Encyclopedia of Virginia biography, Volume V, Part 53

Author: Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, 1853-1935, ed. cn
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company
Number of Pages: 848

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the validity of the present state constitution and its suffrage article, and the suit of Vir- ginia against West Virginia, which he insti- tuted in the supreme court of the United States for the ascertainment of the propor- tion which West Virginia should pay of the indebtedness of the Old Dominion.

General Anderson is a fine example of the "Old Virginia gentleman"-courtly, cul- tured, courageous, and lovable. He is a member of the Protestant Episcopal church, and has for many years served as a vestry- man, and in the councils of the church. He has been twice married, (first) to Ellen G. Anderson, of Richmond, who died in Janu- ary, 1872, and (second) to Mary Louisa Blair, of Lexington, Virginia. He has had five children, all of whom survive at the present writing. His address is Lexington, Richmond, Virginia.

Charles Minor Blackford was born in Fredericksburg, Virginia, on the 17th day of October, 1833, the son of William Matthews Blackford and Mary Berkeley Blackford (nee Minor). He was named for his mother's brother, Captain Charles Landon Carter Minor, of the United States army.

Believing earnestly in the obligations imposed by a heritage of good name and clean blood, and in the danger of disregard- ing hereditary weaknesses, he gathered and compiled for his descendants a wealth of interesting records and character sketches of their ancestors and collateral kindred, em- bracing the more important events in his own life, and his wife's. In a preface to this data, he says :

By reading these pages my sons will learn that through every strain of their blood they are de- scended from those who for generations by clean lives have elevated themselves and have lived in a home circle of culture and refinement, redolent of what is pure and of good repute; who in the serv- ice of their country have ever been distinguished for their simplicity, intelligence, integrity and their devotion to their State; who in war have been where danger was greatest and in peace where counsel was wisest. Past generations with such a record, having contributed with such lavish wealth to the status of their descendants, have a right to demand from the grave that those of their blood who follow shall maintain their name spotless and bright and in time hand it down unsullied and with fresh honors to generations yet unborn. None but a craven in the battle of life, or a sluggard in its race, will turn a deaf ear to such a call, or, unmind- ful of the obligation his ancestry has imposed, bring disgrace on the honored dead or let the high stand- ard of the past be lowered in the present of which he is the guardian.

In the light of his belief in the influences of heredity, a correct biographical sketch of Mr. Blackford must be based upon know- ledge of the characteristics of his own for- bears.

His father, William Matthews Blackford, was the fourth child of Benjamin and Isa- bella Blackford. Of the parentage of Benja- min Blackford, the family has no record, ex- cept that both father and mother died when he was quite young, leaving him, their only child, but small estate. The father is be- lieved to have been one of three brothers, John, Reuben and Martin Blackford, who came over from Scotland and settled in New Jersey before the revolution.

Benjamin Blackford was born in New Jersey, on the 31st day of October, 1767. Even as a boy, he was very industrious and thrifty. Securing first some position with a furnace at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, he rapid- ly accumulated money, so that when he came to Virginia, in his twenty-first year, he had about $25,000 of capital, most of which he had made himself. He soon pur- chased a place near Luray, in Page county, where he built the Isabella Furnace, and subsequently, in the same valley, the Caro- line Furnace. He also established the larg- est stove factory and foundry then in Vir- ginia, and with these two furnaces and his foundry, was perhaps the largest operator in the state. A forceful man of high char- acter and business acumen, he was a potent influence in the financial affairs of his day. In political faith he was an uncompromis- ing Whig, as he had been Federalist. An ardent churchman, he was one of the pio- neers of the Episcopal church in Virginia, representing his parish in the convention of the church in Richmond in 1816. When quite an old man, he met with heavy finan- cial reverses, through accommodation en- dorsement, and coming to Lynchburg, Vir- ginia, made his home with his son, William Matthews Blackford, until his death in Au- gust, 1855.

In 1792, he married Isabella Arthur, daughter of Joseph Arthur, of Cumberland county, Maryland, who died January 24, 1837, near Luray, Virginia, where she is buried. She was a woman of great force of character and influence, whose memory her children held in great reverence. The children of Benjamin and Isabella Black- ford were:

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Thomas Thornberg Blackford, born Feb- ruary 9, 1794, at Pine Grove Furnace, Cum- berland county, Maryland ; married Caroline Steinbergen, of Shenandoah county, Vir- ginia, and died in Lynchburg, Virginia, Feb- ruary 28, 1863, after a successful career as physician.

Joseph Arthur Blackford, born December 18, 1795 ; died June 18, 1797.

Jane Ege Blackford, born August 31, 1798, at Pine Grove Furnace ; married Wil- liam Powell Leiper ; died February 17, 1826, at Isabella Furnace, Page county, Virginia.

John Arthur Blackford, born February 1, 1804, at Catoctin Furnace, Frederick county, Maryland, married (first) Catherine Smith, a sister of Governor William Smith, of Vir- ginia, and upon her death, married again.

Mary Martin Blackford, born October 13, 1806, at Catoctin Furnace; married (first) Joseph Lauk, and (second) James Arthur ; died August 18, 1837.

William Matthews Blackford, father of Charles Minor Blackford, the fourth child of Benjamin and Isabella Blackford, was born at Catoctin Furnace, Frederick county, Maryland, on the 19th day of August, 1801, and died in Lynchburg, April 14, 1864. He was educated for the bar, but his literary tastes soon drew him away from his pro- fession to more congenial work, which his independent means gave him liberty to en- joy. For five or six years he edited and owned the "Political Arena," a Whig news- paper in Fredericksburg, wielding, with his strong and facile pen, great influence as its editor, as well as by reviews for many liter- ary magazines. In 1841, he was appointed by President Tyler charge d'affairs to New Granada, where he made enviable record as a diplomatist. After four years he resigned, that he might come home, and accepted the position of editor of the "Lynchburg Vir- ginian," of which he became part owner. This paper, then the only Whig organ in that part of the state, was very flourishing and potential, and Mr. Blackford, justly re- garded as one of the ablest editors in Vir- ginia, added greatly to its power and in- fluence. In 1853, he sold out his interest in the "Virginian" to become cashier of the Exchange Bank of Lynchburg, where he continued until his death in 1864. Under his successful administration, this bank became the largest and most popular in the city. During the civil war he was financial agent

at Lynchburg for the Confederate govern- ment. He was not a strong man physically, and the mental anxieties incident to the war -those connected with his business and his solicitude for his five sons in the army- brought on an attack of some brain trouble, under which he died, after a few days' ill- ness, loved and respected by all who knew him.

He accumulated a large library of the choicest books, and was rarely in the house without reading or writing something. He used the few minutes of waiting for dinner each day in studying French, which he thus learned to read with such ease and fluency as to enjoy the literary classics of that lan- guage in the original. In a diary kept from 1841 until the week of his death he left a vivid and accurate picture of the times of which he wrote. A loyal churchman, he rep- resented his parish in the church conven- tions from 1827, and for many years was secretary of that body ; was senior warden of St. Paul's Church, Lynchburg, and the leading spirit in every movement connected with the good of the church. His was an unusual combination of that refined taste, broad culture, and trained intellect which, when coupled with strong business sense, leads to success in the paths of finance. His manners were perfect-winning friends and cementing friendships, impressing all who came in contact with him with the sincerity of his expressions, the honesty of his pur- pose and the singleness of his aim.

On the 12th of October, 1825, he married Mary Berkeley Minor, only daughter of General John Minor, of Fredericksburg, Virginia, and of his wife, Lucy Landon Minor (nec Carter). The marriage was celebrated at "Topping Castle," General Minor's country seat on the North Anna river, in Caroline county, Virginia, an estate given to his grandfather, the first John Minor of Virginia, by his father-in-law, Thomas Carr.

Mrs. Blackford was born on the 2nd of December, 1802, at Hazel Hill, her father's Fredericksburg home. She and her mother were called in their day the two most beau- tiful women in Virginia, and she retained her beauty to the last. It was not, however, her personal loveliness, but her strength of character and the enthusiasm and poetic fire of her nature that made her a social power, wielding great influences for good. There

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were two subjects upon which she was sometimes deemed fanatical-temperance and slavery. She was one of the earliest workers in the temperance reform, and she and her husband gave freedom to all their slaves and, at their own expense, sent the most of them to Liberia, just as her mother had done with the great number of negroes she inherited from the Cleve estate. Despite these strong views on the slavery question, and the fact that her husband and sons were all opposed to secession, Mrs. Blackford uttered not a murmur nor a protest when the crisis came and her five boys joined the Confederate forces to defend their state against the invaders. Although an invalid for the greater part of her life, she accom- plished much of good and deeply impressed her influence upon all who came within its range. A skilled housekeeper, she dispensed almost boundless hospitality, keeping up a charming home comfortably within the limits of her husband's moderate income.

Mrs. Blackford's father, General John Minor, of Hazel Hill, Fredericksburg, Vir- ginia, was born in 1761, and married (first) Mary Berkeley, daughter of Landon Carter Berkeley, of Airwell, Hanover county, Vir- ginia, who died after a year, leaving no chil- dren. He then married Lucy Landon Car- ter, daughter of Landon Carter, of Cleve, King George county, Virginia.

General Minor was an officer in both the revolutionary war and the war of 1812, and in private life was a lawyer of renown. He died in Richmond while sitting as one of the electors of the college which cast the vote for Monroe as president. He and President Monroe were warm personal friends.

The first of the Minor name of whom there is any record in Virginia is "Doodas" or "Doodes" Minor, born in Holland in 1644. The name in Holland was "Miendert." He was naturalized in 1673, at the same time with Minor Doodes (see "Hening's Statutes at Large," vol 2, page 308), who, some rec- ords state, was his father, and who is some- times called Miendert Doodes. This Minor (or Miendert) Doodes married Miss Geret (or Garet ) of Holland.

Mr. Blackford, commenting upon this strain of his blood, says: "The Minor fam- ily is a very peculiar one. It has been in Virginia for over 250 years and all that time its members have been persons of high re-

spectability and great local influence, but almost without exception they have shunned public office and positions of prominence. There seems to be something in the blood which carries with it a distaste for office and an unwillingness to come before the people for their suffrage."

Doodes Minor married Mary Elizabeth Cocke, who survived him. According to his will, admitted to probate in Middlesex county, May 27, 1695, he had four sons : Minor Minor, William Minor, Garet Minor and Peter Minor, and he mentions a grand- daughter, Elizabeth Michelburough. He appoints his "loving wife, Elizabeth Minor," and his "loving sons" his "lawful exrs" and "lends" to her during her widowhood what appears to have been a goodly part of his estate.

Garrett Minor (or Garet, as the will has it ), born in 1680, married Diana Carr. They had one son, John Minor, who was born January 29, 1707, and died in 1755. On No- vember 14, 1732, he married Sarah, daugh- ter of Captain Thomas and Mary (Dabney ) Carr, born November, 1714; died Septem- ber 28, 1772. Her mother, Mary Dabney, was born January 22, 1685.

This first John Minor, of Virginia, left eleven children, of whom the eldest was Mr. Blackford's ancestor, John Minor (the second ) of Topping Castle, known as "Major John Minor" ; born November 13, 1735, died March 21, 1800. He is reputed to have been a man of affairs, whose shrewdness, busi- ness ability, energy, and power of endur- ance gave him such influence that his coun- sel was much sought by his contemporaries. He married Elizabeth Cosby and their de- scendants are very numerous. His eldest son was Thomas Carr Minor, born January 13. 1757, married Ann Rudd, and moved to Tennessee. His second son, William Minor, of Hybla, Hanover county, married Mildred T. Lewis, daughter of Captain John Lewis, of Fredericksburg. Mr. Blackford's grand- father, General John Minor, of Hazel Hill, Fredericksburg, was the third son.

Lancelot Minor, the fourth son, was born in 1763, married Mary Overton Tompkins, lived at "Minor's Folly" in Louisa county, and died in 1848. Among his descendants who achieved marked distinction was his seventh child, John Barbee Minor, born January 2, 1813, and died July 30, 1895. As professor of law at the University of Vir-

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ginia, and a writer of legal text books, he made great reputation for its law school, and won lasting honors for himself as the South's great teacher, who "taught the law and the reason thereof." The new law build- ing at the university is named "Minor Hall" in his honor. It is said of him that "in the fifty years of his work in the law school of the university, he exerted, and still indirectly exerts, a wider influence for good upon so- ciety in the United States than any man who has lived in this generation." His sec- ond wife, Ann Fisher Colston, was a sister of Mr. Blackford's wife. Of this marriage there survive him two sons, John B. Minor, Jr., a lawyer of Richmond, and Raleigh Col- ston Minor, professor of law at the univer- sity, and two daughters, Susan Colston Minor, who married John Wilson, and Nan- nie, unmarried, head of the Nurses Settle- ment work in Richmond.

Major John Minor's fifth child was Mary Overton, born in 1765. His sixth, another daughter, Diana, born 1767, married Richard Maury, of Spottsylvania county, Virginia, whose fourth son was the famous Com- modore Matthew Fontaine Maury, the "Pathfinder of the Seas."

Sarah, Major Minor's seventh child, was born in 1773, and married Harwood Good- win. His son, Charles Minor, educated in Edinburgh, a physician, died voung, unmar- ried. Elizabeth Minor, his ninth child, born in 1776, became the second wife of Mr. Humphrey Hill, and died without issue. Barbara, the tenth child, married Kemp Gatewood, of Essex county.

Maior Minor's brothers and sisters, the other children of the first John Minor and his wife, Sarah, were: (2) William Minor, born 1736; died December 14, 1815, leaving a large estate. Nothing further is known of him or his descendants. (3) Thomas Minor, of Spottsylvania county, born Au- gust 5. 1740; died March, 1815; married Mary Dabney. (4) Nancy (or Mary), born March 5, 1741, died 1818, married Joseph Herndon, of Spottsylvania county. (5) Garrett, born March 14, 1743, died June 25, 1799. married Mary Overton Terrell, built "Sunning Hill," Spottsylvania county. (6) James, of Albemarle, born 1745, died 1790, married Mary Carr, of Bear Castle, Gooch- land county. (7) Diana, born 1747, died unmarried. (8) Dabney, born June 11, 1749, died November 4, 1794, married Nancy An-

derson, lived at Woodlawn, Orange county. (9) Vivian, born November 4, 1750, died October 15, 1798, lived at Springfield, Caro- line county, married (first) Barbara Cosby, and (second) Elizabeth Dick. (10) Eliza- beth Minor, born August 16, 1752, married James Lewis, of Laurel Hill, Spottsylvania county, died March 30, 1786. (II) Peter, born August 16, 1755, married Miss Jones, lived in Petersburg, and died in 1793.

Mr. Blackford's mother, Mary Berkeley Minor, was named for her father's first wife. Her own mother was Lucy Landon Carter, a daughter of Landon Carter, of Cleve, King George county.

The records of the Carter family, in all its many ramifications, are familiar to every student of Virginia genealogy, and are easily accessible. Therefore, only the direct an- cestors of Mr. Blackford are given in this line. The first of the Carter name in Vir- ginia of whom there is definite information was John Carter, of "Vpper Norfolk;" in the county of "Nanzimun in the years 1643 and 44," subsequently of Lancaster county. He represented Lancaster in the House of Bur- gesses in 1655, and the same year he was appointed commander of the forces sent against the Rappahannock Indians. He served again in the House of Burgesses in 1657-58-59 and 60. After the dissolution of the House in 1657-58 he was sworn in as one of the governor's council, and on the 3rd of April, 1659, "was nominated by Gov- ernor Bennet to be of the council and ap- pointed by the assembly." His tomb in Christ Church, Lancaster county, records June 10, 1669, as the date of his death. This edifice, erected by his son, Robert Carter, replaced an earlier structure built by him.

He married three times, and of his third marriage with Sarah Ludlowe, daughter of Gabriel Ludlowe, was born in 1663, in Christ Church parish, Robert Carter of Co- rotoman, in Lancaster county, known as "King Carter" from his great wealth and influence. The epitaph on his tomb in Christ Church, records his virtues and achieve- ments. Translated from the Latin, it says:

Here lies Robert Carter an honorable man who by noble endowments and pure morals gave lustre to his gentle birth.

Rector of William and Mary College he sus- tained that institution in its most trying times. He was Speaker of the House of Burgesses and Treas- urer under the most serene princes, William, Ann, George I. and George II. Elected by the House

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of Burgesses its Speaker six years and Governor of the Colony for more than a year he upheld equally the regal dignity and the public freedom.

Possessed of ample wealth, blamelessly acquired, he built and endowed this sacred edifice, a signal monument of his piety towards God. He fur- nished it richly. Entertaining his friends kindly, he was neither a prodigal nor a parsimonious host.

His first wife was Judith, . daughter of John Armistead, Esq. His second, Betty, a descendant of the noble house of Landon. By these wives he had many children in whose education he expended large sums of money.

At length, full of honors and of years, when he had well performed all the duties of an exemplary life he departed from this world on the 4th of Angust, 1732, in the 69th year of his age.

The unhappy lament their lost comforter, the widows their lost protector, and the orphans their lost father.

Mr. Blackford was descended from the second wife, Betty Landon, born in 1684, married in 1701, and died July 3, 1710. Her epitaph, together with that of the first wife, Judith Armistead, is carved on a tombstone found at the east end of Christ Church, Lancaster county :

To the memory of Betty Carter, second wife of Robert Carter, Esq. Youngest daughter of Sir Thomas Landon and Mary (St. Leger) his wife, of Grednal, in the county of Hereford, England, the ancient seat of the family, and place of her nativity.

She bore to her husband ten children, five sons and five daughters, three of whom, Sarah, Betty and Ludlowe, died before her and are buried near her. She was a person of great and exemplary piety and charity in every relation in which she stood, whether considered as a Christian, a wife, a mother, a mistress, a neighbor, or a friend, her conduct was equalled by few, excelled by none.

She changed this life for a better on the 3rd of July, 1710, in the 36th year of her age, and the ninth of her marriage. May her descendants make their mother's virtues and graces the pattern of their lives and actions.

Mr. Blackford writes of the Carters:

It is an enormously large family and doubtless has in it some black sheep, but in reviewing it I think any candid man must be well satisfied to have the blood in his veins. Unlike the Minors and their collaterals, the Carters and their collaterals have taken much part in public affairs and have ever been leaders of public sentiment and thought. From Robert Carter of Corotoman (King Carter) many men of great distinction and honor have de- scended. Among them we have two Presidents of the United States, William Henry Harrison and Benjamin Harrison; four Governors of Virginia, a Governor of Kentucky and two of Louisiana, a Governor of Maryland, a Judge of the Supreme Court, and numberless Senators and Members of the House of Representatives, Generals and Colo- nels, including General Robert E. Lee, who, and VIR-54

whose wife, were both direct descendants. Few families in so short a time have so great a record. The descendants of Robert Carter intermarried with every prominent family in the State, and their progeny find their aptest illustration in the count- less sands of the sea.

The third child of Robert Carter's mar- riage with Betty Landon was Charles Car- ter, of Cleve, King George county, born in 1707, and died in 1764, having married three times. His second wife was Ann Byrd, daughter of Colonel William Byrd, of West- over, sister of the famous Evelyn Byrd. The fifth child of this marriage (Charles Car- ter's ninth child) was Landon Carter, of Cleve-so called to distinguish him from his uncle, Landon Carter, of Sabine Hall-born July 1I, 1751, died December 10, 1811. At nine years of age he was sent to England to be educated, as was the custom of the time, but on the death of his father in 1764, he was recalled by his guardian, Landon Carter, of Sabine Hall. He married (first) in 1771, Mildred Washington Willis, daugh- ter of his brother-in-law, Lewis Willis, of Willis Hall, Fredericksburg, by his first marriage with Mary Champe. She was a granddaughter of Henry Willis, and of his wife, Mildred Washington. This Mildred Washington was a daughter of Lawrence Washington and Mildred Warner, and hence a full sister of Augustine Washing- ton, and aunt of General Washington, for whom she stood godmother, when she was Mrs. Gregory, before her marriage with Henry Willis.

The third child of this marriage was Lucy Landon Carter, the grandmother of Mr. Blackford, who married John Minor, of Hazel Hill, Fredericksburg (see ante. p. 847). She was born in 1776, at her father's beau- tiful country seat "Cleve," on the Rappa- hannock river, in King George county, and died in Fredericksburg, January 7, 1856. She was a most remarkable woman-of great piety, beauty, energy and intelligence. She inherited a large estate, and was the executor of her husband's, which was also large, and managed all with great ability (see ante.).

The children of General Minor and his wife, Lucy Landon Carter, were :

John Minor, of Fredericksburg, born 1797, died unmarried. January 12, 1862.

Overton Cosby Minor, who died young.

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Charles Landon Carter Minor, captain in United States army.

Lewis Willis Minor, surgeon in the United States navy and Confederate States navy, married Eloise Inerarity, of Mobile, Ala- bama.

Mary Berkeley Minor, Mr. Blackford's mother (see ante. p. 846).

James Monroe Minor, surgeon in United States navy, married Ellen Pierpont, of Brooklyn, New York, father of Dr. Charles Lancelot Minor, of Asheville, North Caro- lina.

Lancelot Byrd Minor, a clergyman of the Episcopal church, who went to Africa as a missionary and died there, near Cape Pat- mos. He married Mary Stuart, of Balti- more.

It was the only daughter of this family, Mary Berkeley Minor, who married William Matthews Blackford, and was the mother of Charles Minor Blackford, the subject of this sketch. She survived her husband more than thirty-two years, and died on the 14th of September, 1896, in the ninety-fourth year of her age, at the home of her son, Dr. Lancelot Minor Blackford, at the Epis- copal High School, near Alexandria, Vir- ginia. The children of this marriage, all born at Fredericksburg, Virginia, were:

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Encyclopedia of Virginia biography, Volume V, Part 53

Author: Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, 1853-1935, ed. cn Publication date: 1915 Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company Number of Pages: 848

Author: Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, 1853-1935, ed. cn
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company
Number of Pages: 848