USA > Virginia > History of the colony and ancient dominion of Virginia > Part 48
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
On the next day Dunmore, summoning the burgesses to attend
* May twenty-fourth.
(572)
573
ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
him in the council chamber, dissolved them in the following words: "Mr. Speaker and Gentlemen of the house of burgesses, I have in my hand a paper published by order of your house, conceived in such terms as reflect highly upon his majesty and the parliament of Great Britain, which makes it necessary for me to dissolve you, and you are dissolved accordingly."
The burgesses repaired immediately to the Raleigh,* and in the room called "the Apollo" adopted resolutions against the use of tea and other East India commodities, and recommended the annual convening of a congress. In this measure, as in the appointment of committees of correspondence, Virginia took the lead. North Carolina promptly followed her example. Not- withstanding the untoward turn of events, Washington dined with the governor on the twenty-fifth, and passed the evening with him, rode with him to his farm, and breakfasted there on the following day, and attended the ball given on the twenty- seventh in honor of Lady Dunmore.
Further news being received from Boston, the members who remained in Williamsburg held a meeting on the twenty-ninth, at which Peyton Randolph presided, and they issued a circular, recommending a meeting of deputies in a convention to assemble there on the first of August.
A dissolution of the assembly had been expected, but it had been supposed that it would be deferred until the public business should be despatched-toward the latter part of June. Consult- ations and measures for the preservation of the public rights and liberties were conducted and matured very privately, and by very few members, of whom Patrick Henry was the leader. George Mason, who arrived in Williamsburg in the latter part of May, says, in a letter to a friend: "At the request of the gentlemen concerned, I have spent an evening with them upon the subject, where I had an opportunity of conversing with Mr. Henry and knowing his sentiments, as well as hearing him speak in the
* The Raleigh tavern, a wooden house, is upwards of a hundred years old. There was formerly a bust of Sir Walter Raleigh in front of the house. The ball-room in the Raleigh was styled "The Apollo." There was a tavern in London called "The Apollo" in 1690.
574
HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
house since on different occasions. He is by far the most power- ful speaker I ever heard. Every word he says not only engages, but commands the attention, and your passions are no longer your own when he addresses them. But his eloquence is the least part of his merit. He is, in my opinion, the first man upon this continent as well in abilities as public virtues, and had he lived in Rome about the time of the first Punic war, when the Roman people had arrived at their meridian glory, and their vir- tue not tarnished, Mr. Henry's talents must have put him at the head of that glorious commonwealth."
Mr. Mason found the minds of all at Williamsburg entirely absorbed in the news from Massachusetts. The burgesses, at their own expense, sent to their counties copies of the resolution adopted against the Boston port bill, in order that it should be ratified by the people. Mr. Mason, as other members probably did, directed that his elder children should attend church on the day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer, in mourning. The first of June was observed as set apart by the house of burgesses. The same day being the time fixed for the discontinuance of the use of tea, the ladies, before that day, sealed up their stock, with a determination not to use it until the duty should be repealed, and resolutions of sympathy and encouragement, and contribu- tions of money and provisions, were sent from Virginia for the relief of "our distressed fellow-subjects of Boston."
In the midst of these excitements John Page, of Rosewell, was elected president of the Society for the Advancement of Useful Knowledge.
In the latter part of June, Washington presided as moderator at a meeting held in his own county, Fairfax, and he was made chairman of a committee appointed to draught resolutions on the alarming state of public affairs, to be reported at a future meet- ing. He about this time warmly supported the patriotic mea- sures, in a correspondence with his neighbor and friend, Bryan Fairfax, who adhered to the Anglican side in the dispute. On the twenty-fourth of August he wrote to him: "I could wish, I own, that the dispute had been left to posterity to determine; but the crisis is arrived when we must assert our rights, or submit to every imposition that can be heaped upon us, till custom and use
575
ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
will make us as tame and abject slaves as the blacks we rule over with such arbitrary sway."
The Fairfax committee framed resolutions, intimating that a persistence of the government in its measures of coercion would result of necessity only in a resort to the arbitrament of arms. These resolutions were adopted by a county meeting held on the eighteenth of July, and Washington was elected a delegate to the convention which was about to convene. This body met on the first day of August, (although Dunmore had issued writs for a new assembly,) its object being to consider the state and condi- tion of the colony, and to appoint delegates to congress. A new and more thorough non-importation association was organized. Peyton Randolph, Richard Henry Lee, Washington, Henry, Bland, Benjamin Harrison, Jr., of Berkley, and Pendleton, were appointed* delegates to congress. Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee were listened to with delight, and Washington said, "I will raise one thousand men, subsist them at my own expense, and march myself at their head for the relief of Boston."t
Mr. Jefferson was elected a member of this convention, but was prevented from attending by the state of his health. In the interval before the meeting he prepared instructions for the Virginia delegates in congress, in which he assumed the ground that the British parliament had no right whatever to ex- ercise any authority over the colony of Virginia. These instruc- tions being communicated through the president of the convention, Peyton Randolph, were generally read and approved of by many, though considered too bold for the present. But they printed them in a pamphlet, under the title of "A Summary View of the Rights of British America."} The following excerpts are taken from it: "History has informed us that bodies of men as well as individuals are susceptible of the spirit of tyranny." "Scarcely have our minds been able to emerge from the astonishment into which one stroke of parliamentary thunder has involved us before another more heavy and more alarming is fallen on us." "The
* August eleventh. ¡ Life and Works of John Adams, ii. 360.
į To be found in Amer. Archives, published by Congress, fourth series, i. 690, and in the Congress edition of Mr. Jefferson's works. See also Memoir and Correspondence of Jefferson, 100, 116.
576
ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
great principles of right and wrong are legible to every reader; to pursue them requires not the aid of many counsellors. The whole art of government consists in the art of being honest; only aim to do your duty, and mankind will give you credit where you fail. No longer persevere in sacrificing the rights of one part of the empire to the inordinate desires of another, but deal out to all equal and impartial right. Let no act be passed by any one legislature which may infringe on the rights and liberties of another." "Accept of every commercial preference it is in our power to give for such things as we can raise for their use, or they make for ours. But let them not think to exclude us from going to other markets to dispose of those commodities which they can- not use, or to supply those wants which they cannot supply."
On the subject of slavery Mr. Jefferson used the following lan- guage: "The abolition of domestic slavery is the great object of desire in these colonies, where it was unhappily introduced in their infant state. But previous to the enfranchisement of the slaves we have, it is necessary to exclude all further importations from Africa, yet our repeated attempts to effect this, by prohibi- tions, and by imposing duties which might amount to a prohibition, have been hitherto defeated by his majesty's negative; thus pre- ferring the immediate advantage of a few British corsairs to the lasting interests of the American States and to the rights of human nature deeply wounded by this infamous practice."
In consonance with these opinions, the convention adopted the following resolution: "After the first day of November next we will neither ourselves import, nor purchase any slave or slaves imported by any other person, either from Africa, the West Indies, or any other place."
Mr. Jefferson's pamphlet displays a thorough knowledge of the history and constitutional rights of the colony; it breathes a fiery spirit of defiance and revolution, and the rhythmical splendor of elevated declamation in some of its passages is hardly inferior to Junius. If some of its statements and views are extravagant or erroneous, yet it is bold, acute, comprehensive, luminous, and impressive. This pamphlet, it is said, found its way to England, was taken hold of by the opposition, interpolated a little by Ed- mund Burke, so as to make it answer opposition purposes, and in that form it ran through several editions.
CHAPTER LXXV.
Richard Henry Lee-Congress at Philadelphia-Henry-Proceedings of Con- gress-Washington-Military Spirit in Virginia.
RICHARD HENRY LEE was born at Stratford, on the Potomac, January 20th, 1732, his father being Thomas Lee, and his mother, Hannah, daughter of Colonel Ludwell, of Greenspring, near Jamestown. Richard, second son of Richard Lee, was of the council, and an adherent of Sir William Berkley; and Thomas Lee, third son, was some time president of the council. He was one of the majority of that body who persecuted the dissenters. Richard Henry Lee's maternal relations were conspicuous for their wealth, influence, and public stations. Colonel Ludwell, the father of Mrs. Lee, was of the council, as also was a son of his. Her grandfather was a collector of the customs, (having suc- ceeded in that office Giles Bland, who was executed during Bacon's rebellion,) and afterwards governor of North Carolina. The Lud- wells were staunch supporters of Sir William Berkley and the Stuart dynasty. Richard Henry Lee's mother, one of the high- toned aristocracy of the colony, confined her care chiefly to her daughters and her eldest son, and left her younger sons pretty much to shift for themselves. After a course of private tuition in his father's house, Richard Henry was sent to Wakefield Academy, Yorkshire, England, where he distinguished himself by his profi- ciency in his studies, particularly in the Latin and Greek. Having completed his course at this school, he travelled through England, and visited London. He returned when about nineteen years of age to his native country, two years after his father's death, which occurred in 1750. Young Lee's patrimony rendering it unnecessary for him to devote himself to a profession, he now passed a life of ease, but not of idleness; for he indulged his taste for letters, and diligently stored his mind with knowledge. In 1755, being chosen captain of a company of volunteers raised
37 (577)
578
HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
in Westmoreland, he marched with them to Alexandria, and offered their services to General Braddock; but the offer was de- clined. In his twenty-fifth year Mr. Lee was appointed a justice of the peace, and shortly afterwards elected a burgess for his county. Naturally diffident, and finding himself surrounded by able men, for one or two sessions he took no part in the debates. One of his early efforts was in support of a resolution "to lay so heavy a tax on the importation of slaves as effectually to put an end to that iniquitous and disgraceful traffick within the colony of Virginia." On this question he argued against the institution of slavery as a portentous evil, moral and political .* When the defalcations of Treasurer Robinson came to be suspected, Mr. Lee insisted with firmness, in the face of a proud and embittered opposition, on an investigation of the treasury. In November, 1764, when the stamp act was first heard of in America, Mr. Lee, at the instance of a friend, wrote to England, making ap- plication for a collector's office under that act. He alleged that at that time neither he, nor, as he believed, his countrymen, had duly reflected on the real nature of that act. Observing soon, however, the growing dissatisfaction with that measure, and be- stowing more deliberate reflection upon it, he became convinced of its pernicious character, and of the impropriety of his appli- cation; and from that time he became one of the most strenuous opponents of the stamp act. In the year 1766 he brought to the consideration of the assembly the act of parliament claiming a right to tax America; and he draughted the address to the king, and the memorial to the commons. His accomplishments, learn- ing, courtesy, patriotism, republican principles, decision of cha- racter and eloquence, commanded the attention of the legislature. Although a member at the time of the introduction of Henry's resolutions, in 1765, Mr. Lee happened not to be present at the discussion; but he heartily concurred in their adoption. Shortly afterwards he organized an association in furtherance of them in Westmoreland. He vigorously opposed the act laying a duty on tea, and that for quartering British troops in the colonies. He was now residing at Chantilly, his seat on the Potomac, a few
* Life of Richard Henry Lee, 17.
ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA. 579
miles below Stratford, in Westmoreland. The house at Chantilly is no longer standing. On the 25th of July, 1768, in a letter to John Dickinson, of Pennsylvania, Mr. Lee suggested "that not only select committees should be appointed by all the colonies, but that a private correspondence should be conducted between the lovers of liberty in every province." In the year 1773 the Virginia assembly, at the suggestion of Mr. Lee, appointed the first committee of intercolonial correspondence, consisting of six members, of whom he was one.
Washington was joined at Mount Vernon by Henry and Pen- dleton, and they proceeded together to Philadelphia. Here the old Continental Congress, consisting of fifty-five delegates, re- presenting all the colonies except Georgia, assembled on the 5th day of September, 1774 .*
Upon the motion of Mr. Lynch, of South Carolina, Peyton Randolph, of Virginia, was unanimously elected president, and Charles Thomson, secretary. At the opening of the session, on the second day, the prolonged silence was at length broken by Patrick Henry. Reciting the grievances of the colonies, he de- clared that all government was dissolved, and that they were reduced to a state of nature; that the congress which he was ad- dressing was the first in a perpetual series of congresses. A few sentences roughly jotted down in John Adams' diaryt are all that survive of this celebrated speech.
Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee towered supereminent in debate; yet it soon came to be remarked that in composition and the routine of actual business they were surpassed by many.} But "the egotism of human nature will seldom allow us to credit a man for one excellence, without detracting from him in other respects; if he has genius, we imagine he has not common sense;
* Carpenter's Hall, instituted in 1721 by the Company of Carpenters, is in a court a little back from Chestnut Street. There is in the Hall the following inscription : "Within these walls Henry, Hancock, and Adams inspired the dele- gates of the colonies with nerve and sinew for the toils of war resulting in our national independence." Two high-backed arm-chairs are preserved, marked "Continental Congress, 1774."
¡ See his Life and Works, ii. 366.
Wirt's Life of Patrick Henry.
F
580
HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
if he is a poet, we suppose that he is not a logician."* It has been seen that George Mason considered Henry "the first man on this continent in ability as in public virtues." A great man only can adequately appreciate a great man. Henry was capa- ble of being no less efficient in the committee-room than on the floor of debate .; There was no test of intellectual excellence too severe for him. The state-papers of Richard Henry Lee are sufficient proofs of his capacity.
The proceedings were conducted in secret session. Intelligence which was received from Boston riveted more closely the union of the North and South; minor differences were lost sight of in view of the portentous common danger. The congress made a declaration of rights. Dickinson composed the petition to the king, and the address to the inhabitants of Quebec; Jay an address to the people of Great Britain; and Richard Henry Lee a memorial to the inhabitants of the British colonies. The congress, after a session of fifty-one days, adjourned in October.
Mr. Henry, on his return home, being asked, "Who is the greatest man in congress ?" replied, "If you speak of eloquence, Mr. Rutledge, of South Carolina, is by far the greatest orator; but if you speak of solid information and sound judgment, Colo- nel Washington is unquestionably the greatest man on that floor." John Adams, the eloquent and indomitable advocate of inde- pendence, mentions Lee, Henry, and Hooper as the orators of that body. Washington, in a letter addressed to Captain Mac- kenzie, who had formerly served under him, and was now among the British troops at Boston, gave it as his opinion, that it was neither the wish nor the interest of Massachusetts, nor of any of the colonies, to set up for independence; yet they never would submit to the loss of their constitutional rights. The same opi- nion was avowed by Jefferson, Franklin, and other leading men; yet there was undoubtedly then, and long had been, a strong un- dercurrent, a heavy ground-swell in the direction of independence, it being evident that England would never restore the colonies to their condition previous to 1763. A declaration of war is usually
* Lord Brougham,
+ Grigsby's Va. Convention of 1776, p. 150.
?
581
ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
preceded by a hypothetical denial of hostile designs : it is the lull whose mysterious silence heralds in the approaching storm.
Patrick Henry stood foremost among the statesmen of Virginia, from the beginning of the contest, in favor of independence; he was on this point ten years in advance of them ;* standing out in bold relief the prominent and pre-eminent figure on the can- vas. Samuel Adams, in Massachusetts, was a patriot of the same stamp.
The danger of an outbreak of hostilities between the people of Boston and the British troops growing daily more imminent, the spirit of warlike preparation, by a sort of contagion, pervaded the colonies. It had long been a custom in Virginia to form independent military companies; and several of these now soli- cited Colonel Washington to review them and take command; and he consented; and in the apprehension of war, all eyes involuntarily turned to him as the first military character in the colony. At Mount Vernon he occasionally saw his former compa- nions in arms, Dr. James Craik, and Captain Hugh Mercer, also a physician, both natives of Scotland, and with them talked over the recollections of former years, and discussed the prospects of the future. Washington was visited during the year also by General Charles Lee and Major Horatio Gates, natives of Eng- land, who had distinguished themselves in the British army, and destined to become conspicuous in the American war of revolu- tion. They had recently purchased estates in Berkley County, Virginia.
* Grigsby's Va. Convention of 1776, p. 148.
CHAPTER LXXVI.
1774.
Indian Hostilities-Battle of Point Pleasant-General Andrew Lewis-Death of Colonel Charles Lewis-Cornstalk-Indignation against Dunmore-General Lewis and his Brothers.
IN April, 1774, some extraordinary hostilities occurred be- tween the Indians and the whites on the frontier of Virginia. On which side these outrages commenced was a matter of dispute, but the whites appear to have been probably the aggressors. An Indian war being apprehended, Dunmore appointed General Andrew Lewis, of Botetourt County, then a member of the assembly, to the command of the southern division of the forces raised in Botetourt, Augusta, and the adjoining counties east of the Blue Ridge, while his lordship in person took command of those levied in the northern counties, Frederick, Dunmore, and those adjacent. According to the plan of campaign, as arranged at Williamsburg, Lewis was to march down the valley of the Ka- nawha* to Point Pleasant, where that river empties into the Ohio, there to be joined by the governor, who was to march by way of Fort Pitt, and thence descend the Ohio.
Late in August the Virginia Gazette announced news from the frontier that Lord Dunmore was to march in a few days for the mouth of New River, where he was to be joined by Lewis.
Early in September the troops under his command made their rendezvous at Camp Union, f now Lewisburg, in the County of Greenbrier. They consisted of two regiments, under Colonel William Fleming, of Botetourt, and Colonel Charles Lewis, of Augusta, comprising about four hundred men. At Camp Union they were joined by a company under Colonel Field, of Culpepper, one from Bedford, under Colonel Buford, and two from the Hols- ton settlement, (now Washington County,) under Captains Shelby
* Or "River of the Woods," as the word signifies, or New River, as it was also sometimes called.
¡ Styled by Stuart, in his "Memoir of Indian Wars," Fort Savannah.
(582)
583
ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA.
and Harbert. These were part of the forces to be led on by Colonel Christian, who was to join the troops at Point Pleasant as soon as his regiment should be completed.
On the eleventh of September General Lewis, with eleven hun- dred men, commenced his march through the wilderness, piloted by Captain Matthew Arbuckle; flour, ammunition, and camp equipage being transported on pack-horses and bullocks driven in the rear of the little army. After a march of one hundred and sixty miles, they reached, on the thirtieth of September, Point Pleasant, at the junction of the Great Kanawha with the beautiful Ohio. "This promontory was elevated considerably above the high-water mark, and afforded an extensive and variegated pros- pect of the surrounding country. Here were seen hills, moun- tains, valleys, cliffs, plains, and promontories, all covered with gigantic forests, the growth of centuries, standing in their native grandeur and integrity, unsubdued, unmutilated by the hand of man, wearing the livery of the season, and raising aloft in mid- air their venerable trunks and branches as if to defy the lightning of the sky and the fury of the whirlwind. This widely-extended prospect, though rudely magnificent and picturesque, wanted, nevertheless, some of those softer features which might embellish and beautify, or, if the expression were permitted, might civilize the savage wilderness of some of nature's noblest efforts. Here were to be seen no villages nor hamlets, not a farm-house nor cottage, no fields nor meadows with their appropriate furniture, shocks of corn, nor herds of domestic animals. In its widest range the eye would in vain seek to discover a cultivated spot of earth on which to repose. Here were no marks of industry, nor of the exercise of those arts which minister to the comfort and convenience of man; here nature had for ages on ages held un- disputed empire. In the deep and dismal solitude of these wood- lands the lone wanderer would have been startled by the barking of the watch-dog, or the shrill clarion of a chanticleer. Here the whistling of the plough-boy, or the milk-maid's song, sounds elsewhere heard with pleasing emotions, would have been incon- gruous and out of place."*
* Memoir of Battle of Point Pleasant, by Samuel L. Campbell, M.D.
584
HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND
Dunmore, who had marched across the country to the Shaw- nee towns, failing to join Lewis, runners were sent out by him toward Fort Pitt in quest of his lordship. October the sixth the Williamsburg Gazette announced advices from the frontier that the Earl of Dunmore had concluded a treaty of peace with the Delaware Indians. And before the return of the runners des- patched from Point Pleasant, an express from the governor reached Point Pleasant on Sunday, the nineteenth of October, ordering General Lewis to march for the Chilicothe towns and there join him. Preparations were immediately made for crossing the Ohio.
In the mean time the Indians, headed by Cornstalk, had deter- mined to cross the Ohio, some miles above Point Pleasant, and to march down during the night, so as to surprise the camp at daybreak. "Accordingly, on the evening of the ninth of Octo- ber, soon after dark, they began to cross the river on rafts pre- viously prepared. To ferry so many men over this wide river and on these clumsy transports must have required considerable time. But before morning they were all on the eastern bank, ready to proceed. Their route now lay down the margin of the river, through an extensive bottom. On this bottom was a heavy growth of timber, with a foliage so dense as in many places to in- tercept, in a great measure, the light of the moon and the stars. Beneath lay many trunks of fallen trees, strewed in different directions, and in various stages of decay. The whole surface of the ground was covered with a luxuriant growth of weeds, inter- spersed with entangling vines and creepers, and in some places with close-set thickets of spice-wood or other undergrowth. A journey through this in the night must have been tedious, tiresome, dark, and dreary. The Indians, however, entered on it promptly, and persevered until break of day, when, about a mile distant from the camp, one of those unforeseen incidents occurred which so often totally defeat or greatly mar the best concerted military enterprises."*
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.