USA > Virginia > Augusta County > Augusta County > Annals of Augusta County, Virginia, with reminiscences illustrative of the vicissitudes of its pioneer settlers (A Supplement) > Part 14
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The children of Alexander Breckenridge were a daughter, Sarah, wife of Robert McClanahan, and two sons, Adam and Robert. There was also a George Breckenridge living in the county in 1749, but whether he was a brother or son of Alexander is not known. The only mention of him we have found is the fact that he conveyed 245 acres of Beverley Manor land to Robert Breckenridge, May 16, 1749.
When Robert McClanahan was appointed high sheriff of the county, in 1749, his brother-in-law, Adam Breckenridge, qualified as deputy. The latter soon afterwards (in 1750, it is said) left the county and disap- peared from history. It is thought likely, however, that he has descend- ants in Kentucky.
Robert Breckenridge remained in the county, living on a farm adja- cent to Staunton, and became prominent during the Indian wars. He incurred the hostility of Governor Dinwiddie, and was roundly berated
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by that irate letter-writer, for which we do not think the worse of him The town of Staunton being incorporated in 1761, Major Breckenridge was named in the act as one of the trustees, in association with his brother-in-law, William Preston, his nephew, Alexander McClanahan, and others. Some time thereafter he removed to the " upper country," and when Botetourt was constituted, in 1769-'70, he was one of the first justices of the peace and lieutenant colonel of the militia of that county. He died in Botetourt in 1772.
The sons of Colonel Breckenridge by his first marriage were Robert and Alexander. Both these sons were officers in the Revolutionary army, and both removed to Kentucky soon after the war. Robert, Jr., was a member of the Kentucky Convention and Legislature, and the first Speaker of the House of Delegates. He died, an old and wealthy man, in Louisville some time after 1830. Major Alexander Breckenridge died comparatively young. Among his children was James D. Brecken- ridge, who represented the Louisville district in Congress about the year 1836.
Colonel Robert Breckenridge's second wife was Lettice Preston, daughter of John Preston, of Staunton, and her children were four sons, William, John, James and Preston, and a daughter, Jane, wife of Samuel Meredith.
William Breckenridge, son of Robert, married in Augusta, but spent most of his life in Kentucky. He was the father of the late John Boys Breckenridge, of Staunton.
John Breckenridge, the next son of Colonel Robert, was born on his father's farm, at Staunton, December 2, 1760, and removed with the family to Botetourt in 1769, or thereabouts. He was educated at William and Mary College, and while a student, before he was twenty- one years of age, was elected by the people of Botetourt a member of the State Legislature. Marrying Miss Cabell, of Buckingham county, he settled in Albemarle, on James river, and rapidly attained distinction as a lawyer. He was elected to Congress by the voters of Albemarle district, but declined the position. In 1793 he removed to Kentucky, and during the administration of President Jefferson was Attorney-General of the United States. He died in 1806, only forty- six years of age. One of his sons was Cabell Breckenridge, a dis- tinguished lawyer, who died young, leaving a son, General John C. Breckenridge, late Vice-President of the United States. The other sons of John were the celebrated divines, Rev. Drs. John, Robert J. and William L. Breckenridge, the second of whom was the father of the Hon. William C. P. Breckenridge, now (1886) a member of the United States House of Representatives.
James Breckenridge, third son of Colonel Robert, spent his life in Virginia. He was long known as General Breckenridge, of Bote- tourt, and was distinguished as a lawyer and member of Congress. Among his children were Messrs. Cary and James Breckenridge, of
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Botetourt, Mrs. Edward Watts, of Roanoke, Mrs. Henry M. Bowyer, of Botetourt, and Mrs. Robert Gamble, of Florida.
Preston Breckenridge, the fourth son of Colonel Robert, married a Miss Trigg, and died in middle life, leaving daughters, but no son.
ISRAEL CHRISTIAN was a merchant, and lived first at Staunton, and afterwards in the part of Augusta now Botetourt county. He was a representative of Augusta in the House of Burgesses in 1759-'61. One of his daughters married Colonel William Fleming, of Botetourt; one, Caleb Wallace, first a Presbyterian minister in Virginia, and after- wards a judge in Kentucky; another married William Bowyer, of Botetourt; and a fourth, Colonel Stephen Trigg, of Kentucky. Three counties in Kentucky were named in honor of his son, and two of his sons-in-law, respectively-Christian, Fleming and Trigg. He was the founder of the towns of Fincastle and Christiansburg.
WILLIAM CHRISTIAN, son of the former, was born in Augusta in 1743. He was a member of the House of Burgesses in 1774 (proba- bly from Botetourt), and leaving Williamsburg he raised a company and hastened to join General Andrew Lewis, but failed to overtake him till the night after the battle of Point Pleasant. In 1775 he was chosen Lieutenant-Colonel of the first Virginia regiment, of which Patrick Henry was colonel In 1776, however, he became colonel of the first battalion of Virginia militia, and commander of an expedition against the Cherokee Indians. The troops under his command con- sisted of two battalions from Virginia and one from North Carolina, which, with other men employed, composed an army of one thou- sand six hundred to one thousand eight hundred men. The campaign lasted about three months. Not one man was killed, and no one died. The Indians fled at the approach of the army, but many of their towns were destroyed and their fields wasted. On the return of the army to the settlements, Fort Henry was built at Long Island, in the Holston, near the present Virginia State line, and supplies were taken to it from Rockbridge and Angusta counties. The fort was then supposed to be in Virginia.
In 1780 he commanded another expedition against the Cherokees. In 1781 he was appointed by General Green at the head of a com- mission to conclude a treaty with the Indians, his Virginia associates being Arthur Campbell, William Preston and Joseph Martin. In 1785 he removed to Kentucky, and settled near Louisville. The year fol- lowing he and others pursued a party of marauding Indians across the Ohio river, and overtook two of them near the spot where Jeffer- sonville, Indiana, now is. There he was shot and killed by one of the Indians, both of whom were instantly killed by Christian's companions. His body was carried home, and the inscription on his tombstone states
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that he was killed April 9, 1786, aged 43. His wife was a sister of Patrick Henry. Colonel Bullett, of Kentucky, was his son-in-law. His only son died while a youth .- [ Grigsby's Sketches.]
ANDREW MOORE was born, in 1752, at a place called Cannicello, then in Augusta, now in Rockbridge. In early life he made a voy- age to the West Indies, and was cast away on a desert island, where for three weeks he and his companions lived on a species of lizard. He studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1774. In 1776 he entered the army as lieutenant of a company of which John Hays was captain. Nineteen men enlisted under him at a log rolling as soon as he received his commission. Nearly his whole military life was spent in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York He with his company, as a part of Morgan's corps, participated in the battle at Saratoga, which resulted in Burgoyne's surrender. After a service of three years, and attaining the rank of captain, he resigned and re- turned home. He was a member of the Legislature from Rockbridge when it met in Staunton, in 1781, and continued to serve in that body till 1789. In 1788, he was a member of the State Convention which ratified the Constitution of the United States. Upon retiring from the Legislature he was elected a member of Congress by the Rockbridge District, and held the position during the entire administration of Washington. He was a member of the Legislature again from 1798 to 1800, and was again elected to the lower house of Congress in 1803. He was then elected United States Senator, and served till 1809. In 1810, he was appointed by President Jefferson United States Marshal for the State of Virginia, which office he held till his death, in 1821. At an early date he was made brigadier-general of militia, and in 1809 major-general. He was the father of the late Samuel McD. and David E. Moore, of Lexington .- [ Grigsby's Sketches.]
When the Western District of Virginia was projected in 1801, Mr. Jefferson consulted Judge Stuart of Staunton as to the appointment of a Marshal. He wrote, April 25, 1801, that Andrew and John Alex- ander and John Caruthers, all of Rockbridge, had been recommended to him by different persons. Mr. Caruthers was appointed, but de- clined. On the 5th of August, 1801, Mr. Jefferson wrote to Judge Stuart, informing him of Mr. Caruthers's refusal of the office, and say- ing : "I have now proposed it to Colonel Andrew Moore, with but little hope, however, of his acceptance." The Western District was, however, not established at that time, and Colonel Moore was appointed Marshal for the whole State in 1810.
CHAPTER VII.
THE WAR OF THE REVOLUTION, ETC., FROM 1774 TO 1783.
While the strife between the colonies and mother country was brewing in 1774 the port of Boston was closed by the British, and the people of that city, mainly dependent upon commerce for subsistence, were reduced to a state of desti- tution and suffering. The sympathy of the country was aroused, and contributions for their relief were made in various places. The remote county of Augusta sent her quota the very autumn her sons fought the Indians at Point Pleasant. Says the his- torian, Bancroft : "When the sheaves had been harvested and the corn threshed and ground in a country as yet poorly provided with barns or mills, the backwoodsmen of Augusta county, without any pass through the mountains that could be called a road, noiselessly and modestly delivered at Frederick one hundred and thirty-seven barrels of flour as their remit- tance to the poor of Boston." (Volume VII, page 74.) What a task the transportation was, may be inferred from the fact that nearly fifty years afterwards Bockett's stages took three days to make the trip from Staunton to Winchester.
Again, in 1777, the people of Augusta sent supplies to the destitute. From some cause unknown to us there was a scar- city of provisions in Washington county, southwest Virginia, and the records of that county show that Augusta contributed flour for the use of "the distressed inhabitants." [See Howe, page 501.]
But .our Annals are designed to exhibit the contentions of men, rather than the charities of life. We come now to a curious episode in the history of the county. Lord Dunmore, the last
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royal Governor of Virginia, and his Lieutenant, Connoly, figure therein somewhat as comic actors, it seems to us, although at the time the business was considered serious enough.
Virginia, claimed, by virtue of her charter, all the territory between certain parallels of latitude, which included a part of western Pennsylvania about Pittsburg. Fort Pitt was aban- doned as a military post in 1773, but the country was rapidly occupied by English settlers.
In January, 1774, Dr. John Connoly, a citizen of Virginia, but previously of Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, appeared at Pittsburg and posted a notice of his appointment by Gover- nor Dunmore as "Captain-Commandant of militia of Pittsburg and its dependencies," etc., etc.
Governor Penn, of Pennsylvania, wrote to Dunmore, demand- ing an explanation. At the same time he wrote to the Penn- sylvania authorities at Pittsburg urging them to maintain the rights of that province, and ordering the arrest of Connoly. The "Captain-Commandant" was accordingly arrested and committed to jail, but he prevailed with the sheriff to give him leave of absence for a few days, and instead of returning to prison came to Virginia.
On March 15, 1774, Connoly presented himself before the court at Staunton, and qualified as a justice of the peace for Augusta county, and commandant at Pittsburg.
Dunmore replied to Penn on March 3d, insisting upon the rights of Virginia, and demanding reparation for the insult to Connoly. The least that would be accepted was the dismissal of Arthur St. Clair, the clerk who " had the audacity to commit a unagistrate acting in discharge of his duty." Governor Penn re- plied, and so the controversy continued.
Connoly returned to Pittsburg and gathered around him a body of armed men, a portion of the people claiming to be Vir- ginians. He opened correspondence with the Pennsylvania magistrates, which proving unsatisfactory, he arrested three of them-Smith, Mackey and McFarland-and sent them to Staun- ton for trial. Upon arriving liere they gave security and were discharged to find their way home.
The President of the Pennsylvania court informed Governor Penn of the arrest of his associates. He stated that Connoly, having at Staunton qualified as a justice of the peace for Augusta
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county, "in which it is pretended that the country about Pitts- burg is included," was constantly surrounded by an armed body of about one hundred and eighty militia, and obstructed every process emanating from the court.
Connoly reoccupied Fort Pitt, changing the name to Fort Dunmore.
The following order appears among the proceedings of the County Court of Augusta, under date of January 19, 1775 : "His majesty's writ of adjournment being produced and read, it is ordered that this court be adjourned to the first Tuesday in next month, and then to be held at Fort Dunmore, in this county, agreeable to the said writ of adjournment."
The court was held at Fort Dunmore, under Captain Connoly's auspices, and several persons were arraigned before it for ob. structing the authority of Virginia, as we learn from a Pennsyl- vania historian .- [ Creigh's History of Washington County, Penn- sylvania. ] The record of proceedings is not on file at Staunton. The court could not sit in Staunton at the usual time in March, being on an excursion to Pennsylvania ; but we next find on the order book the following: "His majesty's writ of adjournment from Fort Dunmore to the courthouse in the town of Staunton, being read, the court was accordingly held the 25th day of March, 1775."
A deed from six Indian chiefs, representatives of the united tribes of Mohawks, Oneidas, etc., to George Croghan, for two hundred thousand acres of land on the Ohio river, executed No- vember 4, 1768, was proved before the court of Augusta county at Pittsburg, September 25, 1775-the land lying in the county It was further proved before the court at Staunton, August 19, 1777, and ordered to be recorded .- [See Deed Book No. 22, page I.] The consideration for which the Indians sold these lands embraced blankets, stockings, calico, vermillion, ribbons, knives, gunpowder, lead, gun-flints, needles, and jews-harps. The deed was also recorded in Philadelphia.
At length the Pennsylvanians kidnapped Captain Connoly and took him to Philadelphia, and thereupon the Virginians seized three of the rival justices and sent them to Wheeling as hostages.
By this time the war of the Revolution was approaching. The people of the disputed territory were alike patriotic, but
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the distinction between Virginians and Pennsylvanians was still maintained. Each party held meetings separate from the other, and denounced the encroachments of the British government.
Captain Connoly, being discharged from custody, joined Lord Dunmore on board a British ship in Chesapeake Bay. He was at Portsmouth, Virginia, August 9, 1775, on which day he wrote to Colonel John Gibson to dissuade him from joining the patriot side. He then undertook a journey from the Chesa- peake to Pittsburg, in company with a Doctor Smith, and in November, 1775, was arrested in Fredericktown, Maryland, for being engaged in treasonable projects. He was detained in jail, at Philadelphia, till April 2, 1777.
Finally, in 1779, each of the States appointed commissioners, and through their agency the dispute was quieted in 1780. The boundary was not definitely fixed, however, till 1785, when Mason and Dixon's line was established.
It is generally believed that Dunmore fomented the contro- versy about the boundary line, in order to embroil the people of the two provinces between themselves, and that Connoly was his willing agent. Connoly joined Dunmore at Fort Pitt, in the fall of 1774, and accompanied hi'm in his march into the Indian country. In the summer of 1775, it is said, he was appointed colonel, with authority to raise a regiment of white men on the frontiers hostile to the cause of the colonies, and to enlist the Indians on the side of Great Britain. His arrest at Frederick- town defeated the attempt. After his release he joined the British army, and was with Cornwallis when he surrendered at Yorktown. By grant from Dunmore, he acquired a large landed interest on the Ohio river, where Louisville, Kentucky, now stands, John Campbell and Joseph Simon having an interest in the grant, and his share of the property was confiscated by act of the Legislature of Virginia, the territory then being a part of this State. The last we have heard of him was in 1788, when he came from Canada to Louisville, for the purpose professedly of making a business arrangement with Mr. Campbell, but the popular prejudice against him was such that he could not re- main, and leaving the United States nothing further is known of him .- [See Border Warfare, page 134, and various acts in Hening, passed in 1780, 1783 and 1784, "for establishing the town of Louisville, in the county of Jefferson," &c., &c.]
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In order not to break the connection we have anticipated the course of events, and return now to the early part of the year 1775.
The first patriotic meeting of the people of Augusta county, of which we have any account, was held in Staunton, February 22, 1775. The proceedings were reported as follows :
" After due notice given to the freeholders of the county of Augusta to meet in Staunton, for the purpose of electing dele- gates to represent them in Colony Convention at the town of Richmond, on the 20th of March, 1775, the freeholders of said county thought proper to refer the choice of their delegates to the judgment of the committee, who, thus authorized by the general voice of the people, met at the courthouse on the 22d of February, and unanimously chose Mr. Thomas Lewis and Captain Samuel McDowell to represent them in the ensuing Convention. " Instructions were then ordered to be drawn up by the Rev. Alexander Balmaine, Mr. Sampson Mathews, Captain Alexander McClanahan, Mr. Michael Bowyer, Mr. William Lewis, and Captain George Mathews, or any three of them, and delivered to the delegates thus chosen, which are as follows: 'To Mr. Thomas Lewis and Captain Samuel McDowell .- The committee of Augusta county, pursuant to the trust reposed in them by the freeholders of the same, have chosen you to represent them in Colony Convention, proposed to be held in Richmond on the 20th of March instant. They desire that you may consider the people of Augusta county as impressed with just sentiments of loyalty and allegiance to his Majesty King George, whose title to the imperial crown of Great Britain rests on no other founda. tion than the liberty, and whose glory is inseparable from the happiness, of all his subjects. We have also respect for the parent State, which respect is founded on religion, on law, and on the genuine principles of the constitution. On these princi- ples do we earnestly desire to see harmony and a good under- standing restored between Great Britain and America.
"'Many of us and our forefathers left our native land and ex- plored this once-savage wilderness to enjoy the free exercise of the rights of conscience and of human nature. These rights we are fully resolved, with our lives and fortunes, inviolably to pre- serve; nor will we surrender such inestimable blessings, the pur- chase of toil and danger, to any Ministry, to any Parliament, or
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any body of men upon earth, by whom we are not represented, and in whose decisions, therefore, we have no voice.
"' We desire you to tender, in the most respectful terms, our grateful acknowledgements to the late worthy delegates of this colony for their wise, spirited, and patriotic exertions in the General Congress, and to assure them that we will uniformly and religiously adhere to their resolutions providently and graciously formed for their country's good.
"'Fully convinced that the safety and happiness of America depend, next to the blessing of Almighty God, on the unan- imity and wisdom of her people, we doubt not you will, on your parts, comply with the recommendations of the late Con- tinental Congress, by appointing delegates from this colony to meet in Philadelphia on the 10th of May, next, unless Ameri- can grievances be redressed before that. And so we are de- termined to maintain unimpaired that liberty which is the gift of heaven to the subjects of Britain's empire, and will most cor- dially join our countrymen in such measures as may be deemed wise and necessary to secure and perpetuate the ancient, just, and legal rights of this colony and all British America.
"' Placing our ultimate trust in the Supreme Disposer of every event, without whose gracious interposition the wisest schemes may fail of success, we desire you to move the Convention that some day, which may appear to them most convenient, be set apart for imploring the blessing of Almighty God on such plans as human wisdom and integrity may think necessary to adopt for preserving America happy, virtuous, and free.'"
In obedience to these instructions, the following letter was addressed by Messrs. Lewis and McDowell to the members of Congress :
" To the Hon. Peyton Randolph, Esq., President, Richard Henry Lee, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, and Edmund Randolph, Esqrs., Dele- gates from this colony to the General Congress :
" Gentlemen, -We have it in command from the freeholders of Augusta county, by their committee, held on the 22d Febru- ary, to present you with the grateful acknowledgment of thanks for the prudent, virtuous, and noble exertions of the faculties
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with which heaven has endowed you in the cause of liberty, and of everything that man ought to hold sacred at the late General Congress-a conduct so nobly interesting that it must command the applause, not only from this, but succeeding ages. May that sacred flame, that has illuminated your minds and influenced your conduct in projecting and concurring in so many salutary determinations for the preservation of American liberty, ever continue to direct your conduct to the latest period of your lives ! May the bright example be fairly transcribed on the hearts and reduced into practice by every Virginian, by every American! May our hearts be open to receive and our arms strong to defend that liberty and freedom, the gift of heaven, now being banished from its latest retreat in Europe ! Here let it be hospitably entertained in every breast ; here let it take deep root and flourish in everlasting bloom, that under its benign in- fluence the virtuously free may enjoy secure repose and stand forth the scourge and terror of tyranny and tyrants of every order and denomination, till time shall be no more.
" Be pleased, gentlemen, to accept of their grateful sense of your important services, and of their ardent prayers for the best interests of this once happy country. And vouchsafe, gentle men, to accept of the same from your most humble servants."
The reply of the members of Congress was as follows :
"To Thomas Lewis and Samuel McDowell, Esqrs. :
" Gentlemen,-Be pleased to transmit to the respectable freeholders of Augusta county our sincere thanks for their affec- tionate address approving our conduct in the late Continental Congress. It gives us the greatest pleasure to find that our honest endeavors to serve our country on this arduous and im- portant occasion have met their approbation-a reward fully adequate to our warmest wishes-and the assurances from the brave and spirited people of Augusta, that their hearts and hands shall be devoted to the support of the measures adopted, or hereafter to be taken, by the Congress for the preservation of American liberty, give us the highest satisfaction, and must afford pleasure to every friend of the just rights of mankind. We cannot conclude without acknowledgments to you, gentle- men, for the polite manner in which you have communicated to us the sentiments of your worthy constituents, and are their and
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