RENE became a soldier in his youth, and was in the army of JAMES II in the English Revolution of 1688, but for reasons of preference changed to the standard of KING WILLIAM along with many others. He fought under him at the battle of the Boyne, July 1, 1690. For his services as a soldier he was granted, by the reigning family of England, land beyond the Mississippi River. He is said to have told his family they need never consider themselves settled until they were established there. But they lived in Maryland until 1735-1740, moved to Winchester, Virginia, where RENE died about 1744. There he and his wife are buried in the old Opequon Cemetery. Shortly after BRADDOCK's defeat in 1755, RENE's five sons, who had come with him from Maryland (STEPHEN and JACOB remained there), fled through terror of the Indians to Orange County, North Carolina, and took lands in the section which later became Randolph and Guilford Counties.
En route to America, RENE de ST. JULIEN stopped off on the Isle of Bermuda and married MARY BULLOCK. [MARY BULLOCK was the daughter of CAPT. STEPHEN BULLOCK and his wife MARY. MARY BULLOCK, wife of RENE de ST. JULIEN, is said to have been a "great lady" of Spanish and Scottish descent, reputed to have been very wealthy and beautiful. RENE is said to have been a giant in stature with red hair, a quick temper, and an indomitable will, a Presbyterian of the strictest form who particularly disliked the Quaker testimony against war and slavery. The BULLOCKs were Quakers so the attitudes of RENE and MARY must sometimes have conflicted. Some of their descendants in North Carolina became Quakers.]
The earliest land transaction on record
for Bohemia Manor [Cecil County, Maryland] and RENE JULIAN is May 1, 1720,
but his being there earlier is attested by the record of the birth of his
son ISAAC in 1716, which appears in the Register of St. Ann's Parish at
Annapolis, which is now in the Hall of Records there. In 1737 the lease
obtained in 1720 was transferred to HENRY McCOY, and it is assumed that
this was the time of his going to Winchester, Frederick County, Virginia.