Spotsylvania-Albemarle-Richmond City County Virginia USGenWeb Archives Biographies.....Massey, John E. 1819 - 1901
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Joy Fisher http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031 February 24, 2008, 12:12 am

Author: Leonard Wilson  (1916)

JOHN E. MASSEY

THE family name of Massey is Norman-French. It was derived from "Macy," a place
near Coutances, in Normandy. A man of this name followed William the Conqueror
to England, and his name appears upon the Roll of Battle Abbey. The spelling was
then "Maci." In 1086, when the Domesday Book was compiled, Hugh de Maci held
lands in Huntingdonshire, and Hamo de Maci held nine manors of Hugh Lupus in
Cheshire. These two men were the progenitors of the English Massey families,
which was the form of the name finally taken. The name remained in France, and
during the religious persecutions of the sixteenth century some Huguenot
emigrants of the name settled in London. Even down to the present day there are
two spellings-Massey and Massie, but all these are of the same stock.

    The first record that we have of any Masseys in Virginia was of Alexander,
who came over in 1635, Robert who came in 1653, and Boger who came in 1654.
Presumably these three became the founders of the Virginia families.

    The record of the Massey families was long and honorable in the Old Country.
It has not been so lengthy, but it has been equally honorable in the new
country. In the Colonial period of Virginia they seem to have been stout
churchmen. New Kent, Middlesex, Stafford and Spottsylvania were the main centers
of the family in the earlier period-though there was one strong family in
Goochland and another in Louisa. Just prior to the Revolutionary War another
branch had settled in Brunswick. On the old records, one comes upon the name
constantly among the vestrymen in the different parishes, among justices of the
peace, and as the name of "one of the leading families of Colonial Virginia"-so
says Bishop Meade.

    Space does not permit mention of more than one or two of these characters.
Rev. Lee Massey, originally a lawyer, was ordained an Episcopal clergyman in
1766. He was for twenty years or more rector of the Episcopal Parish of Truro,
in Fairfax County. One of his parishioners was General Washington, and Mr.
Massey bore testimony to the fact that General Washington was the most constant
man in his attendance upon church that he had ever known. He would allow no
social engagement, and no amount of company in his house, to keep him from
church. This Mr. Massey was a man of large form, commanding appearance and very
unusual mental qualities. He lived to the extreme age of eighty-six, and
maintained all his faculties unimpaired to the last.

    Over twenty Masseys served in the Revolutionary Army. Of these, Major Thomas
Massey, of New Kent County, at the close of the Revolutionary War, moved to
Frederick County with the Meades and some other families, and was one of the
first vestrymen of Frederick Parish. His oldest son, Dr. Thomas Massey, located
in Nelson County. Another conspicuous member of the family was General Nathaniel
Massey, of Goochland, who emigrated to Ohio and became founder of the city of
Chillicothe. He married Susan Meade, and the story of his life is told in a work
by David Meade Massey. Coming down to a later period, we come upon the figure of
the Rev. Dr. John E. Massey, preacher, farmer and statesman, who for twenty-five
years after the Civil War was one of the foremost men of the State. He rendered
service not surpassed in value by any man of his generation. He married Margaret
Ann Kable, and of this marriage was born, in Nelson County, on February 1, 1855,
the late William Walter Massey.

    John E. Massey was the son of Benjamin and Elizabeth (Chewning) Massey.
Benjamin Massey was the son of Reuben and Mary (Carter) Massey. Reuben Massey
was a resident of Spottsylvania County, and it is to that branch of the family
that the Albemarle Masseys belonged.

    Dr. Massey had an extraordinary career. He was born April 2, 1819, and died
April 24, 1901. A pronounced character must always meet opposition and
criticism, but though he lived through the most turbulent period of our national
history, he was for the last thirty years of his long and arduous life one of
the best loved men in the State of Virginia. He first practiced law but felt
called to the ministry and was ordained in 1845. As a Baptist preacher eminent
in his vocation he preached in the Valley of Virginia from Martinsburg in
Berkeley County to Lexington and established churches that have grown to be
towers of strength. The Massey blood made him also a farmer, so when, after
serving in a number of churches, his health failed, he gave up active service
and retired to a farm. After the Civil War, when Virginia was down in the dust
of defeat and poverty, and the human cormorants were trying to steal, for their
own profit, what was left in the great old Commonwealth, Dr. Massey went to the
rescue. He was known as "The Father of Readjustment." He threw himself into the
conflict with all the power of his wonderfully energetic nature, and with all of
his great ability. His purpose was to save the people of Virginia from absolute
destruction. For many years he was the center around which revolved the
bitterest fight ever known in the political life of Virginia. Sometimes
defeated, but never despairing, the great old man fought on, and lived to see
the triumph of the principles which he had advocated; and at the very end of his
life (during his last illness) the people of his county were getting ready to
send him to a new Constitutional Convention. Incidentally, during these thirty
years of political activity, he held the offices of State Auditor, State School
Superintendent, Lieutenant-Governor, and served in the General Assembly. He was
the father of the "Massey School Bill." Prolific in authorship, strong in
political debate, and always, and in all places, a man of most intense
convictions, he could not be moved from a position once taken, nor from his
opinions founded upon sound morality. The Richmond Dispatch said of him: "With
the passing of John E. Massey, Virginia loses one of her most brilliant and
interesting citizens. * * * John E. Massey was, in our opinion, the most
all-around Virginia politician of the nineteenth century. He was not only a good
office man, but he was confessedly the best stumper of his generation. * * * He
was really the father of the Readjustment movement, and he was a better
politician and a more sagacious leader than General Mahone." His autobiography
written when he was eighty years old, and edited by Elizabeth H. Hancock, is a
work of great interest to the citizens of Virginia and to all lovers of "the Old
Dominion."


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

MAKERS OF AMERICA
BIOGRAPHIES OF LEADING MEN OF THOUGHT AND ACTION

THE MEN WHO CONSTITUTE THE BONE AND SINEW OF AMERICAN PROSPERITY AND LIFE

VOLUME II

By
LEONARD WILSON,
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

ASSISTED BY PROMINENT HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL WRITERS
Illustrated with many full page engravings
B. F. JOHNSON, INC.
CITY OF WASHINGTON, U. S. A.
1916

Copyright, 1916
by
B. F. Johnson, Inc.

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