USA > Virginia > Historical collections of Virginia : containing a collection of the most interesting facts, traditions, biographical sketches, anecdotes, &c. relating to its history and antiquities ; together with geographical and statistical descriptions ; to which is appended, an historical and descriptive sketch of the District of Columbia. > Part 46
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83
The next morning the Marquis left the court-house, and arrived about noon at Off.cy, bear the North Anna River, the seat of the then ex.governor Nelson, where he passed two or three days in the enjoyment of the hospitalities of the family. He eulogizes the patriotism and zeal of the governor, whose acquaintance he had made at the siege of York, and compliments the beauty, artlessness, and music of the young ladies, describ- ing them as " pretty nymphs, more timid and wild than those of Diana."
The Marquis then goes on to describe the venerable ex-secretary Nelson, the father of Gov. Nelson, whose elegant house, being occupied by Lord Cornwallis during the siege of York, was at last almost entirely destroyed by the cannon-shot of the Americans. The two sons of the secretary were in the American army, and sent a flag to the British general requesting permission for their father to leave the town, which request Corn- wallis humanely granted. The tranquillity which had weceeded these unhappy tunes, by giving him leisure to reflect upon his losses, had not embittered the recollection. He lived happily on his plantation, where in six hours be could assemble seventy of his pos . terity, all inhabitants of Virginia.
PATRICK HENRY, the second son of John and Sarah Henry, and one of nine children, was born on the 25th of May, 1735, at the family seat, called Bradley, in Hannover county. At the age of ten years he was taken from the school where he had learned to read and write, and taught Lafin by his father, who had opened a grammarschool in his own house. At the same thne he acquired some proficiency in mathematics. Pas- sionately addicted to the sports of the field, he could not brook the toll and confinement of study. And the time which should chus have been employed, was often pissed in
* 'I'ne memoir of President Davies as priacially abridged fromu a biographical sketch in fres dood Green's work on the College of New Jersey.
230
HANOVER COUNTY.
the forest with his gun, or over the brook with his angling-rod. "His companions fre. quently observed him lying along, under the shade of some tree that overbung the se- questered stream, watching for hours, at the same spot, the motionless cork of his fishing- line. without one encouraging symptom of snecess, and without any apparent source of enjoyment, unless he could find it in the case of his position, or in the illusions of hope ; or, which is most probable, in the stillness of the scene, or the silent workings of his own imagination." This love of solitude in his youth was a marked trait in his character.
May 1786 2 deury
Fac-simile of the signature of Patrick Henry.
The wants of a large family compelled his father to find employment for his sons. At the age of fifteen Patrick was put behind the counter of a country merchant, and the year following entered into business with his elder brother, William, with whom was to devolve its chief management ; but such were his idle habits, that he left the burden of the concern to Patrick, who managed wretchedly. The drudgery of business became intolerable to him, and then, too, " he could not find it in his heart" to disappoint any one who came for credit ; and he was very easily satisfied with apologies for non-pay- ment. He sought relief from his cares by having recourse to the violin, flute, and reading. An opportunity was presented of pursuing his favorite study of the human character, and the character of every customer underwent this scrutiny.
One year put an end to the mercantile concern, and the two or three following Patrick was engaged in settling up its affairs. At eighteen years of age he married Miss Shel- ton, the daughter of a neighboring farmer of respectability, and commenced cultivating a small farm ; but his aversion to systematic labor, and want of skill, compelled him to abandon it at the end of two years. Selling off'all his little possessions at a sacrifice, he again embarked in the hazardous business of merchandise. His old business habits still continued, and not unfrequently he shut up his stare to indulge in the favorite sports of his youth. His reading was of a more serious character ; history, ancient and modern, he became a proficient in. Livy. however, was his favorite ; and having procured a copy, he read it through at least once a year in the early part of his life. In a few years bis second mercantile experiment left him a bankrupt, and without any friends enabled to as. sist him further. All other means failing, he determined to try the law. His unfortunate habits, unsuitable to so laborious a profession, and his pecuniary situation unfitting him for an extensive course of reading, led' every one to suppose that he would not succeed. With only six weeks' study, he obtained a license to practise, he being then twenty-four years of age. He was then not only unable to draw a declaration or a plea, but incapa- ble, it is said, of the most common and simple business of his profession. It was not until his twenty-seventh year, that an opportunity occurred for a trial of his strength at the bar. In the mean time the wants and distresses of his family were extreme. They lived mostly with his father-in-law, Mr. Shelton, who then kept a tavern at Hanover court-house. Whenever Mr. Shelton was from home, Henry took his place in the tavern, which is the identical public-house now standing at Hanover court-house. The occa- sion on which his gonius first broke forth, was the controversy between the clergy and the legislature and people of the state, relating to the stipend claimed by the former. 'The cause was popularly known as the parsons' cause. A decision of the court on a de- murrer in favor of the claims of the clergy, had left nothing undetermined but the amount of damages in the cause which was pending. Soon after the opening of the court, the cause was called. The scene which ensued is thus vividly described by Wirt :
The array before Mr. Henry's eyes was now most fearful. On the bench sat more than twenty clergy- inen, the mnost learned men in the colony, and the most capable, as well as the severest critics before whom it was possible for hard to have and his debut. The courthouse was crowded with an over- whelming multirude, and surrounded with an innnense and anxious throng, who, not finding room to enter, were endeavoring to listen without, in the deepest attention. But there was something still more awfully disconcerting than all this ; for in the chair of the prosiding magistrate, sat no other person than his own father. Mr. Lyons opened the cause very briedy: in the way of argument he did nothing more than explain to the jury, that the decision upon the demurrer had put the act of 1750 entirely out of the way and left the law of 1748 as the only standard of their damages ; he then concluded with a highiy.
.
297
HANOVER COUNTY.
wrought culogium on the benevolence of the clergy. And now came on the first trial of Patrick Henry's strength. No one had ever heard him speak, and curiosity was on tiptoe. He rose very awkwardly, and faltered much in his exordium, The people hang their heads at so unpromising a commencement; the clergy were observed to exchange sly looks with each other; and his father is described as having almost sunk with confusion from his seat. But these feelings were of short duration, and soon gave place to others of a very different character. For now were those wonderful faculties which he possessed for the first time developed ; and now was first witnessed that mysterious and almost supernatural ( ... >- formation of appearance, which the fire of his own eloquence never failed to work in him. For us his mind rolled along, and began to glow frem its own action, all the erurie of the clown seemed to shed themselves spontaneously. His attitude by decrees became creet and lotty. The spirit of his genius awakened all his features. His countenance shone with a nobleness and grandeur which it hao os r before exhibited. There was a lightning in his eyes which seemed to rivet the spectator. Bis action became gracetul, bold, and commanding ; and in the tones of his voice, but more especially in his em- phasis, there was a peculiar charm, a magic, of which any one who ever heard him will speak as soon as he is nained, but of which no one can give any adequate description. They can only say that it struck upon the ear and upon the heart, in a manner which language cannot tell. Add to all these, his wonder-working finey, and the peculiar phraseology in which he clothed its inages : for he painted to the heart with a force that almost petrified it. In the language of those who heard him on this occa- sion. " he made their blood run cold, and their hair to rise on end."
It will not be difheult for any one who ever heard this most extraordinary man, to believe the whole account of this transaction which is given by his surviving hearers ; and from their account, the court- house of Hanover county must have exhibited, on this occasion, a scene as picturesque as has been ever witnessed in real life. They say that the people, whose countenances had fallen as he arose, had heard but a very few sentences before they began to look up; then to look at each other with surprise, as if doubting the evidence of their own senses ; then, attracted by some strong gesture, struck by some majestic attitude, fascinated by the spell of his eye, the charm of his emphasis, and the varied and commanding expression of his countenance, they could look away no more, In less than twenty minutes they might be seen, in every part of the house, on every bench, in every window. stooping forward from their stands, in death-like silence ; their features fixed in amazement and awe, all their senses listening and riveted upon the speaker, as if to catch the last strain of some heavenly visitant. The mockery of the clergy was soon turned into alarm, their triumph into contusion and despair, and at one burst of his rapid and overwhelming invention, they dod from the bench in precipitation call center Ns da die , such was his surprise, such his amazement, such hls rapture, that. forgetting where he was, and the character which he was filling, tears of ecstasy streamed down his checks, without the power or inclina- tion to repress them.
The jury seem to have been so completely bewildered, that they lost sight not only of the act of 1748 but that of 1758 also ; for, thoughtless even of the admitted right of the plaintiff, they had scarcely left the bar when they returned with a verdict of one penny damages. A motion was made for a new trial ; but the court, too, had now lost the equipeise of their judement, and overrated the motion by a ananimons vote. The verdict. and judgment overruling the motion, were followed by redoubled acclamation, from within and without the house. The people, who had with ditheulty kept their hands off their champion from the moment of closing his harangue, no sooner saw the fate of the cause finally waited than they seized him at the bar, and, in spite of his own exertions and the continued ery of "order," from the sheriff's and the court, they bore him out of the court-house, and raising him on their shoulders, carried him about the yard in a kind of electioneering triumph.
From this time Mr. Henry's star was in the ascendant, and he at once roso to the head of his profession in that section. In the autumn of 1761, having removed to Round- about, in Louisa county, he was employed to argue a case before a committee on elve. tions of the House of Burgesses. Hle distinguished himself by a brilliant display on the right of suffrage. Such a burst of eloquence from a man of so humble an appearance, struck the committee with amazement, and not a sound but from his lips broke the deep silence of the room.
In 1765, he was elected a member of the House of Burgesses, when he introduced his celebrated resolutions on the Stamp Act. Among his papers there was found, after his decease, one sealed and thus endorsed :
"Enclosed are the resolutions of the Virginia Assembly, in 1765, concerning the Stamp Act. Let my executors open this paper." On the back of the paper containing the resolutions was the following endorsement : " The within passed the House of Burgesses in May. 105. They formed the first opposi- tion to the Stamp Act, and the scheme of tixing America by the British parliament. All the colonies. either through fear, or the want of opportunity to form an opposition, or from influence of some kind of other, had remained silent. I had been for the first time elected a burgess a few days before, was young, inexperienced, unacquainted with the forms of the house and the members who composed it. Finding the men of weight averse to opposition, and the commencement of the tax at hand, and that no person was likely to step forth, I determined to venture ; and alone, unaided and unassisted, on the blank bit of an old law -book, wrote the within. Upon offering them to the house, violent debates ensued. Many threats were uttered, and much abuse cast on me by the parties for submission. After a long and warm contest, the resolutions passed by a very small majonty, perleast one or two only. The altar spread throughout America with astonishing quickness, and the ministerial party were overwhelurd. The great paint of resistance to British taxation was universally established in the colonies. This brought on the war, which finally separated the two countries, and gave independence to ours. Whether this will prove a blessing or a curse, will depend upon the use our people make of the blessing, which & gracious God hath bestowed on us. If they are wise, they will be great and happy. Ifthey are of'a contrary character. they will be miserable. Righteousness alone can exult them as a nation. Reader, whoever thou art, remember this ; and in thy sphere, practise virtue thyself, and encourage it in others.
It was in the midst of the above-mentioned debate that be exclaimed, in tones of thunder, " Cæsar had his Brutus-Charles the First his Cromwell-and George the
38
D
208
HANOVER COUNTY.
Third ---- (' 'Treason " cried the speaker --- ' Treason! treason !' echoed from every part of the house. Henry faltered not for a moment ; taking a loftier attitude, and fixing on the speaker an eye of fire, he finished his sentence with the firmest emphasis) -- " may profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it." Henceforth Mr.
The old Court-House, Hanover.
[The Hanover Court-House is over a century old, and is built of imported brick. It is the building in which Patrick Henry made his celebrated speech in " The Parsons' Cause."]
Henry was the idol of the people of Virginia, and his influence as one of the great champions of liberty, extended throughout America. In 1769 he was admitted to the bar of the general court. Without that legal learning which study alone can supply, he was deficient as a mere lawyer. But before a jury, in criminal cases particularly, his genius displayed itself most brilliantly. His deep knowledge of the springs of human action, his power of reading in the flitting expressions of the countenance what was pass. ing in the hearts of his heaters, has rarely been possessed by any one in so great a de- gree. In 1767 or '68, Mr. Henry removed back to Hanover, and continued a member of the House of Burgesses until the close of the revolution, acting upon its most im- portant committees, and infusing a spirit of bold opposition in its members to the pre- tensions of Britain. He was a delegate to the first Colonial Congress, which assembled Sept. 4, 1774, at Philadelphia.
Upon Lord Dunmore's seizing the gunpowder at Williamsburg, in the night after the battle of Lexington, Henry summoned volunteers to meet him ; and marching down tu- wards the capitol, compelled the agent of Dunmore to give a pecuniary compensation for it. This was the first toilbary movement in Virginia. The colonial convention of 1775 elected him the colonel of the first regiment, and the commander of " all the forces raised and to be raised for the defence of the colony." Soon resigning his command, he was elected a delegate to the convention, and not long after, in 1776, the first gov- ernor of the commonwealth, an office he held by successive re-elections notil 1779, when, without an intermission, he was no longer constitutionally eligible. While hold- ing that office he was signally serviceable in sustaining public spirit during the gloomiest period of the revolution, providing recruits, and crushing the intrigues of the tories.
On leaving the office of governor, he served, until the end of the war, in the legisla- ture, when he was again elected governor, until the state of his affairs caused him to resign in the autumn of 1786. Until 1794 he regularly attended the courts, where his great reputation obtained for him a lucrative business. " In 1788 he was a member of the convention of Virginia which so ably and eloquently discussed the constitution of the United States. He employed his masterly eloquence, day after day, in opposition to the proposed constitution. His hostility to it proceeded entirely from an apprehension that the federal government would swallow the sovereignty of the states ; and that ultimate- ly the liberty of the people would be destroyed, or crushed, by an overgrown au! pon- derous consolidation of political power. The constitution having been adopted, the gov. ernment organized, and Washington elected President, has repugnante measurably abated. The chapter of amendments considerably neutralized his objections : bur, nevertheless, it is believed that his acquiescence resulted more from the consideration of
209
HARDY COUNTY.
A citizen's duty, confidence in the chief magistrate, and a hopeful reliance on the wis- dom and virtue of the people, rather than from any material change in his opinions."
In 1794 Mr. Henry retired from the bar. In 1796 the post of governor was once more tendered to him, and refused. In 1798 the strong and animated resolutions of the Virginia Assembly, in opposition to the alien and sedition laws, which laws he was in favor of, " conjured up the most frightful visions of civil war, disunion, blood, and anar. chy ; and under the impulse of these phantoms, to make what he considered a virtuous effort for his country, he presented himself in Charlotte county as a candidate for the Hou-e of Delegates, at the spring election of 1799," although he had retired to private life three years previously.
His speech on this occasion, before the polls were opened, was the last effort of his eloquence. " The power of the noon-day sun was gone ; but its setting splendors wore not less beautiful and touching." Mr. Heury was elected by his usual commanding majority, and the most formidable preparations were made to oppose him in the Assem- bly. Bat " the disease which had been preying upon him for two years now hastened to its crisis ; and on the 6th of June, 1799, this friend of liberty and man was no more."
By his first wife be had six children, and by his last, six sons and three daughters. He let them a large landed property. He was tomperate and frugal in his habits of living, and seldom drank any thing but water. He was nearly six feet in height, spare, and raw-boned, and with a slight stoop in his shoulders ; his complexion dark and sal- low ; his countenance grave, thoughtful, and penetrating, and strongly marked with the lines of profound reflection, which with his carnest manner, and the habitual knit. ting and contracting of his brows, gave at times an expression of severity. " He was gifted with a strong and musical voice, and a most expressive countenance, and he ac- quired particular skill in the use of them. . . . Hle could be vehement, insinuating, humor- ous, and sarcastic, by turns, and always with the utmost effect. He was a natural ora- tor of the highest order, combining imagination, acuteness, dexterity, and ingenuity, with the most forcible action, and extraordinary powers of face and utterance. As a statesman, his principal merits were sagacity and boldness. His name is brilliantly and lastingly connected with the history of 'his country's emancipation."
" In private life, Mr. Henry was as amiable as he was brilliant in his public carcer. He was an exomplaty Christian, and his illustrious l'e was greatly ornamented by the religion which he professed. In his will he left the following testimony respecting the Christian religion : 'I have now disposed of all my property to my family. There is one thing more I wish I could give them, and that is the Christian religion. If they have that, and I had not given one shilling, they would be rich ; and if they have not that, and I had given them the whole world, they would be poor,'"
HARDY.
HARDY was formed in 1786, from Hampshire, and named from Samuel Hardy, a member of Congress from 1783 to 1985. He was a young man of promising talents, who died suddenly. Its mean length is 42, breadth 17 miles. The surface of the county is traversed, in a NE. direction, by the South Branch and other tri- butaries of the Potomac ; with lateral chains of mountains inter- vening, and extending in the same direction with the rivers. The surface is much broken, and. for the most part. very rocky and sterile ; but tracts of excellent land lie on the streams, and in the mountain-valleys. There are some valuable banks of iron ore in the county. Pop., whites 6,100, slaves 1,131, free colored 391; total, 7,622.
Trout Run, or Wardensville, is a small village on Trout Run. in the eastern section of the county, 26 miles from the county-seat. It was laid off in 1827. In the place and vicinity are several
300
HARDY COUNTY.
flour mills and iron works. Moorefield, the county-seat, is 178 miles Nw. of Richmond, and 50 miles southwesterly from Win- chester. This village is situated on the South Branch of the Poto- mac, at the junction of the south fork, in a valley of surpassing fertility, and contains a population of about 400, It was neph. lished by law, in 1777, on land belonging to Conrad Moore, from whom it derived its name. The act appointed, as trustees to lay out the town, Garret Vanmeter, Abel Randall. Moses Hutton, Jacob Read, Jonathan Heath, Daniel M'Neil, and Geo. Rennock. Peter's- burg is a small village on the South Branch of the Potomac.
On the Wappatomaka have been found numerous Indian relies, among which was a highily finished pipe, representing a snake coiled around the bowl. There was also dis- covered the under jaw bone of a human being (says hercheval) of great size, which contained eight jaw-teeth in each side, of enormous size ; and, what is more remarkable, the teeth stood transversely in the jaw-bone. It would pass over any man's face with entire case.
The FAIRTAY Stove, the southern point of the western boundary between Mary- land and Virgina, is on the westerly angle of this county. It was planted Oct. 17, 1746
There are several natural curiosities in this county worthy of note. They are the Regurgitary Spring, the Lost Rives, and the Devil's Garden.
The Regurgitury Spring is on the suenait of a high mountain, a few miles frein Petersburg. It flows and able every two hours. When rising, it emits a note similar to the gurgling of liquor from the hung-hol of a barrel, which continues two hours, and sends out sand and pebbles. fi then ebbs two hours, at the end of which time the water entirely disappears,
The Doll's Garden. A grip of ground between two lofty ranges of mountains, rises gradually for about three miles. when it abruptly terminates at its southern extremity by an isolated and perpendicular site of granithe rock & of about 500 feet in height. At this place there is a figure in solid rock, resembling, in its upper part, the bust of a man. It is on a piece of ground dfelly strewn with roeks, which, from the dark frowning appear- ance of the image, standing as the presiding deity of this savage spot, has given rise to the name it bears. Near his " satanic majesty," a door opens into a cavern, containing about a dozen rooms. The Lost River is so called from having, in the aggregate, a sub- terranean passage of three miles under several mountains.
This section of the country suffered severely in the Indian wars, previous to the revolution. Some incidents of bravery deserve a record :
Near Petersburg, a party of Indians attacked, just before daybreak, the dwelling of Samuel Binghamn. Himself, wife, and parents, slept below, and a hired man in the loft above. A shot was first fired into the cabin, wounding his wife. Bingham sprang to his fect, bade the others to get under the bed, and requested the hired man to come down to his assistance, who, however, did not move. As the Indians rashed in at the door, he lid about him, with his rifle, with so much desperation that he finally cleared the room. Daylight appearing, he discovered that he had killed five, and the remaining two were Been retreating. He having broken his ritle in the mêlée, seized one which had been left by the Indians, and wounded one of the fugitives. Tradition relates. that the other fled to the Indian comp, and reported that they had a fight with a devil, who had killed six of his companions, and that if they went, he would kill them all.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.