USA > Virginia > Virginia and Virginians; eminent Virginians, executives of the colony of Virginia, Vol. I > Part 11
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Of the person of Governor Tyler the writer has been furnished the following description by a grandson, Lyon G. Tyler, Esq., of Richmond, Va., who has recently prepared for publication a meritorious account of his progenitors-the President and the Governor-The Life and Letters of the Tylers: "Governor Tyler did not exceed five feet ten inches in stature. He was lightly built and somewhat round-shouldered. His complexion was fair, nose aquiline, hair brown, inclining to auburn, and eyes light blue."
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There is an expressive portrait of Governor Tyler in the State Library at Richmond, which seemingly denotes the virtues and char- acteristics which so adorned his life.
The County of Tyler, formed, in 1814, from Ohio County, commem- orates the name of Governor Tyler.
GEORGE WILLIAM SMITH.
The familiar patronymic Smith has been most worthily represented in Virginia from its settlement. The capital figure in the line, doughty Captain John Smith, " the father of the Colony," however, returned a bachelor to England. The next prominent representative of the name in the annals of "ye Ancient Dominion," is Major Lawrence Smith, who was designated by the Assembly, in 1674, as the "chiefe com- mander" of a " ffort" to be built near the falls of Rappahannock River, and to be garrisoned by " one hundred and eleven men out of Glouces- ter County." This fort was built in 1676, and in April, 1679, Major Lawrence Smith and Captain William Byrd were allowed to seat lands at the head of Rappahannock and James Rivers. Major Larkin Smith was a gallant officer of the Revolution, and the same name was meri- toriously represented in the war of 1812, and also in the recent great internecine strife. John Augustine Smith, M. D., distinguished author and president of William and Mary College, 1814-26, and subsequently, for a lengthy period, lecturer on anatomy in the College of Physicians, New York, was a native of Virginia, and a graduate of William and Mary College in 1800. Governor William Smith, statesmen, and Major-General of the Confederate States Army, of whom due notice anon, should not be forgotten here. Major Lawrence Smith, as above, it is thought due investigation will establish as the original ancestor in Virginia of the subject of our sketch. His immediate progenitor was Merewether Smith, born about the year 1730, at the family seat, " Bathurst," in Essex County, Virginia, and whose Christian name is indicative of descent from another worthy line. The mother of Mere- wether Smith was a daughter of Launcelot Bathurst, a patentee of nearly 8,000 acres of land in New Kent County, Virginia, in 1683, and who is said to have been of the family of the Earl of Bathurst. whose arms are: Sa. two bars ermine in chief, three crosses pattie or. Crest, a dexter arm embowed; habited in mail, holding in the hand all ppr. a spiked club or. Launcelot Bathurst was "learned in the law," and the records of Henrico evidence that he was appointed Angust 1. 1684, by Edmund Jenings, the Attorney-General for the Colony, his deputy for the said county. The name Bathurst appears as a continu- ously favored Christian name in the Stith, Buckner, Jones, Skelton, Smith, Randolph, Hinton and other families. Merewether Smith mar- ried twice: first, about 1760, Alice, daughter of Philip Lee, third in de-
THE CHAIR OFTHE SPEAKER of the House of Burgesses of the Colony of Va.
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scent from the emigrant Richard Lee, and widow of Thomas Clarke; and, secondly, September 29, 1769, Elizabeth, daughter of Colonel William Dangerfield, of Essex County, member of the House of Bur- gesses in 1758. Merewether Smith served Virginia with zeal and dis- tinction through a long series of years and in important stations. He appears as a signer to the articles of the Westmoreland Association, of February 27, 1766, which, in opposition to the odious Stamp Act, was pledged to use no articles of British importation, and on May 18, 1769, was a signer also of the resolutions of the Williamsburg Association, which met at the old Raleigh Tavern, in that city, and who bound them- selves to abstain from the use of the proscribed British merchandise, and to " promote and encourage industry and frugality, and discourage all luxury and extravagance." In 1770 he represented Essex County in the House of Burgesses. He was a member of the Conventions of 1775 and 1776, and family tradition affirms that in the latter body he prepared the first drafts of both of the noble instruments, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, which were offered by George Mason. It is stated that the late President John Tyler was in possession of docu- mentary evidence, derived from his father, Governor John Tyler, sub- stantiating the claim, but which Lyon Gardiner Tyler, Esq., the son of the President, thinks was destroyed by a casualty during the late war. The original drafts, it is said, were in the possession of the grandson of Merewether Smith, the late John Adams Smith, cashier of the Farmers' Bank, at Richmond, and having been deposited by him for safe keeping in the vault of the bank, were destroyed in its burning, April 3, 1865, incident upon the evacuation of Richmond. Merewether Smith was a representative of Virginia in the Continental Congress, from 1778 to 1782. He represented Essex County in the House of Delegates, in 1786 and 1787, and in 1788 was a member of the Convention which rati- fied the Federal Constitution. He died January 25, 1790; his wife, Mrs. Elizabeth Smith, surviving him, died January 24, 1794. They were both buried at " Bathurst." George William Smith, the issue of the first marriage of his father, was born at "Bathurst " about 1762. He married February 7, 1793, Sarah, fourth daughter of Colonel Rich- ard Adams, the elder, a member of the Convention of 1776, an ardent patriot throughout the Revolution, and one of the most enterprising, public spirited, wealthy and influential citizens of Richmond. Colonel Adams was a large property holder, and the Assembly seriously consid- ered for a time the erection of the State capitol upon a site on Rich- mond Hill owned by him and proffered as a gift to the State.
In 1794 George William Smith represented the county of Essex in the House of Delegates. Soon thereafter he made Richmond his resi- dence, and in the practice of his profession of the law speedily took high rank and enjoyed a lucrative practice. He represented the city in the legislature from 1802 to 1808 inchisive, and in 1810 was appointed a member of the State Council, and as senior member of that body, or
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Lieutenant-Governor, upon the resignation of Governor James Monroe to accept the position of Secretary of State in the Cabinet of President Madison, succeeded him, December 5, 1811, as the Executive of the State. His term was lamentably brief, he being one of the victims of the memorable calamity, the burning of the Richmond Theater, on Thurs- day night, December 26th following. The winter had opened with un- usual gaiety in Richmond; brilliant assemblies followed each other in quick succession ; the theater was sustained by high histrionic talent; the fascinations of the metropolis had drawn thither the young, the beautiful, the gay, and the distinguished from every portion of the state. On the lamentable occasion of the catastrophe the theater was crowded. Six hundred persons, embracing many of the elite, the wealthy, the honored, and the influential of the State, had assembled within the frail wooden building. A new drama was to be presented for the bene- fit of Henry Placide, a favorite actor; and it was to be followed by the pantomime of "The Bleeding Nun," by Monk Lewis, founded on the wild legend of that name. The regular piece had been played; the pantomime had commenced; the curtain had risen upon its second act, when sparks of fire were seen to fall from the scenery on the back part of the stage, and supposed to have been communicated by one of the chandeliers improperly raised. A moment after, Mr. Robertson, one of the actors, ran forward, and waving his hand towards the ceiling, called aloud, "The house is on fire!" His voice carried a thrill of horror through the assembly. All rose and pressed wildly to the doors of the building. The spectators in the pit escaped without difficulty ; the passage leading from it to the outer exit was broad, and had those in the boxes descended by the pillars many would have been saved. Some who were thrown down by violence were thus preserved. But the crowd from the boxes pressed into the lobbies, and it was here, among the refined and the lovely, that the scene became the most appalling. The building was soon wrapped in flames; volumes of dense vapor pene- trated every part and produced suffocation; the fire leaping with awful rapidity encircled with flame those nearest to it, and piercing shrieks rose above the sound of the mass of frantic human beings struggling for life. The weak were trampled under foot, and strong men in the desperation of fear passed over the heads of all before them, in their way towards the doors or windows of the theater. The windows even of the upper lobby were sought; many who sprang from them perished by the fall; many were seen with garments on fire as they descended, and died soon afterwards from their injuries; few who were saved by this means escaped entirely unhurt. But in the midst of terrors which roused the selfishness of human nature to its utmost strength, there were displays of love in death which invoke profound sensibility. Fathers were seen
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rushing back into the flames to save their children, mothers were calling in frenzied tones for their daughters, and were with difficulty dragged from the building; husbands and wives and lovers refused to leave each other, and met death together; even friends sacrificed their lives in en- deavoring to save those under their care. The fate of Lieutenant James Gibbon, of the United States Navy, a son of the hero of the "forlorn hope" at Stony Point, and his betrothed bride, the lovely Miss Conyers, who died interlocked in the embrace of each other, was most touching. Governor Smith had reached a place of safety without the burning building, but returning to the rescue of his little son, John Adams, already mentioned, and who had been separated from him by the throng, he became a victim. Benjamin Botts, an eminent lawyer and the father of the late statesman John Minor Botts, had gained the door. but his wife was left behind. Hastily returning to save her, they both perished. Seventy persons are known to have perished in this horrible holocaust, but it was thought that the victims were much more numer- ous from among the many strangers present. Richmond was shrouded in mourning; hardly a family had escaped affliction from among its members, connections, or friends. And the stroke was not felt alone at home, but fell upon hearts far from the immediate scene of the catas- trophe. Indeed, the horror quite sped the globe, and the clergy of varying creeds alike vented it as a thunderbolt of God's manifest displeasure at such and like exhibitions and exemplifications of the sinfulness of worldly and pleasure-loving flesh-to a whilom damning of the noble drama. On the 30th of December, intelligence of the calamity was communicated to the Senate of the United States, and a resolu- tion adopted that the Senators would wear crape on the left arm for a month. A similar resolution was adopted in the House of Represent- atives, having been introduced in a feeling address by the Hon. William Dawson, of Virginia. The Monumental Church (Episcopal), a hand- some octagonal edifice, was erected in 1812 upon the site of the ill-fated theater. The remains of the unfortunate victims are buried in the por- tico of the church, beneath a marble monument inscribed with their names. A son of the late John Adams and Lucy (Williams) Smith, and grandson of Governor Smith, Bathurst L. Smith, Esq., is a promi- nent merchant of Memphis, Tennessee.
PEYTON RANDOLPH.
Upon the lamentable death of Governor George William Smith, in the burning of the Richmond Theater, December 26, 1811, Peyton Randolph, the senior member of the Council of State, was the acting executive of Virginia until January 3d, following, when, by election of the Assembly, then in session, James Barbour, of Orange County, was inaugurated as Governor.
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Peyton Randolph, the son of Governor Edmund Randolph, graduated from William and Mary College in 1798. Inheriting the genius of his progenitors in successive generations, he became early distinguished in the practice of his chosen profession of law. In 1821 he became the reporter of the Supreme Court of Virginia, but in the midst of his in- creasing usefulness, with the most brilliant prospects before him, he fell in the prime of manhood, a victim to pulmonary disease, dying at Rich- mond, December 26, 1828, widely lamented by numerous friends to whom liis virtues and worth had endeared him. His successor as reporter was the eminent Benjamin Watkins Leigh. The result of Mr. Randolph's labors -- " Report of Cases argued and determined in the Court of Appeals of Virginia, 1821-1828," were published in 6 volumes, 8vo, Richmond, 1823-1832. A son of Mr. Randolph, Edmund Ran- dolph, died in California during our late war.
JAMES BARBOUR.
The Barbour family of Virginia, it is claimed, is of Scottish origin, and to be of the lineage of John Barbour,* one of the earliest Scotch poets and historians; archdeacon of Aberdeen as early as 1357, and who died in 1396. A national work of his, still extant, called The Bruce, is a metrical chronicle of the warlike deeds of Robert the First (1306- 1329) in his efforts for the independence of his beloved country. Bar- bour also composed another book, setting forth the genealogical history of the kings of Scotland, and dedueing their origin from the - Trojan colony of Brutus. He was a favorite author with Sir Walter Scott, who frequently quotes his lines, which are remarkable, also, for their intelligibility to the modern reader. In the Land Records of Virginia the name of William Barber appears as a patentee of lands in Hamp- ton parish, York County, May 6, 1651. William Barber speedily be- came a man of mark and influence, since in 1656 he is found again as a patentee with the title of Lieutenant-Colonel or County-Lieutenant of York. In October, 1660, the Governor, Sir William Berkeley, with Colonel William Barber, ; Colonel Gerard Fowke, Colonel Kendall, Thomas Warren, Rawleigh Traverse, and Thomas Lucas were the super- intendents for the erection of the State House at Jamestown. There are subsequent grants of land in. Rappahannock County to William and to Richard Barber. Thomas Barbar appears as a patentee in New Kent County in 1714. William Barber was a Burgess from York County in 1718, and Charles Barber from Richmond County in 1723. But the definite ancestor of the subject of our sketch was James
* His name is also variously rendered, Barber, Barbere, and Barbar.
t Tradition accredits William Barber as a son of the Baron of Mulderg.
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Barbour,* who appears as a grantee of lands in St. George's parish, Spottsylvania County, June 26, 1731, and again, in 1733, of lands in St. Mark's parish in the same county. He was one of the first vestry- men of this latter parish, at its organization at Germanna, in 1731, and served in that office until the division of the parish in 1740, which threw him into the new parish of St. Thomas, in Orange County, in which division he lived. Among his children was James Barbour, who repre- sented the county of Culpeper in the House of Burgesses in 1764, was colonel and commander-in-chief of the militia of the county in 1775, and was the father of Mordecai, Thomas, Richard, and Gabriel Barbour, the last three of whom emigrated to Kentucky. Mordecai Barbour married a daughter of John Strode, of "Fleetwood," Culpeper County, and was the father of the late Hon. John Strode Barbour, statesman and lawyer, and grandfather of Hon. John Strode Barbour, a present representative of Virginia in the National House of Representatives, and whose material and political services to the State have gained him enduring regard. Thomas Barbour, another son of James Barbour, the settler in what is now Orange County, was a member of the House of Burgesses in 1769, when it issued the first protest against the Stamp Act. He was again a Burgess in 1775, and was a member of the "Committee of Public Safety," of Orange County, in the same year. He married Isabella Thomas, granddaughter of Philip Pendleton.+ Their third son was the Hon. Philip Pendleton Barbour, Speaker of Congress and of the Virginia Convention of 1829-30, and a Justice of the United States Supreme Court. He married Frances Todd, daughter of Benjamin Johnson, Burgess, of Orange County, and had issue: Philippa, married Judge Richard H. Field; Elizabeth, married John J. Ambler, of "Jac- queline Hall," Madison County; Thomas, M. D., married Catharine Strother; Edmund Pendleton, married Harriet, daughter of Colonel John Stuart, of King George County; Quintus, married Mary, dangh- ter of James Somerville, of Culpeper County; Sextus, and Septimus. Justice Barbour died in 1841, and his wife, aged eighty-five, in April, 1872. James Barbour, the subject of this sketch, the fourth son of Thomas Barbour, was born in Orange County, June 10, 1775. His
* The name is rendered Barber in the State Land Records, and from a seal ring lately in the possession of the family, the arms displayed were those of the family of Staffordshire, England: Gules, three mullets argent, within a bordure ermine. Crest-A passion cross on three steps, gules. The motto, Nihilo nisi cruce, seems to indicate an origin in the days of the Crusaders.
t Philip Pendleton, grandson of Henry Pendleton, of Norwich, England, and whose descendants include the names of Clayton, Taylor ("John Taylor, of Caro- lina," a grandson), Gaines, Strother, Ragland, Browning, Beverley, Byrd, Dudley, Burk, Ellis, Slaughter, Hoge, Shackleford, Williams, Spotswood, and others equally worthy.
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education was limited, and chiefly obtained while he was acting as a deputy sheriff, but his tutor for a time was the celebrated James Wad- dell, commemorated as the "Blind Preacher," by William Wirt, in his British Spy. James Barbour entered the service of the State at the age of twenty-four years, as a member of the memorable Assembly of 1799. His colleague from the county of Orange was James Madison (afterwards President of the United States), and he looked forward with eager expectancy to a conflict in debate of that able intellect with Patrick Henry, also a member elect of the Assembly. But he was dis- appointed in the death of the great orator of the Revolution, in June, 1799, before the body convened. James Barbour participated in every debate, ably vindicated the famous resolutions of Mr. Madison, and was the proposer of the anti-duelling law-one of the most stringent and effective legislative acts ever passed. While still a member of the Assembly, he was elected by it, January,3, 1811, Governor of Vir- ginia, to succeed George William Smith, who was one of the victims of the awful burning of the Richmond Theater, on the 26th of December preceding. The administration of James Barbour, covering the im- portant period of the second conflict with Great Britain, was signally able, vigilant, and patriotic. He was emphatically the "War Gov- ernor," and in pledging his personal means to sustain the credit of Vir- ginia, takes honorable rank with Governor Thomas Nelson, of the Re- volution.
Virginia nobly demeaned herself in the War of 1812. Many of her sons highly distinguished themselves in the combats by sea and land, and she suffered from the invasion of the enemy. In May, 1813, Ad- miral Cockburn with a British fleet entered Chesapeake Bay, and com- menced a series of depredations on private property, which far eclipsed those which had made the name of Dunmore infamous in the War of Independence. An English fleet of four line-of-battle ships with twelve frigates was collected in the bay, near the capes and Lynhaven Bay. They carried a large land force under Sir Sydney Beekwith, the naval commander being Admiral Warren. They were closely watched from Norfolk and Hampton. The harbor of Norfolk was chiefly defended by the armament of Mr. Jefferson's famous " Gunboat System," but for the threatened emergency, large bodies of militia, from the upper coun- ties of the State, had been ordered to the seaboard. Unused to the ma- laria of the summer season in lower Virginia, a large number of them were prostrated with sickness and many of them died. General Robert Barraud Taylor, of the State line, commanded the military district, and Commodore Cassin, of the United States Navy, directed the sea defences. On the 20th of June, the advance of the English frigate " Junon," upon Norfolk, was gallantly checked by our immature American Navy. Some movements on the following day among the British shipping, which had moved near Newports News, seemed to indicate an early
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attack upon Craney Island, near the mouth of Elizabeth River, and which commands the approach from Hampton Roads to Norfolk. Its defence was therefore all-important. The forces on the island consisted of about 400 infantry of the line, 50 riflemen from Winchester, under Captain Roberts, 91 artillery in two companies, one from Portsmouth, Captain Arthur Emerson, and the other from one of the upper counties, commanded by Captain Richardson; the whole force being under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel H. Beatty, assisted by Major Wagner of the infantry, and Major Faulkner of the artillery service. Of this force 43 were on the sick-list. On the evening of the 21st, they were reinforced by order of General Taylor, by Captain Pollard of the United States Army, with 30 of his company from Fort Norfolk ; Lieutenant Atkinson from Culpeper County, with 30 volunteers of the militia of Isle of Wight County, and by 150 seamen and marines, under Lieu- tenants Neale, Shubrick and Saunders, from the frigate "Constellation," Captain Tarbell. On the morning of the 22d, the enemy landed about 2,500 troops, under Sir Sydney Beckwith, with the view to approach from the west side of the island, across the water in that direction, which at low water was passable by infantry. Soon after they landed, there approached about 50 boats filled with men, which directed their course to the north side of the island. Here two twenty-four-pounders and four six-pounders had been advantageously posted by Major Faulkner. These were gallantly and effectively served by Captain Emerson and Lieutenants Parke G. Howle and Godwin, aided by Lieutenant Neale and his command. A galling fire was opened upon the approaching foe, and the guns were trained with such fatal precision that five of their barges were sunk, and one of them literally cut in twain. The other boats hauled off' in discomfiture and the valorous Virginians had to speedily succor the drowning wretches thus left struggling in the water. Admiral Warren's own barge, the "Centipede," 52 feet long, and working 24 oars, stranded and was taken with 22 men, a brass pounder and numbers of small arms. In the meanwhile the landed de- tachments were attempting to cross the narrow inlet in front of the bat- tery, but were grievously harassed at long shot, and when they came nearer the havoc was so fearful that they precipitately retreated. So eager were the Virginians for the fray, that the Winchester riflemen pursued the foe into the water, hoping to reach them with their bullets. The loss of the enemy was fully 200, besides the prisoners named, and 50 deserters, whilst on the American side not a man was lost. In trans- mitting the report of Colonel Beatty to the Secretary of War, General Taylor justly remarks of this brilliant feat : "The courage and con- stancy with which this inferior force, in the face of a formidable naval armament, not only sustained a position in which nothing was complete, but repelled the enemy with considerable loss, can not fail to command
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ALEXANDER SPOTSWOOD, Governor of Virginia. From a copy in oil, in the State Library of Virginia.
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the approbation of their government and the applause of their country," and adds : "It has infused into the residue of the army a general spirit of competition, the beneficial effects of which will, I trust, be dis- played in our future conflicts." The heroic defence of Craney Island filled the enemy with rage and shame. They abandoned their designs upon Norfolk, and Hampton was the next point of attack, led by Cock- burn in person, on the 25th of June. Invested with the small force of 400 artillery and infantry, under Major Stapleton Crutchfield, he was unable to withstand the furious assault of a foe, by sea and land, ten times his number. The enemy took possession of Hampton and com- mitted the most revolting deeds. A wanton destruction of private property took place, and the degraded soldiery and the negro slaves, who had been enticed from their owners, were allowed to riot in every species of brutality. The militia of the country, however, collecting in formidable numbers for an attack, the British evacuated the town on the 27th of June, and soon after the invading fleet left the Chesapeake, and prepared for a descent upon North Carolina. It is noteworthy that the patriotic ladies of the city of Richmond, early in 1812, contributed, by the sale of their jewels, towards the building and equipping of a ves- sel of war called the " First Attempt," the command of which was given to Captain Isbon Benedict.
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