When, in the year 1914, Miss Charlotte Noland purchased the lovely old estate of Foxcroft, four miles north of Middleburg, there began a new era both in its interesting story and in the educational standards of Loudoun. No modern institution of the county has spread more generally knowledge of its charms than the famous school which Miss Noland then founded; and it is particularly appropriate that the institution should owe its inception and development to one who in singular degree is a representative of Loudoun's founders. Those Loudoun citizens of today who trace their descent to one of the earlier Nabobs of the county feel a complacent satisfaction therein; but Miss Noland unites lineal descent not only from Francis Aubrey and Philip Noland but from Colonel Leven Powell and Burr Harrison, the earliest explorer, as well, thus inheriting an early Loudoun background believed to be unique.
Foxcroft, Garden Front.
As is the case with so many of the older houses of the county, the age of Foxcroft and the identity of its builder are uncertain; but the local tradition is that it is one of the earliest of the many old brick houses to be found in that part of the county and that its builder was one Kyle who had married a daughter of the Balls. The story goes on that Mrs. Kyle lost her mind after the birth of one of her children and that for a long time thereafter she was enchained in the garret of the old house until, during the absence of her husband on a journey, she freed herself and fell to her death down the stairs. Another local story is that the building of the house was under the supervision of William Benton, the land-steward and friend of President Monroe who, it is said learned brick-making in his native England, discovered good brick-clay in the Middleburg neighborhood and made the brick for most of the early brick houses in that part of the County.
With these local stories as a guide, an examination of the county records show a John Kile to have been a purchaser of land as early as 1797 and also a deed to John Kile from William Shrieves, then of Kentucky, on the 8th February, 1814, of 189 acres "on the waters of Goose Creek" for £320. The description, running as it does from one marked tree in the forest to another, requires a long search and careful plotting to definitely place the property, but it suggests the Foxcroft estate. That these Kiles or Kyles were quite certainly people of standing is indicated by their marriages. John Kile, Jr., presumably the son of the first John Kile, married Winney Powell, a daughter of Elisha Powell and her sister Mary became the wife of Pierce Noland.[133] It all goes to suggest that the old Foxcroft mansion was built by John Kile from brick made under the supervision of William Benton sometime during the 1820's.
Foxcroft School has become so much a part of Loudoun that it is as difficult to picture the Middleburg neighbourhood without it as it would be to think of Middleburg without its famous fox-hunting. The school has eighty-five students, representative of the most prominent families in the United States from coast to coast, with students from abroad as well and there is always a long waiting list of applicants for admission. A healthy outdoor life is combined with carefully planned study. The young ladies are all expert riders, follow the Middleburg Hunt at its numerous meets and every year, since 1915, have their own horse show in May at Foxcroft which is always a brilliant affair.
Llangollan was built about 1810 by Cuthbert Powell, (1775-1849) a son of Colonel Leven Powell from whom he had inherited the land upon the latter's death at Fort Bedford, Pennsylvania, on the 6th August, 1810. Few families in Virginia are more deeply rooted in her history than the Powells. Captain William Powell, who, as a gentleman adventurer, accompanied Captain John Smith to Virginia in 1607 is claimed in the family chronicles to be one of the clan. Whether he was kinsman to that Nathaniel Powell who was with Smith in his brush with the Manahoacs on the Rappahannock in the summer of 1608 does not appear. After spending some years in business pursuits in Alexandria, Cuthbert Powell returned to Loudoun where he served as a justice, represented the county in the Virginia Legislature as a Whig and was a member of Congress from 1841 to 1843. Chief Justice Marshall once described him as "the most talented man of that talented family." In 1930 Llangollan was acquired by Mr. and Mrs. John Hay Whitney of New York who have greatly enlarged the old stone mansion and made the estate the home of one of the most famous racing establishments in America. They organized in 1932 and hold there each year the Llangollan Gold Cup races.
The 750 acres which originally composed Morrisworth were given by William Ellzey to his daughter Catherine who married Mathew Harrison of Dumfries. After his death his widow, with her children, took possession of her patrimony and in 1811 built thereon the main part of the stone mansion. There she resided for the remainder of her life and reared her large family. Her children continued to own the estate until they sold it about 1870 to their kinsman Dr. Thomas Miller of Washington who, dying about two years later, never resided there. He left the property to his daughters, the mansion and about 550 acres going to Miss Virginia Miller and Mrs. Arthur Fendall. In turn these ladies deeded the estate in 1900 to Mrs. Fendall's son Thomas M. Fendall, the present owner, who, in 1915, added the south wing to the house. Mr. and Mrs. Fendall have greatly enlarged and developed the gardens, specializing in iris to such an extent that Morrisworth has become widely known not only for the beautiful scene when the five thousand plants are in bloom but for the many new varieties of iris originated there.
Chestnut Hill near the Point of Rocks, so long identified with the Mason Family, is another of the mansions built about 1800. Samuel Clapham, the son of the second Josias Clapham, was the builder on land he had acquired in 1796 from his father. It came to Thomas F. Mason through his marriage to Betsey Price, a granddaughter of the second Josias as related in Chapter VII. It is now owned and occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Coleman Gore.
Rockland, four miles north of Leesburg, was built by General George Rust in 1822 on land acquired by him in 1817 from the heirs of Colonel Burgess Ball and is unique among the county's old estates in that today it still is owned by a descendant of its builder, Mrs. Stanley M. Brown, who before her marriage was Miss Elizabeth Fitzhugh Rust, the only child of the late owner, Mr. Henry B. Rust. Mr. and Mrs. Brown, with their children, spend each summer at Rockland. The 419 acres of the present estate border for a long distance on the Potomac and are regarded as equalling in fertility any land in the county. During the War Between the States the old house witnessed the alternate passing and repassing of the armies of the North and South in front of it along the old Carolina Road. Hospitality and gracious living have long been synonymous in Loudoun with the very name of Rockland.
The plantation that became Exeter was inherited by Mary Mason Seldon; a sister of Thomson Mason, from their mother Ann Thompson Mason. This Mary Mason Seldon married, first, Mann Page and upon his death took as her second husband her first cousin Dr. Wilson Cary Seldon who, born in 1761, had served as surgeon in a Virginia artillery regiment during the Revolution. Though she had children by Page and none by Seldon, the latter secured this land and between 1796 and 1800 built the main frame dwelling with its pleasing design and interesting detail. The large brick extension in the rear was added by General George Rust about 1854 during his ownership of the estate. By his second wife, Dr. Seldon had a daughter, Eleanor, and it was at Exeter on the 16th February 1843, that she married John Augustine Washington, the last of his family to own and occupy Mount Vernon. When the War Between the States broke out, he at once volunteered for service, became an aide on the staff of General Lee with the rank of lieutenant colonel and was killed in a small engagement, which otherwise would have been unimportant, at Cheat Mountain, now West Virginia, on the 13th September, 1861. In 1857 Exeter was purchased by the late Horatio Trundle. It was inherited by his son Mr. Hartley H. Trundle who with his family resides there.
Selma, another part of Mrs. Ann Thomson Mason's great purchase of "wild lands," saw its first mansion built between 1800 and 1810 by General Armistead Thomson Mason, United States Senator from Virginia (affectionately known as "the Chief of Selma") when he was killed by his cousin, John Mason McCarty, in the famous duel at Bladensburg on the 6th February, 1819. He had inherited the land from his father Stevens Thomson Mason of Raspberry Plain. The property was purchased in 1896 by the late Colonel Elijah B. White, who afterward represented the Loudoun district in the Virginia Senate and was for many years a prominent Leesburg banker. He was a son of the much-loved leader of White's Battalion in the War of 1861. Upon his purchase of the estate, Colonel White built the present stately mansion, so famed for its hospitality, in which he incorporated parts of the older house, burned some years before. Selma is now owned by Colonel White's widow (who before her marriage was Miss Lalla Harrison) and his daughter, Miss Elizabeth White. It long has had the reputation of being one of the most fertile and successfully managed farming estates in the East.
Aldie Manor, in the present town of Aldie, was built by Charles Fenton Mercer and named for Aldie Castle in Scotland, the home of the Mercer family. The town in turn was named for the estate and the Magisterial District in which both lie is named for Mercer. The mansion has long been owned and occupied by the diZerega family.
Morven Park was acquired by Governor Thomas Swann of Maryland who, about 1825, built the imposing mansion there. It was inherited by his daughter who became the wife of Dr. Shirley Carter and for many years much of the neighbourhood's social life centered about it. In 1903 this estate of over 1,000 acres was purchased by Mr. Westmoreland Davis, later Governor of Virginia, who now resides there and carefully supervises the many and varied agricultural activities of his domain.
But to the nation the best known of all the old homes of Loudoun has always been Oak Hill. When James Monroe, after long years of service to his country, came to look forward to his retirement, he owned a large tract of land on the Carolina Road nine miles south of Leesburg, long in the possession of his family, which had occupied a dormer-windowed cottage there. On a gentle elevation on the plantation, President Monroe, in the year 1820, erected the great brick house, three stories in height with its porticos and Doric columns which he named Oak Hill. It was designed by Monroe's friend Thomas Jefferson and the plans were completed by James Hoban the designer and builder of the White House and the supervising architect of the Capitol. President Monroe employed William Benton, an Englishman (who is said to have "served him in the triple capacity of steward, counsellor and friend") to superintend the construction of the mansion under Hoban's supervision and to manage the extensive farming operations of the estate which he did most successfully. It was here that President Monroe wrote his famous message to Congress, delivered in December 1823, embodying what since has been known throughout the world as the "Monroe Doctrine" and it was here also that he entertained Lafayette in 1825. Mrs. Monroe died at Oak Hill in 1830. On Mr. Monroe's death in 1831, the property went to his daughter Mrs. Gouveneur of New York by whom it was sold in 1852 to Colonel John M. Fairfax, who set out the large orchard of Albemarle Pippins some of the fruit from which, sent to Queen Victoria gave her such pleasure that thereafter it enjoyed her preference over all other apples. Later when his son, the much-loved State Senator Henry Fairfax, owned the estate he became known throughout the nation for the Hackney horses he raised there. In 1920 the property was acquired by Mr. and Mrs. Frank C. Littleton who greatly enlarged the old building by the extension of both wings. When Mr. Littleton was quarrying sandstone on the place in 1923 there were found numerous imprints of prehistoric dinosaurs—the first known evidence that these monsters had inhabited this portion of the eastern part of the present United States.
The estate took its name from a group of oaks planted on the lawn by President Monroe, one from each of the then existing States, each tree presented to him for that purpose by a congressman from the State represented.
Mrs. Littleton died in 1924. Mr. Littleton and his son Frank C. Littleton, Jr., continue to make the historic old place their home, carrying on extensive farming operations on its broad acres.
On the 20th March, 1793, the first postoffice was established in Leesburg. The first postmaster was Thomas Lewis, who was succeeded on the 1st April, 1794, by John Schooley, who in turn gave way to John Shaw on the 1st April, 1801. Then came Thomas Wilkinson on the 1st April, 1803; William Woody on the 1st January, 1804, and Presley Saunders on the 12th February, 1823.
At the end of the eighteenth century Loudoun was, in politics, a Federal stronghold. Colonel Leven Powell has long been credited with being the founder of that party in the county. The momentous election for members of the Convention of 1788 was bitterly fought. Stevens Thomson Mason and William Ellzey, both lawyers, were opposed to the adoption of the Federal Constitution. For its adoption stood Colonel Powell and Colonel Josias Clapham. Both of the latter, as we have seen, were old soldiers but no match as orators to their opponents and thus were at a great disadvantage in the contest. Powell's great personal popularity alone is said to have secured his election. Mason also won but the county remained so strongly Federal that its vote dominated its Congressional District.
When war with Great Britain was forced upon us in 1812, a cavalry regiment was raised in Loudoun of which Armistead Thomson Mason of Selma became colonel. But the incident in that war which most prominently stands out in Loudoun's memory came in 1814.
After the American forces under General William H. Winder had been defeated by the British at Bladensburg in August of that year, it was apparent that the capture of Washington was highly probable. Madison's Secretary of State, James Monroe, had been in the camp of General Winder, closely studying with him the enemy's movements and seeking to appraise the ability of the Americans to successfully defend the Capital. That he was not reassured by what he thus learned is shewn by the letter he sent to President Madison wherein he advised him to remove from Washington the government's more important records. The President recognized, none too soon, the imminence of the danger. The more valuable of the government archives were ordered to be taken from Washington and Stephen Pleasanton, then a clerk in the State Department, was placed in charge of their removal. He caused to be made a large number of linen bags in which were placed the government's books and documents, including the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. It is said that the painting of Mrs. Dolly Madison, hanging in the White House, was cut from its frame and accompanied the government's records. Some accounts aver that, so numerous were the archives, twenty-two two-horse wagons were used in their transportation from Washington; others who have written of the incident say that four four-horse wagons only were used, while still others claim the method of transportation to have been by ox-teams. However they were carried, they left Washington across the old Chain Bridge and sought their first safety in the grist mill of Edward Patterson on the Virginia side of the Potomac two miles above Georgetown. So threatening was the British advance, however, that it was deemed prudent to carry the precious cargo further up-country; the wagons were duly reloaded and the caravan continued to Leesburg, where the sacks were placed for one night in the courthouse according to some writers or, on the authority of others, in a vacant building in the town, the key of which was given to a certain Rev. Mr. Littlejohn, a young clergyman then recently ordained. The next day the sacks were again placed in the wagons and driven to the nearby plantation of Rokeby where in its vaults they were stored for two weeks until it was safe to return them to Washington.
During those two weeks President Madison was a guest of Ludwell Lee at Belmont, whence he directed National affairs; and ever since that time it has been a primary and essential asseveration in the credo of every true Leesburger that the town was, during that stirring fortnight, the de facto Capital of the United States.
Proud as that memory may be today, the event itself is said to have caused great anxiety to the more substantial citizens of the town and nearby country for fear lest their sudden prominence in the affairs of the nation would invite a swift and disastrous foray upon them by the temporarily triumphant Britons; a denouement which, happily, did not ensue.
CHAPTER XIV
MATURITY
When Patrick McIntyre published the one hundred and tenth number of The True American in Leesburg on Tuesday the 30th December, 1800, he, following the tradition of his craft, probably left his office with a lively sense of anticipation of the town's forthcoming celebration of the advent of a new century; that he could have foreseen that a single copy of that issue would be the sole available survivor of his journal in 1937 is not to be presumed. Yet in the Library of Congress that single copy begins its collection of Leesburg's newspapers and no copy of the paper is known to survive today in Loudoun. Its four pages devote themselves to the proceedings of Congress, to European affairs, to the activities of the Virginia House of Delegates and to the new treaty with France. The local news must be gleaned from the advertisements. The Rev. Mr. Allen advertises religious services to be held in the courthouse;[134] one W. C. Celden, a slavedealer, informs the public that he "has some likely young NEGROES which he will dispose of reasonably for cash;" and on the 4th page is found an item, obviously inserted by a private individual protecting himself with a cloak of anonymity, "For Sale. A likely NEGRO GIRL who has to serve for the term of nineteen or twenty years. She is now about twelve years of age, and very well grown, and will have to serve one year for every child which she may have during the term of her servitude. The terms of sale may be known by application to the Printer." The widow of Colonel Burgess Ball asks that those having claims against his estate will send them to her as the Administrators were anxious to make provision for their immediate payment.
The ultimate fate of The True American is unknown. In 1808 there was established in the town the Washingtonian which became the recognized organ of the Democratic party in Northern Virginia for many years. No surviving copy of any issue of the first year of this paper has been found by the present writer. Until 1841 it divided the Loudoun field with Whig competitors; after that date its journalistic rivals appear to have been of its own political faith, notably the Loudoun Mirror, established in 1855. In its early years the Washingtonian had a sturdy competitor in the Whig Genius of Liberty, copies of which are now rarely to be found. The most numerous available are in a broken file in the Library of Congress, beginning with numbers issued in 1817 and owing their conservation to the fact that they had been sent by the editor to the Secretary of State. As with the earlier True American these newspapers contain much foreign news and correspondence with lengthy reports of legislative activities in Richmond and Washington; and, in addition, an acrimonious and undignified exchange of long-winded and abusive letters in the Mason-McCarty-Mercer controversies. But that a county paper should find its first duty in presenting local news was not within the philosophy of the editor. Only here and there may one find a paragraph recording some local incident—but patient search is occasionally rewarded. A branch of the Bank of the Valley had been opened in Leesburg in 1818 with local subscribers to its stock and T. R. Mott acting as cashier. Then in the issue of the 31st March, 1818, we read:
"Specie. Arrived on Wednesday last at this port after a pleasant passage of two days from Alexandria, the waggon Perseverance—Grub, Master, laden with SIXTY FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS IN SPECIE for the Branch Bank of the Valley in this place. The Specie is deposited in the 'Strong box' thus laying a foundation for the emission of a paper currency predicated upon Specie Capital, which is the chief corner stone in all monied institutions; without it they must eventually fail."
That Leesburg was provided with its first street pavements through the proceeds of a public lottery has long been town gossip. By way of confirmation, there is an advertisement in the 12th May, 1818, issue of the Genius of Liberty: "By authority. Scheme of Lottery to raise $8000 for the purpose of paving the streets of the town of Leesburg, Va." providing a first prize of $4000 and 2011 other prizes running from $1000 down to $6 each, totalling $30,000. Against these 2012 prizes were to be 3988 blanks, to be represented by 6000 tickets to be offered at $5 each; but the astute managers stipulated that many of the larger prizes were to be paid in part by other tickets and that each of the prizes were to be "subject to a deduction of $15 to $100." To inspire the confidence of the public, the notice was signed by the following representative citizens as Commissioners: Prestley Cardell, C. F. Mercer, George Rust, Joseph Beard, Richd H. Henderson, Samuel Clapham, John Humphreys, John I. Harding, Sampson Blincoe, Fleet Smith, Samuel Carr, and John Gray. So successful was the lottery, avers tradition, that with its profits not only was the town able to pave its principal streets but also brought in, through wooden pipes, a much needed supply of water from Rock Spring, the present home of Mrs. H. T. Harrison. To the community that system of finance exerted an appeal so strong that once again it was used in 1844, to raise the necessary money to build an office for the County Clerk. The present County Office Building was purchased from the trustees of the Leesburg Academy in 1879.[135]
Always has Loudoun been a horse-loving country; but it may surprise some of her people of today to know that in 1817 the county seat possessed a "Jockey Club" which was sufficiently strong and well supported to conduct a four day racing meet with more generous prizes than are now offered. In the Genius of Liberty of the 14th October 1817 there is this advertisement:
"Leesburg Jockey Club. RACES will be run for on Wednesday the 15th October, over a handsome course near the town. A Purse of 200 Dollars three miles and repeat, and on Thursday the 16th day, two miles and repeat a Purse of $100 Dollars, and on Friday the 17th and repeat, a Towne's Purse of at least $150 and on Saturday the 18th an elegant SADDLE, BRIDLE and MARTINGALE, worth at least FIFTY DOLLARS. P. SAUNDERS, sec'y & treas'r."
Thus, although the local reporting was definitely remiss in those days, the advertising columns yield much treasure. The times were hard, land sales forced by worried creditors were frequent and often in the sales advertisements a note is made of log-houses on the land, shewing how numerous that form of habitation still must have been in the Loudoun of that time. With the land sales are many offerings of negroes, not infrequently with a humanitarian undertone pleasant to read, for in Loudoun then there was much anti-slavery sentiment not only among Quakers and Germans but, more significantly, among the wealthy planters and educated town folk. Thus in the issue of the 26th October 1818:
"Negroes for Sale. For Sale, a family of Negroes, consisting of a woman and children. To a good master they will be sold a great bargain. They will not be sold to a southern trader."
The financial stress of the day then, as later, bred much discontent if we may judge from the frequent notices of runaway white apprentices and negro slaves, the latter of both sexes; but while in the case of the slaves rewards are offered for their return of varying amounts from $5 to $200, the masters of the white apprentices, apparently appraising their services somewhat dubiously, offered but from one to six cents for their apprehension and return!
Though times were hard and money scarce there was, in the community, a healthy appreciation of the cultural side of life. George Carter of Oatlands advertises the services of a professor of music, seemingly brought into the county by him, who "now offers to teach the fundamental rules of this science in 8 lessons so as to enable those who are taught by him, to pursue their studies by themselves until they may obtain a perfect practical knowledge of musick."[136] Music seemed to have been in the air. Eighteen months later, there is notice given by Henry Krebs that he has commenced teaching the piano and German flute and the French language. He could be found at Mrs. Peers' boarding house.[137] Lectures on English grammar are announced by E. Hazen at the house of Mrs. McCabe[138] and Charles Weineder, a miniature painter, came to Leesburg for two weeks to take orders in his art.[139]
The profession of the law was followed in Leesburg by Richard Henderson, Burr William Harrison, L. P. W. Balch (who was also secretary of the school board) and John K. Mines. Dr. J. Clapper practiced medicine at Hillsboro "where he may be found at Mr. Hough's tavern," we trust not indicating undue conviviality of the gentleman's disposition. There was ample accomodation for travellers, their servants and horses. Enos Wildman announced that he had lately acquired the Eagle Tavern, formerly run by W. Austen;[140] while Samuel M. Edwards presided at the "Leesburg Hotel & Coffee House" which he had recently purchased from Mr. H. Peers and which was "situated on the main street leading from Winchester to Alexandria, George Town and the City of Washington." Yet another tavern was operated by one "Mr. Foley" and, as we have seen, there were boarding-houses as well. Their bars were stocked without difficulty, for Lewis Mix & Co. had a distillery near the mouth of Sugar Land Run and called for rye, corn and oats.
But perhaps the most impressive picture painted by these old advertisements is that of the teeming industrial and commercial life of the town. It was still, happily, the age of the handicraftsman; the machinery age was yet to come. Transportation was uncertain and slow, and country towns largely produced the furniture, tools, clothing and other needed articles for their own inhabitants and those of their surrounding communities. The variety of the activities of the artisans and merchants of the Leesburg of that day paralleled those of other similar towns throughout the nation. John Carney had a "Boot & Shoe manufactory" which was conveniently located "on King street, next door to Messrs. Humphreys and Conrad and immediately opposite the Court House." In advertising his wares, he added that he wished to take on two or three apprentices of from thirteen to fifteen years of age. He had a business rival in William King, who conducted a similar activity and confidently announced that he had "some of the first rate workmen in the State."
Hats were made and sold by Jacob Martin "at his shop opposite the market house" who duly proclaimed "a very large assortment of hats on hand from the first quality to those of lowest prices; including a large assortment of Good Wool Hats, likewise some Morocco Caps."
If the Loudoun citizen of President Monroe's day needed the services of a tailor, they were made available by Thomas Russel whose business apparently flourished; for he advertised for "one or two journeymen taylors to whom constant employ and the best wages will be given." He also sought one or two apprentices to learn his craft.
Jonathan C. May was opening a dry goods and clothing shop under charge of D. Carter, next to the drug store of Robert R. Hough. As a competitor he had Joseph Beard with his "General and Seasonable assortment of Dry Goods" and Daniel P. Conrad who, "at the Stone House opposite the Court House" offered "a seasonable supply of Fall Goods"; he and George Richards meanwhile publishing notice of the dissolution of their former partnership. In nearby Waterford, B. Williamson and C. Shawen also dissolve their partnership in a general store, on account of Williamson moving to Baltimore and Shawen carries on under the name of C. Shawen & Co.
Samuel Tustin was engaged in a coachmaking business in Leesburg and sought "good tough white ash plant and timber—also a quantity of poplar half inch plank." He, too, wanted an apprentice, seeking one who was fifteen to seventeen years old. There was no lack of opportunity to earn a living offered to a steady lad with an inclination to work and a taste for trade. To the more mature, Aaron Burson offered to rent his fulling mill and dwelling house near Union, describing them as being in "an elegant neighbourhood for the fulling business."[141] John B. Bell, occupying a part of William Drish's house on King Street, was a bookbinder. Not daunted by the slump in business, James G. Jones and Company notify the Loudoun public that they have commenced the brush making business "at Mr. Wetherby's stone house, King Street, nearly opposite Mr. Murrays and that they want a large quantity of hog's bristles" for which a liberal price will be given "IN CASH."
S. B. T. Caldwell advertised for sale writing paper, wrapping paper and medium printing paper.
The present day collectors of old furniture will note that David Ogden had removed his business to the southeast corner of King and Cornwall Streets where he had on hand and offered "some fashionable sideboards, Eliptic Dining Tables, Secretary, Bureaus etc., etc., which I will dispose of on moderate terms. Orders from the adjacent country will be thankfully received." In the same year of 1818, Jacob and Isaac Thomas of Waterford announced that they had on hand a general assortment of Windsor and fancy chairs and were also prepared to do "house, sign and fancy painting with neatness and dispatch."
The political dispute between Mason and McCarthy, mirrored in the pages of The Genius of Liberty, was fated to resolve itself into a tragedy that shook county and Commonwealth to their roots and caused no small sensation throughout the youthful Republic. General Armistead Thomson Mason of Selma,[142] a grandson of Thomson Mason, was a graduate of William and Mary College, a veteran of the War of 1812 and a Senator of the United States from Virginia as well as the leader of the Democratic party in Loudoun. Opposed to him as a Federalist was his cousin, Colonel John Mason McCarty, a grandson of George Mason of Gunston Hall, a descendant of old Daniel McCarthy of Westmoreland[143] and who then occupied Raspberry Plain. For a long time there had been political rivalry and bickering between the two men and when Mason introduced a bill in the Senate to permit Loudoun Quakers, when drafted for military services in war-time, to furnish substitutes by the payment of $500 apiece, McCarthy seized upon its political possibilities and promptly accused him of cowardice. The issue flared in the political campaign then on and, to add to the fire, Mason challenged McCarty's vote at the polls. Some accounts say that this so incensed McCarthy, described as being generally a good-natured individual with a strong sense of humour but also with a temper that upon occasion would break out beyond bounds, that he thereupon, at the polling place, defied Mason to personal combat, in his anger naming the weapons, contrary to a universally recognized rule of the code. Mason decided to ignore the matter, McCarthy taunted him in the public prints and although Mason's side had been defeated at the election, the affair gradually might have blown over and been forgotten had not Mason, returning from a journey to Richmond, by evil chance found himself a fellow stagecoach passenger with his old friend and superior officer, General Andrew Jackson. The matter of the quarrel with McCarthy, in due course, came up for discussion and Jackson, ever a fire-eater himself, is said to have told Mason with some brusqueness that he should not let the matter drop. On his return, therefore, Mason sent his cousin a letter in which he said he has resigned his commission for the sole purpose of fighting McCarthy and "I am now free to accept or send a challenge or to fight a duel. The public mind has become tranquil, and all suspicion of the further prosecution of our quarrel having subsided, we can now terminate it without being arrested by the civil authority and without exciting alarm among our friends." He informed his opponent that he had arranged his family affairs and was "extreemly anxious to terminate once and forever this quarrel." How recklessly eager was his wish was shewn by his instructions to his seconds to agree to any terms at any distance—to pistols, muskets or rifles "to three feet—his pretended favourite distance, or to three inches, should his impetuous courage prefer it."
McCarthy, in the meanwhile, had cooled down and was inclined to turn aside this new challenge in a humorous vein. He suggested to Mason's seconds that the antagonists jump from the dome of the capitol; but the matter had gone too far for joking and he was told his suggestion did not comply with the code. Again and yet again he offered similar absurd solutions and being rebuffed and in an effort to frighten Mason, suggested shotguns loaded with buckshot at ten paces, suicidal terms which were modified by the seconds to charging the weapons with a single ball and the distance to twelve feet.
After the fatal outcome of the Hamilton-Burr duel in 1804, a wave of hostility to the whole institution of duelling had swept the country. In January, 1810, Virginia had passed an act making the death of a duellist within three months of the encounter, murder, and providing that the survivor should be hung. Moreover, it was provided that the mere act of sending or accepting a challenge should make the offender incapable of holding public office. Therefore it was expedient that the meeting should not be held in Virginia and a field, along the side of which ran a little brook, near Bladensburg in Maryland, was selected for the affair. Principals, seconds and referee arrived at a nearby inn on the night of the 5th February, 1819, and at 8:00 o'clock the next morning, in the bitter cold and snow, the cousins confronted each other on the field, standing so close to one another that their "barrels almost touched." As the signal was given both fired and then fell to the ground—Mason dying and McCarthy dangerously wounded. Mason's body was brought back to Leesburg where it rested for a while in the old stone house on Loudoun Street now owned by Mr. T. M. Fendall, before burial in the St. James graveyard in Church Street with religious and Masonic rites. There the grave is still to be seen. It is said that Mrs. Mason locked the main entrance of Selma after the funeral and that no one again used it until her only son came of age—a son destined to meet his death, many years later, as an American officer, in the battle of Cerro Gordo in our war with Mexico. Tradition has it that ever after the duel, McCarthy was a morose and haunted man. A gruesome detail is added that long after his death his marble gravestone was removed to the Purcell drug store in Leesburg and there used for many years as a slab on which prescriptions were compounded.
From such a sombre picture we may turn with relief to the spectacle of Loudoun in gala attire indulging in the greatest and gayest county-wide celebration her history affords.
Of all those who, from abroad, came to help the American Colonies in their revolt, none so wholly captured the affections of her people as the French Marquis de Lafayette and as the years after the war passed by, that affection remained steadfast. In January, 1824, the American Congress entertained the happy idea of authorizing the President to officially invite the old general again to visit our shores, this time as the guest of the whole nation. Lafayette sailed from France on an American war ship in July, 1824, arriving in New York on the 14th August. Then began the national welcome which, continuing for over a year, stands by itself in our history.
In August, 1825, Lafayette, being in Washington, informed his hosts that he wished, once again, to see his old friend James Monroe, then living in retirement on his estate, Oak Hill. Arrangements were made accordingly and on the 6th August the Marquis, accompanied by President John Quincy Adams, left Washington in the latter's carriage for the long drive to Oak Hill. On their arrival they were greeted by Monroe and a number of his friends who had gathered to pay honour to the nation's guest. For three days Lafayette tarried at Oak Hill, walking over the farm with his host and reminiscing over the heroic days of nearly fifty years before. Leesburg, determining to show its love and respect for the general, sent a delegation to invite him to a celebration in his honour in that town, to which Lafayette readily assented. On the morning of the 9th August, 1825, "Mr. Ball a member of the Committee of arrangements and Mr. Henderson of the Town Council"[144] went to Oak Hill to escort their guest to Leesburg. With them were two troops of cavalry commanded by Captains Chichester and Bradfield. General Lafayette, President Adams, former President Monroe and Mr. Henderson took their seats in the carriage drawn by splendid bay horses which had been provided for the occasion and the procession set out for the county seat. As it neared the town, salvos of artillery greeted it and the roads and town itself were so lined and filled with people that it was estimated that at least 10,000 (almost half of the county's population) were present. And now, to quote the historian of the occasion:
"The guest of the nation, with his honoured friends, alighted in the field of William M. McCarty, where in the shade of an oak, he was introduced to Cuthbert Powell, Esq., chairman of the committee of arrangements; who welcomed him in terms of respect and affection apt to the occasion, and in a manner at once feeling and grateful; to which General LaFayette replied, with the felicity which seems never to forsake him. He was then introduced to the committee of arrangements and to General Rust, the marshall of the day, and his aids. The General then received the military, assembled to honour him, consisting of the volunteer troops of cavalry, commanded by Captains Chichester and Bradfield; the two rifle companies, commanded by Captains Henry and Humphries; and the companies of light infantry, commanded by Captains Moore and Cockerill, who, by their equipments and discipline did credit to themselves and the county."[145]
After being introduced to a few surviving soldiers of the Revolution, the distinguished party was driven to Colonel Osburn's Hotel (the present home of Mr. T. M. Fendall on Loudoun Street) the street in front of which was filled with a great crowd of orderly and well-behaved citizens. Here Lafayette was received by the Mayor of Leesburg, Dr. John H. McCabe and the common council. The mayor made an address of welcome and again Lafayette spoke in reply.
After a few minutes for rest and refreshment in the hotel, the carriages were resumed and
"the procession moved through Loudoun, Market, Back, Cornwall and King Street. Between the gate of the Court house square and the portico of the court-house an avenue had formed, by a line on the right, of the young ladies of the Leesburg Female Academy under the care of Miss Helen McCormick and Mrs. Lawrence ... dressed in white, with blue sashes, and their heads were tastefully adorned with evergreens. They held sprigs of laurel in their hands, which they strewed in the way as the General passed them."
Another account discloses that the other side of the "avenue," facing the evergreen-crowned girls, was formed by a line of boys from the Leesburg Institute, whose costumes were embellished with red sashes and white and black cockades. As Lafayette, smiling and bowing, mounted the portico steps, he was greeted by Ludwell Lee on behalf of the people of Loudoun with a patriotic speech and once again the cheerful Marquis managed to make yet another appropriate response. After a full year of the young Republic's exuberant enthusiasm, the delivery of a mere half-dozen or so of speeches of grateful acknowledgment in a single day has lost its earlier terrors. At 4:00 o'clock a great banquet was spread on the tables set up in the courthouse square, the guests' table being protected by an awning. Toasts were enthusiastically given and drunk to Adams, Lafayette and Monroe, each in turn replying. With that auspicious start and the stimulus of the potent beverages, it is recorded that as the time passed, the "volunteer toasts" waxed in number and ecstacy. Afterward, the distinguished guests visited the home of Mr. W. T. T. Mason for the baptism of his two infant daughters, Lafayette acting as godfather for one and Adams and Monroe in similar capacity for the other. More gayety in Leesburg, then a drive through the summer night to Belmont and participation in the merry-making there, before the illustrious visitors sought their rooms for the night in that gracious mansion.[146] As they returned to Washington the next day, it must have been with a profound, if weary, appreciation of the county's enthusiasm, affection and hospitality.
In this second quarter of the nineteenth century, to which we have now come, the name of Charles Fenton Mercer, soldier, statesman and philanthropist, is writ large in Loudoun's records. Already we have read of him in his country home and of his founding the town of Aldie in 1810;[147] but the brief reference there made is wholly inadequate to the man and his accomplishments. Born in Fredericksburg on the 6th June, 1778, he was the son of James Mercer and grandson of that John Mercer of Marlboro whom we have already met.[148] His father, after a distinguished career, left at his death an estate so much involved that the son had some difficulty in securing his education. He, however, was able to graduate at Princeton in 1797 and the next year, at the time of friction with France, was given a commission by Washington as a captain of cavalry. When the danger of war passed, he studied law and, admitted to the Bar, practiced his profession with great success. He served as brigadier general in command of the defense of Norfolk in the War of 1812, removed to Loudoun, was a member of the Virginia Legislature from 1810 to 1817 and, as a Federalist, was elected a member of Congress, in 1816, over General A. T. Mason, the election being so close, however, that it had to be decided by the House of Representatives. In Congress he served until 1840, a longer continuous service "than that of any of his contemporaries." Always deeply interested in the project of the Chesapeake and Potomac Canal, he introduced the first successful bill for its construction and it was in tribute to him that those interested in the plan met in Leesburg on the 25th August, 1823. When the canal company was organized taking over, in effect, much of the plant of General Washington's cherished project the Potomac Company, Mercer became its first president and continued in that position during the period of Federal encouragement. Then came the Jackson administration and its opposition and, as a final blow, the organization of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. The day of the canals gave place to that of the railroads; but that section of the canal in Maryland, across the river from Loudoun, was completed and placed in successful operation, affording to her people better and cheaper transportation to Washington and Alexandria for their products than they before had known.
Mercer was an ardent protectionist, intensely opposed to slavery and an advocate of the settlement of freed slaves in Liberia. He died near Alexandria on the 4th May, 1858, and was buried in the Leesburg Cemetery. On his headstone it is justly reaffirmed that he was "A Patriot, Statesman, Philanthropist and Christian."[149]
Mercer's day well may be cited as the most active and, perhaps, the most ambitiously progressive in business affairs in the county's history. Space precludes enumeration and extensive description of all the enterprises then undertaken but passing mention may be made of a few. The improvement of transportation was a dominant motive. Canals, railroads, turnpikes all were instruments to that end. An early railroad was projected by the men of Waterford and incorporated in 1831 as the Loudoun Railroad Company to run from the mouth of Ketoctin Creek on the Potomac "passing Ketoctin mountain to the waters of Goose creek so as to intercept the Ashby's Gap turnpike road"; a curious and impractical route it may seem to us in the light of present conditions and that it was just as well that the project died in birth. In 1832 another railroad but sponsored in Leesburg, to be known as the Leesburg Railroad and to run from that town to the Potomac, also came to naught. At length in 1849 the Alexandria, Loudoun and Hampshire Railroad was incorporated and built, and under various names has been since continuously operated, thus giving the county its only railroad communication within its boundaries.
In 1832 there was incorporated the Goose Creek and Little River Navigation Company to make those streams available as highways of traffic. Locks, dams, ponds, feeders, and other appurtenant works were ambitiously undertaken. With assistance from the State and the proceeds of the company's sales of stock much construction was accomplished; but during the Civil War the works were destroyed by the Federal armies and they never have been restored.
The Catoctin Furnace Company was another ambitious project. Iron ore was mined in Furnace Mountain, opposite the Point of Rocks, and for a time shipped away for smelting. In 1838 a furnace for treatment of the ore was completed on the property and the ore smelted at first with charcoal made at the plant and later, as operations increased, with coke brought from a distance. The business was highly successful and profitable until ruined by the Civil War. It was this activity that caused the construction, in 1850, of the original Point of Rocks bridge across the Potomac.[150]
Reference to some of the many turnpike companies of the period already has been made. Undertaken for the profit of the shareholders as well as the convenience of the people they, for the first time in her history, gave the county roads fit to bear heavy traffic and were another exemplification of the energy of the time.
When the church was disestablished after the Revolution it was agreed that it would be left in possession of her property. As time went on there arose a clamour among those of other beliefs that her property and particularly her glebe lands should be sold by the Overseers of the Poor, to whom the proceeds should go, their argument being that having been acquired by taxes laid on the whole community, the taxpayers as a body should benefit therefrom. Bishop Mead describes what took place in Loudoun concerning Shelburne's glebe:
"About the year 1772, a tract of land containing 465 acres, on the North Fork of Goose Creek was purchased and soon after, a house put upon it. When Mr. Dunn became minister in 1801 an effort was made by the overseers of the poor to sell it, but it was effectually resisted at law. At the death of Mr. Dunn, in 1827, the overseers of the poor again proceeded to sell it. The vestry was divided in opinion as to the course to be pursued. Four of them—Dr. W. C. Selden, Dr. Henry Claggett, Mr. Fayette Ball and George M. Chichester—were in favour of resisting it; the other eight thought it best to let it share the fate of all the others. It was accordingly sold. The purchaser lived in Maryland; and, of course the matter might be brought before the Supreme Court as a last resort, should the courts of Virginia decide against the church's claim. The minority of four, encouraged by the decision in the case of the Fairfax Glebe, determined to engage in a lawsuit for it. It was first brought in Winchester and decided against the Church. It was then carried to the Court of Appeals in Richmond, and during its lingering progress there, three of four of the vestrymen who engaged in it died, and the fourth was persuaded to withdraw it."[151]
CHAPTER XV
CIVIL WAR
It was a happy, prosperous, and contented Loudoun that the sun shone down upon in 1850. In politics the county was predominantly Whig and in the growing national issues of States' rights, slavery and secession, her sentiment clung to the preservation of the Union; but the seeds of dissension had been sown. The repercussions of John Brown's insane raid on the nearby Harper's Ferry arsenal on the 16th October, 1859, were particularly severe in Loudoun. The madness of it all profoundly shocked the community and seemed to strike at the foundations of existing society, law, and order. Yet a dogged adherence to that Union, which Virginia had been so instrumental in building, persisted. Little doubt was felt concerning the right of a sovereign State to withdraw from what had been a wholly voluntary confederation, but sentiment and a deep feeling of expediency strongly opposed such action. Elsewhere in the State the tendency toward secession was stronger. As the fateful days passed, Virginia was torn between conflicting views. It is probable that the ranting of the extreme abolitionists in the North drove more Virginians toward secession, and that against their will, than the most persuasive arguments of its fieriest advocates.
The Legislature of 1861 recognized the peril of decision in favor of either side, and the gravity of attendant consequences to be so great, that it wisely decided to refer the issue to the people themselves. On the 16th January of that year it therefore authorized that a convention be called, to be made up of delegates elected from every county, for the express purpose of deciding upon Virginia's course. Thereupon such delegates, having been duly elected, the convention met in Richmond on the 13th February, 1861, Loudoun being represented by John Janney, at that time and until his death in 1872, a leader of her Bar, and John A. Carter. Both opposed secession and voted against it in a convention in which it was apparent that its proponents held a majority. Nevertheless, Mr. Janney was elected permanent chairman by a majority of the delegates—a great personal tribute to the man and evidence of the respect in which he was held. Both those who favoured and those who condemned withdrawal from the Union were given ample opportunity to expound and urge their views. When the ominous vote was cast in secret session on the 17th April, 1861, eighty-five of the delegates favoured and fifty-five opposed an ordinance of secession; but their action was conditioned upon the majority decision being referred back to the people of Virginia for approval or rejection. Both Janney and Carter voted against the measure but even while the convention was in session a mass meeting, convened in Leesburg, passed resolutions advocating the proposed ordinance. How great a change had taken place in the sentiment of the county, during those early and fateful months of 1861, is shone in the following table of the results in Loudoun of the election of the 23rd May in which the ordinance of secession was overwhelmingly ratified there: