Notes From Rev Charles Joy

Historic St. Martin’s Parish Sketches by Rev’d Charles Joy

St. Martin’s Parish Sketch 1: The Rev’d Zachariah Brooke

The Rev’d Zachariah Brooke was Rector of Saint Paul’s Parish, Hanover County, when Saint Martin’s Parish was divided from it in 1726. He it was who did much of the early work of a parson to prepare the way for the new parish structure.

He was born at Yeldham, Essex, England in 1676, son of an Anglican priest and brother of two others. He was a graduate of Sidney Sussex College of the University of Cambridge with A.B. in 1693/4 and A.M. in 1697.

Brooke was ordained Priest in Ely Cathedral on 20th September 1702, and became Vicar of the Parish of Hauxton-cum-Newton in the county of Cambridge, of which living he remained the incumbent even after he came to Virginia, the duty being taken by a curate who lived there. This parish is four miles due south of the university town of Cambridge, on the River Cam, and the Church of Saint Edmund, where Brooke officiated Divine Service, is a Norman structure, still in use as the parish church.

In 1719, Brooke received the King’s Bounty, bound for Virginia, where after a brief time as minister of Saint Peter’s Parish, New Kent County, he became Rector of Saint Paul’s Parish in Hanover from 1721 to 1736, of Dale Parish, Chesterfield County, from 1737 to 1738. He had scarcely been appointed to the living of King William Parish, Powhatan County, in 1738, when he died.

In the years when the population in upper Hanover was growing rapidly, Mr Brooke preached “4 Sermons on the Frontiers” each year at first, besides his regular duties at the parish church. Later, when tobacco was “raisd towards building 2 Chappels,” his duty “on the Frontiers” was increased to 18 sermons yearly, 9 at each chapel. It was the Fork Chapel, built 1722, that was to become the first Parish Church of Saint Martin’s, [near] the site of which the present parish church is built. For this frontier work, he was allowed “eight thousand pounds of Tobacco with Cask & Conveniency, so long as those parts continue in our parish.” This arrangement was with the Vestry of the Parish of Saint Paul.

St. Martin’s Parish Sketch 2: Colonel Charles Chiswell

Charles Chiswell, the builder of Scotchtown, was born in 1677 and lived most of his life in Williamsburg and Hanover County. The house at Scotchtown plantation was built about 1719, shortly after Chiswell received a patent for several thousand acres in New Kent, later Hanover County.

As Clerk of the General Court of Virginia, he was a man of some importance in Virginia, and a prominent citizen of the colony.

Chiswell’s sister Mary was the wife of Doctor Charles Barret of Williamsburg, and the mother of the Rev’d Robert Barret who was Rector of Saint Martin’s Parish for much of the 18th century. As the leading resident and one of the largest landholders of the parish, Charles Chiswell was probably responsible through his influence, for presenting his nephew Robert to this living. Although 18th century vestry minutes are missing, it is probable that Charles Chiswell sat upon the vestry of Saint Martin’s Parish, and may even have had a hand in designing the Fork Church.

In the Spring of 1737, Chiswell left Hanover County for a visit to Williamsburg, where he “was taken ill of a Pleurisy and Flux on Friday night,” which was so severe that “it carried him off the Monday night following: and on Wednesday night he was decently interr’d” in Bruton Churchyard.

Charles Chiswell represents the wealthy and influential citizens of Virginia who were loyal to and expended their influence in behalf of the Church of England. As master of Scotchtown, Chiswell was the leading resident landholder and citizen of Saint Martin’s Parish in its earliest years.

St. Martin’s Parish Sketch #3: The Rev’d William Swift

The Rev’d William Swift was the first rector of Saint Martin’s Parish. He was born in London on 30th September 1697, was a student of Merchant Taylor’s School in London from 1710 to 1714, then went up to Cambridge where, in 1714, he was admitted Sizar in Emmanuel College.

Swift was ordained Deacon on 8th June 1718 by the Bishop of Rochester, and Priest on 20th December 1719 by the Bishop of London. In 1722 he received the King’s Bounty for Virginia, having been married in June. The marriage license in the archives of the Bishop of London is issued to “William Swift of St Sepulchre’s, London, Bachelor, and Dinah Hodgkin of St Dunstan in the West, Spinster.”

After serving as rector of Sandys, Southampton, Warwick, and Paget Parishes in Bermuda, he came to Virginia. Though he had come without the permission of the Bishop of London, he nevertheless appeared to Governor Gooch to be “much esteem’d by Those that are acquainted with him . . . a Gentleman very deserving.” He was sent immediately by the governor to Saint Martin’s Parish where, Gooch was confident, he would be “very easie and faithfully discharge his duty in the care of Souls.” Saint Martin’s Parish at that time included, besides the Fork Church and Allen’s Creek Chapel, a “mountain chapple” at the foothills of the Blue Ridge in upper present-day Louisa County.

Swift died at the close of the year 1734, as a letter from the governor to the Bishop of London in January 1734/5, in numbering recent deaths in the colony among the clergy, says “Mr Swift very lately.” He was survived by his wife Dinah and several children who continued to live on in Saint Martin’s Parish.

St. Martin’s Parish Sketch #4: Colonel William Dabney

William Dabney, Colonel of the Hanover County Militia and Sheriff of Hanover, was born at his father’s plantation in King William County in 1707. He was the son of George Dabney, who patented land in Hanover earl in the 18th century.

By his marriage to Anne Barret, daughter of Dr Charles Barret of Williamsburg and his wife Mary Chiswell, William Dabney became brother-in-law to the Rev’d Robert Barret, Rector of Saint Martin’s Parish, and nephew-in-law to Colonel Charles Chiswell of Scotchtown. Colonel Dabney was thus closely connected with the “manor family” of the parish in its earliest years.

Among the Dabney papers in the library of the University of North Carolina is a very interesting document in Dabney’s handwriting, entitled “An acct. of necessarys deliver’d the poor of St Martin’s Parish during my wardenship,” and the years included are 1744 to 1748. Items in this account include tobacco “paid to John Morris for borading Mary Coubroudel,” “1220 Tob. pd. Larkin Que for tarring the church at Allen’s Creek,” and kersey, osnaburg and brown thread for making clothes for the parish paupers.

Colonel Dabney died in August of 1769 at his plantation Aldingham in the South Anna River, for the 950 acres of which he was taxed in 1763.

Colonel William Dabney serves as an example of the plantation master of the 18th century who was at once a member and officer of the parish vestry. His financial responsibilities on behalf of that body are clearly evident in the manuscript accounts which survive in North Carolina. Such lay people made up the vestries of colonial Virginia, and much of the responsibility of local government and administration, both in church and in state, was theirs.

St. Martin’s Parish Sketch #5: The Rev’d Robert Barret

Robert Barret was born at least by 1713, probably in Williamsburg, son of Dr Charles Barret. His father died when Robert was very young, leaving also a daughter Anne who married William Dabney of Hanover. Their mother was Mary Chiswell, a sister to Charles Chiswell of Scotchtown.

Robert Barret travelled to England to be ordained, and received the King’s Bounty for Virginia on 5 December 1737, probably having been ordained shortly before. On 15th June following, Barret was “elected Master of the Indian School” at William and Mary College, but held that position only a short time before his family connections summoned him to Saint Martin’s Parish. He was to serve as rector from 1738 until 1786, throughout the Revolutionary War.

During this time, he lived at the Glebe, in the upper part of the parish near Oakland, and farmed the 350 acres. In 1782 he was listed as head of a household which included 6 whites and 43 [enslaved persons]. Store accounts for the Rev’d Mr Barret in the middle of the 18th century reveal that he bought many items, including rum and brandy, sugar, fabrics, pins and in 1760, “one grizzled bob wig.” Though he resided in the parish glebe, Mr Barret owned a good deal of land outside of Hanover County. Some came by his marriage to Anne Lewis* of Goochland, and some he was granted, including 1500 acres “on both sides of Banister River” in western Virginia.

Like others of the colonial clergy, Mr Barret was strong in his defense of the Established Church. In 1751, he and other clergy asserted that “this Church, of which we are members,” is “worthy by all prudent and honourable means to be defended and supported” against “all Novel notions, and perplexing uncertain Doctrines and Speculations, which tend to the subversion of reasonable creatures.”

Mr. Barret died at an advanced age in Albemarle County, his will being probated in 1805.

*Some genealogical websites online say that the Rev’d Robert Barret was married twice, his first wife named, Elizabeth Lewis and his second wife named, Anne Lee.