USA > Virginia > Virginia's unsung victory in the Revolution > Part 2
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Peter Kinder was a guide for the Tories. Under the special act Tories of one county could be tried in another under certain conditions.
Another interesting point to be found in this confession is the reference to others in the Tory Conspiracy as being "in The Club. "
Many of the courts-martial, as well asmagistrates courts, were held at Green Level, the home of Colonel Charles Lynch. Those found guilty were tied to a black walnut tree and flogged with the legendary "forty-save-one lashes. "The laying on of the whip could be stopped by the guilty one call - ing out, "Liberty Forever. " This would free him from the lash but carried with it a term of eight months service in the Virginia Militia or the Continental Army. Many avoided the flogging entirely by an early plea of loyalty to the American Revolutionary Cause. This increased the roll of the patriot companies and provided additional eligibility for member- ship by modern-day descendants into patriotic societies.
If we have been a gullible public in our acceptance of the above it is perfectly understandable that we could, through the years, have had a wrong interpretation of that insur- rection act and those trials by court-martial. This misun- derstanding was increased by the martial law, and courts-
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martial being rescinded with the close of the war and the termination of the emergency. Courts-martial records were not filed at the county clerk's office. It is understandable that the public not knowing that these laws existed, looked upon Colonel Charles Lynch and the other leaders as making their own laws and punishments. Tory publicity aided in spreading this propaganda during the rest of the Revolution. Their attorneys were loud-mouthed in their contention that all of our acts were illegal and that these fine men were being kept in the army under duress. They had been flogged by Colonel Charles Lynch without legal authority -and on and on into the realm of legend and tall stories.
These drafted patriots began soon to believe their lawyers and the propaganda and being faced with a choice to fight or desert - many deserted and hid out in the Blue Ridge.
These enforcees were not the gentlest soldiers in the service. There was in them incipient danger. Later our under - cover agent, Lieutenant John Wyatt, when he reported for duty in a line company, recognized some of the Tories he had spied upon. Not wishing to be shot in the back he put in for a trans- fer and received it. The recommendation on the application to General John Peter Muhlenberg, and its accompanying explanation by Colonel William Preston, was one of the scant pieces of information that has helped make up this mosaic of history on the Origin of the Lynch Law and the Tory
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Conspiracy - the unsung and unknown victory of Virginia in the Revolution.
Our Revolution rolled on but the situation for the thirteen states was becoming day by day more desperate. The French had arrived but had not had time to make their weight felt. For every step ahead toward victory British pressure seemed to push us back two steps. Many of our victories were on far away fronts. They did not relieve the pressure in Virginia or in the Carolinas . Colonel George Rogers Clark's victori- ous campaigns against the English and the Indians in the Northwest kept our own mountain sharpshooters far away from Virginia.
Colonel Charles Lynch, Colonel William Preston, Colonel James Callaway, and Captain Robert Adams, Jr., by their fine planning and quick action following the undercover dis- coveries of Lieutenant John Wyatt won a great victory over the Virginia Tories and obliterated their effectiveness as a well-organized fighting unit bent upon subjugating Virginia to the British.
A further effect of this victory was to discourage the linking up of organized Virginia Tory units with those of North Carolina that were aiding Lord Cornwallis. This released more Virginia militia to fight with Colonel William Campbell and Colonel William Preston and others at the Battle of King's Mountain in October 1780.
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All of these events were bits in the mosaic that was com - plete after the British Surrender at Yorktown. However during the last year of the Revolution there were many black days and discouraging events. The patriots had nothing to make them feel they were winning the fight for freedom and liberty. There are those misunderstood words again! As a matter of fact so dispirited were some of the fighting men that when ordered south toward Virginia and Yorktown they refused to go, wondering why they should fight Virginia's battles. They were finally persuaded to march south by a combination of tough court-martial sentences and an added liquor allowance.
A study of this attitude or trend by the historians then and now might well have earlier explained one of our growing national peculiarities and danger points: it is legitimate to request and / or force one group of states to follow another section's viewpoint, without obligation to go to that other state's aid in time of need. Perhaps these troops would have gotten by with it had George Washington not been the Com - mander in Chief. Of course, too, that was when the leaders of this country had something in their minds that, for a while, looked toward the sound American dream and not a shadow-haunted nightmare that distorts the dreams of today.
Even in June 1781, a few short months before Lord Cornwallis ' Surrender, George Mason, who wrote THE VIRGINIA BILL OF RIGHTS, an instrument we understood
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better then, than now, was writing letters of despair to his son, doubting that we could win the Revolution even with the heip of the French.
Then came Yorktown, the surrender, and a cessation of warfare. Most of the tired citizens just wanted to forget, even forgive, but above all to get on with the rebuilding of life and living. To the Tories who did not leave the country this meant fitting themselves into the Commonwealth of Virginia. Many set about destroying all evidence of Toryism. Any researcher may find court records but no evidence on file. Some of the genuine, sincere Tories became excellent citizens and held office in the new country.
In Central Virginia a number of the Tories involved in the conspiracy threatened to bring action for damages against Lynch, Preston, Callaway and Adams. I have never been able to find records where these suits were brought. The Virginia Assembly passed an act exonerating these fine officers, stating that the act could be used as a defense in case actions were brought against any or all of them.
That our people misunderstood martial law is not sur- prising. It was with us for a short time only during the last year of the Revolution. It was not brought into general use in all areas of Virginia - only at the location and time needed. It was purely a war emergency statute which became in- operative with the surrender at Yorktown. It was as though
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it had not existed. The people of the country who understood neither this law nor the actions of the leaders in carrying it out simply jumped to their own conclusions. Generally they thought that Lynch, Callaway, Preston and Adams were just making their own laws and the punishments to fit the great emergency. The local patriots did not blame them for this - they were proud enough of them to compose and sing a ballad honoring their actions.
Hurrah! for Captain Bob Adams, And Colonels Lynch, Preston, and Callaway, They never turned a Tory loose Till he cried out : "LIBERTY!"
In the more modern times a ballad made a hero or a western Robin Hood out of Jesse James. On the other hand, the old ballad about Charles Lynch made a villain out of a hero, added words to the dictionary and cast slurs upon a fine name.
However, all of the evidence and misunderstanding be- came distorted stories for tale-telling by the winter fires of future generations - tales to amuse children. It was only
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recently after long research that facts were published with an explanation of martial law and courts-martial under the insurrection statute which proved that these men were acting within the law. This should burn off the fog of doubt that has been inclined to linger around these men and Virginia. For years people remembered only that an uprising had been put down; that men had been flogged and drafted into the army under orders from officers at Lynch's home. Therefore, they said Lynch's Law was used. At this time the westward mi- gration had already started from Central Virginia and the migrants drifted into the habit of describing anything ir- regular, and on the frontiers there were many irregular methods of correcting real or imaginary offenses, as "Lynch's Law, " on the verdict of "Judge Lynch."
Legend has it that much of this was spread by the westward- moving Quakers from the South River Meeting in Campbell County which Charles Lynch helped to found. These people first moved to an Ohio region where they were neither ap- preciated nor wanted and a mob threatened them. It is said in this legend that the Quakers themselves said that the mob had applied Judge Lynch's Law by taking the law into their own hands. Later this was applied to everything in the west and elsewhere from riding an undesirable out of town on a rail to a hanging, an easy step to the creation of the verb. "to lynch."
There is a history lesson in our victory over the British
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and Tories. It shows that a misunderstood method of achiev- ing a victory can in later years become twisted into disgrace while this great, victorious event that aided in the forming of a nation is forgotten. Charles Lynch himself sarcastically mentioned that he had used Lynch's Law when he was forced to flog subversives at the State Lead Mines during the Rev- olution. He was within his legal rights as a military command- er protecting Virginia State property vital to the war effort.
The Lynch family was very prominent in the early set- tling and building of Albermarle, Amherst, Bedford, and Campbell Counties from before 1750. In 1757 John Lynch, a Quaker, brother of Colonel Charles Lynch, founded Lynch's Ferry which soon became a river port with an inn and a few warehouses. In 1786 the town of Lynchburg was founded by act of the legislature. Today tourists have been known to shun Lynchburg believing the distorted view that lynching was created here and that some of our gentle citizens might dash out, drag a tourist from his car and hang him. Besides the fact that we are not villains of that sort, it would be badfor business. The East German textbooks go even further. They claim, for the education of their pupils, that Lynchburg and surrounding counties originated the lynching and torturing of Negroes and that it is carried on today. The State Department and other liberal government agencies share a tendency co leave the correction of such matters up to our local people
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LYNCH'S FERRY - from 1757 LYNCHBURG - from 1786
who do have the means or methods of countering propaganda. As all of this uncorrected and unchallenged propaganda is food for the fanatics and carpetbaggers, you can readily picture how simple misunderstandings can be distorted into a historic dangerous phantasy that is accepted as truth.
Perhaps the day will come when we can search out our basic history by cleaning out the motes of distortion to find beams to illuminate our unsung victories.
IN A NUT SHELL
People assumed that men of Bedford and Montgomery Counties took the law into their own hands to try, sentence and punish freebooters and conspiring Tories during the Revolution in 1780.
The reasons for this assumption sprung from misunder - standings which were threefold: (1) the people's minuscule knowledge of courts-martial and martial law in 1780-81, augmented by the disappearance of the records of these courts-martial; (2) the misleading way in which the legis- lators phrased the 1782 Act of Indemnification, passed so these officers would have a legal defense against all suits by Tories, and (3) the lack of knowledge of the people of the time of the official orders of Governor Thomas Jefferson.
See pages 33, 34, & 35 for this cloudily expressed act , and the Jefferson orders and letters. The act states that the measures taken by these men in suppressing the conspiracy and the act of levying war against the Commonwealth "may not have been strictly warrented by law, although justifiable from the imminence of danger."
Actually Jefferson's orders, the Insurrection and Inva- sion Statute, the statute allowing prosecution for people pub- lishing or speaking words just short of treason, and above all, the emergency, took precedence over the later Act of Indemnification. It is unfortunate that so few scholars during all these years have known of the Jefferson orders, the re- port of William Preston and his letter on the subject to Gen- eral John Peter Muhlenberg(see Kegley's Virginia Frontier), which this writer coordinated and assembled, first, for pu- blication in 1959 for Origin Of The Lynch Law - 1780.
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THE LYNCH TREE At AVOCA, originally, GREEN LEVEL Drawing by Epps Turner Perrow for LOOKING BACK, bv Pauline H. Edwards and Letitia F. Thompson.
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Background
IRGINIA'S UNSUNG VICTORY IN THE REVOLUTION i s published because this important action of our Revo- lutionary War history should be stressed here in Virginia. It has been by -passed and ignored even when local writers tried in vain to call attention to it while trying to explain the true origin of The Lynch Law. Unfortunately they did not have the correct key to unlock the mystery. This key was the Insurrection and Invasion statute that allowed martial law. See the following list of statutes. What seemed to native Central Virginians was a justified taking of the law in the hands of the military authorities and to the Tories as a vio- lently illegal act, was nothing more than duly delegated au- thorities holding courts martial. That many of these were held at Green Level, the home of Colonel Charles Lynch near the junction of the Otter and Staunton Rivers in present- day Campbell County, near Altavista, added up in the minds of the local Virginians and the Tories and Freebooters to be excellent proof that these officers had constituted them - selves as the law, judge, and jury. Bedford County then, was not as much in danger of being within a Police state as the United States is now.
We print below the list of those found guilty of treason by the General Court in Richmond as well a the list of seventy five Tories held prisoner, many of whom were triedby Courts Martial and by county magistrates courts for lesser offenses.
MEN CONVICTED OF TREASON:
Ayres, John
Hunt, Thomas
Bandy, Richard
Chuke or Cheeke, William
Epperson, Anthony
Feazle, Jacob
Watts, Thomas
Greer, Joseph
Wheeler, Rowland
Hore, Edward
Wilks, John
Huddleston, Daniel
Wilson, Joseph
Josiah Meadows and John Richards gave bond for 20,000 each as witnesses before the General Court against the six- teen listed above. It might be well to note that Josiah Meadows was alsolisted as a prisoner and as one of those convicted of treason by the General Court.
10 HENNINGS STATUTES AT LARGE, p. 324, October 1780. Act to Grant Pardon to Certain Offenders. Statute specifical- ly names the following counties: Henry, Bedford, Pittsyl- vania, Botetourt, Montgomery, and Washington, and allows pardon for treason to be sought by the offenders of the area. It specifically names the sixteen convicted of treason (see preceding list), most of whom appear on the Bedford prisoner list. The preliminary trials of the sixteen named took place in Bedford.
Meadows, Joseph
Richardson, Randolph Sinclair, Wayman
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TORY PRISONER LIST
Tuesday, December 5th, 1780; being the names of seventy-five (75) prisoners committed to the care of the keep- er of the Bedford County jail during the summer of 1780- suspicion of treasonable practices against the State; kept for 18 days. JOURNAL OF THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES, December term 1780 - pages 37-38. (These have been rearranged al- phabetically. See photostat of book for that arrangement. )
Ayres, John
Bandy, Richard Beachboard, John
Blankinship, John Bradshaw, John
Bourden, John
Burgess, Edward
Cheeke, William Claywell, Peter
Claywell, Shadrack Cowan, Robert
Craighead, John Cundiff, John
Daniel, Peter Jun. Dodd, John
English, Henry
English, Stephen Epperson, Anthony
Farmer, David Feazle, Bernard
Feazle, Jacob
Fielder, Samuel
Funk, Peter
German, Thomas Greer, Joseph Greere, Nathan
Haill, John Harding, Lake Harris, William
Huddleston, Abraham Huddleston, Samuel Huddleston, William Hunt, Thomas
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Hurt, William
Keith, John Kelly, John
Lucas, William
Mason, Martin
Mason Gilbert
Massy, Sylvester
Massy, Thomas
Maxey, Josiah
Mead, William, Jun.
Mead, Robert
Meade, Robert
Meadows, Josiah
Orr, Edward Overstreet, Thomas, Jun. Overstreet, William
Owen, John
Owens, Owen
Paine, John Pratt, James
Rees, Slewman Richeson, Randolph Rust, David Rust, Peter
Sinclair, Weyman Slinker, Christopher Smith, James
Snow, James
Stiles, Samuel
Treeble, John Trent, John Trimble, Richard
Warren, Daniel Watts, Thomas Watts, William
Webber, John Welch, John Wheeler, Rowland White, Stephen Wilks, John
Wilson, Joseph Woode, Peter
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SOURCE MATERIAL
Clerk's Office for the Circuit Court of Bedford County, Bed- ford, Virginia. See the Index and Court Order Book No. 6 for records of trials of the magistrates courts, preliminary trials for High Treason, militia officer appointments, etc.
LISTS OF STATUTES
Act of May 1780, 10 HENNINGS STATUTES AT LARGE, p. 268. In effect August 1, 1780, allowing prosecution by County or General Court of persons speaking or publishing words just short of treason and advising people to submit to British rule, etc. Petit jury to establish fine and duration of imprisonment.
See Court Order Book No. 6, Clerk's Office, Circuit Court, Bedford County for persons tried under this act
10 HENNINGS STATUTES AT LARGE, p. 309, May 1780. Emer- gency Act in case of Invasion or Insurrection, providing sweeping powers for governor and council including mar - tial law and courts-martial. This sets forth the procedure and legal steps to be carried out after August 1, 1780. There were other references to this act when the state was invaded. Courts-martial were evidently used in other counties, but perhaps with a difference. In October 1780, the Legislature expanded this act to set up a spe- cial court with three or more members of General Court.
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10 HENNINGS STATUTES AT LARGE, p. 324, October 1780. Act to Grant Pardon to Certain Offenders. Statute specifical- ly names the following counties: Henry, Bedford, Pittsyl- vania, Botetourt, Montgomery, and Washington, and allows pardon for treason to be sought by the offenders of the area It specifically names the sixteen convicted of treason , most of whom appear on the Bedford prisoner list. The preliminary ·trials of the sixteen named took place in Bedford.
SEQUEL TO THE CONSCRIPTION BY COURTS-MARTIAL
5 PAPERS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON 77, Princeton University Press, 1951 Colonel James Callaway to Governor Thomas Jefferson, Bedford County, June 4, 1781.
*** "Impossible to get into the field any of the militia sub- jected to six months service by court martial, part of these brought in broke jail and others escaped their guards. * These disaffected and disobedient wretches stay much together and are very troublesome. Near forty of these enlistments that were made in this county last summer for 18 months have long since deserted and are secreted by them. "
Same: Page 436. Letter from County Lieutenant, Colonel William Preston of Montgomery County to Governor Jefferson April 13, 1781, regarding conditions caused by lack of pow - der, and desertions by disaffecteds. Their hiding out in the mountains made it difficult for court martial to put the law "into execution against them. " That the Lead Mines were in danger from disaffecteds. Not in his power to get militia for Lead Mines. They had flower but no meat. Preston sug- gested trading lead for bacon until Colonel Lynch could re- turn from North Carolina.
3 PAPERS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON , p. 597 etc. September 4, 1780. Also see p. 603 for statistics on militia and drafting.
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"AN ACT TO INDEMNIFY CERTAIN PERSONS IN SUPPRESSING A CONSPIRACY AGAINST THIS STATE. I. Whereas divers evil-disposed persons in the year one thousand seven hundred and eighty, formed a conspiracy and did actually attempt to levy war against the commonwealth; and it is represented to the present general assembly that William Preston, Robert Adams, Jr., James Callaway, and Charles Lynch, and other faithful citizens, aided by detach- ments of volunteers from different parts of the state, did, by timely and effectual measures, suppress such conspiracy; And whereas the measures taken for that purpose may not be strictly warrented by law, although justifiable from the imminence of the danger:
II. BE IT THEREFORE ENACTED: that the said William Preston, Robert Adams, Jr., James Callaway and Charles Lynch, and all other persons whatsoever, concerned in sup- pressing the said conspiracy, or in advising, issuing, or executing any orders, or measures taken for that purpose, stand indemnified and exonerated of and from all pains, pen- alties, prosecutions, actions, suits, and damages on account thereof. And if any indictment, prosecution, action, or suit shall be laid or brought against them, or any of them, for any act or thing done therein, the defendant, or defendants, may plead in bar, or the general issue, and give this act in evidence.39 (XI Hennings Statutes at Large, 134)
If these men are guilty of taking the law in their own hands, one wonders about the status of the members of the Boston Tea Party.
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JULY -AUGUST 1780
As Jefferson's replies to the reports of Callaway and Lynch are dated August 1, 1780, it may be assumed that they were written and forwarded several days earlier, as the treason cases became more numerous on the Bedford County Court docket after July 24th.
Confirmation of this will be found in the report of Colonel William Preston, County Lieutenant of Montgomery County, bearing date August 8th, in which he states that the con- spiracy had been discovered about ten days before.
The report is reprinted here following the two letters of Jefferson and should be considered along with them. As the Governor was out of Richmond when the report from Preston arrived, it was answered by Lieutenant Governor Dudley Diggs, in much the same manner as Jefferson. This report and the two letters give the key to the whole situation. It also brings out the part played by secret agents.
GOVERNOR THOMAS JEFFERSON August 1, 1780 TO COLONEL JAMES CALLAWAY
County Lieutenant of Bedford County.
2 OFFICIAL LETTERS OF GOVERNORS OF VIRGINIA, 146
Your proceedings in sending a party immediately to appre - hend those who are concerned in the conspiracy you des - cribe, were very proper as is your keeping a sufficient guard for their security. Such of them whose offense a- mounts to high treason had better be tried as soon as poss - ible before the examining court and sent down if found guil- ty, I mean this of the ring leaders, those who have enlisted others into the conspiracy or who have accepted of commis- sions. The more ignorant and insignificant who give proofs of sincere repentance and may be useful as witnesses to
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convict the others had better not be put under prosecution. The reason is that if they be prosecuted and convicted of treason, the Executive have no power to pardon; by keeping them out of a course of law, the Executive will have in their power to recommend them to the Legislature at their meetings in October to be subjects of an Act of Pardon, if their conduct in the meantime be such as shews they merit to be so recommended. They must, however, be disarmed until further orders. You will doubtless be assisted in your proceedings by the attorney for the Commonwealth in your county. I can therefore add nothing, but exhort you to a con- tinuance of the vigilance and decisions with which you have begun to spare no means of securing the offenders by guards. assured that in so doing, you will meet public approbation which you have merited. I send you forty-one blanket militia commissions and a copy of the act for punishing crimes of a treasonable nature, but not amounting to treason. We have not in any instance undertaken to remit the penalty of the Law obliging the delinquents of the militia to serve eight months conceiving that the exercise of this power should be left with General Stevens to be put in use at the time of their attending on him if circumstances justify it. It is therefore best that those from your county proceed to him immediate- ly, carrying with them your recommendation, which will doubtless have its proper weight with the General.
GOVERNOR THOMAS JEFFERSON August 1, 1780 TO COLONEL CHARLES LYNCH
Commanding Officer Bedford Militia.
2 OFFICIAL LETTERS OF GOVERNORS OF VIRGINIA, 147
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