The Old Dominion her making and her manners |
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 | The Old Dominion |  |
II
With a view to understanding just the situation
when the convention sat, let us for a moment
turn aside out of the clangor of revolution
and picture to ourselves the external appearance
of Virginia's capital, and then we shall
come to those who made it what it is to-day—a
shrine of Liberty. Fortunately, we have the
picture of the town, drawn by a facile and
friendly pen—that of the Rev. Hugh Jones—
about three-quarters of a century before the sitting
of the convention that declared for Independence.
"Public buildings here of note," he says, "are
the College, the Capitol, the Governor's House,
and the Church." Observe that he puts the College
first; and he describes it with much warmth.
Next comes a description of the capitol:
"Fronting the College at near its whole
breadth is extended a noble street mathematically
straight (for the first design of the town
of a mile in length: At the other end
of which stands the Capitol, a noble, beautiful
and commodious pile as any of its kind, built
at the cost of the late Queen, and by the direction
of the Governor.
"In this is the Secretary's Office, with all the
Courts of Justice and Law, held in the same
form, and near the same manner as in England,
except the Ecclesiastical Courts.
"Here the Governor and twelve Counsellors
sit as Judges at the General Courts in April
and October, whither trials and causes are removed
from Courts held at the Court Houses
monthly in every County by a Bench of Justices
and a County Clerk.
"Here are also held the Oyer and the Terminer
Courts, one in Summer and the other in
Winter, added by the charity of the late Queen
for the prevention of prisoners lying in goal
above a quarter of a year before their trial.
"Here are also held Courts Martial by Judges
appointed on purpose for the trial of pirates;
likewise, Courts of Admiralty for the trial of
ships for illegal trade.
"The building is in the form of an `H'
nearly; the Secretary's Office, and the General
Court taking up one side below stairs; the
Clerk of the Assembly's Office, and the House
of Burgesses on the other side; which last is
not unlike the House of Commons.
"In each wing is a good staircase, one leading
to the Council Chamber, where the Governor
and Council sit in very great state, in imitation
of the King and Council, or the Lord Chancellor
and House of Lords.
"Over the portico is a large room where Conferences
are held and prayers are read by the
Chaplain to the General Assembly; which
office I have had the honor for some years to
perform. At one end of this is a lobby, and
near it is the Clerk of the Council's Office; and
at the other end are several Chambers for the
Committees of Claims, Privileges and Elections;
and all over these are several good offices for
the Receiver General, for the Auditor, Treasurer,
Etc., and upon the middle is raised a
lofty cupola with a large clock.
"The whole is surrounded with a neat area
encompassed with a good wall, and near it is a
strong, sweet prison for criminals; and on the
other side of an open court another for debtors,
when they are removed either from other
prisons in each county; but such prisons are
very rare, the creditors being there generally
debtors that some esteem them too indulgent.
"The cause of my being so particular in
describing the Capitol is because it is the best
and most commodious pile of its kind that I
have seen or heard of.
"Because the State House, Jamestown, and
the College have been burnt down, therefore is
prohibited in the Capitol the use of fire, candles,
and tobacco.
"At the Capitol at public times may be seen
a great number of handsome, well-dressed, complete
gentlemen. And at the Governor's House
upon Birth-Nights, and at Balls and Assemblies,
I have seen as fine an appearance, as good
diversion, and as splendid entertainments in
Governor Spotswood's time, as I have seen anywhere
else.
"These buildings here described are justly
reputed the best in all the English America, and
are exceeded by few of their kind in England."
I fancy that his Reverence's pen ran somewhat
away with him in his enthusiasm to picture
Virginia's capital for his friends in Westminster.
I seem to see in his flowery description something
of the generous warmth which always
surges about the heart of Virginians when her
memory comes to them in a far country. But,
about the "complete gentlemen."
I have given the picture at length, partly because
it shows the life of the Virginians who
brought on the Revolution and their relation to
the government, and partly because, making
due allowance for his Reverence's warmth of
feeling, the old town which he so affectionately
described could not have changed greatly between
his day and the day when the convention
of 1776 sat. In fact, it has not changed incredibly
since that day.
If I may say so without offence, Time appears
to me to have dealt gently with this ancient
capital of Virginia. Two wars have left her
much as she was, as, indeed, they have left
the Virginians much as they were when the
Reverend Hugh Jones drew their pleasant picture;
pleasure-loving; chasing their horses five
miles through pastures to ride them two miles
on the road; easy-going till necessity arouses
them, but, once aroused, like the Nemean lion.
Into this capital came on May 6, 1776, one
hundred and thirty of these "complete gentlemen,"
all with one mind and one motive: the
preservation of American liberty. However
they might have differed and wrangled and contended,
here they were all at one. Nor had
a man came but knew that it was a crisis in
his life and fortunes. Three conventions had
sat in the preceding year, the first on the 20th
of March in old St. John's Church, Richmond,
where Patrick Henry fired all hearts by his
eloquent appeal for liberty or death. Though it
had lasted but a week, it did its work well. The
second, which met on the 24th of July, had put
the colony in a posture of defence.
On this day, May 6, the House of Burgesses
held its last session and declared that the ancient
Constitution of Virginia had been subverted by
the King and Parliament of Great Britain.
They thereupon disbanded and gave way to the
great Convention, thus terminating Virginia's
subjection to Great Britain. For the last year
the Royal Governor had been a fugitive from
the capital, and was now on board the warship
William, fulminating proclamations against the
people of Virginia as rebels, declaring martial
law, and arming their runaway slaves, to whom
he held out the reward of freedom. On October
26, 1775, George Nicholas had "fired the
first shot of the Revolution at one of Dunmore's
tenders sent to destroy the town of Hampton."
Four months before, the battle of Great
Bridge had been fought and Woodford had
had burnt Norfolk, Virginia's seaport, to
the ground.
War was already begun, though not yet generally
flagrant. Separation was imminent and
Independence was in the air.
Some persons appear to think that Jefferson
sat down in Philadelphia after the 7th of June
and wrote off the Declaration of Independence
as one might dash off a letter. They little know
the measure of Clio's march. The principles of
that immortal paper had been debated possibly
by every gentleman in Virginia, and by many
outside of her borders. It had been the subject
of discussion at every fireside and in every assemblage
for months, if not for years. And its
substance had been proclaimed as early as June
12 in that immortal paper, the Virginia Bill of
Rights which has since been incorporated in the
Constitution of every State of the Union.
However this may have been, Richard Henry
Lee, on the 20th of April, wrote from Philadelphia,
where he was representing Virginia in
the General Congress, to Patrick Henry, urging
him to propose to the convention about to
assemble a separation from Great Britain.
"Ages yet unborn," he says, "and millions
existing at present may rue or bless that Assembly
eminently depend." (Grigsby, p. 8.)
Those will remember who know the story of
the Declaration, that Richard Henry Lee was
the member of Congress who, in obedience to
Virginia's Instructions, on the 7th day of June
moved Congress to declare the Colonies Free
and Independent States. And but that he was
recalled to Virginia by the illness of his wife, it
would probably have been his pen rather than
Jefferson's which drafted the Declaration.
Who were the members of the conventions
who performed so notable a part in the drama
that was just opening? Simply the old Virginians—planters
and lawyers, plain country
gentlemen—whose names were to be immortalized
by their acts.
| The Old Dominion | |