USA > Virginia > City of Norfolk > City of Norfolk > History of Norfolk County, Virginia and representative citizens, V.1 > Part 29
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In connection with the above, the follow- ing receipt will be of interest :
Rec'ed 30th Janry 1775 from Captain A. B. C. (Ex- ecutor), by the Hands of Mr. Tabb forty stullings for preaching a sermon at the funeral of the late X. Y. Z. THOS. DAVIS.
In 1764. Thomas Nash and Samuel Happer were churchwardens for St. Bride's Parish ; Mathew Godfrey and Lewis Hansford for Elizabeth River Parish; and Thomas Creech and Amos Etheridge for Portsmouth Parish. In 1767, John Whiddon and John Corprew qualified as vestrymen for St. Bride's Parish. In 1771 Arthur Boush and Matthew Phripp qualified as vestrymen for Elizabeth River Parish,-in 1772. John Taylor was elected ves- tryman for the parish.
On the 17th day of December, 1773, the County Court ordered the sheriff to "Advertise the Parish land and negroes will be hired out on the first of January next." William Hap- per and John Corprew, were churchwardens for St. Bride's Parish in 1774, and Mathew Phripp and John Hutchings for Elizabeth River Parish in 1775.
Under the Commonwealth the vestries of Portsmouth and Elizabeth River parishes were dissolved and new vestrics ordered before April 1. 1779. Pursuant to this, January IS, 1779,-"This day Thomas Veale, John Her- bert, Samuel Veale, John Morris, William Baily, William Booker .. George W. Burgess, John Baine, William More, David Porter, Joshua Miers and John Powers took the oath of vestrymen of the Parish of Portsmouth and entered upon the duties of their office." And on the 18th of March. Mathew Godfrey. James Taylor. Mathew Phripp, Thomas Newton, Jr .. Paul Lovall. George Abyvon, John Tabb, Goodrich Bush, John Willoughby and Pruson Bowdoin took the oath as vestrymen of Eliza- beth River Parish and entered upon the duties of their office. These were the first church officials in Norfolk County who qualified under the Commonwealth of Virginia. On the toth of October, 1783, Isaac Luke and William Por-
ter qualified as vestrymen of Portsmouth Parish.
On the 16th day of July, 1784, James Tay- lor, Gent., produced to the County Court an account .of the hire of the negroes belonging to the several parishes in the county, amount- in to £81, 198. 7d. ; after deducting sundry ex- penses, it was ordered that the said Taylor should pay to the churchwardens of each par- ish their proportion of the said money in his hands. On the 19th of September, 1788, Paul Proby and Paul Loyall were ordered by the court to pay the overseers of the poor £7, IIS. 1/2d., the, balance in their hands, and to col- lect the money due for the hire of the par- ish negroes for 1785. and the clerk was di- rected to deliver them a copy of the said ac- count of the hire of the negroes.
St. Paul's Protestant Episcopal Church.
NORFOLK LONG AGO AND ITS OLD MOTHER CHURCH.
A lecture delivered in St. Paul's Sunday-school room May 12, 1879, by Col. William Lamb at the re- quest of the Ladies' Parish lid Society of St. Paul's Church, Elisabeth River Parish.
I would not presume to come before this or any other audience in the capacity of a public lecturer of my own volition, but I was invited by the ladies of the Parish Aid Society to de- liver one of this course of lectures, and I thought it my duty to accept. I have come, however, with no such interesting or instructive literary or scientific effort as you have heard from the distinguished gentleman who has pre- ceded me, but with a plain story of Norfolk Long Ago and its Old Mother Church. with some common place incidents in a boy's life associated with old St. Paul's.
I have chosen this subject because I had a right to feel that all who would assemble here this evening must be more or less interested in that ancient, ivy-covered building. from its broad foundation, to its sheltering eves, where the sparrows build their nests, up to the peaks of its homely gables and in every thing con- nected with its history and surroundings. That
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Old Church and its God's acre compose our Westminster Abbey. Here the worthy fore- fathers of Norfolk sleep. It is true they had no titles in the book of heraldry, but the ties of consanguinity and marriage gave them titles more precious to the loved and loving ones than any that Parliament, or King or Queen, could. possibly bestow.
In 1680, an Act was passed by the Colonial Assembly of the Colony of Virginia for the purchase of 50 acres of land at convenient points in the Colony. "for the establishment of towns for the encouragement of trade and manufacture."
Under this Act 50 acres were purchased August 16, 1682, from Nicholas Wise, a house carpenter of Elizabeth River Parish, in the county of Lower Norfolk, by Capt. William Robinson and Lieut .- Col. Anthony Lawson. feofees, in trust for said county. for and in ! consideration of the sum of 10,000 pounds of good merchantable tobacco and caske. The grant embraced all the land on the Elizabeth River from the eastern to the western limits . of the present Main street, bounded on the north by Back Creek, which at that tune flowed from the river eastwardly nearly to Church street. Its owner, Nicholas Wise, could not write his name. so he made his mark to the deed, and affixed his seal in the presence of four witnesses. This was the first of "Norfolk Towne.".
In 1705. a considerable population had been attracted to this place by its favorable situation for health and trade. and in October of that year Norfolk was incorporated as a town.
corporated, cur Old Church was built. as we learn from the date on its southern gable.
Forrest in his "History of Norfolk." pub- lished in 1853. says: "Samuel Boush. Esq., the first mayor of the Borough of Norfolk, three years after his appointment, presented to the parish the grounds occupied by St. Paul's Church, including the old graveyard. The initials of his name may be seen in large capi- tals in the brick work of the south end of the church with the date 1739." Bishop Meade in his "Old Churches of Virginia," published in 1857. in speaking of the vestry in 1749. says : "Among the first was Col. Samuel Boush, who gave the land on which St. Paul's and its graveyard stands, and whose tomb- stone, at the door of the church, tells where his body lies." In December. 1828. when the trustees of Christ Church refused Dr. French the use of the Old Church of which they were temporary custodians, they said: "That this property, as they are advised, was a donation from Mr. Samuel Boush for the exclusive use of the congregation of the church they repre- sent and none other. under a forfeiture of the same." These statements were made in good faith from tradition. but the record contradicts them.
Mr. Forrest makes Mr. Boush. the first mayor of our borough, present the land three I years after his decease, while Bishop Meade makes the son, Colonel Boush, the donor. The trustees of Christ Church seem to have been advised that it was a gift or legacy from the father to the parish upon certain conditions. Now neither Samuel Boush, Sr .. nor his son, Colonel Boush. could have given or devised this land except by deed or will of record in the clerk's office of Norfolk County, and I have diligently searched the complete records of deeds and wills from 1680 to the will of Col- onel Boush recorded in 1759; neither father nor son gave any land to Elizabeth River Par- ish within the limits of Norfolk County. found from the deed of Peter Malbone .- con-
In September, 1736, Norfolk Borough was established by royal charter, it being consid- ered by King George II a healthful and pleas- ant place, commodious for trade and naviga- tion. Samuel. Boush, Gent., was appointed mayor under the charter, but he died before qualifying, and in November following George Newton, Gent., was elected to fill the vacancy. In 1739, three years after the borough was in- : veying to his daughter, Applia Malbone. "A
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k tt of land in Norfolk Towne 12 acre begin- ning at a white stone. the southernmost corner- stone of my first let, next to the Church."- that a church stood. August 19, 1726. in the church grounds, where we now are and not . name put upon the southern gable as a memo- far from the present Cove street. The deed of rial of one who had been so long and so con- Col. Samuel Boush to Capt. Simen Hancock. ! spicuously associated with the parish: or the November, 1737, and the deed of Peter Mal- vestry may have put his initials there in con- bone to Capt. Nathaniel Tatem. November, : sideration of his liberality. Whether they were 1738, also show that the first church was stand- intended for the initials of father or son. the history of Elizabeth River Parish, from 1700 down to the Revolution, shows no name more worthy of being thus perpetuated than that of Samuel Boush. Three generations of the same name during that period were prominent in the affairs of the parish. ing next to and north of Malbone's land. and on Church street, which last recital. contradicts ; the tradition that the present church, erected in 1739, gave the name to Church street. Un- doubtedly when the corporate limits were ex- tended under the charter of 1736 to Town Bridge, the present. Church street was laid out and given its name from the former church, which was then taken down after the erection of the present one.
Having found that this cemetery was not the gift of Samuel Boush, let us inquire when it was dedicated to the dead.
By a general law, passed in the Colony in 1667, the right was vested in the County Courts, when expedient. to set aside and ap- propriate not more than two acres of land for church and burial purposes. As one and three- fourths acres is the area of this cemetery, it was doubtless thus appropriated to its present uses. "Norfolk Towne" was laid out in 1682. and soon became inhabited. Capt. Samuel Boush gave a chalice to the "Parish Church of Norfolk Towne," in March, 1700. showing that a church must have been erected. But in , 1686, 14 years before this and four years after the town was laid out. Francis Lord Howard, Governor, gave "with the advice and consent of the Counsell of State" 100 acres of land adjoining Norfolk for a glebe for Elizabeth River Parish.
As these glebes, together with the payment of tithes of tobacco and corn, were for the sup- port of the minister and church in each parish, it is not reasonable to suppose that 1686 is the date of the erection of the first church on these grounds. 53 years before the present structure
was built? Tradition informs us that Col. Samuel Boush imported and gave the bricks toward the erection of the present church. It may be that he had the initials of his father's
There is no doubt that this graveyard has been the burial-ground of our fathers for nearly 200 years. Tradition so reports it, and I have conversed with our oldest people and they have never heard of any other used before it. I called on old Capt. Edward L. Young a few weeks before his recent death. He was in his 97th year, and for more than half a century had occupied positions which made him familiar with the topography of Norfolk and its surroundings. Although his physical sight was gone, his mental vision was unimpaired, and he was very positive that no public burial- ground existed prior to the establishment of this cemetery for Norfolk. If there had been, he would undoubtedly have found some evidences cf it while he was the public surveyor for the borough and city of Norfolk. I have been re- peatedly informed that tier upon tier of cof- fins have been unearthed in this yard by the sexton when digging graves previous to the es- tablishment of Cedar Grove Cemetery. There is no menument to be found. except the two recently brought from James River, with a date anterior to 1744, and one with this date was removed from the private burial place of the Taylor family, which was on the site of the present Custom House lot. But the absence of ancient monuments proves nothing against the claim that this was the original God's acre of "Norfolk Towne," for within the memory
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of some of our present inhabitants two-thirds walls, two stories and a half high. A broad wainscoated hall running through the build- of the monuments which were in this yard in their day have disappeared. Many were . ing : a capacious parlor with its brass andirons doubtless deste ved and carried away during the occupancy of our Old Church and its grave- vard by British troops. during the Revolution. aud some from being constructed of soft sand- stone have crumbled with age. There were numberless graves in this yard that never had a headstone, for tombstones at that early day had to be imported and were necessarily ex- ! pensive.
A century and more ago it was a common custom to have family vaults for burials ad- joining the residences of the wealthier class of citizens. The remains of some of them can still be found in different parts of our city. and in my boyhood gave rise to many negro superstitions of haunted houses. It seems a strange taste to tis in these modern times, when more than two generations of a family seldom occupy the same residence, but the early days of our town and borough were the days of : primogeniture and entails. When men accumu- lated wealth they did not have the present thirst. for public notoriety. Official-position was not then the gift of the multitude. Commissions came 3,000 miles across the sea. and were of- ten brought by the fortunate recipients of royal favor. Our solid forefathers sought to found a name in the community in which they lived by establishing a home for their descendants. They built for themselves substantial resi- (lences, surrounded by convenient out-houses and enclosed by brick walls, storm proof against the equinoctial gales: and when their loved ones died, they buried them in a family vault in the garden. under the shadow of their roof- tree, and away from the crowd's ignoble strife. We do not think these houses of the olden times would suit our habits and customs now. I but they were grand old establishments. I can recollect some of them before the light of other day's had clean gone out on the old hearth- stones, and their memory has been mellowed ; kitchen! The capacious chimney, large enough and hallowed by time. I recall one representa- tive home, standing at a corner, with its thick
and lion-legged fender on one side: a sunny sitting room and a big hospitable dining room on the other : the broad sideboard. as dissipated- locking as the tap room of an old time country tavern : no carpets, but waxed hard-pine floors. with an occasional rug, and on the large one. in the dining room its constant companion. the house dog: no counterfeit chromos nor daubs with Dutch gilt frames disfigured the walls. but some masterpieces adorned the parlor, a pair of hunting scenes in water colors enlivened the dining room, while in the hall ancestors with pretty faces emerged out of indescribable dresses, with no waists to speak of, and intelli- gent and brave-looking gentlemen were nar- rowly escaping strangulation in villainous stocks. Upstairs was redolent with rose-leaves in vinegar: the bed rooms, with great. high- . post bedsteads. with curtains detying the changes of temperature without. The kitchen. a Dutch-roofed. one-story brick house. with tremendous chimneys at either end, sufficiently far from the mansion to prevent the smell of cocking even with a favoring wind : and a large square smoking-house, where the family bacon was cured, stood in the paved yard : then there was the stable for the horse and the inevitable : cow, which an English poet said every lady in Norfolk kept somehow : the wood-shed with its autumn-pile, reminding one of a steamboat landing on the James River in the olden time. 1 Then the flower garden flanking the residence. with the old-fashioned lilacs, snow balls. wall flowers and roses ; and the big back garden for vegetables, with a stray sunflower or two. and in it. enclosed by a forbidding wall. the jam- ily burial vault. We do not believe your mod- ern cook, with all her cooking stoves and patented contrivances, could ever reach the per- fection of those old Virginia negroes who pre- sided over the old-time kitchen. And such a to roast an ox, with the huge crane that could swing pets enough to boil the oil for Mor-
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giania to seald the "Forty Thieves," with the : They had the good sense to realize that few back-log of cak smouldering away, and the hickory sticks cracking, singing and treading snow in front. How the Lynnhavens would open their mouths before that fire! And the steak and chops and cuts of venison would broil superlatively on those living coals! The dinners of our forefathers often gave the gout, but dyspepsia; never.
can reach the pinnacle of earthly fame; that their noblest work was to act well their part in their day and generation, for the winds of heaven will cover over, and the tides of ocean will wash out, all footprints on the sand be- fore the moon can wax and wane. Where are the footprints left by the hundreds who now sleep silently around us? And yet, who would not-rather choose the lot of many who lie in these forgotten graves, than of those who, to gain an earthly name, stirred from its depths man's mad ambition, deluged once smiling lands in human blood, and sowed the seeds of sorrow in countless broken hearts.
Of a wintry night, when the December winds would howl around the old Dutch- roofed kitchen. how the old Guinea negro nurse would make the white teeth of the piccaninnies chatter, and the older heads roll their eyes, when she would tell how on such a night, long time ago, she had seen with her own eyes Like some aged Nestor. our Old Church has stood while a hundred and forty years have rolled over its head. It was erected in the Colony of Virginia which, under the fos- tering administration of Governor Gooch, was then peopling the lovely valley beyond the Blue Ridge with that splendid stock of Scotch- "Old Massa," who was buried in the garden, come from the vault and walk around the lot, looking sad and distressed. because "Young Missis," who was of one of the first families in Virginia, had "done gone" and married one of the "poor white trash." And then the blasts of wind, stirring the leaves and slamming the : Irish, whose descendants have done so much blinds, would make those "darkies" start and . toward the elevation of Virginia character. listen. until they became so scared that none ; It was about the same time that the rich lands would go to bed that night, but Break of diy would find them fast asleep around the kitchen firc. bordering on the Shenandoah were settled by the Germans from Pennsylvania, who long af- ter retained their language, correct habits and simplicity of manners. Bancroft. the histo- rian, in writing of this period. says: "The ISth century was the age of commercial am- bition, and Virginia relinquished its commerce to foreign factors. It was the age when na- tions rushed into debt, when stock-jobbers and
We admit, with modern philosophers that the world has grown better with advancing years ; we suppose that to doubt it would be to question the humanizing influences of Chris- tianity, but in those days individual character was as grand and massive as it is now. Those ! sterling men who moulded our institutions have : bankers competed with landholders for po- no superiors in our tin es. Doubtless the great : litical power; and Virginia paid its taxes in tobacco, and alone of all the Colonies. alone of all civilized States, resisting the universal tendency of the age, had no debts. no banks, no bills of credit, no paper money." mass of humanity had not attained the in- tellectual and spiritual elevation that has since been reached. but the professional and middle classes seem, looking at them through the vista of the past, to have had a solidity that we sel- It was the very year. 1739, that England declared war against Spain, and the "Mistress of the Seas," in sending her fleets to capture the Colonies of the discoverers of America, took the first step which led the way to the in- dependence of her own. dom find now. Like our Old Church many may have had a seemingly rude exterior, but they had all the elements of true greatness within. They had not become imbued with the modern idea of becoming great men, and leaving their foot-prints in the sands of time.
France and Spain were allies, and the loval
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Colony of Virginia, and her principal seaport, be well for our city fathers to heed. The Act recites that whereas most of the inhabitants are obliged to pass over the five ferries lead- ing to Norfolk in order to get to church, court and general muster, and that by expenses of ferriage many poor people are prevented from bringing their small wares and commodities to the market of the borough, therefore a tax Norfolk, sympathized with the mother coun- try. The Indian wars had not then been in- cited upon our Western borders by the French. but the Colonists were in the midst of exciting ; times, for we find in the early records of the borough. in September, 1741, three years af-' ter the erection of our church, a resolution by : the board of aldermen, that for the future the ; is levied and the ferries made free to all living inhabitants of this borough shall, to prevent any invasion or insurrection, be armed at the . church on Sundays, and other days of worship or Divine service, under penalty of five shill- ings. Imagine our present congregation at- tending church armed! The vestrymen pass- 1 ing the plates with swords dangling at their sieles, and the squad of young men who bal- ance themselves on the curbstone in Church street, when the people are passing out. each with his gun, presenting arms to the young ladies as they pass in review !
In 1746, we find the inhabitants of the borough manifesting their loyalty by a grand procession in celebration of the defeat of the Pretender. by His Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland. at the battle of Culloden. It was a gay affair. They had an effigy of the Pretender seated in an arm-chair drawn in a cart, musicians of every description were in the crowd, and a nurse carrying a warming- pan with a child peeping out of it was an at- tractive feature of the occasion. A vast crowd cante from the surrounding country to see the sights. The effigy was hung, liquor was plenti- fully distributed, salutes were fired and the borough illuminated. At night the effigy was . burned, and the ladies were entertained with a ball. A correspondent of the Williamsburg Gazette wrote: "The evening concluded with innocent mirth and unaffected joy, becoming a people loyal to their King and zealous for their country's good."
The crowds from the surrounding country which are always reported at the fairs and celebrations in Norfolk in the olden time. re -: mind us of an Act of the General Assembly in 1757, which teaches us a lesson that it would
in the county. Others, besides the inhabitants of the county, had to pay a sinall amount for the support of the ferries. In our boasted age of progress no one from the surrounding coun- try can get to Norfolk for business or pleasure without paying for it. We are surrounded by a cordon of toll-gates and toll-houses. And in mentioning this fact. I mean no reflection on the public-spirited gestlemen who in the last decade have added much to the attractiveness of our surroundings by the substantial bridges and shell roads which lead into our city. While speaking of ferries. I would venture the opin- ion that if our forefathers in 1757 could re- visit these scenes, nothing would excite their surprise more than the improvement in the means of transportation between Norfolk and Portsmouth, especially as managed by the pres- ent efficient superintendent of the ferry. Capt. William H. Murdaugh, of the United States and Confederate States navies, who has spared no efforts to add to the convenience, comfort and safety of passengers.
I am indebted to my friend William Port- lock, clerk of the Circuit Court of Norfolk County, for finding for me in his office, when I had well nigh given up. the search, the old vestry book of Elizabeth River Parish from 1749 to 1761. It is the only parish vestry book I know of in existence, between 1739 and the election of a vestry in 1832, upon the reinvest- ment of the Old Mother Church. The first record is dated October 18. 1749. Rev. Charles Smith was the minister from the time the ves- try book commences, until it ends. upon the division of the parish in 176r: when he re- moved to Portsmouth, where Trinity Church was built the next year. 1762, which churci:
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was rebuilt and enlarged in 1829. The mand the highest prices. So much for fash- ion. Mother Church paid the minister 16.000
. pounds of tobacco, and Tanner's Creek Chapel. 4,000 pounds of tobacco, annually. After 1753. the minister was allowed 4 per cent. for shrinkage.
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