Huegenots
Calvit Huegenots
Only recently did I discover that one of my direct ancestors, Jean Calvet and the source of my middle name of “Calvitt,” was one of the original frontier settlers of Manakin Town, the Huguenot settlement near Richmond.
Pierre Calvet: Huguenot Merchant in Lacaune, France
I have been able to trace the “Calvet” connection back to Pierre Calvet, born in France about 1630. He was a merchant in the little town of Lacaune, in the “Huguenot Valley,” some miles east of Toulouse in the district of Tarn in southern France. His first wife, Isabeau Pagés, bore three children before dying in 1656. Pierre died in Lacaune on October 3, 1682, three short years before King Louis XIV (r. 1643-1715) ended Catholic toleration of Protestantism in France by revoking the Edict of Nantes. We know little of them, because the original records of Tarn containing the registers of baptisms, weddings, and burials of the Reformed Church of Lacaune (1675-1685) have been lost or destroyed.
The children of the two sons of Pierre and Isabeau Pagés brought the Calvet family into Colonial America: Raymond’s son Pierre to South Carolina and Jean’s son Jean to Virginia.[1] I am interested in Jean.
Pastor Jean Calvet Flees Catholic Repression to England
Jean Calvet, born in 1652 in Lacaune, became a Protestant minister in a time of social upheaval and religious strife in France.[2] During the intermittent periods of government toleration in the seventeenth century, Protestants had set up at least eight academies in France. One by one, however, Catholics closed, demolished, or simply took them over. The Academy of Montauban taught students from 1598 to 1659, until its faculty moved what remained to Puylaurens near Castres, where it existed from 1660 to 1685. The renamed academy was among the last of the schools to close, only seven short months before Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes.[3]
Jean Calvet entered the Protestant Academy of Puylaurens in 1673 to begin his studies for the ministry. By 1676, he was ministering to the Church of Sablayrolles. The following year in November, Jean attended the Synod of Haut Languedoc held in Brassac. Released from his responsibilities at the Church of Sablayrolles, he accepted a new position at the Church of Saint Rome de Tarn. He was at the Synod of Haut Languedoc held at Saverdun in September 1678. As pastor of Saint Rome de Tarn, Jean Calvet attended at least two more of these important Synods of Haut Languedoc, one at Realmont in 1679 and the other in St. Antonin in 1682.[4]
Catholics regularly invaded, desecrated, closed, tore down, or simply took over Huguenot temples. Many defiant Huguenot congregations continued to meet until the state made it a crime even to hold services atop the rubble of their destroyed houses of worship. The temples at Lacaune and Sablayrolles were among the churches the Catholics tore down.[5]
In response, many Huguenots fled France, most shortly before and after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes—anywhere from 300,000 to one million. Others died in prison, were hanged, or were condemned to the galleys. France began losing skilled weavers, glass and papermakers, and metal and leather workers. These thrifty, temperate, educated, skilled, industrious, and tolerant Huguenots lived simply, believed deeply, and endured tenaciously. In their flight, they enriched the modernizing economies of the Netherlands, England, Scandinavia, Switzerland, Russia, and the German States as much as their departure weakened France’s.[6]
For Pastor Jean Calvet, the crucial moment came on 22 January, 1685, when dragoons invaded and destroyed the table of the Last Supper, the pulpit, the pews, and the galleries at his church at Saint Rome de Tarn. They tore down the liturgical insignia gracing the doors and windows, and expelled the congregation from their temple. On 2 March, Jean Calvet signed a receipt for his last salary as minister of the Church at Saint Rome de Tarn. He then forsook all his assets including the 350 livres creditors owed him. Soon afterward, he, his wife Suzanne, and their family fled France—probably from La Rochelle—to arrive penniless in Plymouth, England.[7]
Not everyone fled into exile. On 13 September, 1685, 101 Protestants assembled in Saint-Rome. They publicly proclaimed that they wanted to enter “the heart of the Catholic Church, apostolic and Roman” in which they wanted “to live and die.” In that year, 201 families, representing 1,000 Protestants, renounced their faith so “there was but one man left to convert.”[8] Thus, many families, including part of the Calvet family, abjured their Protestant faith and remained in Lacaune, although some merely feigned abjuring until they could safely send their families out of the country.[9]
In England, Jean Calvet faced frustrations, and like most of his compatriots, he arrived destitute. Their need plus outrage at Louis XIV was so great that the English organized a national offering, the Royal Bounty, for the refugee Huguenots. The position of England’s Catholic king, James II (r. 1685-88) had become so insecure that he had to consent, and communicants of the Church of England, Dissenters, and even a few Roman Catholics gave to the fund. In September, 1685, the Reverend Jean H. Calvet was in the Plymouth, England, seeking help from the Commissioners of Customs and asking about the delay in responding to his petition for passage for several French Protestant families to “New Yorke Plantation.” Unsuccessful in his efforts, between 1686 and 1687, Jean Calvet was on the “Royal Bounty,” receiving a pension of six pounds for clothes. He received at least three such pensions.[10]
Soon, he established himself. Near Plymouth in Stonehouse where many Huguenots resided, Jean and another minister set up a Huguenot chapel on 9 September, 1689. In 1698, Jean was an officiating minister at Glass House Street Chapel, which was one of three new congregations formed in London’s West End to minister to the newly-arriving Protestants. He continued to serve this congregation after it moved to Leicester Fields. Because of the large influx of ministers among the many Protestant refugees, there were not enough French churches to employ all the pastors. Several ministers therefore would share a church pulpit, carrying out pastoral duties at many different churches. It seems that Jean served several churches, most importantly the Treadneedle Street Church in the French Colony of the London suburbs, ministering mainly in marriages and baptisms.[11]
By 1708, Jean Calvet had retired when he served as a godfather rather than as minister at a baptism. In 1711, about age 59, he was an “unsalaried as a pastor” and likely infirm. Jean again qualified for the Royal Bounty. He probably died sometime around 1711 or 1712, never having made it to the New World.[12]
Jean Calvet and his wife Suzanne had four documented children, three daughters and one son: Anne, Sara, Suzanne, and Jean Calvet, all most likely born in Lacaune. Presumably, the three daughters remained in England. Jean, on the other hand, left England for the Virginia colony to help father the Calvet, Colvett, and Calvit families in America.[13]
Huguenots Go to the New World
As skilled artisans, master craftsmen, and tradesmen, many Huguenots could not find enough work even in economically advanced England. With the Virginia colony actively seeking settlers, King William III (r. 1689-1702) agreed to pay their passages, give them land, and exempt them from all taxes for seven years. These were no small boons when most artisans had to bond themselves as indentured servants to get to the New World. The Huguenots understood that the New World, including Virginia, offered abundant land, a healthy climate, commercial opportunity, and freedom.
Baron de Sance settled a colony of Huguenots on the James River in 1630. In 1637, 600 French settlers came to Virginia to colonize lands offered by William Fitzhugh in what were to become Stafford and Spotsylvania counties. Major Moore Faust Le Roy already owned a large tract of land on the Rappahannock River before 1651. In 1653, the Huguenot Relief Committee of London paid David Dashaise seventy pounds sterling for 55 French Protestants to go to Virginia. Perhaps these refugees settled in the Northern Neck of Virginia. Every year from 1688 to 1700, aided by William III’s Royal Bounty, small groups of Huguenots went from London to Virginia.[14]
Among the less successful Huguenot settlements was Brenton. It began when Nicholas Hayward, the son of a well-established Virginia merchant in London, sought profit by colonizing the rich Virginia land with Huguenot refugees. In exchange for cash, on 10 January, 1687 he and his partners received 30,000 acres as tenants in common in Old Stafford County. The land lay between the Potomac and Rappahannock rivers near Occoquan Creek in Stafford County and present-day Brentsville, Prince William County. On February 10, 1687, James II agreed to Hayward’s proposal. Organized by George Brent, the town became officially known as “Brenton,” although locals called the settlement “Brent Town.” For security, the Brenton families were to live together in town on one-acre lots and were to farm 100 acres in the countryside. [15]
In London, Hayward busily promoted his settlement by circulating “broadsides” through the coffee houses of Soho, St. Giles, and the weaver’s shops of Spitalfields. Published in French, the broadsides promised “good and fertile” land “in perpetuity.” They added, “the proprietors will give the preference of choice of the situations of farm and house in the order of application, but only on condition that the purchasers shall emigrate to become residents.”[16] The broadsides further promised those not wishing to pay cash could get the land with materials sufficient to build a small house and with Indian corn for subsistence for the first year.
Competition, however, for these industrious refugees was vigorous. William Penn and agents of Carolina, Massachusetts, and Virginia more successfully pushed the virtues of their diverse schemes. Despite the carefully laid plans and inviting handbills, as well as the support of shipmasters of the Virginia trade, the Brenton undertaking failed. Only a few Huguenots arrived at Stafford from the many voyages of Huguenot refugees between 1686 and 1700. Their lives were doubtless hard, although they remain shrouded, because the Stafford County records have long since been destroyed.[17]
Arriving in the Virginia colony before 1700, Jean Calvet joined the larger Huguenot immigration, and he was among the few Huguenots who settled in Brenton. How he had first come to the New World is unclear, but he probably traveled overland from further north with his companions into Old Stafford County before 17003. In March 1700, they signed the “French Men’s Petition,” which noted their arrival and requested the customary, temporary exemption from levies until they could settle themselves and provide for the welfare of their families. Many who signed the French Men’s Petition stayed only a short while before settling in the surrounding counties or going to Maryland. For their part, Jean Calvet and his friends, Isaac Lafitte, Abraham Michaux, and Charles Peraut, traveled overland to Manakin Town.[18]
The Manakin Huguenots
Mixing humanitarian motives and the practical desire to settle lands they owned, Dr. Daniel Coxe in England and Colonel William Byrd I in Virginia played an especially important role in helping the Huguenots. Coxe was a distinguished court physician in the Court of Queen Anne (r. 1702-14). His colonial ventures centered chiefly in New Jersey, but he held more land in present-day Norfolk County, Virginia and vast lands on the Gulf of Mexico. A zealous churchman, Coxe contacted two Huguenot leaders, the Marquis de la Muce and Charles de Sailly.[19]
De la Muce was a Breton nobleman, recently expelled from France after a two-year imprisonment. Coxe’s plan interested both him and de Sailly as a way to recoup in British America the fortunes they had lost in France. De la Muce agreed to found the colony on Coxe’s Norfolk County lands. De la Muce and his lieutenant, de Sailly, petitioned William III to allow them to settle there.[20]
Meanwhile, Byrd, one of the largest landholders and most powerful men in Virginia, was seeking settlers to set up a community on the Virginia frontier a few miles above the fall line of the James River. The Monacan Indians had formerly occupied this land. A once-powerful Siouan confederacy of tribes, they were avowed enemies of the Algonquian-speaking Powhatan confederacy who lived to the east. Byrd wished to settle the Huguenots at what had been the chief Monacan village: he could better settle his own lands if the French Huguenots acted as a buffer between his properties and marauding Indian tribes. The king turned down Byrd’s proposal and told Virginia’s governor to aid the Huguenots in settling in Norfolk County and to grant them an amount of land usual to newcomers. Coxe’s triumph, however, did not last.[21]
The Mary Ann was the first of seven ships bringing Huguenot refugees to Virginia at the turn of the new century. Governor Francis Nicholson welcomed them at Hampton on 23 July, 1700 and surprised them with the news that they would go to the old Monacan village where they would receive land. The influence of Colonel Byrd with the Virginia governor and Council plus the independent spirit prevailing in Virginia counted for more than did the king’s instructions. The Huguenots then went to Jamestown, the colony’s first settlement and former capital. An inadequate diet and crowded conditions during the long ocean voyage and the landing during the unhealthy summer in Virginia led to dysentery, malaria, and other fevers.[22]
The Falls of the James in 1700 marked the last outpost of western settlement in Virginia, and the old Monacan village lay some twenty-five miles beyond. Only 120 men, women, and children followed Byrd and the soldiers into the forests—the rest were too ill to travel further. The grant of land given the Huguenots extended up the James River for about twenty-five miles and was about one mile wide. The settlers marked on the trees the southern boundary line—known as the French line for over a hundred years.[23]
Most of the Huguenots had spent their lives in business, commerce, and industry and were unprepared for the frontier’s loneliness and crudeness. Poor and contentious leadership immediately divided the Huguenots and exacerbated their problems. With autumn, they began a grim struggle for survival. By the end of November, short of seed, tools, cattle, clothing, and especially food, conditions in Manakin had become so bad that only substantial aid from the Virginia government prevented its disintegration. Even so, some died and many left for other parts of the colony.[24]
With the spring of 1701, conditions improved. Byrd visited the town in May, 1701. He reported that “though these people are very poor, yet they seem very cheerful and are … healthy, all they seem to desire is that they might have bread enough.” Byrd inspected about seventy of their huts, offered advice on the value of industriousness, and warned that charity could not last. Thus armed, the French soon carved out a prosperous community.[25]
Within ten years after they had settled in the Virginia wilderness, the lands set aside for the French were fully distributed, but the total grant and the individual allotments proved too small. The Huguenots were already raising many cattle, and they would soon turn to tobacco as their principal crop. The former required a large grazing area and the latter a constant accretion of land. Soon, as young adults married, they needed farms of their own, and they had to move away or see the parental acres redivided into minute portions.[26]
Among those surviving the turmoil of the early Manakin settlement was Jean Calvet. He had arrived in 1700 and is on the list of original founders of Manakin Town. It is unknown how he got to Manakin from Brenton, but he was likely a single man at the time. During his residence of fourteen years, Jean married and had four sons, Pierre, Antoine, Etienne, and Guillaume. He also had two daughters, one of whom he named Anne. He became a naturalized citizen of England. In April, 1714, he received title to his land on the far western edge of the boundary of the French lands with the legal right to pass it on to his heirs. Jean Calvet and his wife continued to live on and work their acreage, adding to their land as they could.[27]
Jean Calvet appears in the King William Parish church records from 1710 through 1718. His neighbors elected him to the vestry on 26 December, 1718. However, he was not present to take the “Oath of Vestry” administered on 26 March, 1719, having died most likely in January, 1719. Given the large number who also died at this time, an epidemic presumably had swept through the little village. The last time Jean Calvet’s name appears is on the inventory of his estate that was to be presented in Varina Court, Henrico County on February 1, 1719. Sheriff Thomas Jefferson—grandfather of the future president—presented the estate’s inventory to the court. Jean Calvet’s name appears on a plaque at the Ellis Island Museum in New York City.[28]
Antonine Calvet’s Family Moves to North Carolina
One of Jean’s sons, Antonine, was born about 1712 in Manakin. He and his two brothers, Etienne and Guillaume, were probably minors when their father died. A list of landholders in 1728 mentions their older brother, Pierre as owning 444 acres. Pierre was about 21 years old, and this property doubtless had been his father’s left by will to be shared with his younger brothers when they reached legal age. Some of this land could possibly have been outside the boundaries of the original French Lands. The family may or may not have spoken English well; they likely continued to speak French within the family. Guillaume died in Virginia in 1744.[29]
Antoine, Pierre, and Etienne at some point migrated to Craven County, North Carolina. Antonine’s name appeared for the last time in 1732 on the list of parish males in Manakin obligated to pay the church tax. On 17 July of that same year, Antonine conveyed a parcel of land to George Payne for six pounds and six shillings, “Lawful money of Virginia.” The property was “part of the first five thousand acres survey’d for ye French Refugees and given by will unto Peter and Anthony, sons of John Calvet dec’d.”[30] Then, on 6 November, 1736, he executed a power of attorney, appointing his “trusty and loving friend, Stephen Chastine” to complete a deed of sale to James Holman for land in Goochland County, Virginia.[31]
Antonine married Mary Dean about 1738 in Johnson County, North Carolina.[32] Mary probably had moved from Pennsylvania into Virginia with some Quakers and thence into North Carolina where Lord Granville’s agent sold them land. They had five children, William (between 1738 and 1740), Joseph (1745), Frederick (1747), Thomas (1748), and Pierre. Antonine died about 1759 in Craven County. Mary remarried to Daniel Higdon in North Carolina in 1762.[33]
Joseph Calvit Moves Westward to Tennessee
Born in either Craven or Johnston County, eventually Joseph’s family name evolved into “Calvit” and their given names became Anglicized. Perhaps a year or two before 1776, he and his brother Frederick moved westward from the more settled section of the Old North State. This area today lies in Washington County in Tennessee near the state’s boundaries with Virginia and North Carolina. Here, in one of the narrow valleys in the Appalachian Mountains, Huguenots built thirteen stockade forts of logs along the Watauga River, not far from its junction with the Holston River that flows southwest until it joins the Tennessee River. The historic “Wilderness Trail” marked by Daniel Boone, lay nearby.[34]
Joseph was a member of the Watauga Association, which existed from 1769 to 1777 and formed the embryo of the present State of Tennessee. In Spring, 1772, men from the thirteen forts gathered and adopted “Articles of Association,” the first written constitution adopted west of the mountains or by a community of American-born freemen. The document declared absolute religious freedom and based all action on manhood suffrage. For six years until 1778, Watauga acted as an independent political community and practiced a more extensive democracy than did the seaboard colonies. In 1776, 112 of these settlers, including Joseph and Frederick Calvit, signed the Watauga Petition, which asked North Carolina to recognize their government.[35]
The Calvits, the American Revolution, and a Land Grant
America’s Revolutionary War for Independence called the four brothers—William, Joseph, Frederick and Thomas—to arms. As the American Revolutionary War flared in the East, the frontier in Tennessee and Kentucky was aflame in Indian attacks sponsored by the British. The Calvit brothers fought in these Indian Wars and suffered their brutalities. In April, 1777 on Crockett’s Creek in what is now Rogersville, Tennessee, Indians shot and scalped Joseph’s younger brother, Frederick. He survived, but that same fight took the life of the grandfather of Davy Crockett with several members of his family.[36]
Responding to such attacks, the governor of Virginia, Patrick Henry, commissioned George Rogers Clark to raise a force of seven companies with fifty men each to defend the frontier. Secretly, Henry also gave him written orders to attack Kaskaskia and other British posts in the Illinois Country. Clark had difficulty raising his force, and he finally set out from Redstone and Fort Pitt with only 150 frontiersmen and some twenty settlers and their families. Reaching the Falls of Ohio, they set up a supply base on Corn Island, where a handful of reinforcements from the Holston River settlements—presumably including Joseph—joined him. Clark revealed his plan to attack Kaskaskia and was hard-pressed to prevent desertions. Defying all odds, in a brilliant and brutal campaign in 1778 and 1779, Clark captured Kaskaskia and Vincennes to rip the Old Northwest Territories from British hands and secure them for American settlement and sovereignty. Joseph served as a Lieutenant with George Rogers Clark in the Northwest Territories in the Illinois Regiment, Virginia State Line.[37]
After their service, two of the Calvit brothers learned that General Clark expected to secure land grants along the Ohio River for his soldiers. Thus, in Autumn and Winter, 1781 and 1782, members of several families built flatboats on the banks of the Holston River. When melted snow and ice flooded the streams, they hoped to float over obstructions, down the Holston to the Tennessee River, and into the Ohio. Once there, they would use long poles to propel the rafts upstream to one of the settlements awaiting them in Kentucky. They fastened together and floored logs to build the rafts. In the center, they built a small cabin for protection from Indian snipers. They steered the rafts by sweeps, attached to the rudder, at the sternposts. Late in March, 1782, the boatyard teemed with preparations for departure.[38]
For mutual protection, twelve families started together down the turbulent Tennessee River. Among them were Daniel and Mary Higdon, their son Jeptha, and two of her other sons, Frederick and Thomas Calvit from her first marriage. The trip was dangerous, especially at the rapids at Muscle Shoals. Although Indians frequently attacked the flatboats during the journey, apparently there were no casualties.[39]
The Calvits Detour to Natchez, Mississippi
The spring thaw, however, was too great in the Ohio River, and the waters swept them downstream to the Mississippi River. The men voted on whether they should stop at the first cove they should find on the western shore of the Mississippi or float all the way to Natchez in Spanish West Florida. They decided on Natchez. The settlers made their way down 2000 miles of river flowing past banks occupied by hostile Indians. They made good time. Leaving the Holston region in late March or early April, the twelve families tied up their rafts at the mouth of Cole’s Creek, fifteen miles above Natchez in early May. The Spanish authorities of West Florida politely received the settlers from Watauga, closely questioned them, and accepted them as citizens of the province and subjects of the Spanish king to whom they signed oaths of allegiance.[40]
How was it that these hardened, frontier veterans of the American Revolutionary War—Protestants at that—so quickly swore loyalty to a Catholic monarch? Given the significant support Spain had supplied the American revolutionaries, the oath presumably was not as difficult as more modern sensibilities might assume.
Fearing war and their patriot neighbors, by 1775 some loyal British subjects had already arrived to Natchez as Frederick and Thomas later would, via the Holston, Tennessee, Ohio rivers, and Mississippi rivers. Meanwhile, the Spanish worked with George Rogers Clark to stymie British control of the territory drained by the Mississippi River, and from New Orleans they sent boats upstream to furnish war materials, including cannon, to American posts on the Ohio and upper Mississippi. Some American frontiersmen accompanied these boats when they returned to Natchez, for example, in 1778 about fifty men in two keelboats. These fifty brought the Revolutionary War to the lower Mississippi Valley. Spain’s activities helped rupture Anglo-Spanish relations, and on 8 May, 1779, Spain declared war on Great Britain. Between late 1779 and early 1781 Spain conquered West Florida and for twenty years controlled a territory that was largely British in its origins.[41]
It is unclear how and when Joseph and his brother William got to Natchez, perhaps overland by the old Indian trail, the Natchez Trace, after their mother and brothers already had settled in Natchez.[42] In any case, the Calvits’ arrival was part of a larger American immigration into Natchez. In 1776, only seventy-eight families lay scattered in different settlements, and in 1779 there were only four small stores servicing the community. The Spanish census of 1785 showed the Natchez District had a population of 1,550 compared with 746 at Mobile and 270 in Baton Rouge.[43] West Florida passed from Spain to the sovereignty of the United States in 1797.
Armed with land grants, the Calvits started their plantations. In 1782, Frederick moved his family to a 600-acre land grant, built a log house, bought some cows, pigs, and a broodmare, and he began to farm successfully. When his estate was distributed in 1808, each of his children received $1,550.[44] William moved to a Spanish land grant on the Homochitto River, Franklin County, Mississippi. By 1790, three of the brothers were large tobacco growers—Frederick produced 10,100 lbs., William 10,000 lbs., and Thomas 7,000.[45]
Joseph settled Saint Catherine’s Creek in 1785, having received a land grant east of Natchez in Adams County, Mississippi and north to the present-day Jefferson County line and close to where his mother lived.[46] The old town of Washington lies on or near his grant. Joseph became a successful planter, landowner, and slaveholder. He later donated land for Washington, Mississippi, and in July, 1802, he sold forty-one acres of land at fifteen dollars per acre for Fort Dearborn next to Washington. Fort Dearborn became increasingly important as complications with Spain over the right of deposit of American goods at New Orleans developed. On 8 September, 1798, Governor Winthrop Sargent appointed Joseph a Captain of Foot in the Lower District of the First Mississippi Militia. The following day, the governor additionally appointed Joseph a Conservator of the Peace. Until the appointment of federal judges, the Conservators of the Peace examined felonies, committed offenders, and appointed constables. They also could administer oaths of allegiance, but only until 30 October, 1798.[47]
Joseph’s brother, Thomas, played a significant role in Mississippi’s early territorial politics. The first territorial election—controlled by the Jeffersonian Republicans—was held in 1800 and brought him into the Assembly as a representative of the Jefferson district. The Assembly convened at Natchez. In an exciting election of 1802, citizens again elected Thomas to the Assembly. In 1808, Thomas joined the Fifth General Assembly, which the governor dissolved in 1809. More notoriously, Governor Cowles Mead met Aaron Burr at Thomas’ rough, pioneer home on Cole’s Creek on 17 January, 1807 to negotiate the latter’s surrender to authorities. This ended Burr’s conspiracy to create an independent nation. Thomas later built a more imposing plantation home.[48]
Meanwhile, in 1817 in [Iron Banks] Jefferson County, Mississippi, Joseph married Sidney “Cidia” Adair, daughter of Joseph Adair and Mildred “Millie” Wallace. They had five children: John, James, Martha “Patsy,” and Thomas. Later in life, Joseph with a widow, Mrs. Sissons, also had an illegitimate daughter, Maria Louisa, whom he recognized in his will. Joseph died in 1819. Maria Louisa as late as 1850 was still fighting in court for her rightful share of her father’s estate.[49]
The Richbourg Family of South Carolina
CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG:
On October 18, 1655, Louis XIV of France, revoked the Edict of Nantes and by so doing deprived his Protestant subjects, the Huguenots, of civil and religious liberty and subjected them to unrestricted persecution at the hands of the Roman Catholic Church.
As a result, more than 400,000 Huguenots abandoned their homes in France and moved to England, Holland, Germany and other lands, which permitted them to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own consciences.
Since the world has never known more courageous and earnest folk than the Huguenots, it beggars the imagination to conjecture what France has lost in human resources during subsequent generations on account of this coerced exodus.
Among the thousands of Huguenots who sought refuge in England was CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG, a Huguenot minister, who after wards became the progenitor of the Richbourg family, of Clarendon County, South Carolina. (1)
Charles Washington Baird suggests in his HISTORY OF THE HUGUENOT EMIGRATION TO AMERICA that CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG may have fled from France to England with a kinsman, Isaac Porcher, a native of the village of Saint Severe in the Province of Berri, who was the ancestor of the Porchers of South Carolina. Baird states: (2)
Isaac was a physician, and had taken his degree at the University of Paris. With his wife, Claude Cherigny, a native of Touraine, he fled soon after the Revocation to England, perhaps in company with his relative, CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG, a Protestant minister afterwards pastor of the French colony on the James River in Virginia and of the French church in Charleston. The Porchers were descended from the Counts of Richebourg.
After their exodus from France, 800 Huguenots joined the Army of William of Orange, and fought under him the Irish wars. Dr. George Howe informs us in his HISTORY OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN SOUTH CAROLINA that “they formed an entire regiment under the command of the Duke of Schomberg in the battle of the Boyle in 1690” and that “in the decisive battle of Aghrim in the following year these auxiliaries, commanded by Ruvigny, earl of Galway, contributed by their gallantry to the victory obtained over the French and Irish Papal Army under the command of St. Ruth. (3)
William of Orange was deeply impressed by the character and valor of the Huguenots who served in his army, and for this reason developed a profound concern for the plight of the Huguenots sojourning in England. As a consequence, he encouraged a substantial colony of them to migrate from England to Virginia about 1690 and establish a Huguenot settlement at Manakin Town on the James River about twenty miles above Richmond. (4)
These colonists were joined in 1699 and 1700 by additional groups of Huguenots numbering more than 700 under the leadership of marquis de la Muce. These groups sailed for Virginia from Gravesend, England, and were accompanied by their pastor CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG, who served as minister of the Huguenot settlement at Manakin Town from the time of his arrival in 1699 or 1700 until his departure for North Carolina. (5)
Unhappy differences of opinion arose among the Huguenots at Manakin Town, and in 1708 Richebourg accompanied “the great body of them” to North Carolina, where they settled on the Trent River. (6)
The Huguenots were derived from their settlement on the Trent River by the Tuscarora and Coree Indians, who unexpectedly took to the warpath on September 11, 1711, and on that day brutally massacred 111 of their white neighbors in eastern North Carolina. (7)
As a result of this tragedy, RICHEBOURG and some of his compatriots made their way to the Province of South Carolina, where many Huguenots had proceeded them. Shortly after his arrival there in 1712, RICHEBOURG established his home near the French or Huguenot Church, which stood in the center of the French village of Jamestown on a high bluff abutting and overlooking the Santee River in Berkeley County, South Carolina. Here RICHEBOURG spent the remainder of his days. (8)
The Huguenot or French Church at Jamestown on the Santee, which consisted of wood on a foundation of brick, had been constructed at an unrecorded time by Huguenots, who had settled in the area shortly before 1690 to cultivate the grape, the olive, and the silk worm and to produce naval stores, and who numbered about eighty families by that year (9) Dr. Arthur Henry Hirsch states in his history of THE HUGUENOTS OF COLONIAL SOUTH CAROLINA that this was the largest settlement of Huguenots in the province outside Charleston during the early life of the colony, and that the French or Huguenot Church at Jamestown on the Santee was probably next to that at Charleston in membership. (10)
By the Church Act of 1706 and an amendment of 1708, the South Carolina Provincial legislature established for Anglean Church purposes the Parish of St. James Santee, whose boundaries embraced the French village of Jamestown and all other parts of Berkeley County lying between the Parish of St. John’s Berkeley on the south and the Santee River on the north. (11) In 1754, the Parish of St. Stephen was formed out of the northwestern portion of the Parish of St. James Santee. (12)
At the time of RICHEBOURG’s arrival at Jamestown, the French or Huguenot Church on the Santee was still enjoying the labors of its venerable pastor, Pierre Robert. (13)
Dr. Howe describes the character and final years of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG as follows: (14)
The character which has been transmitted to us of this persecuted minister of the gospel, exhibits as its peculiar trait a devotedness to the cause of Christ. He appears to have been a man of unobtrusive manners, of deep and fervent piety, and of a serious temper of mind. Adversities and poverty seem to have been his portion in the lot of life.
He seems to have lived, after his removal to South Carolina, for two or three years without a spiritual charge, and without any pecuniary resources for the maintenance of his family; and, we are informed by Humphrey, contemplated a removal out of the colony ‘on account of his great want.’
The infirmities of age creeping upon him, Pierre Robert resigned his charge, and RICHEBOURG was called by the congregation to succeed him in 1715. He continued in the pastorship until his death in 1718-19. His will (original manuscript in the French language) is still preserved in the Public Office in Charleston, and breathes the true spirit of the Christian, resigned under the dispensations of Providence, steadfast in the faith, and triumphant at his approaching death. His wife, ANNE CHASTAIN, and six children survived him. Some of his descendants, who are not numerous, have attained wealth; and no instance is known of any of them having been destitute of the comforts of life.
After considering and weighing the historical data relating to RICHEBOURG and his ministry at the French or Huguenot Church at Jamestown on the Santee. Dr. Howe emphatically concluded that RICHEBOURG never became an Anglican minister and that the church retained its name and character as a Reformed Church throughout his life. (15)
Dr. Howe’s conclusion on this score cannot be recorded with those of Dr. Hirsch, who states in substance, in his history of THE HUGUENOTS OF COLONIAL SOUTH CAROLINA that in 1700 the French or Huguenot Church at Jamestown on the Santee was converted into the Anglican Church at the request of its French founders and members; that its pastor, Pierre Robert, took Anglican orders, that subsequently his successor. RICHEBOURG accepted ordination in the Anglicean communion and thereby assumed in the estimation of the Anglican clergy the obligation to forsake the Calvinistic theology and liturgy of the Huguenots for that of the Anglicans; that notwithstanding RICHEBOURG persisted in preaching and administering the sacraments in the French language in accordance with the Calvinistic theology and liturgy of the Huguenots, and thereby greatly angered the Anglican clergy; that Commissary Johnston the chief representative in the Province of South Carolina of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, in adjunct of the Anglican Church, threatened to “deprive RICHEBOURG of his cure and salary and remove him from the province unless he desisted”; that RICHEBOURG “confessed his error and promised never to commit it again”; and that RICHEBOURG “temporarily submitted” to Johnston’s demand, but soon returned to his Calvinistic ways. (16)
For reasons he deems compelling the writer is constrained to accept Dr. Howe’s conclusions and reject those of Dr. Hirsche.
It is simply incredible that the French Huguenots on the Santee would have lightly or willingly abandoned at that time in history the profound religious convictions for which their fathers and their contemporaries had suffered martyrdom and for which they themselves had exchanged their native land and their earthly possessions for exile and poverty. (17)
Besides Dr. Hirsch’s conclusions are incompatible with RICHEBOURG’s character as it has been revealed by all historical data relating to him outside of the writings of representatives of the English-based adjunct of the Anglican Church the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. According to this data, RICHEBOURG was a strong-willed man, who was inseparable wedded to the Calvinistic faith of the Huguenots and was always ready to do battle for it against any that questioned its authenticity.
Dr. Hirsch based his conclusions on the records of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, where representatives in the Province of South Carolina were unrestrained in their efforts to induce or coerce the Huguenots residing there to forsake their own faith and to adopt in its stead the polity, theology, and usages of the Anglican Church.
As a consequence of their inordinate zeal they succumbed to the temptation to report their proselyting efforts to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts as more fruitful than the circumstances warranted and to change with perfidy any Huguenot clergyman who actively resisted their efforts to proselyte his charges.
Dr. Hirsch admits that Commissary Johnston, who manifested his extreme hostility to RICHEBOURG, was even more rigorous in proselyting the Huguenots than the Anglicans in England, who extended some financial aid to some Huguenot Churches and were desirous of converting their members to the Anglican faith. (18)
It is to be noted that Dr. Howe weighed and rejected as unreliable the records of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts on which Dr. Hirsch based his conclusions, and in so doing quoted with approval the deduction of another researcher of the subject that the records were “got up to advance the interests of the Episcopal Church” and were “replete with inaccuracies and misstatements.” (19)
Apart from its undue acceptance of the biased records of the society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts as the embodiment of the truth in respect to disagreements between the Society’s Provincial representatives and the Huguenots, Dr. Hirsch’s history constitutes a reliable and readable story of the Huguenots in Colonial South Carolina.
RICHEBOURG dated his will January 15, 1718-19, and died soon after its execution. The exact time of his death is not known. Dr. Humphrey was obviously in error in stating that it occurred in 1717. (20) Hirsch gave the date of this event as 1718 and Baird at 1719. (21)
The offspring of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG and his wife ANNE CHASTAIN were children of tender years at their father’s death. The concision is made manifest by the will of Isaac Porcher, which was made September, 1726. After bequeathing and devising his property to his children, Isaac Porcher reminded them that “charity is one of the greatest Christian virtues” and charged them “to take care of the children of (the) late Mr. RICHEBOURG as being objects worthy of compassion.” (22)
While the dates of the births of the six children of the marriage of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG and ANNE CHASTAIN have not been ascertained by the writer, the wills of two of them namely, Charles Richebourg and John Richebourg, indicate that they were born in this order: Charles Richebourg, Rene Richebourg, John Richebourg, James Richebourg, Claudius Richebourg, and Elizabeth Richebourg.
Charles Richebourg was a planter of Berkeley County, S. C. It is implicit in his will, which he executed before St. Cabanas, Jos. de St. Julian and Rene Ravenel, Jr., as subscribing witnesses, on April 10, 1736, that he died unmarried and without issue.
Although his will was not proved until October 8, 1746, it is inferable that he died before November 2, 1743, because he is not mentioned in the will of his unmarried brother, John Richebourg, which was executed on that day.
By his will, Charles Richebourg made his brothers Rene, John, James, and Claudius whom he called Claude, his sister Elizabeth, and his niece Catherine the objects of his bounty, and named his brother Rene the sole executor of his estate. (23)
Rene Richebourg was a planter in the part of Craven County, S. C. which subsequently became Clarendon County. He executed his will before Anne Crouch, E. Cavinis, and John Pamor as subscribing witnesses on November 27, 1740, and died before November 2, 1743, the day on which his brother John Richebourg made his will.
By his will, Rene Richebourg made his “beloved wife Catherine,” his sons, Charles, Rene, and Samuel, and his daughters, Catherine and Elizabeth, the objects of his bounty, and named his friends, Philip, Rene, and Samuel Peyre, the executors of his estate. (24)
John Richebourg was a planter of Berkeley County, S. C. It is implicit in his will that he died unmarried and without issue. He executed that instrument before Rene Ravenel, Jr., David Lafons, and Thomas McDaniel, as subscribing witnesses, on November 1, 1743, and died between that day and December 27, 1743, the day on which it was proved.
By his will, John Richebourg made his surviving brothers, James and Claudius, his sister Elizabeth, and his nephews, Charles and Rene, sons of his “late brother Rene Richebourg” the objects of his bounty, and named his brother James and his friends James De St. Julien and Peter Herman, the executors of his estate. (250
Claudius Richebourg, who is the subject of a separate sketch, pursued the calling of a planter in the part of Craven County, S. C. which subsequently became Clarendon County.
The French village of Jamestown on the Santee and the French or Huguenot Church which ministered to the spirited needs of its inhabitants and the other French Protestants living in the vicinity were located about a mile to the north of the existing municipality of Jamestown in Berkeley County.
The French village of Jamestown did not prosper because the Santee River was subject to frequent freshets at this point and the climate was not healthful. As the years passed, the original French settlers died and their progeny moved to more favorable agricultural area in the Parish of St. John’s Berkeley, the Parish of St. Stephen’s and Craven County, where they achieved substantial prosperity by cultivating indigo and rice, the money crops of the age and region. (26)
As more years passed, the village and church disintegrated and disappeared, and their site was recaptured by the wilderness. The writer visited this spot in July, 1971, and found nothing there indicating its historic past except a simple monument erected by the Huguenot Society at South Carolina to make the spot where the church had stood. (27)
Notes:
(1) As is frequently the case in early days in the colonies and the states in respect to names of non-British origin, the family surname appears in various spellings. It is spelled Richebourg in historical references to CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG and in the wills of his sons Charles Richebourg, Rene Richebourg, and John Richebourg. It is spelled Richborough in the census of 1790, and Richbourg in the census of 1800 and the wills of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG’s son Claudius and his grandson James. It is spelled Richburgh in the census of 1810. During succeeding generations the surname has ordinarily been spelled Richbourg or Richburg. The writer spells it according to the way in which it is spelled in a particular context or in the way in which a particular individual preferred to spell it. Although a number of the descendants of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG were undoubtedly living in Clarendon County in 1790 only two of them, James Richborough, Sr., and William Richborough are listed as heads of families in the census. This fact and the omission of ownership of slaves in some instances indicate that the census of 1790 for Clarendon County is incomplete either as taken or as preserved. Henry Richborough, Sr., Henry Richborough, Jr., James Richbourgh, Sr., Nathaniel Richborough, Sr., Nathaniel Richborough, Jr. and William Richbourgh are listed a heads of families in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County and Claude Richburgh, Richburgh, Henry Richburgh, Sr., Henry Richburgh, Jr., Louisa Richbourg, Nat Richburgh, Jr., Renna Richburgh, Samuel Richburgh, Thomas Richburgh and William Richburgh are listed as heads of families in the census of 1810 for Clarendon County. The National Archives Service does not have in its possession the census of Clarendon County for 1820, 1830, 1840, and 1850, and for this reason the census of the County for each of these years is presumed to be lost.
(2) Charles Washington Baird: HISTORY OF THE HUGUENOT EMIGRATION TO AMERICA (Baltimore, Md., 1966) Vol. 2, page 105. This history is hereafter cited as Baird. As we shall see, CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG was pastor of the French or Huguenot Church at Jamestown on the Santee–not of the French Church at Charleston.
(3) Dr. George Howe: HISTORY OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN SOUTH CAROLINA (Columbia, S. C., 1870), Vol. 1, 166. This history is hereafter cited as Howe.
(4) Howe, Vol. 1, 166.
(5) Howe, Vol. 1, 166: Baird, Vol. 2 105-106, 177. See, also, Bishop William Meade: OLD CHURCHES, MINISTERS, AND FAMILIES OF VIRGINIA, Baltimore, Md., (1966).
(6) Howe, Vol. 1, 166.
(7) Howe, Vol. 1, 166.
(8) Howe, Vol. 1, 166-167. Dr. Arthur Henry Hirsch has much to say concerning Richebourg in his history of “The Huguenots of Colonial South Carolina,” which was published in 1962 and is hereafter cited simply as Hirsch. See pages 19, 62, 76, 81, 133-134, 137.
(9) Hirsch, 15-18, 60-61.
(10) Hirsch. 15, 60.
(11) Howe, Vol. 1. 168: Elizabeth W. A. Pringle: THE REGISTER BOOK FOR THE PARISH OF PRINCE WINYAW (Baltimore, Md., 1916), pages i-vii: Hirsch, 15.
(12) South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine. vol. 45. page 65; see, also, Hirsch pages 14-15.
(13) Howe, vol. 1, 166.
(14) Howe, Vol. 1, 166-167: The Judge of Probate at Charleston has informed the writer that the will of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG cannot now be found in his office.
(15) Howe, Vol. 1. 169.
(16) Hirsch, 133-134.
(17) as Dr. Hirsch concedes, the Huguenots “were foreigners of a race other than that of the most numerous class in the community and spoke a language not only very different than in general as in the Province, but also held in contempt outside of English court circles. They came in want from a country that for centuries had been the political enemy of Great Britain. They were religious refugees and ardent advocates of a faith dissimilar to Anglican.” Hirsch, 138.
(18) Hirsch, 132, 134.
(19) Howe, Vol. 1. 168-169.
(20) Howe, Vol. 1. 167.
(21) Hirsch, 19. Baird, Vol. 1, pages 105-106. It is obvious that he was living on June 2, 1718, because on that day Pierre St. Julian of Berkeley County made his will, which gave a legacy of twenty pounds to “Monsieur CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG, Minister.” Caroline T. Moore and Agatha Aimar Sunmons, ABSTRACTS OF WILLS OF THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA 1670-1740 (Columbia, S. C. 1960), Vol. 1. page 60.
(22) Will of Isaac Porcher, which is recorded in Will Book 1726-1729, Vol. 2, page 374, on file in Probate office at Charleston, S. C.
(23) Will of Charles Richebourg, which is recorded in Will Book 1 1747-1752, pages 461-462, on file in the Probate Office at Charleston, S. C. By his will Charles Richebourg devised his 200-acre plantation on which he resided to his brother Rene Richebourg on condition that Rene convey his 250 -acre plantation known as Long Acres to his brother John Richebourg made specific legacies of one negro slave to each of his Brothers, Rene, John, James, and Claudius, and his sister, Elizabeth, and his niece, Catherine Richebourg; and left the remainder of his estate in equal shares to his brothers, Rene, John, James, and Claudius, and his sister Elizabeth. See, also, ABSTRACTS OF WILLS OF THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA 1740-1760, Vol. 2, page 140.
(24) Will of Rene Richebourg which is recorded in Will Book 1740-1747, page 170, on file in Probate Office at Charleston, S. C. By his will, Rene Richebourg devised his plantation to his son Charles, subject to the right of his wife, Catherine, to reside on it during her widowhood, and bequeathed his personal estate in various proportions to his wife, Catherine, his daughters. Catherine and Elizabeth, and his sons, Charles, Rene, and Samuel. The will shows that the children were under the age of 21 years at the time of its execution. See also, ABSTRACTS OF WILLS OF THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA 1746-1760, Vol. 2, page 30.
(25) Will of John Richebourg, which is recorded in Will Book 1740-1747, page 150, on file in Probate Office at Charleston, S. C. By his will, John Richebourg devised to his nephew, Rene Richebourg, the eldest son of his “late brother, Rene Richebourg”, a 300-acre plantation lying on Magate Swamp in Berkeley County; bequeathed to his “loving sister Elizabeth Richebourg one Negro woman by name Nancy and her daughter by name Silvia”; bequeathed to his nephew, Charles Richebourg, son of his late brother, Rene Richebourg, his gun; and left the remainder of his estate in equal shares to his surviving brothers James Richebourg and Charles Richebourg” and his “loving sister Elizabeth Richebourg: See, also, ABSTRACTS OF WILLS OF THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA 1740-1760, Vol. 2. page 23.
(26) Hirsch 18. Craven County was created in 1682 and originally included all of South Carolina lying between Berkeley County and the North Carolina line.
(27) After the writer had completed this sheet, Mrs. J. W. T of Atlanta, Georgia a descendant of CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG a copy of a manuscript relating to DE RICHEBOURG compiled by the late Dr. Robert Wilson, of the Citadel at Charleston, S. C. whose existence had been unknown to the writer prior to that time. The manuscript is in complete with the research of the writer with respect to DE RICHEBOURG’s family. It states that he married ANNE CHASTAIN and that their sons Charles and John died unmarried that their sons, Rene and Claudius married and left issue, and that no indication as to what because of their son, James and their daughter Elizabeth has been discovered. The manuscript surmises that ANNE CHASTAIN was probably the daughter or sister of Dr. Castaing or Castayne one of the two surgeons who accompanied the Huguenots to Manakin Town. The manuscript accepts the that DE RICHEBOURG took Anglican orders and asserts that Baird’s “statement that Dr. Isaac Porcher was a Richebourg and was descended from the Count de Richbourg and his surmise that CLAUDE PHILIPPE DE RICHEBOURG was of the same stock are equally without foundation.” further states that the maiden name of Rene Richebourg’s wife was Catherine Peyre that they resided at a plantation on the Santee known as Sandy Hill that daughter Elizabeth married Thomas Pamer of Gravel Hill whose Anglicized as Palmer. The writer is constrained to take issue with the statement of the manuscript that Charles Richebourg the son or Rene Richebourg and his wife Catherine Peyre, died in 1792. This Charles Richebourg was the grandson of the original Rene Richebourg. The records of St. Stephens Parish in Craven County show that Rene Richebourg’s son Charles died before May 4, 1771, and that on that day the Court of Ordinary granted a citation to Elizabeth Richebourg. Rene Richebourg the brother of Charles and Joseph Palmer administer his estate, SOUTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL AND GENEALOGICAL MAGAZINE, Vol. 44, page 250. Moreover, the same records disclose that Rene Richebourg’s sons Charles, Rene, and Samuel were active officers of the Anglican Church which served that portion of St. Stephen’s parish lying in Craven County north of the Santee River. SOUTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL AND GENEALOGICAL MAGAZINE, Vol. 45, pages 162-167, 170-217, and Vol. 46, pages 40, 174.
CLAUDIUS RICHBOURGH, the youngest son of Claude Philippe de Richebourg, and his wife, Anne Chastain, was about three years of age at the time of his father’s death.
After attaining maturity, he acquired substantial holdings in land on Jack’s Creek and the Santee River in that portion of Craven County which subsequently became Clarendon County. Here he pursued the calling of a planter, and spent the remainder of his days. The tax lists of Clarendon County revealed that at the time of his death he owned 1050 acres of land and 12 slaves.
The will of CLAUDIUS RICHBOURG gives the Christian name of his wife as UNITY, and discloses that he had five sons and two daughters. They were:
i. Henry Richbourg, who supported the colonies in their fight for independence during the Revolution by supplying provisions for Continental soldiers and the state militia. (1) Henry Richbourg was listed in the census of l1800 for Clarendon County as “Henry Richbourgh, Senr.,” and as the head of a family consisting of one free white male of 45 years and upwards, three free white males between 16 and 26 years, three free white males between 10 and 16 years, one free white male under 10 years, one free white female of 45 years and upwards, one free white female under 10 years, and fifteen slaves. (2)
ii. James Richbourg, who is the subject of a separate sketch.
iii. John Richbourg, who was born August 23, 1747, and died November 29, 1838. (3) He served as a Captain in Colonel Sumter’s Regiment, South Carolina line: during the Revolution. (4) He also aided in winning American Independence by furnishing supplies to the South Carolina Militia. (5) In 1773, Captain John Richbourg married Mary Long who was born in 1755 and died in 1775, survived by a son Nathaniel Richbourg, who married Susan Holliday. After Mary Long’s death, Captain Richbourg contracted a second marriage with Sarah Abbott. Captain Richbourg was listed in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County as “John Richbourg, Sen.” and as the head of a family consisting of one free white male of 45 years and upward, two free white males between 16 and 26 years, one free white male between 10 and 16 years, one free white male under 10 years, one free white female of 45 years and upward, one free white female between 16 and 26 years, and seven slaves. (7)
iv. Nathaniel Richbourg who was listed in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County as “Nathaniel Richbourg. Senr.: and as the hear of a family consisting of one free white male of 45 years and upward, one free white male between 10 and 16 years, one free white male under 10, one free white female of 45 years and upward, one free white female between 10 and 16 years, one free white male under 10, one free white female of 45 years and upward, one free white female between 10 and 16 years, two free white females under 10 years, and sixteen slaves. (8)
v. William Richbourg, who assisted in establishing American Independence by serving in the South Carolina militia and by supplying horses, pistols, and equipment to General Francis Marion’s Brigade. (9) He was listed in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County as the head of a family consisting of one free white male of 45 years and upward, one free white male between 16 and 26 years, tow free white males between 10 and 16 years, two free white males under 10 years, one free white female between 16 and 26 years, and nineteen slaves.
vi. Unity Richbourg, whose husband’s surname was Gayle. (10)
vii. Susannah Richbourg.
CLAUDIUS RICHBOURGH died prior to September 6, 1788, the day on which Thomas Avery, one of the subscribing witnesses to his will, made oath as to its execution before John Ridgill, a justice of the peace of Clarendon County. All available data indicates that he was then about 72 years of age.
The will appears of record in the office of the Judge of Probate of Sumter county and reads as follows:
In the name of God Amen
I, CLAUDIUS RICHBOURG of Craven County in the Province of South Carolina of St. marks, planter, being of perfect health and of perfect mind and memory thanks be to Almighty God, and calling to remembrance the mortality of any Body and that it is ordained for all men once to die, do make and declare this my last will and testament in manner and form following, that is to say, first and principally I recommend my soul into the hands of God, beseeching him to forgive me all my sins through the merits of Jesus Christ my blessed redeemer, and my body I bequeath to the earth to be buried at the discretion of my executors hereafter named. And as touching such goods and worldly estate it hath pleased God to bless me with I give and bequeath and devise of the same in manner and form following:
Imprimis – it is my will, request and order that all my just debts be first of all duly paid and discharged.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved son Henry Richbourg a negroe man by name Minsor to him the said Henry Richbourg, his heirs and assigns forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved son James Richbourg one negroe boy to the said James Richbourg, his heirs and assigns forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved son John Richbourg one negroe girl by name Celia with her issue and increase to him the said John Richbourg, his heirs and assigns forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved son Nathaniel Richbourg a negroe boy by name Sandy to him Nathaniel Richbourg during his life and after his death to the lawful heirs of his body forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved son William Richbourg one negore girl by name Kiah with her issue and increase to him the said William Richbourg, his heirs and assigns forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved daughter Unity Gayle a negroe girl by name Maria with her issue and increase to her the said Unity Gayle during her life and after her decease then to the heirs of her body forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my beloved daughter Susannah Richbourg one negroe girl by name Betsey with her issue and increase to her the said Susannah and after her decease then to the heirs of her body forever.
Item – I give and bequeath to my dearly beloved wife Unity Richbourg all the remainder of my estate of what kind, nature or denomination whatsoever it may be, or wheresoever it may be found at the time of my decease and both real and personal during her life, and my will and pleasure is that my said wife UNITY RICHBOURG shall have freely possession and enjoyment of the same without any molestation or hindrance whatsoever from or by my executors or to the children during her life and further that after her decease then I give and bequeath all my estate real and personal wheresoever and in what nature or kind soever that was in her possession to be equally divided among Henry Richbourg, James Richbourg, John Richbourg, Nathaniel Richbourg, William Richbourg, Unity Gayle and Susannah Richbourg to be equally and impartially shared and divided between them share and share alike to them or their heirs and assigns forever.
Lastly – I nominate, constitute and appoint my three sons Henry, James and John Richbourg executors of this my last will and testament revoking and disannuling all other former will or wills, testament or testaments, in witness whereof I hereunto set my hand and seal the sixteenth day of February in the year of our Lord one thousand and seven hundred and seventy eight and further it is my will all that part of my estate that falls to my son Nathaniel and Unity Gayle, that after their deaths it shall return to the heirs of their bodies forever.
CLAUDIUS RICHBOURG SEAL
[Signed, sealed, published and declared by the testator to be his last will and testament in presence of
R. G. Dennis Joseph Joyner Thomas Avery.
Recorded in Will Book AA, page 209, Sept. 6, 1818, Bundle 86, pkg. 5, Sumter County wills.]
On October 18, 1788, the will of CLAUDIUS RICHBOURGH was proved before the Judges of Clarendon County, and his sons, Henry Richbourg, James Richbourg, and John Richbourg qualified a its executors.
Notes:
(1) On July 27, 1785, the South Carolina Commissioners of the Treasury issued an indented certificate to Henry Richbourg for 29 pounds, 2 shillings, and 1 penny for provisions furnished by him to Continental and State troops in 1780, 1781, 1782, and 1783. A. S. Salley, Jr.: STUB ENTRIES TO INDENTS ISSUED IN PAYMENT OF CLAIMS AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA GROWING OUT OF THE REVOLUTION, Book V, page 137, No. 285.
(2) Henry Richbourg, Jr., was listed in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County as the head of a family consisting of one free white male between 16 and 26, one free white male under 10, one free white female between 16 and 26, one free white female under 10, and 1 slave.
(3) Dr. Robert Wilson MMS relating to Claude Philippe de Richebourg’s family.
(4) Lineage Book No. 77, pages 43-44. See, also Jayne Caraway Garhington Pruitt: REVOLUTIONARY WAR PENSION APPLICANTS WHO SERVED FROM SOUTH CAROLINA, page 44. The South Carolina Commisisoners of the Treasury issued two indented certificates to John Richbourg on account of his Revolutionary service as a soldier. On October 28, 1785, they issued a certificate “to John Richbourg, for 20 pounds, 15 shillings, for 83 days duty in 1780 per accounts audited on which no interest is allowed until one year’s int becomes due”. A. S. Salley, Jr.: STUB ENTRIES TO INDENTS LISTED IN PAYMENT OF CLAIMS AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA GROWING OUT OF THE REVOLUTION, Book Y, page 30, No. 158 and on June 11, 1786 they issued a certificate to “John Richbourg, Lieut., for 4 pounds 5 shillings, stlg for pay due him while a prisoner in 1789 and 1781 P. acct audited.” A. S. Salley, Jr.: STUB ENTRIES TO INDENTS LISTED IN PAYMENT OF CLAIMS AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA GROWING OUT OF THE REVOLUTION, Book, Y, page 188. No. 1314.
(5) On August 7, 1784, The South Carolina Commissioners of the Treasury issued an indented certificate “Mr. John Richbourgh for 35 pounds, 10 shillings and 10 pence farthing for sundries for militia use in 1781 and 1782 as pr account audited.: Wyhna Anne Waters: STUB ENTRIES TO INDENTS ISSUED IN PAYMENT OF CLAIMS AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA GROWING OUT OF THE REVOLUTION, Book II, page 111, No 254.
(6) Dr. Robert Wilson, MSS.
(7) John Richbourgh, Jr. was listed in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County as the head of a family consisting of one free white male between 16 and 26, one free white male between 10 and 16, one free white female between 26 and 45.
(8) Nathaniel Richbourg, Jr. was listed in the census of 1800 for Clarendon County as the head of a family consisting of one free white male between 16 and 26, one free white male under 10, one free white female between 16 and 26, one free white female under 10, and one slave.
(9) On August 7, 1784, the Sough Carolina Commissioners of the Treasury issued an indented certificate “to Mr. William Richbourgh, for 5 pounds, 7 shillings, and a penny sterling for 117 days militia duty in 1782 as per accounts audited. Wylma Ann Waters STUB ENTRIES TO INDENTS LISTED IN PAYMENT OF CLAIMS AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA GROWING OUT OF THE REVOLUTION, Book H, page 111, No 253): and on August 31, 1785, they issued a second indented certificate “to William Richbourg for 31 pounds, 10 shillings, and 9 pence for 2 horses, 1 pr pistols, and 2 saddles and bridles for Genl. Marion’s Brigade in 1781 per warrant audited” A. S. Salley, Jr.: STUB ENTRIES TO INDENTS ISSUED IN PAYMENT OF CLAIMS AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA GROWING OUT OF THE REVOLUTION BOOK X, page 26, No. 154.
(10) The Census of 1790 for Clarendon County discloses two heads of families bearing the surname Gayle, one being listed as Josiah Gale and the other being listed as Caleb Gale.