Legends of Loudoun Part 10

"_Resolved_, That it is beneath the dignity of freemen to submit to any tax not imposed on them in the usual manner, by representatives of their own choosing.

"_Resolved_, That the Act of the British Parliament above mentioned, is utterly repugnant to the fundamental laws of justice, in punishing persons without even the form of a trial; but a despotic exertion of unconst.i.tutional power designedly calculated to enslave a free and loyal people.

"_Resolved_, That the enforcing the execution of the said Act of Parliament by a military power, must have a necessary tendency to raise a civil war, and that we will, with our lives and fortunes, a.s.sist our suffering brethren of Boston, and every part of North America that may fall under the immediate hand of oppression, until a release of all our grievances shall be procurred; and our common liberties established on a permanent foundation.

"_Resolved_, That the East India Company, by exporting their tea from England to America, whilst subject to a tax imposed thereon by the British Parliament, have evidently designed to fix on the Americans those chains forged for them by a venal ministry, and have thereby rendered themselves odious and detestable throughout all America. It is, therefore, the unanimous opinion of this meeting not to purchase any tea or other East India commodity whatever, imported after the first of this Month.

"_Resolved_, That we will have no Commercial intercourse with Great Britain until the above mentioned Act of Parliament shall be totally repealed, and the right of regulating the internal policy of N. America by a British Parliament shall be absolutely and positively given up.

_"Resolved,_ That Thompson Mason and Francis Peyton, Esqs., be appointed to represent the County at a general meeting to be held at Williamsburg on the 1st day of August next, to take the sense of this Colony on the subject of the preceeding resolves, and that they, together with Leven Powell, William Ellzey, John Thornton, George Johnston and Samuel Levi, or any three of them, be a committee to correspond with the several Committees appointed for this purpose

"Signed by

John Morton Thomas Williams Thomas Ray James Noland Thomas Drake Samuel Peugh William Booram William Nornail Benj. Isaac Humphrey Thomas Luttrell Samuel Mills James Brair Joshua Singleton Poins Awsley Jonathan Drake John Kendrick Matthew Rust Edward O'Neal Barney Sims Francil Triplitt John Sims Joseph Combs Samuel Butler John Peyton Harrison Thomas Chinn Robert Combs Appollos Cooper Stephen Combs Lina Hanc.o.c.k Samuel Henderson John McVicker Benjamin Overfield Simon Triplett Adam Sangster Thomas Awsley Bazzell Roads Isaac Sanders John Wildey Thomas Williams James Graydey Henry Awsley Joseph Bayley Wm. Finnekin John Reardon Richard Hanson Edward Miller John d.i.n.ker Richard Hirst Jasper Grant James Davis"[100]

[100] Copy found among papers of Colonel Leven Powell. See 12 William and Mary Quarterly (1) 231.

The names of the following men, composing the Committee for Loudoun, are taken from the record of its meeting on the 26th May, 1775:

Francis Peyton, Esq. James Lane Josias Clapham Jacob Reed Thomas Lewis Leven Powell Anthony Russell William Smith John Thomas Robert Johnson George Johnson Hardage Lane Thomas Sh.o.r.e John Lewis

with one of the members, George Johnson, acting as clerk.

When war began, the gentlemen justices of the county's court recommended certain of her men to the governor from time to time as worthy of commissions in the military forces being raised by the Colony. Many an old and familiar Loudoun name appears on the list and for the interest of their descendants and relatives it is here appended as abstracted from the county records by James W. Head in his very useful _History of Loudoun_:[101]

[101] Loudoun "Orders" G 517-522. Head, 134.

"March 1778: James Whaley Jr., second lieutenant; William Carnan, ensign; Daniel Lewis, second lieutenant; Josiah Miles and Thomas King, lieutenants; Hugh Dougla.s.s, ensign; Isaac Vandevanter, lieutenant; John Dodd, ensign.

"May 1778. George Summers and Charles G. Eskridge, colonels; William McClellan, Robert McClain and John Henry, captains; Samuel c.o.x, Major; Frans Russell, James Beavers, Scarlet Burkley, Moses Thomas, Henry Farnsworth, John Russell, Gustavus Elgin, John Miller, Samuel Butcher, Joshua Botts, John Williams, George Tyler, Nathaniel Adams and George Mason, lieutenants; Isaac Grant, John Thatcher, William Elliott, Richard Sh.o.r.e, and Peter Benham, ensigns.

"August, 1778 Thomas Marks, William Robison, Joseph Butler and John Linton, lieutenants; Joseph Wildman and George Asbury, ensigns.

"September 1778 Francis Russell, lieutenant, and George Shrieve, ensign.

"May 1779 Joseph Wildman, lieutenant, and Francis Elgin Jr., ensign.

"June 14, 1779 George Kilgour, lieutenant and Jacob Caton, ensign.

"July 12, 1779 John Debell, lieutenant and William Huchison, ensign.

"October 11, 1779 Francis Russell, captain.

"November 8, 1779 James Cleveland, captain; Thomas Millan, ensign.

"February 14, 1780 Thomas Williams, ensign.

"March, 1780 John Benham, ensign.

"June, 1780 Wethers Smith and William Debell, second lieutenants, Francis Adams and Joel White, ensigns.

"August, 1780 Robert Russell, ensign.

"October, 1780. John Spitzfathem, first lieutenant; Thomas Thomas and Matthew Rust, second lieutenants; Nicholas Minor Jr., David Hopkins, William McGeath and Samuel Oliphant ensigns; Charles Bennett, captain.

"November, 1780. James Coleman, Esq., Colonel, George West, lieutenant-colonel; James McLlaney, Major.

"February, 1781. Simon Triplett, Colonel; John Alexander, lieutenant-colonel; Jacob Reed, Major; John Linton, captain; William Debell and Joel White, lieutenants; Thomas Minor, ensign; Thomas Sh.o.r.es, captain; John Tayler and Thomas Beatty, lieutenants; John McClain, ensign.

"March 1781. John McGeath, captain; Ignatius Burns, captain; Hugh Dougla.s.s, first lieutenant; John Cornelison, second lieutenant; Joseph Butler and Conn Oneale, lieutenants; John Jones, Jr., ensign; William Tayler, Major first battalion; James Coleman, Colonel; George West, lieutenant-colonel; Josiah Maffett, captain; John Binns, first lieutenant; Charles Binns, Jr., second lieutenant and Joseph Hough, ensign.

"April 1781. Samson Trammell, captain; Spence Wigginton and Smith King, lieutenants.

"May 1781. Thomas Respa.s.s, Esq., Major; Hugh Dougla.s.s, Gent. captain; Thomas King, lieutenant; William T. Mason, ensign; Samuel Noland, captain; Abraham Dehaven and Enock Thomas, lieutenants; Isaac Dehaven and Thomas Vince, ensigns; James McLlaney, captain; Thomas Kennan, captain; John Bagley, first lieutenant.

"June 1781. Enoch Furr and George Rust, lieutenants; Withers Berry and William Hutchison (son of Benjamin), ensign.

"September 1781. Gustavus Elgin, captain; John Littleton, ensign.

"January 1782. William McClellan, captain.

"February 1782. William George, Timothy Hixon and Joseph Butler, captains.

"March 1782. James McLlaney, captain; George West, colonel, Thomas Respa.s.s, lieutenant-colonel.

"July 1782. Samuel Noland, Major; James Lewin Gibbs, second lieutenant and Giles Turley, ensign.

"August 1782. Enoch Thomas, captain; Samuel Smith, lieutenant; Matthias Smitley, first lieutenant; Charles Tyler and David Beaty, ensigns.

"December 1782. Thomas King, captain; William Mason, first lieutenant and Silas Gilbert, ensign."

By a stroke of good fortune, there has been brought to light and published in recent years a journal kept by one Nicholas Cresswell, a young Englishman of gentle birth who, in 1774, at the age of 24 years obeyed a keen impulse to emigrate to Virginia with the expectation of buying a plantation and becoming a Virginia farmer.[102] His home in England was the estate of his father, known as Crowden-le-Booth, in the parish of Edale in the Peak of Derbyshire. The father seems to have been a somewhat stern disciplinarian, against the rigidity of whose rule and unhappy home conditions young Cresswell fretted; and that and an ambition to make his own way in the world, coupled with an appet.i.te for adventure common to his age and race, induced Nicholas to his course.

After many difficulties, he sailed from England in the ship _Molly_ on the 9th of April, 1774, and thus began a series of adventures, his excellent record of which has been characterized as "a valuable addition to Revolutionary Americana" and, it may be added, is nothing less than treasure trove to the student of Loudoun's past. In the course of his ensuing experiences he met, among a mult.i.tude of others, Jefferson, Lord Howe, Patrick Henry, Francis Lightfoot Lee; was upon occasion Washington's guest at Mount Vernon and paints and proves Thomson Mason to have been one of the kindliest and most hospitable of men. His wanderings took him through many parts of Virginia and particularly Leesburg and its neighborhood, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York; on a voyage to Barbados to recoup his health and on an expedition as a viewer and surveyor of new lands, down the Ohio River into Indiana country, in an unsuccessful effort to recoup his fortune. An educated young Englishman, loyal to his King and country, arriving in the Colonies as the storm of the Revolution was about to break, he soon was suspected of being an English spy, was bullied and persecuted by some, befriended by others and, withal, records his experiences in a narrative of such fascination that one reads it from end to end with unabated interest. Of the Leesburg and Loudoun of the period he gives the best contemporary, if not always complimentary, account known to the present writer.

Through the courtesy of the Dial Press, the publishers of his Journal in the United States, the following abstract of Loudoun material is permitted:

[Ill.u.s.tration: NICHOLAS CRESSWELL, the Journalist. (From a portrait now owned by Samuel Thorneley, Esquire.)]

Cresswell first pa.s.sed through Loudoun in November, 1774, in the course of a journey to the Valley. He arrived in Leesburg on Sunday the 27th and records:

"The land begins to grow better. A Gravelly soil and produces good Wheat, but the roads are very bad, cut to pieces with the wagons, number of them we met today. Their method of mending the roads is with poles about 10 foot long laid across the road close together; they stick fast in the mud and make an excellent causeway. Very thinly peopled along the road, almost all Woods. Only one public House between this place and Alexandria."

[102] _The Journal of Nicholas Cresswell_, The Dial Press, New York.

On the next day he inspected Leesburg. "Viewing the town. It is regularly laid off in squares, but very indifferently built and few inhabitants and little trade, tho' very advantageously situated, for it is at the conjunction of the great Roads from the North part of the Continent to the South and the East and the West. Lodged at Mr.

Moffit's, Mr. Kirk's partner in a store which he has here."

On the following Sunday, "Went to a Methodist meeting. This Sect is scattered in every place and have got considerable footing here, owing to the great negligence of the Church Parsons."

The next day he continued his journey to the West, returning to Leesburg on the 14th December, 1774. On the following day, being Sunday, he simply notes "but no prayers." On Monday, "Court day. A great number of litigious suits. The people seem to be fond of Law. Nothing uncommon for them to bring suit against a person for a Book debt and trade with him on an open account at the same time. To be arrested for debt is no scandal here." And on the next day he "Saw the Independence Company exercise. A ragged crew." In January he amuses himself "with shooting wild Geese and Ducks. Here is incredible numbers in the River likewise Swans. It is said they come from the Lakes."