Early Presidents of William and Mary; Wm. and Mary Qrtly., Vol. 1, No. 2

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Early Presidents of William and Mary

   Lyon G. Tyler


   William and Mary College Quarterly Historical Papers, Vol., 1,
No. 2. (Oct., 1892), pp. 63-75.

Page 63

                WILLIAM AND MARY COLLEGE
               QUARTERLY HISTORICAL PAPERS.
     Vol. I.       October 1892.             No. 2.

           EARLY PRESIDENTS OF WILLIAM AND MARY.

                    BY THE EDITOR.

   From a framework of silk curls and black gown relieved under the
chin by the ministerial white bands of his order, the venerable face
of James Blair, D. D., looks down upon the visitor to the library
of William and Mary College.  His hands rest idly in his lap, but
his left elbow rests on the folds of an open book engraved with what
seems Greek letters written upside down -- a Greek testamant perhaps,
while in the back-ground of the protrait is a miniature representation
of the College of which he was at once founder and president for
fifty years.

  Withall, the face in the portrait is one of a man of strong will,
of unbending courage and sincere and elevated purposes.  And, indeed,
if half we read of him is true, there was a need of all the skill
of the artist to depict upon the canvass all the character represented
in such a life as that of James Blair.

  Choosing from an early day to identify himself with the cause of
education in the Colony of Virginia, he met with formidable difficulty
from the men in power who resorted to every means to crush and
destroy him.  But through life he was always found battling for the
right; and in the history of those struggles, it appears that not
even the iron vigor of such a soldier as

Page 64.

Alexander Spotswood was in any way a match for the energy of this
peaceful servant of God, when he was once aroused to the fight.

   The story of Blair's labors in England in behalf of a charter for
a college in Virginia has been often told.  Some stories, however,
are always fresh.  When, thanks to the good offices of Dr. Stilling-
fleet,  Bishop of Worcester, and Dr. Tillotson, Archbishop of
Canterbury, the good Doctor Blair was able at length to go to
Seymour, the Attorney General, with an order from King William and
Queen Mary that the charter should be prepared, and argued to that
funtionary, who was averse to the measure, the need of a college
for the poor Virginians who "had souls to save as well as the people
of England," he was met with the coarse reply, "Souls! damn your
souls! make tobacco."  Tobacco meant gold to England, which
prospered by the trade.

   Sir Edmund Andros, at that time Governor of Virginia, was also
opposed to the charter; and the quaint literature of the period
affords curious reading of his attempts to undermine Doctor Blair's
project and defeat its consumation.(1)  Thus, it is recorded that,
in the elections for Burgesses of the Colonial Assembly, the
Governor was active in spreading the fear that increased taxes
would be the sure result of voting for a "Collegian."  He complained
of the Scotch origin of Dr. Blair, and exerted all his influence
upon those Virginians who had subscribed to the College to induce
them to withhold their subscriptions.  And when his best efforts in
this direction failed of effect, he descended to the low expediencies
of personal insult and outrage.

   Among his courtiers was young Mr. Daniel Parke, a grandfather of
that Daniel Parke of Curtis, who became famous as the first husband
of George Washington's wife.  Not unknown himself to history, Parke
is narrated to have been, at a subsequent date, the messenger 
selected to carry news of the victory of Blen-
______________
   (1)  See Perry's Historical Collections - Virginia.

Page 65.

heim to Queen Anne, and to have received her picture as a reward;
and finally to have lost his life in a tumult on the island of
Antingua, of which he had been made governor.  At this time, as
Dr. Blair relates, he was "a sparkish gentleman" around town, who
"knowing something of the art of fencing, was as ready to give a
challenge, especially before company, as the greatest Hector in
Williamsburg." (1)

   With a view to recommend himself to the Governor's favor, young
Parke undertook a crusade of insult against all friends of the
College.  He abused and challenged to mortal combat Francis 
Nicholson, who was then, though Governor of Maryland, a member of
the Board of Visitors and Governors of the institution; and at
length to vent his ill-humor against Doctor Blair personally, whose
gown protected him from challenges, he set up a claim to the pew
in church in which Mrs. Blair sat, and one Sunday "with great fury
and violence pulled her out of it in the presence of the minister
and congregation, who were greatly scandalized at this ruffian
and profane action."

   Governor Andros, however, found out that it was no light thing
to antogonize a man of the influence of Dr. Blair, who was not only
President of a college, but commissary of the Bishop of London,
member of the Virginia Council and judge of the highest court in 
the colony.

   The quarrel was referred to the Bishop of London and the Archbishop
of Canterbury.  And these prelates, in a conference at Lambeth
Palace, where Dr. Blair argued his case in a manner to confound his
enemies, fully sustained the parson president, and caused Andros
to be recalled.

   To succeed Andros, Sir Francis Nicholson, the same that had been
so badly used by Parke, was, at the instance of Dr. Blair, appointed
governor. Strange to say, however, he became an even more violent
enemy of the good President than Andros had been.  On the very
day of the publication of his commis-
_______________
   (1) Perry.

Page 66.

sion, when Dr. Blair called upon him and recommended to him, in the
name of the Bishop of London, a policy of moderation in his ad-
ministration of affairs, Nicholson hotly stopped him with the

remark:
   "G-----, I know  how to govern Virginia and Maryland better than
all the bishops in England.  If I had not hampered them in Maryland
and kept them under, I should never have been able to have governed
them."
   To which Dr. Blair replied:
   "Sir; I do not pretend to understand Maryland, but if I know of
anything of Virginia, they are a good-natured, tractable people as
any in ye world and you may do anything with them, by way of
civility, but you will never be able to manage them in that way
you speak of, by hampering and keeping them under."

   "Being thus laid aside from all opportunity of offering advice,"
Dr. Blair was quickly amazed to hear the strange stories of
Nicholson's rudeness and abusiveness to everybody in the Colony.
The loyalty of that day to prerogative was a marvel; for we are told
that Nicholsos did not hesitate to tell even the Council, composed
of the best men in Virginia, that "they were brutes, and understood
not manners, that he knew how to govern the Moors, that he would
beat them into better manners, and make them feel that he was a
Governor of Virginia."

   The company was "amazed and silent," it is said, and "this mad,
furious distracted speech," received no other rebuke,  It would be
different now.

   People sought for an explanation of this sudden change in 
Governor Nicholson, and found it thus.  A few miles from Williams-
burg, at the mouth of King's Creek, once known as "Utimaria," the
home in early colonial days of Capt. John Utie, resided Maj. Lewis
Burwell (1) and his bevy of charming daughters, one of whom
infaturated the Governor.  The first name of this
________________
   (1)  Lewis Burwell, the second of the name, who married Abigail
Smith, niece and heiress of Col. Nathaniel Bacon, of King's Creek.

Page 67.

lowland beauty is unknown; but tradition represents her as of that
ravishing type of beauty which, in another fair Virginian, roused
the anonymous poet to alliterative verse:
            "May mild, meridian moonbeams mantle me
            with laughing, lisping Lucy Lightfoot Lee."

   Moonbeams suggest lunacy, however, as well as love, and Miss
Burwell would not accept the mad Governor.  Thereupon, Nicholson
imagined that Dr. Archibald Blair, brother of the President, was
his rival, and "conceived the strongest objections to him and all
his relatives."

   He sent for President Blair and abruptly addressed him in these
words:  "Sir, your brother is a villain, and you have betrayed me."
Then, with hands uplifted to heaven, he thundered out as loud as
he could roar:  "Mr. Blair, take notice; I vow to the enternal
G------ that I will be revenged on you and all your family."


   Even the Minister of Hampton Parish, in which Major Burwell
resided, was not free from the Governor's jealousy.  The former,
who was the Rev. Stephen Fouace, came to be regarded also as a
rival: and Mr. Fouace relates how, on the occasion of a visit to
Major Burwell, who was then very ill, Nicholson set upon him in
the woods with words of bitter abuse, pulled his hat off, and so
threatened him with his pistols and swords that the minister
deemed it prudent to run away from him, "as fast as his horse could
carry him."

   Nicholson often swore that, if Miss Burwell married any other
than himself, he would cut the throats of three persons -- "the
bridegroom, the minister, and the justice that should give the
license," -- tragical language reported everywhere in the social
circles, even of London, until "the change itself rang" in the
English metropolis of Nicholson and his crazy actions.  So much
talk occurred that one of the Governor's London friends conceived
it proper to write him a letter of advice.  He besought him "not
to give the lady or her relatives any further molestation," but
"to remember that English women are the freest in

Page 68.

the world, and are not to be won by constraint, and that it was
not in Virginia as it was in some barbarous countries, where the
tender lady is often dragged into the Sultan's arms just reaking
in the blood of her nearnest relatives." (1)

   Nicholson, however, did not take the advice, but went so far as
to entertain designs on Dr. Blair's life, at one time furnishing
the boys of the Latin or Grammar School with his own pistols to
keep the President out of the College; and at another time,
stealing from the Palace at midnight to Dr. Blair's chamber door,
where only lock and key kept him from entering, and, as the latter
fully believed, from actual murder.

   But the end came at last.  The Council, consisting of Robert
Carter, James Blair, John Lightfoot, Matthew Page, Benjamin
Harrison, and Philip Ludwell, all connected with one another, so
Nicholson charged, by blood or marriage, united in an address to
Queen Anne, and the eccentric Nicholson was removed.(2)

   Then, after a brief interval, came Alexander Spotswood, a man
cast in a nobler mould than any of his predecessors.  He had
served with distinction under the Duke of Marlborough, and his
administration of public affairs was signalized by many important
public measures.  Had he attended more to the courtly maxim of
Charles II "to quarrel with no man however great might be the
provocation, since he knew not how soon he should be obliged to
act with him," that able officer might be recommended as the model
of a provincial governor,  But, says Dr. Blair, "he was so wedded
to his own notions that there was no quarter for them that went not
with him."  Spotswood got into wrangles with the Burgesses, whose
Republican spirit ill suited with his notions of prerogative, and
bcause Dr. Blair would not side with him, he exerted himself to the
utmost "to ruin me," writes the latter bitterly, "with the college
and my parish." (3)

_____________

   (1)  Perry.
   (2)  Perry.
   (3)  Ibid.

Page 69.

   The lion was once more roused in the old parson's breast, and
he returned with a gauntleted hand the blows of the veteran of
Marlborough.  The result was much the same as before Spotswood
was removed.

   After Spotswood's fall, a period of comparative peace shed its
rays upon the venerable commissary.  The college, which had been
burned in 1705, and had had many difficulties to contend with in
the labor of restoration, was now well founded in point of
habitation and educational organization.  It was under Dr. Blair's
able and virtuous administration, aided by a faculty of the ripest
scholars from Edinburgh, Oxford and Cambridge, that the fathers
of the Virginians of the Revolution learned those lessons of
sterling worth and integrity, which, engrafted on the sons, lent
such honor and distinction to Virginia.  The end of a useful life
of 89 years occured on April 18, 1743, just a half a century after
the college charter was obtained.  Gov. William Gooch thus
communicated Dr. Blair's decease to the Bishop of London:  "The
Commissary Blair died the 18th of the last month. * * * The

deceased had a rupture about forty years, and that turning to
mortification, killed him; but such was his constitution that he
struggled with the conqueror ten days after the doctor had declared
that he could not life ten hours.  He has left his books and L500
to the college, and to his nephew and his children near L10,000,
besides other small legacies." (1)

   From the death of Dr. Blair to the Revolution -- about the
interval of a generation -- there were five presidents -- Rev.
William Dawson, Rev. William Stith, Rev. Thomas Dawson, Rev.
William Yates, Rev. James Horrocks, and Rev. John Camm.  With
the probable exception of one of these, they all appear to
_______________

   (1)  For further particulars relative to Dr. Blair consult Perry,
and Sprague's "Annals of the American Pulpit."  He and his wife
were buried at Jamestown.  For inscriptions on their tombs consult
Virginia His. Papers, XI.

Page 70.

have been wise and virtuous men, who left their impress upon the
life of the colony during this period.  At the smallest estimate,
there must have been scattered abroad in Virginia, at the time of
hostilities with the mother country, 1,000 graduates of the college,
who were trained in the humanities and literature of Rome, so
calculated to foster patriotic inspiration.(1)  There would have
been many more had not dissentions in religion and politics crept
into the college during the last ten years of the period.  Unlike
the northern colleges, which continued to represent the religious
convictions of the people, William and Mary, by adhering to the
cause of the Church of England, which was daily weakening in the
Colony, with difficulty retained its patronage.  The majority of
the people in the Colony became dissenters, and though a majority
of the youth of wealth still attended the ancient seat of learning
at Williamsburg, a large minority who had chiefly embraced the new
views of religion went to the North, or to England.

   The history of John Camm, the last of the ante-Revolutionary
presidents, is very instructive to the historian in connection
with Virginia life at a critical period.  A man of high spirit and
of great talent, he was loyal to the King and Church, but un-
fortunately involved the college in the political struggles of
the times.  He it was that led the clergy in the celebrated 
"Parsons' causes" against Patrick Henry, of whom we catch some
interesting glimpses in the letters of Camm's friend, the

Commissary Robinson.(1)  A very unreasonable young man he must
have appeared in the eyes of the royalist Robinson, and Camm
looked through the same glasses.  Robinson says, that in his speech
in the Parsons' cause in Hanover county, Henry actually declared
that the King had forfeited all rights of obedience heretofore due
to him from his subjects in Virginia! and, think of it, he had
shortly after, in the House of Bur-
___________________

   (1)  The Virginians drew their inspiration from Rome and
Greece, which certainly afforded the noblest exemplars known
in those days.

Page 71.

gesses, "denounced the authority of the Parliament and King,"
and gone so far as "to compare his sacred Majesty to a Tarquin,
a Caesar, and a Charles I, not sparing insinuations that he 
wished another Cromwell to arise."

   Now, it was not in the nature of Robinson, and least of all of
John Camm, to yield to any man, and the latter had little else but

scorn for a popular orator like Henry.

   And so the battle over the rights of the clergy was fought by
Camm for many years in the courts and before the Royal Council in
England.  He abandoned the contest only when Lord North showed the
white feather and betrayed him.

   Dr. Arthur Lee accused Camm of being "the centre of all the

disaffection in the Colony," and certainly, what with his agency
in the Parsons' causes, his advocacy of Bishops in Virginia, and
his opposition to the popular move for separation from England,
there was some ground for the declaration.

   The current was all against him, however, and at length too
proud to flee and too brave to surrender, Camm was left the only
Tory in the faculty.  The visitors and governors, worn out with
strife and contentions, removed him in the Spring of 1777, and
in the year 1779 he died. (1)

   In the traditions of the college, Camm is pre-eminently known
as the "Old Parson."  Born in 1718, educated at Trinity College,
Cambridge University, he was twenty-eight years connected with
William and Mary as professor and president. (2)
__________________

   (1)  York County Records.  Appraisement of his estate 15 Feb.,
1769.  Camml eft five children Ann, Thomas, Robert, John and Eliza.
John was ancestor of Camm Patteson, a prominent member of the
Virginia Legislature.

   (2)  Extract from the Trinity College admission book:
   "June 16, 1788, Admissus Est Johannes Camm, sub. siz. fil.
   Thomae de Hornsea in Com. Ebor e Schola Beverlacensi sub Praes.
   Moi. Clarke an. nat. 20.  Tutore Uro Belman."
   Mr. Gerard F. Cobb, of Trinity College, writes that "Hornsea"
is not far from Hull, and at that time Beverely was no doubt the
educa-

Page 72.

He was a bachelor up to the mature age of 51 years, and then he
met his fate in the following remarkable manner.

   A fair Virginian, of name and kinship with the rebel Hansford,
of Bacon's day, was one of Camm's parishioners, and it is said that,
induced by a love smitten swain, he called upon her to urge the
suit of the discarded one.  Among other authorities in favor of
matrimony he invoked the Bible, which, he said, enjoined it as
one of the duties of life.  Persuasion was wasted,  however, for
the young lady declared that, if the parson would consult Chapter
XII. verse 7 of Samuel, he would note an injunction of the text,
which might suggest the reason for her refusal.  Mr. Camm went home
and "examined the scriptures," when the words stood plainly 
revealed:  "And Nathan said to David, thou art the man."  Mr.
Camm took the hint and married the young lady himself.(1)

   A memorable consequence of this action should, however, be
noticed.  According to the monastic views entertained of colleges
at this time, the president alone was authorized to enjoy the
luxury of marriage.  Camm was then a professor only, and accordingly,
the visitors fulminated(2) an order that "all profes-
_________________

tional centre for the S. Eastern district of Yorkshire.  "Sub siz"
is short for "sub sizator."  Those who could plead the "res augustae
domi" were entitled to be entered as subsizers; and paid reduced
fees, etc; they were thereby qualified to compete for the sizarships
which practically met all the expenses of their eduction."

   (1)  See Virginia Gazette for July, 1769, which annouces the
marriage of John Camm, treasurer of College of William and Mary, to
Miss Betsy Hansford.  See also, paper entitled "Hansford," by Mrs.
Annie T. Tyler, Va. Hist. Papers, Vol. XI.

   (2)  See William and Mary College historical catalogue.  Previous,
however, to the Camm episode, Thomas Robinson, master of the
Grammar school, and Rev. Richard Graham, Professor of Mathematics,
had fallen under the censure of the Visitors for alife offence.  Rev.
Thomas Robinson married, while professor, Miss Edity Tyler, sister
of John Tyler, marshal of the vice-admiralty court, and father of
the first Gov. John Tyler.  There is a tradition that Prof. Graham
married

Page 73.

sors and masters hereafter to be appointed be constant residents of
the college, and upon the marriage of such professor or master that
his professorship be immediately vacated."

   After Camm came young James Madison, a cousin of James Madison,
the President of the United States.  He had been Professor of Natural
Philosophy and Mathematics in the College, and though a student of
ministry, was an ardent friend of the Revolution and the sciences
which led in part to it.  He was as ardent a rebel as Camm a 
loyalist.  And so, when the Tory element in the Faculty lost power
by the defection of Profesors Henley and Gwatkin, who, disgusted
"with rebellious colonists and disorderly collegians" (Gwatkins
words), sailed off in 1775, to England in the company of Lady
Dunmore, this young man moved at the faculty meeting to Camm's
great disgust, that hereafter his Majesty's name should be dropped
in all Surveyor's commissions issued by the college.  Camm
entered in the faculty minutes a solemn protest against the motion,

but it was adopted despite his opposition.  (Faculty Minutes,
29, Nov. 1776).

   Afterwards, when he was made president, Madison, in conjunction
with Mr. Jefferson, a member of the "Visitors and Governors,"
carried his revolutionary spirit into the constitution of the
College, breaking down the old curriculum system of Oxford and
Cambridge and introducing in its stead the free ideas, constituting
what is known as the elective system, at the present time recognized
at nearly all American colleges.(1)  Indeed, it is related of
Madison that so strong a friend was he of free principles that
in his sermons he would never speak of Heaven as a
________________

another sister.  At any rate they were removed from their professor-
ships.  Notwithstanding, they took an appeal to the Privy Council in
England and were restored.  The only child of Prof. Robinson was
Mary Robinson, wh o married Thomas Jameson, brother to Lt. Col.
David Jameson, and had descendants of the name of Ayres and others
in the Western States.

   (1)  See "A Few Facts from the Records of William and Mary
Colledge by Lyon G. Tyler." -- American Historical Society Papers.

Page 74.

Kingdom, but as "that great Republic where there was no distinction
of rank, and where all men were free and equal."

   Nor had this grand liberalism of principle, which was induced
no doubt, in part, by the fact of his having held the chair of
the Natural Sciences, as the successor of that Dr. William Small
who, Jefferson says, "fixed his destinies in life," suffered any
considerable falling off, when in the general convention of the
Episcopal Church of the United States, at New York, in the year
1792, he introduced a proposition for a union "with all sincere
Christians," and expressed his opinion and gave his vote against
the use of the 39 articles, altogether opposing them on the 
principle of the "Confessional and other like books."  To the end
Madison remained a scientist, and as Bishop of the Episcopal
Church he lived and died the exponent of religion and the enemy
of superstition.

   I have seen his portrait -- a clean cut face, Roman nose,
penetrating eyes, lips finely wrought and firmly clasped, hair
early turned gray and standing straight upon his head -- the whole
set off by the flowing robes of his high Episcopal office.  I could
not think, however, that devoted as his life had been to William
and Mary College, the portrait would have had a finer effect, if
it had represented him in the class room lecturing on the sciences
to such Virginia boys as James Monroe, Edmund Randolph, and St.
George Tucker.  Indeed, the hundreds that went forth from his
presence, during 39 years of service as professor, and president,
continued in the manner of their living the great merits of him
whom his namesake and relative, the statesman, declared was "one
of the most deserving men that ever lived." (1)

   As Gov. Nicholson has been criticised for his hostility to
President Blair, it is but just to him to say that in the inception
of the project to build the college, he was a warm and zealous
friend.  It is to his lasting credit that in 1692, he bestowed his
houses and lots in Yorktown for the

__________________________

   (1)  For a full biography of President Madison, of William and
Mary, see Sprague's "Annals of the American Pulpit," Vol. V.

Page 75.


establishment of a free school there (York records), and by his will,
dated March 4, 1727, dedicated all his property in Virginia, New
England and Pennsylvania for missionary purposes.  York records.