University of Virginia Library

CONCLUSION.

Some thoughts on the formation of the Virginia character, as
displayed in the American Revolution and previously, may with
propriety follow after the history of the Church and College at
Williamsburg, and the foregoing list of vestrymen. As London
and the Universities were in one sense England, Paris and its University
France, so Williamsburg, while it was the seat of Government,
and the College of William and Mary, were, to a great extent,
Virginia. Here her Governor and chief officers resided; here her
Council often repaired and her Burgesses annually met. What
was their character? Whence did their ancestors come, and who
were they? Happily for the Colony, they were not Lords, or their
eldest sons, and therefore heirs of lordship. With one or two exceptions,
none such ever settled in Virginia. Neither were they in
any great numbers the ultra devotees of kings,—the rich, gay, military,
Cavalier adherents of Charles I.,—or the non-juring believers in
the divine right of kings, in the days of Charles II. and of James II.
Some of all these there were in the Colony, doubtless. Some dainty
idlers, with a little high blood, came over with Captain Smith at
first, and more of the rich and high-minded Cavaliers after the
execution of Charles I.; but Virginia did not suit them well
enough to attract and retain great numbers. There was too much
hard work to be done, and too much independence, even from the
first, for those who held the doctrine of non-resistance and passive
obedience to kings and others in authority, to make Virginia a

comfortable place for them and their posterity.[52] And yet we must
not suppose that the opposite class—the paupers, the ignorant, the
servile—formed the basis of the larger and better class of the Virginia
population, when it began to develop its character at the Revolution,
and, indeed, long before. These did not spring up into
great men in a day or a night, on touching the Virginia soil. Some
of the best families of England, Ireland, Scotland, and France,
formed at an early period a large part of that basis. Noblemen
and their elder sons did not come over; but we must remember
how many of the younger sons of noblemen were educated for the
bar, for the medical profession, and the pulpit, and turned adrift
on the world to seek their own living, without any patrimony.
Some of those, and many more of their enterprising descendants,
came to the New World, especially to Virginia, in search of fortune
and honour, and found them here. Numbers of Virginia families,
who are almost ashamed or afraid in this republican age to own it,
have their genealogical trees, or traditionary records, by which
they can trace their line to some of the most ancient families in
England, Scotland, Ireland, and to the Huguenots of France.
Where this is not the case, still they can derive their origin from
men of education, either in law, physic, or divinity, which things
were too costly in the old countries to be gotten by the poorer
classes, except in some few instances where charity was afforded.
Ministers could not generally be ordained without degrees from
Cambridge, Oxford, Dublin, or Edinburgh. Lawyers studied at
the Temple Bar in London; physicians at Edinburgh. For a long
time Virginia was dependent for all these professional characters
on English education. Those who came over to this country poor,
and ignorant, and dependent, had few opportunities of elevating
themselves; as has been happily the case since our independence,
by reason of the multiplication of schools and colleges, and of all
the means of wealth which are now open to us. Sir William
Berkeley in his day rejoiced that there was not a free school or
printing-press in Virginia, and hoped it might be so for a hundred
years to come; and perhaps it was not much otherwise as to
schools. In the year 1723, the Bishop of London addressed a
circular to the clergy of Virginia, then somewhat over forty in
number, making various inquiries as to the condition of things in
the parishes. One of the questions was, "Are there any schools
in your parish?" The answer, with two or three exceptions, (and
those in favour of charity-schools,) was, none. Private schools at
rich gentlemen's houses, kept perhaps by an unmarried clergyman
or candidate for Orders, were all the means of education in the
Colony, and to such the poor had no access. Another question
was, "Is there any parish library?" The answer invariably was,
none; except in one case, where the minister replied, "We have
the Book of Homilies, the Whole Duty of Man, and the Singing
Psalms." Such were the answers from thirty clergymen, whose
responses I have before me.[53] If "knowledge be power," Virginia
was, up to that time, so far as the poor were concerned, but a barren
nursery of mighty men. Would that it had been otherwise,
both for Church and State! Education was confined to the sons
of those who, being educated themselves, and appreciating the
value of it, and having the means, employed private teachers in
their families, or sent their sons to the schools in England and paid
for them with their tobacco. Even up to the time of the Revolution
was this the case with some. General Nelson, several of the
Lees and Randolphs, George Gilmer, my own father and two of
his brothers, and many besides who might be mentioned, just got
back in time to prepare for the Revolutionary struggle. The College
of William and Mary, from the year 1700 and onward, did
something toward educating a small portion of the youth of Virginia,
and that was all until Hampden Sydney, at a much later
period, was established. But let any one look at the published
catalogue of William and Mary, and see how few were educated
there from 1720 to the Revolution, and let him notice who they
were. Let him also examine whatever lists of Burgesses, Henning's
volumes and the old Virginia almanacs furnish, and he will
see who they were that may be considered the chief men of Virginia.
I have been recently examining another set of records
which show who were considered her first men. I allude to the
vestry elections; and nine times in ten we are confident one of
their body was the delegate. They were the ruling men of the
parishes,—the men of property and education. As we have said
before, from an early period they were in training for the Revolution,
by the steady and ever-successful struggle with Commissaries,
Governors, Bishops of London, and the Crown, on the subject of
the calling and induction of ministers. They also spoke through
the House of Burgesses, which was made up of themselves. We
will venture to affirm that very few of the statesmen of the Revolution
went into it without this training. Even Mr. Jefferson, and
Wythe, who did not conceal their disbelief of Christianity, took their
parts in the duties of vestrymen, the one in Williamsburg, the other
in Albemarle; for they wished to be men of influence. In some
of the communications to England, the vestries are complained of
by the clergy as the aristocratic bodies,—the twelve lords or masters
of the parishes; and they did sometimes, I doubt not, rule
the poor clergy with a rod of iron; but they were not the men to
truckle to George III., Lord North, or the Parliament. Well did
Mr. Burke, in his celebrated speech on American affairs, reply to
some who said that the rich slaveholders of the South would not
stand a war, "that they were entirely mistaken; for that those
who had been long accustomed to command were the last who
would consent to obey."[54] In proof of my position that men of
education, and that gotten chiefly in Europe, were the ancestors of
large numbers of those who formed at a later period the most
influential class, I would here insert a list of the earlier clergy of
Virginia which I got from some ancient documents, (most of them
unpublished,) and this is but a small part of those whose names
are lost to us forever. Let the reader compare these with names
on the civil and military list of Virginia's history, and he must
acknowledge the probability at least of consanguinity between
many of them. I begin with the names of Bucke, Whittaker, the
two Williamses, (names still common in Virginia,) Young, Key,
Berkeley, Hampton, Richardson, Teackle, Cotton, Palmer, Gordon,
the Smiths, Ware, Doyley, the Bowkers, Saunders, Holt,
Collier, Wallace, Walker, the Monroes, Slaughter, Blair, Ander
son, Ball, the Yateses, Hall, Latane, the Roses, the Joneses, Sharp,
Waggener, the Taylors, Stith, Cox, the Brookes, the Robertsons,
the Robinsons, Collings, Baylie, Bell, Warden, Debutts, Forbes,
Marshall, Preston, Goodwin, Cargill, Hughes, the Scotts, the
Fontains and Maurys, the Dawsons, Reid, White, Campbell, Graham,
the Thompsons, Fraser, Thacker, Wilkinson, the Navisons,
the Stewarts, the Dixons, Webb, Innis, Warrington, Cole, Purdie,
Marye, Mackay, Jackson, Green, McDonald, Moncure, Keith, Leland,
Craig, Grayson, Bland, Manning, Hamilton, Dick, Clay,
Lyons. Many of the foregoing belong to the first century of our
existence and to the early part of the second. Many of the families
of Virginia may have descended from some of the foregoing
without knowing it. I leave it to others to search out the civil
list of Virginia names, in order to ascertain as far as practicable
how many of their ancestors may have been well-educated doctors
and lawyers, or respectable merchants and farmers, when first
coming to this country. I hope I shall not be misunderstood. It
is no dishonour to be born of the poorest parents in the land. It
is a much greater honour to be descended from a poor and ignorant
good man, than from a rich or learned bad man. I am only
speaking of a historical fact. It was the shame of our forefathers,
both here and in England, that they did not, by promoting education,
furnish more opportunities to the poor to become in a greater
degree the very bone and sinew of the State. It is our sin now
that more and better attention is not paid to the common schools
of Virginia, in order to make them nurseries of good and great
men.