USA > Virginia > A history of Bristol Parish, Va. : with genealogies of families connected therewith, and historical illustrations > Part 3
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BRISTOL PARISH.
w .. . James river." The town derived its name from :r Jones, who opened a trading establishment with . . Indians at an early day a few rods west of what is : the juncture of Sycamore and Old streets. The n'a e was called Peter's Point. This Peter Jones was i w of the first vestrymen of Bristol Parish. He was a malow-traveller of Col, Byrd in 1733, in a journey to Kinoke, when the idea of Petersburg and Richmond as conceived. Byrd says in his journal of that trip, "" .. hen we got home we laid the foundation of two greit cities, one at Shocco, to be called Richmond; "the the other at the point of Appomattox river, to be :nied Petersburg .* These two places having the up- pe: nost landings on the James and Appomattox, are irally intended for marts, where the traffic of the
C: er inhabitants must centre, Major Mayo offered to them off into lots without fee."
1 October 1748, the towns of Petersburg and Bland- ! were established by act of Assembly. During this Finie the Rev. Robert Ferguson died and was succeed- fre by the
REV. ELEAZAR ROBERTSON.
In 1752, the General Assembly passed an act allow- ing a bridge to be built over the Appomattox to the land of John Bolling, gentleman, by subscription. John Bolling, Richard Eppes, William Kennon, Roger At- kinson, Robert Bolling, Frederick Jones and William Pride were the trustees for building it.
* Three counties meet at Petersburg. Petersburg proper is in Dinwiddie, Pocahontas is in Chesterfield, and Blandford in Prince George.
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BRISTOL PARISH.
June 22, 1852, the vestry met at the Brick churc and contracted with Col. Richard Bland to build ;. addition to the church for {400 current money of VI: ginia. This addition was first ordered to be made o- the south side of the church. It was afterwards deter- mined that it should be on the north side.
REV. THOMAS WILKINSON.
April IS, 1753, the Rev. Thomas Wilkinson wa elected minister in the place of the Rev. Eleazer Ro- bertson, deceased. In the Bland papers there is a let- ter dated at York, 1754, signed T. P., and addressed 13 William Beverley, Esq., speaking of Mr. Wilkinso .: in very flattering terms. This letter it seems was ir answer to an inquiry about Mr. Wilkinson's standing with his former parishioners. The inquiry was sug- gested by a discreditable report concerning this rever- end gentleman. Mr. Beverley's correspondent pro- nounces Mr. Wilkinson to be entirely innocent of the charge, and adds: "I can assure you they have got in him an inoffensive, innocent, good man, who will never create any trouble among them, but will endeavour, to the utmost of his power, to promote good neighbour- hood and unanimity among his flock, and if they be a reasonable people, the more they know him the more they will esteem him."
In 1759, Stephen Dewey, Alex. Bolling, Theo. Bland and William Eaton were appointed to confer with committee of the parish of Martin's-Brandon, to dle- vise measures for the relief of the poor in the several parishes. The joint committee, after due deliberation on the unhappy condition of many poor orphans and other poor children of their several parishes, whose
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· irents were unable to give them any education, and ing desirous that such poor children' should be ught up in an industrious and religious course of ". resolved to recommend earnestly to their several wishes that they should join in a petition to the neral Assembly to procure an act to enable the said wishes to erect a free school for the education of the te children of said parishes; and for perfecting this ful and charitable work they propose that the said tors should open a subscription, that the rich and all 'her well-disposed persons may have an opportunity : contributing of that store which the Father of boun- s hath bestowed upon them.
In April, 1759, the General Assembly enacted that he piece of land which belonged to the Parish of L'ristol, before the division, and lying in Dale, is repre- united as being too small and inconveniently situated r a glebe for the ministers of Dale, the vestry of Dale · directed to sell it and divide the proceeds between Dule and Bristol. This was probably the forty acres : land said by Rev. George Robertson to be un- worthy of a house.
In November, 1762, Petersburg was enlarged by act : Assembly, adding twenty-eight acres of land adjoin- y it, which had been laid off into lots by Peter Jones :1 Robert Bolling. Roger Atkinson, William Eaton, hn Banister, Robert Ruffin, Thomas Jones, Henry Walker, George Turnbull and James Field, gentlemen, Are appointed trustees to lay off the lots and regulate ... streets, &c.
The vestry, composed of the following persons, met : the house of Mrs. Walter Boyd, in Blandford, viz: Theophilus Field, James Boisseau, Alex. Bolling,
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James Murray, Roger Atkinson, Samuel Gordon and George Smith.
REV. WM. HARRISON.
The Rev. Thomas Wilkinson tendered his resigna- tion of the Parish and the Rev. William Harrison was elected to succeed him. Sir Willian Skipwith and Alexander Bolling were appointed to run the line be- tween the parishes of Martin's-Brandon and Bristol according to an act of Assembly which said that said parishes should be divided by Lawson's* creek on Ap- pomattox river, until it meets with the line dividing the lands of Theod. Bland and William Gibbs, thence by a line south to Sussex county.
In 1765 the church at Blandford was illustrated by an event which must have made a great sensation. It was the advent into the old Brick church of that wondrous orator Whitfield, who had "fulmined" over Great Britain and America, startling and moving the people with the flashes of his electrical eloquence. Devereux Jarratt, who had been ordained in Eng- land, where he heard Whitfield and Wesley, and who had lately taken charge of Bath Parish, was probably . present, and may have caught from Whitfield some of that evangelical fervor which characterized his minis-
* Lawson's, in Hening, is probably an error of the press, for Cawson's. There is a small creek near the site of the old Cawson's mansion on the Appomattox, now called Casey's creek, which is doubtless a corruption of Cawson's, which last is probably itself a corruption of "Cawsey's," which was, in early times, called " Caw. sey's Cave," and was represented in House of Burgesses by Mr. Cawscy.
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::. He, himself, as we learn from his journal, some- "'s preached at the old Blandford church.
The only record extant we have of Whitfield's iching at Blandford is from the pen of a clever but sympathizing hypercritic. It is in the form of a . ate letter from a young gentleman who heard him, Mich was never intended to be made public by its iter. That letter has come into our possession, and ·Lere can be no harm in making use of it after all the rties have been so long dead. The letter is well reserved, except the signature, which has crumbled om it. There is reason from internal and other evi- once to conclude that it was written by a great-great- grandson of the Princess Pocahontas, and the way in which he wields his literary tomahawk is worthy of his dian ancestry. Here is the letter, one clause in which was prophecy soon fulfilled:
" PETERSBURG, April 1765.
"On Friday last, the Rev. Mr. Whitfield arrived fron the southward to Appomattox. The following Sunday Bring within the year since Englishmen were formally : . xed without representatives to regulate the taxation a detestable and ever memorable era in the history of Britain and North America, as the inhabitants will one daty know to their sorrow). I say it was the - April After the accursed September of 1764, that the Rev. Mr. Whitfield ascended the rostrum of the Brick church, near Blandford; composed was his deport- :.. ent, his countenance sanctified. He arose, and lo! there was a great silence, or as Dryden sagaciously ex- presses it, "a dreadful silence did invade our cars." He spoke, and there was no more silence. This ad-
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mirable divine gave the Deists a sly blow from behind tacked about and fled for life from these human brutes imitating not, in this particular, the sage Warburton who stands manfully to it, and gives them the most po- lite Billingsgate in the world, from one end to the other of his preface to the Divine Legation. He got out c. this bustle as soon as he could, and then proved to a de- monstration that candles when the sun shines are un- necessary, but at night are very convenient ; that who- ever erects a fabric on which he is to expend his fortune, begins very ill if at the weather-cock, and descends thence' to the cellar. He said a contrary method were far more eligible, but unhappily, Mr. Bousar, the great undertaker was not present to im- prove by his instructions-being on a visit to his friends in Georgia. He next abused good works all to naught. yet by way of consistency, exhorted all to live as if persuaded they were to be saved by good works alone; a very wicked doctrine, as an article of our Church de- clares, that good works, not done in Christ, partake of the nature of sin. Now it requires no logie to prove that Whitfield or the Church must be in error. Much vilipended he, good works again, and declared upon his veracity, he therein, and the Church went hand in hand-that faith was of another efficacy. He also demonstrated that Jesus Christ was the basis of the Christian Religion, and other propositions not suf- ficiently demonstrated before. At length he began, like Felix, to be much moved, and proclaimed aloud to his dear hearers that he was going to cry. Thrice rolled he that one of his eyes that had not renounced his allegiance-thrice smote he with his snowy Dexter his swelling breast; thrice the Holy Gospels (which
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might have been treated with more tenderness); thrice the velvet cushions of the pulpit, and thrice were the understanders overwhelmed with clouds of dust which -sued therefrom. He could not, in decency of this preface, avoid complying with his promise of weeping and inconceivable were his efforts for that purpose; but anding the enterprise fruitless he consoled himself as well as he could in a belief that the lamentations which resounded copiously from the Ethiopians in the gal- tery, sufficed, as he might be supposed perhaps to per- Orm that drudgery by these, his proxies. A criminal measure, was this really his policy, for it being the Sabbath Day they ought to be exempted (say the Scriptures) from all labour whatsoever. After the ser- mon he ascended his chaise, together with a cub-bear who ministered unto him, and who is no doubt far gone in the mystic devotion of his principle, and will carry on the business, probably, when he (Whitfield) be- comes an inhabitant of Abraham's spacious bosom. I say he mounted his chaise (a convenience which the Apostles never used) but the use of which I do not And they have anywhere forbidden, and retired to the Hospitality of the gentlemen in the neighborhood, where he received the compliments of the gentry of these parts, with a most amiable and condescending politeness of which he certainly seems a great master. He is now continuing his apostolic peregrinations les- sening wherever he goes (as the old proverb has it) of his auditors. But alas! this comet of ; race will shortly leave our system-next June-Oh Time retard the fatal period !- it will totally disappear 30 I heard him say) from the North Americans, who 2
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are hereafter frequently to be illumined by the cub aforesaid, with all the horrors of spiritual darkness."
It is clear that this letter was written in an ironical vein and from a political rather than a religious standpoint. It was the Englishman with the stamp act on his brow, rather than the minister in his gown, that sharpened the shafts of the American patriot who snuffed the coming Revolution in the air.
In 1769 an act was passed directing the sale of the glebe, containing 1923 acres, on account of the incon- venience of its situation. The glebe was sold, and on the 21st of March 1771, the vestry conveyed it by deed to William Brown. The church wardens were instructed to pay Rev. Mr. Harrison £26 per annum in lieu of the glebe, until a new one should be pro- vided, which was done in October 1772, when the vestry bought 490 acres land from Mrs. Eliza Yates, for 6350. In the next year they built a dwelling house upon it, with all the necessary appurtenances.
We have now reached the time when the church began to feel the effects of the storm which had for some years been looming in the political horizon, andi which was soon to burst upon the country; and strip- ping the church of her privilege (so-called) which she had derived from her unnatural alliance with the State, leaves her to weep for some years in the dust of hu- miliation, from which when her days of mourning were ended, she rose clothed only in her own beautiful gar- ments, to return to her lawful Lord.
For some years there had been a growing dissatis- faction with the mother country, which had tended to
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alienate many persons from the church which was asso- ciated in their minds with the British government. Many ministers who had been born in England, and who had been taught to regard the Church and the State as one, and whose temporal interests were all bound up with the existing order of things, had no sympathy with the rising spirit of the Revolution, and thus became objects of popular odium and perse- cution. Other persons very naturally availed them- selves of these circumstances to involve both Church and State in one common ruin. Indeed the great body of Episcopalians, with such patriotic ministers as Jar- ratt, Belmaine, Griffith, Thurston and Muhlenburg, sympathized so thoroughly with the prevailing popu- lar sentiment, that they became lukewarm in support of their own Church, which had become identified in public opinion with the British government. Under these influences the Church was so crippled in her re- sources as already to totter to her fall.
Accordingly we find the following entry in the vestry book (1773, Oct. 29): "Whereas the calamitous state of the country renders it doubtful whether a sufficient sum can be collected from the people for the payment of the parochial debt in money, and by the restraints laid upon exports by public consent, the parishoners are precluded of the election the law has given them, of paying their dues in money or tobacco, it is deter- mined by the vestry that the minister's salary shall be estimated at {144 to be collected as nearly as possible in money, unless the prohibition in exports should be removed. In that case the people shall be at liberty to pay in tobacco at eighteen shillings per hundred, in lieu of money, according to their choice. And it is
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further to be understood that the Rev. Mr. Harrison should credit for the balance after the collections are made, three years, without interest, unless it should please Heaven before that time to put an end to the troubles of the country, and then the Incumbent's salary shall be demanded in the usual way.
Signed,
WILLIAM CALL. - PETER JONES, Church Wardens."
In 1776 an act of Assembly was passed repealing all laws of Parliament requiring conformity to the Episco- pal Church and exempting dissenters from contributing to its support. This measure was advocated by Jeffer- son and opposed by Nicholas and Pendleton, all Epis- copalians in their principles. Jefferson had been a vestryman, and Nicholas and Pendleton were vestry- men and devout communicants of the Church.
In 1779 a general assessment for the support of all Protestant ministers was rejected.
In 1780 Mr. Harrison resigned his charge. He con- tinued to live in Petersburg until the 20th November, 1814, when he died in the 84th year of his age. He was buried at his home, Porter Hill, in Petersburg, now occupied (1846) by Mr. Maghee. A tombstone marks the spot with an inscription .*
* The epitaph is as follows :
" Sacred to the Memory of Rev. William Harrison, who departed this life Nov'r 20th 1844, aged 84 years. In tender regard to his memory, his widow has caused this monument to be erected. IIere let him rest in peace and let us try to live like him, that like him we may die." The venerable Mrs. Fabian Armistead of Peters- burg is a daughter of Mr. Harrison and among his surviving de- scendants are John Armistead (clerk) of Petersburg and Mrs. John Banister,
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In 1784 a bill was passed by the General Assembly providing for teachers of the Christian religion. It was earnestly supported by Patrick Henry. Mr. Henry introduced a bill for the incorporation of the Episco- pal Church, which was passed. By this bill all former laws for the government of the Church were repealed, and the ministry and vestry were made a body politic and were authorized to hold all glebe lands, churches, burying-grounds, plate, books, ornaments, and every- thing, which had been the property of the late estab- lished church.
(1784 March 17th.) The Rev. Dr. Cameron and the Rev. Mr. Kennedy were recommended to the ves- try and the
REV. DR. CAMERON
was chosen.
1785. In pursuance of an act of Assembly incor- porating the Church, an election of vestrymen and trustees was held on the 29th March, and the following gentlemen were chosen: John Banister, Robert Boll- ing, James Field, R. Turnbull, Richard Taylor, Joseph Jones, William Robertson, N. Raines, Isaac Hall, John Baird, A. G. Strachan, Christopher McConnico.
In 1876 the law incorporating the church was re- pealed, with a proviso, securing to all religious societies their property in their respective churches, and author- izing the appointment of trustees for its management, and the act of 1788 declared that those trustees should be considered to all intents and purposes the successors to the former vestries, with the same power of holding and managing the property vested in them. S. G. Peachy, John Shore, Jesse Bonner, WVm. J. Geddes,
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Bolling, Strachan, Turnbull, Hall, Robertson, and Feild were elected trustees under this act.
1789. Ordered that Peter Williams and Jesse Bon- ner, gent., provide a sufficient lock and key for Jones Hole church, which had been forcibly entered by some who claimed an equal right to the old churches.
1790. John Grammer, Archie Gracie, Harrison and Hardaway are on the vestry for the first time. The minister's salary was fixed at [116, with the pledge of the vestry that it should not be less. Bolling, Jno. Grammer, A. Gracie and Wm. Robertson were ap- pointed a committee to examine into an eligible site for building a church, and make an estimate of the cost of building it. The committee reported, that a .lot near Bollingbrook warehouse was the most proper situation for a new church. Mr. Robert Bolling gener- ously offered the same for the purpose; but afterwards another lot where the courthouse now stands, was cho- sen. A committee was appointed to petition the Gen- era! Assembly for leave to raise 6756 by way of lottery, to be applied to the building of a church.
1791. Minister's salary fixed at 6100 and [10 for the clerk. Andrew Hamilton, Williams, Hardaway and Robertson were appointed to view and report the value of the glebe.
1792. Bishop Madison who had been consecrated in 1790 made his first visit to this Parish. It was the first Episcopal visit with which this Parish had been favored since its establishment in 1642. It was of course an event of great interest to the friends and members of the church and of curiosity to the public, and we cannot but be amused in looking back through the vista of nearly a century at the ceremonial of the
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vion. Messrs. Bolling, Shore and Campbell were ·winted to draw up a suitable address to be pre- sted to the Bishop at his visitation, and the Rev. Mr. uncron was authorized to procure a singing master : the occasion. Eight dollars were appropriated to · ly expenses, &c. This meeting was held at Arm- ad's in Blandford.
1793. Dr. Cameron was recommended to preach : the outer* church once in five weeks, and in the Brick church, and in the new building intended for a urt-house, alternately the other Sundays.
1793, December, (Dr. Cameron having resigned his charge) the following resolution was recorded :
"Resolved unanimously, that the church wardens be ? quested to furnish the Rev. Dr. Cameron with a cer- : ficate of the thanks of the vestry for the fidelity with which he discharged the duties of his office as rector : this Parish, and that his conduct and conversation during that time has been, in the highest degree, pious and exemplary."
In the Virginia Gazette and Petersburg Intelligencer ; ublished twice a week by Mr. Prentice, there ap- neared the following notice: "Bristol Parish, Peters- Furg, Oct. 28, 1793. The Rev. Mr. John Cameron ¡ resent minister of the Protestant Episcopal Church in :his Parish, being about to remove from the Parish, and having notified the vestry of his intention to vacate it, at the end of this year, we do hereby give notice that :: vestry will receive any gentleman who may apply, provided he be duly qualified agreeably to the canons : the Protestant Episcopal Church, and in preaching
*The outer church was on Harrian creek.
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has a good delivery. The annual emoluments of ti. minister, including perquisites, will be about [120 b. sides the use of the glebe lands, and in addition : these advantages, a clergyman, whose capacity and s .: uation in life would enable him to undertake and p. proper attention to the instruction of youth, might de rive considerable profit from superintending a scho in the town.
Signed,
THOMAS G. PEACHY, ROBERT BOLLING, CHY, Chi Church Wardens."
It is to be regretted that so little is known of sc many excellent men, who deserve to be held in remem. brance. A few facts in regard to Dr. Cameron have been gleaned from the journals of convention and other sources. He was of ancient family. He was educated at King's College, Aberdeen, and being or- dained by the bishop of Chester in 1770, came to America. His first charge was St. James Church. Mecklenburg county. In 1784 he came to Petersburg, thence to Nottoway. He was a fine scholar and taught a classical school with Caledonian discipline. He was made D. D. by William and Mary College. Judge Duncan Cameron of North Carolina was his son and inherited his integrity and piety. Judge Walker An- derson of Florida was his grandson. Rev. Andrew Syme married his daughter. Wm. E. Cameron, the present mayor of Petersburg, is his lineal descendant.
In 1790 Dr. Cameron preached the convention ser- mon. The convention thanked him for his judicious, affectionate and seasonable discourse, and asked a copy for publication. He was chairman of the committee
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: the convention, to prepare a memorial to the legis- ure, asserting the right of the churches to the glebes. In 1789 the diocese was laid off into districts, and clergy of adjoining parishes were instructed to as- mble annually in presbytery and choose one of their ember to preside, with the title of visitor, whose duty : was to visit each Parish in his district to see that the winons of the Church were observed, to inspect the :corals of the clergy, and report the state of each Par- hi to the Convention. There was no Bishop then. Under this canon, Dr. Cameron was made visitor of the parishes of Martin's-Brandon, Albemarle, Bristol, Bath and Manchester. It was in this presbytery, that the first motion was made towards the formation of a society for the relief of widows and orphans of de- ceased clergymen, along with a proposition for the in- struction of students in divinity. In 1816 Bishop Moore, in his address to the Convention, speaks of the death of Dr. Cameron in these words of commendation :
"The venerable Dr. Cameron, a clergyman of dig- nity and deportment, becoming his standing and years, has been taken from our embrace. His little flock has been called to part with their beloved pastor and his widow and children with a husband and father en- deared to them not only by the ties of nature, but by the faithful and honorable discharge of all the duties of . He died resigned to the will of Heaven, and has entered into the joy of his Lord."
1793, in the Massachusett's Historical Society, Coll. Ist series, vol. 3, there is a topographical descrip- tion of the county of Prince George, Va., by the Rev. John Jones Spooner, A. M., AA. S., rector of Martin's- Brandon Parish in said county, 1793. I am indebted
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to Hon. Lyman C. Draper, LL. D., Secretary Wiscons !. Historical Society and to J. Henry Lea, Esq., of Ma- sachusetts, for the following extracts from this book "The S. western part of this County, with part of Di ... widdie, including Petersburg, forms one Parish of the Episcopal church. The remaining part of the Count forms another. There is a glebe belonging to eac! Parish, both in Prince George. There are five Epis- copal Churches in the County, one meeting-house for the friends, one building appropriated to the Metho- dists, who have meetings also in other places. Th. Baptists have also occasional meetings in some parts of the County; to these the Blacks seem particularly at- tached. All the Clergy are supported by voluntary contributions."
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