Governor Spotswood, " who had been bred in the army," was aide to the Duke of Marl- borough, and was badly wounded in the breast at the battle of Blenheim.
His arrival in Virginia, says Campbell, was grected with joy, because he brought with him the right of Habeas Corpus - a right guaranteed to every Englishman by Magna Charta, but hitherto denied to Virginians. Spotswood entered upon his duties as Governor in 1710, and the two Houses of the General
3
SIR ALEXANDER SPOTSWOOD.
Assembly, severally, returned thanks for their relief from long imprisonment, and appropriated more than two thousand pounds for completing the Governor's palace. Although he was, in accordance with the dominant doctrines of his day, a strenuous advocate of the Royal prerogative in Church and State, yet he was one of the most energetic, patriotic and far- seeing statesmen that ever ruled Virginia. He first suggested a chain of forts from the Lakes to the Mississippi (beyond the Alleghanies) to check the encroachments of the French; but many years elapsed before his suggestion and policy were adopted. It was he who conceived the idea of making tobacco notes a circulating medium. His military genius and experience enabled him to wield the militia with great effect against the hostile Indians ; but he was no less zealous in the conception and execution of measures for their civilization and conversion to Christianity, as the Indian school at Christanna on the Meherin river, and the fund of £1000 for instructing their children at William and Mary College, attest. In 1739 he was made Deputy Postmaster-General for the Colonies; and it was he (says Campbell) who pro- moted Benjamin Franklin to be postmaster for the province of Pennsylvania.
Governor Spotswood died at Annapolis, on his way to command the army against Carthagena, and was buried at Temple Farm, one of his old country-seats near Yorktown, so named from a house in the garden erected by Governor Spotswood as a cemetery. Dr. Shield, who bought the farm in 1834, says, "the walls of the temple were then only several feet high : within them I found heaps of broken tombstones, and on putting the fragments together, I found the name of Governor Spotswood."
4
ST. MARK'S PARISH.
It was in the Temple Farm mansion that Lord Cornwallis met Washington and signed the articles of capitulation which secured American independence.
There is some verbal discrepancy between the authorities about the name of the lady whom Governor Spotswood married. Bishop Meade, upon the authority of a daughter of General Alexander Spotswood, says that her name was Jane Butler, sister of the Duke of Ormond. Charles Campbell, our painstaking historian, says her name was Butler Bryan (pronounced Brain), daughter of Richard Bryan, of Westminster, and her Christian name was after James Butler, Duke of Ormond, her godfather. On the other hand, several of her lineal descendants have informed the present writer that Mrs. Spots- wood was the daughter of Richard Brayne, " whose letters to his daughter show him to have been a man of culture." The name of Butler Brayne has been perpetuated in this branch of the family to this day, which raises a strong presumption that it is the true orthography.
Since the above was written I have procured, through the medium of Judge Barton and Capt. George Minor of Fredericksburg, documentary proof which settles the vexed question, in the form of a letter written by Judge Edmond Pendleton for his client John Benger, the son of Dorothea (Col. Byrd's Miss Thecky) Brayne, sister of Lady Spotswood. The letter is dated Virginia, Sept. 8th, 1762, and is addressed to Capt. Wm. Fox, and is signed by John Benger and Edmond Pendleton, and in it is the fol- lowing paragraph :- " Richard Brayne and his wife are dead, and Mrs. Brayne's issue was four daughters, Anne, Diana, Dorothy, and Butler. Dorothy inter-
5
SIR ALEXANDER SPOTSWOOD.
married with Elliot Benger, gentleman, and, with her husband, is since dead, and I am her son and heir. Butler intermarried with Major-General Alexander Spotswood, and afterwards married John Thompson (Clerk). She is dead, and Alexander Spotswood, infant, is her grandson and heir, and is now in England. Anne and Diana remained in England and never married."
Governor Spotswood had four children, John, Robert, Anne Catherine, and Dorothea. John mar- ried, in 1745, Mary, daughter of Capt. Dandridge, of the British army, and had two sons, General Alexander and Capt. John, both officers of the Revo- lution; and two daughters, Mary and Ann. John, son of John and grandson of the Governor, married Mary Rousee of Essex, and had many children. General Alexander Spotswood, grandson of the Governor, married Elizabeth, daughter of Augustine and niece of General Washington. Robert, second son of the Governor, was an officer under Washing- ton in 1755, and was killed by the Indians. Anne Catherine (Kate) married Bernard Moore, of Chelsea in King William ; and their daughter married Charles Carter of Shirley, and was the grandmother of our Chevalier Bayard (sans peur et sans reproche), General Robert Edward Lee, named after two of his uncles, Robert and Edward Carter.
Kate Spotswood, Mrs. B. Moore, was a great beauty. The late Mrs. Dunbar of Falmouth, a granddaughter of Lady Spotswood, had seen her, and was so im- pressed by the vision, that, with true womanly instinct, she remembered, after the lapse of many years, the details of her dress, which we reproduce for the benefit of our lady readers. It was a
6
ST. MARK'S PARISH.
fawn-colored satin, square in the neck, over a blue satin petticoat, with satin shoes and buckles to match, on very small and beautifully shaped feet. A granddaughter of Kate, now living in a green old. age, says that when she was a little girl she saw Kate sitting up in her bed at Chelsea, combing her white and silken hair, with a servant holding up a looking-glass before her.
There is a portrait of Governor Spotswood at Chelsea, and there was another at Sedley Lodge in Orange (now in the State Library at Richmond), which the author of this historical tract had daguer- reotyped. It represents him in full dress, scarlet velvet - graceful and commanding in face and figure -antique model of the cavalier-the old English and the old Virginia gentleman, who are as much alike as father and son. What a grand genealogical treel-with General Sir Alexander Spotswood its root in Virginia, and Robert Edward Lee its bright, consummate flower.
ORGANIZATION OF ST. MARK'S PARISH.
The Register of St. Mark's Parish, which lies before me, is the oldest manuscript record in the county of Culpeper. The parish is older than the county by eighteen years, the former having been established by Act of Assembly in 1730, and the latter in 1748. It is conrious to note the progress of popula- tion, and parishes and counties, from their original seats on tidewater towards the mountains. The people went before, the parishes followed after, and the counties completed the organization, according
7
ORGANIZATION.
to the uniform policy of the British Government to keep the Church and State in union.
In 1634 the colony of Virginia was divided by the House of Burgesses into eight counties, or shires, as they were then called. In 1692 the old county of Rappahannock was extinguished, and its territory distributed into the counties of Richmond on the north, and Essex on the south, side of the Rappahan- nock River. The movement of the growing popula- tion was along the banks of the rivers, on account of the greater productiveness of the soil, and the facili- ties of transportation, in the absence of roads in the intervening wilderness. Thus early in the eigh- teenth century the settlement had passed the Falls of the Rappahannock and reached the Rapid Ann River, where a colony of Germans had seated them- selves, and Lieutenant-Governor Spotswood had established a furnace and built a " castle," in which he occasionally resided.
Over the new settlement a new county and a new parish were erected in 1720. The preamble to the Act of Assembly declares that " the frontiers towards the high mountains being exposed to danger from the Indians and the French settlement towards the west, a new county is established, bordering upon Snow Creek up to the Mill, thence by a southwest course to the North Anna, thence up the said river as far as convenient, and thence by a line over the high mountains to the river Shenandoah, so as to include the North Pass through said mountains; thence down said river till it comes against the head of Rappahannock River, and down that river to the mouth of Snow Creek; which tract of land shall become a county by the name of Spotsylvania, and
8
ST. MARK'S PARISH.
the whole county shall be one parish, by the name of St. George."
The Act also appropriated five hundred pounds for a church, courthouse, pillory and stocks, where the Governor shall appoint. Another clause appropri- ates one thousand pounds for arms and ammunition, to such " Christian tithables " as shall go to seat this county. The county of Brunswick was established by the same law. The inhabitants were made free of levies for ten years. The same privilege is ex- tended to Germans and other foreign Protestants, " who may not understand English readily," if they will entertain a minister of their own.
It will be observed that the movement of coun- ties, parishes and people, by way of Spotsylvania and Brunswick, was towards the northern and south- ern passes through the " high mountains," to trans- cend which and see what lay beyond was the great problem of the day.
The Rev. Hugh Jones, one of the Colonial clergy, in his "Present State of Virginia," published about 1724, says :- " Beyond Governor Spotswood's furnace, within view of the vast mountains, he has founded a town called Germanna, from some Germans sent over by Queen Ann, who are now removed up further. Here he has servants and workmen of most handi- craft trades, and he is building a church, courthouse, and dwelling-house for himself, and with his ser- vants and negroes he has cleared plantations about it, proposing great encouragement for people to come and settle in that uninhabited part of the world, lately divided into a county."
Colonel Byrd, of Westover, on James River, an accomplished gentleman, an adventurous traveller,
9
ORGANIZATION.
and inimitable humorist, visited Colonel Spotswood in 1732, and indites the following pleasant gossip on the occasion :
" The famous town of Germanna consists of Colonel Spotswood's enchanted castle on one side, and a baker's dozen of ruinous tenements on the other, where so many German families had dwelt some years ago, but are now removed ten miles higher, in the Fork of the Rappahannock, to land of their own. There had also been a chapel about a bow-shot from the Colonel's house, at the end of an avenue of cherry trees, but some pious people had lately burnt it down, with intent to get another built nearer their own homes. Here I arrived about three o'clock, and found only Mrs. Spotswood at home, who received her old acquaintance with many a gracious smile. I was carried into a room elegantly set off with pier glasses, the largest of which came soon after to an odd misfortune. Among other favorite animals which cheered this lady's solitude, a brace of tame deer ran familiarly about the house, and one of them came to stare at me as a stranger, but unluckily spying his own figure in the glass, he made a spring over the tea-table that stood under it, and shattered the glass to pieces, and falling back upon the tea- table, made a terrible fracas among the china. This exploit was so sudden, and accompanied with such noise, that it surprised me and perfectly frightened Mrs. Spotswood. But it was worth all the damage to show the moderation and good humor with which she bore the disaster. In the evening the noble Colonel came home from his mines, who saluted me very civilly; and Mrs. Spotswood's sister, Miss Thecky, who had been to meet him, en cavalier, was
10
ST. MARK'S PARISH.
so kind, too, as to bid me welcome. We talked over a legend of old stories, supped about nine, and then prattled with the ladies till it was time for a traveller to retire. In the meantime I observed my old friend to be very uxorious and exceedingly fond of his chil- dren. This was so opposite to the maxims he used to preach up before he was married, that I could not forbear rubbing up the memory of them. But he gave a very good-natured turn to his change of senti- ments, by alleging that whoever brings a poor gentle- woman into so solitary a place, from all her friends and acquaintances, would be ungrateful not to use her and all that belongs to her with all possible ten- derness. We all kept snug in our several apartments till nine, except Miss Thecky, who was the house- wife of the family. At that hour we met over a pot of coffee, which was not quite strong enough to give us the palsy. After breakfast, the Colonel and I left the ladies to their domestic affairs, and took a turn in the garden, which has nothing beautiful in it but three terrace walks, that fall in slopes one below another. I let him understand that, besides the pleasure of paying him a visit, I came to be instructed by so great a master in the mystery of making iron, wherein he had led the way, and was the Tubal Cain of Virginia. He corrected me a little there, saying that he was not only the first in his country, but the first in North America who had erected a regular furnace ; that they ran altogether on bloomeries in New England and Pennsylvania till his example had made them attempt greater works. He said that the four furnaces now at work in Virginia circulated a great sum of money for provisions, &c., in the adja- cent counties. He told me that he had iron in sev-
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