USA > Virginia > Old churches, ministers and families of Virginia, Vol. II > Part 25
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" Surely patriotism, or reverence for the greatest of patriots, if not re- ligion, might be effectually appealed to in behalf of this one temple of God. The particular location of it is to be ascribed to Washington, who, being an active member of the vestry when it was under consideration and in dispute where it should be placed, carefully surveyed the whole parish, and, drawing an accurate and handsome map of it with his own hand, showed clearly where the claims of justice and the interests of religion required its erection."
"It was to this church that Washington for some years regularly repaired, at a distance of six or seven miles, never permitting any company to prevent the regular observance of the Lord's day. And shall it now be permitted to sink into ruin for want of a few hundred dollars to arrest the decay already begun? The families which once worshipped there are indeed nearly all gone, and those who remain are not competent to its complete repair. But there are immortal beings around it, and not far distant from it, who might be forever blessed by the word faithfully preached therein. "The poor shall never fail out of any land, and to them the Gos- pel ought to be preached.
"For some years past one of the students in our Theological Semi- nary has acted as lay reader in it, and occasionally a professor has added his services. Within the last year the Rev. Mr. Johnson, residing in the neighbourhood, has performed more frequent duties there.
"On the day following the one which has given rise to the above, I preached to a very considerable congregation in this old church,
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one-third of which was made up of coloured persons. The sacra- ment was then administered to twenty persons. If I should ever be permitted to visit this house again, it must be under circum- stances far more cheering, or far more gloomy, than those which attended my recent visit."
I am happy to say that this report led the Rev. Mr. Johnson to its use, in a circular, by means of which he raised fifteen hundred dollars, with which a new roof and ceiling and other repairs were put on it, by which it has been preserved from decay and fitted for such occasional services as are performed there. A friend, who has recently visited it, informs me that many of the doors of the pews are gone. Those of George Washington and George Mason are not to be found,-perhaps borne away as relics. Those of George William Fairfax, Martin Cockburn, Daniel McCarty, William Payne, and the rector's, are still standing and their names legible. Of Martin Cockburn and Mrs. Cockburn, intimate friends of George Mason, we have heard a high character for piety and benevolence. Mr. Cockburn was from the West Indies, and Mrs. Cockburn was a Miss Bronaugh, a relative of the Masons, of Gunston. They left no children to inherit and perpetuate their virtues and graces. The family of Mason has long adhered to Old Gunston, near which was the Old Pohick. The following account, from one of the family, will be interesting to its members and friends. The first of the family who came to Virginia was Colonel George Mason, who was a member of the British Parliament in the reign of Charles the First. In Parliament he opposed with great eloquence the arbitrary measures of the King, but when the civil war commenced he drew his sword on the side of the King and was an officer in Charles the Second's army, and commanded a regi- ment of horse. When the King's army was defeated at Worcester by Oliver Cromwell in 1651, he disguised himself, and was con- cealed by some peasants until he got an opportunity to embark for America. He had considerable possessions in Staffordshire, (though the family was of old a Warwickshire one,) where he was born and generally lived; all of which were lost. A younger brother em- barked with him, and they arrived and landed in Norfolk, Virginia. The younger brother, William, married and died at or near Norfolk. He left a son, who went to Boston and settled. His female de- scendants married among the Thoroughgoods, and that family was for a long time in Princess Anne,-perhaps may be now. Colonel George Mason went up the Potomac and settled at Accotink, near Pasbytanzy, where he died and was buried. He called the county
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Stafford, after his native county in England. Such at least is the probable conjecture. This is the George Mason who, in another place, we have spoken of as being, with his wife and Colonel Brent, sponsor in baptism for a young Indian chief whom they took pri- soner in Maryland. Our notice was taken from one of the early Tracts, republished by Peter Force, and which is ascribed to Mr. Mason himself. The Mason family intermarried with the Brents, Fitzhughs, and Thompsons at an early period, and afterward with the McCartys, Bronaughs, Grahams, and many others.
Of one branch of this family, in connection with another old family of Virginia, I have something to say. There was at Hamp- ton, in Elizabeth City county, an old Episcopal family by the name of Westwood. A daughter of one member of it, Elizabeth West- wood, married a Mr. Wallace. At his death she married John Thompson Mason, who settled at Chappawamsic, in Stafford county. She was the mother of Mr. Temple Mason, of Loudoun, and other children, among whom was a daughter named Euphan, who mar- ried Mr. Bailey Washington, of Stafford. At the death of her husband, Mr. Washington, she married Mr. Brent, and lived and died at Park Gate, in Prince William county. She had many chil- dren. Among them was a daughter, who married first Mr. McCrae, then Mr. Storke, of Fredericksburg. Her daughter Euphan mar- ried Mr. Roy, of Matthews. This is mentioned as introductory to some extracts from a few letters of old Mrs. Mason to her son, Temple Mason, of Leesburg, showing the earnest desire she had for the religious welfare of her children. From a letter of her grand-daughter, Mrs. Storke, I learn that she was living at the time of her death at Dumfries, in Prince William county. She was one of those old-fashioned Virginia ladies who, like Mrs. General Washington and Solomon's model of a lady, not only superintended the labours of her servants, but worked with her own hands. This she did until within a few days of her death. But her soul was much more actively engaged with God. While it was possible, she bent her knees daily before God, even when it was thought im- proper to attempt it. Among her last words were the following :- "Certainly, certainly, I can see no other way than that of Christ crucified." "Christ is my all in all."
Let the following sentences, from a letter to her son Temple in 1816, sink deep into the hearts of all her descendants. After exhorting him earnestly to attend at once to personal religion, by reading the Scriptures, and prayer, and attendance on public wor- ship, she thus concludes :-
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" Have no work done on the Sabbath more than is necessary to be done. Have your victuals cooked on Saturday. Give your poor slaves who work in the field, Saturday to sell what they make, that they may have it in their power to go to worship on Sunday. Attend to your dear children. Bring them up in the fear of the Lord. He requires it of you to teach them their prayers. Set them an example, by having family worship for them and your servants. Pray for faith : it is the gift of God. He will hear our prayers, if we ask in faith. Oh that the Lord Almighty and my blessed Saviour may awaken you and open the eyes of your under- standing, while you are reading these lines, and bring you to consider what will make for your everlasting salvation. Oh, if you did but know what your aged mother feels for you and the rest of her children and grandchildren, how much she implores the mercy of God with daily fer- vent prayer, that he would of his great love and pity convert you all," &c.
In two other letters, one of them dated in 1818, she writes in the same earnest strain. One of them to her son Temple, whom she addresses, "My dear child," thus concludes :- " O my blessed God, of thy great mercy, grant, while you are reading these lines, that you may consider and turn and seek him and find him. Oh, what a joy it would give your aged mother to hear or see that you were converted !"
That the prayers of this aged woman were heard in behalf of one of her grandchildren, all who knew Mrs. Henry Magill, of Leesburg, will be ready to believe.
Among the families which belonged to Pohick Church was that of Mr. Lawrence Lewis, the nephew of General Washington, the son of his sister Betty, who married Mr. Lewis. Mr. Lawrence Lewis married Miss Custis, the grand-daughter of Mrs. Washington. In many of the pictures of the Washington family she may be seen, as a girl, in a groupe with the General, Mrs. Washington, and her brother Washington Parke Custis. There were two other full-sisters, who married Mr. Law and Mr. Peter. Mrs. Custis, the widow of Mr. Washington's son, married again. Her second hus- band was Dr. David Steuart, first of Hope Park, and then of Ossian Hall, Fairfax county. He was the son and grandson of the two Mr. Steuarts who were ministers in King George for so long a period. They had a numerous offspring. The residence of Mr Lawrence Lewis was a few miles only from Mount Vernon, and was called Woodlawn. After the desertion of Pohick they also attended in Alexandria, and some time after the establishment of St. Paul's congregation, and the settlement of Dr. Wilmer in it, they united themselves to it, and were much esteemed by Dr. Wilmer, as he was by them. After some years they removed to an estate near Berry- ville, in what was then Frederick, now Clarke county. Mr. Lewis
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was one of the most amiable of men by nature, and became a sin- cere Christian, and a communicant of our Church. His person was tall and commanding, and his face full of benignity, as was his whole character. I wish some of our friends at a distance could have seen him in the position I once beheld him in the church at Berryville, when I was administering the Holy Communion. Some of his servants were members of the church in that place, and on that day one of them came up after the white members had communed. It so happened that Mr. Lewis himself had not com- muned, but came up and knelt by the side of his servant, feeling no doubt that one God made them and one Saviour redeemed them. Mrs. Lewis was also a zealous member of the Church, a lady of fine mind and education, and very popular in her manners. Like her grandmother, she knew the use of her hands, and few ladies in the land did more with them for all Church and charitable purposes, even to the last days of a long life. They had three children. Their son, Lorenzo, married a Miss Coxe, of Philadelphia, and settled on the estate in Clarke, but died some years since. The two daughters married, the one Mr. Conrad, of New Orleans, and the other Mr. Butler, of Mississippi or Louisiana. A numerous posterity is descending from them .*
* The Lewis family of Eastern Virginia is of Welsh origin. Their ancestor, General Robert Lewis, (whose name is favourably mentioned in English history,) came from Wales to Gloucester county, Virginia, in the latter part of the seventeenth century, and there lived and died. His son Robert, who also lived and died in Gloucester, had three sons,-Fielding, John, and Charles. Of the two last I have received no account. Mr. Fielding Lewis, of Wyanoke, Charles City county, was doubtless a descendant of one of them. Colonel Fielding Lewis, son of the second Robert, removed to Fredericksburg early in life, was a merchant of high standing and wealth, a vestryman, magistrate, and burgess, and during the Revolution, being a genuine patriot, superintended the manufacture of arms in the neighbour- hood. He was twice married. His first wife was the cousin and his second the sister of General Washington. One child only, out of three by his first wife, lived to any considerable age. His name was John. He moved to Kentucky, and left a posterity there. The children of Colonel Lewis by his second wife, Betty Wash- ington, were six,-Fielding, George, Elizabeth, Lawrence, Robert, and Howell. Fielding died in Fairfax county, leaving descendants. Elizabeth married Mr. Charles Carter, and was one of the most interesting and exemplary of Christians. George was captain in Baylor's regiment, and commander of General Washington's life-guard. In his arms General Mercer expired on the field of battle at Princeton. Toward the close of the war he married and settled near Berryville in Old Fredc- rick, and took an interest in the affairs of the Church in that parish. After some years he removed to Fredericksburg, and from thence to King George, dying at his seat, Marmion, in 1821. He enjoyed the highest confidence of General Washington, being sent by him on a secret expedition of great importance to Canada. Mr.
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There were other families who belonged to this parish and church, but I am not possessed of information to enable me to speak of them as I could wish. The Chichesters, the Footes and Tripletts, were, I am told, the last to leave it. The following letter from my friend, General Henderson, of Washington, gives some notice of his father, Alexander Henderson, who was one of the vestry of Pohick Church who signed the deed of a pew to Rev. Mr. Massey :-
" WASHINGTON, 5th of February, 1857.
" MY DEAR SIR :- I received yours this morning. My father, Alex- ander Henderson, came to this country from Scotland in the year 1756, and settled first as a merchant in Colchester. During the Revolutionary War he retired to a farm in Fairfax county to avoid the possibility of fall- ing into the hands of the English, as he had taken a decided part on the side of freedom against the mother-country. About 1787 or 1788 he re- moved to Dumfries. He died in the latter part of 1815, leaving six sons and four daughters, all grown. John, Alexander, and James emigrated to Western Virginia, and settled as farmers in Wood county. Richard and Thomas were known to you, the former living in Leesburg and the latter for the last twenty years being in the medical department of the army. James and myself are the only surviving sons. Two of my sisters-Mrs. Anne Henderson and Mrs. Margaret Wallace-are still alive. My sisters Jane and Mary died many years ago. The latter married Mr. Inman Hor- ner, of Warrenton. All the members of the family have been, with scarce an exception, steady Episcopalians."
Of Mr. Richard Henderson, of Leesburg, Dr. Thomas Hender- son, and the sisters, I need not speak to the inhabitants of Lees- burg and Warrenton, where they were so well known as the props of our Church. The author of the letter from which I have ex- tracted has long been a communicant and active vestryman of the Church in Washington.
I have said that after the Revolution, when General Washington changed his attendance from Pohick to Alexandria, and others left the parish, regular services ceased in that part of the county. Mr. Massey either relinquished services because none attended, or from some other cause, although he lived many years after. The Rev.
Lawrence Lewis, of whom we have spoken above, was aid to General Morgan, in his expedition to the West to quell the insurrection in Pennsylvania. Mr. Robert Lewis, the fourth son of Colonel Fielding Lewis, was the private secretary of Gene- ral Washington during a part of his Presidential term. In the year 1791, he took up his residence in Fredericksburg, where as private citizen, as mayor of the town, and as a communicant of the Episcopal Church, he was universally esteemed and beloved. His daughter Judith married the Rev. E. C. McGuire, who has so long been the minister of the Episcopal Church in Fredericksburg. Mr. Howell, the fifth and last son of Colonel Fielding Lewis, moved to Kanawha county, where some of his posterity still reside.
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Mr. Weems, in his books, announces himself as the rector of this parish after this period. If some may, by comparison, be called "nature's noblemen," he might surely have been pronounced one of "nature's oddities." Whether in private or public, in prayers or preaching, it was impossible that either the young or old, the grave or the gay, could keep their risible faculties from violent agitation. To suppose him to have been a kind of private chaplain to such a man as Washington, as has been the impression of some, is the greatest of incongruities. But I wish to do him ample justice. Although his name never appears on the journals of any of our Conventions, and cannot be found on the lists of those ordained for Virginia or Maryland by the Bishop of London, so that a doubt has been entertained whether he ever was ordained a minister of our Church, yet I have ascertained that to be a fact. We pre- sume that he was from Maryland, as there are or were persons of that name there, who were said to be his relatives. We will give him credit for much benevolence, much of what Sterne called the milk of human kindness, and of which Mr. Weems delighted to speak in his sermons and writings. In proof of our disposition to do him ample justice, we present the following account of his boyhood in Maryland, which has been given us by one who knew him :-
" In his youth Mr. Weems was an inmate of the family of Mr. Jenifer, of Charles county, Maryland. They confided in him as a boy of principle, and had no doubt as to his uprightness and morality until about his four- teenth year. When at that age he was seen to leave the house every even- ing after tea and to be often away until late at night. The family began to be afraid that he was getting into corrupt habits, and, notwithstanding his assurance that he would do nothing that would render him unworthy of their estcem and friendship, they felt uneasy. He scorned the idea of abusing their confidence, but, as he persisted in the practice of going away, at length they determined to find out what was the cause of it. Accordingly one night a plan was laid by which he was tracked. After pursuing his trail for some distance into the pines, they came to an old hut, in which was young Weems, surrounded by the bareheaded, bare- footed, and half-clad children of the neighbourhood, whom he had been in the habit of thus gathering around him at night, in order to give them instruction."
I acknowledge that he was in the habit of having the servant, as- sembled in private houses, where he would spend the night, and would recite a portion of Scripture, for he never read it out of the book, and perhaps say something to them, or in the prayer about them, but then it was in such a way as only to produce merriment. This I have experienced in my own family and at my mother's, and have
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heard others testify to the same. I do not think he could have long even pretended to be the rector of any parish. From my earliest knowledge of him he was a travelling bookseller for Mr. Matthew Carey, of Philadelphia, visiting all the States south of Pennsylvania, and perhaps some north of it, in a little wagon, with his fiddle as a constant companion to amuse himself and others. If he would pray with the servants at night in their owners' houses, he would play the fiddle for them on the roadside by day. One instance of his good-nature is well attested. At the old tavern in Caroline county, Virginia, called the White Chimneys, Mr. Weems and some stroll- ing players or puppet-showmen met together one night. A notice of some exhibition had been given, and the neighbours had assem- bled to witness it. A fiddle was necessary to the full performance, and that was wanting. Mr. Weems supplied the deficiency.
He was of a very enlarged charity in all respects. Though calling himself an Episcopal minister, he knew no distinction of Churches. He preached in every pulpit to which he could gain access, and where he could recommend his books. His books were of all kinds. Mr. Carey, his employer, was a Roman Catholic, but dealt in all manner of books. On an election or court-day at Fairfax Court- House, I once, in passing to or from the upper country, found Mr. Weems, with a bookcaseful for sale, in the portico of the tavern. On looking at them I saw Paine's "Age of Reason," and, taking it into my hand, turned to him, and asked if it was possible that he could sell such a book. He immediately took out the Bishop of Llandaff's answer, and said, "Behold the antidote. The bane and antidote are both before you." He carried this spurious charity into his sermons. In my own pulpit at the old chapel, in my ab- sence, it being my Sunday in Winchester, he extolled Tom Paine and one or more noted infidels in America, and said if their ghosts could return to the earth they would be shocked to hear the false- hoods which were told of them. I was present the following day, when my mother charged him with what she had heard of his ser- mon, and well remember that even he was confused and speechless. Some of Mr. Weems's pamphlets on drunkenness and gambling would be most admirable in their effects, but for the fact that you know not what to believe of the narrative. There are passages of deep pathos and great eloquence in them. His histories of Washington and Marion are very popular, but the same must be said of them. You know not how much of fiction there is in them. That of Wash- ington has probably gone through more editions than all others, and has been read by more persons than those of Marshall, Ramsey,
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Bancroft, and Irving, put together. To conclude,-all the while that Mr. Weems was thus travelling over the land, an object of amusement to so many, and of profit to Mr. Carey, he was trans- mitting support to his interesting and pious family, at or near Dumfries, who, if I am rightly informed, were attached to the Me- thodist Church. If in this, or any thing else which I have written, any mistake has been made, I should be glad to receive its cor- rection.
There were three other ministers who occasionally preached at Pohick, and visited Mount Vernon after the death of General and Mrs. Washington, of whom a few words must be said. But, before these few are said, it is proper to speak of the change which took place at Mount Vernon by the death of its illustrious owners. It is well known that Judge Bushrod Washington, the son of General Washington's brother John, inherited Mount Vernon. He was in full communion with the Church when I first became acquainted with him in 1812, having no doubt united himself with it in Phila- delphia under Bishop White, while attending the Supreme Court in that place. I know that he was intimate with Bishop White and highly esteemed him. Judge Washington attended one or more of our earliest Conventions in Richmond and was a punctual mem- ber of the Standing Committee from that time until his death. He married into the family of Blackburns, of Ripon Lodge, not many miles from Dumfries, and perhaps twelve from Mount Vernon. The first Richard Blackburn of whom our vestry-books speak married a daughter of the Rev. James Scott, of Dumfries. His son was, I believe, the father of Mrs. Bushrod Washington, Mrs. Henry Turner, of Jefferson, Mr. Richard and Thomas Blackburn. The family at Ripon Lodge had long been the main support of the church at Dumfries and Centreville, and their house the resort of the clergy. I have before me a paper drawn up in 1812 for the support of the Rev. Charles O'Neill. The first and highest sub- scriber is Mr. Thomas Blackburn, who was, I believe, the husband of our excellent friend Mrs. Blackburn, who lived near Berryville for many of the last years of her life. His subscription is fifty dollars. The next highest is that of a Mr. Edmund Denny, twenty- five dollars. The next Dr. Humphrey Peake, for twenty dollars. All the rest much less. Old Mrs. Blackburn, with her four grand- daughters,-Jane, Polly, Christian, and Judy Blackburn,-daugh- ters of Mr. Richard Blackburn, were much at Mount Vernon. I be- came acquainted with them during the years 1812 and 1813, while I was ministering in Alexandria. They were the first-fruits of my
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ministry in that place, and very dear to me. Two of them-Jane and Polly-married nephews of Judge Washington, and settled in Jefferson. One of them-Judy-married Mr. Gustavus Alexander, of King George, and the fourth-Christian-died unmarried. By my intimacy with these four most estimable ladies and with Mrs. Blackburn and her sister, Mrs. Taylor, I have from time to time become acquainted with the state of things at Ripon Lodge and Mount Vernon as to the clergy. The Rev. Mr. Kemp and the Rev. Mr. Moscrope occasionally officiated at Dumfries and Pohick, and perhaps at Centreville, for the want of those who were better. But in order to conceal the shame of the clergy from the younger ones, and to prevent their loss of attachment to religion and the Church, the elder ones had sometimes to hurry them away to bed or take them away from the presence of these ministers when indulging too freely in the intoxicating cup. The doctrine of total abstinence in families, of banishing wine and spirits from the cellar and the table, was not thought of then in the best of families. If the minister chose it, he must drink. The third and last minister, and who died, I think, in 1813, was the Rev. Charles O'Neill, who was an im- provement on the two last. The families at Mount Vernon and Ripon Lodge were fond of him. He always spent his Christmas at Mount Vernon, and on those occasions was dressed in a full suit of velvet, which General Washington had left behind, and which had been given to Mr. O'Neill. But as General Washington was tall and well proportioned in all his parts, and Mr. O'Neill was peculiarly formed, being of uncommon length of body and brevity of legs, it was difficult to make the clothes of the one, even though altered, sit well upon the other .*
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