USA > Virginia > King and Queen County > King and Queen County > King and Queen County, Virginia (history printed in 1908) > Part 22
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In Drysdale parish I have traced the distinctly marked foundation of the "Park Church," located a few miles above Newtown. That church was also in the shape of a cross, and from the size of its base, I am sure was a large and important structure, though of its history I find no record. The rectory, with its walls of massive thickness, is still standing, occupied as a private residence. There was also in this latter parish a chapel located near a small stream which still bears the name of Chapel Creek, and the hill beyond is known as Chapel Hill.
You have requested me to give you some account of the most prominent families of the upper portion of the county of King and Queen, and especially of the Dew and Garnett families, from which I am descended.
The principal land-holders in the upper section of the county about the beginning of the nineteenth cen- tury were represented by the following names, to wit: Beverly, Gatewood, Pendleton, Roane, Dew, Garnett, Boulware, Lyne, Pollard, Gresham, Kidd, Henshaw, Fogg, Minor, Powers, Hutchinson, Mann, Muse, Bates, Lumpkin, and Martin, whilst a little lower down the county were Hill, Fauntleroy, Webb, Throckmorton, Merriwether, Smith, Ryland, and Fleet.
Concerning each of the above-mentioned families, whose descendants have spread out over an extended territory, much of interest might be written if correct data could be obtained and space in your book would justify.
My paternal grandfather, Thomas R. Dew, was a large land- and slave-owner, and regarded as wealthy by the estimate of that day. He was born in 1765, and died in 1849; married Miss Lucy Gatewood, who sur-
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vived him for eight years. As a product of that mar- riage there were six sons and three daughters, to wit: Dr. William Dew, Thomas R. Dew (afterwards pro- fessor and president of William and Mary College), Philip, John W., Benjamin F. (who was my father) , L. Calvin, and Mrs. Colonel Hudgins of Mathews, Mrs. Colonel Thomas Gresham, and Mrs. Temple. He was a member of the Baptist Church, exerted a wide influ- ence in his community, and served with distinction as captain in the War of 1812. Of the ancestry of Thomas R. Dew I have been able to gain very little definite information. He was the son of William Dew, whose father came from England and settled in Mary- land,-William settling in King and Queen County, Virginia, and Thomas, a brother, in the county of Nan- semond, from which county he (Thomas) served as a member of the House of Burgesses. Tradition has it that Thomas R. Dew was a descendant of Oliver Crom- well,-which impression, I am told, was strengthened by the fact that in his personality and sterling charac- teristics he was thought to resemble that distinguished man, who played a conspicuous part and developed one of the strongest characters in English history.
Dr. William Dew, the eldest son of Thomas R. Dew, located in King and Queen County, married Miss Susan Jones of King William, became an extensive and cele- brated practitioner of medicine, and died greatly la- mented by his community. He was the father of three sons, Thomas R. Dew, Jr.,1 William Dew, Benjamin F. Dew, Jr .; and five daughters, Mrs. Hord, Mrs. Robert Gresham, Mrs. Hilliard, Mrs. Gregory, and Miss Lucy Dew. Thomas R. Dew, Jr., removed to Wytheville, Va. One of his sons, H. W. Dew, is a suc- cessful physician in Lynchburg, Va., and W. B. Dew holds an important government position in the State of Wyoming.
Prof. Thomas R. Dew is the subject of a special note in another part of your book.
Philip Dew married Miss Lucy De Jarnette, and located on his fine Windsor estate in Caroline county.
* Grandson of the first and nephew of the second Thos. R. mentioned.
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He left three children, Thomas R. Dew, Dr. Philip A. Dew, and Mrs. Judge Welch.
John W. Dew married Miss Pendleton and left three children, Miss Mary E. (married Judge A. B. Evans of Middlesex), Roderick Dew of Plain Dealing, and Alice, who, after the death of her sister, also married Judge Evans, and who still lives to bless the Judge's home and to be a true helpmeet in his declining years.
Benjamin F. Dew, A. M. and B. L. of William and Mary College, lawyer, farmer, and teacher, was twice married, first to Miss Mary Susan Garnett, and after her death to Miss Bettie Queensberry. His eldest son, Dr. J. Harvie Dew, is enjoying a large and lucrative practice in the city of New York, where he settled in 1868, immediately after his graduation at the Univer- sity of Virginia. John G. Dew, second and only other surviving son of Benjamin F., after his graduation in the law department of the University of Virginia, set- tled in his native county of King and Queen, where he practiced his chosen profession of the law for many years, being Judge of the County Court for sixteen years, and is now Second Auditor of the State of Vir- ginia. He married Miss Lelia, daughter of Dr. Samuel G. Fauntleroy of the same county.
L. Calvin Dew married Miss Boulware and died in early manhood, leaving four children, Mrs. Thomas B. Henley, Mrs. A. C. Acree, D. Boone Dew,-who yielded up his life on the altar of his country, having been killed in the first engagement after joining Com- pany H, Ninth Virginia Cavalry,-and Robert S. Dew.
Of the three daughters of the first Thomas R. Dew, Mrs. Colonel Hudgins was the mother of Colonel Wil- liam P. Hudgins, who holds an important railway posi- tion in the State of Texas; Mrs. Temple left no chil- dren; and Mrs. Colonel Gresham, had five sons, Rev. Edward Gresham (who was the father of Walter Gres- ham of Galveston, Texas), Colonel T. Robert Gresham, William D. Gresham, Dr. Henry Gresham, and Dr. Charles Gresham, all of whom were prominent men in their respective spheres and localities.
Colonel Reuben Merriwether Garnett, my maternal
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grandfather, was the son of Reuben Garnett, and his mother was a Miss Jamison. Colonel Garnett married, first, Miss Pendleton, a daughter of Captain James Pendleton, who served with distinction in the War of the Revolution. From this marriage two sons and two daughters survived him. Dr. John Muscoe Garnett, the elder son, married Miss Hancock of Chesterfield, and lived at his beautiful country home, Lanefield, in King and Queen County. The radiating influence of his Christian life was shed over the whole community as it was most beautifully exemplified in his own home. His only surviving son, John M. Garnett, Jr., with his sisters, Misses Nannie and Fannie, still reside at the old homestead. Of the elder daughters, Mrs. Dr. C. H. Ryland resides in Richmond, Va., Mrs. Dr. W. L. Broaddus at Bowling Green, Va., and Mrs. Rev. F. B. Beale at Indian Neck, Va.
R. M. Garnett, the other son of Colonel Garnett, lived through a long and happy life at Peach Grove in King and Queen; he married Miss Bettie A. Williams of Fredericksburg, and left the following children : Muscoe H. Garnett, a prominent merchant of Rich- mond; James W. Garnett of King and Queen; Mrs. Gresham, the widow of Colonel William Gresham; Mrs. Fleet, the widow of James R. Fleet, Jr .; and Mrs. Rev. F. W. Claybrook.
Colonel Garnett's daughters were Mrs. Benjamin F. Dew, mentioned heretofore, and the first Mrs. John N. Ryland, who was the mother of Mrs. Joseph H. Gwathmey of King William County, and of John N. Ryland, Jr., of King and Queen. Colonel Garnett left no children by his second marriage, with Miss Hutchinson.
The Garnetts were among the best people in the land, universally respected and beloved, and were noted for their modesty and gentleness of bearing. Colonel Reu- ben M. Garnett was a man of unusual business qualifi- cations, backed by a sound judgment, and his aid and advice were as frequently sought as they were freely given. Though not a lawyer by profession, such was the confidence of the people in his judgment and capac-
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ity that he was frequently consulted in regard to legal matters, and it is probable that no lawyer in the county was called on to prepare so many deeds and wills as he was, and, so far as the writer is informed, not one was ever overturned if attacked.
Of the Boulware family, there were two half-broth- ers, Mr. Lee Boulware and Leroy Boulware. The former had a son, John Boulware, a professor in the Columbian College, succeeded for a short time by his brother William, who afterwards served as Minister to Naples, during the administration of President James K. Polk. Mr. A. L. Boulware, a prominent attorney and president of the First National Bank of Richmond, Va., was a grandson of Leroy Boulware. Mr. J. B. Kidd, a prominent merchant, and manufacturer of the famous "Pinmoney Pickles," and Dr. W. L. Broaddus, a distinguished physician of Bowling Green, Va., are grandsons of Lee Boulware.
All the families whose names are referred to above were of the type of the old Virginia gentry, who lived in comfort on their well-tilled farms. Every such plan- tation was a miniature principality where slavery ex- isted, 'tis true, in name as well as legal form, but so gentle was the discipline that it resembled in regulation a large, well-ordered family, where kindness and con- sideration combined to produce the utmost good feeling and contentment; which tended to the betterment of both classes. I esteem it a great privilege to have been per- mitted to get an insight into the habits and customs, the home life and domestic relations, which prevailed on the old Virginia plantations in the ante-bellum days. No man or set of men, who never entered into the sacred precincts of that life, can begin to appreciate, much less describe, the contentment and happiness which then pre- vailed on the part of the negro as well as his protector and humane benefactor. The latter, though nominally and legally his master, was in the truest sense the negro's next friend and guardian.
I can truly say that, in the abstract, I do not believe in the institution of slavery, that I am sincerely grateful
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for its abolition before I could become the owner of one. But from my youthful impressions of conditions as they prevailed in that section of Virginia, the leisure afforded for cultivation and improvement on the part of the whites, and the civilizing and educational advan- tages afforded the negro by his contact and association, even though in a menial position, with the whites, pro- duced an interdependence and a refining influence upon both races which does not and cannot now exist. It was not unusual to find among the butlers, coachmen, and body servants of "ye olden time," in manner and de- portment, a perfect model for Lord Chesterfield, a specimen of the true gentleman in grace and elegance. No system of education that has been or ever will be devised can by any possibility, with the new-issue negro, produce either a class or an individual of that degree of educational refinement.
Coming on life's stage just in time to catch some in- spiration from the golden age of Virginia's history, be- tween the years 1850 and 1860, to witness and in some measure to participate in the fiercest revolutionary strug- gle ever recorded in the annals of history, to suffer the pangs and humiliation of defeat, and then pass through the far worse period of reconstruction, my youthful im- pressions have strengthened with the passing years, that the intrepid courage and valor of the sons of Virginia and the Southland should challenge the admiration of the world. And the subsequent struggle with poverty, beset with difficulties on every hand, seeking to steer the ship of State between the breakers, to provide for the education and upbuilding of the rising generation, and at the same time carry the load of an emancipated race whose lowest passions and prejudices have been ap- pealed to,-not for their good or elevation, but to clog and impede the progress of resuscitation and civiliza- tion and the upbuilding of the Anglo-Saxon race,-has no parallel in ancient or modern history. No people have ever met more bravely the obstacles and dangers in their pathway than the people of this Southland. No stronger evidence could be adduced of the character and manhood of their ancestors, than the chivalry,
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courage, and manliness exhibited by the sons in the worse than "fiery furnace " through which they have passed, yet with honor untarnished and presenting a self-sacrificing nobility unequaled in the world's his- tory. The consciousness of duty faithfully performed is the God-given reward of the Confederate soldier, but the memory of his self-sacrificing devotion and patri- otic endeavors should ever animate the Southern heart, and arouse feelings of the deepest gratitude in the breasts of all future generations. Indeed, every true Ameri- can citizen, fired by the zeal of a broad-minded patriot- ism, will look with admiring gaze upon the most won- derful exhibition of valor and heroism ever recorded in any age.
The upper portion of King and Queen County, from an early period down to the present time, has been blessed with a succession of good schools, which aided materially in training the sturdy youth of the commu- nity in the way of truth and knowledge. The first school of which we have any information was taught by Mr. Donald Robertson, who was famous as a teacher. President Madison when a youth attended that school, and a story is related of his impres- sions of that section, to the effect that, years after- wards, Mr. Madison inquired of Mr. Roane, the Rep- resentative of that district in Congress, "How are the people in Drysdale parish getting along?" He further said that he was greatly impressed as a boy with the poverty of the land and the fact that the farmers traded lands every March (evidently having reference to the sandy soil and the effect on it of the March winds). Mr. Roane bore willing testimony to the prosperous condition of the people, and remarked that, if a large loan were desired, that was the only portion of his dis- trict which could readily furnish the accommodation. A succession of good schools followed continuously up to the breaking-out of the Civil War, and indeed till the establishment of a system of public free schools.
I am aware that this paper is but a rambling sort of review of a section of the county of King and Queen in which my life has been spent. By one, at least, I can
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say that this territory will ever be regarded as hallowed ground, and that he does and will continue to cherish a sacred memory of the noble names herein recorded, whether the same is the result of kinship, personal knowledge, historical data, or only a legend of the past. With great respect, I am,
Yours truly and fraternally,
JOHN G. DEW.
We give here extracts from a letter from the vener- able and beloved Dr. William F. Bland, who passed away in a year or two after this writing:
Glencoe Station, July 4th, 1902.
ESTEEMED FRIEND :
Your very acceptable letter of the 2 1st was duly re- ceived. I would have answered it sooner, but have been quite unwell. I greatly appreciate your expressions of sympathy for my wife and myself in our bereavement, and shall never forget the earnest prayer you made for the recovery of my dear Willie when he had typhoid fever. Wife and I are both feeble and have many in- firmities belonging to old age. I am already older than any of my ancestors, being seventy-five, and am trying so to live that I may meet my dear children and other loved ones in the spirit world. It would give me great pleasure to meet you and talk over the past. I wish you the best of success in writing the annals of the old county, though I do not think that I can render you much help. The Laneville House ( Corbin place) was built in Colonial times of brick-I think it was one hundred feet long by twenty feet wide-and was occupied by Richard Corbin, the king's deputy receiver- general. It was heired by his son, James Park, whom I can recollect. My father purchased it in 1858.
Pleasant Hill was a large two-story brick building, about fifty-two by forty feet, built before the Revolu- tion by Augustine Moore of Chelsea for John, com- monly called Speaker Robinson, who married his daugh- ter Lucy. It was owned by the Henry family after- wards.
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Newington, the birthplace of Carter Braxton and of other prominent men, was a large two-story building; was afterwards owned by the Harwood family, notably Samuel F. Harwood.
Clifton, I have heard, was owned by Speaker Robin- son, and occupied by his daughters, one of whom mar- ried Col. William Boyd. Both the house here and the one at Newington were burned and each was rebuilt, the latter by Capt. R. H. Spencer.
You requested a brief sketch of my father and others. Col. Robert Bland was born May, 1800, and was twelve years old when his father, Capt. Robert Bland, served in the War of 1812. My father was an ex- tensive farmer, colonel of militia, presiding justice of the court, and died in his seventy-first year. Dr. James T. Boyd, my uncle, was born in 1806; was a successful physician and farmer, and died in 1855. I graduated in medicine in 1849-was the oldest of twelve children. Dr. James E. Bland graduated in medicine in 1856, and died in his sixty-seventh year; was a good physician and citizen. Col. Robert M. Spencer, who lived at Clifton, was a prominent and highly esteemed citizen. Capt. Robert H. Spencer served in the Confederate army, is also a highly esteemed citizen. Alexander Dudley, a talented lawyer, was the founder of the Rich- mond and York River Railroad and its president when he died. There were many other worthy and reliable citizens in the same neighborhood, among them J. W. Courtney, Samuel Tunstall, Dr. Garrett, and his brother, Thomas W., W. B. Bird, Samuel F. Harwood, and others.
In regard to churches in the neighborhood, the " Old Church " must have been built in Colonial times, judg- ing from a tombstone near it over two hundred years old. I have heard that it was sold, bought by a man named Smith and given to the Methodists. When I was a boy it was used by the Methodists and Baptists, but the latter built another house near by (Olivet) . Very truly and sincerely your friend,
WM. F. BLAND.
300 KING AND QUEEN COUNTY, VIRGINIA
CAPTAIN A. F. BAGBY,
Was the second captain of Company K, Thirty-fourth Virginia Infantry, J. R. Bagby, the first captain, having been promoted major.
By himself :
" Alexander Fleet Bagby was born at Stevensville, King and Queen. Attended school at Stevensville, Richmond College, and V. M. I .; was among the first to enlist in defense of Southern rights, and was active in organizing the King and Queen Artillery-after- wards infantry; was elected lieutenant at the organiza- tion, subsequently captain; after the war, in business in Richmond, and then located in Tappahannock, Va. Married F. S. Walker."
EDWARD BENJAMIN BAGBY,
Son of the foregoing, was born in King and Queen Sep- tember 29th, 1865; educated at Aberdeen Academy, University, and Yale Divinity School; was located as a minister at Clifton Forge, Va., then at New- port News. In 1891 he was located at Washington, D. C .; chaplain in Congress, 1893 -; pastor of Church in Washington, 1891 to the present time; in eight years this church has enrolled eight hun- dred members. Married Virginia May Grimes of Baltimore. A second son of Captain Bagby, Richard, is also an efficient minister.
DR. RICHARD HUGH BAGBY
Richard Hugh Bagby, D. D., born June 16, 1820; married Motley; died October 29th, 1870. A son of John, 1791-1878. Educated at Richmond and Colum- bian Colleges; taught a session or two and studied law, but answering a higher call, was ordained at Mattapony in 1842, and became pastor at Bruington, which he served twenty-seven years; in 1869 was made field sec- retary of the Baptist State Mission Board, in which office he died. His body reposes under a monument at Bruington.
He was for a time president of the General Associa-
THOMAS ROANE DEW
Professor of Philosophy and President of the College of William and Mary.
FACING 300
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tion, and always an active participant in that and other kindred bodies. His preaching was practical, evangel- ical, pungent, and wonderfully forceful, acceptable, and effective, and he was in great demand wherever known. One who knew him well, himself a cultured and able man, says: "Dr. Bagby was one of the foremost men Virginia has given to the world." One of the most prominent and able citizens of Richmond says: "He was one of the two greatest men I ever met."
Dr. Bagby's sayings on his deathbed were embalmed in the Religious Herald, having been published more than once. He left two brothers, both having the D. D. from their Alma Mater, Columbian College, one at one time president of the Baptist General Association of Kentucky. Rev. H. A. Bagby, D. D., now of South Carolina, is his nephew, as also is A. Paul Bagby, Ph. D., of Kentucky.
CARTER BRAXTON
Carter Braxton, a signer of the Declaration of Inde- pendence, was a son of George and Mary Braxton, of Newington, whose bodies are interred at Mattapony Church, King and Queen. Mary was a daughter of Robt. Carter, President of Council. Carter was born at Newington Sept. 10, 1736, and died at Elsing Green, King William, Oct. 6, 1797. Carter graduated at William and Mary at the age of 19; married Judith Robinson of Middlesex. He was a member of the Vir- ginia Committee of Safety named at the beginning of the Revolution. He served as a member of the Conti- nental Congress from 1777 to 1783, and in 1785 on Commission of Public Safety with Thos. Jefferson; re- ceived vote of thanks from the Virginia Assembly. He had quite a number of descendants, notably Hon. El- liott Braxton, M. C .; Col. Carter Braxton, A. N. V., and Hon. A. C. Braxton of Staunton, mem- ber of the Constitutional Convention of 1902.
The Virginia Historical Society, acting through Mrs. R. N. Pollard, their King and Queen representative, has recently made an appropriation for restoring and relet- tering the tomb of George and Mary Braxton.
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COLONEL JOHN M. BROOKE (From the Richmond Evening Leader)
LEXINGTON, Dec. 15, 1906 .- Colonel John M. Brooke, emeritus professor of physics and astronomy at the Virginia Military Institute, died here yesterday from the infirmities of old age. He was seventy-nine years old, and was one of Lexington's most distin- guished citizens.
He was born near Tampa, Fla., December 18th, 1826, and was the son of General George M. Brooke of Virginia, a distinguished soldier of the War of 1812. His mother was Miss Lucy Thomas of Duxbury, Mass. At the age of fifteen he entered the United States Navy, and reported to Captain Farragut on the Delaware. Later he was transferred to the sloop-of-war Cyene. Returning home he entered the naval school at Annapolis.
He graduated in 1847, and several years later was on the coast survey. From 1851 to 1853 he was sta- tioned at the Naval Observatory, Washington, D. C. For several years previous to 1860 he cruised in Jap- anese and Chinese waters, making surveys of islands in the Pacific and a part of the eastern coast of Japan. The destruction of his vessel by a typhoon occurring in 1859 while in Yeddo, Japan, Brooke remained at Yoko- hama until the following year. When the Japanese de- termined to send an embassy to the United States, Brooke was invited to accompany the vessel, which he consented to do.
His services were so highly appreciated by the Jap- anese that they offered him a purse of $60,000, but he refused to take anything.
Captain Brooke cast his lot with the Confederate navy in the Civil War, and in 1861 applied, in the con- struction of the Virginia (the Merrimac), the principle of extended and submerged ends.
His invention of deep-sea sounding apparatus revo- lutionized communications between Europe and Amer- ica, as it made possible the laying of the first intercon- tinental telegraph line in the world. The Virginia
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(Merrimac) was his suggestion. In 1866 Colonel Brooke was appointed professor of physics at the Vir- ginia Military Institute.
His first wife was Miss Lizzie Garnett, sister of Gen- eral Richard Brooke Garnett. His second wife, who survives, was a Miss Corbin. Two children also sur- vive, Lieutenant George M. Brooke, of the United States Army, and Mrs. Willis, wife of Professor H. Parker Willis, of Washington and Lee University.
THE BROOKE FAMILY
Compiled from " Virginia Historical Records," by Professor St. George T. Brooke.
I. Humphrey, died 1738.
2. Colonel George, of Mantapike, born 1728; died April, 1782; was a member of the House of Burgesses, of the Committee of Safety, the Virginia Convention, and was colonel in the Virginia division of the Revolu- tionary army.
Robert Brooke, Knight of the Golden Horseshoe, was a brother of Humphrey. A second brother was Wil- liam, who had four sons,-Richard of Mantapike, John, William, Jr., and Robert. Richard probably inherited Mantapike from his grandfather. General George Mercer Brooke, a son of Richard, entered the army in 1808, was major in battles of Lundy's Lane and Fort Erie in 1814, and was promoted to major-general.
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