USA > Virginia > History of the colony and ancient dominion of Virginia > Part 30
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ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
and induction of ministers, which were reserved to the gover- nor. The bishop's commissary made visitation of the churches and inspection of the clergy. He received no salary, but was allowed, by the king, one hundred pounds per annum out of the quit-rents .*
* Account of Va., in Mass. Hist. Coll., first series.
CHAPTER XLIV.
1698-1702.
Administration of Andros-Controversy with Blair-The Rev. Hugo Jones' Account of Maryland - Andros succeeded by Nicholson-Alteration in his Conduct-Supposed Cause-Williamsburg made the Seat of Government- His tyrannical Proceedings-Prejudice of Beverley, the Historian-Act against Pirates-Offices of Speaker and Treasurer combined-Capture of a piratical Vessel-Death of Edward Hill-Commencement at William and Mary-Demise of William the Third-Succeeded by Anne-Nicholson's Description of the People of Virginia.
GOVERNOR ANDROS took singular pains in arranging and pre- serving the public records; and when, in 1698, the State-house was burned, he caused the papers that survived to be arranged with more exactness than before. He ordered that all the Eng- lish statutes should be law in Virginia; this preposterous rule gave great dissatisfaction. He was a patron of manufactures; but the acts for establishing fulling-mills were rejected by the board of trade. He encouraged the culture of cotton, which, however, fell into disuse.
By royal instructions, Andros was invested with the powers of ordinary, or representative of the king and the bishop of London, in the affairs of the church. This brought him into collision with Commissary Blair, and in 1694 the governor arbitrarily sus- pended him from his place in the council, to which he had been appointed in the preceding year. While in England on the busi- ness of the college, in 1695, the doctor preferred charges against Andros as an enemy to religion, to the church, the clergy, and the college. The charges and the proofs covered thirty-two folio pages of manuscript, and were drawn up with ability. But Blair had to contend with formidable opposition, for Governor Andros sent over to London, in his defence, Colonel Byrd, of Westover, Mr. Harrison, of Surry County, Mr. Povey, who was high in office in the colony, and a Mr. Marshall, to arraign the Rev.
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ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
Commissary himself before the Bishop of London and the Arch- bishop of Canterbury. Two days were spent at Lambeth Palace, in the examination, the charges and answers filling fifty-seven folio pages of manuscript, and Dr. Blair's accusers were signally discomfited. Much of the prejudice against him was owing to his being a Scotchman-a prejudice at that time running very high in England. The result was that Blair returned after suc- cessfully accomplishing the object of his mission, and having been reinstated in the council by the king. He was, neverthe- less, again removed upon a pretence equally frivolous .* Andros was sent back to England to answer in person the charges alleged against him, and eventually, they being substantiated, he was removed from his office of deputy governor of Virginia. }
William the Third, by the treaty of Ryswick, in 1697, ob- tained an acknowledgment of his right to the crown, and vindi- cated the principles of constitutional freedom.
The Rev. Hugo Jones, author of a work entitled "Present State of Virginia," writing from Maryland in this year, says of the people there: "They are, generally speaking, crafty, knav- ish, litigious, dissemblers, and debauched. A gentleman (I mean one of a generous Cambro-Briton temper) is rara avis in terris. A man must be circumspect and prudent if he will maintain his reputation among them. Of dealing, it is very true what was told me by a man at London, that none is fit to deal with a Vir- ginian but a Virginian; however, I having made it my business both in London and at sea to inquire into the nature of the peo- ple, that I might know the better how to behave myself among them, have gained as good a reputation as in modesty I could ex- pect; neither have I been much imposed upon in my bargains. As to the people's disposition in matters of religion, they will follow none out of the path of interest, and they heartily em- brace none but such as will fill the barn and the basket. Most sects are here professed, but in general they are practical atheists."}
* Account of Va. in Mass. Hist. Coll., first series, v. 144.
¡ Old Churches, Ministers, and Families of Virginia, i. 157.
į European Magazine, 1796.
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HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
The uncharitable judgments of this narrow-minded writer are not entitled to much weight. Among a people requiring so much ministerial care, he found ample time to devote to the study of natural history, and was curious in the examination of "fishes' bones" and "petrified mushrooms."
In the year 1698 died Thomas Ludwell, Esq., some time secre- tary of Virginia. He was born at Bruton, County Somerset, England. Sir Edmund Andros was succeeded in November, 1698, by Colonel Nicholson, transferred from the government of Maryland. He entertained a plan of confederating the colonies together, and aspired to become himself the viceroy of the con- templated union. Finding himself thwarted in these projects, his conduct became self-willed and overbearing. In a memorial sent to England, he stated that tobacco bore so low a price as not to yield even clothes to the planters; yet, in the same paper, advised parliament to prohibit the plantations from making their own clothing; in other words, proposing that they should be left to go naked .* Indeed, he appeared to be quite altered from what he had been during his former administration in Virginia; and the change was thought to be not a little owing to a disap- pointment in love. He had become passionately attached to a daughter of Lewis Burwell, Jr., and failing to win her favor or that of her parents, in his suit, he became infuriated, and per- sisted, Quixotically, for years in his fruitless purpose. The young lady's father, and her brothers, and Commissary Blair, and the Rev. Mr. Fouace, minister of the parish, were especial objects of his vengeance. To the young lady he threatened the death of her father and her brothers, if she did not yield to his suit. He committed other outrages no less extraordinary.
For the sake of a healthier situation, Governor Nicholson re- moved the seat of government from Jamestown, now containing only three or four good inhabited houses, to Middle Plantation, so called from its lying midway between James and York Rivers. Here he projected a large town, laying out the streets in the form of a W and M, in honor of King William and Queen Mary. This plan, however, appears to have been abandoned, or only
* Beverley, B. i. 98.
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ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
partially carried out .* According to the contemporary histo- rian Beverley, Nicholson declared openly to the lower order of people "that the gentlemen imposed upon them; that the ser- vants had all been kidnapped, and had a lawful action against their masters." In the year 1700 Mr. Fowler, the king's attor- ney-general for the colony, declaring some piece of service against law, the governor seized him by the collar, and swore "that he knew no laws they had, and that his commands should be obeyed without hesitation or reserve." He committed gentle- men who offended him to prison without any complaint, and re- fused to allow bail; and some of them having intimated to him that such proceedings were illegal, he replied, "that they had no right at all to the liberties of English subjects, and that he would hang up those that should presume to oppose him, with magna charta about their necks." He often extolled the govern- ments of Fez and Morocco, and at a meeting of the governors of the college, told them "that he knew how to govern the Moors, and would beat them into better manners." At another time he avowed that he knew how to govern the country without assemblies, and if they should deny him anything after he had obtained a standing army, "he would bring them to reason with halters about their necks." His outrages made him jealous, and to prevent complaints being sent to England against him, he is said to have intercepted letters, employed spies, and even played the eavesdropper himself. He sometimes held inquisitorial courts to find grounds of accusation against such as incurred his dis- pleasure. t
Robert Beverley, author of a "History of Virginia," pub- lished the first edition of it in 1705. He was a son of Robert Beverley, the persecuted clerk, who died in 1687. This may account somewhat for his extreme acrimony against Culpepper and Effingham, who had persecuted his father, and against Nicholson, who was Effingham's deputy. In his second edition, when time had, perhaps, mitigated his animosities, Beverley
* Hugh Jones' Present State of Virginia; Beverley, B. i. 99; Va. Hist. Reg., vi. 15.
+ Beverley, B. i. 97.
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omitted many of his accusations against these governors. In favor of Nicholson, it is also to be observed, that his adminis- tration in Maryland and in South Carolina was more satisfac- tory. But it is certain that he was an erratic, Quixotic, irascible man, who could not bear opposition, and an extreme high churchman.
In the eleventh year of William the Third an act was passed for the restraining and punishing of pirates and privateers, the preamble reciting that "nothing can more conduce to the honor of his most sacred majesty than that such articles of peace as are concluded in all treaties should be kept and preserved in- violable by his majesty's subjects in and over all his majesty's territories and dominions, and that great mischief and depreda- tions are daily done upon the high seas by pirates, privateers, and sea-robbers, in not only taking and pillaging several ships and vessels belonging to his majesty's subjects, but also in taking, destroying, and robbing several ships belonging to the subjects of foreign princes, in league and amity with his ma- jesty;" and they prayed that crimes committed on the high seas should be punished as if committed on land, in Virginia .* A committee was appointed during the same session "to revise the laws of this his majesty's ancient and great colony and dominion of Virginia."t
Among the subjects upon which a tax was laid for the building of a capitol, were servants imported, not being natives of Eng- land or Wales, fifteen shillings per poll, and twenty shillings on every negro or other slave. Colonel Robert Carter, speaker of the house, was elected to fill the office of treasurer; and it came to be the custom for the two offices of speaker and treasurer to be held by the same person. The establishment of the office of a treasurer appointed by the assembly, giving that body control of the colonial purse, added much to the independence of its legislative power.
* Hening, iii. 177.
+ The members of it were Edward Hill, Matthew Page, and Benjamin Harri- son, Esquires, members of the council; and Miles Cary, John Taylor, Robert Beverley, Anthony Armistead, Henry Duke, and William Buckner, gentlemen of the house of burgesses.
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ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
In the second year of Nicholson's administration a piratical vessel was captured within the capes of Virginia. She had taken some merchant-vessels in Lynhaven Bay, and a small vessel hap- pening to witness an engagement between her and a merchant- man, conveyed intelligence of it to the Shoram, a fifth-rate man- of-war, commanded by Captain Passenger, and newly arrived. Nicholson chanced to be at Kiquotan sealing up his letters, and, going on board the Shoram, was present in the engagement that followed. The Shoram, by daybreak, having got in between the capes and the pirate, intercepted her, and an action took place on the 29th of April, 1700, when the pirate surrendered upon condition of being referred to the king's mercy. In this affair fell Peter Heyman, grandson of Sir Peter Heyman, of Summer- field, in the County of Kent, England. Being collector of the customs in the lower district of James River, he volunteered to go on board the Shoram, and after behaving with undaunted courage, standing on the quarter-deck near the governor, was killed by a small shot.
During this year died the Honorable Colonel Edward Hill, of Shirley, on the James River, in the sixty-third year of his age; he was of the council, colonel and commander-in-chief of the Counties of Charles City and Surry, judge of his majesty's high court of admiralty, and some time treasurer of Virginia. He lies buried at Shirley, and a portrait of him and his wife is preserved there.
In the year preceding this, Protestant dissenters, qualified ac- cording to the toleration act of the first year of William and Mary, were exempted from penalties for not repairing to the parish church, if they attended some legal place of worship once in two months .* The press was not yet free in Virginia, and the writ of habeas corpus was still withheld.
There was a commencement at William and Mary College in the year 1700, at which there was a great concourse of people; several planters came thither in coaches, and others in sloops from New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, it being a new thing in that part of America to hear graduates perform their
* Hening, iii. 171.
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HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
exercises. The Indians themselves had the curiosity, some of them, to visit Williamsburg upon that occasion; and the whole country rejoiced as if they had some relish of learning. Fifty- eight years before this there had been celebrated a commence- ment at Harvard College, in Massachusetts .*
In the year 1701 Colonel Quarry, surveyor-general of the cus- toms, wrote to the board of trade: "This malignant humor is not confined to Virginia, formerly the most remarkable for loyalty, but is universally diffused."
During the month of March of this year died William the Third. His manner was taciturn, reserved, haughty; his genius military ; his decision inflexible. In his fondness of prerogative he showed himself a grandson of the first Charles; as the de- fender of the Protestant religion, and Prince of Orange, he dis- played toleration toward all except Papists. The government of Virginia under him was not materially improved. He was succeeded by Anne, daughter of James the Second. Louis the Fourteenth having recognized the Pretender as lawful heir to the British crown, Anne, shortly after she succeeded to the throne, in 1702, declared war against France, and its ally Spain; but Virginia was not directly affected by the long conflict that en- sued. In compliance with the requests of the assembly, the queen granted the colony warlike stores, to the value of three thousand and three hundred pounds, which the governor was directed to pay from the revenue of quit-rents. Her majesty, at the same time, renewed the requisition formerly made by the crown for an appropriation in aid of the defences of New York; but the burgesses still steadily refused.
During the reign of William the Third the commerce of Vir-
* In 1701 the population of the colonies was as follows :-
Connecticut 30,000
Pennsylvania 20,000
Maryland 25,000
Rhode Island
10,000
Massachusetts. 70,000
South Carolina 7,000
New Hampshire 10,000
Virginia 40,000
New Jersey 15,000
New York
30,000
Total
262,000
North Carolina
5,000
(Compendium of United States Census.)
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ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
ginia had been seriously interrupted, and her customary supplies withheld; she, therefore, encouraged the domestic manufacture of linen and wool; but an act for the establishment of fulling- mills was rejected by the board of trade, as also was one for "the better securing the liberty of the subject." Governor Nicholson, in a memorial to the council of trade, described the people of Virginia as numerous, rich, and of republican princi- ples, such as ought to be lowered in time; that then or never was the time to maintain the queen's prerogative, and put a stop to those pernicious notions, which were increasing daily, not only in Virginia, but in all her majesty's other governments, and that a frown from her majesty now would do more than an army there- after; and he insisted on the necessity of a standing army .*
* Beverley, B. i. 104.
CHAPTER LXV.
1703.
Assembly held in the College-Ceremony of opening the Session-The Gover- nor's Speech.
A MEETING of the general assembly was held at her majesty's Royal College of William and Mary, in March, 1703, being the second year of Queen Anne's reign, and, by prorogation, again in April, 1704 .* The clerk of the general assembly was ordered to wait upon the house of burgesses and inform them that his excellency commanded their immediate attendance on him in the council chamber. The burgesses having complied with this order, his excellency was pleased to let them know that her most sacred majesty having been pleased to renew his commission to be her majesty's lieutenant and governor-general of this her majesty's most ancient and great colony and dominion of Virginia, he would cause the said commission to be read to them. This being done, he read them that part of his instructions wherein the coun- cil are nominated, and informed the house that upon the death of Colonel Page, the number of councillors having fallen under nine, he had appointed one to supply that vacancy. The gover- nor next mentioned to the house that he had commissioned some of her majesty's honorable council to administer the oath to the burgesses. Whereupon they withdrew, and the oath was admi- nistered by the Honorable William Byrd, John Lightfoot, and Benjamin Harrison. These gentlemen returning to the council chamber, the clerk of the assembly was ordered to wait again upon the house of burgesses, and acquaint them that his excel- lency commanded their immediate attendance on him. The
* A meeting of the council was held, consisting of his Excellency Francis Nicholson, Esq., lieutenant and governor-general, and William Byrd, John Light- foot, Benjamin Harrison, Robert Carter, John Custis, Philip Ludwell, William Basset, Henry Duke, Robert Quarry, and John Smith, Esquires.
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house of burgesses complying with this order, the governor made the following speech :-
"HONORABLE GENTLEMEN,-
"God Almighty, I hope, will be graciously pleased so to direct, guide, and enable us, as that we may, to all intents and purposes, answer her majesty's writ by which this assembly was called, and by prorogation is now met in this her majesty Queen Anne her royal capitol; which being appointed by law for hold- ing general assemblies and general courts, my hopes likewise are that they may continue to be held in this place for the promoting of God's glory, her majesty, and her successors' interest and ser- vice with that of the inhabitants of this her majesty's most an- cient and great colony and dominion of Virginia, so long as the sun and moon endure. Gentlemen, her most sacred majesty having been graciously pleased to send me her royal picture and arms for this her colony and dominion, I think the properest place to have them kept in, will be this council chamber; but it not being as yet quite finished, I cannot have them so placed as I would.
"By private accounts which I have from England, I under- stand her majesty hath lately thought fit to appoint a day of public fasting and humiliation there; but I have not yet seen her majesty's royal proclamation for it, which makes me not willing to appoint one here till I have. And had it not been for this, I designed that her majesty's royal picture and arms should have been first seen by you on St. George his day, and to have kept it as a day of public thanksgiving, it being the day on which her majesty was crowned, and bearing the name of his royal high- ness the Prince of Denmark, and likewise of the patron of our mother kingdom of England.
"Honorable gentlemen, I don't in the least doubt but that you will join with me in paying our most humble and dutiful acknow- ledgments and thanks to her most sacred majesty for this great honor and favor which she hath been pleased to bestow upon your country, and in praying that she may have a long, prosperous, successful, and victorious reign, as also that she may in all respects not only equal, but even outdo her royal predecessor,
,
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ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
Queen Elizabeth, of ever-glorious memory, in the latter end of whose reign this country was discovered, and in honor of her called Virginia.
"It is now within two years of a century since its being first seated, at which time, if God Almighty and her majesty shall be so pleased, I design to celebrate a jubilee, and that the inhabit- ants thereof may increase exceedingly, and also abound with riches and honors, and have extraordinary good success in all their undertakings, but chiefly that they may be exemplary in their lives and conversations, continue in their religion of the Church of England as by law established, loyal to the crown thereof, and that all these things may come to pass, I question not but you will most cordially join with me in our most un- feigned and hearty prayers to God Almighty for them."
At the close of this verbose speech, the burgesses returned to their house, and the council adjourned .*
* Documents in S. Literary Messenger, communicated by Wyndham Robert- son, Esq., having been copied by his father, while he was clerk of the council, from old papers in the council chamber.
1
CHAPTER XLVI.
1703-1705.
Quit-rents-Northy's Opinion against the Custom of the Vestry's employing a Minister by the Year-The Free Church Disruption in Scotland-Controversy between Blair and Nicholson-Convocation-Nicholson recalled-Notice of his Career-Huguenots.
BY the account of Colonel William Byrd, receiver-general, the nett proceeds of her majesty's revenue of quit-rents for the year 1703 amounted to five thousand seven hundred and forty-five pounds.
In the Church of England the people have no part in the choice of their minister ; a patron appoints him, and a living sup- ports him. In Virginia, on the contrary, the salary being levied directly from the people by the vestries, they fell upon the expe- dient, as has been repeatedly mentioned, of employing a minister for a year. Governor Nicholson, an extreme high-churchman, procured from the attorney-general, Northy, an opinion against this custom, and it was sent to all the vestries, with directions to put it on record. The vestries, nevertheless, pertinaciously re- sisted this construction of the law. In two important points the church establishment in Virginia differed from that in England- in the appointment of the minister by the vestry, according to the act of 1642, and in the absence of a bishop.
In recent times the disruption of the Scottish general assembly resulted in the Free Church of Scotland, which thus, by sacri- ficing the temporalities, vindicated its independence of the govern- ment in things spiritual. In Virginia the vestries virtually maintained a like independence. In Scotland the contest arrayed against each other schismatic parties in the established kirk, known as the Evangelical and the Moderates, whereas in Vir- ginia it was a mere contest for power between the vestries and the government. The Free Church of Scotland, at the time of the disruption, was still in theory in favor of an establishment in
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HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
which the clergy should be chosen by the people and paid by the government .* Even in England, under the constitution of the established church, the ministers of certain exceptional chapels were formerly elected by the freeholders of the parish, subject to the approval of the vicar, and the violation of their rights in this particular was sometimes resented in the ruder districts of York- shire, by outrageous insults offered to the new incumbent during the time of service, and by brutal personal assaults upon the minister. t
Before the beginning of the eighteenth century the proprietary government, granted by Charles the First to Lord Baltimore, had at length been abolished, and the Church of England established there. There was less tolerance under this establishment than before. In Maryland as in Virginia, the discipline of the church was loose, the clergy by no means exemplary, and their condition precarious and dependent.
The differences between Dr. Blair and Governor Nicholson led to a tedious controversy, in which charges of malfeasance in offi- cial duty and private misconduct, especially in the affair of his attachment for Miss Burwell, and his maltreatment of the Rev. Mr. Fouace, were transmitted to the government in England, covering forty-four pages folio of manuscript. The controversy produced no little excitement and disturbance in the colony; a number of the clergy adhered to the governor, being those with whom Commissary Blair was unpopular, and whom the governor had ingratiated by siding with them against the vestries, and by representing the commissary as less favorable to their cause. Governor Nicholson ordered a convocation to be assembled, and during its session held private interviews with his adherents among the clergy, who signed a paper denying the charges made by the commissary and the council. A public entertainment given to them was satirized in a ballad, setting forth their un- clerical hilarity, and depicting some of them in unfavorable colors. This ballad soon appeared in London. In this convo- cation seventeen of the clergy were opposed to the commissary,
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