History of Williamsburg
By
William Willis Bodie
p. 10-20 on Witherspoon Family
"In 1734, John Witherspoon and his seven children, six of whom were married and brought children of their own, came up Black River as far as Potato Ferry; and, from this point, settled in various parts of the Township. Robert Witherspoon, grandson of John, in 1780, wrote the following account of the Witherspoon Colony, the original manuscript, of which this is a true copy, is in the possession of the descendants of the late Dr. J. R. Witherspoon, of Alabama.
'John Witherspoon and Janet Witherspoon were born in Scotland about the year 1670. They lived in their younger years near Glasgow, at a place called Begardie, and were married in 1693. In 1695, they left Scotland and settled at Knockbracken, in the Parish of Drumbo, County of Down, Ireland, where they lived in comfortable circumstances and good credit until the year 1734. He then removed with his family to South Carolina.
We went of board the ship called 'The Good Intent' on the 14th of September, and were detained by headwinds fourteen days in the Lough at Belfast. On the second day after we set sail, my grandmother, Janet, died and was interred in the boisterous ocean, which was affecting sight to her offspring.
We were sorely tossed at sea with storms, which caused our ship to spring a leak; our pumps were kept incessantly at work day and night for many days together and our mariners seemed many times at their wits' end. But it please God to bring us all safe to land, except my grandmother, about the first of December.
But to return,--my grandfather and grandmother had seven children. Their names
were as follows, viz: Janet [or Jennet], David, James, Elizabeth, Robert, Mary, and Gavin. Their daughter Janet was born in Scotland and was married to John Fleming in Ireland. They had a large family of children born in Ireland and brought seven of them to this place, Williamsburg, viz: Isabella, John, Elizabeth, James, Janet, Penelope, and William. My uncle, Jon Fleming, died in 1750, in a good old age; my aunt Janet died in 1761 in the sixty-sixth year of her age. My uncle David was born in 1697, married to Ann Pressley and brought with him to this place two children, viz:
Sarah and Janet. He died in the year 1772 in the sixty-seventh year of his age.
In the fall of the year 1737, my grandfather, John Witherspoon, took a disease called Rose-in-the-leg, which occasioned a fever from which he died. He was the first person buried at the Williamsburg Meeting House, which he had assisted to erect. About the same time, 1737, my father had a daughter, Elizabeth that died, aged three years, born at the place called the Bluff, where we lived.
My grandfather was a man of middling or common stature, of a fine, healthy constitution, of fair complexion, and somewhat bow-legged. He was well acquainted with the Scriptures, had volubility in prayer, and was a zealous adherent to the principles of what was called in his day the Reformed Protestant Church of Scotland. He had also a great aversion to Episcopacy, and whoever will impartially read the history of the times of his younger years in Scotland will see that his prejudices were not without cause. It was his lot to live in a time of great distress to the persecuted Church, during the reign of James the Seventh of Scotland and Second of England. Being one who followed field-meetings, e and some others of his kindred were much harassed by the Papists. Yet, notwithstanding, if his younger years were attended with some trouble, he still enjoyed great peace and tranquility in his after life and had the comfort and happiness of living to see his seven children all creditably married and settled for themselves; and, except the death of my grandmother, his beloved wife, he never knew what it was to part by dealt with one of his own immediate family, a blessing which few persons have granted to them, especially at his advanced age.
My father's name was James, the third child and second son of my grandparents. He was born at the beginning of the present century, lived with his parents at Drumbo, County of Down, until he was twenty-five years old, when he married my mother, whose name was Elizabeth McQuoid, in the twentieth year of her age.
p. 21
"From 1735 to 1737, a great many settlers came to the new township on Black River and practically every acre of land had been taken up by these settlers within a year after the township had been surveyed. Every man settling here was granted a half acre town lot and fifty acres of land in the township for himself, his wife, and each one of his children."
"These original settlers in Williamsburg Township came from England, Ireland, Scotland, Germany, Holland, and from the New England States, Pennsylvania and Virginia. They were all about the same class of men. They were people who had been non-conformists as to State-Church religion, and nearly all of their families had lost their property in the religious conflicts of the seventeenth century. The greater number of them had lived in Ireland for many years before coming to America. They had migrated from England and from Scotland to Ireland on account of fair promises on the part of the English King. These failing them, they sought refuge in America."
p. 30-31
"Jon Witherspoon settled on Boggy Swamp in Williamsburg in 1734, and died in 1737. He was the first person buried at the Williamsburg Meeting House. He was born near Glasgow in 1670, moved to County Down, Ireland, in 1695, from whence he came to this country.
He was the great grandson of John Knox and his second wife, Margaret Stuart. From his Stuart great grandmother, he drew some of the blood of Robert Bruce as well as that of other Scotsmen of great strength and power-even from the Laird who became Shakespeare's Banquo's Ghost.
Witherspoon is an old Scottish name and is frequently mentioned in accounts of ancient battles. A description of the coat of arms may be found in Burke's Armory. The cross and crescents thereon indicate crusader ancestry and the engrailed cross denotes possession of landed estates.
Dr. John Witherspoon, President of Princeton, member of the Continental
Congress, and signer of the Declaration of Independence, was a nephew of the
John Witherspoon, original settler in Williamsburg."
p. 44-47
"While the original settlers of Williamsburg came to the township on Black River primarily for economic reasons, yet the congregational religious principle, which had grown in the majority of them for centuries and which was largely responsible for their temporary impoverished condition, was, in fact, the cause of their migration into this wild country."
"Practically all of the original settlers in Williamsburg Township were of the Congregational or Presbyterian faith and their exceeding enthusiasm was shown in the promotion of Presbyterian principles. Although many of them inclined to the Church of Scotland as 'reformed' by John Calvin and John Knox, yet in heart they were adherents of the untouched ancient doctrines.
On July 2, 1736, the following 'indwellers in Williamsburg' met and formed the Williamsburg Presbyterian Congregation, which congregation has maintained its organization continuously until the present day: John Witherspoon, John Fleming, William James, David Wilson, James Bradley, Robert Wilson, John Porter, David Pressley, Robert Ervin, William Pressley, John Henderson, William Frierson, Thomas Frierson, William Syms, David Allen, John James, James McClelland, and David Witherspoon.
This congregation petitioned for a grant of land for erecting thereon their Meeting House, but the Colonial Governor did not act promptly on their petition. Two years later, in 1738, they secured from Captain Roger Gordon two acres of land on the eastern boundary of the platted 'Town of Williamsburg', and there built the Williamsburg Meeting House. On this spot, the congregation worshipped continuously until 1890, when the church was moved to Academy Street in the town of Kingstree. The lot was then devoted exclusively to the use of the white people of the vicinity as a burying ground.
The first Williamsburg Meeting House was built of logs and was used until 1746, when the log structure was replaced by an excellent house of worship. William Swinton, a prominent member of Prince George's Church, left a legacy of one hundred pounds in his will for aiding the erection of this second Meeting House.
This was the largest building in the township until the War of the Revolution. It faced the East and was located in the Western part of the present Williamsburg cemetery. As one entered he came first to the Deacons' seats. Elevated about six inches above the floor of the aisle. Back of the Deacons' seats, and elevated twelve inches higher, was the pew for the Ruling Elders, larger than that of the Deacons', and about square. Back of the Elders' pew and three feet higher and up against the wall was the pulpit. The pews were all high-backed. The head of each family owned a pew and the Church and the Minister were supported by a tax on these pews. Some of the pew owners were not members of the Church, yet each pew owner had an equal voice and vote in the congregational meetings. This rule resulted in serious conditions in later years.
In 1770, on account of the rapid growth of the colony, both by birth and by new immigrants from Ireland, this house of worship was doubled in size, which was done by extending the side opposite the pulpit."
Hopewell: 250 tons. June 16 advertised arrival in England from South Carolina; a minister urgently needed. Advertised Master, J. Ash; agent, Wm. Beatty, merchant; sailed from Belfast, with Capt. Martin, Master, Oct. 19, 1772
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