History of the Colony and Ancient Dominion of Virginia Part 56

Benjamin Harrison, Jr., of Berkley, was descended from ancestors who were among the early settlers of Virginia. Hermon Harrison came to Virginia in the second supply, as it was called. One of the name was governor of Bermuda. John Harrison was governor of Virginia in 1623. The common ancestor of the Harrisons of Berkley and of Brandon, was Benjamin Harrison, of Surrey. He lies buried in the yard of an old chapel near Cabin Point, in that county.[654:A]

It was long believed that the Harrisons of Virginia were lineally descended from Colonel John Harrison, the regicide and friend of Cromwell, and one of the n.o.blest spirits in a heroic age. This tradition, however, appears to be erroneous. The first of the family in Virginia, of whom we have any particular record, was the Honorable Benjamin Harrison, of Surrey, who was born in that county in 1645, during the civil war in England. It is certain that he could not have been a son of Colonel Harrison, the regicide. He may have been a collateral relation.

The first Benjamin Harrison (of Surrey) had three sons, of whom Benjamin, the eldest, settled at Berkley. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Louis Burwell, of Gloucester; was a lawyer, and speaker of the house of burgesses. He died in April, 1710, aged thirty-seven, leaving an only son, Benjamin, and an only daughter, Elizabeth.

Benjamin Harrison, Jr., of Berkley, was educated at William and Mary; married a daughter of Robert Carter, of Corotoman;[655:A] and was for many years a burgess for his native county, Charles City. In 1764 he was one of the committee chosen to prepare an address to the king, a memorial to the lords, and a remonstrance to the commons, in opposition to the stamp act. Like Pendleton, Bland, and others, he opposed Henry's resolutions of the following year. He was a member of the committee of correspondence, and of all the conventions held before the organization of the republican government. He opposed Henry's resolutions for putting the colony in a posture of defence, but was appointed one of the committee chosen to carry them into effect. He was elected, in 1774, a delegate to the first congress, of which his brother-in-law, Peyton Randolph, (who married Elizabeth Harrison,) was president. In February, 1776, he remarked in that body: "We have hobbled on under a fatal attachment to Great Britain. I felt it as much as any man, but I feel a stronger for my country." As chairman of the committee of the whole house, Mr. Harrison, on the 10th of June, 1776, introduced the resolution declaring the independence of the colonies, and on the fourth day of July he reported the Declaration of Independence, of which he was a signer. He was six feet in stature, corpulent, and of a florid complexion. He was practical, energetic, frank, epicurean, gouty, good-humored, fearless, and patriotic.[656:A]

The sons of the first Benjamin Harrison, of Berkley, were Benjamin, signer of the Declaration; Charles, a general of the Revolution; Nathaniel, Henry, Collier, and Carter H. From the last-mentioned are descended the Harrisons of c.u.mberland. Benjamin Harrison, Jr., the signer, married a Miss Ba.s.sett. Their children were Benjamin, Carter, Ba.s.sett, member of congress, and William Henry, President of the United States. One daughter married a Mr. Richardson, a second married first William Randolph, of Wilton, and then Captain Richard Singleton; a third married David Copeland, and a fourth married John Minge, of Weyanoke, afterwards of Sandy Point. So far the Berkley branch of the Harrisons.

The second son of Benjamin Harrison, of Surrey, was Nathaniel. His eldest son was of the same name, and his only son was Honorable Benjamin Harrison, of Brandon, of the council at the same time with his relative and namesake of Berkley at the commencement of the Revolution. This Benjamin Harrison, of Brandon, was father of the late George Harrison, and of William B. Harrison, of Brandon.

George Wythe was born in 1726, in Elizabeth City County, Virginia, on the sh.o.r.e of the Chesapeake. From his maternal grandfather, Keith, a Quaker, he inherited a taste for letters. His ancestor, Thomas Wythe, was burgess for that county in 1718. The father of George was a prudent farmer of estimable character.[656:B] George, the second son, losing his father at an early age, enjoyed but limited advantages of school education, and his early tuition was princ.i.p.ally directed by his mother; and it is related that he acquired a knowledge of the Latin cla.s.sics from her instructions.[656:C] Mr. Jefferson mentions that while young Wythe was studying the Greek Testament, his mother held an English one to aid him in the translation. It has been since inferred, from an examination of his ma.n.u.scripts, that this last was the only kind of a.s.sistance that he received from her in the Latin and Greek. He studied law under his uncle, John Lewis, of Prince George; but, upon the death of his elder brother and his mother, becoming master of a competent fortune, he fell into habits of idleness and dissipation. Like Swift, however, he was not one who, having wasted part of his life in indolence, was willing to throw away the remainder in despair; and in the society of Governor Fauquier and Professor Small he imbibed their love of learning; and at the age of thirty applied himself unremittedly to study. He became, eventually, distinguished by his attainments in cla.s.sical literature; and he pursued other studies with a like success.

But he often deplored the loss of so many early golden years. His learning, judgment, and industry soon raised him to eminence at the bar.

A member of the house of burgesses as early as 1758, he continued in it until the Revolution. At its dawn Mr. Wythe, in common with Thomas Jefferson and Richard Bland, a.s.sumed the ground that the crown was the only connecting link between the colonies and the mother country. In 1764 Mr. Wythe was a member of a committee of the house of burgesses appointed to prepare a pet.i.tion to the king, a memorial to the lords, and a remonstrance to the commons, on the subject of the stamp act. He prepared the remonstrance in conformity with his radical principles; but it was greatly modified by the a.s.sembly. In May, 1765, he, in common with Nicholas, Pendleton, Randolph, and Bland, opposed Henry's resolutions as premature. Mr. Wythe likewise voted (March, 1775,) against Henry's resolutions for putting the colony in a posture of defence; but he was in favor of the scheme of Colonel Nicholas for raising a large regular force. Early in 1775 Mr. Wythe joined a corps of volunteers as a private soldier; in August he was elected a member of congress. He was returned by the City of Williamsburg to the convention of that year; but being in attendance on congress his place was filled by Joseph Prentis. Mr. Wythe signed the Declaration of Independence, which he had strenuously supported in debate.[657:A] Mr. Wythe married first a Miss Lewis, and secondly a Miss Taliaferro.[658:A] He died childless. He is described as being distinguished for integrity, patriotism, and disinterestedness; temperance and regular habits gave him good health; engaging and modest manners endeared him to every one; his bow was one of most expressive courtesy. His elocution was easy, his language chaste, his arrangement lucid; his frequent cla.s.sic quotations, smacking a little of pedantry; his style, which aimed at the antique, was deficient in elegance and rhythm. Learned, urbane, logical, he was not quick and ready, but solid and profound. He was of middle size, well-formed, his forehead ample, nose aquiline, eye dark gray, expression manly and engaging. His religious opinions were supposed to be skeptical; but the closing scene of his life is said to have been that of a sincere professor of the Christian faith.

FOOTNOTES:

[652:A] Extracts from Orderly Book:--

"SPRING FIELD, July 17th, 1776.

"General Lewis hopes that the reports of some of the officers gaming to excess is without foundation: he begs that the field-officers will make diligent enquiry into it, and if true, to arrest such officers, that a total stop may be put to so infamous practices.

"Officer for the day LIEUTENANT-COLONEL WEEDON."

"SPRING FIELD, July 24th, 1776.

"The Declaration of Independency is to be proclaimed to-morrow in the City of Williamsburg, by order of the council, when all the troops off duty are to attend."

"WILLIAMSBURG, July 26th, 1776.

"Parole--Stephen.

"A fatigue of one captain, two subalterns, two sergeants, and sixty rank and file, to be warned from the College Camp, to carry on the work intended to be thrown up on the road to Jamestown.

"Colonel Buckner will please to order a fatigue proportioned to his number of men, to work on the road from Burwell's Ferry to Williamsburg, at such a place as he shall judge proper to fortify. One company of the second regiment to take post to-morrow at Mr. Burwell's, to erect a work at the mouth of King's Creek. The rest of the second regiment to march to-morrow to Mr. Digges's, to fortify there."

[653:A] He afterwards sent, by Parson Bracken, a volume of his sermons, a present to young Nelson. The parson liked them so well that he preached them all before he delivered the book.

[653:B] Old Churches, of Va., i. 207.

[653:C] His statue is to stand on the monument in Richmond.

[654:A] The following is his epitaph:--

"Here lyeth the body of the HON. BENJAMIN HARRISON, ESQ., who did justice, loved mercy, and walked humbly with his G.o.d; was always loyal to his prince, and a great benefactor to his country.

He was born in this parish the 20th day of September, 1645, and departed this life the 30th day of January, 1712-13."

[655:A] Two daughters of this union were killed at Berkley by the same flash of lightning: a third married a Randolph, of Wilton.

[656:A] Convention of 1776, p. 96; Allen's Biog. Dictionary.

[656:B] Grigsby's Convention of 1776, p. 125.

[656:C] Wirt's Patrick Henry, 65.

[657:A] Convention of '76, p. 122. On his return to Virginia toward the close of the session of the convention then sitting, he was appointed one of a committee to prepare devices for a seal of the commonwealth.

[658:A] p.r.o.nounced "Tolliver," originally an Italian name, Tagliaferro.

CHAPTER Lx.x.xIX.

Richard Henry Lee--Francis Lightfoot Lee--Carter Braxton.

RICHARD HENRY LEE, a signer of the Declaration, was born at Stratford, on the Potomac, in Westmoreland, January the 20th, 1732, about a month before the birth of Was.h.i.+ngton. The father of Richard Henry was Thomas Lee; the mother, Hannah, daughter of Colonel Philip Ludwell, of Greenspring, of the old family of that name, in Somersets.h.i.+re, England, who were originally, it is said, from Germany. Richard Henry Lee's early days were pa.s.sed somewhat after the Spartan manner, his mother, one of the high-toned aristocracy of Virginia, confining her care to her daughters and her eldest son, and leaving her younger sons pretty much to s.h.i.+ft for themselves. After a course of private tuition in his father's house, Richard Henry was sent to Wakefield Academy, Yorks.h.i.+re, England, where he distinguished himself by his proficiency in his studies, particularly in the Latin and Greek. Having finished his course at this school, he travelled through England, and visited London. He returned when about nineteen years of age to his native country, two years after his father's death, which occurred in 1750. Young Lee's fortune rendering it unnecessary for him to devote himself to a profession, he now pa.s.sed a life of ease, but not of indolence; for he indulged his taste for letters, and diligently stored his mind with knowledge in the wide circle of theology, science, history, law, politics, and poetry. Being chosen (1755) captain of a company of volunteers raised in Westmoreland, he marched with them to Alexandria, and offered their services to General Braddock in his expedition against Fort Du Quesne; but the offer was declined. In his twenty-fifth year Mr.

Lee was appointed a justice of the peace, and shortly after a burgess for his county. Naturally diffident, and finding himself surrounded by men of extraordinary abilities, for one or two sessions he took no part in the debates. One of his early efforts was a brief, but strong, elaborate speech in support of a resolution "to lay so heavy a tax on the importation of slaves as effectually to put an end to that iniquitous and disgraceful traffic within the colony of Virginia;" and on this occasion he argued against the inst.i.tution of slavery as a portentous evil, moral and political.[660:A]

In November, 1764, when the meditated stamp act was first heard of in America, Mr. Lee, at the instance of a friend, wrote to England making application for the office of a collector under that act. It was difficult to retrieve so unpopular a step. During this year he brought before the a.s.sembly the subject of the act of parliament claiming a right to tax America; and he composed the address to the king, and the memorial to the commons. His accomplishments, learning, courtesy, patriotism, republican principles, decision of character and eloquence, commanded the attention of the legislature. Although a member at the time of the introduction of Henry's resolutions of 1765, Mr. Lee happened not to be present at the discussion; but he heartily concurred in their adoption; and shortly after their pa.s.sage organized an a.s.sociation in Westmoreland in furtherance of them. When the defalcations of Treasurer Robinson came to be suspected, Mr. Lee, like Patrick Henry on another occasion of the same kind, insisted with firmness on an investigation of the state of the treasury. It was he who introduced the motion (November, 1776,) for separating the offices of speaker and treasurer; and he had a princ.i.p.al agency, together with Henry, in carrying that measure into effect.[660:B] A fragment of his speech on this occasion is preserved.

In the succeeding year he vigorously opposed the act laying a duty on tea, and that for quartering British troops in the colonies. He was now residing at Chantilly, his seat on the Potomac, a few miles below Stratford. In July, 1768, in a letter to John d.i.c.kinson, of Pennsylvania, Mr. Lee suggested that not only select committees should be appointed by all the colonies, but that a private correspondence should be conducted between the lovers of liberty in every province.

The Virginia a.s.sembly, in 1773, (about the same time with that of Ma.s.sachusetts,) appointed a committee of correspondence, consisting of six members, of whom Mr. Lee was one. In the next year he was a delegate in the congress that met at Philadelphia. Patrick Henry spoke first, and he was followed by Richard Henry Lee.

He was an active and laborious member of the leading committees, and he composed the memorial to the people of British America--a masterly doc.u.ment.[661:A] When Was.h.i.+ngton was chosen commander-in-chief, Mr. Lee, as chairman of the committee chosen for the occasion, prepared the commission and instructions. He prepared the second address to the people of Great Britain.

In May, 1776, the convention of Virginia pa.s.sed a resolution instructing her delegates in congress to propose to that body to declare the colonies free and independent; and when those instructions were received at Philadelphia, the delegation appointed Mr. Lee to bring forward a proposition to that effect. He accordingly, on the second of June, made that motion, which was seconded by John Adams. On the tenth Mr. Lee received by express, from Virginia, intelligence of the dangerous illness of his wife; and he, therefore, left Philadelphia on the eleventh, the day on which a committee was appointed to draught a declaration of independence. Had he remained he might have been chairman of that committee, and author of the Declaration of Independence.[661:B]

That instrument was adopted on the eighth of July, and shortly afterwards Mr. Jefferson enclosed to Mr. Lee the original draught, and also a copy of it as adopted by Congress. In August Mr. Lee resumed his seat in that body.

He was in person tall and well proportioned; his features bold and expressive; nose, Roman; forehead high, not wide; eyes light colored; the contour of his face n.o.ble. He had lost by an accident the use of one of his hands; and was sometimes styled "the gentleman of the silver hand;" he kept it covered with a black silk bandage, but leaving his thumb free. Notwithstanding this disadvantage his gesture was very graceful. His voice was melodious, his elocution Ciceronian, his diction elegant and easy. His eloquence flowed on in tranquil beauty, like the stream of his own Potomac.[662:A] He was a member of the Episcopal church. He married first a Miss Aylett, and the children of that union were two sons and two daughters; secondly a lady named Pinkard, a widow.

Francis Lightfoot Lee, brother of Richard Henry, was born in October, 1734. He was educated under a private tutor. He inherited an independent fortune. He became, in 1765, a member of the house of burgesses, and continued in that body until 1775, when the convention returned him a member of congress, in which he remained until 1779, when he re-entered the a.s.sembly. His talents, as an orator and statesman, were of a high order, but it appears that he was never able to overcome his natural diffidence. His seat was Monocan, in the County of Richmond. He married Rebecca, daughter of Colonel John Tayloe, of Richmond County.

Carter Braxton was born at Newington, on the Matapony, in King and Queen, in September, 1736. His father, George Braxton, a wealthy planter, married Mary, daughter of Robert Carter, of the council, and in 1748 represented the County of King and Queen, being the colleague of John (known as speaker) Robinson. Carter Braxton was educated at the college of William and Mary. Inheriting in his youth, upon his father's death, a large estate, at the age of nineteen he married Judith, daughter of Christopher Robinson, of Middles.e.x. She dying, in 1757, Mr.

Braxton visited England, where he remained for several years, and returned in 1760: a diary which he kept while abroad is preserved by his descendants. He married, in 1761, Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Richard Corbin, of Laneville. During his first marriage he built a mansion at Elsin Green, on the Pamunkey, and afterwards another at Cheric.o.ke on the same river. He lived in a style of lavish hospitality, according to the fas.h.i.+on of that day. He was, in 1761, a member of the house of burgesses from the County of King William, and took an active part in the session of 1765. His colleague was Bernard Moore, of Chelsea, son-in-law of Governor Spotswood. Mr. Braxton was, in 1769, a delegate and a signer of the non-importation agreement. He was a member of the convention of 1774. In the following year, when Henry at the head of a party of volunteers had advanced within sixteen miles of Williamsburg, for the purpose of recovering the gunpowder removed by Dunmore, Mr.

Braxton interposed his efforts to prevent extremities. In this course Mr. Braxton coincided with the moderate councils of Pendleton, Nicholas, and Peyton Randolph. During this year Mr. Braxton was a member of the a.s.sembly, and of the convention that met at Richmond. He was also one of the committee of safety. In December he was elected a delegate to congress in the place of Peyton Randolph, and he was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. The convention having, in June, 1776, reduced the number of delegates in congress from seven to five, Mr.

Harrison and Mr. Braxton were not re-elected. According to Girardin,[663:A] Mr. Braxton's "Address on Government" was not universally relished, (it was indeed severely denounced, as has been seen,) and his popularity had been in some degree impaired by persons whose political indiscretions, though beyond his control, fatally reacted against him. He was, nevertheless, returned by the County of King William a member of the convention, and if he had fallen under a cloud of suspicion, it appears to have been soon dispersed, for, in October, 1776, the thanks of the convention were unanimously returned to Thomas Jefferson and Carter Braxton, for their ability, diligence, and integrity, as delegates in congress.

FOOTNOTES:

[660:A] Life of Richard Henry Lee, i. 17.