University of Virginia Library

JAMES PATTON PRESTON.

Scarce another American family has numbered as many prominent
and honored representatives as that of the yeoman founded Preston
descent, with its collateral lines and alliances.

John Preston, its propositus, a ship-carpenter, was born in Londonderry,
Ireland, where he married Elizabeth Patton, a sister of Colonel
James Patton, of Donegal, with whom he removed to Virginia, and
settled in the summer of 1735 in that portion of Orange County from
which Augusta County was erected in 1738. Colonel Patton had for
some years commanded a merchant ship trading to Virginia, and was a
man of property, enterprise and influence. He obtained an order from
the Council of Virginia under which patents were issued to him and
his associates for 120,000 acres of the best lands lying beyond the Blue
Ridge. He was killed by the Indians at Smithfield, Virginia, in 1753.
He left as issue two daughters, one of whom married Captain William
Thompson, and the other Colonel John Buchanan. From the last were
descended John Floyd and John B. Floyd, Governors of Virginia, Hon.
James D. Breckinridge, of Louisville, Ky., and Colonel William P.
Anderson, of the United States Army. John Preston settled first at
Spring Hill, but in 1743 he purchased a tract of land, adjoining
Staunton, on the north side of the town. He died soon after, and was
buried at the Tinkling Spring Meeting-House. His widow died in
1776, aged seventy-six years. They had issue five children: Letitia,
who married Colonel Robert Breckinridge; Margaret, who married Rev.
John Brown; William, who married Susanna, daughter of Francis
Smith, of Hanover County, Virginia, and who was a member of the
House of Burgesses and a prominent patriot in the American Revolution;
Ann, who married Francis Smith; and Mary, who married John
Howard.

Colonel William and Susanna (Smith) Preston had issue twelve
children: i. Elizabeth, married William S. Madison, the second son of
John Madison, and the brother of Rev. James Madison (President of
William and Mary College), of Thomas Madison, who married the
youngest sister of Patrick Henry, and of George Madison, Governor of
Kentucky, who married Jane Smith, the niece of Colonel Preston's wife;
ii. General John, member of the Assembly, and long treasurer of Virginia;
married twice, first to Mary, daughter of William Radford, and
secondly, to Mrs. Elizabeth Mayo, née Carrington; iii. Francis, lawyer;
member of Virginia Senate, and of Congress, and brigadier-general in
the war of 1812; married Sarah B. Campbell, a niece of Patrick Henry
and daughter of General William Campbell, the hero of King's Mountain;
iv. Sarah, married Colonel James McDowell, of Rockbridge
County, an officer of the war of 1812, and had issue Governor James
McDowell and two daughters: Susan S., who married Hon. William
Taylor, of Virginia, and Elizabeth, who married Hon. Thomas H.
Benton, of Missouri; v. Anne, died at the age of thirteen years; vi.
William, Captain in the United States Army under Wayne; married
Caroline, daughter of Colonel George Hancock; of their issue, Henrietta,
married General Albert Sydney Johnston, of the United States and

Confederate States Armies; and William, statesman, diplomate and
soldier, was a Major-General in the Confederate States Army; vii.
Susanna, married Nathaniel Hart, of Woodford County, Kentucky;
viii. James Patton; ix. Mary, married John Lewis, of Sweet Springs,
Virginia; x. Letitia, married John Floyd, Governor of Virginia; xi.
Thomas Lewis, lawyer, member of the Virginia Assembly and Major in
the war of 1812; married Edmonia, daughter of Governor Edmund
Randolph, and had issue: Elizabeth R., who married William A. Cocke,
of Cumberland County, Virginia; and John Thomas Lewis, Colonel in
the Confederate States Army, and Professor in the Virginia Military
Institute, who married Margaret Junkin, Virginia's sweet poetess; xii.
Margaret Brown, married Colonel John Preston, of Walnut Grove,
Virginia, a distant relative. James Patton Preston, the subject of the
present sketch, and the eighth of the children of Colonel William and
Susanna (Smith) Preston, as enumerated, was born at Smithfield, June
21, 1774. He enjoyed early advantages of education, under one Palfrenan,
a poet and scholar, who having, in a drunken frolic, been inveigled
into a disreputable marriage in London, shipped himself to Virginia,
under articles of service for his passage. Upon his arrival at
Williamsburg he was purchased by Colonel William Preston, and employed
by him as a tutor in his family. Palfrenan was the friend and
correspondent of the poetess Elizabeth Carter, an English lady of great
learning and acquirements. Colonel Preston also possessed a fine library
which had been selected for him in London by Gabriel Jones, a learned
and able lawyer, who is said to have been an early partner in the practice
with Thomas Jefferson. James Patton Preston appears from the
catalogue of William and Mary College to have been a student in that
institution for some time during the period 1790-1795. He probably
graduated thence about the year last stated. Tradition affirms him to
have been a merry youth; and a distinguished jurist, in a recent letter
to the writer, accredits him with the perpetration, whilst a student, of
a feat of equivocal distinction. In the preceding sketch of Lord Botetourt,
it will be recollected that it is stated that the statue of him
erected by order of the House of Burgesses, had been much mutilated
by the college students. Its graceless decapitation is stated to have
been a frolicsome freak of the embryo legislator and chief executive of
the Commonwealth of Virginia.

James Patton Preston was elected to the State Senate of Virginia in
1802; was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel of the 12th Infantry, United
States Army, March 19, 1812, and for gallantry was promoted, August
15, 1813, to the rank of Colonel, and assigned to the command of the
23d Regiment of Infantry. He participated in the battle of Chrystler's
Field, November 11, 1813, and was so severely wounded in the thigh
that he was crippled for life. Peace having been declared, his command

was disbanded, and he was honorably discharged from service,
August 18, 1815. In recognition of his patriotic service he was elected,
by the General Assembly, Governor of Virginia, to succeed Wilson
Cary Nicholas, December 1, 1816, and served in that capacity by
annual re-election until December 1, 1819. It is noteworthy that in
the last year of his incumbency, on the 25th of January, the law was
passed establishing the University of Virginia, in Albemarle County,
upon a site near Charlottesville which had previously belonged to Central
College, which was purchased. Fifteen thousand dollars per annum
were appropriated from the Literary Fund to meet expenses of
building and of subsequent endowment. The institution was to be
under the direction of seven visitors, appointed by the Governor and
Council, and from their number these visitors were to elect a rector to
preside and give general superintendence. Thomas Jefferson was elected
the first rector and retained the office until his death. He drew all the
plans for the buildings, which were so nearly completed in 1824 that
preparations were made for opening the schools the following year.
This was done with professors chiefly obtained from Europe. Only
the chairs of law, chemistry and ethics were filled from the United
States. In the year 1819, also, a revision of the Code of Virginia was
made.

Subsequent to his gubernatorial service, Mr. Preston was for several
years postmaster of the city of Richmond. He finally retired to his
patrimonial inheritance, the homestead "Smithfield," in Montgomery
County, where he died May 4, 1843. The county of Preston, now in
West Virginia, formed in 1818, from Monongalia County, was named
in his honor.

He married Ann Taylor, the second daughter of Robert Taylor, a
prominent merchant of Norfolk, Virginia, and the sister of General
Robert Barraud Taylor, of Virginia, and left issue three sons and
three daughters: i. William Ballard Preston, a member of the Virginia
Conventions of 1850-1 and 1861, Secretary of the Navy in the Cabinet
of President Taylor and Confederate States Senator; married Lucy
Redd, and left issue; ii. Robert Taylor Preston, Colonel Confederate
States Army, married Mary Hart, of South Carolina, and left issue; iii.
James Patton Preston, Jr., Colonel Confederate States Army, married
Sarah Caperton, and left issue; iv. Susan Preston, died unmarried;
v. Virginia Preston, died unmarried; and vi. Jane Grace Preston,
married Judge George Gilmer.

In support of the claim made in the opening paragraph of this
sketch, it may be said of "the Preston family" that it has furnished
the National Government a Vice-President (the Hon. John Cabell
Breckinridge), has been represented in several of the Executive Departments,
and in both branches of Congress. It has given Virginia
five Governors—McDowell, Campbell, Preston, and the two Floyds—

ARMORIAL BOOK-PLATE OF JOHN MURRAY
EARL OF DUNMORE,

Last Royal Governor of Virginia.

and to Kentucky, Missouri, and California, one each—severally in Governors
Jacobs, B. Gratz Brown, and Miller; Thomas Hart Benton,
John J. Crittenden, William C. and William Ballard Preston, leading
moulders of public sentiment; the Breckinridges, Dr. Robert J. and
William L., distinguished theologians of Kentucky; Professors Holmes,
Venable, and Cabell of the University of Virginia, besides other distinguished
educators. Nor is their battle-roll less glorious. It is
claimed that more than a thousand of this family and its connections
served in the contending armies in our late civil war. Among the
leaders were Generals Wade Hampton, Albert Sydney Johnston,
Joseph Eggleston Johnston, John Buchanan Floyd, John Cabell
Breckinridge, and John S. and William Preston. When it is stated
that besides the names enumerated, the family is connected with those
of Baldwin, Blair, Bowyer, Brown, Buchanan, Bruce, Cabell, Carrington,
Christian, Cocke, Flournoy, Gamble, Garland, Gilmer, Gibson,
Grattan, Hart, Henry, Hughes, Howard, Lee, Lewis, Madison, Marshall,
Mason, Massie, Mayo, Parker, Payne, Peyton, Pleasants, Pope,
Radford, Randolph, Read, Redd, Rives, Siddon, Sheffey, Taylor, Thompson,
Trigg, Venable, Watkins, Ward, Watts, Winston, Wickliffe,
among many others as well esteemed, some idea may be formed of its
mental characteristics and social influence.