MS Kfl
 
 CENTENARY MEMORIAL 
 
 OF THE 
 
 OF 
 
 PRESS YTERIANISM 
 
 IN 
 
 WESTERN PENISILVANIA UNO PARTS ADJACENT, 
 
 CONTAINING THE HISTORICAL DISCOURSES DELIVERED AT A CONVEN- 
 TION OF THE SYNODS OF PITTSBURGH, ERIE, CLEVELAND, 
 AND COLUMBUS, HELD IN PITTSBURGH, 
 DECEMBER 7-9, 1875. 
 
 WITH APPENDICES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PITTSBURGH: 
 
 PRINTED FOR THE PUBLISHING COMMITTEE, 
 
 BY BENJAMIN SINGERLY, 74 THIRD AVENUE; 
 
 AND FOR SALE BY 
 
 W. W. WATERS, PRESBYTERIAN BOOK STORE. 
 1876.
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, In the vear 1876, by 
 
 AARON WILLIAMS, FOR THE PUBLISHING COMMITTEE, 
 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at "Washington. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 The profits from this work are to be appropriated toward the endow- 
 ment of the " Elliott Lectureship " in the Western Theological Seminary 
 at Allegheny, Pa.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 By the Chairman of the Publishing Committee. 
 
 LIFE AND LABORS OF THE REV. JOHN MCMILLAN, D.D. : 
 The Gospel he Preached, and its Influence on the Civilization of 
 
 Western Pennsylvania. 
 By DAVID X. JUNKIN, D.D. 
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY : 
 
 Early Revivals ; The " Falling Work ;" Lay-Helpers; etc. 
 By AARON WILLIAMS, D.D. 
 
 THE EDUCATIONAL HISTORY : 
 Colleges, Academies, and 'Female Seminaries. 
 
 Also, 
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 
 By JAMES I. BROWNSON, D.D. 
 
 THE MISSIONARY HISTORY, 
 Domestic and Foreign ; with Biographical Sketches of Missionaries. 
 
 By ELLIOT E. SWIFT, D.D. 
 3
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY : 
 Organization of Presbyteries and Synods; with Notices of the 
 
 Earlier Ministers. 
 By SAMUEL J. M. EATON, D.D. 
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY : 
 
 With the Early History of the First Presbyterian Church. 
 
 By WILLIAM M. DARLINGTON, ESQ. 
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY, 
 
 its Connection with the Early Presbyterian Church History of 
 
 South-western Pennsylvania. 
 
 By JAMES VEECH, LL.D. 
 
 CLOSING ADDRESS : 
 
 The Future in the Light of the Past. 
 
 By PROF. SAMUEL J. WILSON, D.D., LL.D. 
 
 APPENDICES. 
 
 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION. 
 
 GENERAL INDEX.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 JHE Centennial Memorial Convention, which assembled 
 in the First Church, Pittsburgh, December 7-9, 1875, 
 was but the last of a series of Conventions which 
 have been held at irregular intervals at Pittsburgh, for 
 conference and prayer with reference to a revival of religion among 
 the churches of this region. 
 
 In 1842 there was a convocation of ministers and elders from the 
 Synods of Pittsburgh, Wheeling, and Ohio, at which the venerable 
 Elisha Macurdy, then in the eightieth year of his age, appeared, and 
 addressed the convention with great affection and solemnity, closing 
 with this appeal, "Brethren, wake up! Talk to sinners kindly, 
 affectionately, frequently, and God will pour out his Spirit. I have 
 no doubt but God is ready to pour out his Spirit if we will do our 
 duty. Farewell, brethren, and may God be with you." 
 
 This convention was followed by large outpourings of the Spirit 
 of God. 
 
 Again, in December, 1857, the ministry and eldership were con- 
 vened from a radius of two hundred miles. They met, as before, 
 in the First Church. During some of the sessions the whole assem- 
 blage was in tears, and old men and strong men were almost speech- 
 less with emotion. That convention was followed by a mighty 
 revival, which overspread this country during the ensuing Avinter 
 and through the following year. Out of it grew the "world's 
 concert of prayer," on the first week of January, which was first 
 proposed at Lodiana, India, by the missionaries of the Presbyterian 
 Board, "having (as they say) been greatly refreshed by what we 
 have heard of the Lord's dealings in America." 
 
 5
 
 INTRO D UCTION. 
 
 A convention was also held at Pittsburgh, in January (15-17), 
 1861, at which about three hundred ministers and elders were in 
 attendance, representing the region of country embraced in the 
 "four Synods." It was a refreshing season of conference and 
 prayer. An excellent pastoral letter, prepared by Dr. Jacobus, was 
 adopted and sent forth to be read in the churches, many of which 
 were richly blessed during the ensuing year. 
 
 Another convention was held, commencing February 12, 1867, 
 in Pittsburgh, composed of representations of twenty Presbyteries 
 embraced in the four Synods of Pittsburgh, Allegheny, Wheeling, 
 and Ohio. This was also called a centennial, having special refe- 
 rence to the missionary visit of Rev. Charles Beatty and Rev. George 
 Duffield to this region about one hundred years before, by appoint- 
 ment of the Synod of New York and Philadelphia. The date of 
 this convention, however, was too late for a proper centennial, the 
 first visit of Charles Beatty to Fort Duquesne, and his preaching 
 there, having taken place in 1758, and his later visit above men- 
 tioned in 1766. At this convention the histories of several of the 
 Presbyteries were read by persons previously appointed to prepare 
 them ; and a standing committee was appointed, consisting of Rev. 
 Charles C. Beatty, D.D., LL.D., as chairman, to secure the prepa- 
 ration of a " memorial volume," which should record the history of 
 Presbyterianism in Western Pennsylvania during the preceding 
 century. Owing to the growing infirmities of the venerable chair- 
 man, Rev. Dr. James I. Brownson, of Washington, a member of 
 the committee, became the acting chairman. Several brethren were 
 appointed to prepare the different parts of the proposed history, 
 and entered upon their work. But the enterprise was at length 
 abandoned, or rather postponed, for two reasons, (ist) it was felt 
 that the more appropriate time for such a centennial as was proposed, 
 would be the year 1875, tn i g being the anniversary of Rev. John 
 McMillan's advent to this region and becoming the first settled 
 pastor. And (ad) no arrangement had been made in the way of 
 funds to meet the expense of publication, and the committee could 
 not undertake it at their own risk. This convention was also fol- 
 lowed, as the preceding ones had been, with rich blessings upon 
 many of the churches during the ensuing year. 
 
 The year 1875 having arrived, the watchful acting chairman of
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the memorial committee took measures for carrying out the purposes 
 of the convention of 1867. At a meeting of the Alumni Associa- 
 tion of the Western Theological Seminary, held in Allegheny, April 
 22d, the subject was brought up, and Rev. Messrs. Aaron Williams, 
 (made chairman at Dr. Brownson's request), James I. Brownson, 
 James Allison, S. J. M. Eaton, and George Hill, were appointed a 
 committee of arrangements to take the necessary measures for 
 calling a centennial memorial convention, within this year, to cele- 
 brate the planting of Presbyterianism in Western Pennsylvania by 
 John McMillan and his co-laborers ; and to secure the delivery of 
 appropriate historical discourses, which should compose the Memo- 
 rial Volume contemplated by the previous convention. The four 
 Synods of Pittsburgh, Erie, Cleveland, and Columbus, were to be 
 invited to join in holding this convention. The committee met in 
 May, and, finding some changes necessary in the list of writers 
 previously appointed, proceeded to reconstruct the list of authors 
 by reappointing those who were most available, and adding others. 
 The result of these arrangements the reader has before him in the 
 present volume. The committee commend the work to the churches 
 as a memorial of what our fathers' God has done for us during the 
 last hundred years, and to the blessing of Him in whose covenant 
 
 favor we confide. 
 
 A. W.
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Rev. JOHN MCMILLAN, D.D. 
 
 Rev. JOSEPH PATTERSON. 
 
 Rev. FRANCIS HERRON, D.D. 
 
 DAVID ELLIOTT, D.D!, LL.D. 
 
 CHARLES C. BEATTY, D.D., LL.D. 
 
 CANONSBURG ACADEMY (formerly Jefferson College). 
 
 WASHINGTON and JEFFERSON COLLEGE. 
 
 THE OLD WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY (present building). 
 
 BEATTY HALL AND LIBRARY HALL. 
 
 STEUBENVILLE SEMINARY. 
 
 PENNSYLVANIA FEMALE COLLEGE (East End, Pittsburgh) ,
 
 THE LIFE AND LABORS 
 
 REV. JOHN MCMILLAN, D.D. 
 
 THE GOSPEL WHICH HE PREACHED, AND ITS INFLUENCE 
 UPON THE CIVILIZATION OF WEST PENNSYLVANIA. 
 
 A DISCOURSE 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. D. X. JUNKIN, D.D.
 
 THE LIFE AND LABORS 
 
 OF 
 
 REV. JOHN M C MILLAN, D.D. 
 
 Deut. xxxii. 7. Remember the days of old, consider the years of many 
 generations : ask thy father, and he will show thee ; thy elders, and they 
 will tell thee. 
 
 IJUMAN progress is entirely dependent upon the memory. 
 By this power the mind retains or recalls knowledge 
 once acquired, and thus garners the materials of 
 thought, comparison, and deduction. Memory is at 
 once the recorder of the intellect and the storehouse of the affections. 
 Without this faculty of mind, man would be a perpetual novice his 
 past a blank, his future imbecility indeed he would not be man. 
 Without memory, science and art would perish. 
 
 What memory is to the individual, history is to social man. 
 " History," said one, " is the memory of nations." It teaches 
 philosophy by example and experience. It gathers light from the 
 past to shed upon the future, and to con its lessons is a dictate both 
 of reason and of revelation ; for, whilst it increases the sum of 
 human knowledge, it kindles a virtuous emulation of deeds benefi- 
 cent and great, inspires gratitude to the God of history, and pro- 
 claims his glory. 
 
 It was doubtless from considerations of this kind that Moses reca- 
 
 discourse is an abridgment of the one previously delivered at 
 Pigeon Creek and Chartiers, the pastoral charge of Dr. McMillan. 
 II
 
 12 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 pitulated the history of Israel, and enjoined, as he did in this text, 
 its rehearsal in every generation " Remember the days of old, con- 
 sider -the years of many generations," etc. Although this passage and 
 its context is richly suggestive, I propose not to detain you with a 
 full discussion of it, and I shall make no further use of it, except 
 to vindicate, by divine authority, the propriety of celebrations like 
 the present, and the duty of studying the history of God's pro- 
 vidence especially such events as relate to the Church of Christ 
 and to the interests of civilization and regulated liberty. 
 
 The holy nation, and almost all others, have associated important 
 events in their history, not only with monumental erections, but 
 with memorial days, anniversaries, jubilees, and centenaries. For 
 this, in your speaker's judgment, we have divine authority in our 
 text and numerous other Scriptures. We are exhorted, perhaps 
 commanded, to " remember the days of old." 
 
 History, when truthful, is a narrative of God's providence ; and 
 he who fails to recognize " God in history" has no adequate con- 
 ception of it. The//(9/ of the vast drama of time, of which history 
 is but the successive acts and scenes, -was, planned by the divine mind. 
 He shapes the destiny of nations. He decrees the rise and fall of 
 empires. He is " King of kings." His glorious purposes ever 
 in view, He provides instruments best ^adapted to. their accomplish- 
 ment. When social tempests rage, He 
 
 " Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm." 
 
 And if it be our duty to know God in his being, perfections, and 
 works, it is our duty to " remember the days of oFd, and consider 
 the years of many generations." 
 
 This brief discussion of our text will suffice to exhibit its mean- 
 ing, and opens the way, whilst it supplies an apology, for a glance 
 at the history of our Church in this region ; and especially for a 
 sketch of the life and labors of the venerable man whom I have 
 been requested to commemorate. 
 
 The pioneers of Pennsylvania M'ere a race of men better qualified 
 to make history than to write it. The axe, the mattock, the plough, 
 and the rifle, were implements with which they were more familiar 
 than with the pen. Having to struggle with the forest, with wtfd 
 beasts, and with savage men, they performed heroic deeds worthy
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMILLAN, D.D. '3 
 
 of historical record ; but they had no leisure or facilities for re- 
 cording them ; and it is difficult to rescue from the dim traditions 
 and the imperfect records of the times the story of their toils and 
 prowess and sufferings, worthy to be written in imperishable lines. 
 
 If the civil and military enterprises of a new country are difficult 
 to ascertain and verify, it is still more difficult to trace the found- 
 ing, in a frontier country, of that kingdom which " cometh not 
 with observation." The physical development of a country the 
 felling of the forest the building of cabins and towns the opening 
 of roads the struggle with savage foes the burning of dwellings 
 the murder or captivity of neighbors are events that impress them- 
 selves upon the common memory and become the traditions of a 
 settlement, and are recited by the parents to the children at a thou- 
 sand firesides, and are often recorded in letters and newspapers. 
 But the quiet rearing of the first family altars in forest homes the 
 first gathering for social worship beneath the forest shades the first 
 readings of the Holy Book the first echoes of the voice of prayer 
 and praise from the grand old hills the first advent of the mission- 
 ary of the cross the noiseless planting of the seeds of piety, 
 which afterwards grow into congregations of the Lord these, be- 
 cause less exciting, are less clearly remembered. 
 
 Still, there is much material for the church history of Western 
 Pennsylvania far more than could be compressed into a single 
 discourse of reasonable length; and, as the theme assigned me is 
 biographical rather than historical, I shall introduce general history 
 only so far as my specific subject may demand. 
 
 On the 25th day of July, 1775, two mounted men might have 
 been seen slowly riding over the Laurel Hill. The path was almost 
 impracticable, the day was sultry, and both horses and riders gave 
 proofs of weariness. Their equipage was such as was usual at that 
 early period saddle, bridle, capacious leather saddle-bags, corduroy 
 over-alls, with overcoats strapped upon the saddle-pad behind the 
 riders. About noon they arrived at the cabin of a Mr. Barker, 
 near the western base of Laurel Hill. At that point the travelers 
 part company, their routes leading in different directions. One 
 of them tarried at Mr. Barker's till five o'clock in the afternoon, in 
 order to obtain the convoy of that settler to the next house, about 
 thirty miles distant. The person thus awaiting convoy through the
 
 14 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 wilderness was a young man not yet twenty-three years old, of 
 slender but well knit frame, a little above medium height, o c 
 rather dark complexion, of grave and comely, but not very hand- 
 some features, and of a demeanor that betokened earnestness and 
 energy of character beyond his years. He was dressed in the garb 
 usual with clergymen of the period, now dusty from the moil of 
 travel. 
 
 This young man had been licensed to preach the Gospel, nine 
 months before, by the Presbytery of New Castle, at East Notting- 
 ham, in Chester county. 
 
 From that date he had been itinerating in preaching the Gospel, 
 first in the vacancies of his own Presbytery, and then in different 
 places in Augusta and Rockbridge counties in Virginia. In July 
 he crossed the mountain from Staunton to the head of Tygert's 
 valley, and bent his way to the Northwest, preaching in the settle- 
 ments through which he passed, until he arrived at the western 
 base of Laurel Hill, as already stated. 
 
 At five o'clock on the evening of that 25th of July, under the 
 guidance of Mr. Barker, the youthful preacher set forth on his way 
 to the part of the country which was to be the field of his life-long 
 and valuable labors. "Nothing remarkable happened," says he in 
 his journal, "save that Mr. Barker shot a doe, part of which we 
 carried with us. Night coming on, and being far from any house, 
 we were forced to lodge in the woods. We sought for a place where 
 there was water, unsaddled our horses, and hobbled them with 
 hickory bark, and turned them to the hills. We then made a fire, 
 roasted a part of our venison, and took our supper. About ten 
 o'clock we composed ourselves to rest. I wrapped myself in my 
 greatcoat and laid me on the ground, with my saddle-bags for a 
 pillow." Such was the first night spent in Western Pennsylvania 
 by the man who was to prove her chief Apostle. Let us trace him 
 from that night in the woods, until he reached the scene of his 
 nearly sixty years' toil. 
 
 "THURSDAY. This morning we rose very early, ate our break- 
 fast, got our horses, and set to the road again. About noon we 
 arrived at Ezekiel York's (doubtless ' the next house ' before men- 
 tioned). Here my companion left .me, and I had to take to the 
 woods alone. Crossed two hills, which in some parts of the world
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMILLAN, D.D. 13 
 
 would be called mountains, and after traveling what they called 
 twelve miles, came to the glades. My lodging this night was not 
 much better than last night. I had a deerskin and a sheet under 
 me, and a pillow for my head. This, however, I placed under my 
 haunch, to keep rny bones from the floor, and I placed my coat 
 under my head." "Friday," continues his journal, "I left the 
 glades and traveled ten miles, to one Coburn's. Here I got some 
 grain for my horse the first since Wednesday morning. They 
 told me that I was about ten miles from Col. Wilson's, where I in- 
 tended to tarry the rest of the week ; but the day being wet, the 
 road difficult, and houses scarce, I lost my way often. About 
 sunset I came to a cabin, but it was waste. I searched all about, 
 but could find no inhabitants. I then took another path, and 
 reached another cabin; but there was nobody at home, and the 
 door was barred. I went further along the path, but found no 
 shelter. The night being dark and very rainy, I returned to the 
 forenamed cabin, turned my horse into a field, climbed the wall of 
 the cabin, and went into a hole in the roof that served for a chim- 
 ney. I then opened the door, brought in my saddle, kindled a fire, 
 laid myself down on a sort of a bed, and slept very contentedly 
 till morning. I then buckled on my wet clothes, got my horse, and 
 set out, not knowing which way to steer. But before I had gone 
 many rods, I met the owner of the cabin, told him the story, got 
 directions of the road, and came to Col. Wilson's in time for break- 
 fast." 
 
 On the first Sabbath of August he preached at Mount Moriah to 
 a small congregation. This was his first sermon in Western Penn- 
 sylvania ; and after mentioning the smallness of the audience, he 
 adds: "However, they seemed attentive, and some tears were 
 shed." Those tears were the harbingers of copious showers, after- 
 wards shed under the preaching of the same earnest lips ; and that 
 sermon was the first link in a series which reached on for more 
 than- half a century. 
 
 Returned the same evening to Wilson's, the young preacher 
 remained there till Wednesday, August 4th. Thence we can trace 
 him, by his journal, from point to point, preaching and visiting, 
 until on Saturday, the 2ist of August, he arrived at Mr. John 
 McDowell's, on Chartiers Creek, where, on the following day, he
 
 {6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 preached his first sermon on that field of his life-labor. Previous 
 to his arriving there, he had visited a number of settlers with whom 
 he had been acquainted east of the mountains, one of them his 
 brother-in-law. These settlers were doubtless from Chester county. 
 On the next day he rode to Patrick McCullough's, on Pigeon Creek, 
 and on Tuesday, the 24th, preached his first sermon in that part 
 of his future charge, at the house of Arthur Forbes. 
 
 Such was the time, and such the circumstances, of the first ad- 
 vent of the great and good JOHN MCMILLAN to Western Penn- 
 sylvania, and to the churches of Chartiers and Pigeon Creek, in 
 which he was the instrument of a work which told so mightily 
 upon the interests of religion, education, and civilization in this 
 western region. 
 
 JOHN McMiLLAN sprung from that sturdy, earnest, godly, and 
 liberty-loving race, the Scotch-Irish. His parents, William and 
 Margaret (Rea) McMillan, emigrated from the North of Ireland to 
 Chester county, Pa., about 1742, and settled at Fagg's Manor, 
 where she died when the subject of this sketch was but ten years 
 old. He was born on the nth of November, 1752. Like Elka- 
 nah and Hannah, his pious parents had devoted him, in purpose 
 and in prayer, to the Gospel ministry. Having lost an infant son, 
 they solemnly vowed that, if God would give them another son 
 they would call him by the same name (John), and devote him, God 
 willing, to the sacred office. The son was given, the vow was ful- 
 filled, and, as we shall see, the child thus devoted was made the 
 instrument, like the forerunner of our Lord, of turning many to 
 the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the 
 Lord. 
 
 Trained in the family and in the school of the vicinage, he made 
 good progress in primary studies, and in due time entered the 
 Fagg's Manor Academy, then under the direction of that eminent 
 divine and educator, Dr. John Blair. In that school were trained 
 many men who in their day attained eminence, such as Davies, 
 Cummins, Robert Smith, James Finley, Dr. John Rodgers, and 
 others. At that academy young McMillan continued, until its 
 principal, Dr. Blair, was called to Princeton College. He then, 
 at about the age of fifteen, repaired to the grammar school of 
 Pequea, in Lancaster county, and pursued his studies under that
 
 THE REV. JOHN AfcMILLAN, D.D. 
 
 learned scholar and theologian, Dr. Robert Smith. Your present 
 speaker, in his earlier life, saw the scenes of McMillan's training, 
 much as they were a hundred years ago. The churches, forty years 
 ago, were substantial stone structures, the pulpits in the side 
 instead of the end of the building, and with the straight high- 
 backed pews of the most orthodox type. Then, and very likely 
 yet, these ancient churches were surrounded by the grand old 
 forest trees, beneath which the red man had strayed ; and at Pequea 
 the tree was pointed out under which George Whitefield had 
 preached. 
 
 Young McMillan continued at Pequea until the spring of 1770, 
 when he entered the College of New Jersey, then under the presi- 
 dency of that great scholar, theologian, statesman, and patriot, Dr. 
 JOHN WITHERSPOON, the vice-president being Dr. Blair, formerly 
 of Fagg's Manor. Previous to entering college young McMillan 
 had been the subject of religious impressions, under the ministry 
 of such men as Blair and Smith, and had united with the church. 
 
 But whilst a student at Princeton, his religious views and expe- 
 rience assumed a much more clear and satisfactory type, particu- 
 larly during a season of revival in the college, which occured not 
 long after he entered it. He was then eighteen years old, and seems 
 to have shared largely in the spiritual blessing. In his manuscript 
 notes, he says, in regard to this season : "At one time there were 
 not more than two or three of the students that were not under 
 serious impressions. On a day which had been set apart by some 
 of the students as a day of fasting and prayer, while the others 
 were at dinner I retired to my study, and while trying to pray, 
 I got some discoveries of divine things which I never had before. 
 I now saw that the Divine law was not only holy, just, and spirit- 
 ual, but also that it was good, and that conformity to it would 
 make me happy. I felt no disposition to quarrel with the law, but 
 with myself, because I was not conformed to it. I felt it now easy 
 to submit to the Gospel plan of salvation, and felt a calm and a 
 serenity of mind to which I had hitherto been a stranger. And 
 this was followed by a delight in contemplating the divine glory, 
 in all His works ; and, in meditating upon the divine perfections, 
 I thought I could see God in everything around me.*' 
 
 In this brief quotation are disclosed the elements of McMillan's 
 B
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 future power and wide-spread influence for good. In that narrow 
 study in old Nassau Hall, which seven years afterwards trembled 
 with the roar of battle, and was partly consumed by British van- 
 dalism in that narrow study, and at that noontide hour, in the 
 soul of that young suppliant on his knees, were sown the seed of 
 lofty principles and mighty impulses, which grew with his growth 
 and strengthened with his strength, and made him the hero that he 
 was. Then was laid by the same Spirit who hath garnished the 
 heavens, the broad and deep foundations of John McMillan's great- 
 ness and marvellous influence for good. Then were shed abroad 
 in his heart the grand impulses which bore him forward in study, 
 in labor, in toil, and hardship, and through trials and dangers that 
 might appal the stoutest heart. And in that young student's soul 
 that day were planted the grand principles of religion and of regu- 
 lated liberty, the dissemination and development of which, by him 
 and his fellow-laborers, among the brave and hardy settlers of this 
 region, have laid the broad and stable foundations of our Christian 
 civilization, and made Western Pennsylvania a great, glorious, and 
 prosperous community. . . 
 
 The Gospel which, in that hour of fasting and secret prayer, 
 was more fully shed abroad in that young student's heart, was not 
 the mawkish, sentimental, emasculated Gospel, which is so rife and 
 popular in certain quarters in our day. It is not a Gospel which 
 disregards law prostrates all distinction between right and wrong 
 esteems the righteous and the wicked as equally worthy and safe 
 softens the lurid flames of Hell to the faintest rose color palsies 
 the restraints of law by scoffing at its penalties; enfeebles the 
 moral tone of the community by holding up manhood, instead 
 of Godhood, as the standard of right ; abates the abhorrence of 
 sin, by denying that it cost the atoning blood of the Son of God, 
 and boasts that men do not need that blood. It was not a Gospel 
 that teaches men that its provisions are a sort of insolvent law, 
 in which God lets down the high claims of eternal justice to the level 
 of man's shattered abilities, and consents to accept a percentage 
 of the duties which men owe to God and to the rule of right, 
 instead of a perfect satisfaction. It was not a Gospel that substi- 
 tutes man's putrid "inwardness" for the moral law, as a rule of 
 life. It was not a Gospel which fosters, instead of eradicating,
 
 THE REV, JOHN McMILLAN, D.D. 
 
 the lusts of our corrupt nature, and bears such fruit as has re- 
 cently emitted its fetid odors from a Brooklyn Court. No, my 
 countrymen, the Gospel which won the hearts of John McMillan 
 and James Power, and Joseph Smith, and Thaddeus Dod, and Mat- 
 thew Henderson,* and the other godly and self-denying men, of 
 our own and other branches of the great Presbyterian family, who 
 were the pioneer preachers of this region, was a Gospel that teaches 
 men to fear God as well as to love Him to reverence law as the 
 exponent of the will of the Supreme to aim to satisfy the claims 
 of law, by accepting the suretyship of Christ, who has in our stead 
 obeyed its precept and endured its penalty a Gospel that makes 
 men feel that they are under the law to Christ, and sweetly drawn 
 to obey it, as a rule of life, by the impulse of love and gratitude. 
 It is a Gospel that "magnifies law and makes it honorable," not by 
 the prostration of its penalities, and defeating its requirements, but 
 by a complete satisfaction of both, through the obedience unto death 
 of the God-man, our Surety and Redeemer. The Gospel which 
 McMillan learned and taught proposed no abatement of the high 
 claims of justice no compromise with sin, and relinquished no de- 
 mand for perfect obedience to law. But it pointed to the "Lamb 
 of God who taketh away the sin of the world" not by an absolute 
 pardon, which would only encourage rebellion, but by an atoning obe- 
 dience and sacrifice, which paid the sinner's debt, and at the same 
 time demonstrated that God was so determined to punish sin that he 
 would not spare his beloved son, when he stood charged even with 
 imputed guilt. It was a Gospel which exibited at once "the good- 
 ness and severity of God" a Gospel which demonstrates by the 
 most terrible tragedy of time, that it is of the essential nature of 
 God to vindicate justice by punishing sin, whilst it girdles his throne 
 with the rainbow of mercy and of hope. It is a Gospel of peace, 
 originating in eternal love, but based upon the rock of eternal jus- 
 tice a Gospel that slays the sinner's enmity and wins him to obedi- 
 ence, by demonstrating God's love to the sinner in the death of Jesus 
 a Gospel that provides a propitiation (forgiveness), but only that 
 its author may be feared ' ; because it proves that God never forgives 
 
 * Matthew Henderson was the first Associate Presbyterian Minister 
 in West Pennsylvania. He labored at Chartiere near Canonsburg in 
 what is now the U. P. congregation of that place.
 
 20 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 until it is right and safe to forgive. In short, it is a gospel that gives 
 "glory to God in the highest, on earth peace and good will to 
 men. " 
 
 Such was the Gospel which at that noontide hour flooded the 
 mind of the youthful McMillan with a light "above the brightness 
 of the sun." Like the monk of Erfurth, it came to him in his 
 solitary cell. Like the Apostle Paul, it came to him "about noon;" 
 and it is not an uninteresting coincidence that the Apostle of the 
 Gentiles and the Apostle of Western Pennsylvania received this 
 fresh baptism about the same hour of the day. Paul's illumination 
 was preternatural McMillan's by the ordinary operation of the 
 Spirit of Grace; and if the former was called to a more magnificent 
 and world-wide work, the latter was called to a mission the re- 
 sults of which no human arithmetic can measure. 
 
 We have dwelt longer upon this crisis in our hero's history, be- 
 cause, as we judge, it contains the seeds of things the embryo of 
 that mighty influence which God, through this good man, exerted 
 upon the growing population of this region, and which He continues 
 to exert throughout the vast West. Into his young heart, at that 
 crisis in his history, was poured the light of that Gospel which he 
 and his fellow-evangelists brought across the Alleghenies and planted 
 amid the grand old forests of Western Pennsylvania a Gospel 
 whose real believers will lie abased, before their God, whilst they 
 spurn the yoke of man a Gospel which draws men to God- and to 
 duty "with cords of love" that teaches them to respect the rights of 
 others, and defend their own that inculcates the true elements of 
 law, order, and regulated liberty and a Gospel whose outgrowth, 
 into a formulated church government, as naturally produces RE- 
 PRESENTATIVE REPUBLICANISM as does the development of the acorn 
 the oak. The great ideas of social federation, representation, 
 trust, responsibility, social duty, and accountability to God, are all 
 taught in the Calvinistic theory of the Gospel ; and all these are 
 necessary elements of a true civilization and of civil liberty. And 
 if our noble commonwealth has exhibited a model representative 
 democratic government, which her younger sister states have been 
 glad to copy, and which challenges the admiration of the world, she 
 owes i % t to the doctrines of evangelical religion ; and it is a matter 
 of history, that Presbyterian men exercised a controlling influence
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMlLLAN, D.D. 
 
 in shaping the fundamental law and the jurisprudence of our com- 
 monwealth. 
 
 And it is a matter of gratulation, that the seed sown by McMillan 
 and his compeers has taken such deep root, in the region of which 
 this city is the metropolis, and has produced so sturdy and prolific 
 a crop that, at the close of a century after their advent, the de- 
 scendants of the pioneers maintain, with unswerving firmness, the 
 principles and institutions of their fathers. West Pennsylvania still 
 contains "the backbone of Prcsbyterianism." And, as an index of 
 this, it is but just to say that the local organ of our Church in 
 this city (and it is but the echo of the unswerving conservatism of 
 our people) has firmly maintained sound doctrine and -civil and 
 ecclesiastical order, and has never truckled to the loose morality 
 and the corrupt liberalism of the times. It has never failed to 
 rebuke, in terms just and explicit, that morbid tolerance of error 
 and social corruption, which springs from the fact that their abet- 
 tors are rich and fashionable, or their authors men of genius and 
 popular talents. 
 
 But to resume our narrative. Mr. McMillan graduated in the fall 
 of 1772, and returned to Pequea and prosecuted theological study 
 under Dr. Robert Smith, as did many of Dr. Smith's former stu- 
 dents, from time to time, as there were then no theological semina- 
 ries in the country. In due time he was received under the care of 
 the Presbytery of New Castle, and, after the usual trials, licensed 
 to preach the Gospel, as already stated. This occurred before he 
 was quite twenty-two years of age. We have already traced his 
 journey and his labors, until he arrived upon the field of his life work. 
 
 In order to a full appreciation of the labors of McMillan and his 
 compeers, it would be necessary to exhibit the state of this country, 
 and of its sparse inhabitants, at the time of their advent. This 
 would swell the present discourse beyond due limits, and might 
 trespass upon fields allotted to others of my learned friends , who 
 are to take part in this celebration. I will only call attention, then, 
 to those marvellous movements of Divine Providence, by which this 
 region was reserved to become the home of Presbyterians. 
 
 At one time it seemed likely that the lilied flag of France 
 would wave from Quebec to New Orleans, over the Canadas and 
 the vast valley of the Mississippi symbol of the power of the
 
 Sit PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Bourbons, and protector of the Popish religion. At another time, 
 under the auspices of the Ohio Company, of which the Washing- 
 ton family were active members, there was a prospect that this region 
 would be settled by Germans, and that the language of Luthei 
 would here prevail. But God had other purposes; and this land was 
 reserved for the occupancy of that race which, having migrated, for 
 conscience' sake, from North Britain to Ulster, had stood, at Derry 
 and on the banks of the Boyne, for the Protestant religion and 
 the liberties of the world. 
 
 It was a kind and wondrous Providence by which, the power of 
 France was swept from the vast region which they once claimed, 
 and by which the scarlet woman was kept from rearing her altars 
 and establishing her persecuting power in this magnificent domain. 
 It was a wondrous Providence that reserved for the Scotch and 
 Scotch-Irish Presbyterians a home in this grand region, and com- 
 mitted to their rude but honest hands the chief part in laying the 
 foundations and shaping the structure of our institutions, civil and 
 religious. 
 
 The main events, civil and military, which secured this result, 
 are known to the tyro in our history. The French were expelled. 
 The honest Germans would not settle in a region over which 
 Episcopacy claimed rule and tithes (for Virginia claimed this re- 
 gion at the time Lawrence Washington was negotiating for German 
 emigrants, and Episcopacy was the established religion of the old 
 Dominion), and thus it was that West Pennsylvania was reserved 
 for the Scotch-Irish. 
 
 We have not space to describe the slow and difficult process by 
 which these western counties were settled. The population was 
 still sparse when Mr. McMillan arrived. The people were still 
 grappling with the forests, and endangered by savage foes. No 
 more interesting historical field is afforded in our country than is 
 West Pennsylvania. The simple facts connected with its settle- 
 ment, its defence against the French and the Indians, and its pro- 
 gressive development, transcend in interest the stories of romance. 
 From the time that the first traders visited this region, as early as 
 1715 or 1720, on to the date of the advent of the first permanent 
 white settler, Christopher Gist, in 1752, its history is one of thril 
 ling interest ; and illustrates, in the most wonderful manner, the
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMILLAX, D.D. 23 
 
 grand unity of that scheme of Divine providence, the record of 
 which makes up the drama of human history. The visit of a young 
 Virginian to Venango Le Boeuf, and the forks of the Ohio, the next 
 year after Christopher Gist's settlement, constitutes a link in one of 
 the most stupendous chains of human events which history records. 
 Gist accompanied this young man on this important journey; and, on 
 their return, the youth narrowly escaped death by an Indian bullet, 
 in what is now Butler county ; and was near perishing the next day 
 in the swollen waters of the Allegheny, a short distance above where 
 this city now stands. But God preserved him then, and subsequently, 
 to become the FATHER of his Country, and to give to history its 
 
 most ILLUSTRIOUS NAME. 
 
 On his way out, that youth had cast his military eye over ' ' the 
 Point," the future site of Forts Duquesne and Pitt; and, when he 
 returned to Williamsburg, he made such a report of the military 
 importance of the position as induced Governor Dinwiddie to send 
 Capt. Trent, the next year, with a company of soldiers, to take 
 possession of this locality and erect a fort. Trent arrived on 
 the i yth of February, 1754, took military possession of the site 
 of the future Pittsburgh, and commenced the erection of a fort; 
 but before it was completed, it was, on the i?th of April, be- 
 leagured by Contracoeur with a large body of French and Indians. 
 These came down the Allegheny river in about one thousand 
 canoes and batteaus. Trent being absent, his lieutenant, Ward, 
 was constrained to capitulate, and returned to Virginia. And 
 thus, on the site of this city, began, a century and a quarter 
 ago, that memorable conflict, the old French war, which sent its 
 thunders into every quarter of the globe, sent desolation along 
 our frontiers, and resulted in sweeping the lilies of France from 
 the vast domain which she claimed in Canada and the valleys of 
 the Ohio and Mississippi. 
 
 Previous to this war, a few settlers had arrived some from Mary- 
 land, some from Virginia, but much greater numbers from Cum- 
 berland, Franklin, and other counties of Pennsylvania. But they 
 had nearly all abandoned their rude homes, upon the commencement 
 of that war. After the peace of 1762, many of them returned, 
 and the tide of the immigration, notwithstanding the alarms and 
 horrors of Pontiac's war, became steady, and many flocked to this
 
 24 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 region some from other colonies, but chiefly from the parts of 
 Pennsylvania which had been settled by the Scotch-Irish, and also 
 from Ireland itself. 
 
 Like Gideon's men, the pioneers were select selected by a pro- 
 cess somewhat similar. None but the hardy, the brave, the rough 
 and ready, the self-denying and adventurous, would be likely, 
 voluntarily, to encounter the toils and perils of the wilderness. 
 The Scotch-Irish Presbyterians preponderated, although consider- 
 able numbers of German descent and some from other colonies 
 mingled with them. They were of the middle class in society, 
 which is removed alike from the effeminacy of the wealthy and the 
 indolence and ignorance of the lower strata. Whatever the Pres- 
 byterian immigrant might be forced to leave behind, he brought 
 with him to his forest home the Bible and Shorter Catechism, and, 
 long before there were any ministers, or organized congregations, or 
 public worship, many a cabin in the wold resounded with the 
 voices of praise and prayer. 
 
 At the time of McMillan's advent, Pittsburgh was an irregular 
 village. The country was a wilderness. A dense and majestic fo- 
 rest reared its countless sturdy columns and tossed its stalwart branches 
 over this broad expanse of hill and valley, broken only here and there 
 by "a deadening" or incipient clearing. The roads were rough and 
 often dangerous, mere bridle-paths, almost impracticable for any con- 
 veyance except the pack-horse. The rude log cabin, with its clap- 
 board roof and doors, its earthen, or at best its puncheon floor, and 
 rough and sylvan furniture, was the settler's home. Salt, iron, glass, 
 powder, shot, and all such necessaries, had to be brought over the 
 mountains on pack-horses. Their food consisted of the products of 
 the soil, prepared with the rudest appliances, to which milk, pork, 
 venison, and other fruits of the chase were added. Their clothing, 
 after the garments brought with them were worn out, was largely of 
 their own manufacture. Flaxen cloth and linsey-woolsey constitut- 
 ed the garments of the women and the hunting shirts of the men, 
 whilst buckskin was a staple both for moccasins and dress. As many 
 as nineteen bridegrooms have been known to be married in the same 
 blue cloth coat, the only dress coat in as many wedding parties, which 
 was made to do duty, by fair sale or generous loan, for several years. 
 Their manners and customs were as simple and unostentatious as
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMILLAN, D.D. 
 
 their attire. A frank hospitality marked their intercourse with neigh- 
 bors and with strangers. A sound morality, a simple honesty, and 
 often, too, decided piety, imparted lofty character to the pioneers. 
 Their women were worthy of such husbands, and worthy to be the 
 mothers of the generations which, under blander auspices, have de- 
 scended from them. They were heroines in their sphere, and many 
 a deed of daring was performed by woman's hand in those trying 
 times. 
 
 It was to such a wilderness land, and to such a brave, thoughtful, 
 and unsophisticated people that John McMillan and his fellow-labo- 
 rers came an hundred years ago. 
 
 After his first visit to Chartiers and Pigeon Creek, he preached at 
 several points in this region, and amongst others at Fort Pitt, where 
 he spent the second Sabbath of September. Thence he returned to 
 his father's house in Fagg's Manor, which he reached in October, 
 1775. He then attended Presbytery, and was appointed to go on 
 another missionary tour, to the valley of Virginia, and thence west- 
 ward ; and we can trace his progress, by the help of his journal, 
 through Maryland, Virginia, and over the bleak Alleghanies, in the 
 depth of winter, till he again arrives at Pigeon Creek, on the fourth 
 Sabbath of January, 1776, and on the next Sabbath at Chartiers. 
 This second visit awakened great interest in the places where he 
 labored, and he often speaks of the assemblies being "numerous, 
 attentive, and much affected." He returned home in March. Soon 
 after a call was made and forwarded to his Presbytery, which he ac- 
 cepted on the 22d of April, 1776. He was then dismissed to the 
 Presbytery of Donegal, then the most westerly Presbytery of the 
 Church, and by it he was ordained, in view of taking charge of those 
 congregations in which he spent his life. His ordination took place 
 at Chambersburg, June 19, 1776. 
 
 Meantime the war of the Revolution had begun. Lexington and 
 Bunker's Hill and other battle fields had been baptized to freedom 
 in patriot blood. Fifteen days after McMillan's ordination the 
 Declaration of Independence was made and signed, and the country 
 committed to a life or death struggle. 
 
 He tarried in the East until August 6th, when he was married to 
 Miss Catherine Brown, daughter of an elder of the church of Upper 
 Brandywine. The marriage was solemnized by the Rev. John Car-
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONTENTION. 
 
 michael, father of the late Mrs. Robert Jenkins, of Windsor Place, 
 Lancaster county, and grandfather of the wives of Drs. John W. 
 Scott, John W. Nevin, Alfred Nevin, and Rev. W. W. Latta. It was 
 this patriotic pastor, as his daughter, Mrs. Jenkins, informed me, 
 who, when on a visit to Washington's camp at Valley Forge, heard 
 our great chief complaining of the great want of linen for dressing 
 the wounds and sores of his suffering soldiers. Carmichael returned 
 home, and, on the next Sabbath, made an appeal to the patriotic 
 women of his charge, asking them to spare three or four inches from 
 the lower end of a certain garment, to meet this crying want in the 
 suffering army. The women of Brandywine responded to the call ; 
 and, by Tuesday noon, the pastor might might have been seen ap- 
 proaching the camp with several bags full of narrow rolls of linen, 
 just such as the surgeons needed. The country was so poor, and 
 importations being cut off, it was necessary for people to deny them- 
 selves, in order to sustain the patriot cause. And I have no doubt 
 that the young bride, Catharine McMillan (for she was still there), 
 contributed her full share to the stores of the surgeons. And these 
 were no flimsy cotton rags (cotton was then unknown), but good 
 substantial home-made linen. 
 
 Such were the perils of the times, that McMillan did not take his 
 wife to the West until more than two years after his marriage. But 
 he visited his congregations, spent much time amongst them, preach- 
 ing, ordaining elders, and administering ordinances. At length, in 
 November, 1778, his family accompanied him to the field of their 
 future abode and labors. 
 
 In a letter written to Dr. Carnahan, in 1832, he describes the 
 home to which he brought his family. ' ' The cabin in which I was 
 to live was raised, but it had neither roof, chimney, nor floor. 
 The people, however, were very kind ; they assisted in preparing my 
 house, and on the i6th of December I moved into it; but we had 
 neither bedstead, tables, stool, chair, nor bucket. All such things 
 we had to leave behind, as there was no wagon-road over the 
 mountains, and everything had to be carried on pack-horses. We 
 placed two boxes, one upon the other, for a table, and two kegs 
 served for seats, and having committed ourselves to God, in family 
 worship, we spread a bed on the floor and slept soundly till morn- 
 ing. The next day, a neighbor coming to my assistance, we made
 
 THE REV. yoh'x MCMILLAN, D.D. . ? 
 
 a table and stools, and in a little time we had everything com- 
 fortable about us. Sometimes, indeed, we had no bread for weeks 
 together, but we had plenty of pumpkins and potatoes, and all 
 the necessaries of life ; as for luxuries, we were not concerned 
 about them. We enjoyed health, the Gospel and its ordinances, 
 and pious friends. We were in the place where God would have 
 us be ; and we did not doubt but that He would provide every- 
 thing necessary. And, glory to His name, we were not disappoint- 
 ed." 
 
 Brethren and countrymen, what a mighty influence for good 
 was begun in that log-cabin, on the night of the 1 8th of December, 
 1778! When that young minister and his young and godly wife 
 knelt that night in family prayer, a train of causes was -set in 
 operation, which reached on through more than half a century, and 
 is still operating for good far beyond the sphere of their personal 
 agency. The Gospel, as preached by him and by those who were 
 converted under his ministry, or educated through his agency, has 
 proved mighty through God to the accomplishment of grand 
 results. As a minister, an educator, and a citizen, he was a man 
 of wondrous work. Possessing a strong physique, a mind above 
 mediocrity, an education solid and in advance of his times, his 
 labors must have been simply prodigious, especially in the early 
 years of his ministry, when the poverty of his people prevented them 
 from giving him an adequate stipend, and his own hands had to 
 minister to his necessities. To write always one, and sometimes 
 two, sermons a week, and to commit them to memory to visit his 
 flock, scattered over a wide district of forest country to catechise, to 
 assist at communions, to attend church courts and all, over such 
 roads as the present generation cannot conceive of, demanded 
 Herculean toil and brain work. 
 
 And the results of the labors of him and his contemporaries are 
 stupendous. If there is a striking contrast between the log-cabins 
 of the pioneers and the stately mansions that now adorn both town 
 and country ; if the Western Pennsylvania of to-day, with her towns, 
 cities, churches, colleges, schools, factories, steamboats, railroads, 
 and her ten thousand appliances of human elegance and comfort, 
 presents a wondrous contrast with the forest-clad, savage-roamed, 
 roadless, and thinly populated Pennsylvania of one hundred years
 
 28 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ago; if we now exult in a civilization such as adorns and blesses 
 social life ; and if we may justly claim that our region has sent forth 
 men, means, and influences to shape the great commonwealths 
 which have sprung up west of us, we ought, in simple justice, to 
 trace our own solid greatness and the happy influences which we 
 have been able to set forth, largely to the seed sown by John 
 McMillan and his compeers in toil, and to the plastic power of their 
 life and labors. Into the details of these labors we have not time to 
 enter. A volume could not record them. They were abundant, 
 unceasing, earnest, and powerful. The grand old story of the cross 
 was their central and never forgotten theme. The doctrines of the 
 cross the motives and the glories of the cross they loved to pro- 
 claim. The fall and depravity of man the abhorrent nature of sin 
 the sinner's liability to the law's dread penalty the need of a 
 Redeemer and an atonement the love of God in providing both 
 Christ's death and righteousness the freedom and fulness of salva- 
 tion the necessity of the new birth, faith, and repentance ; Sinai, 
 Gethsamane, Calvary, death, judgment, heaven, hell : such were the 
 themes of the preaching of John McMillan and his contemporaries 
 of our own and other branches of the Presbyterian Church in these 
 Western counties. And they are the only themes worthy of the 
 pulpit. These doctrines had, in the British Isles, so leavened 
 society as to accomplish wonderful reformation and sow the seeds 
 of liberty and constitutional government. The Bible, the Sabbath, 
 and Calvinism, had made Britain what she is, and had made Ulster 
 the nursery of freemen. And when these doctrines, in connection 
 with the republican form of church government, were planted in the 
 virgin soil of this region, and amongst a people of strong mother 
 wit, of simple manners, and free as the winds which tossed the forests 
 round them, they had fuller development, and have produced their 
 normal fruits in fuller measure than ever before. I except only 
 New England, where the same causes wrought the same glorious 
 results. 
 
 Dr. McMillan's voice, even when your present speaker sat under 
 it, in 1829-31, was strong, clear, and powerful in the tones of 
 denunciation, but often meltingly tender. As I remember him, he 
 was peculiarly powerful in exhibiting the terrors of the law. He al- 
 most made you hear the mutterings and feel the vibrations of Sinai's
 
 THE REV. JOHX McMlLLAN, D.D. 29 
 
 thunder; and yet, when setting forth the love of Jesus, his voice 
 would mellow to the tenderest tones. At the communion seasou 
 he was peculiarly effective. Then his heart, and eyes, and voice 
 were like those of one fresh from Gethsamar.e and Golgotha. Me- 
 thinks I can hear him yet, as in melting accents, he would say to 
 the communicants, as they sat around the long white table : " Eat, 
 O friends; drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved!" Forty-six 
 years ago, last March, I sat down, for the first time, at the holy 
 table, in the dear old church of Chartiers. The lovely and beloved 
 John Cloud, who, with the lamented Laird, laid his bones beneath 
 the torrid sands of Africa, our first martyr missionary, sat by my 
 side. Dr. McMillan served that table ; and the memory of that 
 scene shall never fade from .this heart. It was a Bochim. So ten- 
 derly did the Doctor portray the scenes of Calvary, that every eye 
 ran over, every heart was full. My dear friend Cloud was con- 
 vulsed with emotion, and the entire audience was moved. My 
 venerated President, Dr. Matthew Brown, was there, with soul 
 aglow, assisting in the ordinance ; and it was a day to be remem- 
 bered. Alas ! how few then present linger here below. But it is 
 well Heaven only is home ! 
 
 It might be pleasant, on this centenary, to make mention of the 
 places and houses of worship of one hundred years ago ; to follow 
 the early preachers as they proclaimed the Gospel, first in the pri- 
 vate cabin-houses, then in " the tent," located near some sparkling 
 spring, with logs or puncheons for seats, ranged like the seats of a 
 church ; a platform roofed over for a pulpit, with a board in front 
 for the books, and a bench for a seat, with no shelter for the con- 
 gregation but the grand old forest trees. Many a time have 
 McMillan and his compeers proclaimed the Gospel from one of 
 these " tents," in a church whose walls were the horizon, or at 
 best, the surrounding hills, whose pillars were the sturdy forest 
 trees, whose ceiling was the sky, and whose floor was the grassy 
 or the leaf-strewn earth. 
 
 Then succeeded the structure of unhewn logs, roofed with clap- 
 boards, sometimes " chuncked and daubed," and sometimes not. 
 Then, as the resources of the worshipers improved, the hewn log 
 meeting-house, with recess in the centre of each long side, so that 
 two lengths of logs could be builded in, the pulpit occupying one
 
 30 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 of the recesses. Then came, as years rolled on, the structures of 
 frame, stone, and brick ; but none of these last belonged to the 
 period we celebrate. 
 
 For a long time they had no means of heating their churches in 
 winter. No stoves were to be had ; and even when it was proposed 
 to introduce them, it was resisted by some as an innovation almost 
 heretical. Hardy dames must our grandmothers have been. Hardy 
 men their sons and husbands. Sometimes an earthen hearth would 
 be placed in the centre of the meeting-house, and a pile of wood or 
 charcoal would afford some heat; and the open puncheon floors, 
 and abundant crevices between the logs, afforded escape to the car- 
 bonic-acid gas, which else had suffocated our orthodox ancestors. 
 
 Communion seasons, in the earlier years, were less frequent and 
 better attended than now. Sometimes hundreds would gather from 
 near and distant congregations to share the blessed privilege ; and 
 such was the hospitality of the times that all found entertainment. 
 Sometimes thousands would be drawn together ; and with wagons 
 and other appliances for shelter, many would remain upon the 
 ground from day to day a camp meeting.* Glorious revivals often 
 marked these assemblies ; and in many such our Christian hero bore 
 effective part. And for all that is sublimely simple, solemn, and 
 impressive in the worship of God, some of these scenes in the grand 
 old forests of these counties throw the more artistic services of our 
 most gorgeous churches into utter shade. 
 
 I will have time only to mention, without elaborating, that which 
 was by no means the least important part of the life-work of my 
 hero. Nor is it necessary, as this subject will be fully treated by 
 my brother, Dr. Brownson. He was the father of education, in its 
 
 * The pioneers brought with them from the older countries, and from 
 Ireland and Scotland, the custom of using unleavened bread at the 
 Lord's Supper. There can be no doubt that this custom originated in a 
 desire to conform, as closely as possible, to the ordinance as originally 
 instituted. There can be no doubt that unleavened cakes were used at 
 the first Lord's Supper ; and that it was considered as symbolical, even 
 under the Christian dispensation, is manifest from 1 Cor. v. 8. When 
 the custom of using nweetened unleavened cakes came in, or why intro- 
 duced, we cannot ascertain. It is not universal. There can be no doubt 
 that unleavened bread, in the form of cake, is more convenient than 
 bread from an ordinary leavened loaf; whilst it is certainly not less 
 Hcriptural.
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMILLAN, D.D. 3 i 
 
 higher grades, in this western land. True, Smith, Dodd, and others 
 started schools at an early date, and deserve much praise. But 
 McMillan began his cabin-college early, and maintained it long, 
 until it was merged in the Canonsburg Academy, and then in Jeffer- 
 son College. He educated more than one hundred young men, 
 most of whom entered the ministry, and others became distinguished 
 in other professions. What human arithmetic can calculate the in- 
 fluence for good that resulted from his educational labors, and then 
 from the teaching and the preaching of his pupils, and theirs, in a 
 widening ratio of progression. As an educator, he is entitled to the 
 gratitude of posterity. 
 
 Fourteen years ago, in a little metrical memorial of my class 
 (1831), delivered in Providence Hall, Jefferson College, I made 
 mention of several of the early worthies in the history of the college; 
 and, as I cannot give my estimate of my venerable subject in fewer 
 words, you will pardon a quotation from my little poem : 
 
 " There was another, fifty years ago, 
 Still lingering mid these scenes a saint below ; 
 A reverend relic of a bygone age, 
 The Christian pastor, teacher, patriot, sage ; 
 By all the sons of Jefferson revered, 
 I see him now just as he once appeared, 
 Above the medium height, erect and square 
 Frost slightly sprinkled o'er his masive hair ; 
 His eyes benignant, features long and grave 
 Step slow and steady manners blunt and naive ; 
 His costume he despised the gay beau monde 
 Fashion prescribed not what be doffed and donned 
 Broad-brim and doublet, broad skirt, small clothes, won 
 Respectful notice ; 'twas the style of Washington ! 
 A wit, a scholar, patriot, and divine, 
 His name in Western annals long shall shine. 
 While yet, on Western hill, and plain, and glen, 
 Roam'd savage beasts and not less savage men ; 
 While settlers' cabins, few and far between, 
 Dotted these wilds; and wigwam fires were seen 
 Gleaming along meandering Chartiers, 
 He came, the Apostle of the pioneers. 
 With earnest manner, and with tearful eye 
 His pulpit earth his sounding-board the sky 
 And oft his trusty rifle by his side ; 
 His hearers armed against a savage foe.
 
 3? PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 He spake, mid forest shades, of Him who died, 
 
 Pointed the way to Heav'n, and warn'd of coming woe. 
 Mid scenes like these, he and his brave compeers- 
 The stalwart Presbyterian pioneers 
 Of Western Pennsylvania sowed the seed, 
 Of which their sons now reap the glorious meed : 
 Religion, education, freedom, arts, 
 A teeming husbandry and crowded marts, 
 Refinement, enterprise, and plenty reign, 
 Where erst roam'd prowling beasts and savage mcu. 
 And songs of Zion now are sweetly sung, 
 Where erst the war-whoop and the deatih song rung. 
 
 All honor to the men whose stalwart arms, 
 'Mid toil, privation, and war's dread alarms 
 Whilst struggling for a home and daily bread, 
 In faith and prayer the deep foundations laid, 
 On which our glorious institutions-rest ! 
 Oh ! be their names revered, their mem'ry blest ; 
 And, while we give their deeds to hallowed fame, 
 High on the scroll write John McMillan's name ! 
 When embyro Jefferson, neath clapboard roof, 
 Of future greatness gave the earliest proof 
 A cabin college in the wold he won 
 The honored title FOUNDER OF JEFFERSON. 
 
 Of many interesting incidents in the history of this good and 
 great man we have not time to speak. Of the defects of his public 
 character and career, and they were few, it might be ungracious to 
 make mention. The most prominent of these was, perhaps, an un- 
 due severity in rebuking what he disapproved, and a certain blunt- 
 ntss of manner and speech which sometimes repelled those whom he 
 might have won. As illustrative of this trait, we might mention his 
 impatience with the freaks of fashion and with foppery in dress. 
 He clung to the cocked hat, breeches, and shoe-buckles, long after 
 others had laid them aside ; and seemed reluctant to permit woven 
 cloth to supersede the buckskin. Joseph Dunlap, son of the Presi- 
 dent of the College, was somewhat inclined to foppishness in dress. 
 Meeting him one day when trigly dressed, the doctor broke out 
 with, "Joe, can you tell me the difference between you and the 
 devil? " " Oh, yes," retorted Joe ; " the devil wears a cocked hat, 
 a low flapped doublet, a coat of continental cut, breeches and shoes 
 with knee and shoe buckles ; but I wear pantaloons and clothing of
 
 THE REV. JOHN McMILLAN, D.D. 
 
 modern style." The laugh was against the Doctor, and he joined in 
 it with great good humor. 
 
 He loved a practical joke. It is said that once, on his way to 
 Synod, accompanied by that devout man, Joseph Patterson, they 
 asked for a little whiskey, by way of making some compensation 
 for the watering of their horses at a country inn. A small quantity 
 was poured into a glass, when Mr. Patterson proposed asking a bless- 
 ing. Dr. M. assented, and whilst this devout brother was saying a 
 somewhat protracted grace, the Doctor emptied the glass, and in 
 reply to the rather blank look of his brother, he remarked, " You 
 must watch, as well as pray." The story of Dr. Ralston soundly 
 thrashing a bully, who was treating Dr. McMillan rudely, when the 
 two were on their way to presbytery, is well known. I had the 
 story from Dr. Ralston's son. About 1825, a student, who after- 
 wards became an able minister, was introduced by Dr. Brown to 
 Dr. McMillan, with a view of obtaining aid from a fund of which 
 the latter had control. In the course of conversation it transpired 
 that the student was married, when the doctor, with characteristic 
 bluntness, shook his head, saying, " Oh ! the fellow's married, is he ? 
 Ah ! I don't think my fund will carry double." But I believe after 
 all, it did.* Other anecdotes of our hero might be added, but I 
 must bring this already too lengthy discourse to a close. 
 
 The civil history of our region, and other things germaine to this 
 centenary, will be given by other speakers. In these you will be 
 able to discover many things that were hindrances to Christian 
 work among the pioneers. The rival claims of Pennsylvania and 
 Virginia to this region, and the existence for many years of two 
 governments, led to social strife, which hindered the progress of 
 religion. The incursions of hostile, Indians was also a great hin- 
 drance ; and the border wars kept up such a spirit of revenge, as 
 was very unfavorable to piety and the arts of peace. The Whiskey 
 Insurrection, too, was for a time a hindrance, and into its excite- 
 ments nearly all were drawn. But Dr. McMillan's influence did much 
 to restrain disorder and restore peace. The college war, too, was a 
 
 * Dr. McMillan solemnized tlio marriage of Dr. McElroy, now of New 
 York, to Miss Allison near Canonsburg. When Dr. McElroy's attendant, 
 Dr. George Junkin, tendered a fee, Dr. McMillan declined taking it, 
 saying, " No ! No! dog wont eat dog." 
 C
 
 34 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 hindrance. It was a fight for union, which, like some other fights 
 for union, widened the breach. But I leave these details to others, 
 and forbear. 
 
 In the summer and fall of 1833 he had made a very pleasant tour, 
 visiting friends and former pupils, and returning homeward, was 
 suddenly taken ill in Canonsburg, and after a short but severe ill- 
 ness, died at the house of his friend and physician, Dr. Jonathan 
 Leatherman, on the i6th day of November, 1833, aged eighty-one 
 years and five days. He died in the faith, and sustained by the 
 consolations of that Gospel which he had so earnestly proclaimed 
 for nearly sixty years. 
 
 "He being dead yet speaketh." The springs and rills of influ- 
 ence for good which he opened still flow on, and have gathered 
 into broad and mighty rivers, which make glad the city of our God. 
 The blessings from a covenant-keeping God still descend from 
 generation to generation. Pigeon Creek and Chartiers still exist, 
 and work effectively for Christ. The sons of Jefferson do many of 
 them still live and labor. Those that are dead yet speak by the 
 influence they have left behind. And all over this broad land, 
 and throughout the missionary world, the waves of blessed influ- 
 ences, set in motion by JOHN MCMILLAN, will roll on, circling 
 wider and wider, till they shall at last break, in sparkling beauty, 
 around the Judgment Throne !
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 BY 
 
 REV. AARON WILLIAMS, D.D.
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 Showing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his 
 strength, and the wonderful works which he hath done." Psalms 
 Ixxviii. 4. 
 
 ]E are aware of 'the increasing interest which attaches itself 
 to the events of early days the farther we recede from 
 them. "Things which we have heard and known" 
 ourselves, do not awaken our curiosity like those of 
 " which our fathers have told us." There is a commonness in pass- 
 ing occurrences, together with a consciousness that we can readily 
 remember them, that leads us to neglect putting them on record. 
 Many of the experiences of our youth we should be glad to recall 
 more accurately as we advance in years, but they have become almost 
 obliterated from the tablets of memory. How eagerly do we who 
 are growing old desiderate the memoranda which we ought to have 
 kept (but did not) of what our fathers have told us of the occurrences 
 of their early days. Increasing distance lends increasing enchant- 
 ment to the view of those old and almost forgotten events. 
 
 Had those old fathers of our Western Presbyterianism been more 
 careful than they were to keep memoranda of their abundant labors 
 and trials and successes ; had they even cared to keep their sessional 
 records in some more permanent form than on loose sheets of paper, 
 how highly should we prize such records to-day. But they are not 
 to be found. None of our oldest churches can produce their earliest 
 sessional records, or can tell us of the date and circumstances of 
 their organization. The men of that day were too busy making 
 history to find time to write it. It was sufficient for them that their 
 record was on high. 
 37
 
 38 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Besides, paper was scarce and costly in those days, and blank 
 books were probably not to be had, or they were too poor to buy 
 them. Hence their habit of writing in a very small hand. They 
 had to make the most of the paper they had. You that have seen 
 the chirography of Dr. McMillan know that it was almost as fine as' 
 diamond print, and yet perfectly clear and legible. In hearing him 
 preach, in my boyhood, I have often noticed (as I sat not far from 
 his left hand) how adroitly he concealed his fully written manuscript 
 from the prejudices of his hearers between the leaves of the small 
 black pocket-Bible, which he always had in his hand. 
 
 These centenary celebrations, with which we are becoming fa- 
 miliar, are, in part, an attempt to recover the unrecorded history 
 of the planting and training of those old churches, and to transmit 
 it to the generation following. These are things which none of us 
 have seen or known, but of which our fathers have told us ; and it 
 is well that we should gather up, so far as we can, from these ances- 
 tral recollections, the precious memories of the Lord's doings in 
 those days, that we ourselves may be refreshed and strengthened by 
 them, and may show to the generation to come the praises of the 
 Lord, and his strength, and the wonderful works which he hath 
 done 
 
 It is made my duty to record the religious history of the times 
 which this Centennial is designed to commemorate. And as time 
 would fail to give that history comprehensively, I shall confine my- 
 self to that feature of it which is most characteristic and instructive, 
 namely, the history of the early revivals. 
 
 The men of those days were "revival men," brought up under 
 revival influences, and accustomed to expect revival seasons as the 
 results of faithful ministerial and Christian labor. They believed in 
 uncommon manifestations of the Holy Spirit's influence, at irregu- 
 lar intervals, as being the normal method in which God builds up 
 His kingdom. They found what were virtually revivals of religion 
 in the days of Joshua, of Samuel, of Josiah, of Hezekiah, of Ezra, 
 and of John the Baptist. They found a revival in the two days' visit 
 of our Lord to Samaria, when many of the prejudiced Samaritans 
 believed on him, and said to the woman, " Now we believe, not 
 because of thy saying, but we have heard him ourselves, and 
 know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world."
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 39 
 
 And besides the great Pentecostal seasons of the Apostles' days, they 
 found revivals under the labors of IrenaeuS at Lyons, and of other 
 faithful martyrs of the early church, when, the more severe the per- 
 secutions, the more rapid and wonderful was the growth of Chris- 
 tianity ; so that in less than six hundred years after Christ, although 
 already between thirty and fifty millions had suffered martyrdom, 
 yet in the beginning of the seventh century there were in many 
 places of the Roman Empire thirty Christians to one Pagan. We 
 read, that "in A. D. 627, in Great Britain, King Edwin, with all 
 his nobles and a very great multitude of people, believed, and were 
 baptized by the missionary Paulinus, who, from morning till even- 
 ing, was wholly engaged in catechising and baptizing the people 
 who came to him in crowds from every village and neighborhood." 
 Similar seasons were known among the persecuted saints of the Al- 
 pine valleys. But more especially were our pioneer ministers fa- 
 miliar with the revivals of Kilsyth and Cambuslang in Scotland, in 
 the early part of the last century, as well as those in our own coun- 
 try under the labors of Edwards and Whitefield, and the Tennents 
 and Blairs of New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania. Fagg's Manor, 
 where McMillan was born and received the earlier part of his edu- 
 cation, was a seat of revivals, having been visited with a great out- 
 pouring of the spirit under the preaching of Whitefield and Samuel 
 Blair, a work which carried its hallowed influences down to the time 
 of John Blair, under whom McMillan commenced his studies. 
 McMillan, Smith, and Dodd those " first three " of our worthies 
 were all educated under revival influences, being graduates of the 
 College of New Jersey, at Princeton an institution born in the 
 midst of revivals, and established for the special purpose of training 
 up young men for the ministry. The same is true also as to the 
 influences under which were trained Power, Finley, Marquis, and 
 the other ministers of that day, who were the co-laborers of Mc- 
 Millan. They were all familiar with revival scenes and revival 
 preaching. 
 
 So also of the early settlers generally of this country. They 
 came, most of them, from the same regions whence came these 
 early ministers, and were accustomed to the earnest preaching and 
 lively Christian zeal which characterized the Presbyterianism of that 
 day. Neither ministers nor people were Antinomian in their views or
 
 40 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 spirit. They were decided Calvinists, but their Calvinism was that 
 of Paul, who preached "Work out your own salvation with fear 
 and trembling, for it is God who worketh in you to will and to do 
 of his own good pleasure." 
 
 Such was the good seed which, in the providence of God, was 
 sown in this virgin soil ; and it is not to be wondered at that such 
 glorious harvests as those which we are about to chronicle were 
 gathered from these fertile fields. 
 
 In attempting to trace the history of the revivals of those days, 
 the very earliest of all seem to have been those which occurred in 
 the forts, or "blockhouses," whither the people were driven for 
 protection from the incursions of the savage Indians who still occu- 
 pied the country north of the Ohio river. These Indian raids, while 
 they were a source of great trial and suffering, were at the same 
 time a means of grace to the people, crowded together as they were 
 in these blockhouses, and with nothing to do but keep watch against 
 the sudden attacks of their wily foes, while they had ample time 
 for Christian conference and prayer. They humbled themselves 
 before God, as receiving his fatherly chastisement in these trials, 
 and they earnestly besought his help in their time of need. It 
 is not surprising that God should pour out his Spirit upon them 
 in these circumstances. 
 
 The very earliest of these revivals seems to have been that which 
 took place in Vance's Fort, under the labors of a pious layman, 
 Joseph Patterson, whose faithful efforts in the work of saving souls 
 were so characteristic of him afterwards when he became a minister. 
 The Rev. Joseph Stevenson gives the following account of this work 
 of grace, "It may almost be said that the Presbyterian Church in 
 Western Pennsylvania was born in a revival. In 1778, Vance's 
 Fort, into which the families living adjacent had been driven by the 
 Indians, was the scene of a remarkable work. There was but one 
 pious man in the fort, Joseph Patterson, a layman, an earnest devoted 
 Christian, whose zeal had not waned, even amid the storms and ter- 
 rors of war; and during the long days and nights of their besiege- 
 ment, he talked with his careless associates of an enemy more to be 
 dreaded than the Indian, a death more terrible than by the scalping- 
 knife. As they were shut up within very narrow limits, his voice, 
 though directed to one or two, could easily be heard by the whole
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 4! 
 
 company; and thus his personal exhortations became public ad- 
 dresses. Deep seriousness filled every breast, and some twenty per- 
 sons were there led to Christ. These were a short time subsequently 
 formed into the Cross Creek Church, which built its house of wor- 
 ship near the fort, and had as its pastor for thirty-three years one 
 of these converts, the Rev. Thomas Marquis."* 
 
 Still another of these fort revivals occurred about the same 
 time in the Ten-Mile neighborhood, under the labors of Thad- 
 deus Dodd. A blockhouse had been erected here in 1774-75, 
 and was one of the strongest, as well as the most exposed, of 
 
 *The above account of the Vance's Fort revival is given as it is found 
 in "Sprague's Annals," vol. IV., p. 84, published in 1859, and repeated in 
 other publications. The Rev. Joseph Stevenson, of Bellefontaine, Ohio, 
 who wrote the account, was the son-in-law of the pastor, Rev. Thomas 
 Marquis, and has been considered good authority. Since the delivery, 
 however, of this, my attention has been called to a Historical Discourse, 
 preached June 24, 1867, by Rev. John Stockton, D.D., for nearly fifty years 
 the honored pastor of the Cross Creek Church, in which the correctness 
 of the account is questioned, so far as the agency of Joseph Patterson is 
 concerned. He says, "In these forts [Vance's and Wells'] social, and 
 afterwards public worship, was kept up for seven years, especially iii 
 summer and autumn, the seasons when the Indians were wont most 
 to make their raids. And it was a common thing for men to go to these 
 meetings armed with their trusty rifles, and to stand guard during the 
 services. On the meetings held in these forts the Holy Spirit was shed 
 down. At an early period, in Vance's fort, seven or eight persons were 
 hopefully converted. Among these were Thomas Marquis and his wife 
 Jane, whose eldest child was baptized bj r Rev. James Power, in 1778. 
 Mr. Marquis subsequently became first an elder, and afterwards the pas- 
 tor of this congregation." All this is confirmatory of Mr. Stevenson'sac- 
 count as to the fact of the revival; but Dr. Stockton goes on to show 
 that Mr. Patterson's removal to Cross Creek did not take place until 
 the autumn of 1779 ; whereas the call for the pastoral labors of Rev. 
 Joseph Smith, from the united congregations of Cross Creek and Upper 
 Buffalo was made out in June of that year. The revival, iind the or- 
 ganization of the Cross Creek congregation, must, therefore, have taken 
 place previous to Mr. Patterson's arrival. He speaks of him, however, 
 as "an intelligent and ardently pious man, an active leader in meet- 
 ings for social worship, and afterwards a ruling elder in this church." 
 As these Indian raids continued after Mr. Patterson's coming, it is no 
 doubt true that he was employed in the fort, as Mr. Stevenson relates ; 
 and the chief error is in saying that he was the only pious man, and 
 that the church of Cross Creek grew out of his labors. Mr. Stevenson 
 gave the current tradition, but Dr. Stockton's statements are no doubt 
 correct. (See Appendix A.)
 
 42 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 these wooden fortresses. The settlers were chiefly from New Jer- 
 sey, and had come from the very midst of those wonderful scenes 
 of revival which had been witnessed under the labors of White- 
 Geld and the Tennents. They greatly rejoiced when Mr. Dodd, 
 a young minister from the same region, came to settle among 
 them, to share their hardships and to care for their souls. Fort 
 Lindley was named from Demas Lindley, a descendant of one of the 
 Pilgrims of the Mayflower, who was among the first settlers o'n Ten- 
 Mile, and afterwards became prominent as a citizen and a ruling 
 elder in the church. This church seems to have grown out of a 
 glorious revival of religion, which occurred in the fort during one 
 of those frequent Indian raids which drove all the inhabitants of 
 the neighborhood together. More than- forty persons were brought 
 to Christ in this revival, and thus there was great joy in the fort as 
 well as in Heaven. Mr. Dodd's sacrifices were rewarded. 
 
 Such were some of the ' ' little revivings which the Lord gave 
 His people in their bondage." They were but the beginnings of 
 better things, which were experienced a few years later. In Mc- 
 Millan's charge there was a remarkable season of the outpouring 
 of the spirit, which began in December, 1781. It made its 
 first appearance among a few who met together for sacred wor- 
 ship on the morning of a Thanksgiving Day which had been ap- 
 pointed by Congress on occasion of the surrender of Cornwallis 
 at Yorktown. McMillan and his people were patriots, and they 
 mingled their thanksgivings for national blessings with earnest 
 supplications for the presence of the Holy Spirit, now so much 
 needed in order to lift up a standard against the floods of infidelity 
 and irreligion which had come in during the war of the Revolution. 
 While they were yet speaking, God heard them. They were en- 
 couraged to appoint other meetings for the same purpose ; and the 
 favorable appearances still increasing, they continued to hold 
 ''Sabbath night societies" (or prayer meetings) for nearly two 
 years. It was then usual to spend the whole night in religious exer- 
 cises. "Nor did the time seem tedious," says McMillan, in his 
 letter to Dr. Carnahan, "for the Lord was there, and His work 
 went pleasantly on." At the first sacramental season after the work 
 began, forty-five were added to the church. This time of refresh- 
 ing continued in a greater or less degree till 1 794, twelve years.
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 43 
 
 At every sacramental occasion during that period numbers were 
 added to the church. Nor was this work confined to McMillan's 
 field. During the winter of 1781-2 the congregations of Cross 
 Creek and Upper Buffalo, under the ministry of the Rev. Joseph 
 Smith, were visited in like manner with reviving influences. Here, 
 too, the " praying societies " had much to do with the beginning 
 and continuance of the good work. Says the account, "During 
 the winter season, week day and night sermons and meetings for 
 social worship were frequent, and many were under deep convic- 
 tions. The summer following was remarkable for the increase of 
 the number of the awakened, though most labored long without re- 
 lief." In those days revivals were not conducted on the high-pres- 
 sure system. The Spirit of God often brooded long upon the face 
 of the deep before God said, "Let there be light;" and the con- 
 versions which took place were generally such as proved themselves 
 to be genuine and abiding. 
 
 And yet, there is no doubt that God would have done more 
 speedy and mighty works of grace had his people expected it. Judge 
 Edgar, one of Mr. Smith's elders, in a letter which has been pre- 
 served, laments that there were so few of God's people who knew 
 anything of travailing or agonizing for the birth of souls. Never- 
 theless, it pleased God to bring many out of darkness into His mar- 
 vellous light, so that about fifty in each of those congregations were 
 added to the church at the fall communions. And the work rather 
 increased than diminished for the ensuing three years. In 1783 
 about one hundred were received into the church of Buffalo at one 
 communion, and many more were awakened. Even for six or seven 
 years after the work began, there was but little apparent diminution 
 in its power. At Cross Creek, in 1787, a very refreshing commu- 
 nion season was enjoyed. After the usual services on Monday 
 some hundreds were bowed down and silently weeping, and a few 
 crying out in anguish of soul. When the assembly was dismissed 
 most of the people remained on the ground, unwilling to depart 
 from scenes so hallowed, and it was not till after dark that they 
 were persuaded to retire, with a promise of meeting there again the 
 next morning. Tuesday was indeed a solemn day, and was spent 
 chiefly in exhortations and prayers by the Revs. Messrs. Smith,
 
 44 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Dodd, and Cornwell. Another harvest of souls was the result, up- 
 wards of fifty being gathered in at the next communion. 
 
 Other neighboring congregations also shared in these gracious 
 visitations, particularly Bethel and Lebanon, under the ministry of 
 the Rev. John Clark ; Ten-Mile, under the Rev. Thaddeus Dodd ;' 
 and King's Creek and Mill Creek, then vacant, but with praying 
 societies kept up by faithful laymen. During these several revivals, 
 it is said that more than a thousand persons were brought into the 
 kingdom of Christ a remarkably large number when we consider 
 the sparseness of the population and the hindrances in the way. 
 
 Again, in 1795, the congregation of Chartiers, says Mr. McMillan, 
 enjoyed another remarkable season of the outpourings of God's 
 Spirit, which, though not so extensive or long continued as the 
 previous revivals, yet resulted in the gathering of about fifty into 
 the church, several of whom were students in the Academy in 
 Canonsburg, and afterwards became ministers of the Gospel. In 
 the spring of 1799, the Lord again revived His work in this con- 
 gregation. Many were at once awakened, including again several 
 students in the Academy, and about sixty joined the church. " This 
 revival," says Dr. McMillan, "as well as that of 1795, was carried 
 on without much external appearance, except a solemn attention 
 and silent weeping under the preaching of the word." Thus far, 
 in all these revivals, the work was rather of a quiet sort, with none 
 of those remarkable "bodily exercises" which appeared afterwards. 
 
 In 1 798, the year previous to the work just described at Chartiers, 
 the Lord poured out His Spirit on a new settlement north of the Ohio 
 river, in Beaver county. Pa., under the labors of the Rev. Thos. E. 
 Hughes, who had just commenced his ministerial work, having been 
 licensed to preach in October of this year by the Presbytery of Ohio. 
 The showers of grace seem to have begun to descend as soon as he 
 entered this new field, as they often descended during his subsequent 
 pastorate of more than thirty years over this same people. The 
 writer remembers indistinctly having heard the tidings of a great 
 revival in the later years of Mr. Hughes' ministry, in which one 
 hundred persons were added to the church ; and having heard him 
 preach in his old age, after he had resigned his charge, such was 
 the unction and earnestness of manner which he still retained, that
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 45 
 
 * 
 
 I am not surprised at the success which attended his ministry during 
 the fire of his youth. In the first revival to which we refer that of 
 1 798-9 the work was very powerful, and in a short space of time 
 a considerable number were made subjects of saving grace, among 
 whom were eighteen out of the thirty pupils then attending a school 
 in that place. The youth or children of this school were so deeply 
 exercised that all play and diversions were stopped, and the time 
 usually thus employed was spent in religious reading or conversa- 
 tion, in singing hymns, or retiring into the woods to pray. Up- 
 wards of thirty in all were added to the church as the fruit of that 
 revival. 
 
 In 1800 the Rev. Joseph Badger, then on his way from Massa- 
 chusetts to his new field of labor in the Western Reserve, Ohio, re- 
 ports that he had "passed through and near to twenty Presbyterian 
 congregations, where from 1 798 there was a pretty general serious 
 awakening." 
 
 Such were some of the gracious visitations of God to the churches 
 of this region during their infancy and up to the close of the last cen- 
 tury. They took place under the earnest preaching of the old-fash- 
 ioned Calvinistic gospel, without any startling novelties or extraordi- 
 nary means, but with much prayer and faithful work on the part of 
 ministers and people. There was no dilution of the truth, no.agency 
 of evangelists, no undue exaggeration of the terrors of the law noth- 
 ing but the ordinary means of grace, in connection with special 
 seasons of prayer, and the semi-annual communions, which were each 
 a protracted meeting of four or five days. Seasons of coldness and 
 declension intervened between the seasons of revival, and were fruit- 
 ful in the growth of error and wickedness. Floods of vanity and 
 carnality, it is said, appeared likely to carry all before them. The 
 love of many of God's people waxed cold, and the ministers were 
 discouraged. Still, the means were faithfully used. The truly pious 
 kept up their praying societies, even though but thinly attended. 
 A concert of prayer on the first Tuesday in every quarter of the 
 year, which had been recommended by the Presbytery of Ohio, in 
 1796, was generally observed in the churches, and was greatly in- 
 strumental in staying the tide of worldliness. Still, the century 
 closed in the midst of a season of great spiritual declension, and 
 great discouragement on the part of God's people. Darkness was
 
 4b PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 upon the face of the deep ; but the spirit of God was moving upon 
 the waters. 
 
 We come now to a new period in this history. ' ' About the latter 
 end of the year 1801 and beginning of 1802," we are told, " there 
 was a remarkable attendance upon ordinances ; meetings for the 
 worship of God, both public and social, were generally crowded, 
 and there appeared an increasing attention to the word, and great 
 solemnity in the assemblies. The people of God became more sensi- 
 ble of, and affected with, the low state of religion, and the danger- 
 ous perishing condition of sinners." In the meantime, intelligence 
 was coming through various channels of a wonderful work of grace 
 which had commenced a year or two before in Kentucky, under the 
 labors of the famous and somewhat fanatical James McGready, who 
 had been one of McMillan's pupils, and was well known in this 
 region. This work had also extended into North Carolina, and was 
 rapidly spreading over the adjacent parts of the South and Southwest. 
 It was, undoubtedly, for the most part, a genuine work of grace, 
 though marred with serious defects and extravagances, which be- 
 came more and more objectionable as the excitement increased. 
 It was here that those " bodily exercises " began to be experienced, 
 which were considered so inexplicable at the time; and which, 
 under the preaching of enthusiastic and imperfectly educated men, 
 who could not discriminate between a nervous epidemic and the 
 work of God's grace on the soul, assumed forms of extravagance 
 which they never reached under the more sober and judicious minis- 
 ters of Western Pennsylvania. 
 
 The reports of this great revival elsewhere served greatly to en- 
 courage the hopes of God's waiting people here, and the expecta- 
 tion became general that the Lord was about to grant them similar 
 blessings. 
 
 Such was the state of feeling during the spring and summer of 
 1802 ; and special tokens of the divine presence were apparent in 
 some of the churches, especially at Cross Roads and Lower Buffalo 
 the former being one of the charges of Elisha Macurdy, and the 
 latter of James Hughes. " But the first extraordinary manifesta- 
 tions of the Divine power were made in the congregation of Three 
 Springs, part of the charge of Elisha Macurdy, at the time of the 
 administration of the Lord's Supper, on the fourth Sabbath of Sep-
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 tember, 1802." Some weeks before this communion season, an 
 agreement had been made among the pious to spend a certain time, 
 about sun-setting on each Thursday, in secret prayer, each alone, to 
 plead with God for the presence of his Holy Spirit on that occasion. 
 On the Sabbath preceding the communion it was evident that God 
 was already hearing their prayers. At the close of the afternoon 
 service, when the congregation was dismissed, about fifty persons 
 remained upon the ground, unwilling to go away, and spent most 
 of the night in social worship. On the Thursday following, which 
 was the usual " fast day " before the sacrament, after the usual ser- 
 vice, a prayer meeting was appointed in the evening ; and before 
 worship began, two young women (one of whom is still living), 
 who had retired to the woods to pray, fell to the ground, unable to 
 bear up any longer under the distressing anguish of a wounded spirit. 
 Others were soon similarly affected, and most of the time from that 
 until Saturday afternoon was spent in conversing with the distressed 
 in mind. Their general complaint was a sense of guilt, especially 
 in rejecting Christ ; hardness of heart, and inability to help them- 
 selves ; while all acknowledged the justice of God in their condem- 
 nation. None as yet had found peace. Most of Saturday night 
 was spent in social worship. And when the congregation was dis- 
 missed on Monday, some hundreds remained, and could not be per- 
 suaded to leave. All the following night was spent in social exer- 
 cises, and about the break of day six persons expressed a hope of 
 having obtained an interest in Christ. The assembly dispersed a 
 little before noon on Tuesday. 
 
 On the Thursday following, at Cross Roads, it being the day of 
 their monthly prayer meeting, there was also a time of God's power; 
 many were awakened ; and here also the whole of the following 
 night was spent in religious exercises. Such was the beginning of 
 the work in Macurdy's two congregations. A few days after, on 
 Tuesday, the 5th of October, it being the day of concert prayer, 
 the Lord also appeared by the powerful operation of the Spirit in 
 the congregation of Cross Creek, the charge of Thos. Marquis. The 
 people seemed unwilling to leave, when dismissed ; and a few words 
 from one of the elders to the young people standing about the door 
 caused them all to dissolve in tears. The congregation re-assem- 
 bled, and most of the night was spent in prayer, conversation, and
 
 48 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 praise. How different this from the way in which many of our 
 young people now spend the time together until "the wee small 
 hours !" 
 
 On the Sabbath following, being the loth of October, the Lord's 
 Supper was administered at Raccoon, the charge of Rev. Joseph 
 Patterson, formerly the "layman" at Vance's Fort. After the 
 usual services connected with the communion, social worship and 
 preaching were continued through the night ; and the house being 
 too small to contain all who were present, services were also held 
 at the tent, many new awakenings continuing to take place. On 
 Monday, in connection with the usual public worship, many more 
 were made to cry out in agony of soul, unable to sit or stand. 
 Some who had been notorious for their wickedness were stricken 
 down and constrained to cry out in anguish, "Undone! undone ! 
 for ever undone !" 
 
 On the last Sabbath of October the Lord's Supper was adminis- 
 tered at Cross Roads. A great multitude of people collected, many 
 from a distance, with wagons and provisions, prepared to remain 
 during the whole of the solemnity. There was much rain and snow, 
 yet most of the people remained together until Tuesday morning. 
 Nine ministers were present. The house could not hold half the 
 people, and services were held at the same time both in the house 
 and in the tent. Prayers and exhortations were continued all night 
 in the house, except at short intervals, when a speaker's voice could 
 not be heard for the cries and groans of the distressed. On Mon- 
 day three ministers preached in different places at the same time. 
 After public worship was concluded, and the people were preparing 
 to remove, the scene was very affecting. The house was thronged 
 full, and when some of those without were about to go away, they 
 found that part of their families were in the house, and some of them 
 lying in distress, unable to remove. Some went away, but the 
 greater part remained. The work became more powerful than be- 
 fore, and numbers who had prepared to go were constrained to stay. 
 The exercises continued throughout the whole night. Many of the 
 young people were remarkably exercised, and frequently addressed 
 others about the perishing condition they were in the' glories of 
 the Saviour the excellency and suitableness of the plan of salva- 
 tion and warned, invited, and pressed sinners to come to Christ ;
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 49 
 
 all in a manner quite astonishing for their years. About sunrise the 
 people dispersed. 
 
 An appointment was made for the administration of the Lord's 
 Supper again, on the second Sabbath in November, at Upper Buf- 
 falo, the charge of the Rev. John Anderson. On Saturday preced- 
 ing the communion, a greater concourse of people than had ever 
 been seen before at a meeting for divine worship in this country, 
 assembled, and formed an encampment in a semi-circle around 
 the front of the tent, in a shady wood. Many had brought wagons, 
 with their families and provisions, with a great number of tents. 
 It seems to have been a regular camp meeting, such as had already 
 begun to be held in the South. But these camp meetings grew out 
 of the necessities of the case, there being otherwise no possibility of 
 providing accommodations for the multitudes which assembled. On 
 this occasion fifteen ministers were present, all members of the Synod 
 of Pittsburgh, and all taking part in the various exercises. The 
 administration of the word and ordinances was accompanied with 
 an extraordinary effusion of divine influences on the hearts of the 
 hearers. Some hundreds were, during the season, convicted of 
 their sin and misery. Preaching, exhortations, prayers, and praises 
 were continued alternately throughout the night in the meeting- 
 house, which was full, and part of the night at the tent. On 
 Sabbath, after two "action sermons" (as they were called) had 
 been preached, one in the house and the other at the tent, the 
 Lord's Supper -was administered at the tent to about nine hundred 
 and sixty communicants. The multitudes of non-communicants 
 were addressed at the same time, part in the house, and part in an 
 adjacent grove, by several ministers. 
 
 It was on this occasion that Macurdy preached, without prepara- 
 tion, his famous "War Sermon," of which I received an account 
 from his own lips. The circumstances have often been described 
 by others, and I need only confirm their statements, especially that 
 given by Dr. Elliot. Macurdy undertook the duty at McMillan's 
 request. He ascended a wagon, in the midst of the crowd, with 
 fear and trembling, not knowing what to say. He gave out a 
 hymn and offered a short prayer. He then opened the Bible, and 
 his eye fell upon the second Psalm, "Why do the heathen rage," 
 etc. The idea of insurrection and amnesty occurred to him. The 
 D
 
 5 o PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 people were all familiar with these ideas from the recent experiences 
 of the -'Whiskey Insurrection," and the terms of amnesty offered 
 by the Government. He startled them by announcing that he was 
 about to preach on politics that he had just received a letter from 
 the Government that an insurrection had taken place, that measures 
 had been taken to suppress the rebellion, and that an amnesty had 
 been proclaimed to all who would return to their duty; that some of 
 the rebels were there present, and he would now read them the letter. 
 He then read the second Psalm, and proceeded to apply it to the 
 condition of sinners as rebels against the government of God, and to 
 announce the terms of amnesty offered them in Christ. "Kiss ye 
 the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish," etc. The spirit gave him 
 utterance, and a powerful impression was produced. Many fell 
 prostrate to the ground, crying out in anguish that they had been 
 insurgents against God. " The scene," said the Rev. Thomas Hunt, 
 who was in the wagon with him, "appeared to me like the close of 
 a battle in which every tenth man had been fatally wounded." Many 
 of these prostrate ones soon became reconciled, and found peace 
 with God. 
 
 On Monday the whole assembly was addressed by one speaker 
 from the tent. They were composed, solemn, and attentive during 
 the time of public worship ; but after the blessing was pronounced, 
 many were struck down in all parts of the congregation, and many 
 more sat still, silently weeping over their miserable state as sinners 
 exposed to eternal wrath. Many of God's dear children were filled 
 with peace in believing. The exercises were continued until after 
 sunrise on Tuesday morning, when the assembly was solemnly dis- 
 missed, and began with apparent reluctance to prepare to disperse. 
 After some time the most removed, except the people of the con- 
 gregation, who still tarried, lingering at the place where so much of 
 God's power had been manifested to their eyes and in their con- 
 sciences. Numbers who had gone home to provide refreshments for 
 their friends returned. Still they could not part. All again col- 
 lected in the meeting-house, where this day also was spent till 
 evening, in preaching, exhortation, and prayer. The exercise was 
 very powerful, and numbers were affected who appeared to be un- 
 moved before. 
 
 Thus did this wonderful work continue to prevail and extend.
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 51 
 
 Meetings were held in the various churches thrughout this region. 
 These were crowded with people from all the country around, to 
 the distance of nearly a hundred miles. From the time of the 
 administration of the Lord's Supper at Three Springs, in Septem- 
 ber, 1802, the work continued to extend for several months. Nearly 
 all the churches west of the mountains were visited with less or more 
 of these divine influences, and although the number of professed con- 
 versions was not so great in proportion as in some modern revivals, 
 the impressions made were more deep and lasting, and the fruits 
 continued to be gathered in at successive communion seasons for 
 years to come. Our fathers made more of what they called the 
 ' law work " than many do now. Their great labor was to bring 
 sinners to feel that they were lost, and they were not in haste to 
 bring them up from these depths, believing that He who came to 
 seek and save the lost would not leave them to perish in the deep 
 waters. And yet they did not fail always to point them to Christ 
 as the great deliverer. They were, however, less anxious to count 
 numbers than to save souls. And the permanent good fruits of these 
 revivals attest the wisdom of those who labored in them. 
 
 In the condensed account which I have thus given of the great 
 revival of 1802-3, no particular notice has been taken of one of its 
 remarkable peculiarities, which in the parlance of our fathers, gave 
 name to it as the " falling work." 
 
 Our history would not be complete without some account of this 
 singular feature of the work, which, though a frequent accompani- 
 ment, was really no essential part of the work itself. That the body 
 should be affected by any strong mental emotion, was nothing new 
 or strange. That religious emotion, especially such as is awakened 
 by a vivid apprehension of the great verities of the Christian faith, 
 should express itself in irrepressible outcries, and even in fainting 
 and swooning away, was only what had often been witnessed before 
 in seasons of revival. It was so in the great revival of Cambuslang, 
 in Scotland, in 1742, and in the simultaneous work of grace in New 
 Jersey and elsewhere under the labors of Whitefield and the Tennents. 
 In Whitefield's account of this latter work, although at first he look- 
 ed upon it with suspicion saying of it " Satan begins to cast some 
 into fits," yet afterwards, when he had seen how the Spirit of God 
 was working on the hearts of many of its subjects, he speaks of the
 
 5 2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 "amazing manifestations of distress " without disapprobation. Of 
 the work at Fagg's Manor he says, "Some were struck as pale 
 as death, others lying on the ground, others wringing their hands, 
 others sinking into the arms of friends," etc. ; while of himself on 
 one of these occasions, he says:. "After I had finished my last 
 discourse, I was so overpowered with a sense of God's love, that it 
 almost took away my life." 
 
 The traditions of this work at Fagg's Manor were yet fresh when 
 McMillan was a student there, and the great work in Kentucky and 
 North Carolina was still in progress when the revival of 1802-3 
 commenced here. There the "bodily exercises" were much more 
 marked than elsewhere, and ultimately assumed the form of jerking, 
 jumping, barking, etc., not unlike the extravagances of the Middle 
 Ages in Europe. Both history and physiology prove that such ex- 
 citements are epidemical ; and it is not surprising that, along with 
 the intelligence that reached our fathers respecting the great work 
 of grace in the West and South, and which was one of the means of 
 kindling up the spirit of revival among them, the reports of these 
 strange bodily accompaniments of the work should have awakened 
 an expectation of something similar here ; and the expectation itself, 
 according to the laws of mental physiology, was enough to induce 
 the effects anticipated. These physical laws were not then well un- 
 derstood, and there has always been a disposition among men to 
 think that "the Kingdom of God cometh with observation." 
 Bodily affections, such as crying out, swooning, etc., are taken as 
 evidence of the work of the Holy Spirit, although there is no neces- 
 sary connection between them; and the excitement produced -by 
 these outward manifestations, no doubt, has served to arrest atten- 
 tion and thus to prepare the minds of many to be impressed by 
 divine truth who might otherwise have remained unaffected. 
 
 At an early stage of the great revival here, these bodily exercises be- 
 gan to show themselves. " It was no unusual thing," says McMillan, 
 "to see persons so entirely deprived of bodily strength that they 
 would fall from their seats or off their feet, and be as unable to help 
 themselves as a new-born child." Dr. Anderson says, "There 
 was, in some cases gradually, and in others instantly, a total loss of 
 bodily strength, so that they fell to the ground, like Saul of Tarsus, 
 and with oppression of the heart and lungs, with suspension of
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 53 
 
 breath, with sobs and loud cries." The subjects of these affections 
 retained the use of their faculties, even during the paroxysms, in 
 full vigor. They had a clear perception of all that was said and 
 done around them, even while they lay apparently in a state of sus- 
 pended animation. Their mental exercises were generally highly 
 intensive. Their convictions of guilt and danger were, for the 
 most part, very pungent, causing them to utter agonizing cries for 
 mercy. And when they obtained deliverance through Christ, they 
 were often filled with love, admiration, and joy. Robert Johnston, 
 who saw much of the work as it appeared in his own congregation 
 of Scrubgrass, says, ' ' I have seen men and women in solemn atti- 
 tude, pondering the truths which were presented, fall in a moment 
 from their seats, or off their feet, as helpless as though they had 
 been shot, and lie from ten to fifteen or twenty minutes, or longer, 
 as motionless as a person in a sound sleep. At other times the 
 whole frame would be thrown into a state of agitation, as, seemingly, 
 to endanger the safety of the subject ; and yet, in a moment this 
 agitation would cease, and the persons arise in the full possession 
 of all their bodily powers, and take their seats, composed and 
 solemn, without the least sensation of pain or uneasiness." "Nor 
 was there that kind of uniformity in the occurrence of these dif- 
 ferent effects on the body, as to allow them to be ascribed to cor- 
 responding exercises of the mind. Some have been agitated in 
 body under pleasing exercises of the mind, and others have lain 
 motionless under the anguish of a wounded spirit. Some were 
 under deep and pungent convictions for weeks before they felt any 
 effects on the body, while some passed through the whole course of 
 awakening and conviction, and became hopefully pious, who never 
 felt any symptoms of bodily agitation." Professors of religion were 
 also as likely to be affected as others. Persons who had long been 
 members of the church, and even ministers, in some instances, were 
 similarly affected. The falling took place, likewise, on all occa- 
 sions, most generally, however, at the public meetings. Yet in- 
 stances occurred at family prayer, in solitude, and even in merry 
 company, or during the prosecution of ordinary business. 
 
 It was not the character of the preaching that induced these 
 effects. The Rev. George M. Scott, of Mill Creek, says, " When 
 the bodily exercise first appeared, I considered the whole to be a
 
 $4 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 delusion. I supposed these excitements were produced by preach- 
 ers thundering the terrors of the law ; and I thought I could check 
 it by preaching the invitations of the Gospel, and the way of sal- 
 vation through Christ ; but I soon found that instead of stopping 
 the work, this kind of preaching only increased it." But while the 
 bodily affection seems to have been involuntary and uncontrollable, 
 the outcries and meanings which sometimes accompanied it, could 
 be suppressed. Thus Mr. Johnston, in his account, further says that, 
 at an early period of the work in his church, he urged his people 
 to guard against any disorder of this kind. This had the desired 
 effect. " I have preached," he says, " to a crowded assembly, when 
 more than half the people were lying helpless before me, during a 
 greater part of the service, without the least noise or disturbance of 
 any kind." Some of the members of the Synod of Erie, now pre- 
 sent, may remember a statement which was made in a religious con- 
 ference at our meeting in Greenville, in 1872, by a venerable 
 elder, ' Father Stinson,' who, among other reminiscences of those 
 early days, said, that during the prevalence of the celebrated fall- 
 ing work, four young men determined to go one evening to the 
 place of meeting, and to show that they could not be influenced by 
 the prevailing excitement. They rode boldly up and entered the 
 meeting. They listened quietly 'to the solemn sermon, and wit- 
 nessed the falling of some in the assembly. After a while they rode 
 away together, but had not gone far until one of them cried out, 
 " O, I am ruining my soul ! " The others all responded with the 
 same feeling, and they went back to the meeting, yielded to its 
 influences, and all became Christian men, and two of them minis- 
 ters of the Gospel. These notices may suffice to give some idea of 
 the character of the work. (See Appendix B.) 
 
 When it first appeared our fathers knew not how to treat it. They 
 saw that generally a work of the Holy Spirit was connected with it, 
 and they were afraid to give a wrong touch to the ark. As Ma- 
 curdy says, "There it was, and we could do nothing with it." 
 They warned the people, however, against supposing it to be any 
 sign of grace; and in their wisdom they held a firm check upon the 
 tendency to such tumultuous excitements and extravagances as were 
 witnessed in Kentucky. Some good people, especially among our 
 Seceder brethren, thought it a work of the devil; and, as in duty
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. S5 
 
 bound, preached and wrote against it. In reply, Dr. Ralston's 
 vigorous pamphlet, commonly known as " The Currycomb," was 
 called forth. 
 
 As to the causes of these bodily exercises we are perhaps more 
 favorably situated for forming a correct judgment than those who 
 witnessed them. These phenomena then bordered on the marvel- 
 lous, and the religious experience of very many of the subjects was 
 so unquestionably genuine that many were disposed to regard both 
 the outward and inward parts of the work as alike from the Holy 
 Spirit. The calmer judgment, however, of those who have since 
 investigated the subject in the light of history, and of better scienti- 
 fic acquaintance with the laws of the animal economy, and of the 
 reciprocal influence of the mind and the nervous system, has led all 
 judicious men to the conclusion that these bodily exercises were alto- 
 gether the result of natural causes, and were only an incidental ac- 
 companiment of a true work of grace wrought by the Holy Spirit. 
 
 Such are the opinions expressed by the venerable Dr. Baxter, of 
 Virginia, who witnessed much of the work ; also by Dr. Archibald 
 Alexander, Dr. Charles Hodge, Dr. Joseph H. Jones, and many 
 others, including physicians and physiologists, who were competent 
 and impartial judges of such matters. We have not time to quote 
 their testimonies.* 
 
 * Dr. Baxter, in a letter originally published in the Watchman of 
 the South, and copied into the Presbyterian Advocate of March 11, 
 1840, repeatedly speaks of these exercises as a "disease," and one that 
 "seemed to be conveyed by a mysterious infection." Of the work as 
 he saw it in Kentucky and in the valley of Virginia, he says that "in a 
 great variety of cases the exercise was convulsive and turbulent in a 
 high degree ; and although this exercise was unfavorable to composed 
 thoughtfulness at the time, yet when the paroxysm had subsided, the 
 reason, intelligence, or health of tho subject did not appear to be at all 
 impaired." He says further, " At the time of which I am speaking, 
 although some of the subjects of the exercise were serious people, yet a 
 large proportion of its subjects showed no religious feelings at all." 
 And he gives an instance where "the people had met for a common 
 frolic, and when the music and dancing began, the jerking exercise also 
 broke out amongst them and produced the greatest alarm. The com- 
 pany dispersed with very little ceremony.' 
 
 On another occasion, "two men at the court-house had quarrelled and 
 fought, and in the midst of the scuffle one of them was taken with tho 
 jerks, which soon parted the combatants." Again he says, "I was one
 
 )6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 As to the character of the ministry of those days, whose labors 
 God so greatly blessed, much has been written, and we shall learn 
 
 day traveling with an old acquaintance who had been for some time sub- 
 ject to this exercise. He was a moral man, but not a professor of reli- 
 gion. The disease came upon him whilst on the road ; he threw himself 
 from his horse, rolled and tossed on the ground for some minutes, and 
 then arose in full health and vigor, and we pursued our journey." 
 
 Dr. Archibald Alexander, in his work on "Religious Experience," 
 says, " In those remarkable bodily affections, called the jerks, which 
 appeared some years ago in religious meetings, the nervous irregularity 
 was commonly produced by the sight of other persons thus affected; 
 and if in some instances, without the sight, yet by having the imagina- 
 tion strongly impressed by hearing of such things. It is a fact, as un- 
 doubted as it is remarkable, that as this bodily affection assumed a great 
 variety of appearances in different places, nothing was more common 
 than for a new species of the exercise, as it was called, to be imported 
 from another part of the country, by one or a few individuals. This 
 contagion of nervous excitement is not unparalleled," etc. 
 
 Dr. Joseph H. Jones, in his work on "Man, Moral and Physical," at- 
 tributes these bodily exercises to the influence of "morbid imitative 
 sympathy, and of imagination on the nervous system. He says, "They 
 were occasioned doubtless, in part, by an undue excitement of the ani- 
 mal feelings." " One remarkable feature of these bodily affections, was, 
 that the very apprehension of an attack would often bring it on, in 
 spite of all precautions or efforts of the will to prevent it " of which 
 he adduces some remarkable examples from Davidson's " History of the 
 Presbyterian Church in Kentucky." His discussion of the whole sub- 
 ject is quite exhaustive. 
 
 Dr. Charles Hodge, in his " Constitutional History of the Presbyterian 
 Church," says, "Though Edwards [Jonathan] neverregarded these out- 
 cries and bodily affections as any evidence of true religious affections, 
 he was at this time much less sensible of the danger of encouraging 
 such manifestations of excitement than he afterwards became. Nor 
 does he seem to have been sufficiently aware of the nature and effects 
 of nervous disorders, which in times of excitement are as infectious as 
 any form of disease to which the human system is liable ; " " That such 
 bodily affections owe their origin, not to any divine influence r but to 
 natural causes, may be inferred from the fact that these latter are ade- 
 quate to their production;" and that "they have prevailed in all ages, 
 among pagans, papists, and every sect of fanatics" "all propagating 
 themselves by a kind of infection." 
 
 An able article, by an intelligent Christian physician, who witnessed 
 the phenomena for himself, in the Biblical Repertory for 1834, throws 
 much light on the subject. 
 
 Dr. Carpenter, in his recent work on "Mental Physiology," also learn- 
 edly discusses tho nature of such bodily affections.
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 much that is profitable from the sketches which are to be read on 
 this occasion. We are not so well acquainted with the lay helpers 
 both men and women who afforded such important aid to these 
 men by their exemplary piety, their active co-operation, and their 
 earnest prayers. Let us look at a few of these. 
 
 As specimens of the eldership in those early churches, the name 
 of PHILIP JACKSON, Macurdy's " praying elder," is perhaps best 
 Vnown. We find a sketch of him in Elliott's " Life of Macurdy," 
 which is too long to quote, showing him to have been one of the 
 earliest settlers in the bounds of the Cross Roads (now Florence) 
 congregation ; converted under the preaching of the Rev. Joseph 
 Smith; made an elder in 1786 ; with little education, but of strong 
 common sense, and great energy of character ; the right-hand man 
 and bosom friend of his pastor, Elisha Macurdy ; a man abounding 
 in prayer, always ready to speak to men about their souls, often 
 retiring with his pastor to the woods to pray once for the conver- 
 sion of his own son (a prayer that was heard), but mostly to wrestle 
 with God for the revival of his work. When his pastor suggests, at 
 a prayer meeting, the propriety of a special concert of secret 
 prayer on Thursday evenings, Philip starts up and says, "Take 
 the vote ! take the vote ! " And, on another occasion, he is honest 
 enough to pray in the presence of his pastor, who had recently 
 asked a weak brother to preach, that the Lord would keep the 
 pastor from the sin of inviting ministers to preach, merely out of 
 compliment to them. Once he accompanied Mr. Macurdy in one 
 of the missionary tours on which he had been sent to the destitute 
 settlements up along the lake shore ; and besides other assistance in 
 the work of organizing churches, he was greatly instrumental in 
 bringing into the church their kind hosts, Mr. and Mrs. Judah 
 Colt, with whom he sat up most of a night, talking with them about 
 the state of their souls. Mr. Colt erected his family altar (on which 
 the daily offerings were kept up by his wife in his absence), and has 
 left a fragrant memory behind him as a liberal patron of the 
 church's enterprises, and one of the earliest and most munificent 
 benefactors of our own Theological Seminary. This tribute we owe 
 to Philip Jackson. 
 
 JUDGE JAMES EDGAR is another type of elder belonging to the 
 church of Cross Creek. In 1779, he drew up a call for the minis-
 
 58 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 terial labors of the Rev. Joseph Smith, from the united congrega- 
 tions of Buffalo and Cross Creek, which is a model document, very 
 different from the stereotyped form now in use. His name is most 
 familiarly known in connection with the Whiskey Insurrection, 
 which he earnestly opposed. Judge Brackenridge says of him, 
 though not appreciatingly, " His head was prematurely hoary with 
 prayer and fasting and religious exercises, his face thin and puri- 
 tanical like the old Republicans in the Long Parliament of England. 
 He was a man of sense and not destitute of eloquence." Dr. 
 Carnahan says, "This truly great and good man, little known be- 
 yond the precincts of Washington county, had removed to Western 
 Pennsylvania at an early day. He had a good English education, 
 and had improved his mind by reading and reflection, so that, in 
 theological and political knowledge he was superior to many pro- 
 fessional men. Yet he lived in retirement on his farm, except when 
 the voice of his neighbors called him forth to serve the Church or 
 the State. He was one of the associate judges of Washington 
 county. I heard him, on Monday after a sacramental occasion, 
 address an assembly of two thousand people, on the subject of the 
 insurrection, with a clearness of argument, a solemnity of manner, 
 and a tenderness of Christian eloquence, which reached the under- 
 standing and penetrated the heart of every hearer. The consequence 
 was that very few in his neighborhood were concerned in these law- 
 less riots." 
 
 Still another of those elders, " who through faith obtained a good 
 report," was "FATHER" ROBERT CAMPBELL, of the church of 
 Donegal, now in the Presbytery of Blairsville. He loved com- 
 munion seasons, and besides attending those of his own church, 
 with all the accompanying exercises of four or five days, he was 
 found at the communions of neighboring churches, even when, as 
 he once said, " in order to do-so, he had to fight the devil and a 
 buckwheat field ready to be harvested, and at last only gained the 
 victory by running away from both." Before the pastor's arrival 
 on such occasions, he would not allow the people either inside or 
 outside of the house to be unemployed. He would sing or pray, or 
 call on some one else to do so, generally dropping a weighty 
 thought, pungent remark, or brief exhortation. He seldom spoke 
 five sentences at a time. His very soul would sing. He had no
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 stereotyped prayer, but talked familiarly though reverently to God, 
 as a child pleading with a father. In imitation of his Master, he went 
 about doing good. Rarely could he afford to lodge with Christians, 
 if godless families lived near. These he went to visit, and with 
 them read the Bible, talk and pray. If he lodged with professors, 
 his aim would be to provoke them to love and good works. (See 
 Appendix C.) 
 
 Another honored name among the eldership is that of JOHN 
 LOWRIE, father of the Hon. Walter Lowrie, formerly Secretary of 
 our Board of Foreign Missions. He was born in the parish of 
 Lockhutton, near Dumfries, Scotland, and was a member of the 
 church in that parish, as early as 1 764. He came to America in 
 1793, and settled on a farm in Huntingdon county, Pennsylvania. 
 In 1802, the year of the great revival, he removed to Butler county, 
 where he and his wife, his son Matthew B., and others of his child- 
 ren, were members of the church of Scrubgrass he being a ruling 
 elder. He was a model elder, and was a most efficient helper of his 
 pastor, the Rev. Robert Johnston, in the great work of grace which 
 that church enjoyed. He is said to have been a " host in himself in 
 the church," although it is to be regretted that the details of his life 
 have not been recorded. One circumstance is mentioned as show- 
 ing his firmness in standing by his religious convictions. As a 
 juror, he was in a case which the judge wished to end on the Sab- 
 bath ; but the old gentleman refused to come into court on that 
 day, and the case had to wait until Monday, much to the judge's 
 vexation. His later years were spent in peace, chiefly occupied 
 with the reading of the Scriptures and missionary intelligence. As 
 to the honor due to his memory, it is enough that he was the pro- 
 genitor of so many worthy and distinguished sons of the Presby- 
 terian Church. 
 
 Perhaps I may be excused for alluding also to another illustrative 
 example of the piety of those times, in a kinsman of my own 
 "FATHER" EBENEZER COE. He was a soldier of the Revolution, and 
 in his old age made his home mostly in my father's house. Among 
 my earliest and most impressive recollections, is that of having seen 
 this good old man retiring two or three times a day to the garret of 
 the house, where he spent some time alone. And when my childish 
 curiosity was awakened to know the cause. I learned a lesson which
 
 60 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 I ought to have profited by more than I have, when told that he had 
 gone there to pray. At other hours his Bible was his constant com- 
 panion. 
 
 Such were some of the men whom our fathers in the ministry had 
 for their co-laborers in the Lord's work. They were not the sort of 
 men to be driven by the winds of a transient enthusiasm, or to mis- 
 take an artificial excitement for a genuine revival of religion. (See 
 Appendix D.) 
 
 Nor ought we to omit a passing notice of the women of those 
 days, many of whom were mothers in Israel indeed, and such as 
 Paul commends as his helpers, and who labored much with him in 
 the Lord. And just here I may further claim indulgence for men- 
 tioning a fact which I have learned respecting a sister of the man 
 last named. She was as patriotic in her way as her brother, but she 
 served her country at home by doing what she could for the suffer- 
 ing soldiers in the field. Especially did she pray for them in the 
 closet. On one occasion, in the very darkest period of our country's 
 struggle against the mighty power of Britain, when men's hearts 
 were failing them for fear, it is said that this woman spent the 
 whole night in the house top, wrestling in prayer for her country's 
 deliverance; and when she came down in the morning, she ex- 
 claimed, with a smiling countenance, "Never fear, the Americans 
 will yet surely prevail." She felt that God had heard her prayer. 
 
 Another instance, illustrative of this confidence in the power of 
 prayer, is that of an old lady, whose name is not given, who, when 
 the Rev. Jos. Smith, before his removal to the West, was lying ap- 
 parently at the point of death, and his friend James Edgar (whom 
 we have already mentioned) came to inquire about him after 
 special prayer had been offered for him at a prayer meeting replied 
 that Mr. Smith was worse; "but," said she (when she saw that Mr. 
 Edgar's heart sank within him), "he will not die, for the Lord hath 
 told me to-day that He would raise him up and send him out to the 
 .West to preach the Gospel." This she spoke with great confidence, 
 and while Mr. Edgar was sitting by the bedside of the sick man, the 
 favorable crisis of the disease came, he soon recovered, and was able 
 to follow his friend to their new home in the West, in answer to the 
 call that had been made out for him. 
 
 And here, I shall venture another well authenticated instance of
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 61 
 
 a similar kind, in the wife of that layman of Fort Vance, who after- 
 wards became the Rev. Joseph Patterson. When, after having gone 
 through a course of study for the ministry, he was about leaving 
 home to attend the meeting of Presbytery, at which he expected 
 to be licensed, he asked his wife to pray for him, particularly 
 at the hour of noon on the following Thursday, at which time 
 he expected to be delivering his trial sermon. Contrary, however, 
 to his expectations, he was called to preach at the same hour on the 
 preceding day; and when he returned home after the adjournment 
 of Presbytery, Mrs. P. said to him, "I think you did not deliver 
 your sermon on Thursday, as you expected." "When did I then?" 
 he inquired. "I think," she seriously replied, "from the impres- 
 sions made on my mind, that it was at twelve o'clock on Wednes- 
 day." This fact is given on the authority of Dr. Elisha P. Swift, 
 who received it from the lips of Father Patterson himself. There 
 were many such " prayer tests" in those days, before Tyndall was 
 born. 
 
 Another godly woman was the wife of the Rev. Joseph Smith, 
 who, after having been for more than twenty years a most efficient 
 helpmate to her husband, after his death made her home in the 
 family of her brother-in-law, the Rev. James Hughes. Being 
 without any particular charge or incumbrance, she spent a great 
 part of her time among the poor, the afflicted, and those who were 
 concerned about the state of their souls. A steady member of 
 female praying societies, she did much to unite Christian women of 
 different denominations in these societies, one of which she attended 
 weekly until a few days before her death, when she was too weak to 
 walk. She passed from earth in her seventy-eighth year, while the 
 family were engaged in their morning devotions, and were singing 
 the hymn beginning, 
 
 "Ye fleeting charms of earth, farewell, 
 
 Your springs of joy are dry ; 
 My soul now seeks another home, 
 A brighter world on high." 
 
 Again, as illustrative of the influence of the pious women of those 
 days in promoting the great revival, we find in the Life of Macurdy 
 this statement: That during the summer of 1802, just preceding 
 the commencement of the revival, a few of the devout women of
 
 62 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 
 
 the congregation met at the house of Mr. Macurdy and formed 
 themselves into a praying circle, with the special object of praying 
 for a revival of religion. In the midst of the discouragements which 
 then surrounded him, he felt deeply interested in this movement. 
 During their first meeting at his house, he took his axe, and retiring 
 to a grove near by, cut down some boughs from the trees, of which 
 he formed a booth. Then, within that secluded arbor, while these 
 pious women were praying in the house, he knelt in earnest suppli- 
 cation to the God of Lydia, and invoked his blessing upon them and 
 their object. His heart was full. It was an hour of conflict; on 
 one side half a dozen timid women ; on the other, the legions of the 
 Prince of Darkness. It was at this time that the passage in Isaiah 
 xxxv. 4 "Say to them that are of a fearful heart, be strong," &c., 
 was forcibly impressed upon his mind, and became the foundation of 
 a discourse so powerful that McMillan, who was not given to flattery, 
 said to him, after hearing it, "It was not you that preached to-day, 
 but God." How much the women's prayers had to do with the 
 choice of that text, and the growth of that sermon in his mind, it is 
 not for us to say. 
 
 I shall give but one more instance, showing what stuff the women 
 of those days were made of. It is that of the wife of Judge Mc- 
 Dowell, the elder at whose house McMillan lodged on his first visit 
 to the West, in 1775. Mrs. McD., like many other women of that 
 day, was accustomed to keep up family worship in her husband's 
 absence. On one occasion two prominent lawyers from Washing- 
 ton (who might be named) came in the evening to visit the Judge 
 on business. His wife informed them that he was absent, but he 
 would be home in the morning, at the same time inviting them to 
 her hospitality, which they accepted. These gentlemen were both 
 known as open sceptics. The hour for family worship having ar- 
 rived, there came a trial of her faith and courage. Her conscience 
 would not permit her to omit the usual service, nor to invite them 
 to retire before it was attended to. She called her family together 
 as usual, explained to her guests the uniform custom of the house- 
 hold, and proceeded to read the Scriptures, sing a psalm, and to 
 bow in prayer in the presence of men who, though not used to bow 
 before God, were constrained to kneel at this domestic altar, with 
 this brave woman officiating as priestess. It is said of one of these
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 men that from this impressive occasion he dated an entire change in 
 his views on the subject of religion. 
 
 These instances may suffice in the way of examples of the lay 
 piety of those days. And there were, no doubt, many others of 
 like spirit, whose names have not been chronicled on earth, but are 
 written in heaven. It is no wonder that with such ministers and 
 preaching, and with such fathers and mothers in Israel as helpers in 
 the work, the Lord glorified himself in doing great things for Zion 
 in those early years. The choice seed which was then sown in this 
 virgin soil has continued to bear fruit ever since. And this planta 
 tion of grace spread itself far and wide over the regions west ; so 
 that the four Synods which are here represented, not to speak of 
 others, were largely planted by those who were the sons and daugh- 
 ters of these revival workers. Hence it is that this region of the 
 church has been well denominated the back-bone of our American 
 Presbyterianism. We have reason to be proud of our spiritual an- 
 cestry, and yet humbled that we are not as worthy of this ancestry 
 as we might be, while at the same time we may be thankful that we 
 have not wholly forgotten the faith of our fathers. 
 
 Among the lessons which we may learn from this survey are such 
 as these : 
 
 i. That we need a revival of family religion such as was main- 
 tained in the households of those fathers. They ' ' commanded their 
 children, and their households after them, that they should keep the 
 way of the Lord," etc. These parents deserved the reverence which 
 they demanded from their sons and daughters. It was a matter of 
 course that such mothers should keep up the worship of the house- 
 hold in the absence of the fathers. Family religion was not then a 
 secondary matter. They had, it is true, no church Sunday-schools ; 
 but they had what was better so far as the children of the pious 
 were concerned a Sabbath-school in every family on the evening 
 of the day, after returning from public worship, when the Catechism 
 was studied and recited, and other religious instruction given. Thus 
 they spent the "whole day," and not merely a part of it, in the 
 public and private exercises of God's worship. And I can testify 
 for one, that such Sabbaths were not gloomy and hateful, though 
 impressively solemn. Some, it may be, were pharisaically austere ; 
 but better even this, a thousandfold, than a holiday Sunday after-
 
 6j PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 noon, which shall obliterate all the good impressions of the morning, 
 and leave no time or disposition for family instruction. Woe to 
 the church and woe to the land, when our old Puritan and Scotch- 
 Irish holy Sabbaths (which are the true Scripture Sabbaths) shall be 
 superseded by continental holidays. The new Hopkinsianism is an 
 exotic in this region, and we trust it may ever find here a soil un- 
 congenial to so mischievous a growth. 
 
 2. That God is ever waiting to bestow blessings upon a waiting 
 people. Iniquity abounded ministers and people felt their need 
 they sought the Lord secretly, socially, and by special concert. 
 They heard "the sound of a going," etc., and they bestirred them- 
 selves they looked for the spreading of the little cloud until the 
 Lord poured down upon them abundance of rain. Shall it not be 
 so with us in these days ? 
 
 3. They remembered the heathen and the waste places (as we 
 shall see more fully in a subsequent discourse), and they gave liber- 
 ally according to their means thus bringing their tithes into the 
 storehouse, and proving the Lord therewith. Shall we not also 
 learn to practice more self-denial and beneficence for Christ's sake ? 
 Shall we not endeavor to bring every member in each of our churches 
 (the weak as well as the strong) to give systematically to all our be- 
 nevolent enterprises thus coming up to the help of the Lord, by 
 replenishing all the empty treasuries of the Boards, and thus see if 
 God will not pour us out a blessing. 
 
 4. We want more of such lay helpers, male and female, as they 
 had in those days. What a vast storehouse of undeveloped power 
 have we in our churches, especially in the eldership and in our 
 Christian women? The latter are nobly waking up to the duty 
 and privilege of "woman's work for woman," both at home and 
 abroad. Let all thus awake. And the eldership also, is there not 
 beginning to be a shaking among many who have been as dry bones? 
 What mean these conferences of elders at the meetings of the General 
 Assembly, and these conventions of elders in divers places to in- 
 quire into the nature and duties of their office? If the eldership in 
 all our churches were waked up to the duty of working, and setting 
 others to work, in Sabbath-schools, prayer-meetings, exhorting, 
 visiting families, and inquiring into the state of family religion, 
 catechetical instruction, Christian giving, etc. being themselves ex-
 
 THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 amples to the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made them 
 overseers then would the power of the church be increased ten- 
 fold; and there would be no need of lay evangelists, male and fe- 
 male, to supplement (if not usurp) the office of the ministry. Our 
 church machinery is complete, and if it were in proper working 
 order, and the impulsive power of the Holy Ghost applied to it, no 
 other evangelistic agencies would be needed. 
 
 5. AH this implies and presupposes that the ministry be compe- 
 tent, holy, and faithful ; that we preach such unadulterated and un- 
 diluted truth as those old fathers preached, and as we may find it in 
 the few published sermons of McMillan and Porter; that we be 
 "men of Issachar, having an understanding of the times, that we 
 may know what Israel ought to do;" that we be up to the spirit of 
 the times, and instinct with the Spirit of the Lord; that we preach, 
 not science or politics, but Jesus Christ and him crucified; that we 
 believe, and therefore speak ; knowing in whom we have ourselves 
 believed; having no other aim than to glorify our Master in the 
 salvation of souls; for whom we travail in birth until Christ be 
 formed within them. 
 
 O brethren ! shall we not seek a new consecration a fresh bap- 
 tism? And may we not expect that this holy convocation in which 
 we are now met, like those of former years, shall be followed by 
 special visitations on all our churches and throughout the land? 
 We are now about to enter upon the last quarter of this eventful 
 century, and upon a new year, and a new centennium of our 
 Western Presbyterianism. Providence and prophecy point to 
 greater struggles and greater triumphs than our forefathers wit- 
 nessed. The Lord is at hand ! Our time of work will soon be 
 ended ! Let us understand our high responsibilities, and standing 
 firm on the vantage-ground of opportunity which the Lord has 
 fiven us, let us occupy till He come ! 
 
 NOTE. In the foregoing sketches of the early revivals, the writer has 
 generally quoted the very language of the current authorities, some- 
 times slightly abridged or modified, but often without the use of quota- 
 tion marks or the mention of names. 
 E
 
 THE EDUCATIONAL HISTORY 
 
 OF 
 
 PRESBYTERIANISM 
 
 n 
 
 WESTERN PENN'A AND ADJACENT REGIONS. 
 
 Delivered at the Centennial Convention, held in the First 
 Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, December 
 7th, 8th, and 9th, 1875. 
 
 JAMES I. BROWNSON, D.D., 
 
 Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Washington, Pa
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 BfRESBYTERIANISM has a very distinctive character. 
 Its first principle is unqualified subjection to the word 
 of God, in contrast alike with rationalism and churchly 
 authority. Divine supremacy in all things, but espe 
 
 cially those of the human soul, is one of its fundamental doctrines ; 
 yet that very supremacy includes man's agency and responsibility, 
 as concerning this life and the world to come. In its polity, this 
 system is not a mere voluntary society ; nor yet a hierarchy, com- 
 petent to suspend private judgment or to enact laws which Christ 
 has not given. It is rather a commonwealth, whose divine Lord 
 only is " Master," having received "all power in heaven and in 
 earth," and whose rulers and members are all "brethren." Such a 
 conception admits offices of instruction and administration, of di- 
 vine appointment, for the maintenance of truth and order. But 
 they come under the only sanction and limitations of God's will, 
 with no rival rule of caprice or unauthorized expediency. Equality 
 of birthright, liberty within Scriptural sanction, express or fairly de- 
 duced, and a rule of faith and practice revealed from heaven these 
 are its blood-bought rights, never to be yielded for any "yoke of 
 bondage." " God alone is Lord of the conscience, and hath left it 
 free from the doctrines and commandments of men, which are in 
 anything contrary to his word or beside it in matters of faith and 
 worship." [Confession of Eaith.] 
 
 In such a system, however it may be with others, the education 
 
 both of the ministry and the people is not an incident, but a funda- 
 69
 
 70 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 mental necessity. The ministry under a responsibility, whereof an 
 open Bible is the continual test, must be able, both by culture and 
 the enlightenment of the Spirit, to discover the truth of God and to 
 distinguish it from " the commandments of men." The people, 
 having a right as clearly assured, must be ready, like the noble Be- 
 reans, to "receive the word with all readiness of mind," and to 
 ' ' search the Scriptures daily whether v these things are so. ' ' And both, 
 having their minds "sanctified by the word of God and prayer," 
 are then ready truly to "judge all things" and yet be "judged of 
 no man." This is the real logic of relations, and whether in this 
 case it has or has not been fulfilled in history, let impartial Europe 
 and America decide. 
 
 The track of the great Reformation of the sixteenth century is not 
 more clearly marked in the countries of its prevalence by the rescue 
 of the word of God from its dark covering of ceremony and super- 
 stition, than also by the establishment of seminaries and schools. 
 " We boast of our common schools," says our great historian, Ban- 
 croft, " but Calvin was the father of popular education, the inventor 
 of the system of free schools." Impartial judges do not fail to trace 
 much of the glory of New England's early enterprise and great ad- 
 vancement in both general and special education to the leaven of 
 Presbyterianism, so strongly diffused through its early and control- 
 ling Puritanism. But still more unmistakable is this influence, pure 
 and unmixed, as it came hither from Scotland, Ireland, and Hol- 
 land, transferring to our shores the progress and spirit of their insti- 
 tutions in the persons of their educated and godly ministers and 
 other instructors. Its memorials we may find in such colleges as 
 Princeton in New Jersey, Hampden-Sidney and Washington in Vir- 
 ginia, Davidson in North Carolina, Dickinson, as it was, in Eastern, 
 and our own Jefferson and Washington in Western Pennsylvania, 
 besides others, especially westward and southward, which have grown 
 out of them, or have sprung from the same seed. 
 
 By far the largest proportion of the first white settlers of Western 
 Pennsylvania were Scotch-Irish Presbyterians. That people had been 
 disciplined, first in Scotland and then in Ulster, by long and severe 
 contest for civil and religious liberty, into the "hardness" of "good 
 soldiers of Jesus Christ." It was no wonder that, at length, under 
 the rule of intolerant prelacy, they were ready to make common
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. ft 
 
 cause with the Huguenots in the settlement of the Carolinas, and 
 with the Dutch in that of New York and New Jersey, but espe- 
 cially to plant themselves amidst the forests of Pennsylvania, in the 
 region now covered by Chester, Lancaster, and York counties, under 
 her first and blessed banner of religious toleration, and in Cecil 
 county, Maryland. As they surpassed all other people in the cour- 
 age and endurance requisite for border warfare, so they were pushed 
 forward to occupy the lands west of the Susquehanna to the Blue 
 Ridge, even in advance of the extinguishment of Indian titles in 
 1 736 by the proprietary government, as well as westward still under 
 like extinguishments in 1754 and 1768. Even the royalty and high 
 church-ism of the cavaliers consented to their occupation of the beau- 
 tiful valley of the Shenandoah under legal sanction, finding compen- 
 sation for the endurance of a hated faith, in such a breastwork of 
 defence against savage butchery. From that Virginia valley came a 
 large proportion of the population, as well as of the religious efforts 
 and supervision, which established the church and its institutions in 
 the territory represented in this Convention. A chief reason for this 
 fact is to be found in the claim of Virginia to what is now the south- 
 western portion of Pennsylvania, prior to the extension of Mason's 
 and Dixon's line in 1784, which settled the long and fierce dispute. 
 
 When the four honored fathers of the Redstone Presbytery organ- 
 ized that body in 1781, the population west of the Alleghenies was 
 small and scattered. Only twenty-nine years before had the first 
 white settlement been made by Gist and the eleven families he had 
 gathered, at Mount Braddock, in what is now Fayette county. The 
 best English authority reports the whole population at about four 
 thousand, when General Stanwix, the successor of the lamented 
 Forbes, erected Fort Pitt in 1760, only fifteen years before John 
 McMillan and his associates took possession of this soil in the name 
 of Christ. The census of 1790, fifteen years after their coming, 
 found only about fifty thousand people in the western counties, or 
 less than one-twentieth of the present number. Taking the poverty 
 of the people, and the absence of facilities for travel, transportation, 
 and business into the account, the disparity of condition is increased 
 an hundredfold. And yet the same rude cabins and forests which 
 encompassed assemblies of devout worshipers on the Lord's day, 
 furnished, to an extent most noteworthy in history, not only secular
 
 f2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 instruction, but classical and scientific learning. It was an essential 
 part of their inheritance brought from the old country, and cherished 
 under the culture of the Blairs and Smiths in their Eastern Penn- 
 sylvania homes. 
 
 It would be as unprofitable as it would be unjust to the memories 
 of James Power, John McMillan, Thaddeus Dodd, and Joseph Smith, 
 to make invidious comparisons of their educational, any more than 
 their ministerial work. They were all valued sons of the College of 
 New Jersey, and devoted friends both of scholarship and religion. 
 With one mind they co-operated in the promotion of sound learning. 
 The elevation of society furnished a general motive, whilst the de- 
 mand for a competent supply of ministers of the Gospel, was nothing 
 short of a necessity. And neither history nor tradition has trans- 
 mitted a whisper of jealousy between them. "From the outset," 
 says Doddridge in his "Notes," " they prudently resolved to create 
 a ministry in the country, and accordingly established little gram- 
 mar schools at their own houses, or in their immediate neighbor- 
 hoods." In the absence of positive evidence, it is to be presumed 
 that Dr. James Power, whose first visit, in 1774, was followed in 1779 
 by his permanent settlement as pastor of the churches of Mount- 
 pleasant and Sewickley, in Westmoreland county, was a promoter of 
 liberal education, especially in view of his known fidelity in the cate- 
 chetical instruction of his own people. His literary character, at 
 least, may be inferred from the fact that he was one of the first two 
 recipients of the title of D.D. from Jefferson College, in 1808. In 
 the cases of the other three first members of the mother Presbytery, 
 all of whom labored in Washington county, there is no room for 
 doubt, each having established a school for training in the higher 
 branches of learning. The question of priority has enlisted much 
 zeal among the friends as well as descendants of these venerable men, 
 but as yet without any definite settlement. Limit of space, as well 
 as propriety itself, will restrain us on this occasion from entering that 
 field with the hope of any satisfactory result. A brief statement of 
 the case must suffice. 
 
 It is certain that the Rev. Thaddeus Dodd erected a building on his 
 own farm, and opened in it a classical and mathematical school in 
 1782, three years after his settlement as Pastor of Ten-Mile, and 
 just as many years before his congregation erected a house of worship.
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 That academy continued in operation three years and a half, until 
 the sale of the farm led to its suspension. It numbered among its 
 pupils James Hughes, John Brice, Daniel Lindly, Robert Marshall, 
 John Hanna, and David Smith, the first fruits of a large native min- 
 istry, gathered in the western church. The suspension of Mr. Dodd's 
 academy transferred Messrs. Hughes, Brice, and probably others, 
 to the school opened in the "study" at Buffalo, in 1785, by the Rev. 
 Joseph Smith, where they were joined by Joseph Patterson, James 
 McGready, Samuel Porter, and others of like purpose. That school, 
 claimed by the author of "Old Redstone," the grandson of Mr. 
 Smith, to be "the first school opened with exclusive reference to the 
 training of young men for the ministry," was successful for a few 
 years, until the failing health of Mr. Smith compelled its abandon- 
 ment, and then most of its students passed into the "Log Cabin" 
 school of Dr. John McMillan, at Chartiers. 
 
 The date of the establishment of Dr. McMillan's academy is the 
 central question of the debate already referred to. It is likely to 
 remain an open question; but settle it as we may, his fame will abide 
 as the conservative, thoughtful, resolute, and far-seeing leader of his 
 brethren in the educational, as well as ecclesiastical work of the 
 church. On the one hand, it is urged that although Dr. McMillan 
 must have given occasional and private instruction in the classics as 
 early as any of his brethren, if not indeed before them all, yet that 
 his school, as such, only in fact covered the common English branches, 
 until shortly before the cessation of Mr. Smith's school at Buffalo. 
 But against this view, it is forcibly argued, on the ground of popu- 
 lar tradition, confirmed in probability, as we shall presently see, 
 by Dr. McMillan's own words, that his school, . as an academy, 
 must have originated as early as Mr. Dodd's, viz., in 1782, if not one 
 or two years before it. The argument turns somewhat, though not 
 conclusively, upon another question, viz., whether James Ross, the 
 first known teacher under Dr. McMillan, and afterwards so distin- 
 guished both as an advocate and statesman having reached a seat 
 in the United States Senate in 1 794 gave instruction in the classics, 
 or simply taught English branches, whilst receiving private instruc- 
 tion in Latin and Greek from Dr. McMillan himself. At least as 
 early as 1 786 he can be traced as an attorney in vigorous practice in 
 the courts of Washington county.
 
 74 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 After all, might there not be a key of solution in the suggestion 
 that Dr. McMillan's school was probably opened as early as 1780, 
 and included Latin and Greek in its design, so far as the demand for 
 them then existed, but that upon the beginning of Mr. Dodd's dis- 
 tinctively classical academy two years later, such instruction may 
 have been chiefly surrendered to him for a time, in view of the suffi- 
 ciency of one such school to meet the demand, and in view of Dr. 
 McMillan's other abundant labors ; to which also is to be added 
 the fact that Dr. McMillan's charge, so prolific of candidates for the 
 ministry afterwards, was at first less so than the congregations of some 
 of his brethren. This supposition concedes priority to Dr. McMillan, 
 which is probably the truth, whilst it brings other facts into harmony 
 with it, else very difficult of explanation. In that case, the subse- 
 quent collection of the classical students at Chartiers was simply, in 
 this respect, a resumption. 
 
 The curious reader may find the whole question ably argued, if 
 not satisfactorily settled, in the Appendix to Dr. Joseph Smith's 
 History of Jefferson College ; on the one side by the author him- 
 self, and on the other by Professor Robert Patterson, now associate 
 editor of the Presbyterian Banner. But whatever may have been 
 the origin of the "Log Cabin" academy, as compared with those 
 of Messrs. Dodd and Smith, it survived them, and continued to supply 
 the demands of English, classical, and even theological education, 
 until 1791, when its students were passed over to the Canonsburg 
 Academy, shortly before erected. The spirit of McMillan in this 
 whole enterprise, as well as his hearty co-operation with his brethren 
 in the same direction, may be discovered in the modest statement 
 of his letter to the Rev. Dr. James Carnahan, under date of March 
 26th, 1832. "When I had determined," says he, "to come to 
 this country, Dr. Smith" [his theological instructor, the Rev. 
 Robert Smith, D.D., of Pequea] "enjoined it upon me to look out 
 for some pious young men and educate them for the ministry, 'for,' 
 said he, ' though some men of piety and talents may go to a new 
 country at first, yet if they are not careful to raise up others, the 
 country will not be well supplied.' Accordingly I collected a few 
 who gave evidence of piety, and taught them the Latin and Greek 
 languages, some of whom became useful, and others eminent minis- 
 ters of the Gospel. I had still a few with me when the academy
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 75 
 
 was opened at Canonsburg, and finding I could not teach and do 
 justice to my congregation, I immediately gave it up and sent them 
 there." 
 
 Such was the state of the case, when the wants of the community 
 rose above the supply of private enterprise, and demanded associated 
 effort. "It reflects the highest honor upon these illustrious men," 
 says Professor Patterson, the champion of Dr. McMillan's priority 
 as an educator, " that scarce thirty years were suffered to elapse 
 after the first daring adventurer had penetrated a hitherto pathless 
 wilderness thirty years not of prosperity, but of painful vigilance 
 and struggle, of unexampled hardship and heroic endurance until 
 the poetry and eloquence of Greece and Rome, the truths of 
 modern science and of sacred learning, had found three humble 
 halls, three devoted instructors, and a score of assiduous pupils 
 though the war whoop of the retreating savage still echoed within 
 the surrounding valleys, and his council fires still blazed upon the 
 hills." And yet to-day we celebrate these first glorious achieve- 
 ments, following them down in their ever widening influences 
 through three generations. The combined movement referred to 
 found embodiment in the charter of the Washington Academy, by 
 an act of the Legislature of Pennsylvania, dated September 
 24, 1787. The same act devoted for the uses of the aca- 
 demy five thousand acres of public land north of the Ohio river, 
 chiefly in what is now Beaver county. That charter was secured 
 mainly through the influence of Dr. McMillan and his two elders, 
 Judges Allison and McDowell, then members of the Legislature. 
 The original list of trustees embraced all of the settled Presbyterian 
 ministers west of the Monongahela, and not less than seven or eight 
 ruling elders and some other leading members of the same deno- 
 mination, as well as a goodly representation from other churches. 
 It was not until 1789 that the academy went into operation 
 under the Rev. Thaddeus Dodd, who was chosen principal, doubt- 
 less because, by common consent, he was the finest classical and 
 mathematical scholar of these eminent fathers. His promise of 
 continuance in this work covered only one year, though he gave an 
 addition of three months, preaching one-third of this period in 
 Washington, and the remaining two-thirds in his own charge. He 
 was succeeded by his associate, Mr. David Johnston. But the
 
 76 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 burning of the court house, in which the classes were heard, follow- 
 ed, and then a feeling of depression, if not of indifference in the 
 community, almost insuperable. The division of sentiment among 
 friends abroad, and diversion of their influence, and the suspension 
 of operations which ensued, might probably have been .avoided had 
 the Hon. John Hoge. a trustee, and one of the proprietors of the 
 town, met the proposal of the Rev. Messrs. John McMillan and 
 Matthew Henderson, the latter of whom was father of the Associate 
 (now United Presbyterian) Church in the West, for the donation of 
 a lot for the erection of an academy. The prompt offer of such a 
 lot in Canonsburg, by Col. John Canon, together with the advance 
 of funds for the erection, turned the scale. About this time, or in 
 the summer of 1791, a consultation of ministers and citizens, con- 
 cerning the establishment of an institution on a larger scale, was 
 held, which, under like influence, resulted in favor of Canonsburg. 
 Mr. Johnston having resigned at Washington, his election as 
 principal of the new institution was followed by its spaedy opening 
 and the famous first recitation, " under the shade of some sassafras 
 bushes," by Robert Patterson and William Riddle, the first pair of 
 a long and worthy succession of students. The Rev. Messrs. 
 McMillan, Smith, and Henderson were present, and consecrated 
 the incipient enterprise in prayer. At the meeting of the Synod of 
 Virginia, in October of the same year, another great impulse was 
 given by the adoption of " a plan for the education of persons for 
 the ministry of the Gospel," which recommended that two institu- 
 tions should be taken under the patronage of the Synod. One of 
 these was to be located in Rockbriclge county, Virginia, under the 
 presidency of the Rev. William Graham, and special care of the 
 Presbyteries of Lexington and Hanover the same which grew into 
 Washington College at Lexington. The other was to be established 
 in Washington county, Pennsylvania, under the care of the Rev. 
 John McMillan, and to be " cherished " and " superintended " by 
 the Presbytery of Redstone. The Synod also advised that in one 
 or other of these institutions all the candidates for the ministry with- 
 in its bounds should be instructed. The Presbytery of Redstone, at 
 its meeting in Pigeon Creek, October 18, 1792, unanimously agreed 
 to make Canonsburg " the seat of that institution of learning which 
 they were appointed to superintend," though, upon a reconsidera-
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 77 
 
 tion of the subject, in the following spring, the way was left open 
 for a division of the funds, if in the future the good of the church 
 should require the erection of another institution. Contributions 
 were taken by active agents under the influence, first, of the Presby- 
 tery of Redstone, and, then, after its organization, of the Ohio 
 Presbytery, in whose terrritory the academy was located. Aid was 
 also rendered under the favor of the Associate Presbyterian Church, 
 led by the Rev. Matthew Henderson and others. These funds were 
 applied in part to reimburse Col. Canon for his outlay in the erection 
 of the academy, and in part for current expenses. In 1794, or seven 
 years after the incorporation of the Washington Academy, a charter 
 was obtained at Canonsburg for the institution from the Supreme 
 Court of Pennsylvania, under the name of " The Academy and Lib- 
 rary Company." But at what precise time the " Log Cabin" school 
 was merged into the Academy, thus fully established, it is not easy 
 to determine. It is certain, at least, that without being under direct 
 ecclesiastical control, the institution had the zeal of the ministry 
 and the church in its favor. It was happy, also, in its succession of 
 principals and assistant instructors, such as Samuel Miller, James 
 Mountain, James Carnahan, and John Watson. The last of these 
 became the first President of Jefferson College under the charter of 
 1802, while Mr. Carnahan reached afterwards the same high place 
 in the College of New Jersey. Nor can such names among its 
 pupils as those of Cephas Dodd, Elisha McCurdy, Thomas E. 
 Hughes, Thomas Marquis, Robert Johnston, James Hoge, Joseph 
 Stockton, Samuel Tait, James Satterfield, Obadiah Jennings, Wil- 
 liam Neill, James Ramsey, Gilbert McMaster, and others, fail to 
 tell their own story of benefit in requital of the offerings of the 
 church. At least one baptism of revival came down upon the in- 
 stitution, in 1797, in answer to the prayer of God's people, when of 
 forty students there was not one who was not believed to be either 
 an avowed Christian or " a subject of sharp awakenings." It was 
 not, however, until the year 1800, that the first legislative aid came 
 in the form of a grant of $1,000. And this in turn stimulated the 
 renewal of a movement which had failed in 1796, but now found 
 success in the charter of January i5th, 1802, which transformed the 
 Canonsburg Academy into Jefferson College, the first, and in its 
 day the most useful college west of the Alleghenies. The two sur-
 
 78 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 viving fathers of the Redstone Presbytery, John McMillan and 
 James Power, were among its trustees, Messrs Smith and Dodd 
 having meanwhile gone to their rest. With them also were asso- 
 ciated Joseph Patterson, Thomas Marquis, Samuel Ralston, John 
 McPherrin, James Dunlap, and John Black, honored ministers, 
 together with a list of laymen of corresponding prominence and 
 worth. The officers of instruction were constituted by simply ele- 
 vating the teachers of the academy into members of the Faculty. 
 
 Returning now to the Washington Academy, which, as we have 
 seen, was suspended in 1791, we find that it was shortly afterwards 
 re-opened and carried on with greater or less success until the 
 spring of 1805, under James Dobbins and Benjamin Mills. Then a 
 new era dawned upon it in the election to its management and in- 
 struction of the Rev. Matthew Brown, who had just then also been 
 chosen as the first pastor of the Presbyterian church of Washington. 
 He was ably assisted, the first year, by his young friend, David 
 Elliott, afterwards his distinguished successor both in the college and 
 the church, and the second year by his honored pupil, George 
 Baird. Success crowned the ability and energy of the new princi- 
 pal, and in due time the academy, which had led her sister at 
 Canonsburg by seven years in the first charter, now followed her, 
 after the lapse of four years, in the second, having received also an 
 act of incorporation as a college, dated March 28, 1806. Formal 
 application was made for this charter to the Legislature by the 
 trustees, but its success was due chiefly to the personal influence of 
 the energetic principal, aided by the great force of Parker Campbell, 
 Esq., the leading member of the Washington bar. The trustees of 
 the academy were made the corporators of the college, and to their 
 number, as in the Jefferson Board, additions were made from time to 
 time from the most prominent ministers and citizens of the surround- 
 ing country. The proportion of numbers in both cases was always, 
 of course, in favor of that branch of the church, which, in fact, 
 gave the breath of life to both. It is worthy of remark that during 
 the whole subsequent period, from the charter, in 1806, until the 
 union of the colleges, with the exception of two and a half years, 
 the presidency of the Board was filled by two venerable men, viz., 
 the Rev. John Anderson, D.D., for twenty-four years, ending in 
 1831, and the Rev. David Elliott, D.D., LL.D., for thirty- three
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 years, ending in 1865. Dr. Samuel Ralston likewise presided over 
 the Jefferson Board nearly forty-four years. 
 
 The history of Jefferson and Washington Colleges has heretofore 
 been given to the public with considerable fullness. In these pub- 
 lished memorials and in the general catalogue issued in 1872, an 
 inquirer may partially trace the succession in each down to their union 
 and their consolidation. Each struggled from first to last with poverty 
 and passed through various changes of fortune. Yet each, by a 
 divine blessing upon indomitable energy, accomplished a work for 
 the country and the church beyond computation. Rival contestants 
 they were for public favor upon the same field of operation. Their 
 movements were not always without contest and bitterness. Their 
 separate existence was maintained for about threescore years against 
 an unceasing protest of the public mind, which, together with the 
 pressure of their own necessities, compelled frequent though un- 
 availing efforts for their consolidation. And yet the history of this 
 or any other country may be challenged for results, in educated 
 men, as great in proportion to the means expended as their records 
 will show. 
 
 John Watson the first President of Jefferson College, grew up an 
 orphan in Western Pennsylvania, almost without education, until his 
 habits of reading and study were discovered by the distinguished 
 Judge Addison. This gentleman encouraged him with books and 
 counsel, and doubtless commended him to Dr. McMillan, who in 
 turn elevated him from menial service to a place in the Academy 
 at Canonsburg, first as a pupil, and then as assistant teacher, and 
 then secured for him the benefit of a fund in Princeton College, 
 pledging other help besides. But his own energy won triumph over 
 the need of further help, having secured for him the position of 
 teacher of the grammar school, and thus enabling him to graduate 
 with distinction. Recalled to Canonsburg, he became Principal of 
 the academy, arid, also, along with his patron and father-in-law, Dr. 
 McMillan, an influential agent in procuring the college charter, and 
 then under it, by unanimous choice, the first in a long line of eminent 
 presidents. Meanwhile he had entered the ministry, but his lament- 
 ed death, November 31, 1802, within the very year of the charter 
 and only three months after his inauguration, was a baptism of 
 affliction to the infant institution and the church. With him was
 
 8o PRESBYTERIAN. CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 associated Samuel Miller, or " Master Miller," as he was called from 
 his former service in the academy, as Professor of Mathematics and 
 Natural Philosophy. A loving pupil, Dr. Samuel C. Jennings, 
 describes this gentleman as a man of low stature, with a penetrat- 
 ing eye, and in old age a smooth white head; a self-made scholar, 
 kindly in disposition, and rebuking oftener with the pointing of his 
 finger than with sharp words. He is also reported as a decided 
 Christian and an active ruling elder in Dr. McMillan's church, even 
 after his voluntary retirement from the college, in 1830, until his 
 peaceful death a year later. Dr. McMillan himself, without actual 
 change of the service he was wont to render, was made Professor 
 of Divinity, to give instruction, as before, to candidates for the 
 ministry. And the very year of the charter was signalized by the 
 graduation of the first class trained in the academy, but crowned 
 with college honors consisting of Reed Bracken, Johnston Eaton, 
 William McMillan, John Rhea, and Israel Pickens all afterwards 
 effective ministers of the Gospel but the last, who reached the dis- 
 tinction of Governor of Alabama and United States Senator. This 
 beginning of the college was small, but it was the beginning of an 
 enterprise, the end of which is still among the great purposes of 
 God. 
 
 The administration of the second President, the Rev. James 
 Dunlap, D.D., extended over a period of eight years, ending in 
 1811. He was a son of New Jersey College, of the class of 1773, 
 received ordination in 1781 at the hands of the New Castle Presby- 
 tery, and after a pastorate of seven years over the united churches 
 of Laurel Hill and Dunlap's Creek, near Brownsville, Pa., and of 
 fourteen more over the latter church alone, accepted the presidency. 
 His discharge of the trust was not marked with special interest, 
 except in the way of financial struggle, on the part of the institu- 
 tion, to maintain its existence, and still harder struggle, on the 
 part of the president, to defray the expenses of his family and pay 
 his tutors, on a salary of less than $600, with a small addition from 
 the Church of Miller's Run, to which he ministered. Even his 
 salary was larger by one-fourth than that of his predecessor. Such 
 then were the country and the times ! These causes, along with a 
 spirit perhaps too easily wounded by the frank dealings of the 
 Board, led to the resignation of a man said to have possessed great
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 81 
 
 excellence of character. The average number of his graduates was 
 slightly over Jive, which was the size of the only class under his pre- 
 decessor. 
 
 During the interval of a year which followed, Dr. McMillan, who 
 had been made Vice Principal for this purpose, gave to the college 
 his general supervision. At its close the Rev. Andrew Wylie was 
 inducted into the presidency the same Dr. Wylie afterwards so 
 noted in the administration of both the colleges and in their contro- 
 versies. He had been a pupil of Dr. Matthew Brown, in the 
 Washington Academy, but was graduated with the class of 1810, in 
 Jefferson College, the last year of Dr. Dunlap's presidency. His 
 succession to this high place at the age of twenty-two years, and 
 only eighteen months after his reception of a diploma, was a 
 triumph of which any young man might be proud. Perhaps we 
 may find here the swing of the pendulum. It was, at least, a very 
 marked return to the first policy of having a young president, after 
 an intervening administration commenced at the age of sixty years. 
 Nor was the new president fine scholar and energetic executive as 
 he was remarkable for success, during the five years of his incum- 
 bency, as the total of his eighteen graduates will show. But fairness 
 demands that we look away from Canonsburg for at least a part of 
 the explanation. 
 
 It must be remembered that during the ten years last under re- 
 view, Washington College had come into earnest operation under the 
 Rev. Matthew Brown, its originator and first president, as we have 
 seen. He was a graduate of Dickinson College in 1784. The eight 
 classes which -received the Bachelor's degree at his hands in these 
 opening years numbered in all forty-eight, or an average of six. 
 Like those of Jefferson, they embraced a fine proportion of names 
 since high in the registry of Church and State. "Much of the favor 
 of the church, which, as has appeared, had been transferred to 
 Canonsburg, was won back. The foundations of a college were 
 firmly laid, alike in scholarship and government, and a presidential 
 reputation was made, of which the alumni of both colleges are 
 justly proud. And yet, let it be remembered, that until the last 
 year of his term, the only regular professor associated with Dr. 
 Brown was James Reed, who held the chair of Mathematics and 
 Natural Philosophy. Precisely the same was true of Jefferson, 
 F
 
 8 a PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION, 
 
 which did not add a second professor until 1818, or three years 
 lafer still, when in like manner the Ancient Languages were detach- 
 ed from the presidency and formed into a distinct chair. So limited 
 then were these fountains of learning in resources ! So self-denying 
 and laborious the agents who executed their work ! And yet so 
 bright is the record of the men year by year sent from them into 
 the high places of the land ! 
 
 " The College War " cannot be passed over in this history, though 
 even yet the time has scarcely come for its impartial treatment, ex- 
 cept to state some of its prominent facts. It came to its crisis in the 
 transfer, by election, in 1816, of Dr. Wylie from the presidency of 
 Jefferson to that of Washington. It raged actively for at least two 
 years, and then left animosities behind it, which far out-lived the 
 busy actors themselves. Happy is the disposition of posterity to for- 
 get a strife which alienated good men, divided communities and 
 families, filled the press with crimination, embarrassed the cause of 
 education, and put the church of God itself under a heavy stress of 
 trouble. Well has it been said, that the survival of the colleges 
 themselves, and of religion at the centres of the contest, was a signal 
 proof of the power and grace of God. 
 
 True to human nature as it is, the immediate occasion of this strife 
 was an earnest and almost successful negotiation for the consolida- 
 tion of the institutions at one place. Committees of the Boards met 
 at Graham's tavern, midway between the two towns, on the 26th of 
 October, 1815, and approximated but did not reach a satisfactory 
 basis of union. The next day the following proposition was offered 
 in the Jefferson Board, viz., " Resolved, That provided the Board 
 of Trustees of Washington College will not recede from their sine 
 qua non, viz., ' that the permanent site of the united college should 
 be in the borough of Washington,' but will give $5,000, in addition 
 to their present funds, half of the trustees, and the casting vote in 
 the choice of the Faculty, this Board will agree to give up the site to 
 them, and will unite with them in petitioning the Legislature to effect 
 the object in view." Action, however, was suspended on this reso- 
 lution, in order to hold a consultation with the Faculty, when Presi- 
 dent Wylie gave his consent, and stated his belief of Professor Mil- 
 ler's concurrence, founded on consultation with him. But a warm 
 debate left the Board a tie upon the resolution, whilst the President,
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 83 
 
 Dr. Ralston, "hesitated" for a time, "but afterwards he did vote 
 in the affirmative," though not until the negative side had claimed 
 that the crisis was past, and the secretary had recorded that the 
 president had declined voting under which ruling the motion was, 
 of course, lost. And thus was postponed, for just half a century, a 
 consummation often sought, and surely devoutly wished, by many 
 friends of both colleges before and since. Without expression of 
 opinion, we may see in these facts, that it was not as yet the will of 
 Providence that these streams should be joined until their separate 
 benefits should have been more fully secured, and the channel of 
 their union better prepared. 
 
 Negotiations to the same effect were soon renewed, though excited 
 feeling rendered their success impossible. But other changes soon 
 turned the current of events. The resignation of Dr. Brown as Presi- 
 dent at Washington, and the election of Dr. Wylie, with his transfer 
 to the vacant place, were simultaneous. His -election was secured, 
 amidst excitement, by the casting vote of the President, Dr. John 
 Anderson ; and a like tumult prevailed at Canonsburg. In the hot 
 strife thus engendered, motives were of course assailed. Parties re- 
 sorted to the public press for vindication. Sharp lines of division 
 were drawn between former friends, extending even to ministers and 
 churches. Dr. Brown, retiring from the college, continued in his 
 pastoral relation for six years longer, with the warmest love of his 
 church generally, as well as the sympathy of a portion of the public, 
 drawn to him as an injured man. During these six years, and for 
 just the same period afterwards, Dr. Wylie presided at Washington, 
 but neither his fine talents, scholarship, address, and energy, nor the 
 warm devotion of friends and students, could wholly raise him above 
 the adverse influences growing out of the circumstances of his elec- 
 tion. Men of the highest honor were enlisted on both sides of that 
 controversy, in view of which fact, the judgment even of this remote 
 generation should be held in abeyance. Yet the evils of the warfare 
 were clear and abundant. In such a condition of things, it is not a 
 little to the credit of Dr. Wylie, that there was an average of nine 
 graduates from the college during the twelve years of his administra- 
 tion. But his retirement in 1828 to take charge of the Indiana State 
 University, at Bloomington, was soon followed by the suspension of 
 the college itself. He died in 1851, having passed threescore years.
 
 8j PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Dr. Wylie's successor at Canonsburg was the Rev. Wm. McMillan, 
 A.M., a nephew of the venerable founder of the college, and an 
 alumnus of its first class. He was a man of rugged scholarship and 
 force rather than of social and literary culture. He was measurably 
 successful during his presidency of five years, adding fifty-nine names 
 to the roll of alumni. He also supplied the church of Miller's Run. 
 The chief reason of his resignation was the alleged failure of the 
 Board to sustain him in a controversy with certain students, charged 
 with mutiny, sedition, and rebellion. These charges, involving the 
 reputation of the Principal, as he claimed, the Board, on investiga- 
 tion, did not regard as sufficiently proven. He was subsequently 
 President of Franklin College, at New Athens, Ohio, and died 
 in 1832. 
 
 The last Wednesday of September, 1822, marks the crisis and 
 dawn of the true glory of Jefferson College. The Rev. Matthew 
 Brown, D.D., LL.D., who then held a call in his hand to the 
 presidency of Centre College, at Danville, Kentucky, and was favor- 
 ably considering it, was elected that night to the place made vacant 
 by President McMillan's resignation. A prompt committee man- 
 aged to have him brought from Washington to Canonsburg before 
 breakfast the next morning, ready to preside at the commencement, 
 confer the degrees, and deliver the Baccalaureate address, all on the 
 same day. Confessing himself bewildered as in a whirl of events, he 
 could not resist what seemed to him and his brethren a clear call of 
 the Lord. And subsequent events have but confirmed that interpre- 
 tation. He carried into his new position the benefits of his official 
 experience of ten years at Washington, and the fine reputation he 
 had so fairly won. If his character was not the most symmetrical, he 
 still had the elements of success in an eminent degree. Opposites 
 blended in him most remarkably. Special eccentricities, a hasty 
 temper, and the reactions of mirth and depression, were all joined 
 with a vigorous intellect, clear judgment, quick discernment, good 
 sense, ardent piety, and untiring energy. If his impetuosity some- 
 times involved him in mistakes, his students loved him, even the 
 wildest of them, for the depth of heart which never failed to make 
 him a friend of all disposed to do right. His strong hold upon the 
 public, also, especially upon the church, gave him a power in behalf 
 of the college, only surpassed by his unrivalled skill in canvassing for
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. Sj 
 
 patronage. Finding the institution with about eighty students, he 
 soon greatly increased the number, and kept it at a high figure to the 
 end of his service. In every other respect, also, the college was ad- 
 vanced. During the twenty-three years of his presidency, the gradu- 
 ates numbered seven hundred and seventy-two, or an average, for the 
 whole period, of thirty-five. Of all these, it is said that nearly 
 one-half entered the ministry, and not a few went forth as foreign 
 missionaries. In word and deed he was a promoter of revivals, and 
 rejoiced in at least two baptisms of great power through his ministry, 
 both in the college and the church, of which for fifteen years he acted 
 as pastor. That of 1834-5 will be recalled by some here present as 
 the spiritual birth-time of many heralds of salvation, some of whom 
 echoed his messages on heathen shores. Surely the seal of heaven is 
 upon the work of those years. It must have been grateful to his 
 heart, that upon the occurrence of the first simultaneous vacancy in 
 the college and church at Washington, six years after leaving that 
 place, he was cordially invited to resume his old position in each. 
 He ever continued to love that community, and the church of which 
 he had been the first pastor. And there, by his own request, his 
 body was laid down to rest beside beloved dust, after his spirit had 
 been called, July 29, 1853, at the venerable age of seventy-seven 
 years, to its glorious rest. 
 
 The Rev. Robert J. Breckenridge, D.D., LL.D., of Kentucky, 
 succeeded Dr. Brown upon his resignation in 1845, and for two 
 years gave to the college the benefit of his great name and brilliant 
 talents. But the government of a college not proving congenial to 
 his taste any more than suitable to his gifts, he returned to his be- 
 loved native State in 1847, having graduated two classes, number- 
 ing in all ninety-six members. A portion of his remaining life was 
 spent as a professor in the Presbyterian Theological Seminary at 
 Danville. 
 
 Next in order comes an alumnus of 1825, in the person of that 
 noble Christian gentleman, refined scholar, and eloquent preacher, 
 the Rev. Alexander Blaine Brown, D.D., son of Dr. Matthew 
 Brown. After serving for six years as Professor of Belles Lettres 
 and adjunct Professor of Languages four of them before the retire- 
 ment of his venerable father he was advanced to the presidency in 
 1847, and filled it with great credit and success for nine years, when
 
 86 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONTENTION. 
 
 failing health compelled the exchange of labor for rest. A kind 
 Providence, however, permitted him, the balance of his life, to open 
 the Gospel to a loving people as pastor of the Centre Church. The 
 cross was given up for the crown in 1863. He lives still in many 
 hearts. Four hundred and fifty-three diplomas bear his signature, 
 equal to fifty for each year. 
 
 In turn, two eminent gentlemen succeeded in this important 
 office, viz., the Rev. Joseph Alden, D.D., LL.D., author of standard 
 works on Mental Philosophy and the Science of Government, and 
 the Rev. David H. Riddle, D.D., LL.D., the former for five, and 
 the latter for three years, extending to the union of the colleges. 
 Both of these presidents did honorable service in this office, sus- 
 taining well the prosperity of the college, and now occupy places of 
 prominence and usefulness. Dr. Riddle is an alumnus of the class 
 of 1823. He was a son-in-law of Dr. M. Brown. 
 
 In such a sketch of sixty-three years, it would be impossible to do 
 justice to the long line of professors so identified with this history. 
 They were generally men of very creditable ability as well as 
 fidelity, and their names shall not perish from the college records, 
 nor from the hearts of the alumni. Of such are John H. Kennedy, 
 Henry Snyder, Samuel R. Williams, and Robert W. Orr, among the 
 dead; and Aaron Williams, D.D., Robert Patterson, John Frazer, 
 Samuel Jones, and Alonzo Linn, among the living all except two 
 distinguished sons of the college, as well as professors. But fidelity 
 to truth, as well as deference to the affectionate memories of forty- 
 four classes, must claim distinct notice of William Smith, D.D., a 
 graduate of 1819, an honored Professor of Languages from 1821 
 until the union of 1865, and still a venerated servant of God, in 
 the full use of his faculties, looking for his Lord's coming. Of the 
 1,890 graduates of these years, 920 entered the ministry, 408 be- 
 became lawyers, 193 have been physicians, and 368 have turned to 
 other occupations. About one-third of the whole number have 
 ended the work of life. The survivors are dispensing the benefits 
 gathered along the line of two human generations. 
 
 Returning once more to the other branch, before brought down 
 to the suspension of 1828, we may trace the new life of Washington 
 College through a period of thirty-five years. The interval of sus- 
 pension had brought to Washington, as pastor of the Presbyterian
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 87 
 
 church, just the man to re-organize the college, in the person of the 
 Rev. David Elliott, D.D., LL.D., a graduate of Dickinson College 
 in 1808, then in his forty-third year, having been a pastor at Mer- 
 cersburg, Pennsylvania, for seventeen years. With the college as 
 well as the church in view, he had been recommended by his ad- 
 miring friend, Dr. Matthew Brown, on the resignation of Dr. Oba- 
 diah Jennings in order to accept a call to the church of Nashville, 
 Tennessee. And the nobleness of both these eminent men, Drs. 
 Brown and Elliott, is revealed in the fact that the most untiring de- 
 votion of each to these rival interests never cast a shadow over their 
 confidential friendship. Dr. Elliott peremptorily declined the offered 
 Presidency, and only yielded, at last, as a temporary expedient, 
 until a permanent successor could be obtained. He opened the 
 college accordingly, November zd, 1830, with two Professors and 
 some twenty boys of the vicinity, exalted into students. His own 
 resolution, however, inspired confidence ; his vigorous administra- 
 tion and extensive correspondence soon made the college known, 
 and the third session ended with a collegiate roll of one hundred and 
 nineteen young men, each class being respectably filled. Mean- 
 while, by a visit to Harrisburg, he had secured an annual State ap- 
 propriation of $500 for five years, to support a department for the 
 special education of teachers. At that stage of progress, he handed 
 over the institution to the successor of his own nomination, the Rev. 
 David McConaughy, D.D., LL. D., an alumnus of Dickinson, of 
 1795, called from the pastorate at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in the 
 spring of 1832. 
 
 Dr. McConaughy's administration partook of the moral dignity 
 of his character, without sensational or spasmodic effort. His resig- 
 nation, in September, 1849, was followed by his peaceful death at 
 his home in Washington, January 29, 1852, " in the seventy-seventh 
 year of his life, and the fiftieth of his ministry." The survivors of 
 three hundred and eighty-eight alumni who passed under his care 
 can never forget the scholarly ability of his instructions nor the 
 godly conversation which give the beauty of holiness to his life. 
 Still less will they forget the extraordinary fervor of his prayers in 
 their behalf, so often evinced by tremulous tones and flowing tears. 
 Copying the portrait drawn of him after death by the hand of his 
 discerning friend and immediate predecessor, we may well say that
 
 88 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 if indeed "as it regarded direct personal activity abroad, and tacti- 
 cal skill in meeting sudden emergencies connected with the govern- 
 ment of a college, he may have lacked some of the qualities desirable 
 in a President," it is equally certain that " his commanding talents, 
 his extensive and accurate scholarship, his unwavering integrity, 
 his purity of motive, his paternal care and affectionate regard for his 
 pupils, the dignity and uniformity of his deportment, and the cap- 
 tivating benevolence of his disposition in a word, the concentrated 
 force of the many and rare qualities which clustered around his 
 character, gave him a power and control over the public mind and 
 over the hearts of the young men, against which these few incidental 
 defects presented but slight resistance." 
 
 Dr. McConaughy's successor was the Rev. James Clark, D.D., 
 then called from a pastorate in Belvidere, New Jersey, and now a 
 resident of Philadelphia. Upon his resignation, in July, 1852, after 
 a service of two years in the college, that he might accept a call 
 to Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, a temporary administration, coupled 
 with a laborious pastorate, of which others, if necessary, but surely 
 not myself, might speak, carried the institution to the annual com- 
 mencement in September, 1853. 
 
 The inauguration of the Rev. John W. Scott, D.D., of the Jeffer- 
 son class of 1827, as President of Washington College, upon the 
 occasion just named, marks a new era in its history. A special 
 relation had just been formed with the Synod of Wheeling, the 
 object of which was to bring collegiate education more directly 
 under the influence of religion and the church. Under that system 
 the management of the institution was still in the hands of the 
 Trustees, as before, but in consideration of the revenue derived 
 from an endowment of $60,000, as well as other funds raised also by 
 the Synod, that body had the nomination of members of the Board 
 and the Faculty, and from the persons thus nominated the Board 
 elected. The arrangement was indeed denominational, in the sense 
 of a more positive religious influence, coupled with systematic study 
 of the Bible, and, in the case of Presbyterian students, a like study 
 of the standards of the church. But from this last course all who 
 so preferred were excused, and beyond this, also, the largest liberty 
 and exemption from sectarian influence known in other colleges 
 was allowed. Justice to truth demands the statement that, under
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 89 
 
 the lead of a very efficient President and the instruction of a Fa- 
 culty of more than usual ability, the twelve years of this arrange- 
 ment were not surpassed by any like period in thorough scholar- 
 ship, and that, too, without the disadvantages of denominationalism, 
 which so many feared. Two hundred and sixteen were added to 
 the alumni, of whom one hundred and eighteen became ministers of 
 the Gospel, including six foreign missionaries. During this period, 
 several revivals of religion extended their influence into the col- 
 lege, as others had done before. Professors E. C. Wines, D.D.. 
 William J. Martin, William H. Brewer, James Black, D.D., Wil- 
 liam J. Brugh, D.D., and others of this period, were worthy successors 
 of William P. Alrich, D.D., William K. McDonald, LL.D., Richard 
 Henry Lee, LL.D., Robert Milligan, Nicholas Murray, James W. 
 McKennan, D.D., and others of the preceding period since the 
 resuscitation. The last three named, as well as Professor Black, 
 were worthy sons of the college. The President, in his voluntary 
 retirement, preparatory to the union of the colleges, carried with 
 him the high esteem of all connected with the institution. He is 
 now doing efficient service in the cause of education, as Vice-Presi- 
 dent and Professor in the University of West Virginia, at Morgan- 
 town. 
 
 The foregoing recital brings us down to a most interesting event, 
 several times referred to, viz., the union of the colleges. 
 
 For this event there had been a long course of preparation. 
 Away from the localities of these institutions, there had always been 
 a public sentiment averse to their separate existence. Attempts to 
 unite them had been made, at intervals, through their whole history. 
 We have before seen how near that of 1815 came to success. But 
 many causes combined, at length, to force this result. Financial 
 pressure was one of the chief. Each had been betrayed by bad 
 example into the ruinous policy of endowment by cheap scholarships 
 Jefferson leading the way in 1851, and Washington following two 
 years afterwards. In each case, the revenue thus provided only rose 
 to the lowest level of expenses in cheap times with small salaries, 
 without any provision for expansion or progress. The injury came 
 in the almost total displacement of tuition fees, in the fastening of 
 permanent responsibilities upon the colleges out of all proportion 
 to their means, and in an evident lowering of the public estimate of
 
 90 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the pecuniary value of collegiate education. The cost of living, 
 which was doubled, if not trebled, by the civil war of 1861-5, 
 demanded as a necessity a reduction of the working force or else 
 a great increase of funds. The large benefactions to colleges in the 
 East, as the fruit of fortunes accumulated during the war, produced 
 a competition in buildings, appliances, and new professorships, such 
 as had never been known before. Unwonted facilities for travel 
 and transportation, also, made access to all institutions easy, and 
 reduced their cost to substantially the same level. Both Jefferson 
 and Washington, in these circumstances and with the experience of 
 reduced finances, must be speedily lifted out of their perils, or look 
 the question of life or death in the face. No important help coming 
 to either, a donation of $50,000 was offered by the Rev. Charles C. 
 Beatty, D.D., LL.D., on condition of union. It was followed with 
 the proposed surrender, on the same condition, of the ecclesiastical 
 relation of Washington College by the Synod, and the tender of the 
 perpetual use of its endowment to the united college, so long as it 
 should continue to be Protestant and evangelical. Even then, the 
 two Boards were reluctant, and only consented under the resistless 
 force of public sentiment, concentrated by the joint action of the 
 alumni, at the last moment of the crisis. 
 
 The union thus effected under a legislative act, dated March 4, 
 1865, was a step forward, but it proved to be incomplete and unsatis- 
 factory. The corporations were merged into one, the departments 
 and classes were apportioned and separately conducted at the two 
 former localities, but with the effect of undue expense, a want of 
 unity, and the old rivalry more or less continued. The Presidents 
 of the old colleges, Drs. Scott and Riddle, gracefully retired, in 
 order that the unity of the future might be represented fairly in the 
 person of a new President, whose antecedents were identified with 
 neither institution. In due time the choice fell upon the Rev. Jona- 
 than Edwards, D.D., LL.D., an alumnus of South Hanover Col- 
 lege of the class of 1835, and twenty years afterwards its President, 
 but then pastor of the West Arch Street Presbyterian Church of 
 Philadelphia, a gentleman of the finest talents and culture. His 
 inauguration, April 4th, 1866, was followed by an honest effort on 
 his part, seconded by the Faculty and Trustees, to make the experi- 
 ment a success, but the complicated system was inseparable from
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 difficulties which could not be overcome. After three years of able 
 service the President resigned, April 2oth, 1869, to accept a pastoral 
 charge in the city of Baltimore, having introduced one hundred and 
 thirty-four graduates into the goodly company of the alumni. 
 Again, however, the clamor had arisen for further change, and 
 neither patrons nor alumni would be satisfied without it. Nothing 
 would answer the demand short of absolute consolidation at one 
 place. The Trustees again hesitated, but finally yielded to a neces- 
 sity, and by careful steps reached, with singular unanimity, a plan 
 which found its expression in an amended charter of February 26th, 
 1869, which of itself settled every question except that of location. 
 This question, after a competition opened to any place in the State 
 of Pennsylvania, was to be settled by a two-thirds vote of the Board 
 within sixty days, or, on their failure, by the voice of four out of 
 five disinterested arbitrators upon whom two-thirds of the Board 
 might agree. It was, however, settled by a two-thirds vote of the 
 Trustees on the 2oth of .April, 1869, in favor of Washington. 
 Among the inducements offered by that community was a subscrip- 
 tion of $50,000 to the funds of the institution. It is worthy of 
 notice that other donations have since followed from the same com- 
 munity, including the endowment of an additional professorship 
 by Francis J. Lemoyne, M.D. The Rev. Dr. Beatty has also 
 added to his former munificent benefaction the endowment of the 
 professorship of Greek. For a time litigation, attended with the 
 restraint of an " injunction," arrested the progress of the consolida- 
 tion, but in due time it was sanctioned by the highest courts of 
 Pennsylvania and of the United States. During the interval of 
 legal contest, Professor Samuel J. Wilson, D.D., LL.D., of the 
 Western Theological Seminary, exercised the office of President for 
 one session at Canonsburg, and the present speaker in like manner 
 for the following year at Washington. But at the Commencement 
 in 1870, the way for permanent reorganization having been suffi- 
 ciently opened, the Rev. George P. Hays, D.D., pastor of the 
 Central Presbyterian Church of Allegheny City, Pa., an alumnus of 
 the Jefferson class of 1857, was elected President, and other corre- 
 sponding changes were made. The inauguration took place in the 
 Town Hall at Washington, on the evening of September 2ist, 1870, 
 in the presence of a large assembly composed of the Trustees,
 
 $2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Faculty, students, citizens, and strangers. The oath of office was 
 administered by the Hon. William McKennan, Judge of the Third 
 Circuit Court of the United States. 
 
 The five years which have since elapsed have been marked with 
 very commendable energy in the President and his associates, in the 
 Faculty as well as in the Board, and have witnessed gradual recovery 
 from the depressing effects of the contest at law. The respective 
 chairs are ably filled ; the several classes have again come up to 
 strength; the interest -bearing endowment funds amount to $180,000 ; 
 and a new college building, valued, together with the ground, at 
 $125,000, has been erected and dedicated, which, in beauty and 
 adaptation, is in striking contrast with the succession of struc- 
 tures in both localities under the old system of things. All of 
 these advancements simply represent the purpose of a new begin- 
 ning, and invite public confidence to the future. 
 
 Such a record of work and fruits this Centenary offers in evidence, 
 that the sacred trust of liberal education in behalf of God and hu- 
 manity, taken up by John McMillan and his associates one hundred 
 years ago, has been faithfully prosecuted. We have traced it down, 
 though imperfectly, in this legitimate succession from their hands, 
 to show the marvellous goodness of God in its preservation and pro- 
 gress. From the smallest beginnings amidst the throes of the na- 
 tion's birth, there has been advancement upon the line of the cove- 
 nant of our fathers with Heaven, until we have come to a crisis of 
 blended history and hope, when the enterprise we have sketched 
 offers its share of lustre to the crown of a century about to be 
 placed upon the nation's head. But, best of all the trophies of the 
 college for this complete cycle, are the achievements in the service 
 of patriotism, humanity, and religion so nobly won by her three 
 thousand alumni. Two-thirds of their number yet survive to cele- 
 brate the wonderful progress of their country, and the still grander 
 work of the Church of God, whilst they rejoice, along with count- 
 less multitudes, that their Alma Mater has been honored in the train- 
 ing of so large a proportion of the effective agents in every depart- 
 ment of responsibility and usefulness. It is no mean account which 
 credits thirteen hundred ministers of the Gospel, seven hundred 
 lawyers, and three hundred and fifty physicians, to these institutions ; 
 and all of these have gone forth to serve their generation in these
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. ()3 
 
 noble professional callings as leaders in society, a very large pro- 
 portion of them going with the tide of emigration from Western 
 Pennsylvania and adjacent regions, to people and elevate the great 
 States of the West. It is a significant fact that of the six hundred 
 and four ministers in the four Synods represented in this Conven- 
 tion, two hundred and twenty-nine, or more than one-third, are 
 sons of this college. But it is a no less significant token that to the 
 same graduation rolls we may trace forty-four presidents of colleges, 
 seventy professors of colleges, and twenty two professors of theolo- 
 gical seminaries, together with some twenty-five principals of fe- 
 male seminaries, and a countless number of principals of academies ? 
 Many of these have been in the front rank of educators, and the 
 institutions with which they have been connected have been largely 
 of the first class. And besides these, three have been Governors of 
 States, five United States Senators, three Cabinet officers, forty-five 
 Representatives in Congress, and fifty-one Judges. Neither history 
 nor calculation can give the wider results with accuracy upon such 
 a scale of operations. But surely, in the light of such facts, whilst 
 allowing to others their just share of the work of the century we 
 commemorate, it is not too much to say that the educational policy 
 of Western Pennsylvania was initiated by the sainted fathers of the 
 Redstone Presbytery, and that their descendants have, in a large 
 proportion, directed and controlled it unto this day. May no in- 
 fidelity to such a trust work its forfeiture ! 
 
 OTHER INSTITUTIONS.* 
 
 Having thus followed the stream of this history down through its 
 direct channels from the times of the fathers until now, it yet re- 
 mains to trace some of the collateral branches , which have originated 
 
 * It is proper to explain that before delivery, the following part of this 
 address was, upon the advice of honored brethren, enlarged beyond its 
 original conception, and t.hat it has been still further enlarged since, at 
 the earnest solicitation of many who are entitled to represent the wishes 
 of those for whose benetit these proceedings and their publication were 
 intended. This apology for length will, it is hoped, be accepted. 
 
 J. I. B.
 
 94 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 more or less, at different times, in the same influence, and have 
 yielded large contributions to the same general results. It could 
 not be otherwise than that men of liberal, and especially Christian, 
 education should carry with them the like benefits into the places of 
 their life and labor. How the institutions already sketched have 
 reproduced their culture in scores of others through the patronage 
 and even the direct agency of their pupils, has already been hinted. 
 In common with other educated men, and largely in their own right, 
 they have done much to shape the education of their country, espe- 
 cially in the Western and Southern States. But we must refrain 
 from entering so large a field, and limit ourselves to the sphere 
 covered by the labors of the early fathers, or that chiefly embraced 
 in the limits of the original Synod of Pittsburgh, as well as subject to 
 its influence. And of such institutions, foregoing even the mention 
 of many of great usefulness, whose general relation to the commu- 
 nity allow no other claim of Presbyterians to the honor of their 
 work than that of hearty and effective co-operation, we may speak 
 only of such as, directly or indirectly, have had important connec- 
 tion with the church of our love. Let it be remembered, however, 
 that only a few of such institutions have been or are under eccle- 
 siastical control, and none even of them have been exclusive, in any 
 sense. When our ministers and members have borne the burden of 
 support and responsibility, the advantages of education have been as 
 free to others as themselves. 
 
 COLLEGES 
 
 may very properly claim our first attention. One of these, the 
 WESTERN UNIVERSITY at Pittsburgh, scarcely comes within the rule 
 here prescribed, but by location and actual merit deserves a passing 
 mention. Its general relation to the community forbids Presbyte- 
 rians to claim its work, in any peculiar sense, as their own. Yet, 
 in fact, its succession of Presidents, from its establishment in 1819 
 to the present time, with one exception extending over a space of six 
 years, have been representatives of one or other of the Presbyterian 
 churches. Its present very efficient President, George Woods, 
 LL.D., confesses the same faith with ourselves, and the President of 
 the Board of Trustees is the Rev William D. Howard, D.D., pastor 
 of the Second Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, and a Vice-Presi-
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 95 
 
 dent of this Convention. Presbyterians, by circumstances rather 
 than by rule, have most largely sustained and managed it a fact 
 not likely to be changed, since the large proportion of its handsome 
 endowment has lately come from that source. Standing in the most 
 general attitude, and having other objects more prominent, the ranks 
 of the ministry have also profited by its excellent instructions. 
 
 ALLEGHENY COLLEGE, at Meadville, Pennsylvania, has a history 
 not the most creditable to the enterprise of Presbyterians, however 
 it may redound to the credit of a worthy sister denomination. 
 It received its impulse from the Meadville Academy, which was char- 
 tered in 1805, and at first conducted by the Rev. Joseph Stockton, 
 the first pastor of the Presbyterian church in that place. The col- 
 lege was chartered ten years later by the Legislature, which also 
 made a donation to it of $2,000 at the same time. Its first Presi- 
 dent was the Rev. Timothy Alden, D.D., who, strangely enough, 
 during most of his service of sixteen years, was the whole Faculty, 
 as well being " Professor of Oriental Languages, Ecclesiastical His- 
 tory and Theology," with the further charge to give instruction "as 
 occasion might require," in "all the branches of Literature and 
 Science !" Dr. Alden's zeal secured donations to the library of 
 eight thousand volumes from Drs. Bentley and Thomas, and the Hon. 
 James Winthrop, all of Massachusetts, making one of the finest col- 
 lections in the country at that time. By means of private benefac- 
 tions and another gift of $5,000 from the State, buildings were 
 erected. But though the college abounded in Trustees to the num- 
 ber of fifty, and dispensed honorary degrees with a lavish hand, its 
 graduates were comprehended in three or four small classes, and, a 
 portion of the time, instruction was suspended. An earnest effort 
 to invigorate the college was made in 1829 by the addition of the 
 Rev. David McKinney (now the venerable Dr. McKinney) and 
 Reynall Coates, M.D., to its Faculty. But the discouragement and 
 resignation of these gentlemen the next year, was followed by nego- 
 tiations which, in 1833, resulted in the transfer of the institution to 
 the Pittsburgh Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
 
 Possibly, this end was unavoidable. Some eccentricities in the 
 President may have counteracted his industry. A greater hindrance 
 may have been found in the attachment of surrounding ministers 
 and other educated men to other colleges, especially those of Wash-
 
 96 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION". 
 
 ington county. But wounded pride may find compensation in the 
 hope that the superstructure, reared by others upon foundations laid 
 by Presbyterian hands, may ever stand for our country's good and 
 the glory of our common Lord. 
 
 FRANKLIN COLLEGE, located at New Athens, Ohio, has completed 
 an existence of half a century. Its charter is dated January 22, 
 1825. The Rev. William McMillan, D.D., formerly President of 
 Jefferson College, was chosen as its first President in the following 
 spring. A successful administration of seven years, with the sole 
 assistance of Professor John Armstrong in the chair of mathematics, 
 came to an end by Dr. McMillan's death. He was succeeded by the 
 Rev. Richard Campbell, and then by the Rev. John Welsh, each of 
 whom retired, after brief service, to die of consumption. The Rev. 
 Joseph Smith, D.D. (author of "Old Redstone"), began, in 1837, 
 a service in this office, which for a time was marked with much ad- 
 vancement and promise, as shown in the addition of a professorship 
 and other enlargement. But the anti-slavery agitation just then 
 rose to its height, and had New Athens as one of its centres. Presi- 
 dent Smith yielded to the fierce strife, and accepted a like position 
 in Frederick College, Maryland. The Rev. William Burnett suc- 
 ceeded him, but in one year, for like causes, the President and all 
 the Professors resigned, leaving the college without a Faculty. At 
 this crisis the special enemies of slavery gained ascendancy and re- 
 organized the institution, with the Rev. Edwin H. Nevin, D.D., as 
 President, assisted by two professors. The popular talents of the Presi- 
 dent, backed by the determined spirit of his supporters, withstood 
 many difficulties, even the sale of the college property for debt under 
 the sheriff's hammer, until 1845, when he accepted a pastorate in 
 Cleveland. His successor, the Rev. Alexander D. Clark, D.D., 
 ended a labor of sixteen years of comparative success by his trans- 
 fer, in 1862, to Allegheny City, Pa., to devote himself wholly to a 
 professorship in the United Presbyterian Theological Seminary, the 
 duties of which he had performed a part of each year during most 
 of his Presidency. During the war of the Rebellion and until 1868, 
 the college had a feeble existence without a head, but then the Rev. 
 R. G. Campbell combined these duties with those of his pastorate 
 for a period of three years, when he yielded his place to the present 
 incumbent, A. F. Ross, LL.D. Of these Presidents, Messrs. Me-
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 97 
 
 Millan, Richard Campbell, Smith, and Nevin were Presbyterian 
 ministers; the rest, except the present one, were ministers of the 
 United Presbyterian Church or the bodies now composing it. 
 
 President Ross, though not a minister, has long been a worthy 
 ruling elder of the Presbyterian church. He brought to the college 
 a fine reputation for talents and scholarship, and much experience as 
 a professor in other institutions. Under his management, should the 
 present effort to secure an endowment succeed, we may look for fu- 
 ture stability and progress. Of the more than three hundred alumni 
 of the college, at least two-thirds have gone into the ministry of the 
 Gospel, being divided chiefly between the two Presbyterian bodies 
 from which it has drawn its support. Many others have reached 
 high stations in public life as civilians. 
 
 WESTERN RESERVE COLLEGE is located at Hudson, in North-East- 
 ern Ohio. The date of its charter is February 7, 1826. It was 
 founded by the three Presbyteries of Grand River, Portage, and 
 Huron, for the distinct purpose of educating young men for the 
 ministry. These Presbyteries, formed under the "Plan of Union," 
 included all the Presbyterian and Congregational Churches of the 
 Connecticut Western Reserve. The happy, reunion of the Presby- 
 terian Church, after a division covering the period of a generation, 
 and the consequent reconstruction of its ecclesiastical bodies, have 
 placed this college within the limits of one of the Synods com- 
 posing this convention. This blending of forces also joins it in 
 closer sympathy than ever before with the other institutions now 
 passing under review, alike in the sphere and objects of their 
 great work. Its scholarly and excellent President, the Rev. Car- 
 roll Cutler, D.D., like his worthy predecessor, the late Rev. Henry 
 Lawrence Hitchcock, D.D., is a member of the Presbytery and 
 Synod of Cleveland. Their two only predecessors were Presbyte- 
 rians also. 
 
 The Rev. Charles Backus Storrs, D.D., was Professor of Theology 
 in the institution as early as 1828, or two years before he became the 
 first President of the Faculty. He gave place, in 1833, to the Rev. 
 George Edmond Pierce, D.D., and he in turn to Dr. Hitchcock, in 
 1855. Dr. Cutler has been President since 1871. A distinct Theo- 
 logical Department was conducted from 1830 until 1854, since which 
 
 time "theology has been taught here, as in other colleges, only so 
 G
 
 9<? PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 far as it is a part of a liberal education." A Medical Department 
 was established in Cleveland in 1844, which is still in operation. The 
 catalogue for the past year contains the names of seventy-two aca- 
 demic students, eighty medical, and fifty-four in the preparatory 
 school. Of about four hundred graduates of the college proper, 
 one-third have entered the Christian ministry, and a fair proportion 
 are in preparation for it. Fourteen have become foreign missiona- 
 ries. Ninety-nine are, or have been, pastors of Presbyterian churches, 
 and seventeen more became such, who, without academic gradua- 
 tion, studied theology under the professors. Six alumni are in theo- 
 logical seminaries as candidates for the Presbyterian ministry. The 
 present endowment is chiefly the gift of Presbyterians. One of the 
 professors is a. minister of the Congregational Church. The trustees 
 are chiefly Presbyterians and Congregationalists, the majority being 
 on the side of the former. The college is reported as favorably si- 
 tuated, in a healthy condition, having an elevated standard of schol- 
 arship, and possessing a high character, alike in the ability of the 
 professors and the culture of the alumni. 
 
 WOOSTER UNIVERSITY, situated at the town of the same name in 
 Wayne county, Ohio, is the youngest of these collegiate institutions. 
 It was "founded" and is "owned and controlled by Ohio Synods 
 of the Presbyterian Church." But while standing in these relations, 
 it claims to be "under constant and positive religious principles 
 and influences," and yet "without sectarianism or restriction of 
 freedom of opinion." 
 
 The pioneer settlers in the region of this university, especially the 
 Presbyterians among them, were mostly Scotch-Irish immigrants 
 from Pennsylvania. Their ministers were in the largest proportion 
 educated in Jefferson and Washington Colleges. They carried with 
 them the educational as well as religious spirit of their race. The 
 first policy of the State appeared in the establishment of Ohio Uni- 
 versity, at Athens, in 1804, and twenty years later, in the charter of 
 Miami University, at Oxford. Presbyterians, simply by means of 
 their position and general force in society, wielded a controlling in- 
 fluence in both. But a deepening anxiety concerning the religious 
 culture so essential to sound collegiate training, was a natural se- 
 quence of the tenure of property and the power to elect trustees, 
 both held by the Legislature. Other denominations also were
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 taking care of their own interests by means of colleges of their own. 
 Self-preservation, therefore, demanded distinct action. 
 
 Earnest discussion, in these circumstances, among leading minis- 
 ters and others, chief among whom was the venerable James Hoge, 
 D.D., of Columbus, led, as early as 1847, to union in the policy of 
 a Synodical College. But the object was not really gained until 
 1866, when the Synods of Cincinnati, Ohio, and Sandusky (O. S.) 
 came to agreement in the establishment of the University at Woos- 
 ter. The liberal offer by the citizens of the town and county of a 
 site of twenty-one acres, together with a subscription of $100,000 
 for building purposes, had much to do with the choice of a location. 
 An energetic canvass of the Presbyterian churches in the State pro- 
 duced a subscription of $260,000 to the endowment fund. And the 
 building having been erected, except its projected wings, the col- 
 lege was formally organized in 1870. A faculty was then installed, 
 with the Rev. Willis Lord, D.D., as President. At the same time, 
 Charity Medical Hospital at Cleveland, having fifty students, trans- 
 ferred its property and corporate rights to the young university, and 
 became its medical department. Two years later a preparatory 
 school was added. Unlike the mother colleges of Pennsylvania and 
 the older States generally, the co-education of the sexes was, from 
 the first, adopted as the policy of this institution. 
 
 The five years of subsequent history the names and boundaries 
 of the controlling Synods having meanwhile been changed in conse- 
 quence of the reunion of the church have shown marked success 
 and growing public favor. The students have been largely sons of 
 Ohio, but many also have come from adjacent States. About one- 
 half of the seventy-seven graduates from the collegiate department 
 have devoted themselves to the work of the ministry. Dr. Lord 
 was succeeded in 1873, by the Rev. A. A. E. Taylor, D.D., under 
 whose spirited presidency the university is going forward in a very 
 encouraging manner, alike in numbers, appliances, and all the other 
 elements of success. The Faculty embraces a full number of pro- 
 fessors, and the collegiate students for the year 1875 reached the 
 number of one hundred and seventy, including, of course, young 
 ladies who are members of the several classes. In such a history, 
 with its implied promise, all true friends of education, religion, and 
 the Presbyterian Church must rejoice, whilst they cordially recognize
 
 roo PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 in the new university one of the forces to be relied upon, under the 
 blessing of God, for the joint diffusion of thorough culture, sound 
 views, and salutary moral and religious influence over our whole 
 country and the world. 
 
 From colleges we now come to 
 
 < 
 
 ACADEMIES. 
 
 It would be impossible to write the histories, or even to state the 
 names and localities of the numerous classical schools of the cen- 
 tury past, which have rendered important service to society, as well 
 as to bur own and other branches of the church, in requital of co- 
 operative support. Many such have been mainly sustained by the 
 influence of our ministry and membership. Few, if any, others 
 have failed to receive at least a fair proportion of patronage from 
 the same source. Of a very large number Presbyterian ministers 
 have been principals or teachers, before or after their ordination. 
 Yet, in a large number of such cases, it would be unjust to other 
 brethren associated in the same enterprises to set down the work 
 and results to the credit of Presbyterianism. Let us rather forego 
 a measure of our lawful claim than "boast of things without our 
 measure, that is, of other men's labors." A limited selection, there- 
 fore, according to our knowledge, must not be taken as implying 
 disparagement of others, not less worthy of recorded history in 
 their more general relations and work. 
 
 The first in order is the academy at Greersburg, now Darlington, 
 Beaver county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 The founder of this school was the Rev. Thomas Edgar Hughes, 
 who was born April 7, 1769, in York county, Pa., prosecuted his 
 preparatory studies in the Canonsburg Academy, was graduated in 
 the college at Princeton in 1797, studied theology with Dr. McMil- 
 lan, was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Ohio in 1 798, and 
 ordained the following year as pastor of the churches of Mount 
 Pleasant and New Salem, in Beaver county. He was the first pastor 
 settled north of the Ohio river, and the Moderator of the Presbytery 
 of Erie, at its session in 1806. At that meeting, held in one of his 
 churches, the general solicitude in behalf of education found expres 
 sion in the following minute, viz. : "Presbytery proceeded to take 
 into consideration the necessity of a seminary of learning being in-
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. /Of 
 
 stituted within their bounds for the education of youth, resolved to 
 give their aid to erect an academy at Greersburg, and to solicit the 
 aid of their respective charges." It is the impression of the Rev. 
 Wm. Hughes, the second of four honored ministerial sons of the sub- 
 ject of this n'otice, who still lives at Loudonville, Ohio, that his father 
 opened a school in a cabin at Greersburg, which was within his pas- 
 toral charge, at least as early as 1803. But, as an organized acade- 
 my, under the fostering care of the Presbytery, it dated from 1806, 
 as we have seen. The Legislature, in granting its charter, also made 
 an appropriation to it of six hundred dollars. Mr. Hughes was him- 
 self the first teacher, and in person collected funds for its establish- 
 ment, traveling, for this purpose, into the New England States as far 
 as Boston, where, besides donations in money, he received a con- 
 siderable library, globes, maps, and an orrery. In 1808, Mr. Hughes 
 reported to the Presbytery the collection of between four and five 
 hundred dollars, which sum was by that body appropriated to the use 
 of young men preparing for the Gospel ministry. From 1814 until 
 1830, the school was taught by the Rev. Messrs. James Rowland, 
 Robert Dilworth, D.D., and J. R. Cunningham, respectively, during 
 their preparation for licensure. But Mr. Hughes always extended 
 to it his earnest care, and the students enjoyed the benefits of his 
 ministry, and of the powerful revivals with which it was blessed. 
 Many of them were fitted there for their subsequent course in Jeffer- 
 son College, whilst others passed from their academical training at 
 once, under the same instructor, to the study of theology. A large 
 number of them became effective preachers of the Gospel. 
 
 One incident, hitherto unpublished, may serve to illustrate at once 
 the spirit of the founder and the work of the school. Mr. Hughes 
 was traveling on horseback one evening, when darkness overtook 
 him. Passing a cottage, he heard the voice of a female pleading in 
 prayer for her little boys, in an adjoining garden, and dedicating 
 them to God, that in some way they might be used in his service. 
 Learning from the family with whom he lodged that night some- 
 thing of that mother and her children, he made special arrangements 
 for the education of one of them at the academy. That .little boy 
 has since been known as a distinguished minister of the Gospel, col- 
 lege professor, and author of books, under the name of William H. 
 McGuffey, D.D., LL.D. His death, not long since, closed an ex-
 
 loa PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 tended service of high honor in the University of Virginia, preceded 
 by a similar work in the University of Ohio. He was graduated in 
 the class of 1826, of Washington College. 
 
 The ACADEMY OF WEST ALEXANDER, in Washington county, Penn- 
 sylvania, was organized in September, 1828, by the Rev. John Mc- 
 Cluskey, D.D., an alumnus of Jefferson of 1822, now a father in the 
 church, resident in Wooster, Ohio, but then a young minister as- 
 suming the care of a church to which he had been called the previous 
 April. Mr. McCluskey, aided by competent teachers, managed the 
 school alone until 1836, when, on account of its great increase, a 
 board of trust was chosen to assist him. A legislative charter was 
 secured in 1840, and in 1849 ^ e academy was formally taken under 
 the care of the Presbytery of Washington, as, at once, a Parochial 
 and Presbyterial institution. The resignation of his pastoral charge, 
 in 1853, passed the academy, as well as the church, from the hands 
 of Dr. McCluskey into those of his excellent successor, the Rev. 
 William H. Lester. During this period, covering a quarter of a 
 century, forty-four ministers of the Gospel have come forth from that 
 school, thirty-two of whom entered the service of the Presbyterian 
 Church. Fifteen more have since been added. Of these, and others, 
 not a few were hopefully converted while they were at the academy. 
 Diligent teaching, energetic administration, earnest biblical instruc- 
 tion, and the genial influence of religious culture, were all crowned 
 with rich fruits. The reduction of expenses to the lowest possible 
 point brought the poor side by side with the rich into the full bene- 
 fit so freely enjoyed. Most of the students thus trained entered 
 Washington College, and are now numbered among her sons. 
 
 Simultaneously with the opening of the academy at West Alexan- 
 der, a classical school was established (in the same Presbytery) at 
 CROSS CREEK, the site of Vance's Fort, so prominent in Presbyterian 
 history, and the scene of the labors of the "silver-tongued" Mar- 
 quis, as it has since been the scene of the ministry of the venerable 
 John Stockton, D.D., for nearly half a century. This school was 
 started under the influence of Mr. Stockton, who was a graduate of 
 Washington College, a year after his settlement as pastor. Its teach- 
 ers, with various intervals, were Samuel and George Marshall (the lat- 
 ter a son of Jefferson, in the class of 1831 , and afterwards the Rev. Dr. 
 Marshall, of Bethel), Robert McMillan, and Thomas M. C. Stockton,
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. foj 
 
 son of the pastor. Thirty ministers of the Gospel came forth from 
 that school, besides several others from the congregation in which 
 it was located. Dr. Marshall, after his settlement at Bethel, opened 
 a school there, which was also largely blessed and useful in the same 
 way. 
 
 ELDERSRIDGE ACADEMY was founded by the Rev. Alexander Don- 
 aldson, D.D., pastor of the Presbyterian church in the place of the 
 same name, in Indiana county, Pennsylvania. Dr. Donaldson was 
 graduated at Jefferson College in 1835. On the day of his ordina- 
 tion, June 21, 1839, a young man was placed under his care, for 
 study, by the Presbytery. Others followed during a period of seven 
 years, until the whole number thus instructed amounted to twenty- 
 five, nearly one-half of whom were there at one time. At this point, 
 under the urgency of his old and honored preceptor, Dr. Matthew 
 Brown, Mr. Donaldson formally opened an academy, on April 16, 
 1847, having for his assistant Mr. John Barnett, afterwards an alum- 
 nus of Jefferson College, of the class of 1849, an( ^ now Pastor of the 
 church at Connellsville, Pennsylvania. Sixteen students appeared 
 at the opening, and during the summer a small frame building was 
 erected, at a cost of $300, which answered the purpose of a school- 
 room, until, in 1853, it gave place to a brick structure of two stories, 
 costing $3,000. 
 
 The whole number of students connected with the academy up to 
 this time has been twelve hundred and fifty, of whom about two 
 hundred were young ladies. More than two hundred of the whole 
 number have since become graduates most them in colleges, and 
 some in the female seminaries. Two hundred and fifty have " con- 
 fessed Christ before men " while they were students in the academy. 
 Out of the whole number, one hundred and eighteen have entered 
 the Christian ministry, as against sixty-nine who have entered the 
 medical profession, and sixty-one who have become members of the 
 bar. Seven have gone, in holy consecration, as foreign missiona- 
 ries, to carry the Gospel to the heathen. In 1850 the academy was 
 formally transferred to the care of the Blairsville Presbytery, but 
 this connection was ended by the formation of the Presbytery of 
 Saltsburg, in 1856, in the bounds of which it was. Then it fell 
 back with its educational and pecuniary responsibilities to the care 
 of the principal, as before. A negotiation is now pending with a
 
 104 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 view to its transfer, as a donation, to a board of trustees, who are 
 hereafter to hold and control it, selecting its principal and teachers. 
 In advance of a charter, the building is undergoing thorough repair, 
 and other arrangements are in progress. Dr. Donaldson will still 
 be its principal, assisted by T. B. Elder, A.B., and S. J. Craighead, 
 A.B. Such a record as this is surely worthy of a place in these 
 memorials of God's blessing upon the fidelity of his consecrated ser- 
 vants. Will it not enter as truly into that history to be unfolded 
 when the Lord himself shall come to make up his jewels ? 
 
 GLADE RUN ACADEMY, situated in Armstrong county, Penn- 
 sylvania, and, like Eldersridge, within the present boundaries 
 of the Presbytery of Kittanning, next claims our attention. It 
 was founded in October, 1851, by the Rev. Cochran Forbes, then 
 pastor of the church of Glade Run, and the members of his ses- 
 sion. The service of the first principal, now the Rev. John M. 
 Jones, of Markle, Pennsylvania, following immediately his gradua- 
 tion in Washington College, extended over a period of three years, 
 and, being renewed in 1861, was continued until 1868. Du- 
 ring the remainder of the whole period, now approaching a quar- 
 ter century, with the exception of two or three sessions, the 
 charge has been in the hands of the Rev. Geo. W. Mechlin, 
 D.D., the present pastor of the church. He belonged to the Jeffer- 
 son class of 1853. Near the close of the late civil war a building 
 was erected by friends of the academy to increase the facilities for 
 cheap and comfortable boarding, into which all disabled soldiers 
 were received without room rent, and another building for the same 
 general purpose has since been added, at the sole expense of Mr. 
 G. W. Goheen. The inspiration of these movements created the 
 further need of a charter, which was obtained in 1864. 
 
 This academy was the first of its kind in a large district extending 
 to the north and east of it. It was founded in prayer, with a chief 
 design alike of furthering thorough education, and of securing a safe 
 retreat from the corruptions of society. Many have enjoyed, 
 through its instrumentality, thorough professional training, who 
 otherwise would never have even aspired to it, and not a few schools 
 have since started into existence, finding in it both a precedent and 
 a model. Nearly twelve hundred students have more or less shared 
 its advantages. During one year the roll contained one hundred
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 105 
 
 and twenty-seven names. About forty of the number are now 
 preaching the Gospel, whilst ten or twelve more are in college pre- 
 paring for the same sacred office. A fair proportion also have gone 
 into the other professions, some of whom have already reached emi- 
 nence. Many, too, have been successful teachers. The blessing 
 of the Lord still abides upon the academy, with the promise of still 
 more abundant future results. 
 
 The WITHERSPOON ACADEMY, at Butler, Pennsylvania, is one of 
 the few institutions established under ecclesiastical control which 
 have had continuous prosperity. Its existence may be traced to a 
 convention called by the Presbytery of Allegheny (now Butler), in 
 1847, when the pen of the lamented Van Rensselaer was stirring 
 the Church in behalf of a more sanctified education. Its first prin- 
 cipal, as well as the chief agent in its establishment, was the Rev. 
 Loyal Young, D.D., then pastor of the Presbyterian Church of But- 
 ler, assisted by David Hall, now the Rev. Dr. Hall, of Indiana, 
 Pennsylvania. A charter was obtained in 1849, an d a building was 
 erected with money contributed by the churches. The successors 
 of Dr. Young as principal have been the Rev. Messrs. Martyn Ry- 
 erson, John Smalley, J. R. Coulter, James S. Boyd, J. W. Hamil- 
 ton, and the present incumbent, William I. Brugh, D.D. Dr. 
 Brugh, after holding a professorship in Washington College for 
 several years, undertook the academy, and during the ten years of 
 his charge, his ability and energy have carried it up to a high stage 
 of prosperity. Together with commodious buildings, an elevated 
 standard of scholarship, a healthful moral and religious influence, 
 and skillful teaching and management, the academy has a fine record 
 of successful work. Through its new plans and spirit it also looks 
 out upon a bright future. Eleven hundred pupils of both sexes 
 have more or less enjoyed its advantages. Besides sending many 
 sons into the other professions, and into high positions of public 
 trust, it has about twenty-five representatives in the sacred office, 
 and almost as many more who are candidates for the same holy 
 work. The catalogue for the past year contains the names of 106 
 male and 89 female students. 
 
 The VERMILION INSTITUTE was established at Haysville, Ohio, 
 in 1846, by the citizens of that place. Some three or four years 
 later, it was donated to the Presbytery of Richland for the purposes
 
 106 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 of a Presbyterial academy. The Presbyteries of Coshocton and 
 Wooster were subsequently also enlisted in its support and manage- 
 ment. After the reunion of the Church in 1870, the ownership and 
 control remained in the Presbytery of Wooster until the spring of 
 1875, when, on account of various difficulties, it was sold and re- 
 conveyed to the citizens of Haysville. During a portion of these 
 years, however, it accomplished a work eminently worthy of com- 
 memoration. 
 
 The successive principals of the institute were the Rev. W. W. 
 Colmery, the late Rev. S. Diefendorf, D.D., and A. F. Ross, 
 LL.D. The highest prosperity was reached under Dr. Diefendorf, 
 who, if not specially distinguished for accurate scholarship, " had," 
 in the language of the Rev. T. K. Davis, "the admirable faculty of 
 waking the students to independent thought, and imparting to them 
 a sturdy, off-hand, and self-reliant character." His peculiar skill, 
 also, in cheapening the cost of living, had a marked effect in gather- 
 ing students, the number rising, in 1860, to two hundred and 
 twenty-five. But most positive of all was his religious force, which 
 was wielded through a continual handling of " the deep things of 
 God," as represented in the great questions of theology. "From 
 1858 to 1864," says Dr. John Robinson, "an almost continual 
 revival of religion prevailed in the institution. Students who went 
 there avowed infidels were converted, and have since entered the 
 ministry. It is believed that about one hundred of the students 
 have become ministers of the Gospel." 
 
 The NEW HAGERSTOWN ACADEMY, Ohio, deserves a like honor- 
 able mention, were its history sufficiently known. During the 
 past thirty-nine years of its existence, it has had but one idle term. 
 Its founder, the Rev. Richard Brown, D.D., still lingers in vene- 
 rable age to bless God for the fruit of his labor. The like reward 
 of success belongs to the Rev. Alexander Swaney, D.D., another 
 principal. Its present head is J. Howard Brown, a son of the first 
 principal. The pupils, male and female, have reached in all the 
 number of twelve hundred. Not less than fifty of the students are 
 now preaching the Gospel. 
 
 The MILLER ACADEMY, a child of the Presbytery of Zanesville, 
 and organized in 1851 at Washington, Ohio, had a brief but excel- 
 lent life. Its first principal, the Rev. James Anderson, resigned early
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. IVJ 
 
 on account of domestic affliction, and was succeeded, after an 
 interval of suspension, in 1854, by the Rev. J. E. Alexander, now 
 of Greenville, Tennessee, who for nine years conducted it with 
 great success and benefit. As many as fourteen candidates, assisted 
 by the Board of Education, were there at one time, besides others 
 also looking to the sacred office. Sixteen students were, in a 
 revival of 1858-9, hopefully brought to Christ. A large proportion 
 of the students became heralds of the Gospel. The lamented Dr. 
 Van Rensselaer, Secretary of the Board of Education, after a visit 
 in 1858, bore the following testimony, viz., " Miller Academy has 
 already rendered a vast service to the cause of education and reli- 
 gion. Its works praise it." It is to be lamented that the disturb- 
 ance and enlistments of the war of the Rebellion led to its suspen- 
 sion, and that it has since passed out of existence. 
 . The CANONSBURG ACADEMY, which now occupies the former site 
 and buildings of Jefferson College, has a legitimate right by inheri- 
 tance to a place in this record of the century. It was an express 
 provision of the charter of 1869, which consolidated the two col- 
 leges, that an academy, normal school, or other institution of lower 
 grade than a college, should be established at the place losing the 
 college, or at each of them should a new place be chosen. And in 
 either or each case, as the case might be, as much of the property 
 there located as the Board should think necessary for the use of such 
 an institution, was to be placed in the hands of seven local trustees, 
 chosen by the Board for this purpose, and authorized to carry the 
 organization into effect. When, therefore, Washington had been 
 chosen as the seat of the united college, the Board in due time 
 designated Messrs. William Smith, D.D., Dr. William G. Barnett, 
 Dr. J. W. Alexander, Dr. John W. Martin, John Hays, Esq., 
 David C. Houston, and J. Nevin Brown, as the trustees of the 
 academy, and set apart for their use and control the college build- 
 ings at Canonsburg, the President's house, and the two additional 
 professors' houses, together with a valuable portion of the libraries, 
 apparatus, and furniture, formally relinquishing all further right in 
 them. 
 
 The academy has been most happy in the selection, as its prin- 
 cipal, of a scholarly Christian gentleman of the highest fitness, in- 
 tegrity, and industry, in the person of the Rev. William Ewing,
 
 /OS PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Ph.D., an alumnus of Washington College of the class of 1842. 
 His associates in instruction are Messrs. James F. Ray, a scientific 
 graduate of Washington and Jefferson College in 1871, Professor of 
 Mathematics, and William M. Payden, Professor of Languages, 
 together with other occasional assistants. Valuable assistance was 
 rendered a portion of the time by the Rev. William F. Brown, 
 pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Canonsburg. As now con- 
 stituted the academy has two departments. The classical depart- 
 ment prepares young men for college, and the normal is de- 
 signed for the special education of teachers. During the four 
 years since the opening, the number of students for the year has 
 ranged from one hundred and five to one hundred and twenty-nine. 
 The academy has already won a high reputation and a fine prospect 
 by the thoroughness of its instruction, as indicated in the high stand- 
 ing of its students in some of the best colleges of the land. Its 
 success has surprised even its own friends. 
 
 FEMALE SEMINARIES 
 
 did not form a part of the educational scheme of the Presbyterian 
 fathers of Western Pennsylvania. Yet they constitute a necessary 
 outgrowth of their conception and work. Society cannot be success- 
 fully elevated without thorough culture in the mothers, daughters, 
 and sisters of the land. Such culture is surely a birthright of the 
 Gospel, under which the distinction of relative responsibilities re- 
 mains, but which in the heritage of privilege and duty knows 
 "neither male nor female." Seven centuries before the Christian 
 era, the prophet's vision included the very prospect which only the 
 Church of the last half century has begun to adequately realize: 
 " Thy sons shall come from far, and thy daughters shall be nursed 
 at thy side." (Isaiah Ix. 4.) The work and progress of this half 
 century, in the direction now indicated, have, in the region repre- 
 sented in this Convention, been equal to those of any other part of 
 our country, at least in proportion to the general wealth. Only 
 the preparation of the first half of this period was needed in the 
 removal of prejudices and the development of educational ideas, to 
 make the Presbyterianism of this region true to itself in lifting the
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. rog 
 
 education of females to the level of that of the other sex. The 
 blessed results have already come to large realization. 
 
 The EDGEWORTH LADIES' SEMINARY, established by Mrs. Mary 
 Olver, at Pittsburgh, in 1825, and shortly afterwards transferred to 
 Braddock's Field, was the first institution of its kind west of the 
 Allegheny Mountains. After eight or ten years it was again re- 
 moved to the beautiful valley of Sewickley, on the Ohio river, where, 
 with greater or less success, it flourished until February n, 1865, 
 when the destruction of the building by fire brought it to an end. 
 
 The fine English culture of the first principal, sanctified by the 
 grace of God, impressed the best educational and religious character 
 upon the institution, making it a large blessing to many homes, to 
 society, and to the Church of God. At her death, July i, 1842, it 
 passed under the care of her daughter, Mrs. M. J. Flower, but its 
 doors were closed in 1843. ^ n tne spring of 1846 it was reopened, 
 under the charge of the Rev. Daniel E. Nevin and his wife, who suc- 
 cessfully conducted it for six and a half years, deriving their patron- 
 age chiefly from wealthy families in Pittsburgh, both Presbyterians 
 and Episcopalians. It was then transferred to Prof. Samuel R. 
 Williams, who had just been a member of the Faculty of Jefferson 
 College. He in turn, after two years of prosperity, yielded it to the 
 Rev. Henry R. Wilson, D.D., and he again, three years later, to 
 the Rev. Aaron Williams, D.D., whose term ended with the confla- 
 gration. It was chiefly a boarding-school, through its whole history. 
 To the last it maintained a high position, not only for mental cul- 
 ture, but also for religious spirit and influence. Many daughters of 
 the Church trace to its opportunities the enlargement of their minds 
 and gracious blessings in their hearts. 
 
 The STEUBENVILLE FEMALE SEMINARY, a short distance beyond the 
 borders of Pennsylvania, but within the old Synod of Pittsburgh, was 
 opened on the i3th of April, 1829, by the Rev. Charles C. Beatty, 
 D.D., pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Steubenville, and his wife, 
 Mrs. Hettie E. Beatty. It was undertaken as a joint service to 
 society and the cause of Christ, and from a small beginning it soon 
 developed into a seminary of the first class, and in this attitude it has 
 ever since remained. The first six graduates received their diplomas, 
 and the first catalogue was issued, in 1833. The history of the in- 
 stitution records a long list of assistants and teachers, who, under the
 
 i io PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION, 
 
 wise headship of Dr. and Mrs. Beatty, have done its work in the most 
 satisfactory manner. In 1856, the Rev. A. M. Reid, Ph.D., who 
 represents the Jefferson class of 1849, and his wife, Mrs. S. L. Reid, 
 were associated with the management as assistants; and in time they 
 became the successors of Dr. and Mrs. Beatty. The latter, however, 
 still hold official connection with it in the way of superintendence 
 and care, as their hearts and influence are yet, in comparative retire- 
 ment, given to its interests. More than four thousand pupils have 
 thus far been connected with this seminary, six hundred and seventy- 
 nine of whom have been regularly graduated. Thirty of these pupils 
 have gone forth as missionaries to the heathen world, about five hun- 
 dred have become wives of ministers of the Gospel, and about two 
 thousand have been engaged, more or less, in the work of teach- 
 ers. In the impulse of their beginnings, and the character they 
 have taken, many institutions in this and other parts of our country 
 have the best reason to bow in filial respect to this "mother of schools 
 and seminaries." Happy as it has always been in high educational 
 tone, there is a still brighter seal upon the fidelity of almost half a 
 century, in the immortal fruits of its uniform religious influence, as 
 they have appeared in hundreds of pupils returned to their parents as 
 children of the kingdom of God. 
 
 The WASHINGTON FEMALE SEMINARY, at Washington, Pa., will, 
 by the first of next May, have completed a history of forty years. 
 Its first principal, Mrs. Frances Biddle, of Philadelphia, after a ser- 
 vice of four years, yielded her place, in 1840, to Miss Sarah R. Fos- 
 ter, now Mrs. Hanna, widow of the late Rev. Thos. Hanna, D.D. 
 Under this headship, the seminary was brought down successfully to 
 1874, when the honored principal, yielding to the infirmity of years, 
 gave the reins of adminstration into younger hands. She still lives, 
 respected, in sight of the institution she loved so well. At this point 
 the graduation list had reached five hundred and forty-seven, one- 
 sixth of whom had passed from among the living. A much larger 
 number had, of course, enjoyed, in part, the advantages of the semi- 
 nary without completing the course. Ten or twelve became mis- 
 sionaries, more than one hundred have been successful teachers, and 
 a fair proportion have gladdened ministers' homes as wives and 
 mothers. Its chief support has come from Presbyterians and United 
 Presbyterians.
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 The present principal is Miss Nancy Sherrard, of Steubenville, 
 Ohio, and a daughter of its honored seminary. She has now passed 
 into the second year of her administration, and already her educational 
 and executive ability have been crowned with signal success. From 
 depression the seminary has been raised to prosperity, and the fairest 
 prospects illumine the path of its future. Its pupils exceed one hun- 
 dred. The principal is ably assisted by Miss Mary McDonald, vice 
 principal, and by a full corps of excellent teachers. She is also sus- 
 tained by a board of eight trustees, incorporated by the State of 
 Pennsylvania. 
 
 The BLAIRSVILLE FEMALE SEMINARY, in Indiana county, Pennsyl- 
 vania, owes its origin, in the spring of 1851, to the practical views 
 and purpose of the Rev. George Hill, D.D., who has been, for thirty- 
 four years, the honored and useful pastor of the Presbyterian church 
 at that place. By him, with the aid of several liberal gentlemen, its 
 buildings were erected, and for a year and a half he acted as princi- 
 pal. He was succeeded by the Rev. Samuel H. Shepley, who, with 
 tne assistance of his wife, Mrs. Parmelia P. Shepley, conducted it 
 through thirteen years with success and benefit ; making a list of 
 ninety-four graduates a little more than an annual average of seven. 
 Dr. Shepley passed to his reward during the last year. His successor, 
 in 1865, was the Rev. James R. Hughes, now pastor of the Memorial 
 Church of Dayton, Ohio, who was compelled, by domestic affliction, 
 to surrender his prosperous management in a little more than two 
 years. The present principal, the Rev. J. Jewett Parks, A.M., at the 
 end of eight years of laborious and faithful service, has the highest 
 esteem not only of his fifty-six graduates, but of the community and 
 his patrons, and of educated visitors who have inspected his opera- 
 tions. The happy combination of physical comfort, mental drill, and 
 moral and religious influence, both invites and deserves large patron- 
 age. 
 
 The HOLLIDAYSBURG SEMINARY for young ladies is nestled among 
 the mountains of Pennsylvania, but thus far has drawn the larger 
 part of its patronage from the Western counties. Its charter of 
 1866 resulted from a movement of sundry gentlemen in Hollidays- 
 burg, led by their pastor, the Rev. David H. Barren, to secure the 
 benefits of an education at once liberal and evangelical. Its patron- 
 age has from the first been almost exclusively Presbyterian, and it
 
 n a PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 has been self-sustaining. Its fine building and grounds, costing 
 above $80,000, offer the best attractions of comfort and taste, whilst 
 the internal management demonstrates its success, in the presence of 
 one hundred and forty students the last year. The Rev. Joseph 
 Waugh, Ph.D., an alumnus of Washington College, has been its 
 principal from the beginning, nobly sustained by his accomplished 
 wife, and assisted by ten teachers. Its present condition is said 
 to be more satisfactory than that of any former time. 
 
 Last in this enumeration of female institutions comes the PENN- 
 SYLVANIA COLLEGE, which received its first impulse in 1869, from 
 an offer of $20,000 from sundry gentlemen, for the purpose of 
 establishing a seminary for young ladies in the East End of Pitts- 
 burgh. The condition was that the institution must be of the first 
 class in educational facilities, and of sound and thorough religious 
 influence. The President of the college, as well as a majority of 
 the Trustees, must be members of some branch of the Presbyterian 
 Church. The whole cost of the college property, located at Shady- 
 side, has been $140,000. The other appliances also indicate high 
 aims and progress. The Rev. James Black, D.D., its first Presi- 
 dent, was elected July 22, 1870, and brought with him, along with 
 scholarly ability and untiring energy, the excellent reputation he 
 had acquired as professor in Washington College, his Alma Mater, 
 as Vice-president of Washington and Jefferson, and as President of 
 the Iowa State University. At the end of five years, having accom- 
 plished, through the assistance of able teachers, a great work, he has 
 resigned his place in order to accept the chair of Greek in Woos- 
 ter University. The Rev. Thomas C. Strong, D.D., late Principal 
 of Wells' Female College, at Aurora, New York, was chosen as his 
 successor June 7th, 1875. He comes with a fine record of past suc- 
 cess to confirm the testimony of his eminent qualifications for the 
 responsible position. Sixty -five pupils wait upon the instructions 
 of the college at the present time, and the prospect is regarded as 
 bright with hope. 
 
 Let us come now, last of all, to the important subject of 
 
 THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 Prior to the establishment of the seminaries at Princeton and Alle- 
 gheny, by the General Assembly, professional instruction was given 
 to candidates for the ministry by pastors, especially by such of them
 
 
 :*^. 
 
 -<r..V ;'- 
 
 i!W 
 
 
 %'*:. 
 
 . 
 ' 
 

 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 113 
 
 as, in the judgment of their brethren, were fitted for this work. A 
 number of the early ministers of Western Pennsylvania performed 
 such service for the church, and did it well. But from the first, until 
 the infirmities of age gathered upon him, Dr. John McMillan was 
 the generally accepted trainer of young preachers. Whatever his 
 " Log Cabin" was or was not, it certainly was a theological school, 
 to which the largest proportion of candidates, under the counsel of 
 their pastors, resorted. His formal appointment as " Professor of 
 'Divinity" at the organization of Jefferson College, was simply an 
 official designation of a work for the church, which he had been 
 performing without reward for many years. Nor surely less honor- 
 able to the ability of his instructions, after a full trial of them, was 
 the action of the Synod of Pittsburgh, in 1821, only twelve years 
 before his. death, and six years before the Western Theological Semi- 
 nary went into operation, when, at the age of sixty-seven years, he 
 could only view his life-work as mainly accomplished. That action 
 is as follows, viz., " Whereas, it appears to this Synod that a num- 
 ber of promising young men, who are setting their faces towards 
 the Gospel ministry, are not in circumstances to attend the Theo- 
 logical Seminary at Princeton ; therefore, Resolved, That this Synod 
 take measures for procuring a library for the benefit of such, to be 
 under the control and direction of this Synod. That it be recom- 
 mended to every member to solicit books or moneys for this impor- 
 tant purpose, and that this library be located at present in the edifice 
 of Jefferson College, at Canonsburg, and placed under the care of 
 Rev. John McMillan, D.D., Professor of Theology in that Semi- 
 nary." Here, surely, was a recognition above that of college 
 Trustees, and only inferior to formal election by the General As- 
 sembly itself. 
 
 In his admirable history of the Presbytery of Erie, Dr. Eaton 
 states that no less than twenty of the early ministers of that body 
 received their professional instruction at the hands of Dr. McMillan. 
 The late Matthew Brown, D.D., after careful examination, gave the 
 number of his theological pupils at not less than one hundred. To 
 such an extent did he preach through others, both while he lived 
 and long after his own lips were sealed in death. He taught theo- 
 logy largely by means of a system carefully prepared by himself. 
 Each student was required, in want of the benefit of printing, to 
 H
 
 H4 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 transcribe these " Lectures" from the manuscript. Whatever extent 
 of research may have been embodied in that "system," its clearness 
 and thoroughness are said to have reflected the strength of the great 
 writers from whose pages the most accomplished professors to the 
 present time also are not ashamed to draw discriminating know- 
 ledge. An illustrative incident of fifty years ago may not be out of 
 place here. It was at a time when advancing years had led Dr. McMil- 
 lan to seek rest, and when, to some extent, the succession, as a favorite 
 professional instructor, had fallen upon the Rev. John Anderson, 
 D.D., of Buffalo. A class consisting of William J. Frazer, Samuel 
 McFarren, John Stockton, Wm. C. Anderson, James W. McKennan, 
 David Colmery, John L. Hawkins, and Hugh W. Koontz the 
 most of whom afterwards rose to great eminence and usefulness 
 were anxious to have the use of Turretin as a text book, and Dr. 
 Anderson, their instructor, was not less anxious for them. They 
 knew not where they could purchase it, nor from whom they could 
 borrow it, unless Dr. McMillan, the possessor of the only copy 
 known to exist west of the mountains, could be induced to loan it to 
 them. My friend, now Dr. Stockton, the venerable pastor at Cross 
 Creek, was finally prevailed on to make the journey, and try his 
 powers of persuasion. Timidity almost chilled the words upon his 
 youthful lips in the presentation of the case, as he stood abashed in 
 the presence of the venerable Doctor. But he was kindly enter- 
 tained at his table, and came back in the gladness of triumph, with 
 the coveted treasure in his saddle-bags, as precious as gold, given, 
 too, with the patriarch's most benignant blessing. Is it not to be 
 feared that in these days of multiplied facilities, eagerness for com- 
 munion with Turretin has subsided, and that this and like masters 
 in theology perhaps for the lack of a fashionable English dress 
 are either wholly absent from a large proportion of ministers' libra- 
 ries or left to cold neglect upon the shelf? 
 
 Almost one-half of the century we now commemorate, as to its 
 work of theological education, is covered by the history of the 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. That history was fully written 
 in connection with the Alumni Reunion of 1872,* and need not be 
 
 *The Committee of Publication, at the requestor the Professors of the 
 Seminary, has decided to reproduce that history in the present volume. 
 It immediately follows this address. A. W.
 
 EDUCATIONAL HISTORY. 
 
 repeated here, save only to make the acknowledgment of divine 
 goodness, as still seen in the prosperity and progress of the Seminary. 
 Let it ever stand as the true consummation and glory of the plans 
 and work of McMillan and his associates, as well as of their honored 
 and godly successors. 
 
 REFLECTIONS 
 
 upon the whole subject of these sketches may be safely left to those 
 who have taken them into their minds. How little did the fathers 
 of one hundred years ago, with all their faith, comprehend the 
 abundant harvests of a century enfolded in the seeds they cast into 
 the soil of the wilderness ! When in their log cabins they led young 
 men of rustic habits forward into the beauties of classic literature, a 
 cloud covered from their vision the development which in threi 
 generations should not only fill the region of their self-denial with 
 the fruits of culture, but, from that very region, too, send forth the 
 abundant offerings of learning, science, and refinement, in hallowed 
 union with religion, across the continent and to the ends of the 
 earth. Thus now it is said of their children and successors as to 
 Jacob and Israel of old, " What hath God wrought /" Only let 
 ours and the generations to come ever walk in the footsteps of their 
 devotion to truth, to God, and to the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus 
 Christ.
 
 I
 
 A HISTORY 
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY 
 
 Allegheny City, Pa. 
 
 Being an Address Delivered in the Third Presbyterian 
 Church of Pittsburgh, by 
 
 JAMES I. BROWNSON, D.D., 
 
 Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Washington, Pa . 
 
 On the occasion of the Alumni Re-union, April 17th, 1872. 
 "7
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 
 
 [HE mother to the sons, and the sons to the mother, in 
 affectionate greeting ! This is the spirit of the present 
 occasion. Shall I report to the mother of her long 
 absent children, who come from far and near, to offer 
 thanksgiving and praise on the Lord's altar in her behalf, and pro- 
 nounce her blessing upon them ? Or shall I answer the inquiring 
 love of the children, who sit once more in the familiar circle of the 
 old homestead, to hear of the vicissitudes and experiences of the 
 mother, whose name and honor have ever been carried in their 
 hearts? Rejoicing in the birthright of a son, I shall aim to do 
 both, confident, at least, that however imperfect the service, the 
 tribute of affection is sure. 
 
 The decisive advance in our church, from ministerial training 
 under pastors, to the higher system of the Theological Seminary, 
 combining the advantages of distinguished professors, large libraries 
 and the association of students, was made when the General Assem- 
 bly, after deliberation and appeal to the Presbyteries, projected in 
 1810, and located in 1812, the Seminary at Princeton, New 
 Jersey. Even then, there was a diversity of judgment upon the 
 question of one Seminary for the whole church ; or two for its chief 
 sections ; or as many as the Synods should see proper to establish 
 and control. The first of these plans was adopted, but there was 
 left a large sentiment opposed to centralization, and looking to the 
 future need of the country, especially in "the great valley of the 
 Mississippi." This found decisive expression in a resolution of the 
 Assembly of 1825, that it was "expedient forthwith to establish a 
 Theological Seminary in the West," to be styled "The Western 
 
 IIQ
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church in the United 
 States." A Board of Directors, consisting of twenty-one ministers 
 and nine ruling elders, was selected by ballot, to report the follow- 
 ing year a suitable location, and such " alterations " in the plan of 
 the Princeton Seminary as, in their judgment, might be " necessary 
 to accommodate it to the local situation of the Western Seminary." 
 Five commissioners were also chosen at the same time, to examine 
 proposed sites, and, in view of their comparative healthfulness, 
 offers of money and property, and other considerations, to report 
 their opinion on the subject of location to the directors. These 
 Commissioners were : General Andrew Jackson, of Tennessee ; the 
 Hon. Benjamin Mills, of Kentucky ; the Hon. John Thompson, of 
 Ohio; and the Rev. Messrs. Obadiah Jennings and Andrew Wylie, 
 of Pennsylvania. 
 
 By appointment of the Assembly, the directors and Commissioners 
 met simultaneously at Chillicothe, Ohio, on the i5th day of July, 
 1825. Some of the Commissioners were not present, and no record 
 of the proceedings of that body was kept, except the fact that no- 
 thing was done besides the reception of proposals, and that they ad- 
 journed to meet in Washington, Pa., on the 2oth of November 
 ensuing. The Board of Directors was organized, and the following 
 officers were chosen, viz., James Blythe, D.D., President; Francis 
 Herron, D.D., First Vice-president; Rev. John Thompson, Second 
 Vice-president; and Rev. Elisha P. Swift, Secretary. After a general 
 discussion, an able circular, reported by Messrs. Thompson and Swift, 
 was adopted, inviting further proposals for the site, and pledges of 
 endowment from communities disposed to compete for the location. 
 They then adjourned to meet in Wheeling, Va., on the third Thurs- 
 day of April following the time and place being chosen to suit the 
 convenience of such of their number as might be commissioners to 
 the next Assembly. 
 
 At the meeting in Wheeling, the Commissioners reported offers 
 from various places, but declined to make any recommendation, as 
 only three of their number, out of five, had been present at their 
 meeting. Nine of these offers came from the State of Ohio, as fol- 
 lows, viz., West Union, Chillicothe, Springfield, New Richmond, 
 Ripley and Georgetown, Lebanon, Decatur, Cincinnati, and Wal- 
 nut Hills. Pennsylvania was represented by Meadville and Alle-
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 
 
 gheny. The only other offer came from Charleston, Indiana. In 
 the affluence of these times, when business is conducted on a princely 
 scale, when the rude cabin has given place to the stately mansion, 
 and when the self-denials of pioneer life have passed over into gene- 
 ral luxury, you must not smile at the inducements held forth forty- 
 seven years ago to secure the benefits of a theological seminary, 
 connected with one of the leading denominations of the country. 
 Only four places went beyond $5,000, whilst most of the others fell 
 much below that sum ; and even then, portions of the subscriptions, 
 in some cases, were to be paid " in trade ;" a part of one was hon- 
 estly confessed to be "of doubtful collection]" and the whole of 
 another was to bear six per cent, interest, "until the subscribers 
 should think it expedient to pay the principal." Cincinnati offered 
 a lot of ground valued at $17,000, encumbered, however, with a 
 debt of $3,000. Charleston tendered a guaranty of eighteen acres, 
 valued at $100 per acre, and $10,000 in cash, " to put the seminary 
 in operation." Walnut Hills offered thirty acres, in three parcels, 
 estimated at $6,000. In behalf of the location which ultimately 
 carried the day, the proposal was a donation of $21,000, in instal- 
 ments, together with the release of eighteen acres of "common," 
 for use, worth, in fee simple, about $20,000. But Allegheny was 
 not then the city of to-day, with a population of 60,000, palatial 
 residences, fine churches, beautiful parks, street cars, charitable in- 
 stitutions, and complete municipal appointments, but a village, con- 
 taining seven hundred people, nestling on the river side, which, to 
 be identified in these very transactions, had to be described as 
 " Alleghenytown, opposite Pittsburgh." It was not even a borough 
 then, but a part of Ross township, and only rose to the dignity of 
 a city in 1840, with a population of 10,000. Even her older 
 "smoky" sister, which furnished, doubtless, the most of this pecu- 
 niary offer, has increased at least twelvefold in size, and advanced 
 to the front rank among the cities of the Union, in the average 
 wealth of her citizens. 
 
 The first vote of the Board was taken upon West Union, Ohio, 
 when James Blythe, D.D., and John T. Edgar, of Kentucky, with 
 Robert G. Wilson, D.D., James Hoge, and James Culbertson, of 
 Ohio, voted yea ; and Francis Herron, D.D., Matthew Brown, D.D., 
 Obadiah Jennings, and Elisha Swift, of Pennsylvania, together with
 
 122 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION, 
 
 Randolph Stone and Donald Mclntosh, of Ohio, and William Wylie, 
 of Virginia, ministers, and John Milligan, the only ruling elder 
 present, voted nay. The next vote was taken upon Allegheny, 
 which precisely reversed the former, both in number and names, 
 the proportion being eight for and five against that place. 
 
 The following members were absent, some of whom had been at 
 the former meeting in Chillicothe, viz., Gideon Blackburn, D.D., 
 John Thompson, John Sevvard, William Speer, Murdock Murphy, 
 Duncan Brown, James Scott, and Allan D. Campbell, ministers, and 
 Matthew B. Lowrie, George Plumer, Edward Ward, Walter Dunn, 
 Samuel T. McCracken, Thomas P. Smith, David Hudson, and 
 Thomas Skillman, ruling elders. The vote thus taken was largely 
 sectional, and represented the opposite views held, both in the As- 
 sembly and out of it : on the one hand, in favor of a location in the 
 midst of a population prepared to sustain the institution, leaving the 
 planting of Seminaries further West to other generations ; and on 
 the other, in favor of some place central to the great West, for all 
 time to come, with little regard to present need and support. How 
 hidden from the sight of these wise fathers was the progress by 
 which Ohio has long since ceased to be a frontier, or even a Western 
 State ! 
 
 The minority recorded a "solemn dissent" from the action taken, 
 expressing their opinion also, that it "would not promote the be- 
 nevolent wish of the Assembly," as well as their " regret, that in the 
 absence of the Directors belonging to the Synod of Tennessee, and 
 the greatest part of those appointed from the Synods of Kentucky 
 and Ohio, the members from the Synod of Pittsburgh, with one 
 from the Reserve Synod, have, by their votes, recommended Alle- 
 ghenytown for the proposed seminary." This dissent was as sol- 
 emnly answered by the majority, who declared that the deficiency in 
 all the pecuniary offers of the South and West left it doubtful 
 whether an institution of the kind contemplated could be carried 
 into effective operation, for many years to come, in any of those 
 places. They further emphatically urged that " the vast extent of 
 what is called the valley of the Mississippi, the variety of its climates, 
 and the different manners, customs, and habits of its population, all 
 conspired to produce and force upon the minds of the majority the 
 conviction that no single Seminary, wherever located, can ever com-
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 123 
 
 bine the strength or supply the wants of such a numerous, wide- 
 spread, and mixed population." They were, therefore, "compelled 
 by a sense of duty," to select the place where such a Seminary was 
 most needed, and which would combine the greatest advantages, 
 and promised the greatest immediate benefits to the cause of piety 
 in the Presbyterian Church. 
 
 Thus ended the skirmish. The divided recommendation of the 
 directors only transferred the real battle into the General Assembly. 
 How earnest it was, will appear from the fact that the Assembly of 
 1826, instead of adopting the Board's report, postponed the decision 
 for a year, by passing the resolution, "That the Western Theologi- 
 cal Seminary shall be located either in Alleghenytown, in the vi- 
 cinity of Pittsburgh, or at Walnut Hills, in the vicinity of Cincin- 
 nati, or at Charleston, Indiana, as the General Assembly of 1827 
 shall decide." The resolution, as at first proposed, simply bound 
 the Assembly to a location "at some point on the Ohio river." 
 But it was brought to definite specification by the wit of Dr. Obadiah 
 Jennings, illustrated by the well told story of a letter, sent by mail 
 from the Emerald Isle, to some friend Patrick, addressed as "residing 
 in Pennsylvania, or elsewhere in the United States of America." 
 
 The final struggle took place in the Assembly of 1827, when, 
 Charleston having been withdrawn, the roll was called, and Alle- 
 gheny received a majority of two votes over Walnut Hills. This 
 result was not a little due to the earnest advocacy of the venerable 
 Dr. Ashbel Green, who was ever a warm friend of this Seminary, 
 though also President of the Board of Princeton, and, as Chairman 
 of the committee, the writer of its original "Plan." The Mode- 
 rator, our own venerable Dr. Herron, calling another to the Chair, 
 made an effective speech, after which, under an immediate call for 
 "the question" he was enabled to confirm his eloquence with his 
 vote. The hot zeal of the opposition muttered some hints more 
 complimentary to the Dr.'s sagacity than to his fairness, in leaving 
 the chair at the crisis of decision. But these found a prompt refuta- 
 tion, both in his high character and in the manifest impossibility of 
 knowing when the vote would be taken. The witnesses of that great 
 debate report the advocates of Allegheny as doing full justice to the 
 resources of this matchless region, to the prospective importance of 
 a city which must ever be the key to the great Western valley, and
 
 i2j PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 to the thorough and compact Presbyterianism having its centre here. 
 They were especially rapturous in describing the three picturesque 
 valleys, watered by as many noble rivers, upon which the Seminary 
 would look down from its proud elevation of more than one hun- 
 dred feet above the point of confluence. Even the hill itself 
 dropping, of course, the poetry of its time-honored name was un- 
 covered to view, with the future charm of its commanding alti- 
 tudes, its beautiful drives and walks, its rounded symmetry, and the 
 terraces, arbors, and fountains which would adorn its sides. But 
 these artistic ornaments, set in the brow of nature are even yet in 
 prophecy bequeathed now, for fulfilment, to the county of Alle- 
 gheny, in honor of her citizen soldiery in the second war for inde- 
 pendence, whose beautiful monument, crowning those aerial heights, 
 shall stir the patriotic pride of coining generations. 
 
 The strife for location was now ended. Let us, therefore, turn to 
 the longer and harder struggle of establishment. The Board of Di- 
 rectors, appointed by the Assembly of 1827, consisted of Francis 
 Herron, D.D., Ashbel Green, D.D., Samuel Ralston, D.D., Matthew 
 Brown, D.D., Andrew Wylie, Obadiah Jennings, Elisha P. Swift, 
 William Speer, Elisha McCurdy, Francis McFarland, Thomas E. 
 Hughes, Thomas Barr, Joseph Treat, Thomas D. Baird, James Gra- 
 ham, Robert Johnson, William Jeffrey, and Charles C. Beatty, min- 
 isters ; and Matthew B. Lowrie, John Hannen, J. M. Snowden, 
 Benjamin Williams, Aaron Kerr, Thomas Henry, Samuel Thompson, 
 and Reddick McKee, ruling elders. The late death of Dr. William 
 Jeffrey leaves the President of the Board, Charles C. Beatty, D.D., 
 LL.D., the only surviving minister of that noble company. Red- 
 dick McKee, Esq., also from among the honored elders, alone sur- 
 vives. At the first meeting following their appointment, Dr. Her- 
 rou was elected President an office he held, by annual re-election, 
 until his death, Dec. 6, 1860. Mr. Speer was made Vice-president, 
 Dr. Ralston, Secorid Vice-president, Dr. E. P. Swift, Secretary, and 
 Michael Allen, Esq. (not a member of the board), Treasurer. At 
 a subsequent meeting in October following, modifications of the plan 
 of Princeton Seminary, subject to the Assembly's approval, were 
 agreed upon. One change was made, less in substance than in 
 words, to give greater distinctness and emphasis to the conviction, 
 which was to be the watchword in this whole enterprise, viz., "That
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 125 
 
 learning, without religion, in the ministers of the Gospel, will prove 
 injurious to the Church : and religion without learning, will leave 
 the ministry exposed to the impositions of designing men, and in- 
 sufficient, in "a high degree, for the great purposes of the Gospel 
 ministry." Such was the auspicious beginning. 
 
 From this salient point, let us pursue the history, for the sake of 
 clearness and despatch, in distinct branches. The first of these shall 
 be 
 
 THE GROUNDS AND BUILDINGS. 
 
 One of the first movements of the Board was to appoint a build- 
 ing committee, and to instinct them "to erect, as soon as possible, 
 an edifice not exceeding the dimensions of the Seminary at Prince- 
 ton, three stories high;" and the subscriptions from Pittsburgh and 
 Allegheny were, with the consent of the donors, to be set apart for 
 this purpose. Instructions were further given to erect the edifice 
 'on the centre of the hill," provided the cost, including excavation 
 and leveling, would not be more than $1,000 above what it would 
 be on the eastern section. In the end, this excess is said to have 
 been at least six times the sum named ! The decision in favor of 
 this summit outlook was not made without strong opposition, led by 
 Dr. Matthew Brown. A far better situation still, a short distance west- 
 ward, on grounds now occupied by heirs of the late John T. Logan, 
 Esq., and others, with an area of ten acres, was offered at $1,000, 
 and its purchase was urged, especially by the late John Irwin, Esq., 
 who proposed to be one of ten to make it a gift. But it was de- 
 clined, partly because the leaders were committed to the eminence, 
 and partly from the fear of forfeiting the lease of the eighteen acres, 
 originally offered to the Assembly, and accepted. A portion of the 
 very ground, thus declined, has lately been sold at $200 per foot. 
 Notwithstanding the good intentions, the mistake, then made, is 
 clear to us ; yet let us modestly remember that our wisdom is ' ' after 
 the fact." 
 
 Even this was not the most serious mistake. It seldom requires 
 less than bitter experience to expose the common error, that the 
 success of a public institution is assured by expensive buildings, even 
 without provision for its current expenses. Such bitterness was 
 not wanting in this case. The first strength and ardor were ex- 
 pended in brick and mortar. Even here, unexpected difficulties
 
 126 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 arose. The delay and expense of preparation, the tardy supply of 
 means, and an unfavorable re-action in the sentiment of the sur- 
 rounding community, hindered a beginning of the foundations 
 until the Spring of 1829. Most serious of all, was the trouble arising 
 about the title to the grounds. They had been a part of the Com- 
 mon of Allegheny, but the citizens had severally released the right 
 of open pasture, which was the only right attaching to their lots, 
 and the Legislature of the State, which held all other rights, had 
 donated them for the perpetual use of the Seminary. The three 
 original Trustees designated in the grant to hold for this purpose, 
 until such a time as a Board of Trustees might be incorporated, 
 were James Brown, Hugh Davis, and John Hannen. The last two 
 have passed away from among the living ; the first lingers on the 
 borders of the Spirit Land in his 94th year. It was rumored, 
 about this time, that there were certain parties who had not re- 
 leased their right of pasture on the Common ! One such brought a 
 suit, on this ground, to overturn the transaction, but the Court 
 ruled him out, on the ground of his consent by silence. A most 
 zealous search discovered one case of a minor, in whose behalf there 
 had been no relinquishment, and this was effectually used to give 
 force to a hostility which repeated itself in acts of violence, in suits 
 of injunction to restrain improvement and use of the grounds, and 
 in other vexations, extending over many years, until the question 
 was settled by compromise, in 1846, on the payment of $1,500, for 
 the sake of peace. Without this annoyance, the Seminary might 
 have been made almost self-sustaining, through the lease of lots, in 
 the very years of its hardest struggle for life. It was not strange, 
 that under such a pressure, the Board met on March zoth, 1829, to 
 consider the propriety of suspending the erection on the hill, and of 
 substituting a modest structure, 50 by 36 feet, of three stories, on 
 the north-east corner of the ground. 
 
 But men of faith then were no more to be hindered in the Lord's 
 work than was Nehemiah in his day. Certain streets were ordered 
 to be laid out, in concession to public clamor. The work of pro- 
 curing releases from any who might not have given them was re- 
 newed. But the building must go on, and Joseph Patterson, Esq., 
 was appointed to superintend it ; which he nobly did, releasing his 
 salary for its furtherance. And thus, at last, the Seminary began
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 127 
 
 to rise upon its foundations. But instead of cut stone, as had been 
 determined a year before, its outer walls appeared in less pretentious 
 brick, whilst for the inner walls, the rude stone dug in the process 
 of excavation was deemed sufficient. It was ready for use early in 
 the spring of 1831, for purposes of recitation, and on March 2pth, 
 of that year, the students ascended to the possession of the lodging 
 rooms prepared for them. Until then, they had boarded as they 
 could in the city, and received sound theology in the session room 
 at the rear of the First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh. 
 
 The building was commodious. It consisted of a central edifice, 
 sixty feet in length by fifty in breadth, of four stories, having at 
 each front a portico "adorned with Corinthian columns," and a 
 cupola in the centre ; and also two wings, of three stories each, fifty 
 feet by twenty-five. It contained a chapel of forty-five feet by 
 twenty-five, with a gallery of like dimensions for the library ; suits 
 of rooms for professors, rooms for the steward, and about eighty 
 dormitories for students. The cost of the whole was but little short 
 of $25,000, even in those cheap times. But, alas ! the unplastered 
 walls of many of its rooms, as well as its rude walks and unadorned 
 grounds, told the story, for many years, that the Presbyterians of 
 Western Pennsylvania were more given to faith than works. Yet, 
 such as it was, it is to many of us here to-night, associated in 
 memory with venerable professors, who led us to the precious 
 treasures of God's truth, and also, with beloved class-mates, joined 
 to us in study, counsel, and prayer, as we strove together to become 
 "able ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the 
 spirit." 
 
 That structure fulfilled its purpose until January 23d, 1854, when, 
 under a mysterious Providence, a calamitous fire, originating in a 
 manner unknown, broke forth near the roof, during intensely cold 
 weather, and levelled it with the ground. Most of the students were 
 at supper at the time, and lost even their clothing and books. The 
 library was greatly damaged, besides the destruction of a large part 
 of it. The Halsey library, being on the lower story, was chiefly 
 rescued. The First Church of Allegheny generously tendered its 
 capacious lecture and Sabbath-school rooms for the recitations of 
 the classes, and the offer was thankfully accepted. A like generous 
 invitation was given by the Second Church of Pittsburgh. Much
 
 128 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 hospitality was also extended to the students, and a liberal subscrip- 
 tion was made for their relief. 
 
 The time of the conflagration seemed providential. Negotiations 
 between the city and the Seminary, frequently attempted before, 
 had come to consummation in a deed dated December 3, 1849, an< ^ 
 acknowledged August 27, 1850, by which all of the land granted by 
 the State in 1827, except about one acre, was passed over to the 
 city, under the obligation of a perpetual lease, with the right re- 
 served, however, to use the old building for three years, with free 
 access to it, and then to remove its materials. On the other hand, 
 the city became bound to the Seminary for $35,000, in the form of 
 a. perpetual loan, with an interest per annum of $2,100, to-be paid 
 semi-annually, on the first days of January and July, from and after 
 July ist, 1850, without any deduction or abatement whatever, on 
 account of any taxes, charges, or assessments on or for the reserved 
 lot and the buildings which might be erected thereon. The terms 
 of payment are refreshing, after the experience of intervening years 
 in salaries and other transactions, under the standard of paper cur- 
 rency. Our good Trustees, not being without some experience of 
 the uncertainty of human affairs, stipulated in the bond that this 
 semi-annual interest should for ever be paid in ' ' lawful silver money 
 of the United States, each dollar weighing seventeen pennyweights 
 and six grains, at least." Time has justified their conviction that 
 a little " worldly wisdom," rightly tempered, is not without its use. 
 
 The three years of occupation had expired when the fire occurred, 
 and thus the crisis for building was doubly attested, but the old ma- 
 terials were gone. In lieu of them, an insurance of $5,000 became 
 the nucleus of a construction fund, the balance of which was 
 promptly supplied by subscriptions, and the new edifice was in due 
 time completed, without debt, at a cost of a little over $22,000. It 
 is beautifully situated on the centre of the reserved site, with the ad- 
 dition of a lot purchased from the Rev. Dr. McGill. The grounds 
 front on Ridge and Marshall Streets, 216 feet by 200 on Irwin 
 Avenue, and were valued at 16,000. The new building was par- 
 tially used in the fall of 1855, but its formal dedication took place 
 January 10, 1856, when in the absence of Dr. Herron (on account 
 of sickness), the dedicatory prayer was offered by the Vice-president 
 of the Board, Dr. Swift, and an address, full of grateful memories
 
 Cc
 
 WESTER X THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. IX) 
 
 and of high trust in God, was delivered by the Senior Professor, 
 Dr. Elliott. On this occasion there v/as joy, not unlike that of the 
 returned captives of Israel over the second temple, but probably 
 none "wept with a loud voice," like many of the priests, Levites, 
 and chief of the fathers then, " who had seen the first house." The 
 edifice was "not so large as the old one" the reduction being 
 chiefly in dormitories and culinary conveniences but it was "much 
 superior in location, arrangement, accommodation, and general fit- 
 ness for the purpose contemplated." What was gained in the in- 
 spiration of study may be left among the unsettled questions of his- 
 tory, between later and earlier generations of the alumni. The 
 Seminary, at least, " makes more noise in the world," in its new 
 location, by means of a fine bell, of 300 Ibs. weight, presented in 
 1859, by the Second Street Presbyterian. Church, of Troy, N. Y., 
 through its pastor, the Rev. D. Kennedy, D.D. And punctuality 
 ought to be impressed by means of the handsome regulator clock, 
 presented by Seymour Hoyt, Esq.. of New York. 
 
 The same crisis of trial which hastened the erection of the new 
 Seminary became associated also with home accommodations for 
 the Professors and students. The erection of houses for these pur- 
 poses had often been under consideration before, but like the pro- 
 ject of leasing lots for the sake of revenue, to relieve the habitual 
 stress of poverty, its postponement was invariable, owing to the 
 open question of title. In July, 1843, the specifications of Boyd & 
 Murdock, for two Professors' houses, were accepted by the execu- 
 tive committee ; but in less than a month the work had to be stopped, 
 and damages paid to the contractors, on account of opposition 
 manifesting itself through the city councils. But now, at last, the 
 way was clear. Before the occurrence of the fire, arrangements 
 were made for two Professors' houses, and their actual completion 
 shortly afterwards, in 1854, on the western end of the reserved site, 
 was followed some two years later, or shortly after the erection of 
 the Seminary itself, by that of two other like residences at the oppo- 
 site end. These houses are tasteful and comfortable. Their cost 
 was about $5.000 each, or less than half their present value. The 
 generous offer of $600 for each of them, like many another in- 
 ducement from the same source in the history of this enterprise, led 
 other donors, chiefly in these two cities, to supply the balance of 
 I
 
 130 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the requisite funds. The only exception was in the case of the 
 house erected for the venerable Professor of Didactic and Polemic 
 Theology, Dr. Elliot, for which a sum nearly sufficient, in addition 
 to the $600 already named, was realized from the sale of a tract of 
 land in Mercer county, Pa., which had been donated in 1839 for 
 this specific purpose, through the Professor himself, by James S. 
 Spencer, Esq., of Philadelphia. By this admirable arrangement for 
 the comfort of the Professors, another pledge of stability and pro- 
 gress was gained. 
 
 But like unto this, and even more assuring of success, was the 
 erection, in 1859, on the north side of Ridge Street, of Beatty Hall, 
 fitly named in honor of the Christian generosity of the donor, Mrs. 
 Hetty E. Beatty, of Steubenville, Ohio, whose gift of $10,000 for 
 this purpose, covering the cost of the building, enabled the Trustees 
 to make this handsome provision of students' dormitories. The 
 whole cost, including the lot, was $15,000. It is a fine building, in 
 the main, of four stories, originally containing eighty-one single 
 rooms, the whole building being supplied with gas and water fix- 
 tures. It was remodeled in 1868, at a cost of $3,586, so as to in- 
 crease the size and comfort of the rooms by a reduction of their 
 number, and the funds for this purpose were mostly raised through 
 appeals of Professors Jacobus and Hodge to eastern friends. The 
 furniture of these rooms, as well as of those of the Seminary build- 
 ing, for the same purpose, was mainly supplied by the generosity of 
 churches and individuals. 
 
 Nor even yet are we through with this branch of the subject, 
 until we refer to the fire-proof Library building, whose corner- 
 stone has just been laid amidst such signal demonstrations of affec- 
 tion on the part of the assembled alumni. Its cost of $25,000, has 
 been provided for by the sale of lots, which have appreciated in 
 value. Within it will henceforth be found, in new conditions of 
 safety and attraction, the collection of more than ten thousand 
 volumes of the general library, including all that were saved from 
 the fire of those collected by Dr. A. D. Campbell, in Europe, in 
 1829, and also of the "Henry Library," a valuable assortment, 
 rich in historical and exegetical works, gathered in Europe by the 
 Rev. Charlton Henry, of Charleston, S. C., and donated to the 
 Seminary in June, 1828, after his death, by his father, Alexan- 
 
 r '
 
 ~- 
 
 '
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 131 
 
 der Henry, Esq., of Philadelphia, through the influence of Dr. 
 Herron. Extensive additions have been made from time to time, 
 especially since the conflagration, by voluntary gifts and legacies, 
 and through solicitation of the Professors and others. The ' ' Hal- 
 sey Library," which contains, in addition, two thousand volumes, 
 with a fine supply of Patristic and Biblical literature, was deposited 
 for the special use of the Professors, in 1852, by the honored ex- 
 Professor whose name it bears, and now, by a consummated libera- 
 lity, on prescribed conditions, it becomes a possession. Thus we 
 have a nucleus of twelve thousand volumes. Hereafter, neither the 
 hearts nor eyes of visitors will be without hopeful appeals for con- 
 tribution to the attractive shelves which shall contain these treasures. 
 Nor, as we trust, shall the library fund of $5 ,000, the fruit of in- 
 surance upon the library, taken before the fire, fail to be so re- 
 plenished and increased, as to secure an ever-enlarging supply of 
 the best theological works of the age. 
 
 Let us now turn back from this high progress in one line of our 
 history, to trace, over the same years, the still greater struggle to 
 provide for 
 
 CURRENT EXPENSES. 
 
 The establishment of the Seminary, in 1827, included the elec- 
 tion of a Professor. The known readiness of several students to 
 enter the institution was still another reason for beginning opera- 
 tions at once. Several members of the Board, and other persons, 
 were, therefore, appointed to canvass prescribed fields and raise 
 funds for present use and general endowment. But in this, as in 
 the building fund, great discouragements had to be met. The 
 West and South were much alienated by failure to secure the loca- 
 tion. Even some friends of the enterprise in this region had, in 
 part, concurred with them on that question. In the East, there 
 were some willing to help, but other interests first claimed their 
 attention, and besides, they naturally waited to see what would be 
 done at home. The burden fell chiefly on the Synod of Pittsburgh, 
 which then embraced nearly all of Western Pennsylvania and Western 
 Virginia, as well as a large part of Eastern Ohio. But the Scotch- 
 Irish Presbyterians of this favored region, were not then, as they are 
 not now, quite so remarkable for the rush of enthusiasm, as for 
 steadfast orthodoxy. Some churches and individuals responded to
 
 fjs PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the first call with reasonable liberality, whilst many more were de- 
 linquent. After the first few appeals, many sank into comparative 
 inaction. The expense of excavating the hill was a soothing plea to 
 some. Others had to be educated with difficulty up to the practical 
 idea of sustaining a "school of the prophets," without charge for 
 tuition. Others still were misled by injudicious agents, who, for the 
 sake of a present liberality, were wont to comfort avarice with the 
 promise of exemption from like future appeals. The "last appeal" 
 never came ; and God forbid it ever should, until the judgment day. 
 For a long time, the chairs were only partially filled, and the Professors 
 had the triple benefit of extra service, low salaries, and agencies, in 
 vacation, to raise money for their own bread. Every one of the 
 first twenty-five years was a solemn crisis of life or death. Nearly 
 every meeting of the Board, and of the Synod, was held in the pre- 
 sence of an emergency. The Assembly, representing the whole 
 Church, exercised control and voted appropriations, but the money 
 had to be raised here at home, with only occasional help from 
 abroad. It was raised only by means of incessant vigilance and 
 effort on the part of those having the great interest at heart. In- 
 deed, so discouraging was the apathy of the Church at large, that 
 from 1831 to 1836, several movements were made in the board to- 
 wards asking the Assembly to transfer the whole management to the 
 Synod, so as to secure its full interest at least. It is due to truth to 
 record the fact, that far in the lead of all other Churches, and equal, 
 in benefactions, to all the rest of the Synod itself, was the noble old 
 First Church of Pittsburgh, led on by its heroic pastor, Dr. Herron, 
 whose faltering, at any time during these early years, would have 
 been certain death. His moral influence, in sustaining the sinking 
 spirits of others, and the force of his name and efforts abroad, in se- 
 curing contributions, were only less than the power wielded among 
 his own people. By his side stood his faithful friend and parishioner, 
 Michael Allen, the Treasurer of the Seminary, who, to his gratuitous 
 service, added untiring vigilance and the offerings of an open purse, 
 though not without very intelligible protests against the parsimony 
 of the churches. 
 
 The resorts to meet these ever-recurring emergencies would make 
 a long chapter of details, but the time is too short, and the story 
 would be too uniform for present interest. Annual contributions
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 133 
 
 were made by the willing churches. Temporary agencies were 
 created, and, for five years, ending in 1840, Dr. A. D. Campbell, 
 ever an earnest and faithful friend of the Seminary, besides being an 
 instructor in church government, was a general agent. Appeals, 
 by letter, were made to distant friends, some of which brought timely 
 help; in the case of James Lenox, Esq., and a few others, those ap- 
 peals were often repeated, and as often honored. One such crisis 
 may be taken as representative. In 1839, the liabilities of the trea- 
 sury were $7,807.66, of which $2,855 was due to the Professors, tand 
 the channels of income were dry. At the request of the board, Dr. 
 Elliott went to Philadelphia, as a beggar, in the last extremity. On 
 the day of his arrival the banks had suspended specie payment, and 
 business was collapsed. Yet, his personal influence secured a sub- 
 scription, in money, of $5,256.50, payable in four annual instal- 
 ments, and the title to a tract of land in Mercer county, before men- 
 tioned. It was under this stimulus that the good old Synod came 
 again to the rescue, and became responsible, by formal pledge, for 
 the support of the Seminary for five years. Thus, as many times be- 
 fore and afterwards, light broke through the dark clouds. 
 
 It was as the period of five years, just mentioned, approached 
 completion, that a movement was made as a last resort, which, in 
 its final success, by the blessing of God, carried the institution into 
 assured life. All of the old methods of sustentation had been ex- 
 hausted. Accummulated capital, regular and special donations, and, 
 indeed, all available supplies, had melted away in current expenses. 
 Each rally, hitherto, had only postponed the evil day of suspension, 
 and suspension would forfeit the title to the property. Every visi- 
 ble token was discouraging, except the high character of the Profes- 
 sors, and the presence of more than fifty noble candidates for the 
 ministry in our halls. So the case stood in 1843, when the Rev. 
 Richard Lea, an ardent alumnus, prompted, it is said, by his wife, 
 as good men generally are, and sustained by his Elder, Malcomb 
 Leech, Esq., proposed, first in the Presbytery of Ohio, then in the 
 Synod of Pittsburgh, and at last, after signal failure in both, through 
 the columns of the Presbyterian Advocate, the scheme of a perma- 
 nent endowment of two professorships, at $25,000 each, with the 
 expectation that at least one more could be secured by a sale of the 
 land. A favorable response appeared soon, over the signature of
 
 134 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 John C. Plumer, Esq., of West Newton. The Presbyteries, led by 
 the mother Presbytery, Redstone, discussed and strongly recom- 
 mended the plan. It was adopted by the Directors, at a meeting, 
 June 1 2th, 1844. The notable provisions of the form of subscrip- 
 tion were : first, that the principal should be intact, and the interest 
 only expended ; and second, that the fund was to be forfeited to the 
 donors, or their heirs, if ever a change should be made in the for- 
 mula required to be subscribed by the Professors, at their inaugura- 
 tion, " whereby the Confession of Faith and catechisms of the Pres- 
 byterian Church in the United States of America, are now adopted, 
 ex animo, to be received and taught by the said Professors." Theo- 
 dore H. Nevin, Esq., was appointed Assistant Treasurer, with spe- 
 cial charge of this fund. A Board of Trustees was chartered to 
 hold and manage the money. The Synod of Pittsburgh took up the 
 matter vigorously at its next meeting. Its roll was called, and many 
 of the Ministers and Elders pledged themselves for $50 each, under 
 a scheme suggested in the Advocate by "Wyandotte," understood 
 to be the Rev. George Hill, who had been an "agent," under the 
 old system, just long enough to prepare him for "a new departure." 
 Mr. Lea was recommended by the Synod as an agent for temporary 
 service, and afterwards appointed permanently by the Board, to 
 carry out the plan, and, with the consent of his church the Pro- 
 fessors agreeing to supply his pulpit he spent three years in this 
 service, without charge. Mr. Allen headed his book with a sub- 
 scription of $1,000, and a non-communicant paid his traveling ex 
 penses for the first year. The Rev. John Kerr, another alumnus, 
 by request did a like service in the Synod of Wheeling. The Pro- 
 fessors relinquished a portion of their dues, and also, afterwards, 
 agreed to a temporary reduction of their salaries, from $1,500 to 
 $1,200, in the same spirit. Appeals through the pulpit and the 
 press, vigorous personal efforts, repeated again and again on the 
 same ground, and all the influence of ecclesiastical appliances were 
 needed for success. It came at last, after a struggle of not less than 
 half a dozen years ! 
 
 But these very years were marked with harder conflicts, and 
 darker clouds, than ever before or since. The very concentration 
 upon endowment turned away the supplies of present want. Debts 
 accumulated, the Professors were often paid with borrowed money,
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 135 
 
 sometimes with bonds, and oftener still, were obliged to incur debts 
 for the means of living, in anticipation of a replenished Treasury. 
 Financial embarrassments thickened, until, notwithstanding internal 
 prosperity, the question of disbanding was forced home upon the 
 Directors with more power than ever before. Rumors of such a 
 probable result were industriously circulated. It added greatly, 
 also, to these troubles, that a movement was made in 1847, a ^ New 
 Albany, Indiana, to transfer our Seminary, with one or more of its 
 Professors, to the Seminary located there, and that a similar move- 
 ment at Cincinnati, in 1849-50, aimed at the absorption of both New 
 Albany and Allegheny at that place. It was even found necessary 
 for the Assembly of 1850 to pass a formal resolution, declaring the 
 Seminary to be "permanently fixed in its present location," so as to 
 quiet the injurious clamors thus raised. It is not wonderful that in 
 this great uncertainty, discouragement so came upon the Directors 
 themselves, that a resolution offered by one of the firmest friends, to 
 dispose of the property, pay off the debts, and close the doors, was 
 seriously and painfully discussed. "While the resolution was pend- 
 ing," says the record, written by the lamented Comingo, "sadness 
 and sorrow, darker than the intervening night, filled many hearts." 
 But a key of hope was struck, when, in the opening speech of the 
 next morning, a good Elder, after the tossings of a sleepless night, 
 announced his readiness to "trust in the Lord, and go forward." 
 His counsel prevailed, and the light of a brighter day soon came. 
 From the high prosperity of later years, we look back with wonder 
 at the patient endurance of those believing and prayerful men ! 
 
 The sale of the grounds added another endowed chair to those 
 secured, as we have just seen. The endowment of a fourth pro- 
 fessorship was started in 1856, and brought to final completion in 
 1863, when the eyes of the Treasurer must have glowed, as, balanc- 
 ing his columns, which showed $100,000 of unencumbered endow- 
 ment, joined with other like prosperity, he appended the unwonted 
 statement, " The endowment fund is completed, and the Seminary 
 is out of debt." Following this, too, is the record of another ad- 
 vance, when, in 1866, the Trustees reported an addition of $30,000 
 to the permanent funds, by means of private subscriptions, led by 
 the Presidents of the two Boards, Dr. Beatty and James Laughlin, 
 Esq., at $5,000 each, for the double purpose of securing an ade-
 
 jj6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 quate contingent fund, and of raising the productiveness of each of 
 the four professorships, to $2,000 a year. Nor, even yet, is this 
 recital complete, until we mention the joint endowment of the 
 "Re-union Professorship," by Dr. Beatty and his wife, to the 
 amount of $50,000, tendered and accepted in 1870, on the con- 
 dition that the incumbent shall " not be a pastor." And this 
 munificent gift is but an addition to $27,000, bestowed before by 
 the same liberal hands. To this completed endowment of five 
 Professorships, it is pleasant to add one of a Tutorship in Hebrew, 
 to the amount of $5,000, contributed by the Central Presbyterian 
 Church of Pittsburgh, under the care of Dr. Jacobus, as a part of its 
 " Memorial " offering. Other " Re-union " gifts, for different uses, 
 were made to a considerable extent. The scholarship fund, of 
 $39,000, pledged for the support of nineteen students, the sustenta- 
 tion fund, of nearly $4,000, the interest of which is used, under the 
 discretion of the Professors, to aid those who are straitened, and 
 the contingent fund, of $20,000, all enter into the evidences of 
 present prosperity. The whole endowment fund now amounts to 
 $187,000. And it is a simple debt of justice to record the grateful 
 fact that, through the vigilance of Mr. Nevin, who has been Trea- 
 surer of all of these endowment funds from the beginning, in 1842, 
 and of all other funds since 1848, not a dollar of them has been 
 lost by injudicious investment, or otherwise. This is the point 
 unto which we have now attained. In the contrast with former 
 poverty and struggle, we have no reasons for boasting, but every 
 reason for thanksgiving to the Head of the Church. Progress is 
 thus demonstrated to be the law of the Seminary's life ; only let it 
 be greater in the future, and ever worthy of such a birthright, at 
 such a time as this. 
 
 It is now time for us to pass to the inner life of our beloved 
 seminary, as represented first and mainly in its 
 
 PROFESSORS. 
 
 In this subjective branch of the subject, the impossibility of detail 
 and incident will make it easy to fulfill the desire for condensation 
 and brevity. Yet here we have, beneath the exposed surface, a 
 history vastly more important than any thus far brought out. The 
 character and efficiency of a theological seminary depends far less
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINA&Y. fJ7 
 
 upon pecuniary resources, and outward facilities, than upon the 
 ability, aims, and fidelity of the men who impart its instructions, 
 embody its spirit, lead and stimulate its movements, and become 
 the models of its students. Nothing is more certain than that the 
 piety, scholarship, habits, manners, temper, and force of the Pro- 
 fessors, are largely reproduced, in kind and degree, in their pupils. 
 We have all known how easy it is, often, to identify a young minis- 
 ter as the son of a certain Seminary, or as the admiring student of a 
 particular Professor, by his style of thought and expression, as well 
 as his attitudes, tones, and gestures. Alas ! the defects common in 
 such a case are even more likely to be copied than the excellencies. 
 When the fundamental qualities of an efficient ministry enter, for 
 weal or woe, into this vast personal influence, the interest of the 
 Church in the fitness of our Theological Instructors is beyond cal- 
 culation. These, more than any other men, must mould the minis- 
 try, and ultimately the Church itself. 
 
 Happily this part of our record abounds in reasons for gratitude 
 to the Head of the Church, and there is no part of it which we would 
 wish to blot. The Assembly of 1827, which located the Seminary, 
 also elected the Rev. Jacob Jones Janeway, D.D., then a pastor in 
 Philadelphia, Professor of Theology. He was the only candidate 
 nominated, yet it is not without interest now, that in counting the 
 ballots, it was discovered, much to his own surprise, at least, that the 
 Rev. David Elliott, a member of that Assembly from the Presbytery 
 of Carlisle, had received five votes. It was doubtless the shadow of 
 a coming event. The Professor elect, in a subsequent letter to the 
 Board, declined the appointment, but, upon urgency and reflection, 
 changed his mind, and signified his acceptance to the next Assem- 
 bly. Meanwhile the Board, in view of the public expectation, and 
 the known readiness of several students to commence their studies, 
 appointed the Rev. Elisha P. Swift, pastor of the Second Presby- 
 terian Church of Pittsburgh, to give instruction in theology, and the 
 Rev. Joseph Stockton, in Hebrew. In fact, the former took entire 
 charge for the winter session, commencing November 16, 1827, and 
 the latter for the summer session following, there being four stu- 
 dents, in all, under their charge, viz., Thomas Beer, Isaac T. Ben- 
 net, Alfred Hamilton, and Joseph Reed, of whom Brother Beer alone 
 remains to tell the story of that first-born class. One year later, on
 
 ij8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the arrival of the regular Professor, they were joined by Alexander 
 M. Mcjunkin, the noble and beloved Alexander B. Brown, after- 
 wards the eloquent preacher, and honored President of Jefferson Col- 
 lege, together with our two excellent brethren, the Rev. Adam Tor- 
 rence, and Aaron Williams, D.D., whom we affectionately greet on 
 this occasion. 
 
 Dr. Jane way was inaugurated on the i6th of October, 1828, in 
 the First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, during the sessions of 
 the Synod, Drs. McMillan, Herron, Brown, Ralston, and Swift 
 taking part in the services, and on the next evening he delivered his 
 inaugural address. Dr. John McDowell, then of Elizabethtown, 
 New Jersey, had been elected by the previous Assembly, to the 
 Chair of Church History and Government, but had declined. Dr. 
 Janeway conducted the instructions, during the winter, with the aid 
 of his son, Thos. L. Janeway, so well known since as Secretary of 
 the Board of Domestic Missions, but tendered his resignation to 
 the Assembly of 1829, and returned to Philadelphia. His chief rea- 
 son given, was the fear of trouble arising out of doubtful title to the 
 property ; but it was, also, privately whispered that his family did 
 not fully unite with the Pittsburghers, in loving their city, as old 
 ham is loved, in proportion as it is has been smoked / In the want 
 of a Professor, the students were dismissed for that summer. 
 
 The same Assembly which released Dr. Janeway found a most 
 worthy successor in the person of the Rev. Luther Halsey, D.D., 
 then Professor of Natural Philosophy in New Jersey College, at 
 Princeton. His inauguration took place in the Second Presbyterian 
 Church of Pittsburgh, on the evening of October 19, 1829, when 
 the Rev. William Jeffrey preached, and the Rev. Thomas Hoge de- 
 livered the charge to the Professor. His inaugural address was de- 
 livered in the First Church the next evening. His plan for con- 
 ducting the studies was at once laid before the Board, and approved, 
 and he entered upon the vigorous prosecution of his work. Soon 
 after the opening of the session, Mr. John W. Nevin, a native of 
 Shippensburg, Pa., who, after his graduation in Princeton Semi- 
 nary, had conducted, for some two years, the Chair of Biblical and 
 Oriental Literature in that institution, during the absence of the 
 Professor, Dr. Charles Hodge, in Europe, entered upon his duties 
 as Instructor, in the same department here, by appointment of the
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. rj<? 
 
 Board. Besides the six students of the former session, who returned, 
 nine new students entered, some of whom, even yet, hold a high 
 place in the service and honor of the Church. They were as fol- 
 lows, viz., James Anderson, John C. Lowrie, A. D. Pollock, Loyal 
 Young, .Wm. Reed, Joseph S. Wylie, Robert Glenn, James Wilson, 
 and Thomas A. Carothers. Thus equipped, the Seminary went for- 
 ward with marked success, in everything save the struggle for funds. 
 The instructions were able ; the attendance of students surpassed 
 expectations; the spirit of piety and of missionary consecration 
 compared most favorably with that of any other institution ; and 
 large benefits began to be realized, not only in this region, but over 
 the whole Church and in the foreign field. A solemn affliction, 
 however, was endured, in the death of Dr. Ezra Fisk, at Philadel- 
 phia, December 5, 1833, while on his way hither to assume the 
 Chair of History, to which he had been chosen by the previous 
 Assembly. 
 
 The Assembly of 1836 sanctioned and confirmed the transfer of 
 Dr. Halsey from the department of Theology to that of Church His- 
 tory and Government, and placed in the former chair the Rev. 
 David Elliott, then pastor of the church of Washington, Pennsyl- 
 vania. The previous Assembly had elected Dr. Elliott to the vacant 
 Chair of History ; but he had declined. His chief reason was his 
 reluctance to undergo separation from a church with which his rela- 
 tions were most affectionate. Added to this, also, was the fact that 
 whilst, of course, mastery of the department proposed was within 
 his reach, his studies and tastes had been in another direction. The 
 Board, however, urged again and -again his reconsideration of the 
 subject. Professor Halsey, in a manly and brotherly letter to Dr. 
 Elliott, expressed a strong desire for his acceptance. How the 
 question was finally arranged, to the satisfaction of all parties, ap- 
 pears fully in the following extract from the report of the Directors 
 to the Assembly of 1836, as found in the published minutes of that 
 year: "The Board are gratified," says the report, " in being able 
 to state that Dr. Elliott, who was chosen by the last General Assem- 
 bly to the Professorship of Ecclesiastical History, has, after much 
 deliberation, accepted the appointment. Dr. Halsey, who has, 
 since his first connection with the Seminary, conducted both the 
 departments of Ecclesiastical History and Didactic Theology, having
 
 140 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 expressed a desire that he should be transferred to the Chair of Ec- 
 clesiastical History, and Dr. Elliott to that of Theology, the Board 
 recommended the transfer to the action of the Assembly." This 
 change was accordingly made. 
 
 One year later, Dr. Halsey resigned his place in the Seminary. 
 His ability, fidelity, and Christian character, had won for him 
 many warm admirers and friends, alike among the ministry and the 
 people. He had accomplished eight years of valuable service for the 
 Lord. His relations to the Faculty had been amicable and 
 brotherly. The Board with regret parted with him. His pupils 
 until this day cherish the most affectionate remembrances of him. 
 And now, in his beautiful age, his own abiding attachment for this 
 Seminary is seen in the noble benefaction, through which he shall 
 continue to speak when death shall have sealed his lips. The affection- 
 ate confidence of the Board meets him on this occasion, in the form 
 of a cordial invitation to deliver lectures to the classes during his resi- 
 dence here, as his strength may permit, on important branches of 
 their course. The Lord's blessing be upon him while he lingers 
 among us, and a crown of glory on high ! 
 
 Dr. Elliott was inaugurated in the autumn following his appoint- 
 ment, when Dr. Henry R. Weed delivered an able charge. 
 Through all the vicissitudes of the Seminary, he has remained, in 
 honor, until now. At the time of his entrance, in the summer of 
 1836, there were twenty-six students ; when the first catalogue was 
 issued, two years later, the number had risen to fifty. The studies 
 of the Chair left vacant by the retirement of Dr. Halsey, in 1837, 
 were conducted by Professor Nevin, an assistant having been em- 
 ployed in his "own department, until his resignation, in 1840, to be- 
 come a Professor in the Theological Seminary of the German Re- 
 formed Church, then at Mercersburg, Pa. During these years, he 
 performed acceptably the service, and wore the dignity of a Profes- 
 sor, without formal investiture, simply because this was his prefer- 
 ence. He is still the recognized leader of the church of his adoption. 
 And, although we may be less inclined than formerly to confess him as 
 a representative of our views, on some very important questions, there 
 are not a few of the sons of Allegheny who will cherish in memory 
 the ability of his instructions, and the earnestness of his work, as well 
 as the greatness of his intellect and the warmth of his friendship.
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. i.fr 
 
 The spring and summer of 1840 marked one of the severest trials 
 of all this history. The retirement of Dr. Nevin left Dr. Elliott 
 the sole Professor. Straitened finances, diminished classes, and a 
 discouraged spirit in the church, were combined into a heavy 
 burden upon the shoulders of one man of unwavering faith and reso- 
 lute courage. Had the heart of Dr. Elliott quailed then, the Semi- 
 nary would have come to its burial. But the Lord again interposed. 
 Once more strength was born from the .womb of necessity. "Post 
 tenebrosissimum, sit lux /" The Rev. Robert Dunlap of blessed 
 memory, then pastor of the Second Church of Pittsburgh, gave tem- 
 porary assistance in teaching. The Rev. Dr. A. D. Campbell still 
 lectured occasionally on Church Government. Meanwhile, the 
 crisis was met with prayerful vigilance. The attention of the Board 
 was 'called to the Rev. Lewis W. Green, of Kentucky, as a suitable 
 person to fill the Chair of Oriental and Biblical Literature, and the 
 Assembly of 1840 gave him a cordial election. The announcement 
 of his acceptance, in September following, brought joy. His in- 
 auguration took place October 26th, 1840, when a sermon by Dr. 
 Beatty, a charge by Dr. McConaughy, and the Professor's address on 
 "The interpretation of the Bible," commanded the attention of a 
 large assembly. Provision having been made for the salary of a 
 third Professor, for three years, by special subscription, the Rev. 
 Alexander T. McGill, pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church of 
 Carlisle, Pa., was chosen as Instructor, in 1841, and elected by the 
 Assembly of 1842, Professor of Ecclesiastical History and Church 
 Government. He was inaugurated on the i8th of November fol- 
 lowing, the Rev. George Marshall preaching the sermon, and Dr. 
 Herron delivering the charge, in connection with the Professor's 
 address on "The scope and significance of Church History." This 
 re-organization of the Faculty was satisfactory to the church, and 
 attracted students. And so the instruction continued for five years, 
 when, in 1847, Dr. Green retired to take charge of the Second 
 Presbyterian Church of Baltimore. He was afterwards succes- 
 sively President of Hampden Sidney College, Virginia, and of Tran- 
 sylvania University, and Centre College, in his own native Kentucky. 
 While in the last position, in 1862, he was called to his glorious 
 rest. He was a fine scholar, an eloquent preacher, and a genial, 
 Christian gentleman.
 
 142 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 The chair of Dr. Green was not regularly filled until 1851. The 
 intervening years were witnesses of the struggle to complete the 
 endowment of the two professorships, which we have before sketch- 
 ed, and therefore were years of economy. Drs. Elliott and McGill, 
 by means of extra labor, with the assistance of tutors, carried the 
 classes along satisfactorily. But the simultaneous completion of this 
 endowment and the added endowment of a third chair, through the 
 lease of the ground, prepared the way for the third Professor. The 
 choice fell upon the Rev. Melancthon W. Jacobus, pastor of the 
 First Church of Brooklyn. His inauguration did not take place, 
 however, until May 12, 1852. The venerable Dr. Herron presided, 
 and delivered the charge. Dr. Jacobus, after a valuable service of 
 twenty years, in the Seminary and out of it, is still at his post, in 
 the full vigor of Christian manhood. His valuable commentaries 
 upon the Scriptures have won for him a high reputation, which the 
 Seminary has shared, along with the fruits of his fine scholarship. 
 
 Two years later, the organization of the Faculty was again dis- 
 turbed by the transfer of Dr. McGill to the Seminary at Princeton. 
 The question of his removal from the Institution had been raised 
 with annoying frequency, by calls to other positions, during the 
 twelve years of his incumbency, but now the movement came in the 
 way of a formal nomination to the Assembly, by the Princeton 
 Directors, for a chair in that Seminary. This was resisted by the 
 friends of Allegheny, on the ground that the sanction of such a pre- 
 datory warfare of one Seminary upon another, by the Assembly, 
 would be of disparaging and damaging effect upon the Institution. 
 After considerable contest in the Assembly, Dr. McGill took upon 
 himself the responsibility, by expressing a personal preference for 
 the change, whereupon the opposition was withdrawn, and he was 
 transferred. The friends of our Seminary had always given him a 
 warm support, and, at that time, desired his continuance. They 
 valued him for his fine qualities as a Professor, and they remembered 
 his excellent work, but they did not wish to retain him against his 
 own desire. The Directors, in parting with him, recorded their 
 sense of his "valuable services," and their prayerful wish that " the 
 blessing of God" might rest upon him in his new sphere. He is 
 still efficiently at his post in Princeton. 
 
 The vacancy thus created in the Faculty was filled by the same
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. r.;j 
 
 Assembly, which elected William S. Plumer, D.D., pastor of the 
 Franklin Street Church of Baltimore, Professor. He was chosen 
 without his consent, or even knowledge, and with a distinct under- 
 standing of his unwillingness to accept a chair of history. But to 
 meet the case, a resolution was passed, authorizing the Board of 
 Directors, in conjunction with the Professors, to make such an ad- 
 justment of the departments of instruction, as to them might seem 
 best, duly regarding the rights of each Professor. 
 
 It is proper to say that, being myself the mover of that resolution, I 
 offered it with a full and confidential knowledge of Dr. Elliott's readi- 
 ness to surrender the chair of theology to a younger man, and to take 
 another better suited to his time of life. The venerable Dr. Archi- 
 bald Alexander, of Princeton, at about the same age, had made a simi- 
 lar change. The Directors and Faculty had no difficulty in making 
 such a re-arrangement of the chairs. Dr. Elliott was made Professor 
 of Polemic and Historical Theology and Church Government, and 
 Dr. Plumer, yielding to the unanimous urgency, accepted the Pro- 
 fessorship of Didactic and Pastoral Theology, and was inaugurated 
 October 20, 1854. It was on that occasion that the venerable Dr. 
 Swift, then in his sixty-third year, closed his masterly charge to the 
 new Professor with touching reminiscences of the past history of the 
 Seminary, rising to the height of his lofty eloquence as he said, " In 
 respect to this and other institutions, common to us all, I seem to 
 hear, from behind the curtain, the voices of our still much loved 
 McMillan, Patterson, McCurdy, Jennings, and Brown, saying, On- 
 ward f Brethren, Onward f with the work of the Lord ! " And 
 lo, now for these seven years, the voice of Swift himself, along with 
 that of Herron, has been crying from behind the same curtain, 
 Onward ! 
 
 Dr. Plumer brought to the Seminary an excellent reputation for 
 piety, orthoxy, and ability as a leader in the movements of the 
 Church. He gave it also the full-benefit of his large acquaintance, 
 his great personal influence, and his untiring energy. His unusual 
 power to gather students into the Seminary, and to stimulate their re- 
 ligious activities when there, were freely acknowledged, and are still 
 held in vivid remembrance. The number in attendance in 1854, 
 \\a& fifty-four , with an upward tendency. By a blessing upon the 
 fidelity of each of the Professors, and upon their harmonious co-
 
 144 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 operation, with the benefit, also, of the material progress before 
 noted, in three years the roll contained eighty-one names, and at the 
 breaking out of the war, in i86i,.the whole number was one hun- 
 dred and sixty-five. The complications of the war led Dr. Plumer 
 to resign his place on the 1 8th of September, 1862, and the Board, 
 with regret for circumstances over which they had no control, felt 
 constrained to accept his resignation. He is now a Professor in the 
 Seminary at Columbia,. South Carolina. He still has the warm per- 
 sonal regard of the Professors, Directors, and alumni, and their grati- 
 tude for his valuable services. 
 
 The Assembly of 1857 elected the Rev. Samuel Jennings Wilson 
 Professor of Ecclesiastical History and Homiletics. He is an hon- 
 ored son of the Seminary itself, of the class of 1855, and a no less 
 honored alumnus of Washington College. At the time of his elec- 
 tion, his gifts in that department had been fully tested by the ex- 
 perience of one year as Instructor. His was known as the fourth 
 professorship, the endowment of which was started in 1856. Dr. 
 Wilson was formally inducted April 27, 1858, when the words of 
 charge fell upon his ears from the lips of the good and wise Dr. 
 Samuel McFarren, now a saint in glory. He is still a Professor of 
 high ability, in the full force and usefulness of his calling, and in the 
 strength of his early manhood, having shared with like zeal, also, the 
 outside efforts of his brethren to build up the institution. Long 
 may he be spared for this great service of Christ, as well as to utter, 
 with eloquent earnestness, the Gospel messages. 
 
 The next Professor chosen was Dr. William M. Paxton, the pastor 
 of the First Church of Pittsburgh, who was appointed by the Assem- 
 bly of 1860, Professor of Sacred Rhetoric, and inaugurated on the 
 nth of April following, being officially and happily addressed by 
 William D. Howard, D.D., pastor of the Second Church of the same 
 city. Dr. Paxton's connection as Professor was subordinate to his 
 important pastorate, yet his courses of lectures, gratuitously given, 
 were received with great pleasure and profit by the students. Since 
 his removal to New York, in 1865, they have, of course, been for 
 the most part interrupted, and for this reason, he has felt, at length, 
 constrained to resign his Chair. 
 
 The Rev. Archibald Alexander Hodge, D.D., a son of the venera- 
 ble Dr. Charles Hodge, of Princeton, a Missionary in India during
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 145 
 
 the first years of his ministry, and at the time of his election, a pas- 
 tor in Wilkesbarre, Pa., was introduced into the Chair of Didactic, 
 Historical and Polemic Theology, November 2, 1864, the Assembly 
 of that year having chosen him to that office. The Rev. James M. 
 Platt, of Zanesville, Ohio, delivered the address. The Professor's 
 own inaugural address struck most happily a key-note below which 
 his performance has never fallen. The classes continue to receive 
 the benefits of his comprehensive, thorough, and masterly instruc- 
 tion, whilst his theological contributions through the press are among 
 the most accepted representations of our faith. He also abides with 
 us, in the fullest confidence of the Church, a champion for the truth. 
 
 The last addition to the regular corps of Professors was made in the 
 person of Dr. William H. Hornblower, who was elected to the Re- 
 union Professorship of Sacred Rhetoric, Church Government, and 
 Pastoral Theology, by the Board of Directors, under the new 
 arrangement adopted by the Assembly of 1870, which gives the 
 entire management to the Directors, retaining the power of veto 
 in the Assembly itself. He was inaugurated in November last. 
 After an appropriate charge by the Rev. George Hill, D.D., a 
 member of the Board, his own offering of first fruits was laid upon 
 the altar, in pledge of the abundant harvest of benefits to be ex- 
 pected from his labors. He comes among us with an excellent 
 reputation, and fresh in the sympathies of a long and successful 
 pastorate, at Paterson, New Jersey, to combine with the culture 
 of scholarship, practical training in the art of preaching, as well as 
 of ruling in the house of the Lord. 
 
 In addition to these, the Rev. Charles C. Beatty, D.D., LL.D., 
 has, since 1863, by appointment of the Board, filled the office of 
 Lecturer Extraordinary on Practical Theology. His gratuitous and 
 able service in this respect has been a source of large benefit to the 
 students, and of great importance to the Seminary. Ill health, now, 
 to the regret of all, compels his withdrawal. 
 
 Such is our band of Professors. Four of them are in the fulness 
 of their manly vigor, each one possessing distinct traits and force 
 peculiar to himself; and in their union they give to our young men 
 the advantage of a variety and completeness not often surpassed. 
 At their head remains our honored father, David Elliott, D.D., 
 LL.D., after a service covering just one-half of the present century. 
 K
 
 rj6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 He has been cordially released from further labor, save only that, in 
 the character of Emeritus Professor, at the age of eighty-five years, 
 he shall give to his junior Professors and the students his wise and 
 pious counsels, commending them severally to the grace of God, in 
 his prayers, as he nears the Promised Land. Profoundly thankful, 
 Fellow Alumni, for the good Providence which has preserved him 
 for this reunion, with a cloudless intellect and a warm heart, shall 
 we not invoke a blessing for him while he lives, and then, when he 
 dies, each of us cry, ' ' My father, my father, the chariot of Israel 
 and the horsemen thereof?" 
 
 But what shall we say, in the last place, of 
 
 THE SONS OF THE SEMINARY, 
 
 who, like the living "jewels" of the mother of the Gracchi, are 
 the best of all fruits and witnesses of usefulness? God's blessing is 
 not so manifest in any other part of this history, as in the number, 
 character, and achievements of the men who have received here the 
 double culture of mind and heart, which prepared them for the toils 
 and faith of the ministerial work. Of the one thousand and forty - 
 nine who have been matriculated, a very small proportion have 
 failed to enter the sacred office. In the first years, the students were 
 generally from the two neighboring colleges Jefferson supplying 
 the largest number, and Washington the next ; and the consolidated 
 college must evidently, in the career of prosperity before her, ever 
 be the best source of supply. But the growth of numbers, and the 
 extended list of literary institutions from which the supplies have 
 come, have kept pace with all other tokens of progress. In 1856, 
 the Senior Professor reported fifty-two as the average attendance 
 from the beginning. During the intervening sixteen years it has 
 been one hundred and three. The highest point reached was in 
 1 86 1, when the roll contained one hundred and sixty-five names; 
 the lowest mimber since was seventy-three, in 1867. What the 
 numbers would have been, but for the late civil war, which dimin- 
 ished accessions by calling to the battle-field so largely the students 
 of colleges and academies, and by diverting the pursuits of so many 
 more from a course of liberal education, cannot now be accurately 
 stated. All who remember the circumstances will only wonder that 
 our own and other Seminaries maintained their ground so well. The
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. iff 
 
 reaction in the colleges has now fairly set in, and in the flow of the 
 future we can see greater advancement than ever before. The 
 present number of students, eighty- three, is an increase of eight 
 over the last year. And they represent twenty-two colleges and ten 
 States of the Union, as well as three foreign countries. Amherst 
 in Massachusetts, Cornell in New York, Princeton in New Jersey, 
 Hanover and Wabash in Indiana, and the University of Virginia, 
 send sons to sit in these seats, along with those of nine institutions 
 of Ohio and five of Pennsylvania. 
 
 If we would trace the alumni of the Seminary, we must go to 
 nearly every part of our own land, and to nearly every missionary 
 field of the world. Three honored sons are secretaries of Boards of 
 the Church, viz., the Senior Secretary of the Board of Foreign Mis- 
 sions, the Secretary of the Board of Education, and the Secretary of 
 the Freedmen's Committee. We are ably represented in the pulpits 
 of Albany, New York, Philadelphia, Harrisburg, Baltimore, Pitts- 
 burgh, Cincinnati, Columbus, Louisville, Lexington, St. Louis, 
 Springfield, and other leading cities, as well as a vast number of 
 places less prominent, but not less difficult or important. A fair 
 contribution of efficient men has certainly been made to presidential 
 and professorial chairs, and to editorial work. How richly the 
 churches covering the territory of the old Pittsburgh Synod have 
 received back all their outlay, with interest, appears in the statistics, 
 which show that in the ministry of the present Synod of the same 
 name, numbering one hundred and thirty-seven, there are eighty- 
 eight alumni of the Seminary ; that, in the Synod of Erie, there are' 
 eighty-nine out of one hundred and forty-six ; and that, in the three 
 Presbyteries of the Synod of Cleveland lying within the same origi- 
 nal bounds, there are forty-six out of eighty-eight. In Eastern 
 Pennsylvania, and in most of the old States out of New England, 
 few Presbyteries are without one or more of them. Looking west of 
 us, by state boundaries, we now find one hundred and twenty-one 
 living sons of the Seminary located in Ohio, fifty-two in Illinois, 
 thirty-five in Iowa, nineteen in Indiana, twenty-one in Missouri, 
 seventeen in West Virginia, fourteen in Kansas, nine in Minnesota, 
 five in Nebraska, eight in Wisconson, eight in California, three in Ore- 
 gon, and some in other Western States, and in most of the territories. 
 A considerable number are to be found in the Southern States.
 
 tjS . PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 In all these various localities, these sons of Allegheny bear their 
 witness to the training received here. They differ from each other, 
 of course, in attainments, zeal, and efficiency. But, like the 
 students of any other institution, they are more or less moulded 
 into one type. It is far from being the only claim we make for 
 them, but it is certainly a chief one, that, as a general rule, they 
 become, in the field of work, practical preachers and efficient 
 pastors. In their drill, scholastic culture is secured, but it is subor- 
 dinated to actual power. Without any disparagement of our other 
 excellent Seminaries, or invidious comparison with them, but in full 
 acknowledgment of their excellencies and advantages, we may be 
 allowed a sense of pleasure in the fact that our students are so largely 
 sought by congregations, alike amidst the refinements of Eastern, 
 and the more rugged energies of Western society. 
 
 But, after all, our loftiest joy is derived from the connection of 
 our Seminary with Foreign Missions. It is not to be forgotten that 
 the old Synod of Pittsburgh, in the midst of which it was established, 
 resolved itself, at its first meeting, in 1802, amidst the glow of the 
 great religious revival, into a Western Missionary Society, with 
 special reference to the conversion of the Indian tribes. In 1831, 
 the same body organized the " Western Foreign Missionary So- 
 ciety," taking " the world" for " the field." Its first efficient and 
 eloquent secretary was the same Dr. Swift who, four years before, 
 had given the first note of instruction in the Western Theological 
 Seminary. It became, by the adoption of the General Assembly, in 
 1838, the Board of Foreign Missions for the whole church, and it 
 now has, in the re-united church, a force of two hundred and thirty- 
 seven foreign laborers, male and female, in the field, besides a large 
 number of native ministers, and three hundred and seventy-eight 
 native helpers. It is not strange that the missionary spirit which 
 prompted such an organization, should have provided a " school of 
 the prophets," located at the same centre. Nor is it any more 
 strange that the first missionaries sent out by this Presbyterian so- 
 ciety should have been from that very school. John C. Lowrie and 
 William Reed went forth in 1833, as the vanguard of the army of 
 conquest, in Northern India, and were followed, one year later, by 
 James Wilson and John Newton, now the veteran missionary of 
 thirty-eight years. The year 1834 also gave John Cloud to touch
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 
 
 the shores of West Africa, and die, whilst his classmate, Joseph 
 Kerr, went forth to the Western Indians. In 1836, Edward Cope 
 became our witness at Ceylon, and Robert W. Orr, of our Board, 
 and Joseph S. Travelli, of the American Board, lifted up their voices 
 in China. Two years later still, Joseph Warren joined the noble 
 company in Northern India ; at the same time, also, William 
 Hamilton became the pioneer among the Iowa Indians, soon to be 
 followed by Stephen R. Riggs, among the Sioux. Thus the first 
 nine classes were represented, amidst heathen altars, by twelve 
 foreign missionaries, witnesses for Christ and the Presbyterian 
 Church in her organized capacity. To their number have been 
 added, from time to time, a most worthy succession. Among the 
 sainted dead are the noble Fullerton and the murdered Campbell 
 and Johnson of India, the consecrated Paull, of Africa, and the 
 faithful Sharpe, of South America. In China, besides Speer and 
 Green, whom failing health recalled, Happer, after a service of 
 more than a quarter of a century, and Noyes, and Mateer, and 
 Lyon, and Corbett, still answer to the roll-call, while Condit fol- 
 lows seven years of service there with a like work among the 
 Chinese of California. Leavitt and Williams are back in this 
 country, but the Newtons (the father and two sons), "Wykoff, W. F. 
 Johnson, Holcomb, and Kelso, still blow the Gospel trumpet on 
 the plains of Northern India. McDonald, McFarland, and George, 
 are our living representatives in Siam, and Thompson in Japan. 
 Blackford, Schneider, and Wallace, are still bearing aloft the Gospel 
 banner in South America; and McLaren was, for three years, of 
 their company. Burtt, following in the footsteps of the pioneers, 
 served his day among the western tribes ; and, while we are here, 
 D. F. McFarland and Roberts stand up for Jesus in New Mexico. 
 And that the same Christian heroism has not died out, is evidenced 
 by the fact that our young brother Hull, of the present graduating 
 class, goes with his most worthy companion Graham, of the Semi- 
 nary at Princeton, to join the band who testify the grace of God 
 in Western India. The name of another member of the class is 
 now before the Board for appointment to some foreign field. Shall 
 not all of these precious names have a warm place in our hearts, 
 amidst the joys of this re-union ? Nor shall we cherish less the far 
 larger number who, with toil and trial as great have rushed over
 
 i jo PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 mountains, prairies, and wildernesses, to supply the destitutions of 
 our great and growing country. They are our brethren in the 
 largest fellowship of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. They are 
 with us now, in spirit. 
 
 But now I hasten to the conclusion. We surely cannot be with- 
 out an overpowering sense of gratitude to God, in this review of his 
 mercies. The Seminary has been preserved through the most peril- 
 ous vicissitudes, recurring almost annually during the first half of its 
 history, but, at last, it has been led by the invisible hand up to the 
 fulness of strength. Its foundations were laid in faith, and the all- 
 seeing Preserver has looked down upon it in love, during all these 
 years. The prayers of the sainted Patterson which consecrated every 
 room of the first building apart, and never failed, in any place, to 
 ask a covenant-keeping God to "bless the lads" represented then, 
 and have been followed since, by petitions of like earnestness from 
 many other hearts, which remain an unblotted record before the 
 Throne. In answer thereunto, the Holy Ghost has kept the fire of 
 a true devotion burning upon the heart-altars of Professors, Directors, 
 and friends, and has drawn hither and sanctified the young men of 
 the Church, in gratifying numbers. 
 
 The work of forty-five years for Christ, in training godly mini- 
 sters for his service, can never be undone. Neither can the vantage 
 ground, which has been reached, ever be lost. There are consecra- 
 ted men, by hundreds, who, in the full equipment received here, are 
 nobly fighting, upon as many fields, the battles of the Lord against 
 error and sin. And there are large classes in the institution panting 
 to follow them. The future we may read in the covenant of which 
 our risen Redeemer is "surety;" in the Providence which, by means 
 of science, art, commerce, and government, is annihilating the bar- 
 riers of distance, tradition, and caste, for the fusion of races into one 
 Gospel brotherhood ; in the problem of the uncounted millions des- 
 tined soon to throng this vast continent, whose destiny only the 
 "Great Commission" can solve; in the rising spirit of the Church 
 and ministry, to enter the open doors of a waiting world with the 
 Word of Life ; and in the eternal purpose which the blood of Calvary 
 has sealed, assuring to our faith for Christ the heathen for his inheri- 
 tance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession. For 
 the great achievement, let the Western Theological Seminary ever be
 
 WESTERN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. fjl 
 
 held in holy dedication, and, while life lasts, let every one of her 
 sons be a faithful witness in behalf of the coming glory of Jesus, the 
 Saviour of lost men. 
 
 SUPPLEMENT. 
 
 The decision of the committee of publication to insert the fore- 
 going history of the Theological Seminary in this volume, as a legiti- 
 mate part of the century's record, makes it necessary to add a brief 
 notice of the intervening years. 
 
 The venerable Dr. Elliott was present at the happy reunion of 
 1872, to pronounce, from the fulness of a father's heart, his blessing 
 upon the hundreds of ministerial sons then assembled. But, after 
 gentle stages of declining health, he entered into the heavenly rest, 
 March 18, 1874, in the triumph of faith, still whispering, with his 
 last breath, petitions for God's favor upon the beloved Seminary, as 
 well as its Professors, students, and alumni. The warmest expres- 
 sions of reverential love, both official and personal, attested the 
 strength of ties which nothing but death could have sundered. A 
 small memorial volume, only too feebly written, preserves the facts 
 of his history, and an outline of his noble character. 
 
 An important addition to the instruction of the institution was 
 made, in 1874, by the erection of the chair of New Testament Litera- 
 ture and Exegesis. The Professor unanimously chosen is the Rev. 
 Samuel T. Lowrie, D.D., an alumnus of Miami University, a son of the 
 Seminary itself, of the class of 1856, and, at the time of his election, 
 the pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Abington, Pennsylvania. 
 His inauguration took place in the Second Presbyterian Church at 
 Pittsburgh, November 10, 1874. The Rev. S. F. Scovel delivered an 
 appropriate charge to the new Professor, who followed with an in- 
 augural address, ably setting forth the scope of his proposed instruc- 
 tion. His excellent scholarship, joined with assiduous labor, have 
 already given him a fine reputation in the Seminary, which is extend- 
 ing through the Church. 
 
 In the number of students the Seminary holds its ground with an 
 upward tendency. The accessions of the present year were over forty. 
 Ninety-five of the students have gone forth into the ranks of the
 
 tja PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ministry since the reunion of 1872. Of these five have gone as mis- 
 sionaries to the foreign field, making the whole number fifty-four 
 who have represented the institution among the idolatries of heath- 
 enism.
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 
 
 I-Y 
 
 REV. ELLIOT E. SWIFT, D.D,
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 
 
 |T is highly probable that the missionary spirit by which 
 the fathers of Western Pennsylvania were animated 
 hastened the organization of the Synod of Pittsburgh. 
 We may infer this from the action taken by that 
 venerable body at its first meeting. The General Assembly of 
 May, 1802, had ordered that the Synod of Virginia, in whose terri- 
 tory all this region was, should be divided into three Synods, and 
 that the Presbyteries of Redstone, Ohio, and Erie should constitute 
 the Synod of Pittsburgh. The elements of this future Synod accord- 
 ingly assembled in the First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, on 
 Wednesday, September 29, 1802. After having completed their 
 organization and provided rules for their government, they re- 
 solved "That the Synod of Pittsburgh shall be styled the Western 
 Missionary Society;" and they add, in a second resolution, "The 
 object of the Missionary Society is to diffuse the knowledge of 
 the Gospel among the inhabitants of the new settlements, the 
 Indian tribes, and if need be, among some of the interior inhabi- 
 tants, where they are not able to support the Gospel." 
 
 These resolutions were intended to affirm that each member of 
 the Synod should regard himself as under obligations to carry the 
 Gospel to the destitute, and, as bound by virtue of his connection 
 with the Synod, to contribute his most earnest prayers, his most 
 mature counsel, and his largest official influence to the success of 
 this great work. 
 
 Does not this action, taken by the Synod at its very first meeting, 
 reveal the fact that the missionary spirit had been stimulating, for
 
 I 5 b PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 years before, the fathers who labored in these wild and perilous re- 
 gions ? Does it not prove that the erection of the Synod was only 
 a means to the better accomplishment of an end, and that while its 
 organization would no doubt have been effected in due time, de- 
 manded by the necessities of the country, the missionary zeal of 
 these fathers nevertheless accelerated that important event ? 
 
 The Synod of Pittsburgh transacted much of its mission work by 
 means of a Board of Trust. This was nothing else than what is 
 styled in modern times an executive committee. It consisted of 
 seven members, who were elected annually, and transacted all 
 business in the interim of synodical meetings. It made a full 
 report to that body, submitting therewith the journals of its 
 missionaries. The following persons constituted the Board of Trust 
 as originally organized : Rev. Messrs. John McMillan, David Smith, 
 Thomas Marquis, and Thomas Hughes, together with Messrs. James 
 Edgar, William Plumer, and James Caldwell, elders. The prin- 
 ciple of rotation in position and service on this Board appears to 
 have been popular in the Synod, for from the year of its organiza- 
 tion, frequent changes occur in the names of both ministers and 
 elders. 
 
 The subjects of these missionary efforts may be divided, as indeed 
 they were in the constitution of the society, into two classes. The 
 first embraced the Indian tribes, some of whose settlements were 
 within the territory of the Synod. 
 
 The deep interest taken in these roving sons of the forest is to be 
 attributed, first of all, to the religious character of the fathers in 
 Western Pennsylvania. With them the doctrines of the apostacy of 
 the race, and of redemption through Christ, were more than mere 
 idle fancies. They firmly believed that the people of these untutored 
 and often treacherous tribes had immortal souls, and were daily 
 perishing "for lack of knowledge." But they could not believe 
 this without putting forth some corresponding effort. 
 
 Apart from this however, it should be remembered that from a 
 very early date the work of the Church in America had been largely of 
 a missionary character. The whole western continent was covered 
 by these aborigines, who were legitimate subjects of missionary 
 effort. It was with specific reference to their evangelization that 
 some of the noblest men in the early ministry of our country had
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. ftf 
 
 come to America. It was not always the fascination of a virgin 
 soil and an unbroken country which brought them. Nor was it 
 always the desire to escape from civil disabilities and persecu- 
 tions. We do not indeed deny that these and other inferior 
 motives, may at times, have operated. But often the considera- 
 tion was much more spiritual and missionary. They remem- 
 bered the promise, "they that dwell in the wilderness shall bow 
 before Him." They saw nothing impracticable in bringing the 
 Indians speedily under the power of the Gospel, and the early and 
 successful missions established in all parts of the country are the 
 memorials of their faith and zeal, to stand while time shall last. 
 
 This then one hundred years ago, was one of the great religious 
 movements of the times, and the fathers of Western Pennsylvania 
 were in sympathy with it. They had missions among the Wyan- 
 dots at Sandusky, the Senecas near Buffalo, the Ottawas at Maumee, 
 and the Cornplanters on the head waters of the Allegheny. Their 
 work consisted in securing lands, opening schools, employing inter- 
 preters, giving instruction in the arts of agriculture, and in preach- 
 ing the Gospel. The mission among the Ottawas was conducted with 
 great energy. In 1825 it was transferred by the Synod to the United 
 Foreign Missionary Society, and in May, 1826, it was transferred 
 by the General Assembly to the American Board. 
 
 As specimens of the minutes often made by the Synod, with re- 
 gard to this part of the work, we read that in 1804, " Rev. George 
 Scott reported his mission to the Indians, at Sanduskytown and 
 Brownstown, accompanied by Mr. John Bruce. Synod approved 
 the prudence, diligence, and fidelity of Mr. Scott, and ordered that 
 both Messrs. 'Scott and Bruce be paid from the missionary fund of 
 Synod." 
 
 Then again in the minutes of 1822, we read : "At a meeting of 
 the Board of Trust of the Western Missionary Society, held in 
 Washington, Pa., on the 3d day of October, 1822, on motion, re- 
 solved unanimously that the Synod be requested to appoint the Rev. 
 Samuel Tait, Superintendent /r0 tern, of the mission family about to 
 be located among the Ottawa Indians, on the Maumee river, and 
 that the Synod direct the adjacent Presbyteries to appoint supplies 
 for Mr. Tail's pulpit during his absence. This recommendation 
 of the Synod was unanimously adopted."
 
 1 58 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Some of the fathers of the Synod were especially active in these 
 missions among the Indians, of whom were Rev. Messrs. William 
 Wick, John McPherrin, George Hill, James Hughes, Thomas Mar- 
 quis, Michael Law, George M. Scott, James Satterfield, Samuel 
 Tait, Thomas E. Hughes, Elisha Macurdy, and Joseph Badger. 
 
 The other class in whose behalf missionary efforts were made, 
 were "the inhabitants of the new settlements." The large propor- 
 tion of these were Scotch Presbyterians from the North of Ireland, 
 who had escaped from the intolerance of episcopacy. As they 
 landed in the ports of Pennsylvania and Virginia, they were en- 
 couraged by the authorities to move towards the western frontier. 
 It was self-interest no doubt, which suggested this policy. These 
 scattered settlers would defend the inhabitants of Eastern Pennsyl- 
 vania and Virginia against the attacks of cunning and treacherous 
 Indians. They would subserve the same purpose with the break- 
 water, when it receives and destroys the violence of the impetuous 
 waves. And now these Scotch-Irish families, having found these 
 wild and widely scattered homes, must not be lost to the Church 
 and the land. They were strong in their attachments to the West- 
 minster Confession, and they knew nothing but the usages of Pres- 
 byterian discipline and worship. They must be gathered, organized 
 into churches, and supplied occasionally with the ordinances of re- 
 ligion, until houses could be built and pastors provided. 
 
 And here again a few specimens from the records of the Synod 
 will be full of interest. Thus, in 1802, "Rev. John McPherrin was 
 appointed a missionary for one month, his field of missions to be 
 the Connecticut Reserve." 
 
 In 1803, " Rev. Robert Patterson was appointed a missionary, to 
 itinerate one month in the settlements adjacent to Lake Erie, to set 
 out as soon as convenient." 
 
 In the same year, "Rev. Elisha Macurdy, of the Presbytery df 
 Ohio, was appointed to go one month on a mission in the settle- 
 ments down the Ohio river, to set out on the first of November 
 next." 
 
 " Rev. John Wright, a licentiate under the care of the Presbytery 
 of Redstone, was appointed to spend two months on a mission in 
 the settlements down the Ohio river, to commence his route at 
 Waynesburg."
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 
 
 * 
 
 One of the earliest and most conspicuous missionary laborers 
 in this region was the Rev. Joseph Badger. He was born in Wil- 
 braham, Mass., February 28, 1757. The earlier as well as the 
 later history of this devoted servant of Christ is full of incident. 
 There is a fascination in it by which the reader is carried captive. 
 When entering his nineteenth year he joined the army of his coun- 
 try and was present at the battle of Bunker Hill. In 1779, while 
 under the instruction of Rev. Jeremiah Day, he became impressed 
 with the truth of the Bible. As the result of the moral change then 
 wrought, he abandoned all thought of returning to the army, and 
 entered upon a course of study with a view of the ministry. During 
 his senior year while at Yale College he constructed a planetarium, 
 for which the corporation paid him one hundred dollars. In 1 700 
 he was appointed by the Connecticut Missionary Society to labor 
 in the Western Reserve. Having reached his field, he preached in 
 Youngstown, Hudson, Cleveland, Austinburgh, Maumee Station, 
 Ashtabula, and Gustavius, organizing churches where it seemed 
 practicable. He was present at the organization of the Synod of 
 Pittsburgh as a missionary of the Connecticut Society, and was in- 
 vited to sit as a corresponding member. But having in the mean- 
 time connected himself with the Presbytery of Erie, the next year he 
 appeared as a member of Synod. In 1806 he declined a reappoint- 
 ment from the Connecticut Society, and accepted a commission from 
 the Western Missionary Society at Pittsburgh. While returning 
 from this city, and while still far from home, he received the sad 
 intelligence of the death of one of his daughters. At another time, 
 while absent on one of his missionary tours, his house was burned, 
 with nearly all his provisions and furniture. He was happy in ex- 
 pedients, boundless in his resources, and indefatigable in his labors. 
 It is impossible to read the published Sketches of this man without 
 the conviction that he was raised up by God for a special work. He 
 died at Perrysburgh, Ohio, in 1846, in the ninetieth year of his age. 
 
 The missionary zeal of the Rev. Elisha Macurdy also demands 
 some special mention. He was born in Carlisle, Pa., on the isth 
 of October, 1763, and was baptized in the old log meeting-house on 
 Pomfret Street, by Rev. George Duffield, D.D., grandfather of the 
 late Dr. Duffield, of Detroit. After several changes in location, his 
 father settled in Ligonier Valley, Westmoreland county. Elisha,
 
 160 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 who was then twenty-one years of age, did much by his exertion to 
 maintain the family. He thus acquired habits of industry and 
 knowledge of human nature, both of which were of advantage to 
 him in his subsequent preparation for the ministry. He was 
 awakened under the preaching of Rev. James Hughes, and admitted 
 to full communion in the Church of Salem, under Rev. John Mc- 
 Pherrin. The earnestness of his piety appeared in his often rising 
 in the night for prayer, and in his frequently urging the importance 
 of personal religion on those he met. After he had determined to 
 study for the ministry, he sold the farm he had acquired by his own 
 industry, to secure the necessary funds. He entered the Academy 
 at Canonsburg in 1792, and afterward studied theology with Rev. 
 John McMillan, D.D. He was licensed on the 26th of June, 1 799, by 
 the Presbytery of Ohio, and ordained and installed over the united 
 congregations of Cross Roads and Three Springs, in June, 1800. 
 
 Soon after his licensure, he made two missionary tours through 
 the region bordering on Lake Erie, preaching frequently, and in 
 places where the Gospel was seldom heard. Indeed, he was so much 
 interested in these missionary labors that he, for a time, declined 
 calls from churches which were quite importunate for his services. 
 
 He was most conspicuous however, in his missionary efforts for 
 the Indians. 
 
 In the spring of 1 804 he received as inmates of his family, two 
 Indian lads John Barnett of the Wyandots, and Peter Johnson of 
 the Mohawks. The history relating to the former of these is long 
 and full of interest. 
 
 In April, 1808, he went with Rev. Messrs. Marquis and Ander- 
 son to Sandusky to inquire into, and adjust, certain difficulties in 
 that mission. Circumstances appeared to require that Mr. Macurdy 
 should remain for six months in charge of the station, while the 
 other members of the committee returned home. During this period 
 he obtained a very vivid impression of the depravity and degrada- 
 tion of the Indian tribes, and of the trials and dangers incidental to 
 a missionary's life among them. In one instance he discovered very 
 remarkable courage and firmness, and even severity, in resisting the 
 demands made by a band of squalid and debauched red-men. Such 
 was his tact and management that he acquired great influence over 
 the Indians generally.
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 161 
 
 In 1811, he visited Sandusky a second time, to adjust difficulties 
 growing out of the relations of the superintendent and teacher. 
 
 In September, 1816, he performed a missionary tour to the station 
 of the Cornplanter Indians, to ascertain the practicability of estab- 
 lishing a second school among them, and in October, 1818, he again 
 visited them. 
 
 In the spring of 1819, in company with Rev. James Scott, he 
 visited the Indians at Sandusky, and again in May, 1821. 
 
 Having been appointed to visit Maumee, and prepare for the 
 mission to be established, he set out in August, 1822, in company 
 with Rev. Joseph Stevenson. During his stay of two months, he 
 manifested great energy and prudence in making arrangements for 
 and in raising the buildings. He refused to accede to exorbitant 
 terms first proposed by laborers, and as the work advanced, he 
 promptly dismissed the indolent and incompetent. While supervis- 
 ing the whole, he also performed as much labor as any man on the 
 ground, besides supplying the station with the Gospel on the Sabbath. 
 
 In 1823, we find him again visiting Maumee, and while on his 
 return he was prostrated by a fever, from the effects of which he 
 did not soon recover. 
 
 In the spring of 1825, he visited the same station with Rev. James 
 C. Crane, and soon after he made what proved to be his final visit, 
 this time in company with Rev. Dr. Anderson. 
 
 All these missionary tours were undertaken by the appointment 
 of the Society, and Rev. Dr. Elliott has estimated that the distance 
 traveled would amount to 4,500 miles. 
 
 Mr. Macurdy was a member of the Board of Trust from its or- 
 ganization, and for many years its treasurer. He was uniform in 
 his attendance upon its meetings, and his judgment had great 
 weight with his brethren. 
 
 In 1836, Mr. Macurdy removed to Allegheny, where he spent 
 the remaining portion of his natural life. He died on the 22dof 
 July, 1845, i* 1 th e eighty-third year of his age. 
 
 The Synod of Pittsburgh endeavored to promote its own interest 
 in this work by means of an annual sermon on missions. This was 
 commonly delivered on Thursday evening, by some member ap- 
 pointed at the previous meeting. Thus, in 1803, Rev. Samuel 
 Porter preached from Psalm Ixxii. 17 : " His name shall endure for 
 L
 
 162 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ever : his name shall continue as long as the sun, and men shall be 
 blessed in him; " and the next year the Rev. Samuel Ralston ful- 
 filled this service. In 1805, Rev. Thomas Marquis preached from 
 Song viii. 8 : " What shall we do for our sister in the day when she 
 shall be spoken for?" and the next year the Rev. James Hughes 
 preached from Isaiah xlix. 16 : " Behold, I have graven thee on 
 the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me." In 
 1807, Rev. Wm. Wylie preached from Matthew vi. 10 : "Thy 
 Kingdom come ; " and the next year Rev. Thomas Hughes preached 
 from Psalm cii. 13 : " Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion : 
 for the time to favor her, yea, the set time, is come." In 1809, 
 Rev. Elisha Macurdy preached from Mark xvi. 15 : " And he said 
 unto them, go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every 
 creature; " and the next year, the Rev. John McPherrin preached 
 from Matt. xvi. 26 : " For what is a man profited, if he shall gain 
 the whole world, and lose his own soul." This commendable usage 
 of an annual sermon was maintained with unfailing uniformity during 
 the whole period in which the Synod conducted its missionary opera- 
 tions through the Board of Trust. In connection with each of these 
 sermons collections were made, the amounts of which varied from 
 $30 to $70. One of the most generous collections, amounting to 
 $73, was in 1817, after a sermon by Rev. Robert Johnston, from 
 Isaiah xi. 9 : " The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, 
 as the waters cover the sea." 
 
 Another means adopted for promoting a deeper interest in the 
 missionary work, was the publication of a monthly. This was styled 
 the Western Missionary Magazine. At its first meeting, Synod 
 chose twelve members as editors, three of whom were to have the 
 special superintendence of the business. The first committee con- 
 sisted of the following ministers : Messrs. John McMillan, Thos. 
 Moore, John Anderson, Joseph Badger, John McPherrin, Wm. 
 Wick, James Hughes, Samuel Porter, William Wylie, David Smith, 
 Samuel Ralston, and George Scott. Thus it would seem that the 
 Synod was not ignorant of the advantages to be gained from a long 
 array of instructive and fascinating contributors. The circulation of 
 the Magazine however, was necessarily limited, and the profits, 
 which were to go to the treasury of the Missionary Society, were 
 small. The Synod therefore, was in some doubt, at the end of the
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 163 
 
 second year, whether it were expedient to continue its publica- 
 tion. In 1807 the editors reported that the profits accruing from 
 the sale of the Magazine amounted to $334 32. 
 
 The fathers of this Synod had great confidence in the power of 
 prayer. Through a succession of years they met at six o'clock in 
 the morning, to wrestle with God. We can now only conjecture 
 the sacred glow which would be enkindled in meetings held before 
 dawn, and composed of men whose almost resistless energy in prayer 
 became a matter of precious tradition in the regions where they 
 labored. It is not assumed indeed, that these meetings were held 
 in the interest of missions alone. And yet when thus assembled, 
 they surely would not overlook that work which occupied so much 
 of their thought amid the deliberations of the day. 
 
 With these methods of management the Synod of Pittsburgh con- 
 tinued to conduct its missionary work for twenty-seven years. And 
 because the results had been so very satisfactory, the question as to 
 what should be the future relations of the Board of Trust to the 
 Board of Missions of the General Assembly, became, in 1828, a 
 matter of prayerful and anxious consideration. This latter Board, 
 to which our beloved Church owes so much, had its origin in the 
 Standing Committee on Missions, appointed by the Assembly in 
 1802 ; and in 1816 this committee, on its own recommendation, was 
 succeeded by a Board, which was styled the Board of Missions, act- 
 ing under the authority of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian 
 Church in the United States. For a number of years however, its 
 efficiency was far from meeting the wishes of its friends. It encoun- 
 tered opposition from the American Home Missionary Society, not 
 only in the open field of evangelistic effort, but even on the floor of 
 the General Assembly. Then too, much of the money which would 
 otherwise have found its way into the Treasury of the Board, was ab- 
 sorbed by numerous synodical and presbyterial organizations. 
 These smaller missionary societies saw no good reason why they 
 should not expend the funds they had collected, upon their own 
 territory. This policy, however, was undesignedly militating against 
 the Assembly's Board, and it was becoming evident that the work 
 must be unified and regulated from one common centre. The 
 Assembly therefore, in 1828, reorganized the Board of Missions of 
 the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, with the provi- 
 sions under which it has since operated.
 
 i(>4 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 The fathers in the Synod of Pittsburgh were by no means igno- 
 rant of, or indifferent to, the influences which were compelling this 
 speedy unification. They were ready to forego all cherished schemes, 
 for the sake of greater general efficiency. They therefore adopted, 
 in 1829, the report of a committee appointed the previous year, in 
 which they say : "It is, and ought to be, a matter of sincere con- 
 gratulation on the part of the members of the Presbyterian Church 
 generally, that the Board of Missions, acting under its sanction, 
 lias recently adopted, and is now prosecuting an efficient and ex- 
 tended plan of operation, suited in its extent to the moral necessi- 
 ties and resources of this great and rising country, and in its indi- 
 vidual form and character, to the feelings of the members of the 
 Presbyterian Church. The committee rejoice that on this plan many 
 congregations within our bounds have been already organized into 
 auxiliary societies, and that in different and distant parts of our 
 Church the same plan has been so far cordially approved and acted 
 upon, as to justify the belief that at no distant period our Church 
 will be in fact, what she was intended to be in the conception and 
 design of the venerable framers of her Constitution, one great mis- 
 sionary association, meeting in her efforts and liberality the spirit of 
 those ages of increasing zeal and widening prosperity, through which 
 she was destined to pass on her way. to the full glory of the latter day. 
 Your committee believe, therefore, that every possible encourage- 
 ment should be afforded to the General Assembly in its design of 
 uniting and concentrating all the missionary resources of our Church, 
 and that its call upon the several Synods and Presbyteries of which 
 it is composed, to come up to the help of the Lord, should be dis- 
 tinctly and promptly answered from one extremity of the continent 
 to the other." 
 
 After the adoption of several resolutions, in which the Synod 
 opens the way for the soliciting agents of the Assembly's Board, 
 encourages the formation of auxiliaries, recommends the Board's 
 monthly publication, and highly approves of the scheme to raise 
 $100,000 for missionary purposes, they resolved that the operations 
 of the Board of Trust of the Western Missionary Society be suspended 
 during the will of the Synod, with the view of putting the whole 
 missionary business into the hands of the Board of Missions of the 
 General Assembly for so long a period as circumstances'shall, in the 
 view of the Synod, justify such an arrangement.
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 
 
 The Board of Trust was to be continued, however, until the busi- 
 ness of the Western Missionary Society should be fully settled, and 
 even afterwards, if the conditions of its charter required it, and it 
 was directed and empowered to proceed in the adjustment of all un- 
 finished missionary business. 
 
 Thus nobly and generously did this grand old Synod, in 1829, 
 transfer the immediate supervision and control of the work she had 
 begun in 1802. By her wisdom, patience, and efficiency, she has 
 obtained an imperishable record in the annals of our church. Rev. 
 Ashbel Green, D.D., says, in his "History of Domestic and Foreign 
 Missions in the Presbyterian Church," that while the Synods of the 
 Carolinas, Virginia, and Kentucky, were distinguished for their 
 zeal, the Synod of Pittsburgh was the longest and most extensively 
 and efficiently engaged in this work. 
 
 The time was now rapidly approaching however, when these 
 fathers of Western Pennsylvania were about to afford a more sublime 
 spectacle. Heretofore their missionary operations had been neces- 
 sarily confined to their own territory. But now they were about to 
 enter upon a grander work, and assume a more weighty responsi- 
 bility. Under the influence of the Holy Spirit, they were about to 
 embark single-handed and alone, in the enterprise of sending the 
 gospel to other continents, and in doing it they were about to as- 
 sert and illustrate the great principle of ecclesiastical supervision and 
 control. For while several societies in Europe such as the Church 
 Missionary Society, the Baptist Missionary Society, and the Wesleyan 
 Missionary Society had conducted their missions on this plan, it 
 had been as yet scarcely attempted by the Presbyterian Church 
 in the United States. Though the propriety of the movement 
 proposed by these fathers was seriously questioned by many, they 
 appear to have assumed that time would vindicate the wisdom of 
 their acts. And, as every one knows, the results have long since 
 constrained the then timid and doubting to concede to them the 
 position of advanced thinkers on the subject of missions. 
 
 It was in 1 83 1 , just two years after the Board of Trust had been 
 directed to transfer its work to ,the Board of Missions, that the 
 Western Foreign Missionary Society was organized. For some 
 years previous the churches of the Synod had been encouraged to 
 raise funds for the foreign missionary work. In 1827, the stated
 
 166 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 clerks of the respective Presbyteries were directed to distinguish in 
 their reports the moneys received for foreign, from those received 
 for domestic missions, and in 1828, they resolved that contributions 
 made within their bounds for foreign missions, under the direction 
 of Synod, or its agents, be transferred to the Board of Domestic 
 Missions of the General Assembly, and that this Synod be con- 
 sidered, so far as the collection and transmission of funds for this 
 object is concerned, a Foreign Missionary Society, auxiliary to that 
 Board. It is not improbable, however, that the most of the funds 
 thus forwarded were expended upon the Indian missions of our land. 
 
 The moral sublimity of the enterprise on which the Synod was 
 now to enter cannot be fully seen without taking into the account 
 its size and financial ability. Its faith and forecast never appear so 
 admirable as when we consider the comparative newness of 
 the region, the fewness of its churches, and the smallness of its re- 
 sources. The city of Pittsburgh was then a town of about 13,400 
 inhabitants. It required three and a half days of staging, by night 
 and day, to reach Philadelphia. It contained but two Presbyterian 
 churches for the Church of the Northern Liberties, or the Fourth 
 Church, as it was afterwards called, had then been but recently or- 
 ganized. The First Presbyterian Church of Allegheny Town was 
 only about one year and six months old. 
 
 The Synod consisted of eight Presbyteries Redstone, Ohio, Erie, 
 Hartford, Washington, Steubenville, Allegheny, and Blairsville. 
 Covering a large extent of territory, it embraced the towns of 
 Somerset, Morgantown, Fairview, Erie, Youngstown, New Lisbon, 
 St. Clairsville, Wheeling, Steubenville, and Washington. Francis 
 Herron was in Pittsburgh, Samuel Ralston was at Mingo, Thomas D. 
 Baird was at Lebanon, Robert Johnston was at Rehoboth and Round 
 Hill, Johnston Eaton was at Fairview, Wm. O. Stratton was at Can- 
 field, Robert Sample was at New Castle, Samuel Tait was at Mercer, 
 Clement Vallandigham was at New Lisbon, John Anderson was 
 at Upper Buffalo, David Elliott was at Washington, John Coulter 
 was at Butler, John Munson was at Plaingrove. 
 
 George Lyon had commenced his labors at Erie, John Stockton 
 at Cross Creek, William Smith at Miller's Run, Charles C. Beatty at 
 Steubenville, Ashbel G. Fairchild at George's Creek, and Watson 
 Hughes at Saltsburg; Timothy Alden and Matthew Brown were
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 767 
 
 the Presidents of the respective institutions of Meadville and Canons- 
 burg ; while Luther Halsey and John W. Nevin, then a licentiate, 
 were professors in our Theological Seminary. 
 
 In 1831, the General Assembly had only 20 synods, while in 1875 
 it reports 36. There were only five of these to the West of us 
 Ohio with five Presbyteries, Western Reserve with five Presbyteries, 
 Cincinnati with four Presbyteries, Indiana with five Presbyteries, 
 and Illinois with four Presbyteries. 
 
 And then how much like a child in its tender infancy was our 
 scheme of systematic benevolence. How very primitive and meagre 
 are the statistical reports of that day. There are only four col- 
 umns for benevolence missions, commissioners' fund, education, 
 and theological seminaries ; and the number of blanks is suggestive 
 of churches as yet undisciplined in the grace of giving. 
 
 Yet notwithstanding all, these fathers were strong in the confi- 
 dence of faith. The heathen were perishing. It. was in their hearts 
 to send chosen, consecrated men as their representatives to Asia and 
 Africa, just so soon as their society could be organized. 
 
 At the meeting of the Synod in the city of Pittsburgh, in October, 
 1831, an overture on missions was reported by the appropriate 
 committee, and after considerable discussion was referred to the 
 Rev. Messrs. Elisha P. Swift, Luther Halsey, James Hervey, Samuel 
 Tait, and Thomas Hunt, to report thereon as soon as practicable. 
 On the following Monday afternoon they reported a preamble full 
 of bold and inspiring sentiment, in which they say in substance : 
 That the signs of the times call upon all who love the Saviour to 
 send the Gospel to those who sit in pagan darkness that they have 
 no desire to depreciate the exertions of Christians in Europe or 
 America that they acknowledge with pleasure the truly splendid 
 operations of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign 
 Missions, and that they recur with grateful sentiments to the humbler 
 efforts of the Western Missionary Society of their own Synod. 
 
 Still, they say, the resources of the Presbyterian Church are slum- 
 bering in inaction ; the American Board is too remote to develop 
 the benevolence of our churches ; the honest predilections of our peo- 
 ple demand an organization under ecclesiastical control, and no other 
 judicatory of the Presbyterian Church, it is believed by them, can 
 now act on this subject with so much propriety and unanimity as this.
 
 168 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Then, disclaiming all party feeling, and trusting to the aid and 
 guidance of the God of missions, they resolved, "That it is expedient 
 forthwith to establish a Society or Board of Foreign Missions, on 
 such a plan as will admit of the co-operation of such parts of the 
 Presbyterian Church as may think proper to unite with it in this 
 great and important concern." 
 
 They then adopted the Constitution of the Western Foreign Mis- 
 sionary Society of the United States, according to which the society 
 was to be composed of the members of sessions and churches of the 
 Synod of Pittsburgh, and other synods and presbyteries, which might 
 formally unite with them. The centre of operation was to be in the 
 city of Pittsburgh, and no change of location was to be effected 
 without the consent of this Synod, and in the event of such a change, 
 the synodical supervision, for which provision had been made, was to 
 be transferred to the General Assembly, or to that particular Synod 
 in whose bounds the operations of the society should be concen- 
 trated. 
 
 The Board of Directors was to consist of six ministers and six 
 elders chosen by the Synod, of persons residing in Pittsburgh or its 
 vicinity, to which were to be added one minister and one elder, 
 chosen from and by each of the eight Presbyteries in the Synod ; 
 the Board thus having, as originally constituted, twenty-eight mem- 
 bers. Its officers were a President, Vice-president, a Recording 
 Secretary, a Corresponding Secretary, and a Treasurer. The Exe- 
 cutive Committee was to consist of five ministers and four ruling 
 elders, besides the Corresponding Secretary and Treasurer, who were 
 to be members ex-officio. 
 
 The Board was to meet annually in May, and a discourse was to 
 be delivered in its presence, on some appropriate subject. 
 
 The following were the first Directors of the Society, for Pitts- 
 burgh and vicinity : 
 
 For three years Rev. E. P. Swift, Rev. A. D. Campbell, Mr. 
 Harmer Denny, Mr. Samuel Thompson. 
 
 For two years Rev. Francis Herron, D.D., Rev. Luther Halsey, 
 Mr. John Hannen, Mr. James Wilson. 
 
 For one year Rev. Robert Patterson, Rev. Thomas D. Baird, 
 Mr. Benjamin Williams, Mr. Francis G. Bailey.
 
 M/SSIONAKY HISTORY. 
 
 FOR PRESBYTERIES. 
 
 Redstone Rev. A. O. Patterson, Mr. A. Johnston. 
 
 Ohio Rev. Matthew Brown, D.D., Mr. J. Herriott. 
 
 Erie Rev. Samuel Tait, Mr. J. Reynolds. 
 
 Washington Rev. David Elliott, Mr. J. McFarren. 
 
 Hartford Rev. Wm. McLean, Mr. J. Clark. 
 
 Steubenville Rev. C. C. Beatty, Mr. D. Hoge. 
 
 Allegheny Rev. J. Coulter, Mr. B. Gardiner. 
 
 Blairsville Rev. S. McFarren, Mr. T. Pollock. 
 For a number of years the organization of the Board was as fol- 
 lows : Hon. Harmer Denny, was President; Rev. Thomas D. Baird, 
 Vice-president; Rev. A. D. Campbell, Rev. C. C. Beatty, and Rev. 
 George Marshall, filled, in succession, the office of Recording Sec- 
 retary; Rev. Elisha P. Swift was Corresponding Secretary; Rev. 
 Elisha Macurdy, Treasurer ; Mr. Samuel Thompson, Assistant Trea- 
 surer. 
 
 This whole movement of the Synod appears to us so eminently 
 legitimate and proper, that we can see no good reason why any 
 other Synod of the church, or the General Assembly itself, might 
 not have originated it. And yet the preamble says : "It is believed 
 that no other judicatory of the Presbyterian Church can act on this 
 subject with so much propriety and unanimity." But neither this 
 clause in the preamble, nor the provisions of the constitution, nor the 
 arguments contained in early official papers, can be fully appre- 
 ciated unless examined in connection with the history of those 
 times. 
 
 It should be remembered then, that for several years the American 
 Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, still dear to many a 
 heart, had been the medium through which a portion of our churches 
 had conducted their foreign missionary work. Growing in influence 
 and power, it had been attracting toward, and merging in itself, all 
 smaller organizations. With the assumption of their pecuniary ob- 
 ligations, it could, of course, claim a corresponding generous sup- 
 port. In 1826 it had thus received into union with itself the United 
 Missionary Society, an organization in the support of which the 
 Presbyterian, Dutch Reformed, and Associate Reformed Churches 
 were united; the General Assembly amid the dissatisfaction of 
 many, going no further than to consent to the union.
 
 ijo PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 The arguments by which this process of absorption was justified 
 were these : The friendly relations subsisting between Congrega- 
 tionalists and Presbyterians would be promoted by co-operation 
 the same Gospel was preached by the representatives of each society 
 funds for each organization were obtained from the same individuals 
 and churches, and there was danger of collision ; the most rigid econo- 
 my was demanded in missionary operations, and money may be saved 
 in the salaries of agents, officers, etc. These arguments for the union 
 of societies were just and valid, to the minds of those who used them, 
 against new organizations under ecclesiastical control. Men who 
 could skilfully use this logic were to be found in almost every 
 congregation, Presbytery, Synod, and Assembly of the Presbyte- 
 rian Church, ready to baffle the advocates of ecclesiastical super- 
 vision with expedients, the narration of which would make the lis- 
 tener alternately relax his muscles and knit his brow. 
 
 It was in the midst of such controversies that the fathers of 
 Western Pennsylvania organized the Western Foreign Missionary 
 Society. 
 
 They " believed that the Presbyterian Church (we are quoting 
 from a report of those times) owes it as a sacred duty to her glorified 
 Head to yield a far more exemplary obedience, and that in her dis- 
 tinctive character as a Church, to the command which He gave at 
 his ascension into heaven, ' Go ye into all the world and preach 
 the gospel to every creature.' It is believed to be among the causes 
 of the frowns of the great Head of the Church, which are now rest- 
 ing upon our beloved Zion, in the declension of vital piety and the 
 disorders and divisions that distract us, that we have done so little 
 comparatively nothing in our distinctive character as a Church of 
 Christ, to send the gospel to the heathen, the Jews, and the Mo- 
 hammedans." 
 
 We have a specimen of the logic which was current in all their 
 discussions, found in a paper from the pen of the Corresponding 
 Secretary. 
 
 " On what appointment," says the writer, " do pastors and elders 
 sit in the house of God and hold the keys of the Kingdom of 
 Heaven, but that which commissions them to go and disciple all 
 nations? 
 
 " If, at the bar of such courts, by the very fact of their lawful exis-
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY, 
 
 tence, the perishing heathen have no right to sue out the payment 
 of a Redeemer's mercy, then the most material object of their sit- 
 ting is cancelled ; and that neglected, starving portion of mankind, 
 who enter with a specific claim, are turned out to find relief by an 
 appeal to the sympathy of particular disciples. Will ' the Head of 
 all principality and power ' stay in judicatories where the laws of 
 his kingdom are so expounded ? Until something more is done for the 
 conversion of the nations, what article on the docket of business can 
 be relevant at any meeting, if this is not ? Shall a worthless, unsound 
 delinquent be told that, according to the Word of God, and the 
 constitution of the Church, he has a right to come and consume 
 hours of time in trifling litigation ; and shall a world of benighted 
 men, who have received as yet no hearing, and no mercy, and no 
 information that Jesus has left a deposit for them also, be turned over 
 to the slow and uncertain compassion of individuals?" 
 
 Almost all of the fathers who were in the memorable Synod of 
 1831 lived to see the principle of ecclesiastical supervision fully en- 
 dorsed by the General Assembly. Thirty-eight years ago it adopted 
 the missionary organization which had its origin here. It has con- 
 ducted its enterprises of Home Missions, Publication, Education, 
 Church Erection, and Aid to Freedmen in a similar manner. And 
 in later years, there has been no principle, to the unqualified support 
 of which all parties have been so ready to rally in the re-united Pres- 
 byterian Church, as to this the ecclesiastical supervision of all 
 benevolent work. 
 
 The first Corresponding Secretary of the Society was the Rev. 
 Elisha P. Swift. He was born in Williamstown, Mass., August 12, 
 1792, and received his collegiate education in the venerable and 
 prosperous institution located there. Descended from John Eliot, 
 the apostle to the Indians, in his familiar conversations with his chil- 
 dren he would sometimes refer with sentiments of great admiration 
 to the missionary labors of his illustrious ancestor. Shortly before 
 he commenced his academic studies in Williams College, a deep 
 concern for the perishing heathen had been awakened in some of its 
 most pious and devoted students. There it was that Samuel John 
 Mills, Jr., James Richards, and Gordon Hall, had been communing 
 frequently together. Their memorable hay-stack prayer-meeting 
 had been held in 1807, and the interest thus commenced resulted in
 
 rjz PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the organization of the American Board in 1810. It is not known 
 how far these influences may have affected the character and pur- 
 pose of Elisha P. Swift. But early in his Christian life he resolved to 
 consecrate himself to the missionary work. He was accepted by 
 the American Board, and ordained by a Congregational council in 
 the Park Street Church, Boston, on the 3d day of September, 1817. 
 In a few months however, a combination of circumstances over 
 which he had no control, directed his feet toward another field. 
 After having supplied the Presbyterian Church of Dover, Delaware, 
 for one year, he was called to the Second Presbyterian Church of 
 Pittsburgh, and on being installed in 1819, he entered with interest 
 into all the missionary enterprises of the Synod. In 1821 he had 
 visited Maumee with Rev. Michael Law, for the purpose of establish- 
 ing, under the Board of Trust, an Indian mission. In 1831 he had 
 been in the Synod for twelve years, and was, of course, well acquaint- 
 ed with the sentiments of its members. After having sought the 
 advice of esteemed fathers in other portions of the Church, and hav- 
 ing received the approval and encouragement of Drs. Ashbel Green, 
 Archibald Alexander, and Samuel Miller, he took a very active part 
 in the organization of the Western Foreign Missionary Society. He 
 was the author of the overture -by which the subject was brought to 
 the attention of the Synod, as also of the preamble and constitution 
 afterward reported by the special committee, and adopted by the 
 Synod. His fervid and touching appeals overcame all who were 
 still scrupulously cautious and hesitating. All varieties of feeling 
 were fused by him into one harmonious sentiment, and the whole 
 Synod prepared for united and energetic action. 
 
 It is a delicate task' which has been assigned to us. We claim to 
 know something of the character and labors of Elisha P. Swift, but 
 we forbear. Filial love and admiration might make us oblivious 
 alike of brevity and propriety. 
 
 It may not be improper however, to quote a few statements from 
 the writings of others. 
 
 Rev. Ashbel Green, D.D., in his "History of Missions, "says: "It 
 is due to Rev. Elisha P. Swift to state that its origin is to be traced 
 principally to his ardent zeal in the missionary cause, and to his 
 views of the importance of an institution organized in the manner 
 exhibited in the foregoing documents."
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 173 
 
 Rev. S. J. Wilson D.D., in his address at the funeral of Dr. Swift, 
 said: "He had no desire to have his name trumpeted through the 
 world, yet the church to which he belonged will always cherish his 
 name as the founder of her Board of Foreign Missions." 
 
 Rev. James Allison, D.D., made this statement in a notice of Dr. 
 Swift's death published in the Presbyterian Banner : "While the 
 Presbyterian Church lasts as long as a history of Foreign Missions 
 remains, the name of Elisha P. Swift will be remembered. He was 
 at all times ready to advocate with wonderful power every good 
 cause ; but the very mention of Foreign Missions fired his soul with 
 quenchless ardor, and made his voice the sound of a trumpet calling 
 to conflict and victory." 
 
 Rev. Wm. D. Howard, D.D., in a history of the Board of Foreign 
 Missions, delivered at a convention held in Pittsburgh in 1872, says : 
 "And many, I am persuaded, will retain, so long as memory con- 
 tinues to perform its office, a recollection of his fervid eloquence 
 as, rising with his theme, his great eye all aglow with the fire of 
 genius, his heart heaving with emotion, and his majestic form raised 
 to its full height, in trumpet tones he declaimed against sin, or 
 
 In strains as sweet 
 As angels use, 
 
 he pleaded with sinners to be reconciled to God. This great and 
 good man may be regarded as the founder of the Presbyterian Board 
 of Foreign Missions." 
 
 Then Dr. Howard adds: "He had able and earnest coadjutors. 
 In his own Synod, there was Dr. John McMillan, whose iron sinews 
 laid the foundations of our Presbyterian Zion in Western Pennsyl- 
 vania ; and Francis Herron, that great-hearted Christian gentleman, 
 and Matthew Brown, the gifted and skillful Christian educator, and 
 Charles C. Beatty, a descendant of the first American minister who 
 ever preached the gospel where this great city now stands, and 
 David Elliott, who, at the age of more than fourscore, still lingers 
 among us, yet helping the cause of Christ by his wise counsels and 
 earnest prayers. And besides, there was the earnest and generous 
 Campbell, the saintly Macurdy, the clear-sighted McFarren, and 
 many others. And these ministers were aided in the work by a 
 noble band of intelligent and devoted elders, among whom were the
 
 ij 4 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Hon. Harmar Denny, and Samuel Thompson, and John Hannen, 
 and Francis G. Bailey, and Richard Edwards, and many besides. 
 Beyond the bounds of his own Synod, Dr. Swift was favored with 
 the counsels and encouragement of such men as Dr. Ashbel Green 
 of Philadelphia, and Drs. Archibald Alexander and Samuel Miller 
 of Princeton, and John Breckenridge of Baltimore, and Joshua 
 Wilson of Cincinnati, and William W. Phillips of New York, whose 
 church was, at the beginning, one of the most liberal contributors to 
 this cause, as it has continued to be from that time till this." 
 
 Rev. Charles C. Beatty, D.D., has recently made this statement: 
 "I consider Rev. Elisha P. Swift, D.D., to have been really the 
 father and founder of our Presbyterian Foreign Mission work ; and 
 I think he should be prominently presented as bringing forward and 
 greatly furthering this work in its inception, as distinctively under 
 church organization. 
 
 " My first introduction to Mr. Swift was in connection with 
 the work of missions. When he came on to the General Assembly, 
 in the spring of 1822, he was charged by the Synodical Board of 
 Trust with obtaining a Superintendent for their newly established 
 Indian mission on the Maumee. He applied to the Professors at 
 Princeton, who referred him to me. I had been appointed the pre- 
 vious fall, in connection with a class-mate, by the United Foreign 
 Missionary Society, to establish a mission among the Indians on the 
 Columbia river. This enterprise failed for want of support from 
 Congress, and the Professors knew that I was disengaged, and might 
 desire to be employed in other mission service. I had several con- 
 ferences with Mr. Swift on the subject, and though I felt constrained 
 to decline the appointment, it tended to establish a friendship be- 
 tween us which strengthened by future associations, continued 
 through life. In passing through Pittsburgh the next October, on 
 my way to my mission field in the West, he was the first to call and 
 invite me to preach for him the ensuing Sabbath morning, and I 
 preached in the First Church in the afternoon. The brethren in 
 Pittsburgh were instrumental in obtaining my settlement in Steuben- 
 ville the next summer, and my associations with them were always 
 most intimate. I found Bro. Swift always foremost and most en- 
 thusiastic in the Foreign Mission work. 
 
 ' ' When it was proposed in the Synod to transfer our Missions to
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 1 75 
 
 the United Missionary Society, then about to be merged in the A. 
 B. F. M., we were both of us reluctant, and spoke against it, though 
 finally acquiescing. The Synod very generally and cordially co- 
 operated with the American Board in its work, but he was never 
 fully reconciled to the church giving up missions to a voluntary as- 
 sociation. He was already ahead of most in his conviction that the 
 church should herself do this work through her organized forms. 
 This induced him finally to bring his plans before Synod, where it 
 met at first with but a cold reception. Most felt entire confidence 
 in the working of the A. B. F. M., and some argued that it would 
 be dishonorable towards that Board to set up an independent So- 
 ciety. But Mr. Swift was not discouraged, and his strong state- 
 ments as to the church's duty, his forcible arguments for imme- 
 diate action, his burning missionary zeal, and fervid eloquence, finally 
 carried the Synod, and his plan was adopted. This was the com- 
 mencement of the Western Foreign Missionary Society, and here 
 was laid the foundation of our Board of Foreign Missions. His 
 ardor in the cause, his earnest effort, his untiring energy and popular 
 address, did much to recommend it to the people and make it a 
 success." 
 
 For nearly two years, Elisha P. Swift discharged the duties of 
 Corresponding Secretary gratuitously, devoting to them a portion 
 of time amid his numerous pastoral engagements. Contrary to the 
 anticipations even of its friends however, the Society was early 
 beginning to win the sympathy and co-operation of Presbyteries 
 and Synods both East and West. The business of the secretary was 
 becoming so extensive and onerous, as to demand the labors of 
 one who could devote all his time and energy to it. The Board 
 therefore, instead of accepting the resignation of Dr. Swift, took 
 steps to have the pastoral relation between him and the Second 
 Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh dissolved. He finally yielded to 
 the urgent solicitations of his brethren, and sundered ties which 
 bound him to a people among whom he had labored in unbroken 
 harmony for nearly fourteen years. He preached his farewell ser- 
 mon on Sabbath, March 3d, 1833, and from that date until he re- 
 signed his office, his life was crowded with varied and pressing em- 
 ployment. He was engaged in soliciting funds as general agent, in 
 presenting the claims of the Society to Synods and Presbyteries, in
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 preparing "instructions," commonly delivered to departing mis- 
 sionaries before large and interested audiences, in providing for 
 missionaries their outfits and securing their passages, in editing the 
 Foreign Missionary Chronicle, in conducting correspondence with 
 missionaries in the field, with young men in the theological semi- 
 naries, and with the friends and patrons of the Society generally. 
 In his journal he refers at this period to the distracted condition of 
 the church, the influence of older and more powerful missionary 
 organizations, his conscious unfitness for some duties of his office, 
 his necessary absence from his family, the injury being done to his 
 habits of study, and the interruption to secret devotions incidental 
 to traveling, as abating at times the enjoyment which he had in his 
 work. He resigned his office in September, 1835, to take charge 
 of the First Presbyterian Church of Allegheny, but continued to 
 serve the Board until his successor accepted the position. 
 
 Hon. Walter Lowrie was the second Corresponding Secretary of 
 the Board. He was born near Edinburgh, Scotland, on the loth day 
 of December, 1 784, and was only eight years old when he came to 
 America. His family soon removed to Butler County, Pa., where, 
 in his eighteenth year, he experienced God's converting grace in 
 one of those revivals of religion which have made memorable the 
 early history of Western Pennsylvania. It was then' his desire to 
 enter the ministry, and he even commenced his preparatory studies 
 under Rev. John McPherrin, the pioneer Presbyterian of that 
 region. Though providential events intercepted his purpose to 
 preach the gospel, there were other services awaiting him, in the 
 future, most congenial to his feelings, while not less promotive of 
 the Master's glory. After occupying for six years a position in the 
 United States Senate as a representative of Pennsylvania, he was 
 elected Secretary of the same body, in which position he continued 
 for twelve years. It was while thus engaged that he was called by 
 the Western Foreign Missionary Society to become its Correspond- 
 ing Secretary. Nor is it surprising that the mind of the Board should 
 have been turned toward him. His holy enthusiasm in the mission- 
 ary enterprise found expression in one of the first large offerings 
 the society received. It was the donation of $1,000, conveyed in a 
 manner as unostentatious as the gift was munificent. It came as 
 an offering from an unknown friend, to be appropriated to the
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 177 
 
 salary of Elisha P. Swift during his first year of service as secretary 
 after he had given up his pastoral charge. The position to which 
 Mr. Lowrie was called in 1835, he continued to occupy for thirty-two 
 years. At the meeting of the Board of Foreign Missions in 1868 he 
 declined, on account of increasing bodily infirmities, to be put again 
 in nomination for the office. The Board, while reluctantly accept- 
 ing his declinature, testified in appropriate resolutions to his dis- 
 tinguished ability, untiring zeal, and most conscientious faithfulness. 
 In parting with their venerable and honored Secretary, they say, 
 they follow him with their warmest wishes and prayers, that God's 
 grace would succor and cheer him, and at last minister to him an 
 abundant entrance into his heavenly kingdom. He entered into 
 rest on the i4th day of December, 1868, in the eighty-fourth year 
 of his age. 
 
 Rev. William M. Paxton, D.D., says in his address at the funeral, 
 referring to his acceptance of the office pressed upon him : " The 
 work was new and compassed on every side with difficulties. The 
 Church was to be aroused, the spirit of missions enkindled, and the 
 system of co-operation was to be organized." 
 
 His wisdom and executive capacity in the office were only excelled 
 by his 'power to enlist attention and awaken interest in behalf of his 
 cause. With no pretention to oratory, he went before the people in 
 the most humble way, presenting in a conversational style his simple 
 statement ; but warming with the deep interest of his theme, he 
 grew eloquent, and seldom closed without riveting his subject upon 
 the conscience, or moving his audience to tears. 
 
 He had wise and able counsellors in the Board and in the Execu- 
 tive Committee, and often the assistance of the most eloquent voices 
 in the Church to commend his cause ; but during the whole thirty 
 years of his incumbency, Walter Lowrie was himself the efficient 
 head of the missionary work and the controlling power in its ad- 
 ministration. 
 
 The Western Foreign Missionary Society, at the time of its trans- 
 fer to the Board of Foreign Missions of the General Assembly, had 
 occupied four distinct fields of labor, and was about to take posses- 
 sion of a fifth. Brief biographical notices of the heroic servants of 
 God, who labored for longer or shorter periods in these respective 
 
 missions, will be given at the end of this history. Their faith 
 M
 
 /7<? PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 and courage can scarcely be appreciated in these modern times. 
 Facilities in travel have brought India, China and Japan, Syria and 
 South America, nearer than they were forty years ago. Besides, the 
 physical constitution demanded by each missionary field is now bet- 
 ter understood. Our Boards consider other qualifications, in addi- 
 tion to ardent temperament, earnest piety, and missionary zeal. Its 
 executive officers feel under solemn obligation to discourage the 
 overtures of those whose powers of endurance would not be equal to 
 the work. Then too, medical science has advanced, and judicious 
 advisors are much more accessible than formerly. And moreover, 
 many mission-fields now have their sanitariums, their healthful and 
 bracing atmospheres, like Woodstock, in India, to which the weary 
 and exhausted may repair. The number who now early fall upon 
 the field, or return in an enfeebled condition, is much smaller than 
 in the beginning. In view of these things, the life of a missionary 
 will not now appear to be the perilous, uncertain, self-renouncing 
 service it was when the Western Foreign Missionary Society was 
 organized. 
 
 One of these missions was Northern India. On the 3oth of May, 
 1833, the Board sent out Rev. Messrs. William Reed (22), (see 
 biographies), and John C. Lowrie (13), and their wives. Mrs. 
 Louisa Lowrie (14) died in Calcutta. Failing health compelled Mr. 
 Reed to return without delay to America. He died during the 
 voyage, in the Bay of Bengal, and Mrs Reed remained in America. 
 Rev. John C. Lowrie proceeded to Lodiana, and after several years 
 of labor, left India as the only hope of saving his life. 
 
 On the 4th of November, 1834, Rev. Messrs. James Wilson (24), 
 and John Newton (17), and their wives, with Miss Julia A. Davis 
 (6), were sent out to reinforce the Lodiana mission. 
 
 On the i6th of November, 1834, Rev. J. R. Campbell (4), of 
 the Reformed Presbyterian Church, and Rev. James McEwen (15), 
 with Messrs. Jesse M. Jamieson (9) (10), William S. Rogers (23), 
 Joseph Porter (20) (21), and their wives, also sailed for this field. 
 
 The Western Foreign Missionary Society had five stations in India : 
 Lodiana, Allahabad, Futtehgurh, Saharunpur, and Sabathu. 
 
 A second mission was Western Africa. In 1832 the Society ap- 
 pointed Rev. Messrs. Joseph Barr (i), and John B. Pinney (19), 
 to this field. The former died of cholera in Richmond, five days
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 179 
 
 before the time fixed for embarking. The latter sailed for Mon- 
 rovia, and did effective service until constrained by shattered health 
 to relinquish the field. 
 
 In November, 1833, ^- ev - Matthew Laird and wife (12), and Rev. 
 John Cloud (5), sailed for Africa. Soon after their labors had com- 
 menced, the three were, within a few days, called to their heavenly 
 rest. Mr. James Temple, a colored licentiate who had been sent out 
 with them, soon returned to the United States, and resided for a 
 number of years in Philadelphia. In 1834, Mr. J. T. C. Findley 
 went out to Africa, but was compelled to return in 1835, and the 
 same year the society sent out Mr. E. Tytler, a colored licentiate. 
 He did not live, however, to render much service. 
 
 A third mission of the society was to the North American Indians. 
 In November, 1833, it sent out Rev. Messrs. Wells Bushnell (2), and 
 Joseph Kerr (n), and their wives, with Miss Nancy Henderson (7), 
 and Miss Julia Boal to the Wea Indians a tribe on territory now 
 in the State of Kansas. Miss Boal was injured by being thrown 
 from a carriage, in the State of Missouri, on her way to the field. 
 She was left at Columbus, in that State, where, after having suffi- 
 ciently recovered, she taught school for a time. She never rejoined 
 the mission. Mr. Henry Bradly was also sent out as a farmer, and 
 still later Mr. E. Sheppard. 
 
 In 1835, Mr. Aurey Ballard and wife, with Mr. F. H. Lindsay 
 and wife, and in March, 1837, Mr. Samuel M. Irwin (8), and 
 wife, were appointed missionaries to the lovvas. Mr. Ballard left 
 the mission in 1842, and died in Richardson county in the State 
 of Nebraska, a few years ago. He labored in the mission in the 
 capacity of a farmer. His wife who is also dead, was a most ex- 
 cellent teacher. 
 
 A fourth mission was Smyrna. Rev. Josiah Brewer (3), and Mr. 
 Thomas Brown, a printer, and his wife, sailed for this field in March, 
 1836. The unexpected return of Mr. Brown, and a previous under- 
 standing had with Mr. Brewer, led the Board to reconsider its pur- 
 pose to send out Rev. Wm. McCombs and Mr. John McClintock, 
 and to relinquish the field. 
 
 A fifth mission was China. Rev. Robert W. Orr (18), and wife, 
 with Rev. A. Mitchell (16), sailed on the nth of December, 1837. 
 The latter was soon called to his eternal rest, and the former with
 
 i8o PRESB YTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 health greatly impaired, returned to the United States. It was after 
 the appointment of this band, and while they were preparing to em- 
 bark, that the supervision of the society with all its missions, was 
 accepted by the General Assembly. 
 
 The transfer in the location of the society from Pittsburgh to 
 New York, was made in 1837. During the first six years of its ex- 
 istence, it had extended its limits far beyond the Synod of Pittsburgh. 
 Minister and laymen in prominent positions, and with controlling 
 influences, had given it their warmest support. Distant presbyteries 
 had accepted its conditions and sent their representatives to appear 
 in its Board. A growing conviction prevailed in the minds of many 
 of its warmest friends in Pittsburgh and elsewhere that its efficiency 
 would be greatly promoted by its removal to one of the principal 
 Eastern cities. It had been supposed that some such change would 
 result from a movement made in the General Assemblies of 1835 and 
 1836, to have that body accept the transfer of the society. But after 
 a protracted and earnest debate, the Assembly of 1836 declined, by 
 a majority of one, to receive it. Thus numerous and decided were 
 the supporters of the American Board in that Assembly; and without 
 waiting for the uncertain issues of those tempestuous times, the Board 
 of the Western Foreign Missionary Society, at its annual meeting, 
 held on the 23d day of May, 1837, in the Sixth Presbyterian Church, 
 Philadelphia, decided to transfer the centre of operation from Pitts- 
 burgh to New York. And while there was not entire unanimity in 
 this surrender of location, all present ultimately acquiesced. A num- 
 ber of brethren residing in Pittsburgh resigned, by letter, their places 
 on the Board, that they might be filled by persons in and about New 
 York. Rev. Messrs. W. W. Phillips, D.D., Joseph McElroy, D.D., 
 John M. Krebs, Nicholas Murray, E. W. Crane, George Potts, and 
 Elders Moses Allen, James Lenox, and James Paton, were chosen to 
 fill the vacancies, and the name and style of the society was made 
 the " Presbyterian Foreign Missionary Society." 
 
 The effort, which had failed in previous Assemblies, was more suc- 
 cessful in 1837. That body resolved, by a vote of 108 to 29, "That 
 the General Assembly will superintend and conduct, by its own pro- 
 per authority, the work of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian 
 Church, by a Board appointed for that purpose, and directly amena- 
 ble to said Assembly."
 
 MISSIONARY HISTOKY. 181 
 
 It made provision for a Board of eighty members, with necessary 
 offices, and an Executive Committee. Among those chosen by this 
 same Assembly, as members of the Board, we find these names : 
 Ministers, W. W. Phillips, D.D., Joseph McElroy, D.D., John M. 
 Krebs, Elias W. Crane, George Potts, Nicholas Murray, Ashbel 
 Green, D.D., Francis Herron, D.D., Matthew Brown, D.D., Elisha 
 P. Swift, Thomas D. Baird, David Elliott, D.D. Laymen, James 
 Lenox, James Paton, Moses Allen, Harmer Denny, John Hannen, 
 Samuel Thompson. Indeed, the Board of the " Presbyterian Foreign 
 Missionary Society," located two weeks before at New York, was, 
 by this election, incorporated with the Assembly's Board. 
 
 The Assembly gave this Board power to receive a transfer of fo- 
 reign missionary societies now existing in the Presbyterian Church, 
 with all missions and funds under their care. 
 
 It was not more specific with regard to the society just located at 
 New York, because it was supposed that the " Central Board of 
 Foreign Missions," within the Synod of Virginia, and the Southern 
 Board of Foreign Missions, within the Synod of South Carolina, 
 would also be transferred. 
 
 On the 3ist of October, 1837, the Board elected by the Assem- 
 bly at Philadelphia six months before, convened in the First Church, 
 Baltimore, when the Presbyterian Foreign Missionary Society was 
 received, by transfer, from the Synods of Pittsburgh and Philadel- 
 phia. It then had forty-five missionaries ; though eight of these were 
 then on their way to their fields of labor, three were expecting daily 
 to embark ; seven were detained for the present for want of funds, 
 and two were in this country for other causes. Eleven of these were 
 ordained ministers, five were teachers, one was a printer and book 
 binder, and twenty were women. 
 
 It had under its care three presses, one high school, and two 
 boarding schools. 
 
 The receipts for the year ending October 15 were $40,266, and 
 the balance in hand, $5,784, which, they say, would be wanted for 
 the China Mission. 
 
 The Missionary Chronicle, included of course in the transfer, was 
 made the organ of the Board, and measures were taken to enlarge it 
 and extend its circulation. 
 
 From this review several statements may be deduced.
 
 z8i PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 1. The Presbyterian form of government is adapted to the vigor- 
 ous prosecution of missions. 
 
 2. Western Pennsylvania is greatly indebted to missionary efforts, 
 inasmuch as it was through them that her earliest and most influen- 
 tial churches have been organized. 
 
 3. The early religious history of Western Pennsylvania commits 
 all Presbyterian Churches to the constant, generous, and unwaver- 
 ing support to the Boards of Home and Foreign Missions. 
 
 We cannot ignore the labors of the fathers, nor be indifferent to 
 the organizations for which they freely gave their money, toils, and 
 prayers. 
 
 4. The ground on which this First Church of Pittsburgh stands is 
 rich in precious associations. Events as important in their religious 
 influence as any that have occurred on this Western continent have 
 been witnessed here. They are felt to-day to the ends of the earth, 
 nor will their influence cease while time shall last. These associa- 
 tions should be treasured and used to stimulate our effort. 
 
 5. Success in missionary effort depends on faith in God and earn- 
 est prayer. The resolution of the fathers was, " For Zion's sake will 
 I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake will I not rest, until 
 the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation 
 thereof as a lamp that burneth."
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 183 
 
 BIOGRAPHIES OF MISSIONARIES, 
 
 APPOINTED BY THE 
 
 WESTERN FOREIGN MISSIONARY SOCIETY, 
 
 From its Organization, until the Transfer, 1831-1837. 
 Arranged alphabetically. 
 
 (i) REV. JOSEPH WELSH BARR. 
 
 Mr. Barr was born in Trumbull county, Ohio, on the 220! day of 
 July, 1802, and was the son of Rev. Thomas Barr. His father had 
 removed from Western Pennsylvania in the spring of 1800. Joseph 
 was apprenticed to learn the house carpenter business, when he was 
 sixteen years old. He graduated at Western Reserve College, and 
 studied theology at Andover and Princeton. He was ordained by 
 the Presbytery of Philadelphia, on the i2th day of October, 1832. 
 He died of Asiatic cholera, in the city of Richmond, Va., on the 
 26th day of October, of 'the same year, and but five days before the 
 time fixed for sailing from Norfolk for the western coast of Africa. 
 His early history was so rich in material, his religious experience so 
 instructive, and the circumstances of his death so impressive, that a 
 memoir was compiled by Rev. Elisha P. Swift, D.D., in. 1833, 
 which has been more recently revised and republished by the Pres- 
 byterian Board of Publication. 
 
 (2) REV. WELLS BUSHNELL. 
 
 Mr. Bushnell was born in Hartford, Conn., in April 1799. He 
 experienced renewing grace in the city of Pittsburgh, when about 
 seventeen years old, and connected himself with the First Presby- 
 terian Church, under the pastoral care of Rev. Francis Herron, D.D. 
 He graduated at Jefferson College, and completed his theological 
 training at Princeton. He was licensed by the Presbytery of New 
 Brunswick, and on the 25th day of April, 1826, he was united in 
 marriage with Miss Elenor Hannen, a daughter of John Hannen, 
 for some years an elder in the First Presbyterian Church, Allegheny. 
 Mr. Bushnell was ordained by the Presbytery of Erie, and installed
 
 i8+ PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 pastor of the church of Meadville on the 2 ad day of June, 1826. 
 This relation was continued until the 26th day of June, 1833, when 
 it was dissolved, at his own request, the Western Foreign Missionary 
 Society having accepted him as a missionary to the Indians. In 
 company with the Rev. Joseph Kerr and wife, he and his wife left 
 Pittsburgh, on the 6th day of November, 1833. Their labors were 
 principally among the Wea Indians, and were attended with sick- 
 ness and exhaustion to Mr. Bushnell and his family. After a year 
 and a half therefore, he was compelled to leave the Indian country. 
 He supplied for a time the First Presbyterian Church of Louisville, 
 Ky., and after that, the churches of Greensburg and Shelbyville, 
 Indiana. From February, 1836, to April, 1838, he .was a member 
 of the Presbytery of Indianapolis. On the 1 8th day of April, 1839, 
 he was dismissed from the Presbytery of Erie to that of Beaver, 
 with a view to his installation as pastor of the church of New Castle, 
 Pa., in which relation he continued for fifteen years and a half. 
 He then connected himself with the Free Presbyterian Church, 
 and ministered to the churches of Mount Jackson in Lawrence 
 county, and New Bedford in Mercer county, until his death. This 
 occurred at Mount Jackson, on the i6th day of July, 1863, in the 
 sixty-fifth year of his age. 
 
 Mr. Bushnell was of medium height, slender but erect, quick and 
 nervous in his movements. He was strong in his convictions and 
 fearless in his utterances. Even amid the agitations which ulti- 
 mately led him to sever rather abruptly his connection with the 
 Presbytery of Beaver, his brethren never lost confidence in his piety 
 and devotion. He was a faithful pastor, evangelical in his preach- 
 ing, and the zealous advocate of every humane and benevolent work. 
 At this date Mrs. Elenor Bushnell is residing in Youngstown, Ohio. 
 
 (3) REV. JOSIAH BREWER. 
 
 Mr. Brewer sailed for Smyrna on the 28th day of March, 1836. 
 He was not without considerable experience in the mission work of 
 that region. He had been operating for nearly ten years among 
 the Jews, having been sent out in September, 1826, by a Ladies' 
 Society in Boston. His appointment by the Pittsburgh Society, and 
 his continued support in that field, was based on certain conditions 
 suggested by Mr. Brewer himself. During the winter of 1836-37,
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 
 
 Rev. Wm. McCombs and Mr. John McClintock, and their wives, 
 were appointed to this field of labor, and expected soon to. sail. But 
 on the eve of the departure of this .proposed reinforcement, Mr. 
 Brown, a printer and bookbinder, who had gone out with Mr. 
 Brewer, returned to the United States without any consultation 
 whatever with the Society. The unnecessary return of Mr. Brown 
 led the Society to reconsider the whole subject of the mission in 
 Smyrna. And inasmuch as the conditions in regard to Mr. Brewer's 
 support had not been fulfilled, the Society released him from fur- 
 ther connection with them, expressing their warm desire for his 
 future usefulness. 
 
 (4) REV. JAMES ROBINSON CAMPBELL, D.D. 
 
 Mr. Campbell was born near Omagh, County Tyrone, Ireland, in 
 the year 1800. He arrived in Philadelphia in 1824, and while 
 serving as a clerk he devoted his spare time to study, under the care 
 of that distinguished classical scholar, the late Joseph P. Engles, 
 Esq., many of whose pupils have obtained great eminence. 
 
 His theological studies were pursued under Dr. Samuel Brown 
 Wylie, in the Reformed Presbyterian Seminary at Philadelphia. He 
 was ordained by the Presbytery of Philadelphia of the Reformed 
 Presbyterian Church, in October, 1834. He embarked for India 
 on the 1 6th day of November, 1835, ^ n company with Rev. James 
 McEwen, Messrs. Jamieson, Rogers, and Porter. His station was 
 Saharunpur, Northwest Province, India. He visited the United 
 States in 1847-48, and his pulpit addresses on the subject of mis- 
 sions are still remembered by many. 
 
 The degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon him by La- 
 fayette College, Easton, Pa., in 1856. He died at Landour, Hima- 
 laya Mountains, India, on the i8th of September, 1862, in the 
 sixty-second year of his age, having been a missionary in India over 
 twenty-six years. His widow, Mrs. Mary Ann Campbell, survived 
 him only a few years, and died in India. 
 
 All of Dr. Campbell's sons who came to manhood have entered 
 the ministry. 
 
 The eldest son, Rev. Thomas Cochran Campbell, died in Marion, 
 O., June 8th, 1862, after two years of successful work for Christ. 
 The second son, Rev. James Robinson Campbell, is the pastor of
 
 f86 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the Presbyterian Church of May's Landing, Atlantic county, New 
 Jersey. The third son, Rev. George Stuart Campbell, is pastor of the 
 Presbyterian Church of Williamstown, New Jersey, also supplying 
 the Church of Franklinville, in the same State. 
 
 One of Dr. Campbell's daughters became the wife of Col. Morgan, 
 of the British Army, and the other two are at present engaged in 
 the missionary work in India. 
 
 Rev. T. W. J. Wylie, D.D., to whom we are indebted for some 
 of these facts, also makes this statement : 
 
 " The instructions and example of parents, eminent for godliness, 
 laid the" foundation for the character which he afterwards developed. 
 Shortly after his arrival in Philadelphia, he obtained employment in 
 the service of J. H. Warder, one of the principal merchants in the 
 city. Mr. Warder was a member of the Society of Friends, and 
 his views in regard -to the observance of the Sabbath were not as 
 strict as those of the young Irish Presbyterian. Mr. Campbell 
 having refused to attend to some work on the Sabbath, which he 
 considered unsuitable for that day, his employer threatened to dis- 
 miss him, but he was inflexible, and declared that he would prefer 
 losing his place to doing anything which his conscience condemned. 
 His firmness gained the respect and confidence of Mr. Warder, and 
 he not only retained him in his employment but made him his con- 
 fidential clerk. Having become a member of the First Reformed 
 Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, he at once took a class in Sab- 
 bath-school, a work in which he greatly delighted, and in which he 
 was remarkably successful. His attention having been- drawn to the 
 condition of the heathen world, he endeavored to excite an interest 
 in that object in the church with which he was connected, among 
 other things introducing into the Sabbath-school the system of col- 
 lection for Foreign Missions by purses in all the classes. 
 
 " Having devoted himself to the life of a foreign missionary, and a 
 society having been formed in Mercer county, Pa., by members of 
 the Presbyterian, the Associate, the Associate Reformed, and the 
 Reformed Presbyterian Churches, to support a Foreign Missionary 
 in connection with any one of these donominations, he was accepted 
 by them and sent out to India, under the direction of the Western 
 Foreign Missionary Society of Pittsburgh. He arrived at Saharunpur, 
 fiis station in India, on November loth, 1836. Here he labored
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 187 
 
 assiduously for twenty-seven years, with the exception of a short period 
 in 1847 and 1848, during which he made a visit to his native land 
 and to America. While in this country, he delivered in several 
 places a course of lectures on Foreign Missions in India, which were 
 afterwards published in a duodecimo volume by the Board of 
 Foreign Missions of the Reformed Presbyterian Church. He also 
 contributed largely to the religious press, being a letter writer of 
 superior excellence. He was indefatigable in his labors, and 
 besides his services at his own station, he made frequent itinerations, 
 and also acted as treasurer for the entire mission. He devoted 
 much of his attention to the education of the native youth, in which 
 he was eminently successful, a large number of those under his care 
 having renounced heathenism, and received the Christian religion, 
 several of whom have become ordained ministers or licentiates, or 
 Scripture readers. One of the handsomest churches in upper India 
 was erected at Saharunpur by his agency. His reluctance to inter- 
 mit his labors hastened, if it did not cause, his death, which was a 
 fitting close to his long and useful life. Tranquil and triumphant 
 he passed from earth to heaven, from sacrifice and toil to rest and 
 his reward. He was a man of warm heart, and a judgment re- 
 markably sagacious, energetic, animated, genial, modest, with a 
 profound devotion to the Saviour, which controlled all his actions. 
 In person he was of medium height, well rounded face, a clear com- 
 plexion, and a robust frame." 
 
 (5) REV. JOHN CLOUD. 
 
 Mr. Cloud was born on the pth of December, 1801, in Cross 
 Creek Township, Washington county, Penna. His father, Mr. 
 John Cloud, was an elder in the Church of Raccoon, Washington 
 county, during the pastorate of Rev. Moses Allen, and afterward in 
 the Church of Hopewell, Beaver county, under the ministry of Rev. 
 James D. Ray. He next served as an elder in two churches under 
 the charge of Rev. William Reed, Long's Run in Columbiana 
 county, Ohio, and Salem in Beaver county, Pa. 
 
 The subject of this notice graduated at Jefferson College in 1830, 
 and the same year entered the Allegheny Seminary and prosecuted 
 the full course of study. He was ordained by the Presbytery of
 
 /<?<? PKESB YTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 New York in the Brick Church (Dr. Spring's) on the nth day of 
 October, 1833, w ^h a view to the foreign missionary work. 
 
 Without being married, he sailed with Matthew Laird and wife 
 for Africa, on the 6th of November, 1833. Not many weeks after 
 reaching Monrovia he was prostrated by the African fever. Before 
 being fully restored, he so exposed himself as to bring on malignant 
 dysentery, from which he died, April 9, 1834. 
 
 Rev. David X. Junkin, D.D., has given his recollection of Mr. 
 Cloud as follows: "He was rather below medium height, slightly 
 built, stooped forward a little, of fair complexion, light brown hair, 
 blue eyes, very pleasant features, a man of warm affections, and very 
 genial and kind in his manners." 
 
 There are two brothers and one sister of Rev. John Cloud still 
 surviving. They reside in Hookstown, Beaver county, Pa. 
 
 (6) Miss JULIA A. DAVIS. 
 
 Miss Davis sailed for India, in company with Rev. John Newton 
 and Rev. James Wilson and their wives, November 4, 1834. 
 
 Soon after her arrival in Calcutta overtures of marriage were 
 made to her by Rev. John Goadby, a missionary at Cattack, under 
 the patronage of the General Baptist Missionary Society of Eng- 
 land. In view of the statements made to her that the way did not 
 then appear to be opened for unmarried females to labor effectively 
 in India, Miss Davis was disposed, after a time, to accept the pro- 
 posal; and they were accordingly married on April i, 1835. She 
 withdrew her connection from the Pittsburgh Society, with the hope 
 of being enabled with greater usefulness to prosecute the work for 
 which she left her native land. 
 
 (7) Miss NANCY HENDERSON. 
 
 Miss Henderson was born in Virginia, in the forks of the Cheat 
 River, in 1795. In 1832-33 she was engaged in conducting a school 
 on the Lancasterian system, in the city of Pittsburgh. It was located 
 on Liberty, below Ferry Street. She relinquished it to go out as a 
 missionary to the Western Indians. She left Pittsburgh, November 
 6, 1833, with Messrs. Kerr and Bushnell and their wives, and after 
 laboring for over three years, she returned to Pennsylvania. The 
 immediate occasion of her return was the extreme illness of her 
 mother, who afterward died. In 1839 sne was joined in marriage
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 189 
 
 with Mr. Richard Forrest, and resided in Allegheny. She died in 
 Council Bluffs, Iowa, while making a visit to her daughter, on 
 the ist day of April, 1871, in the y6th year of her age. Her 
 mortal remains were brought to Pittsburgh, and interred in the 
 Allegheny Cemetery. At the time of her death she was in com- 
 munion with the Central Presbyterian Church of Allegheny. She 
 was tall and slender, gentle in manner, and subdued in her tones. 
 She was a woman of deep religious experience, and ready for every 
 good work. 
 
 (8) REV. SAMUEL M. IRWIN. 
 
 Mr. Irwin was born in Mercer county (now Lawrence), near New 
 Castle, in 1812, and was sent out by the Society in the capacity of 
 a teacher to the Indians. He left Pittsburgh on the 1 4th of March, 
 1 83 7, -and it took six weeks of travel by water and land to reach his 
 destination. He was then one hundred miles beyond the line of 
 civilization. The lowas, Sacs, and Foxes of Missouri, were the 
 tribes among which he labored. He continued among them for 
 about twenty-six years, when the Indians were removed and the 
 country occupied by the whites. Since then his time has been given 
 to Highland University, which institution is an outgrowth of the 
 missionary work. He was licensed by the Presbytery of Lafayette, 
 Synod of Missouri, on the 5th day of April, 1845, an< ^ was ordained 
 soon after by the same body. He is on the same ground to which 
 he was. sent more than thirty-five years ago. 
 
 The Iowa Indians, to whom his labors were chiefly directed, are 
 greatly reduced in numbers, but the condition of those that remain 
 is greatly improved. At first they followed the chase and were 
 often engaged in war ; now they are quite well civilized, and many 
 are Christians. The missionary work has been of unspeakable ad- 
 vantage to them. 
 
 (9) REV. JESSE M. JAMIESON, D.D. 
 
 Mr. Jamieson was born on the 27th day of June, 1809, near New- 
 ville, in Cumberland county, Pa. His parents were members of 
 the Associate Reformed Church, and his paternal grandfather was, 
 for some time, pastor of the Big Spring Church. His mother died 
 when he was four years old. His grandfather had previously moved 
 to Indiana county, Pa., and his father afterwards followed him to
 
 ii)0 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the same place. There Mr. Jamieson spent his boyhood. He en- 
 tered Jefferson College in 1830, and graduated in 1834. Reunited 
 with the Presbyterian Church in 1832, under the ministry of Rev. 
 Matthew Brown, D.D. He then taught an academy in Maryland, 
 and studied theology there with the Principal, Dr. Alexander Camp- 
 bell. In the autumn of 1835, at the request of Rev. Dr. Brown 
 and the secretary of the Pittsburgh Society, he went to India to 
 take charge of the High School at Lodiana. On the 2ist December, 
 1836, the Presbytery of Lodiana was organized, at which time Mr. 
 Jamieson, with Messrs. W. S. Rogers and Joseph Porter, were taken 
 under its care, as candidates for the ministry. Mr. Jamieson was 
 ordained by the same Presbytery in October, 1837. He spent 
 twenty-two years in India, and was stationed at Saharunpur, Saba- 
 thu, and Ambala, successively. He gave a good deal of time to the 
 study of the Sanscrit, Persian, and Thibetan languages, besides the 
 spoken dialects. He returned to America in the summer of 1857, 
 having left two wives and three children in India graves. The de- 
 gree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon him by Jefferson 
 College, Pa., in 1858. For two years after his return, he was en- 
 gaged in teaching the languages and mathematics in the Marengo 
 Collegiate Institute, Illinois, and in Carroll College, Wisconsin. 
 Since then he has supplied weak churches in the neighborhood of 
 Monmouth, Illinois, where he has resided for thirteen years. 
 
 (10) MRS. REBECCA JAMIESON. 
 
 Mrs. Jamieson, the first wife of Rev. Jesse M. Jamieson, was born at 
 Middleford, Delaware, on the 2 6th of January, 1818. She was the 
 daughter of Captain Thomas Townsend. She was admitted to full 
 communion in the church when fourteen years of age. The band 
 with which she was associated embarked for India on the i6th of 
 November, 1835. She died of cholera on the 4th day of Septem- 
 ber, 1845. 
 
 Mrs. Jamieson acquired an extensive knowledge of the Hindi, 
 and could both speak and write it with great readiness. This pre- 
 pared her for enlarged usefulness through the press. One of her 
 little works was widely circulated. Her death was very peaceful, 
 and full of consolation to her friends.
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 191 
 
 (u) REV. JOSEPH KERR. 
 
 Mr. Kenr was born at Johnsonsburg, Sussex county, New Jersey, 
 on the 4th day of February, 1805. His father, Aaron Kerr, re- 
 moved to Washington county, Pa., when he was four years old. 
 He graduated at Jefferson College in the autumn of 1830, and at 
 once entered the Allegheny Theological Seminary, and continued 
 there till the summer of 1833. He was licensed by the Presbytery 
 of Ohio, on the 26th day of June, 1833 ; married to Miss Mary Ann 
 Caldwell, and ordained sine titulo by the Presbytery of Ohio (now 
 Pittsburgh), during the sessions of the Synod of Pittsburgh, in Octo- 
 ber of the same year. On the 6th day of November, 1833, he left 
 Pittsburgh in company with Rev. Wells Bushnell and wife, on the mis- 
 sion to which they had been appointed. Their field of labor was in 
 what is now the State of Kansas, and among a segment of the Miami 
 tribe. There were four little bands, the Weas, Peorias, Keanker- 
 shaws, and Kaskaskias. These names were given in view of the 
 proximity of their former settlements to some stream or town. The 
 station was selected by Rev. Wm. D. Smith, and called the Wea 
 Mission. They entered the house there when it had no door nor 
 window, no floor nor chimney, but were thankful and happy in 
 their work. They put up a unhewed log meeting-house, and in it 
 witnessed some of the wildest and most disolderly assemblies, and 
 afterwards meetings of the deepest solemnity. The Indians would 
 engage in every imaginable employment during service, swapping 
 knives and blankets ; but in this same house, and with these same 
 Indians, they afterwards saw the most fixed and solemn attention to 
 the interests of the soul. 
 
 Mr. Kerr continued at the Wea Mission for three years and a 
 half, sustaining a general connection with the early missionary work 
 among the Iowa Indians. During these years he had associated 
 with him Mr. Henry Bradley, a farmer, Mr. Francis Lindsay, and 
 Mr. E. Shepherd, as teachers, all of whom rendered valuable aid. 
 
 After having been three years in the service, Mrs. Kerr lost her 
 health, and was apparently brought very near to the grave. After 
 some months of prostration, she returned to her friends in Pitts- 
 burgh, Mr. Kerr remaining on the field six months longer. He 
 ' left the mission in the spring of 1837, and in the autumn of the 
 same year he accepted a call from the Church of Two Ridges, in the
 
 i<)2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Presbytery of Steubenville, and continued there for six years. In 
 1843 ne became pastor of the Church of Poland, Ohio, in the Pres- 
 bytery of New Lisbon, and remained for eleven years. His health 
 being shattered, and being subject to a paralytic affection of the 
 vocal organs, he was compelled to resign his charge and leave a much 
 loved people, with whom he had seen many happy days. 
 
 In the spring of 1854 he removed to Iowa, where he has been 
 employed for several years in the diffusion of religious literature under 
 the Presbyterian Board of Publication. He also preaches in vacant 
 churches and frontier neighborhoods as opportunity offers. He 
 is a member of the Presbytery of Iowa, and resides at Fairfield, 
 Jefferson county, Iowa. 
 
 (12) REV. MATTHEW LAIRD. 
 
 Mr. Laird was born in Union county, Pa., about the year 1805. 
 He was educated at the celebrated Milton Academy, under Dr. 
 Kirkpatrick, completing his classical studies at Jefferson College in 
 1830. After a short season spent in teaching he repaired to Prince- 
 ton Seminary, where he finished his theological course in 1833. 
 He was ordained by the Presbytery of Northumberland, in October 
 of the same year. He was married, and sailed from Norfolk, Va., 
 for the western coast of Africa, in company with Rev. John Cloud, 
 November 6th, 1833. Soon after reaching Monrovia, the three 
 were prostrated by malignant dysentery. John Cloud was first 
 taken. Mrs. Laird died on May 3d, 1834, and her husband on the 
 following day. 
 
 Rev. David X. Junkin, D.D., has supplied the following interest- 
 ing statement as to the manner in which Mr. Laird was introduced 
 to the ministry. "He was apprenticed to a pious Baptist named 
 William Thomas, to learn the business of a carpenter. Mr. Thomas 
 was employed in 1826-27 in building a barn for the late Dr. George 
 Junkin, who then resided near Milton Pa., and was pastor of a 
 church in that place. Mr. Junkin was laid low by a typhus fever, 
 and during his illness, Mrs. Junkin sometimes asked Mr. Thomas to 
 conduct family worship. On one occasion Mr. Thomas called 
 upon his apprentice, Laird, to lead in prayer. This he did with such 
 fervor and earnestness as to attract the notice of the sick pastor, 
 and when the family devotions were concluded, Mr. Junkin said to
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 193 
 
 his wife, 'If the Lord spare me to recover, that young man shall 
 enter the ministry, God willing.' Mr. Thomas generously relin- 
 quished to the pious apprentice the balance of his term of service. 
 Mr. Junkin received young Laird into his family, and sent him in 
 due time to the Academy and College. 
 
 " Mr. Laird was a man of medium height, erect, with rather 
 broad face and full round features, fair complexion, light hair, 
 solemn manner, devout piety, somewhat slow in his mental opera- 
 tions, but solid and careful in his attainments and opinions, and an 
 indefatigable Christian worker. I have often seen Barr and him 
 at the carpenter's work-bench at Princeton, by which they both 
 kept up health by wholesome exercise, and helped to bear their 
 Seminary expenses." 
 
 (13) REV. JOHN C. LOWRIE, D.D. 
 
 Dr. Lowrie was born in Butler, Pennsylvania, on the i6th day of 
 December, 1808. His father was Hon. Walter Lowrie, for thirty- 
 two years the Corresponding Secretary of the Board of Foreign Mis- 
 sions. He graduated at Jefferson College in 1829, after which 
 he spent three years in the Allegheny Theological Seminary, and a 
 part of 1832-33 at the Princeton Seminary. He was licensed by the 
 Presbytery of Ohio, in the First Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, 
 on the 2ist of June, 1832, and ordained by the Presbytery of New 
 Castle, in the First Church of Philadelphia, on the 23d of May, 1833. 
 
 He was appointed as a missionary to India, June, 1832, and from 
 that time until October he was engaged in visiting churches, and 
 presenting the cause of missions. He sailed for India on the 3oth 
 of May, 1833, an d reached Lodiana in November, 1834. In Decem- 
 ber, 1836, he returned home, with the hope of regaining his health. 
 His labors, for two years, consisted in endeavoring to awaken a 
 deeper interest in the perishing multitudes of India. Until the latter 
 part of 1838 he expected to return to his distant field, but the Execu- 
 tive Committee, having taken medical advice, refused their sanction. 
 From 1838 till 1850 he served the cause as Assistant Corresponding 
 Secretary of the Foreign Board, also ministering statedly to a church 
 in New York city, from 1845 till 1850. In 1850 he was appointed 
 Corresponding Secretary of the Board, and in this service he is now 
 engaged. The degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon 
 N
 
 /5V PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 him by Miami University, Ohio, in 1852. He was the Moderator 
 of the General Assembly in Pittsburgh, in 1865. He is the author 
 of "A Manual of the Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church 
 in the United States of America" a volume of great accuracy and 
 convenience, which has already passed through several editions. We 
 hope that the time is far distant, when any will be called to tell, as 
 we may not now, of the lovely character and valued services of Dr. 
 John C. Lowrie. 
 
 (14) MRS. LOUISA A. LOWRIE. 
 
 Louisa A. Lowrie, wife of the Rev. John C. Lowrie, D.D., was 
 a daughter of Thomas and Mary Wilson, of Morgantown, Virginia, 
 and sister of the late Hon. Edgar C. Wilson, of the same place. She 
 belonged to the first band of missionaries sent by the Pittsburgh 
 Society to India, and sailed from Philadelphia May 30, 1833. 
 She died in Calcutta, November 21, of the same year, in the 
 twenty-fourth year of her age. The annual report of 1834 says of 
 her: "Her desires to devote herself to the spiritual good of the 
 heathen were fervent, and her qualifications for the work were, to 
 human view, uncommon ; but He for whose glory she left her native 
 land and bore her feeble exhausted frame half round the globe, was 
 pleased, doubtless for wise reasons, to disappoint her earthly hopes, 
 and require her associates, a few short weeks after their arrival, 
 to consign her to the dust, there to proclaim, as she sleeps in 
 Jesus on India's distant shores, the compassion of American chris- 
 tians for its millions of degraded idolaters, and to invite others from 
 her native land to come and prosecute the noble undertaking in 
 which she fell." Her pastor at Morgantown, Rev. Ashbel G. Fair- 
 child, D.D., prepared a memoir, soon after her death; and few who 
 have seen in it the excellent likeness of that lovely face will ever 
 forget it. Her memory is still affectionately cherished in Wes- 
 tern Pennsylvania. A few years ago the Women's Missionary So- 
 cieties within the Presbyteries of Pittsburgh and Allegheny named 
 the house they were building at Mynpurie, India, "The Louisa 
 Lowrie Home." It is intended as a dwelling for the unmarried wo- 
 men laboring as missionaries at that station. It was completed in 
 1872, and is alike honoring to the woman whose name it bears, and 
 creditable to the missionary zeal of those by whom it has been com- 
 pleted.
 
 MISSION AR Y HISTOR Y. 195 
 
 (15) REV. JAMES McEwEN. 
 
 Mr. McEwen was born in Crieff, Perthshire, Scotland, in the year 
 1 80 1. He received his academical education in Philadelphia. 
 While pursuing these studies, at the suggestion of his teacher he 
 wrote brief statements of his views of the doctrines of the Gospel. 
 They appeared in successive numbers in the Presbyterian, under the 
 title of " Plain Divinity." They were much admired, and attributed 
 very generally to a more experienced pen. He studied theology at 
 Princeton Theological Seminary, and was ordained as an evangelist 
 by the Presbytery of Philadelphia, on the 24th of April, 1834. He 
 embarked on the i6th of November, of the same year, for India, and 
 on reaching his field, was led by providential events to locate at Al- 
 lahabad. His labors were blessed, and a church of thirteen persons 
 was organized in January, 1837. His health failing, his physician 
 advised his return to America, to which he came in 1838. In 1839 
 he paid a visit to his native country, and while his health was im- 
 proving, his soul was refreshed by witnessing the glorious work of 
 God in Kilsyth. After his return from Scotland he became pastor 
 of the Church in Delhi, New York. Here he continued to labor 
 till within a few weeks of his death, which occurred on the nth of 
 March, 1845, i n the forty-fourth year of his age. 
 
 During the seven weeks of his last illness, he commenced a most 
 serious course of self-examination. This resulted in a calm confi- 
 dence that his hopes were founded on the Rock of Ages. His peace 
 and joy were, as he expressed it, as great as he desired. He was a 
 sound divine, a faithful preacher, and a diligent student. 
 
 (16) REV. JOHN A. MITCHELL. 
 
 Rev. John A. Mitchell, who sailed for China with Rev. R. W. 
 Orr and wife, was a native of Tennessee. He was threatened with 
 pulmonary disease before he left this country, and died in Singapore 
 on the 2d day of October, 1838, in the thirty-third year of his age. 
 He had at times, during his last illness, most joyful anticipations of 
 the heavenly rest, and ardent longings "to depart and be with 
 Christ." He was well qualified for the missionary work, and had a 
 strong desire to preach the Gospel among the heathen. 
 
 (17) REV. JOHN NEWTON, D.D. 
 
 Mr. Newton was born in the State of New Jersey, about the year
 
 f 9 6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 1809. Soon after his birth, his parents, who were most excellent 
 people, removed to Bucks county Pa., and settled near Doylestown. 
 His father was a ruling elder in the church of that place. Mr. Newton 
 was made the subject of divine grace in the summer of 1822, during 
 a revival of religion which occurred under the preaching of Rev. 
 Charles C. Beatty, D.D., then a student in the Seminary. Mr. 
 Newton's father dying not long after, and leaving a large family in 
 straitened circumstances, he was taken, in 1826, into the family of 
 Dr. Beatty, in Steubenville, which was his home until he left for 
 India. He was prepared for college in Steubenville, was graduated 
 at Canonsburg, after which he taught for a year or two in the 
 academy at the former place. He received his theological educa- 
 tion in the Allegheny Seminary, which he entered in 1831. He 
 was licensed by the Presbytery of Steubenville, which also desired 
 to ordain him for his work ; but at the urgent solicitation of the 
 First Presbyterian Church of New York, which had undertaken his 
 support in India, he was transferred to the Presbytery of New York, 
 and by it ordained in the First Presbyterian Church, on the 22d 
 day of October, 1834. He and his wife, with Mr. James Wilson 
 and wife, sailed from Boston, for India, on the 4th day of Novem- 
 ber, 1834. During his forty years of service in India his labors 
 have chiefly been in two fields, Lodiana and Lahore. The latter 
 is his station at present. 
 
 He has visited America on two occasions. One was in 1853-54, 
 when he was accompanied by all of his family. He was a member 
 of the General Assembly in 1853, representing in it the Presbytery 
 of Lodiana. During his stay he resided in Steubenville. The 
 other visit was in 1870, when he came alone, and was again a mem- 
 ber of the General Assembly meeting that year in Philadelphia. 
 
 The degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon him about 
 
 1855- 
 
 Dr. Newton was first married to Miss Elizabeth P. Janvier, a for- 
 mer teacher in the Steubenville Seminary, where she had embraced 
 religion. 
 
 They had four sons, all of whom are missionaries in India Rev. 
 Charles Beatty Newton, and Rev. Francis John Newton of Lahore, 
 Rev. Edward Payson Newton of Lodiana, and Rev. John Newton, 
 Jr., M.D., of Sabathu.
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. tqj 
 
 They also had two daughters, both of whom were married to 
 missionaries. The elder is Mrs. Margaret Forman of India. The 
 younger is deceased. 
 
 The Presbyterian Church may well regard with pride the mis- 
 sionary record of John Newton. The name of this family will oc- 
 cupy a conspicuous and honored place in the ecclesiastical history 
 of India in future centuries. 
 
 (18) REV. ROBERT WILBERFORCE ORR. 
 
 Mr. Orr was born near Clarion, Clarion county, Pa., on the i8th 
 day of January, 1808. His training was that of the strict Scotch- 
 Irish Presbyterian stamp. He entered Jefferson College at the age 
 of twenty-one, with the intention of preparing for the practice of law. 
 But while there, becoming a subject of divine grace, he resolved to 
 seek the ministry. He was graduated at Jefferson College in 1833, 
 with distinguished honor. He pursued the full course in the West- 
 ern Theological Seminary, and afterwards spent one session at Prince- 
 ton as a resident graduate. He was licensed by the Presbytery of 
 Allegheny (now Butler), then embracing Clarion county, and or- 
 dained in 1837 as a missionary to China by the Presbytery 
 of Bedford, N. Y. He was united in marriage with Miss Eliza 
 Ann Carter, on the i2th day of September, 1837. He sailed for 
 Singapore, on the nth of December, in the same year. Here he 
 labored efficiently, visiting Malacca, Siam, and the neighboring 
 islands, with the view of locating the mission in the most desirable 
 place, as China was not yet open to foreigners. His health, which 
 had been impaired even before he left the Seminary, began to fail 
 during his second year of service. With the hope of regaining it, 
 he spent a part of his third year on the Nilgherry Hills, in the South 
 of India. He returned to Singapore after seven months, not much 
 benefited, and in 1841, after an absence of four years, he returned 
 to his native land. 
 
 His health being somewhat recruited, he taught in the Academy 
 of Clarion for two years, supplying, a part of his time, the churches 
 of Bethel and Greenwood. 
 
 In the autumn of 1844, he was elected a Professor in Jefferson 
 College, and continued in this position for seven years, preaching 
 during this period to the Church of Centre.
 
 f 9 8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Severe hemorrhage from the lungs, in the autumn of 1 85 1 , com- 
 pelled him to resign his professorship, after which he spent some 
 time in the interest of the endowment of the College. 
 
 In the spring of 1854 he returned to Clarion county, and was 
 elected County Superintendent of Common Schools, in which office 
 he remained until his death, supplying, for six months of this time, 
 the churches of Mill Creek and Mount Tabor. He died near 
 Clarion, on the 3oth day of March, 1857. 
 
 Mr. Orr was a ripe scholar, an able theologian, a judicious coun- 
 sellor, and an earnest minister of the New Testament. His end was 
 calm and peaceful. He often repeated, " Jesus, lover of my soul." 
 His dying prayer was, " Come quickly, Lord Jesus !" 
 
 His surviving companion, Mrs. Eliza Ann Orr, resides in Pitts- 
 burgh, where also one of his sons is living. The other son resides 
 in Chicago. Rev. Franklin Orr, of the Presbytery of Kittanning, 
 is his brother. 
 
 (19) REV. JOHN B. PINNEY, LL.D. 
 
 Mr. Pinney was born in Baltimore, on the 25th day of December, 
 1806. He graduated at the University of Georgia, at Athens, in 
 1828. He was admitted to practice at the bar of the Supreme 
 Court of Georgia the same year, Hon. Wm. H. Crawford presiding. 
 He taught a private school at Walterborough, South Carolina, for 
 one year, after which, in 1829, he entered the Theological Seminary 
 at Princeton, and continued there for three years. 
 
 He was ordained as a foreign missionary, with Rev. Joseph Barr, 
 by the Presbytery of Philadelphia, in October, 1832. He embarked 
 for Africa in 1832, and returned in the summer of 1833. In the 
 autumn of the same year he again sailed for Liberia, and in 1835 he 
 returned a second time. In 1839 he went. out with Messrs. Canfield 
 and Alward, and returned in 1840. In February, 1847, ne was 
 installed pastor of the Church of Washington, Pa. In April, 1848, 
 he resigned this charge, and accepted the position of Corresponding 
 Secretary of the New York State Colonization Society, in which 
 service he continued until 1872. In March, 1875, h g entered upon 
 the work of securing funds for educational purposes in Lincoln 
 University, Oxford, Pa. With this design, in the summer of the 
 same year he visited England and Scotland.
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 799 
 
 For twelve years Dr. Pinney was the editor of the New York 
 Colonization Journal. 
 
 The degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him by Hamilton Col- 
 lege, Clinton, N. Y., in 1860. 
 
 The dauntless Christian- courage with which Mr. Pinney sailed 
 alone for the insalubrious coast of Africa, after Mr. Barr had been 
 smitten down at his side, won the admiration of the Church. Con- 
 strained to abandon his chosen field, he has ever since discovered a 
 deep interest in the colored race. 
 
 (20) REV. JOSEPH PORTER. 
 
 Mr. Porter was born in Derby Plains, Ohio, on the 5th day of 
 January, 1808. At the age of nineteen he made a public profession 
 of his faith, and soon entered upon his studies for the ministry. He 
 graduated at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, but did not com- 
 plete his theological course in this country. He sailed for India on 
 the 1 6th of November, 1835. He reached Lodiana in December, 
 1836, and was ordained to the gospel ministry by the Presbytery 
 of Lodiana, in October, 1837. In 1842 his wife was removed from 
 the toils and trials of earth. In 1848 and 1849 Mr. Porter visited 
 the United States to make arrangements for the education of his 
 children. He remained for two years, presenting the cause of mis- 
 sions to the churches. In a visit to Western Ohio he became ac- 
 quainted with Miss Mary Parvin, daughter of the late Rev. Theo- 
 philus Parvin, missionary to South America. With her he was after- 
 ward joined in marriage. They sailed for India on the 8th of Au- 
 gust, 1849, and after four additional years of toil, he was taken to 
 his rest. He died in Lodiana, on the 2ist of November, 1853, in 
 the forty-sixth year of his age. This sad event occurred at the time 
 of the annual meeting of the mission, and when eight of his fellow- 
 laborers were present. 
 
 The following statement from the Rev. Jesse M. Jamieson, D.D., 
 is given in Dr. Lowrie's "Manual of Missions": "For several 
 years before his death Mr. Porter had charge of the Lodiana mis- 
 sion press, and was indefatigable in his labors to make it efficient. 
 He also had charge of all the mission buildings, and seemed to take 
 pleasure in relieving his brethren of the secular affairs of the station. 
 This he did the more cheerfully, as for several years an affection of
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the throat, which finally undermined his constitution, prevented him 
 from doing much in the way of direct preaching. He was well ac- 
 quainted with the Hindustani and Punjabi languages, and when 
 his health permitted, was an acceptalle and affectionate preacher in 
 these dialects. His last work on earth was correcting the final proof 
 sheets of a Punjaubi dictionary on which he and two of his brethren 
 had long labored. This labor he continued until the day before his 
 death, or until his hands refused to perform what his heart desired." 
 
 (21) MRS. HARRIET J. PORTER. 
 
 Mrs. Porter, the first wife of Rev. Joseph Porter, was a native of 
 the State of Indiana. She sailed for India on the i6th of November, 
 1835, and died at Lodiana, on March loth, 1842. She was highly 
 esteemed by all the missionary laborers associated with her. 
 
 (22) REV. WILLIAM REED. 
 
 Mr. Reed was born in j 80 2, in Mifflin county, Pa., within the 
 bounds of the East Kishacoquillas Church. In this church he was 
 baptized, and in after years admitted to full communion. He 
 graduated at Jefferson College, and entered the Allegheny Theolo- 
 gical Seminary in 1829, where he continued three years. He was 
 ordained by the Presbytery of Huntingdon on the first day of May, 
 1833, at an interesting meeting held in the Church of East Kishaco- 
 quillas. He embarked with Rev. John C. Lowrie, for India, on the 
 3oth day of May, 1833, and arrived in Calcutta in the month of 
 October of the same year. While engaged in acquiring the lan- 
 guage, pulmonary disease gradually developed itself. His medical 
 attendants advised his return to his native land, and he sailed for 
 Philadelphia in July. He declined rapidly during the voyage, and 
 died on the i2th of August, 1835, in the thirty-second year of his 
 age. He was buried in the waters of the Bay of Bengal. 
 
 Rev. John C. Lowrie, D.D., his colleague, has made this record of 
 him in his " Manual of Missions : " " Mr. Reed was a man of ex- 
 cellent mind, respectable scholarship, blameless character, and sin- 
 cere piety. These gifts and graces, united to the best habits of 
 industry and much energy, led the Church to form the hope of 
 his being very useful in the service of Christ among the heathen. 
 It was not unreasonable to expect that in a long life such a man
 
 AflSSIONARY HISTORY. aor 
 
 would do great good. Nor can it be questioned that even the short 
 course allotted to him was spent in the best way. His life and 
 his example were known to a large number of Christian friends. 
 His being one of the first missionaries of a new and distinctively 
 ecclesiastical organization, was itself a fact of much moment at the 
 time, and worthy of remembrance. But in reference to him, as also 
 to many others, the Church must recognize the will of the Lord as 
 the highest reason for all the mysteries of Providence. ' As for 
 God, his way is perfect.' ' 
 
 (23) REV. WILLIAM S. ROGERS. 
 
 Mr. Rogers was born at Greenfield, Highland county, Ohio, on 
 the 1 4th day of January, 1809. He received his literary education 
 at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, and graduated in August, 1835, 
 but did not take a full theological course in this country. He left 
 for India, in November, 1835, and was ordained to the ministry by 
 the Presbytery of Lodiana, in October, 1837. He returned to the 
 United States in the autumn of 1843, and for one year served the 
 First Presbyterian Church of Oxford, Ohio, as stated supply. From 
 1844, for about ten years, he served as an agent of the Board of 
 Foreign Missions. After laboring in an agency for the building of 
 the Oxford Female Seminary, he again ministered as stated supply 
 to the church of that place. He also served successively the churches 
 of Camden, Harmony, College Corners, and Shelby, the first three 
 being in the vicinity of Oxford. Meanwhile he held a ready pen, 
 and wrote frequently for the press, both secular and religious, 
 always in the interest of humanity and the kingdom of Christ. He 
 died in Oxford, on the 2oth day of August, 1873, in the sixty- 
 seventh year of his age. 
 
 Rev. J. M. Wampler says of Mr. Rogers : 
 
 " Personally, Bro. Rogers was a man of tall, spare, and rather 
 delicate frame, with a fair complexion ; and, during his latter years, 
 his locks were almost white, which, with his full-flowing snow- 
 white beard, gave him quite a venerable and patriarchal appear- 
 ance, and from every lineament of his countenance beamed good- 
 ness and kindness a true index of the inner-man. Socially he 
 was affable, courteous, a Christian gentleman, at home in every cir- 
 cle. But the most noted feature was his religious character. In this
 
 202 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 respect he was eminently a light to all around him. He filled my 
 idea of ' that disciple whom Jesus loved ' about as nearly as any man 
 I ever knew." After his decease a friend remarked to me: "His 
 daily walk was a living exemplification of the gospel." Another 
 said : "He was as good a man, if not the best, that ever walked the 
 streets of Oxford." Even ungodly men were constrained to recog- 
 nize him as one of the excellent of the earth. As a preacher he 
 was clear, earnest, spiritual, practical his matter fitted rather to 
 feed the piety and quicken the graces of God's children, than to 
 awaken the impenitent. The one great subject which lay nearest 
 his heart, and occupied his thoughts, was that of foreign missions. 
 His heart yearned for the salvation of a lost world, and the glory 
 of Christ. 
 
 During his last illness he was characteristically patient and resigned, 
 having "no solicitude," as he expressed himself to me, as to the re- 
 sult of his sickness. Often, during the paroxysms of extreme pain, 
 he would seek to comfort his friends by saying, "but for a moment." 
 When near his end, he committed his family to their covenant-keep- 
 ing God by the simple monosyllable "trust." 
 
 (24) REV. JAMES WILSON. 
 
 Mr. Wilson was born in Ligonier Valley, Pennsylvania, on the 
 24th of November, 1802 ; was graduated at Jefferson College in 1830; 
 completed the course of three years' study in the Allegheny Theologi- 
 cal Seminary, and was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Red- 
 stone in April, 1833. He was ordained by the Presbytery of Hud- 
 son, Goshen, N. Y., as their missionary to India, on the aoth of Oc- 
 tober, 1834, and sailed from Boston, with Rev. John Newton, on 
 the 5th of November of the same year. He arrived in Calcutta 
 early in February of 1835, and reached Lodiana in December of that 
 year. This was the first mission station of the Western Foreign "Mis- 
 sionary Society. He was transferred to Sabathu, in the Himalaya 
 mountains, in October, 1836, and to Allahabad in the autumn of 
 1837. After seven years of labor there, he accepted an invitation 
 from Lieut. -Governor Thomason to remove to Agra, and take the 
 Secretaryship and Treasuryship of the N. India Bible Society at its 
 organization in that place. By advice of the mission, he returned to 
 America, in August, 1852, and since then he has been supplying va-
 
 MISSIONARY HISTORY. 203 
 
 rious congregations in Virginia, Tennessee, and Georgia. He has 
 two sons in the ministry Rev. Luther Halsey Wilson, and Rev. 
 John Lowrie Wilson, both of whom are settled in South Carolina. 
 He also has two sons in the eldership the one residing in Nashville, 
 Tennessee, and the other in the State of Kentucky. 
 
 The present address of Rev. James Wilson is Nashville, Tennessee. 
 Though laboring for twenty years past, in parts remote from the 
 scenes of his youth, his associates in the Seminary, and in his sub- 
 sequent missionary toils, remember him with great affection.
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY, 
 
 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES 
 
 REV. S. ]. M. EATON. D.D., 
 
 lin, Pi.
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 
 
 |T was a grand country upon which the fathers entered 
 an hundred years ago. It was the far West then, em- 
 bracing Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Ohio. The 
 French had claimed it ; the red men of the forest con- 
 tended earnestly for its possession ; the Jesuits had been in the 
 advance in exploring its resources. Yet the hand of Providence 
 seemed to have preserved it for the special occupation of that grand 
 people we call Scotch-Irish. 
 
 The Ohio Company, formed about the middle of the last century 
 for its settlement, could not induce German immigrants to enter be- 
 cause of the support required for the Church of England. And so 
 the land was held in abeyance until the strong, rugged Presby- 
 terians, whose ancestors had worn blue bonnets and explored peat 
 bogs, who feared neither French nor Indians nor the mighty forest, 
 were prepared to enter in and take possession. 
 
 Other influences assisted. The French were conquered on the 
 "Plains of Abraham," in 1759; Pontiac, that grandest of all Indian 
 Sagamores, and whose conspiracy, mightier than that of Catiline at 
 Rome, had been suppressed, made peace in 1763 ; finally the treaty 
 of Anthony Wayne, concluded in August, 1794, opened the way for 
 conquest on more peaceful fields. 
 
 The Presbyterian Church was planted, first in what are now 
 Washington, Fayette, Westmoreland, and Allegheny counties, in 
 Pennsylvania, along the Monongahela and Ohio rivers and their 
 branches ; thence up the Allegheny to the shores of Lake Erie, 
 thence to the Muskingum, the Scioto, and the Cuyahoga rivers, 
 making this dense wilderness glad, and opening the way for the 
 207
 
 208 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 spread of civilization and religion to the Rocky Mountains and 
 the Pacific Ocean. 
 
 Eastern Pennsylvania and Virginia had been settled largely by 
 immigrants from Ireland and Scotland. In the year 1729, there 
 arrived in Pennsylvania from Europe six thousand two hundred and 
 eight persons, for the purpose of settling in that colony, of whom 
 more than five thousand were from Ireland.* Before the middle 
 of the century, twelve thousand arrived annually for several years, f 
 
 In 1 736, one thousand families sailed from Belfast alone for this 
 country. 
 
 The Scotch-Irish Presbyterians were grand material for the erec- 
 tion of new states and churches in the wilderness. Their ancestors 
 have a grand record that reaches back to the possession of Western 
 Europe by the Romans. Tertullian says that many Christians, to 
 escape the persecution of the Roman power, fled to regions inacces- 
 sible to the Romans. They found a refuge and a home amid the 
 bleak mountains of Scotland and the Northern coast of Ireland. 
 " The Scotch Church was planted by Christian refugees, at a period 
 unknown to history." J 
 
 The settlers of this region of Western Pennsylvania were nearly 
 all the descendants of these immigrants from Ireland and Scotland. 
 They had the same blood in their veins that had flowed at London- 
 derry and the Boyne Water. It was the blood of the Covenanters, 
 martyrs, and witnesses of Jesus in the old historic days. They were 
 God's chosen people, sent here to conquer this rugged land for 
 God, and their influence is felt here to this day. 
 
 How soon the influences of Presbyterianism were felt here we 
 cannot tell. The mosses have gathered upon the records. The 
 footprints have become dim as the years have passed beyond the 
 century. But we know those old Scotch-Irish Presbyterians well 
 enough to be very sure that like Abraham of old they would build 
 their altar wherever they pitched their tent. 
 
 There was a population here very early in the last century. In 
 1738, "John Caldwell, in behalf of himself and many families of 
 our persuasion who are about to settle in the back parts of Virginia," 
 induced the Synod of Philadelphia to appeal to Gov. Gooch, of Vir- 
 ginia, " for countenance and protection " in their proposed settle- 
 
 * Foote's Notes. f Proud's Hist, of Penn. % Dr. Speer.
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 2O<) 
 
 ment. The countenance and protection was granted, and they went 
 to "settle on the western side of our great mountains." 
 
 In 1 760, the year when Fort Pitt was completed, there is evidence 
 that a large population was planted in this region. Smoltet, in his 
 History of England, tells us that the completion of this fort estab- 
 lished the perfect security of about four thousand settlers, who now 
 returned to the quiet possession of their lands. 
 
 The first Protestant sermon preached west of the Allegheny moun- 
 tains was by Rev. Charles Beatty. He came to Fort du Quesne 
 November 24, 1758, with the army that took possession of the fort, 
 evacuated that day by the French, and, by order of the commander, 
 Gen. Forbes, the next day, or the following, preached a Thanks- 
 giving sermon before the army.* 
 
 In 1760, Rev. Messrs. Alexander and Hector Allison were di- 
 rected by the Synod of Philadelphia to go with the Pennsylvania 
 forces. In 1766, Rev. Messrs. Charles Beatty and George Duffield 
 were sent by the Synod to explore the frontier settlements and ascer- 
 tain the condition of the Indians. They arrived at Pittsburgh on 
 the 5th of September, finding Chaplain McLagan in spiritual charge 
 of the fort. On the following Sabbath Mr. Beatty preached in the 
 fort, and both the missionaries preached to the people who lived 
 outside the fort. Thence they proceeded as far west as the Mus- 
 kingum, when they returned to Pittsburgh, and then to their homes 
 in the East. 
 
 Mr. Beatty died at Bridgeton, N. J., August 13, 1792. He was 
 the father of Erkuries Beatty, who was the father of Rev. Charles 
 C. Beatty, D.D., who is with us at this day, and has been a most 
 efficient laborer in the region whose territory and history we are 
 considering. 
 
 Soon after Mr. Beatty's visit Mr. Anderson was appointed to visit 
 this region, with the promise of twenty shillings for every Sabbath 
 he should preach " on the other side of the Kittatinning mountains." 
 
 In 1769, the Synod ordered the Presbytery of Donegal to supply 
 the Western frontier with ten Sabbaths of ministerial labor. So we 
 see that for nearly twenty years before the settlement of a minister 
 in this region, the Synod used its utmost efforts to supply it with 
 the means of grace. 
 
 * Letter of John Haslett to Rev. Dr. Allison, November 24, 1758. 
 O
 
 zio PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 JAMES FINLEY 
 
 was the first of the pioneer ministers who visited this region. This 
 was in 1771. He came on horseback, with a single companion, to 
 explore the country, and prepare the way for a permanent settlement. 
 He was at this time in the prime of life, about forty years of age ; 
 born in the province of Ulster, Ireland ; educated at the Faggs Manor 
 School. He was ordained by the Presbytery of New Castle in 1 752. 
 In person he was a fat, nervous, florid little man, able to endure 
 hardships, and prepared, as soon as circumstances would admit, to 
 cast in his lot with the new settlements. He moved thither with his 
 family in 1783, and about two years afterwards became pastor of the 
 Churches of Rehoboth and Round Hill, first called " Upper and 
 Lower Meeting Houses." Of these churches he continued pastor 
 until his death, that occurred January 6, 1795. 
 
 JAMES POWER, D.D., 
 
 first visited the new settlements in 1774. He was born in Chester 
 county, Pa., in 1746; graduated at Princeton in 1766; licensed by 
 the Presbytery of New Castle, June 24, 1772. In 1776 he was or- 
 dained by the same Presbytery sine titulo, the reason being assigned 
 that "he was about to remove to the Western parts of this province." 
 
 Mr. Power moved across the mountains with all his family and 
 household effects packed on horseback. The minister carried the 
 eldest daughter on a pillion- behind him, and the youngest in his arms. 
 The two other daughters were seated in baskets hung on either 
 side of another horse, the mother on a third, and the household 
 effects on other horses. 
 
 After performing missionary work for some five years, he became 
 pastor of the Churches of Sewickley and Mount Pleasant. In 1787 
 he was released from the charge of the Sewickley Church, but con- 
 tinued with Mount Pleasant until 1817. He died August 5, 1830, 
 aged eighty-five years. 
 
 Mr. Power was of medium height, erect, slender, graceful in man- 
 ners, and extremely neat in his dress. As a preacher he was clear, 
 methodical, and evangelical. 
 
 JOHN MCMILLAN, D.D., 
 
 was the next man on the ground ; of Irish descent ; born at Faggs 
 Manor in 1752; graduated at Princeton; licensed in 1774. He
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 
 
 first visited the West in 1775. He returned the next year, but owing 
 to Indian difficulties did not remove his family to Washington county 
 until 1778, when he took charge of the congregations of Chartiers 
 and Pigeon Creek. From the latter he was dismissed about the year 
 1800; of the former he continued pastor until 1830. He died at 
 Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, November 16, 1833, in the eighty-first 
 year of his age. 
 
 Dr. McMillan was not attractive in personal appearance. He was 
 six feet in height, rough-hewn in features, brusque in manners, and 
 with a voice that was like the rumbling of thunder. 
 
 THADDEUS DODD 
 
 was born in New Jersey, March 7th, 1740. His parents were from 
 Connecticut. He graduated at Princeton, in 1773; licensed in 
 1775; he came to the West in 1777. He became pastor of the 
 churches of " Upper and Lower Ten Mile," in Washington county. 
 His death took place May 2oth, 1 793, in the fifty-fourth year of his 
 age. 
 
 Mr. Dodd was a man of sallow complexion, erect, slender, with 
 dark hair, and eyes that were keen and lively. He was a fine 
 scholar, particularly in the department of mathematics. He was 
 supposed to have been in his day the only man in the West who 
 thoroughly understood the mysteries of Gunter's scale. He was 
 known as a son of consolation. His life was gentle, his preaching 
 earnest, persuasive, and particularly attractive to the young. 
 
 JOSEPH SMITH 
 
 was a Marylander, born at Nottingham, in 1 736 ; graduated at 
 Princeton in 1764; licensed, August 5, 1767; he came to the West 
 in 1 7 79. In the fall of that year, calls were presented him from Buffalo 
 and Cross Creek congregations. In the following spring he moved 
 out and commenced the work. This was his life work. He 
 preached here until his death, April, 1792, at the age of fifty-six. 
 
 Mr. Smith was tall and slender, fair in complexion, fine counten- 
 ance, and eyes that were fairly brilliant. He was a son of thunder; 
 dealt largely in the terrors of the law, so much so as to be called 
 " Hellfire Smith" by those who were lacking in reverence. Rev. 
 Samuel Porter, one of his contemporaries, says of him : "I never 
 heard a man who could so completely as Mr. Smith unbar the gates
 
 212 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 of hell, and make me look far down into the abyss ; or who could 
 so throw open the gates of heaven, and let me glance at the insuffer- 
 able brightness of the great white throne." He was a very devo- 
 tional man. He kept a cloak near his bed in winter to wrap him- 
 self in, when he would arise in the night hours for prayer. With 
 these four ministers, McMillan, Power, Dodd, and Smith, the West- 
 ern Church crystalizes into the form of the 
 
 PRESBYTERY OF REDSTONE. 
 
 This Presbytery was erected by the Synod of New York and 
 Philadelphia, on the i6th of May, 1781. It was directed to meet 
 at Laurel Hill, in what is now Fayette county, on the third Monday 
 of September following, at n o'clock A.M. The time approached, 
 but the incursions of Indians in the neighborhood of some of the 
 members of the Presbytery, rendered the meeting at Laurel Hill 
 impracticable. The meeting was held in Pigeon Creek, Washington 
 county. The record runs thus : ' ' Ubi post preces sederunt, the 
 Rev. Messrs. John McMillan, James Power, and Thaddeus Dodd ; 
 Elders, John Neil, Demas Lindley, and Patrick Scott; absent, 
 Rev Joseph Smith." 
 
 This was the first meeting of Presbytery west of the Allegheny 
 Mountains. The second meeting was a failure, no quorum appeared. 
 The third meeting was also a failure, "owing to the incursions of 
 the savages." At the next meeting, Rev. James Dunlap was re- 
 ceived from the Presbytery of New Castle. He had received calls 
 from the churches of Laurel Hill and Dunlap's Creek. Mr. after- 
 wards Dr. Dunlap was born in Chester county, in 1744; graduated 
 at Princeton in 1773 ; ordained by the Presbytery of New Castle in 
 1781. In the year 1802, he was elected President of Jefferson Col- 
 lege; resigned 1811 ; died near. Philadelphia, November 22, 1818. 
 
 At this meeting of Presbytery James Edgar was present. He 
 was a prominent elder, and a man of great influence in the Presby- 
 tery. Judge Brackenridge says of him : " He was an associate 
 judge of the county of Washington, and a kind of Rabbi in the 
 Presbyterian churches in the Western country. His head was pre- 
 maturely hoary with prayers and fastings and religious exercises ; 
 his face thin and puritanical, like the figures of the old Republicans 
 in the Long Parliament of England."
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 
 
 Judge Edgar's influence was great, not only amongst his neigh- 
 bors but throughout the Presbytery. He was a wise counsellor, 
 and an efficient laborer in the cause of Presbyterianism. 
 
 In 1781, John Clark, already an old man, came into the bounds, 
 and became pastor of Lebanon and Bethel. He died in 1797. In 
 1785, Alexander Addison was received under the care of Pres- 
 bytery as a licentiate from Scotland. He preached for a time at 
 Washington, Pa. After a time he gave up preaching, and became 
 distinguished in the legal profession. 
 
 Rev. Dr. Carnahan, of Princeton College, says of him: " Alex- 
 ander Addison was president of the courts in the four counties, and 
 I venture to say that a more intelligent, learned, upright, and fear- 
 less judge was not to be found in the State." 
 
 In the year 1785, Samuel Barr accepted calls from Pittsburgh and 
 Pitt township. In 1788, four candidates were licensed to preach the 
 gospel Brice, Hughes, McGready, and Patterson. Mr. McGready 
 became famous in the Kentucky revivals. Brice settled at Three 
 Ridges and Forks of Wheeling, Hughes at Short Creek and Lower 
 Buffalo, and Patterson at Raccoon. 
 
 JAMES HUGHES 
 
 was a native of York county, educated under direction of Rev. Jo- 
 seph Smith and Thaddeus Dodd. He afterwards became a member 
 of the Presbytery of Miami, and in 1818 was chosen Principal of 
 what is now Miami University. He died May 22, 1821, at Oxford, 
 Ohio, aged fifty-six years, leaving a beautiful record of zeal in the 
 Lord's work. 
 
 JOSEPH PATTERSON 
 
 was a famous man in his day. He was born in Ireland, studied 
 with Joseph Smith, and was somewhat advanced in years at the time 
 of his licensure. He continued the pastor of Raccoon for some 
 twenty-seven years. His last days were spent in Pittsburgh in works 
 of great usefulness, seeking out the poor, and distributing Bibles to 
 boatmen. He was a man of faith, earnest in prayer, and devoted 
 to the Lord's work. He died February 4, 1832, in the eightieth 
 year of his age. 
 
 During the few years succeeding, John McPherrin, Samuel Por- 
 ter, Robert Marshall, George Hill, William Swan, and Thomas Mar-
 
 214 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 quis were licensed. These men had all been educated at home, and 
 became efficient laborers in the field. During the same period, 
 Jacob Jennings was received from the " Low Dutch Church." Of 
 these, 
 
 SAMUEL PORTER 
 
 was born in Ireland, in 1760. His studies were pursued under di- 
 rection of Mr. Smith and Dr. McMillan, the latter making no charge 
 for board or tuition, while a friend provided for his family in the 
 meantime. He was licensed November 12, 1789. In the following 
 year, he became pastor of the congregations of Poke Run and Con- 
 gruity. Of the former he was pastor until 1798 ; of the latter, until 
 his death, September 23, 1825, in the sixty-sixth year of his age. 
 
 GEORGE HILL 
 
 was born in York county, March 13, 1764. He was licensed to 
 preach, December 22, 1791. He was first settled in the congrega- 
 tions of Fairfield, Donegal, and Wheatfield, November 13, 1792. 
 Six years afterwards, he resigned the charge of Wheatfield, and ac- 
 cepted a call from Ligonier. In these charges he labored until his 
 death, June 9, 1822, in the sixty -eighth year of his age. He was a 
 man of remarkable vigor of constitution, with a mind to work, and 
 did good service for the Master. Rev. George Hill, D.D., of Blairs- 
 ville, is his grandson. 
 
 JACOB JENNINGS 
 
 was born in New Jersey, in 1744. He was a descendant of the 
 Plymouth Pilgrims, and a physician by profession, having practiced 
 medicine for twenty years before his licensure. He was licensed by 
 the Reformed Dutch Church, and received by the Presbytery of 
 Redstone, April 17, 1792. He was settled as pastor of Dunlap's 
 Creek, in Fayette county, where he continued until June, 1811, 
 when, on account of infirmity, he was released from his charge. He 
 died February 17, 1813, aged sixty-nine. He was the father of 
 Rev. Obadiah Jennings, and grandfather of Rev. S. C. Jennings, 
 D.D. 
 
 DAVID SMITH 
 
 was the son of Rev. Joseph Smith, one of the original members of 
 the Presbytery of Redstone. He was born 1772; graduated at
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 215 
 
 Harapden-Sidney College ; licensed by the Presbytery of Redstone, 
 November 14, 1792; settled first at George's Creek and Tent, in 
 Fayette county, afterwards at Rehoboth and Round Hill, until his 
 death, August 24, 1803, in the thirty-second year of his age. He 
 was the father of Rev. Joseph Smith, D.D., the historian of " Old 
 Redstone." 
 
 The Presbytery of Redstone was composed of able, devoted, and 
 self-denying men. They were the men for the times. Although 
 commencing in the wilderness, they were not forgetful of the pros- 
 pective wants of the country. They laid the foundations deep and 
 broad. The influence they exerted in the planting of the church is 
 felt at the present day, not only in the region where they labored, 
 but in the regions beyond. 
 
 THE PRESBYTERY OF OHIO. 
 
 was erected by the Synod of Virginia in 1793. The ministers com- 
 posing it were John McMillan, Joseph Patterson, James Hughes, 
 John Clark, and John Brice. The Monongahela River bounded its 
 territory on the East and North, thence the line ran northward to 
 Presque Isle or Erie. On the West it embraced the frontier settle- 
 ments in Western Reserve in Ohio. 
 
 Other names were soon added to the roll, giving it strength and 
 
 efficiency. 
 
 THOMAS MARQUIS 
 
 was one of these. He was born near Winchester, Va., in 1753, f 
 Irish parentage; emigrated to Washington county, 1775; studied 
 with Joseph Smith, and at the Canonsburg Academy, also with Dr. 
 McMillan ; licensed by the Presbytery of Redstone, April 19, 1793 5 
 ordained by the Presbytery of Ohio, June 13, 1794; and installed as 
 pastor of the congregations of Upper Buffalo and Cross Creek. Of 
 the latter he continued the pastor until 1826. He died, September 
 29, 1827, aged seventy-four. He was below the middle stature, 
 features small, finely formed, with the lines of thought deeply traced. 
 He had a sweet musical voice, and was sometimes called " the 
 silver-tongued Marquis." He was a grand and attractive preacher 
 in his day. 
 
 SAMUEL RALSTON 
 
 was an Irishman ; born in 1756, and graduated at the University of 
 Glasgow. He was licensed in Ireland ; emigrated to this country
 
 2SO PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 in 1794; ordained by the Presbytery of Ohio, November 30, 1796, 
 and installed as pastor of Mingo Creek. This charge continued 
 until his death, September 25, 1851. He also preached a portion 
 of his time at Horseshoe Bottom and Williamsport. His entire 
 charge was in Washington county. " Dr. Ralston was a man of 
 war from his youth," an author of some prominence, and a success- 
 ful pastor. 
 
 JOHN ANDERSON, D. D., 
 
 was a North Carolinian ; born April 10, 1767; studied with Rev. 
 David Caldwell, D.D. ; licensed by the Presbytery of Orange, 
 1793. In 1802 he" became pastor of the congregation of Upper 
 Buffalo. This relation continued until June 18, 1833. He died 
 February, 8, 1835. 
 
 Rev. S. C. Jennings, D.D., says of him: "Dr. Anderson was tall, 
 slender, with light hair, sunken cheeks, and eyes and teeth protruding. 
 His appearance late in life was so cadaverous as to excite sympa- 
 thy. He was very plain in his apparel, wearing usually horns-made 
 cloth, and not always black." 
 
 He was a very pungent preacher, and was called by his brethren 
 " the screw auger." " He bored down jnto the very inmost souls 
 of men, and drew up and presented to their astonished view de- 
 praved passions and appetites that they had never imagined to be 
 there." 
 
 He was not without humor. At one time a member of Synod 
 protested against being called Doctor of Divinity. "Oh ! " said Dr. 
 Anderson, "just treat it as a nickname. They formerly called me 
 'Bare Bones,' and I bore it without saying a word, and found it 
 the easiest way." 
 
 MOSES ALLEN 
 
 was the son-in-law of Dr. McMillan. He was licensed to preach in 
 1802, and soon became the pastor of the congregations of New 
 Providence and Jefferson. He was for a time pastor of Raccoon, 
 and afterwards of Crab Apple, in Ohio. 
 
 GEORGE M. SCOTT 
 
 was a Princeton student. He became pastor of the congregation of 
 Mill Creek, in Beaver county. His labors continued here from
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 217 
 
 1801 to 1826. He was of low stature, round face, and bland dis- 
 position. 
 
 In the meantime other laborers entered the field, of whom were 
 William Woods, Joseph Anderson, John McClean, Andrew Gwinn, 
 John Watson (the first President of Jefferson College), Thos. Moore, 
 James Snodgrass, William Wylie, and others. Congregations had 
 been multiplying; the country was filling up with settlers, and 
 the settlements extending northward to Lake Erie, and westward 
 toward the interior of Ohio. The territory was becoming too large 
 for a single Presbytery, and petitions were presented to Synod for a 
 new Presbytery, looking also toward the organization of a new 
 Synod. 
 
 THE PRESBYTERY OF ERIE 
 
 was erected by the Synod of Virginia, at a meeting held at Win- 
 chester, Va., October 2, 1801. The following is the minute of 
 Synod: "At the unanimous request of the members present from 
 the Presbyteries of Redstone and Ohio, the Synod did and hereby 
 do erect the Rev. Messrs. Thomas E. Hughes, William Wick, Samuel 
 Tait, Joseph Stockton, and Robert Lee, together with all the con- 
 gregations north and northwest of the Ohio and Allegheny rivers, 
 unto the place where the Ohio river crosses the western boundary 
 of Pennsylvania, into a separate Presbytery, to be called the Pres- 
 bytery of ERIE, and appointed their first meeting to be held at 
 Mount Pleasant, on the second Tuesday of April next. William 
 Wick was appointed to open the meeting with a sermon, and preside 
 until a new Moderator be chosen." 
 
 At the appointed time the Presbytery met. In the meantime, two 
 other brethren had come into the bounds : James Satterfield and 
 William Wylie. All the ministers were present, with four elders : 
 William Plumer, John Monteith, William Waddell, and Ithiel Dodd. 
 "Supplications" for supplies came in from seventeen vacant 
 churches or congregations. 
 
 These seven ministers were all settled at the organization of the 
 Presbytery. 
 
 THOMAS EDGAR HUGHES 
 
 was pastor of Mount Pleasant and Salem. He heads the long roll 
 of the Presbytery of Erie. He was the first minister of the Gospel
 
 2i8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. ' 
 
 who settled north of the Ohio river. He was of Welsh origin, and 
 born in York county, Pa., April 7, 1769; graduated at Princeton 
 probably in 1797; studied theology with Dr. McMillan; licensed 
 to preach by the Ohio Presbytery, October 17, 1798; ordained by 
 the same, August 28, 1799. He was pastor of New Salem until 
 1808, and Mount Pleasant until 1830. He died May 2, 1838, in 
 the seventieth year of his age. Four of his sons, William, John D., 
 Watson, and James R., became ministers of the Gospel. 
 
 WILLIAM WICK 
 
 was a descendant of the Pilgrims. He was pastor of Hopewell, 
 now in Lawrence county, Pa. , and Youngstown, Mahoning county, 
 Ohio. He was the first permanent laborer in the Western Reserve. 
 He was born on Long Island, N. Y., June 29, 1768; studied at 
 Canonsburg Academy and at Dr. McMillan's Log Cabin ; licensed 
 to preach the gospel by the Presbytery of Ohio, August 28, 1799; 
 ordained by the same, September 3, 1800, and installed as pastor of 
 Neshannock and Hopewell. During the next year he was released 
 from Neshannock, and gave half his time to Youngstown. Of the 
 churches of Hopewell and Youngstown he remained pastor until his 
 death, March 29, 1815, in the forty-seventh year of his age. 
 
 SAMUEL TAIT 
 
 was born near Shippensburg, Pa., February 17, 1772. He too 
 studied at Canonsburg and with Dr. McMillan, and was licensed 
 by the Presbytery of Ohio, June 25, 1800 ; ordained by the same, 
 November 19, 1800. His first charge was Cool Spring and Upper 
 Salem, in Mercer county, Pa. In June, 1806, he commenced his 
 labors in Mercer, Pa., where his pastorate continued until his death, 
 June 2, 1841, in the seventieth year of his age. This man proved 
 to be one of Erie's great men. He was mighty in prayer, untiring 
 in energy, and devoted to the Lord's work. 
 
 JOSEPH STOCKTON 
 
 was a Pennsylvanian ; born near Chambersburg, February 25, 
 1779; studied at Canonsburg and with Dr. McMillan; licensed by 
 the Presbytery of Ohio, June 26, 1799, and ordained by the same, 
 June 24, 1 80 1, and installed as pastor of the churches of Meadville 
 and Little Sugar Creek, in Crawford county, Pa. This relation was
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 219 
 
 dissolved June 27, 1810. He was the author of the "Western 
 Spelling Book" and "Western Calculator." He died October 29, 
 1832, in the fifty-fourth year of his age. 
 
 ROBERT LEE 
 
 was another Canonsburg student, studying theology with Dr. Mc- 
 Millan. He was born in Ireland, in the year 1771; licensed by 
 Ohio Presbytery, October 22, 1800, and ordained by the same, 
 June 26, 1801 ; and installed as pastor of Amity and Big Spring, in 
 Mercer county, Pa. He died in Leesville, Ohio, February 9, 1842, 
 in the seventy-first year of his age. In person he was tall, slender, 
 and dignified in deportment. 
 
 JAMES SATTERFIELD 
 
 was a Marylander, born August, 1767. Moving into Washington 
 county, brought him within the sphere of Dr. McMillan's influence, 
 and into the ministry. He was licensed by the Presbytery of Ohio, 
 September 3, 1800; ordained by the same, March 3, 1802; and in- 
 stalled as pastor of the congregations of Moorfield and Neshannock. 
 He died November 20, 1857, in the ninetieth year of his age. He 
 was a large robust man, able and willing to work. He had one 
 son, Meade, in the ministry, who died before his father. 
 
 WILLIAM WYLIE, D.D., 
 
 was the last of the original members of the Presbytery of Erie. He 
 was born in Washington county, Pa., July 10, 1776. He studied 
 for a time with Thaddeus Dodd, also at Canonsburg, and of course 
 with Dr. McMillan. He was licensed by the Presbytery of West 
 Lexington, and by that body transferred to the Presbytery of Ohio, 
 by which he was ordained, March 5, 1802, and installed pastor of 
 the Churches of Upper Sandy and Lower Sandy, now Georgetown 
 and Utica, the former in Mercer, the latter in Venango county, Pa. 
 He died May 9, 1858, in the eighty-second year of his age. 
 
 Dr. Wylie was a man of more than ordinary power as a preacher. 
 He was tall in stature, social, cheerful, and hopeful. 
 
 At the second meeting of Presbytery there were ordained and 
 installed two brothers, John and Abraham Boyd, the former as pas- 
 tor of Union and Slate Lick, the latter of Bull Creek and Middlesex,
 
 220 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 all in Armstrong county, Pa. Then ordinations were accompanied 
 by " fasting," as well as prayer and the laying on of hands. 
 
 This record brings us to the organization of the first Synod in 
 the West. 
 
 HARDSHIPS. 
 
 The church was not planted here amid beds of roses. Her early 
 progress was not like that of Cleopatra down the Nile with gilded 
 barge and silken sails and cordage, to the sound of flutes and harps 
 aeolian. The times were propitious, but full of hardships and 
 difficulties. The virgin soil must be brought to the sunlight. Toil 
 and danger must be encountered. Good hard work must be laid 
 out in building the walls and setting up the gates of Zion. The first 
 ministers came across the mountains on horse-back, bringing their 
 household gods with them. They struggled with the first settlers, 
 in the toils of the field, in the defence against savages, in the pri- 
 vation that must attend the early days of settling a new country. 
 
 And these hardships continued as the settlements were pushed 
 northward toward the lakes, and westward beyond the Ohio. 
 Hunters' paths were to be followed, rivers without bridges were to 
 be crossed, the Gospel was to be preached in the shadows of the 
 forest, in the log cabins of the settlers, wherever and whenever the 
 way should be opened. 
 
 When John McMillan first entered his cabin in Washington 
 county, he had two boxes placed one on the other for a table, and 
 two kegs for seats for himself and wife. For weeks together he had 
 no bread, but plenty of pumpkins and potatoes, and was satisfied. 
 
 In the year 1 789, the Church of Fairfield, Redstone Presbytery, 
 promised their minister his salary in money or grain, at the follow- 
 ing prices : " Wheat at four shillings the bushel, rye or corn at two 
 shillings and sixpence per bushel." 
 
 A notable instance of poverty and enterprise alike, occurred in 
 the days of Joseph Smith's pastorate at Cross Creek and Upper 
 Buffalo. The minister had purchased a farm, but he was in debt 
 for it. His salary was unpaid. Grain was plenty, but money was 
 scarce. Wheat would not bring over twelve and a half cents per 
 bushel. The minister was notified that he must pay for his land or
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 
 
 leave it. Three years' salary were now due. If Mr. Smith left his 
 farm, he must abandon his churches. The people could not raise 
 the money. They could not borrow. They came together, and 
 sought God's counsel. They could furnish any quantity of wheat. 
 Mr. Moore, the miller, would grind the wheat. They resolved to 
 bring their wheat, turn it into flour, and send it to New Orleans to 
 market. The wheat was brought on the backs of horses from two to 
 twenty-six miles' distance, from all over the country. A flat boat 
 was built. The flour was placed on board. Who would undertake 
 the charge of running it down the river, amid the danger of wreck, 
 and robbers, and savages ? 
 
 An old elder, William Smiley, sixty-four years of age, arises and 
 says: "Here am I, send me." Two young men volunteer to go as 
 his assistants. All the congregation assembles to see the party set 
 out on their voyage. The pastor gives out a hymn, then offers 
 prayer ; the farewells are said, and the boat is pushed out into the 
 stream. 
 
 More than nine months pass away without tidings. There is 
 neither mail nor telegraph, and the birds brought no news. At 
 length one Sabbath morning, as the people assembled for worship, 
 they found old father Smiley, seated on his rude bench before the 
 pulpit, calm, devout, as though nothing notable had happened. 
 
 At the close of the service, the people were notified to meet early 
 the following week, to hear the report of the trading party. All 
 were present on Monday. In brief speech, after thanks had been 
 offered for the safe return, the old elder reported that all had gone 
 well. They had reached New Orleans safely, and sold their flour 
 for twenty-seven dollars per barrel. He then poured the proceeds 
 upon the table, a larger heap of gold than any of them had ever 
 seen before. 
 
 The young men were paid one hundred dollars each. Father 
 Smiley was asked his charge. He replied that he ought to receive 
 as much as the young men, although he had not worked as hard as 
 they, but would take nothing until the minister was paid. The 
 back salary was paid, with one year in advance. Elder Smiley 
 received three hundred dollars, and a large dividend remained to 
 those-who had furnished the flour. 
 
 There were hardships of various kinds. For many years danger
 
 222 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 was apprehended from the Indians. The men brought their rifles 
 to the church on the Sabbath, and occasionally some of the younger 
 men were detailed to skirmish in the woods during the time of 
 service. Some of the ministers themselves, during these dangerous 
 times, carried their rifles to church, and set them in the pulpit whilst 
 they were preaching. 
 
 It was through many tribulations, extending over a period of half 
 a century, that the churches were planted, nurtured, and grew strong 
 in the region covered by these Synods. 
 
 PSALMODY. 
 
 It is interesting to inquire into the principles and practice of the 
 early Western Church on the question of Psalmody. There is noth- 
 ing on record by the Western Presbyteries or Synods to afford light 
 on the subject. But the action of the parent Synod is important. 
 An overture was brought into the Synod of New York and Philadel- 
 phia, in 1763, as to the propriety of singing "Dr. Watts' imitation 
 of David's Psalms." No specific answer was given, although the 
 Synod declared that it had "no objection to the use of said imita- 
 tion by such ministers and congregations as incline to use it, until 
 the matter of Psalmody be further considered." The matter passed 
 along with some attention until 1787, when the following action was 
 taken : "The Synod did allow, and hereby do allow, that Dr. Watts' 
 imitation of David's Psalms, as revised by Mr. Barlow, be sung in 
 the churches and families under their care." 
 
 They further declared that ' ' they are far from disapproving of 
 Rouse's Version, commonly called the Old Psalms, in those who 
 were in the use of them, and chose them;" discouraged harsh and 
 unchristian censures on either side, and exhorted "to be more ten- 
 der and charitable on these heads." At this meeting of Synod 
 the Presbytery of Redstone was represented by Findley, McMillan, 
 Power, and Barr, and this action no doubt reflected their sentiments. 
 
 The practice of the fathers most probably corresponded to this 
 action. At the first the probabilities are that Rouse's Version was 
 generally used, though in some congregations Watts' was used from 
 the first. In the congregations of Mr. Dodd, at Upper and Lower
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 223 
 
 Ten Mile, Watts' was used from the beginning. This was the case 
 in other congregations. 
 
 But there were other ministers and congregations where Rouse 
 was the only acknowledged Psalmody. Sometimes a compromise 
 was made. The service was commenced with an Old Psalm, and 
 concluded with Watts. One of the old ministers used Watts' in his 
 family, and at prayer meetings, until the way was opened for its use 
 in the church. Still, on the first occasion of giving out a Psalm 
 from the new book, an irate Milesian was so sorely grieved with the 
 impropriety of the proceeding, that he started from his seat, ap- 
 proached the pulpit, and threatened to drag the minister down by 
 the neck. 
 
 Good old Samuel Porter was sorely troubled over the matter. He 
 could not think of using anything but Rouse. Yet on one occasion, 
 hearing a strange congregation singing the hymn, 
 
 Let those refuse to sing, 
 Who never knew our God, 
 
 his warmth and ardor overcame his scruples, and he joined in with 
 them, declaring that if his conscience would not allow him to sing 
 such words he would wring its neck. 
 
 Apart from the matter of conscience, there was little difficulty in 
 introducing the new hymnology, as books were not generally ne- 
 cessary. The Psalm or Hymn was always lined out. Sometimes 
 one line was given out at a time, and sometimes two. This was 
 done by the clerk or leader of the music. 
 
 This clerk was an important officer, and in dignity and importance 
 second only to the minister himself. He occupied an elevated seat 
 just under the pulpit, and when the Psalm was announced, arose 
 and gave out the lines in a curious, half-singing tone, managing 
 to close on the precise key on which the tune was to be commenced. 
 
 The singing was primitive. At the first, all sang a single part, 
 called the "air." Gradually other parts were introduced the 
 " trible," the " counter," as they were called, and the bass. 
 
 The tunes were not numerous ; they could easily be acquired. 
 They were known as "The twelve tunes of David." Sometimes 
 the clerk had the notes of them copied in " buckwheat characters," 
 on the fly-leaves of his Psalm-book, and referred to them surrep-
 
 224 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 titiously, as the minister did to the notes hidden away in his pocket 
 Bible. 
 
 But the spirit of change came. Emigrants from New England 
 passed through the settlements, on their way to Ohio, some of whom 
 spent the winter. Some of these Eastern men were musicians, and 
 introduced new tunes ; especially a wonderful variety of tune called 
 the "Fugue." A peculiarity of these fugue tunes was, that after 
 the four parts had passed together over the first two lines of the 
 stanza, they separated, leading off one after the other, each singing 
 for itself, yet managing to come out together at the close. These 
 fancy tunes became immensely popular. 
 
 A favorite amongst them was "Sherburne," usually sung to the 
 Christmas Hymn : 
 
 " While shepherds watched their flocks by night, 
 
 All seated on the ground, 
 The angel of the Lord came down, 
 And glory shone around." 
 
 After singing the first two lines in the ordinarily staid manner, 
 the air would lead off, "The angel of the Lord;" the counter 
 would then take up the same line ; when it had advanced the same 
 distance, the tenor would strike in ; then the bass ; until the hearer 
 would be ready to suppose that all the angels on the plain of Beth- 
 lehem were singing, each on his own account, with the prospect of 
 being involved in inextricable confusion. Yet by judicious repeat- 
 ing on the part of those in advance, and hastening of those in the 
 rear, the parts all managed to come out exactly together. It was a 
 wonderful feat, however. 
 
 In process of time, as books multiplied and became common, the 
 matter of singing without lining out became important. In many 
 places the prejudices of the people were as strongly aroused against 
 this as against a New Testament Psalmody. They had become so 
 accustomed to lining out as to imagine that this was really a part of 
 divine worship. 
 
 Gradually, however, the change was made, that was eventually to 
 the satisfaction of the great majority of the worshipers. These 
 changes, however first, the adoption of the hymns of Watts, then 
 the dispensing with lining out resulted in the removal of many from
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 
 
 the Presbyterian Church, who preferred to go to other bodies, 
 where the old system of Psalmody was in use. 
 
 The clerk had duties of another kind to perform. These were 
 somewhat delicate in their nature, yet always discharged with 
 dignity and firmness. This was the public proclamation of the 
 bans of matrimony in the church, on three consecutive Sabbaths. 
 It was done in this form: "There is a purpose of matrimony be- 
 tween John Smith and Hannah Brown, of which this is the first 
 publication." The following Sabbath the formula was changed to 
 the second, and then the third publication, when it was supposed to 
 be proper for the marriage ceremony to take place. 
 
 Sometimes, during these publications, there was a visible smile 
 among the younger members of the congregation, but the whole 
 thing usually passed off with sobriety and decorum. 
 
 CHURCH EDIFICES. 
 
 The early church edifices were like the dwellings of the inhabi- 
 tants, extremely rude and simple. The houses were log cabins, the 
 churches log cabins of larger size. Many instances are recorded 
 where churches were built in a single day, and without the outlay 
 of a dollar. The first church building erected in Pittsburgh, was in 
 1786, of squared timber; but this was in the city, where style had 
 begun to manifest itself. In the country the plan was less preten- 
 tious. Trees were felled of the proper size, cut to the desired 
 length, notched at the corners, and laid up log upon log to the de- 
 sired height. For the gable ends, the ends of the logs were sloped 
 off, to give the proper inclination to the roof, and logs placed across 
 to receive the clapboards. Then clapboards were split out of 
 straight oak, placed in order on these logs, and kept in place by 
 \veight poles. The door and windows were then cut out, the floor 
 laid with puncheons split from straight logs, the door made from 
 the same, with wooden hinges and pins, and the windows filled with 
 oiled linen or paper. The seats were logs, split and elevated on 
 wooden legs ; the pulpit was arranged, and all was ready for wor- 
 ship. 
 
 In the Erie Presbytery, in Cool Spring congregation, such a
 
 226 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 church was built and fully completed between sunrise and sunset 
 of a single day. In this case, the stump of a large tree was selected 
 as the pulpit, and the church built around it. Two upright pun- 
 cheons, with a third across them, were arranged as a breast work 
 and support for the Bible. The minister's seat was arranged on the 
 other side of the stump, with the wall of the church for his support. 
 In some cases neither nail nor bit of sawed lumber was employed. 
 
 Where larger buildings were desired, the cruciform style was 
 adopted. Such a building really had twelve sides and the same 
 number of angles. There was nothing symbolical in these sides and 
 angles. It was merely a matter of convenience and strength. The 
 pulpit occupied the choir, and the congregation the nave and tran- 
 septs. The style of house that succeeded this was a building of 
 hewn logs, with glass windows and permanent seats. 
 
 In these primeval days, no provision was made for heating the 
 churches. During the severest weather in winter, the people came, 
 sat during the two long services, eating their biscuits, and shaking 
 hands with the minister during the recess, and then returned to their 
 homes. Occasionally an old foot stove, that had done duty in New 
 England, was filled with coals and brought to church. But this was 
 thought to be effeminate, and none but the aged women would 
 resort to it. In the first church on the Lake Shore, an old sugar 
 kettle was placed in the middle of the church, filled with charcoal, 
 and the coal kindled, sending its gases out with the heat, much to 
 the discomfiture of those who approached too near. 
 
 But there was a more primitive place of worship than even the 
 log cabin. It was the green wood itself. The grand old forest trees 
 lined its aisles, and the blue canopy of heaven formed its dome. 
 Even after the days of houses for worship, the forest sanctuary was 
 used in summer and on special occasions. A place was selected 
 with the underbrush removed. A tent, as it was called, was erected 
 for the ministers. This was simply a speaker's stand, with floor 
 elevated some four feet above the ground, with breastwork in front, 
 and seat in the rear. Far out from this, amid the forest trees, seats 
 were erected of round logs, having convenient aisles, the ground 
 ascending gently so as to command a view of the tent. 
 
 Such places were specially popular and desirable for the celebra- 
 tion of the Lord's Supper. At such times several of the neighboring
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 227 
 
 congregations joined, and the meeting was kept up for several 
 days. 
 
 But even in such places the cold and snow were not insuperable 
 difficulties in the way. At a sacrament held in the woods in Scrub- 
 grass Congregation, in -1803, snow fell on Sabbath night, but the 
 people came together, brushed the snow from the seats, and sat con- 
 tentedly, listening to the Word. To this meeting many persons 
 came from a distance of thirty miles. 
 
 When Cephas Dodd was installed at Ten Mile, the same year, the 
 services were held in Joseph Riggs' sugar camp. The snow lay 
 thickly on the ground, and the wind whistled through the leafless 
 trees, but the voices of the speakers and singers were heard above 
 all other sounds, and the people remained quietly until the solemn 
 services were over. 
 
 In those early days the services were usually tedious ; two long ser- 
 mons, with the Psalms lined out previous to singing, necessarily con- 
 sumed much time. There were no bells to summon the people. On 
 Sabbath morning, for die space of an hour, they would be assembling, 
 on horseback and on foot. Horses were tethered to trees. Women 
 who had walked bare-footed, sat down on logs and put on their 
 shoes as they came in 'sight of the meeting house. Those who came 
 early sat down in the shade and awaited the time of service. At the 
 proper time the minister was seen slowly entering the church, when 
 the congregation, as though by a common impulse, followed him, 
 and the service commenced. 
 
 The sacrament was the great occasion. It was announced through 
 the entire region of country. The services commenced on Thurs- 
 day. This was called the " fast day," and observed as the Sabbath. 
 Then on Saturday, the session met to receive candidates. All the 
 communicants then received "tokens," entitling them to the privi- 
 lege of communing on the following day. These "tokens" were 
 simple bits of lead with the initial letters of the name of the congre- 
 gation upon them, and were distributed by the pastor and elders to 
 all who expected to join in communion. For the accommodation 
 of strangers an elder was usually stationed near the door, or tent, on 
 Sabbath morning, with tokens in his hand. 
 
 On Sabbath morning the congregation was usually very large. On 
 such occasions several ministers were expected to be present. The
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 "action" sermon, as it was called, was usually preached by the pas 
 tor. Then followed a process called "fencing the tables." This 
 : was a tedious review of all the sins forbidden in the Ten Command- 
 ments, and, by inference at least, forbidding all from coming to the 
 table who had committed any of these sins-. 
 
 In those days literal tables were always present. Sometimes there 
 were accommodations for all present to partake at once ; if not, there 
 were two or more tables, just as circumstances might require. 
 
 After the long services of Sabbath, the meeting was usually con- 
 cluded on Monday. It was common for persons from a distance to 
 spend the evenings of Saturday and Sabbath in the congregation, 
 and many a house in near proximity to the church was literally 
 packed with guests ; and these guests expected to act the part of 
 hosts to their entertainers on some similar occasion. 
 
 Wonderful stories have come down to us of the power and elo- 
 quence of the old ministers, on some of these occasions. But the 
 circumstances of the times must be taken into consideration. There 
 were thinking people in the congregations, but their information was 
 limited, and the truths of the Gospel were most eagerly sought and 
 attentively received. 
 
 SYNOD OF PITTSBURGH. 
 
 The first Synod in ' the West was erected by the General Assem- 
 bly, in May, 1802. The act recites " that the Presbyteries of Red- 
 stone, Ohio, and Erie, be constituted a Synod, to be known by the 
 name of the Synod of Pittsburgh, and that they hold their first meet- 
 ing in the Presbyterian Church, in Pittsburgh, on the last Wednes- 
 day of September next." The Synod met on the 29th of September, 
 1802, and was opened with a sermon by Rev. John McMillan. 
 There were present twenty-nine ministers and sixteen elders. 
 Seven ministers were absent. Rev. Jacob Jennings was elected 
 moderator, and James Hughes and David Smith, clerks. 
 
 At this first meeting, the Presbyteries made the following report : 
 
 The Presbytery of Redstone consists of eleven ordained ministers : 
 
 James Power, pastor of Mt. Pleasant; Joseph Henderson, pastor 
 
 of Ebenezer, and Black Lick ; James Dunlap, pastor of Laurel Hill ; 
 
 ' Jacob Jennings, pastor of Dunlap's Creek and Little Redstone ;
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 229 
 
 John McPherrin, pastor of Salem; Samuel Porter, pastor of Con- 
 gruity ; George Hill, pastor of Fairfield and Donegal ; Wm. Swan, 
 pastor of Long Run and Sewickley ; David Smith, pastor of Round 
 Hill and Rehoboth ; James Adams, pastor of George's Creek and 
 Union ; Francis Laird, pastor of Poke Run and Plum Creek. 
 
 Vacant congregations, able to support a minister : Pittsburgh, 
 Greensburgh and Unity, Pitt Township and McKeesport, Mor- 
 gantown and Middletown. Unable : New Providence, Uniontown, 
 Tyrone, Sandy Creek, Crossings, Clarksburgh, Tygert's Valley, 
 Somerset, Turkey Foot, Wheatfield, and Stony Creek. 
 
 The Presbytery of Ohio reported that they consisted of sixteen 
 ordained ministers : John McMillan, pastor of Chartiers ; Joseph 
 Patterson, pastor of Raccoon ; James Hughes, pastor of Lower 
 Buffalo and Short Creek ; John Brice, pastor of Three Ridges and 
 Wheeling ; Thomas Marquis, pastor of Cross Creek ; Thomas 
 Moore, pastor of Ten Mile ; Samuel Ralston, pastor of Horseshoe 
 Bottom and Mingo Creek ; Wm. Woods, pastor of Bethel and 
 Lebanon ; George M. Scott, pastor of Mill Creek and the Flats ; John 
 Anderson, pastor of Upper Buffalo ; Andrew 'Guinn, pastor of 
 Pigeon Creek and Poke Run ; John Watson, pastor of Miller's Run ; 
 Joseph Anderson, pastor of Richland and Short Creek ; John Mc- 
 Clane, pastor of Montours ; Elisha Macurdy, pastor of Cross 
 Roads and Three Springs ; James Snodgrass, pastor of Steubenville 
 and Island Creek. 
 
 Vacant congregations, able to support a minister : Washington, 
 New Lancaster, and Rush Creek. Not yet able : Jefferson, Waynes- 
 burg, Charleston, Grave Creek, Yellow Creek, and Long Run. 
 
 The Presbytery of Erie reported that they consisted of nine or- 
 dained ministers : Thomas Edgar Hughes, pastor of Mount Pleasant 
 and New Salem ; William Wick, pastor of Hopewell and Youngs- 
 town ; Samuel Tait, pastor of Mercer and Upper Salem ; Joseph 
 Stockton, pastor of Meadville and Sugar Creek ; Robert Lee, pas- 
 tor of Amity and Big Spring ; James Satterfield, pastor of Moor- 
 field and Upper Neshannock : William Wylie, pastor of Fairfield, 
 Upper and Lower Sandy ; John Boyd, pastor of Union and Slate 
 Lick ; Abraham Boyd, pastor of Bull Creek and Middlesex. 
 
 Vacancies, able to support a minister : Slippery Rock and Lower 
 Neshannock, Westfield and Poland, Upper and Lower Greenfield,
 
 sjo PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Scrubgrass and Bear Creek. Unable to support a minister : War- 
 ren, Breakneck, Thorn's Tent, Franklin, Concord, Big Sugar Creek, 
 Oil Creek, Gravel Run, Middlebrook, Power's Mills, Crossings of 
 Cussawaga, and Pymatuning. 
 
 Two important matters occupied the attention of the Synod at its 
 first meeting the organization of the " Western Missionary So- 
 ciety," and the establishment of a magazine. For the latter no less 
 than twelve editors were appointed. The magazine was established, 
 and continued in existence several years. It was called The 
 Western Missionary Magazine, and was the repository of much 
 valuable matter pertaining to the missionary work of the Synod. 
 In 1807 the editors reported that the profits of the magazine had 
 amounted to $334.32. 
 
 In 1808 two new Presbyteries were erected Hartford (after- 
 wards changed to Beaver) and Lancaster, in Ohio. The former was 
 arranged with the following boundaries : ' ' Beginning at the mouth 
 of Big Beaver Creek ; thence up said Creek and up Neshannock to 
 the mouth of Little Branch; thence northerly to the mouth of 
 Walnut Creek, on. Lake Erie; thence along the lake to the west 
 line of New Connecticut ; thence to the southwest corner of the 
 Connecticut Reserve ; thence east along the South line of the Con- 
 necticut reserve to the Tuscarawas branch of the Muskingum river ; 
 thence in a direct line to the Ohio river at the mouth of Yellow 
 creek; thence up the Ohio river to the place of beginning." 
 
 At the next meeting of Synod the new Presbytery reported as 
 follows : Thomas Edgar Hughes at Mount Pleasant ; William Wick 
 at Hopewell and Youngstown, Ohio ; James Satterfield at Moorfield 
 and Neshannock ; Nicholas Pittinger at Poland, Ohio ; Benjamin 
 Boyd at Beulah, Trumbull, and Pymatuning ; Clement Vallanding- 
 ham at New Lisbon and Long's Run ; Johnston Eaton at Fairview 
 and Springfield ; James Boyd at Warren and Newton, Ohio ; Joseph 
 Badger, Jonathan Leslie, and Joshua Beer, without charge. 
 
 Vacant congregations, able to support a minister : Vernon, 
 Vienna, Brookfield, Hubbardville, and Richfield. 
 
 Unable to support a minister : Salem, Beavertown, Cleveland, 
 Hudson, Tallmage, Springfield, Burton, Canfield, Westfield, and 
 Newcastle. 
 
 Three of these ministers had been added since the Presbytery
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 231 
 
 was erected, viz., Messrs. Leslie, Beer, and James Boyd. This 
 last was one of a ministerial family; no less than four of the 
 brothers were ministers of the Gospel, and all did good service in 
 the work to which they were called. 
 
 ROBERT PATTERSON 
 
 was one of the early ministers on the shores of Lake Erie. He was 
 ordained on the ist day of September, 1803, and did good service 
 in that new region. The field was new and promising, and he 
 accomplished much, both as a pastor and missionary. He was 
 born at Stilhvater, N. Y., April i, 1773; died near Pittsburgh, 
 Pa., September 5, 1854. He was the son of Rev. Joseph Patterson. 
 
 JOHNSTON EATON 
 
 was settled on the Lake Shore, at Fairview and Springfield. Of the 
 former charge he was pastor from 1808 to his death, June 17, 1847, 
 He was stated supply of the First Church, Erie, for five years. Born 
 at Franklin county, Pa., February 7, 1776; graduated at Jefferson 
 College, 1802 ; licensed by Ohio Presbytery, August 22, 1805 ; or- 
 dained June 30, 1808. 
 
 CLEMENT VALLANDINGHAM 
 
 was born in Allegheny county, Pa., March 7, 1778; graduated at 
 Jefferson College in 1808 ; studied with Dr. McMillan ; licensed by 
 Ohio Presbytery, June 25, 1806; ordained and installed as pastor 
 at New Lisbon, Ohio, June 24, 1807. He was pastor there until his 
 death, October 21, 1839. 
 
 ROBERT JOHNSTON 
 
 was of English extraction, being a lineal descendant of Oliver Crom- 
 well; born August 7, 1774; educated at Canonsburg Academy 
 and Dr. McMillan's log cabin ; licensed by Ohio Presbytery, April 
 22, 1802 ; ordained by Erie Presbytery, October 19, 1803, and 
 settled at Scrubgrass, Venango county, Pa. In 1811 removed to 
 Meadville, Pa., until 1817 ; at Round Hill and Rehoboth until 1822 ; 
 at Bethel ten years. He died May 20, 1861, in the eighty-seventh 
 year of his age. Mr. Johnston was a successful pastor and an 
 ardent Christian. He was the father of Rev. J. W. Johnston, of the 
 Presbytery of Shenango.
 
 232 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 PHILIP JACKSON 
 
 the famous " praying elder " of Elisha Macurdy, did good service 
 in the church. He accompanied Macurdy on some of his preaching 
 tours as far as Lake Erie. (See Religious History, p. 57.) 
 
 JOSEPH SMITH 
 
 was another elder who might have received the same cognomen, for 
 he was .a mighty man of prayer. He was one of Mr. Tait's elders 
 at Mercer, Pa. When over forty years of age, a plain mechanic, 
 and with little assistance, he learned the Hebrew language, so as 
 to use the Hebrew Bible for his devotional reading for the remain- 
 der of his life. He was the father of Rev. Jos. T. Smith, D.D., of 
 Baltimore. 
 
 PRESBYTERY OF LANCASTER. 
 
 The Presbytery of Lancaster was erected with the following 
 boundaries : " On the West by the line of the Kentucky Synod, on 
 the South by the Ohio river, on the East and North by the West 
 line of the seven ranges, and the line of the Hartford Presbytery ; 
 including Rev. Messrs. Stephen Lindley, Jacob Lindley, John 
 Wright, James Robinson, and James Scott. They were to meet at 
 Lancaster, Ohio, on the first Wednesday of April, 1809. Stephen 
 Lindley was to preside. In 1810 they reported two additional 
 ministers George Vaneman and William Jones, with sixteen con- 
 gregations. 
 
 In the older presbyteries a number of valuable ministers had 
 entered on the Lord's work. New congregations were organized; 
 the older settlements, and the tide of emigration was setting 
 strongly in the direction of Lake Erie and Central Ohio. Much 
 prosperity attended the labor of pastors in their own immediate 
 fields, and also in the missionary work in which they were largely 
 engaged in the regions beyond. 
 
 PITTSBURGH. 
 
 Pittsburgh, the great centre of influence in the region we are con- 
 sidering, was not at the first the most promising field of labor. After 
 Mr. Beatty's visits in 1758 and 1766, Mr. Jos. Smith was sent by the
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 233 
 
 Presbytery of Ohio to preach there in August, 1784. A few months 
 after this, Arthur Lee, of Virginia, speaks of the place in rather a 
 hopeless way during a visit there : " There are in the town four 
 attorneys, two doctors, and not a priest of any persuasion, nor 
 church, nor chapel ; so that they are likely to be damned without 
 the benefit of clergy." 
 
 > In 1785, Rev. Samuel Barr came here to preach, and was recog- 
 nized by Presbytery without any formal installation. About the 
 same time a church was organized, and a small log-house erected 
 for a house of worship. Mr. Barr remained until June, 1789. For 
 the next ten years they were dependent on supplies. In June, 1799, 
 Rev. Robert Steele, from Ireland, began to supply the church. He 
 had many difficulties. He could not for a time satisfy the Presby- 
 tery of his fitness for the work, and there were grave dissensions 
 amongst the people. Finally, in 1802, he was received as a mem- 
 ber of Presbytery, and a call placed in his hands from the congre- 
 gation of Pittsburgh, when, without farther action, he was recognized 
 as pastor. He continued to labor with them until his death, March 
 22, 1810. 
 The next pastor was 
 
 FRANCIS HERRON, D.D. 
 
 He accepted the call from the congregation in June, 1811, and 
 continued the pastor until 1850, when at his own request he was 
 released from his pastoral charge. His was a very successful pas- 
 torate. The gloom and discouragement that had prevailed were 
 removed, and great prosperity followed. Francis Herron 
 was born near Shippensburg, Pa., June 28, 1774; graduated at 
 Dickenson College, in 1794; licensed by Carlisle Presbytery, Oc- 
 tober 4, 1797 ; ordained by the same, April 9, 1800, and settled as 
 pastor of Rocky Spring Church. His life work was in Pittsburgh, 
 where his memory will long be precious. He died December 6, 
 1 860, aged eighty-six years. The second church was organized about 
 the year 1804; Nathaniel R. Snowden was pastor in 1805. John 
 Boggs became pastor, December 3, 1807, and was dismissed April 
 20, 1808. Thomas Hunt succeeded him, December 26, 1809; dis- 
 missed, July i, 1818. He was succeeded by E. P. Swift, D.D., in 
 November, 1819; dismissed March i, 1833. Robert Dunlap fol- 
 lowed, succeeded by Rev. W. D. Howard, D.D.
 
 234 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 The church of Washington was organized in 1793. The first 
 pastor was Rev. Matthew Brown, D.D., from 1805 to 1822. The 
 second was Rev. Obadiah Jennings, D.D., from 1823 to 1828. 
 The third was Rev. David Elliott, D.D., from 1829 to 1836. Then 
 followed Rev. D. Deruelle, Rev. James Smith, D.D., Rev. W. C. 
 Anderson, D.D., Rev. J. B. Pinney, LL.D., the present pastor, 
 Rev. J. I. Brownson, D.D., who commenced his labors in 1849. 
 
 In 1814, the Synod of Ohio was erected by the General Assem- 
 bly, detaching the Presbytery of Lancaster from the Synod of Pitts- 
 burgh, thus reducing its boundaries. 
 
 PRESBYTERY OF GRAND RIVER. 
 
 In the same year a new Presbytery was erected from the territory 
 of the Presbytery of Hartford, called Grand River, including Rev. 
 Messrs. Joseph Badger, Jonathan Leslie, Giles H. Cowles, and 
 Thomas Barr. The new Presbytery was to meet at Euclid, Ohio, 
 and Joseph Badger to preside. The next year they reported five 
 ministers and fifteen churches. 
 
 In 1818 Grand River Presbytery was divided, forming the Presby- 
 tery of Portage, embracing Rev. Messrs. Thomas Barr, Caleb Pitkin, 
 John Seward, Simeon Woodruff, Wm. Hanford, Joseph Treat, and 
 Alvin Coe. The new Presbytery met at Hudson, Ohio, on the 
 second Thursday of December, 1818, Thomas Barr presiding. The 
 next year they reported eight ministers, and twenty-eight congre- 
 gations. 
 
 PRESBYTERY OF STEUBENVILLE. 
 
 In 1819 two new presbyteries were erected from the- old territory 
 of Synod. 
 
 It was resolved by Synod, that so much of the Presbytery of Ohio 
 as lies on the northwest side of the river Ohio, including Rev. 
 Messrs. Lyman Potter, Joseph Anderson, Abraham Scott, James 
 Snodgrass, John Rhea, Thomas Hunt, Thomas B. Clark, and 
 Obadiah Jennings, with their respective charges, be formed into a 
 separate Presbytery, to be known as the Presbytery of Steubenville. 
 They were to meet at Steubenville, on the fourth Wednesday of 
 October, 1819, Lyman Potter presiding.
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 2jj 
 
 At the next meeting of Synod they reported Lyman Potter and 
 Abraham Scott without charges ; Joseph Anderson at Richland and 
 Short Creek; James Snodgrass at Island Creek; John Rhea at 
 Beech Spring; Thomas Hunt at Two Ridges, and Obadiah Jen- 
 nings at Steubenville. 
 
 .Vacant congregations, able to support a pastor: Crab Apple, 
 Westport and Nottingham ; unable, Centre and Cadiz. 
 
 Of these ministers, Lyman Potter was advanced in years when 
 the Presbytery was organized. He was a missionary and colporteur, 
 and did good service in this work. He died May 17, 1827, in the 
 eightieth year of his age. 
 
 JAMES SNODGRASS 
 
 began to labor at Steubenville and Island Creek, in 1800. He left 
 that field in 1816. He was afterwards in Richland Presbytery. 
 
 JOHN RHEA, D.D., 
 
 of Beech Spring, had the reputation amongst his brethren of being 
 an able theologian and an effective preacher. He was grave, yet 
 pleasant in manner, pure in heart, and earnest in life. 
 
 OBADIAH JENNINGS, D.D., 
 
 was born in New Jersey, December 13, 1778; educated at Canons- 
 burg; admitted to the bar in 1800; licensed to preach in 1816; 
 pastor of the First Church, Steubenville, for six years ; pastor of the 
 Church of Washington, from 1823 to 1828; pastor at Nashville, 
 Tenn. Died, January 12, 1832. 
 
 Rev. C. C. Beatty, D.D., says, in relation to Steubenville Pres- 
 bytery : ' ' There was preaching to the settlements on this side the 
 Ohio River, by different ministers, as early as 17989. The Lord's 
 Supper was administered by Dr. McMillan at Little Short Creek, 
 and by Rev. James Hughes on the River Hills, about five miles 
 north of Steubenville. The congregations of Short Creek (after- 
 wards Mount Pleasant), Richland (afterwards St. Clairsville), were 
 gathered by Joseph Anderson in 1799, and he continued their 
 pastor for nearly thirty years." 
 
 Rev. James Snodgrass began to preach at Steubenville and 
 Island Creek in 1800, continuing with the former about fifteen 
 years, and with the latter nearly ten years. The congregation of
 
 2 3 b PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Cross Roads (afterwards Crab Apple) was gathered by Mr. Ander- 
 son early in this century, and Beech Spring about 1803, over both 
 which Dr. Rhea was settled in 1804, and continued with them as 
 pastor upwards of forty years. Cedar Lick (now Two Ridges) 
 was established by Mr. Snodgrass, who ministered to it one fifth of 
 his time. A few years subsequently, it and Richmond (now 
 Bacon's Ridge) came under the pastoral care of Rev. Wm. McMil- 
 lan. These were the first charges on the western side of the Ohio 
 River, in what is now Steubenville Presbytery. 
 
 WASHINGTON. 
 
 The Presbytery of Washington was to include so much f the 
 Presbytery of Ohio as lay between the Ohio River and the road 
 leading from Georgetown to Washington and Waynesburgh, thence 
 South to the boundary line of Synod, including Rev. Messrs. 
 Thomas Marquis, Geo. M. Scott, Elisha Macurdy, John Anderson, 
 Cephas Dodd, Joseph Stephenson, James Hervey, Andrew Wylie, 
 and Thomas Hoge, with their respective charges. They were to 
 meet at Three Ridges on the third Tuesday of October, Thomas 
 Marquis presiding. At the following meeting of Synod they 
 reported ten ministers and nineteen churches : Thomas Marquis 
 at Cross Creek, George M. Scott at Millcreek and Flats, John 
 Anderson at Upper Buffalo, Elisha Macurdy at Cross Roads and 
 Three Springs, Cephas Dodd at Lower Ten Mile, Joseph Steven- 
 son at Three Ridges, James Hervey at Forks of Wheeling and 
 Wheelingtown, Jacob Cozad at Lower Buffalo, and Andrew Wylie, 
 President of Washington College. 
 
 Vacant churches : Upper Ten Mile, West Liberty, Unity, 
 Charleston and Waynesburgh. 
 
 JOSEPH STEVENSON 
 
 was born near Harper's Ferry, March 25, 1779 ; studied at Jeffer- 
 son College, and with Thomas Marquis ; licensed by Washington 
 Presbytery, October 18, 1808; ordained by the same, June, 1809, 
 and settled as pastor of Two Ridges and Forks of Wheeling, until 
 1825; removed to Bellefontaine, Ohio, where he labored until set 
 aside by infirmity. He died February 24, 1865, in the eighty- 
 sixth year of his age. He was the father of Dr. Jno. M. Stevenson, 
 of the American Tract Society.
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 237 
 
 JAMES HERVEY, D.D., 
 
 was born in Brooke county, Va., August 13, 1782; graduated at 
 Jefferson ; licensed by the Ohio Presbytery, and ordained and 
 settled as pastor of Forks of Wheeling and Wheeling. He was 
 pastor of the former church until his death, September 13, 1859. 
 He was everywhere regarded as an humble, godly, consistent mini- 
 ster of Christ. 
 
 WILLIAM SPEER 
 
 was a native of Adams county, Pa. ; a graduate of Dickinson Col- 
 lege; licensed by the Presbytery of Carlisle, June 22, 1791. He 
 became a member of the Presbytery of Redstone in 1803, and 
 accepted calls to Greensburgh and Unity. He labored here until 
 his death, April 26, 1829. He was grandfather of Rev. Dr; Speer 
 of the Board of Education. 
 
 TEMPERANCE. 
 
 In the present state of public opinion, it is interesting to inquire 
 as to the views and practices of the early Western Church as to 
 temperance. There is not much that is encouraging in the early 
 history. Grain was plenty, the market was dull, and the almost 
 universal practice was to condense it into the form of whiskey. 
 Three-quarters of a century ago, every third or fourth farm through- 
 out the counties of Washington, Fayette, Westmoreland, and 
 Allegheny, had a distillery. The result was, the people drank, the 
 elders drank, the ministers drank. It was thought to be a necessary 
 beverage. In the winter the people thought it kept out the cold ; 
 in the summer they imagined it moderated the heat ; in wet weather 
 it was supposed to prevent colds ; and in sickly seasons it was believed 
 to prevent diseases. 
 
 But there is this much to be said in their favor : they manufac- 
 tured whiskey, not a miserable compound of strychnine and slops, 
 that poisoned, and crazed, and eat out the system. 
 
 So they used whiskey freely at births, at marriages, at funerals, on 
 all festive occasions. 
 
 Notwithstanding, the testimony does not indicate that drunken- 
 ness was the vice of the times. It is true the Whiskey Insurrection 
 occurred in the bounds of the Redstone Presbytery, but this arose,
 
 2 3 8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 not from the love of the people for the article, but from a mistaken 
 notion that their rights were invaded. 
 
 Yet with all this, it can only be said in the Apostle's language : 
 " The times of this ignorance God winked at ; but now commandeth 
 all men everywhere to repent." 
 
 In 1814 the Presbytery of Erie inaugurated a new movement in 
 the matter in the following words : ' ' Presbytery taking into view 
 the pernicious effects of ardent spirits on the peace and good morals 
 of society, and the necessity of testifying by example as well as pre- 
 cept against the common and excessive use of them at public meet- 
 ings and social visits : Resolved, to make no use of them at their 
 various ecclesiastical meetings." 
 
 Two years afterwards, the same Presbytery enjoins upon its 
 ministers to bear public, testimony against the vice of drunkenness. 
 In 1829, the Presbytery resolved itself into a temperance society, 
 on the principle of " rigid and entire abstinence from the use of ar- 
 dent spirits, except for medicinal purposes." 
 
 The Synod of Pittsburgh took very decided action in 1816. 
 After enumerating many of the evils of whiskey-drinking, it was 
 " Resolved, that ardent spirits ought never to be used except as a 
 medicine, . . . that the habitual use of it in families, and by 
 laborers, is training up thousands for poverty, disgrace, the prison, 
 the gallows, and eternal misery." 
 
 From this onward the testimony grows stronger and stronger, 
 until the Synod plants itself firmly on the principle of total absti- 
 nence. 
 
 ALLEGHENY. 
 
 At the beginning of the century the site of Allegheny City was a 
 wilderness. In 1812 a few settlers had made inroads upon the forest, 
 and had builded their cabins. Notice is called to the fact in the 
 minutes of the Presbytery of Erie, in April of that year, in the fol- 
 lowing words : " An indigent and needy neighborhood, situated 
 on the Allegheny, opposite Pittsburgh, having applied for sup- 
 plies," the matter was laid before the Presbytery. 
 
 Joseph Stockton seems to have been the first stated minister, 
 preaching a part of his time there until 1819. Afterwards John
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 2j 9 
 
 Joyce, and after him Job F. Halsey, preached until 1835. ^ was 
 not, however, until February, 1830, that the first Presbyterian 
 Church was organized. It embraced fifty-four members. E. P. 
 Swift, D.D., was called to the pastorate in 1835. He continued 
 with the church until his death. 
 
 ELISHA POPE SWIFT, D.D., 
 
 was born in Williamstown, Mass., April 12, 1792. On his mother's 
 side he was descended from Rev. John Eliot, the "Apostle of the 
 Indians." Graduated at Williams College 1813 ; theology at Prince- 
 ton; licensed by New Brunswick Presbytery, April 24, 1816; or- 
 dained as a Foreign Missionary, September 3, 1817. Prevented, 
 providentially, from entering upon Foreign Missionary work, he 
 was settled at Pittsburgh in 1819, in Allegheny City in 1835. He 
 died April 3, 1865, in the seventy-third year of his age. 
 
 Dr. Swift was majestic in person, towering in intellect, kind and 
 tender in heart, and gave himself wholly to the work of the Lord. 
 Two of his sons are in the ministry of the church. 
 
 ASHBEL GREEN FAIRCHILD, D.D., 
 
 was born at Hanover, New Jersey, May ist, 1795. He graduated at 
 Princeton in 1813, and finished his theological studies at the same 
 place. He was licensed to preach the Gospel by the Presbytery of 
 Jersey in April, 1816; ordained as an Evangelist by the Presbytery 
 of Redstone, July i, 1818 ; and installed as Pastor of George's Creek, 
 Morgantown and Greensboro, July 2, 1822, with a salary of three 
 hundred and thirty-three dollars. In 1827 he resigned the charge 
 of Morgantown and Greensboro, and was installed over Tent. He 
 died June 30, 1864. He was author of " Great Supper, " "Bap- 
 tism," " Unpopular Doctrines," "What Presbyterians Believe." 
 
 PRESBYTERY OF ALLEGHENY. 
 
 In the year 1820. the Presbyfery of Allegheny was erected from 
 the territory of Erie Presbytery. Its boundaries included so much 
 of said Erie Presbytery as lies south of the line commencing at the 
 mouth of Little Neshannock: thence up Big Neshannock to the 
 mouth of Yellow Creek ; thence up Yellow Creek to Hosack's Mill ;
 
 240 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 thence along the Mercer road to Franklin ; north of Franklin to the 
 mouth of French Creek ; thence up the Allegheny river to the State 
 line ; embracing Rev. Messrs. John McPherrin, Abraham Boyd, 
 Robert McGarraugh, Cyrus Riggs, Reed Bracken, John Redick, 
 and John Munson, with their respective charges. They met at 
 Butler, John McPherrin presiding, on the first Tuesday of April, 
 1820. 
 
 At the next meeting of Synod they reported : John McPherrin at 
 Butler and Concord ; Abraham Boyd at Bull Creek and Deer Creek ; 
 Alex. Cook at Ebenezer and Bear Creek ; Robert McGarraugh at 
 Rehoboth and Licking ; Cyrus Riggs at Scrubgrass and Unity ; 
 Reid Bracken at Nebo and Middlesex ; John Redick at Slate Lick 
 and Union ; John Munson at Plain Grove and Centre. 
 
 Vacant congregations, unable to support a pastor: Franklin. 
 Amity, Richland and Redbank. 
 
 In 1822 some important changes were made in the boundaries of 
 the Presbytery. All that portion of the Presbytery of Redstone 
 situated north and west of the Ohio and Allegheny rivers, was at- 
 tached to Ohio Presbytery. This territory embraced Rev. Messrs. 
 John Andrews, Francis Herron, Joseph Stockton, Robert Patterson, 
 and E. P. Swift. 
 
 In 1825 the Synod of Western Reserve was erected by the 
 General Assembly from the territory of this Synod, embracing the 
 Presbyteries of Grand River, Portage and Huron. 
 
 In 1830 the Presbytery of Blairsville was erected from the terri- 
 tory of Redstone, embracing the ministers and congregations north 
 of the Pittsburgh and Stoystown turnpike, viz. : Rev. Messrs. J. W. 
 Henderson, Francis Laird, David Barclay, James Graham, John 
 Reed, Samuel Swan, Jesse Smith, Thomas Davis, John H. Kirk- 
 patrick, Samuel McFarren, Elisha D. Barrett, James Campbell, and 
 Watson Hughes, with their respective charges. The new Presby- 
 tery held its first meeting at Ebenezer, Francis Laird presiding. 
 
 At the next meeting of Synod, this Presbytery reported thirteen 
 ministers, and twenty-four congre'gations, of which four were va- 
 cant. 
 
 In 1833 the name of Hartford Presbytery was changed to Beaver, 
 as the town of Hartford, after which it had been called, was no 
 ionger within its bounds.
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.- 241 
 
 THE SYNOD OF OHIO 
 
 was erected by an act of the General Assembly of 1814, on petition 
 of the Presbytery of Lancaster and Synod of Kentucky. The act 
 was in these words : " That the Presbytery of Lancaster be separated 
 from the Synod of Pittsburgh, and the Presbyteries of Washington 
 and Miami be separated from the Synod of Kentucky, and be erected 
 into a new Synod, to be known and called by the name of the Synod 
 of Ohio ; to meet at Chillicothe on the last Thursday of October 
 next, and that Rev. Robert G. Wilson, or in case of his absence, 
 the senior minister present, open the Synod with a sermon, and 
 preside until a new Moderator be chosen." 
 
 At the time appointed there were present at the new Synod, 
 from the Presbytery of Lancaster : Thomas Moore, without charge ; 
 Stephen Lindley, pastor at Marietta; Jacob Lindley, S. S. at 
 Athens ; John Wright, pastor at Hocking and Rush Creek ; John 
 Robinson, pastor at Mt. Pleasant ; James Scott, pastor at Ebenezer, 
 Clinton, and Frederic; James Cunningham, pastor at Salem and 
 Fearing ; William Jones, pastor at Circleville and Walnut Plains ; 
 Joseph S. Hughes, pastor at Delaware and Liberty ; and James Cul- 
 bertson, pastor at Zanesville and Springfield. 
 
 Vacant congregations, able to support a pastor : Waterford, 
 Newark and Concord, Worthington, Union and Washington, 
 Clear Creek, Amanda. Unable to support a pastor : Portsmouth, 
 Gallipolis, Unity, Leading Creek, Berkshire, Licking, High Bank, 
 Mansfield, and Wakatomaka. 
 
 From the Presbytery of Washington : R. G. Wilson, at Chillicothe ; 
 William Williamson, at W. Union, Manchester, and Cabin Creek ; 
 James Gilleland, at Red Oak ; Robert Wilson, S. S: at Washington 
 and Germantown, Kentucky; John Boyd, S. S. at Short Creek 
 and White Oak; Nicholas Pittenger, at Nazareth, Rocky Spring, 
 and Newmarket ; Robert B. Dobbins, at Smyrna and Williams- 
 burgh ; James Hoge, at Franklinton, now Columbus ; Samuel Woods, 
 at Liberty ; James H. Dickey, at Buckskin, Concord, and Pisgah ; 
 John Andrews, Samuel Baldridge, and Johh P. Campbell. 
 
 Vacant Churches : Hopewell and Alexandria ; Big Bottom ; 
 Washington, Ohio; Oak Run and Todd's Fork; Harmony and 
 Union, and Bethel. 
 Q
 
 242 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 From the Presbytery of Miami : James Welsh, at- Dayton ; Wil- 
 liam Robinson ; M. S. Wallace, at Hamilton, Seven Mile, and 
 Dick's Creek ; Joshua L. Wilson, at Cincinnati ; Daniel Hayden, at 
 Duck Creek and Hopewell ; John Thompson, at Springfield and 
 Unity. 
 
 Vacant Churches: Bath, Lebanon and Yellow Spring, Honey 
 Creek and Mackacheek, Washington and Troy, New Lexington and 
 New Jersey, Brookville and Whitewater. 
 
 In 1817 a petition was received from members of the Presbytery 
 of Lancaster requesting a division of that Presbytery. Accordingly 
 a new Presbytery was erected, called the Presbytery of Richland, 
 composed of the following members : James Adams, James Scott, 
 James Cunningham, George Van Eman, William Matthews, Ebe- 
 nezer Washburne, and Joseph S. Hughes. Many of these brethren 
 attained to great usefulness and eminence in the church. 
 
 JAMES HOGE, D.D., 
 
 was the son of Rev. Moses Hoge, D.D. Was born in Moorfield, 
 Virginia, in 1784. Licensed to preach the Gospel by Lexington 
 Presbytery, April 17, 1805. Ordained by Washington Presbytery, 
 June n, 1808, and settled as pastor of Franklinton, Ohio, now 
 First Church, Columbus. Of this church he was pastor until Feb- 
 ruary 28, 1858, when he was released from his charge. He died 
 September 22, 1863. Dr. Hoge was one of the great men of the 
 Synod of Ohio. His influence was great in the Synod and in the 
 General Assembly. With Drs. Rice and Lord, he was for some time 
 a professor in a theological seminary in Cincinnati. The First 
 Church of Columbus was the first of any denomination organized in 
 that part of the State. This organization took place February 8, 
 1806. The first edifice was a log cabin, 25x30 feet. A new build- 
 ing was erected in 1830. 
 
 JOHN WRIGHT 
 
 was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, 1777. Graduated 
 at Dickinson College. Studied theology with Dr. Power and David 
 Smith. Licensed by Redstone Presbytery, October, 1800. In 1806 
 settled at Lancaster and Rush Creek, O., where he labored for nearly 
 thirty years. In 1832 he retired from the active duties of the minis-
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 243 
 
 try. He died at the house of his son, Rev. E. W. Wright, at 
 Delphi, Indiana, August 31, 1854. 
 
 JAMES CULBERTSON 
 
 was born in Rocky Spring congregation, Franklin county, Pa., in 
 1785. He was licensed by the Presbytery of Carlisle, and in Au- 
 gust, 1812, commenced his life-labors in Zanesville, Ohio. The 
 congregation was weak, and without a house of worship, yet he set 
 forward with zeal and hope. He was ordained December 24, 1812. 
 He died February, 1847, a f ter having been pastor of the church for 
 thirty^ve years, 
 
 JOSEPH SMITH HUGHES, 
 
 the grandson of Joseph Smith, of Redstone Presbytery, and son of 
 Rev. James Hughes, President of Miami University, commenced his 
 studies at Greersburg Academy, in Beaver county, Pa., and was 
 licensed to preach and commenced his labors as first pastor of Dela- 
 ware, Ohio, November n, 1810, where he labored until his death, 
 in 1823. He was Recorder for Delaware county. His disposition 
 was genial, his popularity unbounded among the people, and his 
 preaching very acceptable. 
 
 JOSHUA L. WILSON, D.D., 
 
 was a Virginian, born in Bedford county, September 22, 1774. 
 The family library consisted of a Bible, Watts' Hymns, and the 
 Shorter Catechism. He studied privately, and was licensed to 
 preach in 1802 ; ordained 1804. He was settled first in Kentucky. 
 In 1808 he became pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Cincin- 
 nati, where he continued for thirty -eight years, until his death. He 
 died on the i4th of August, 1846. He was a man of more than 
 ordinary talent and- of great influence in the Church. He had a 
 fine, stately form, with a bright, intellectual face. 
 
 DANIEL HAYDEN 
 
 was from Western Pennsylvania; born April, 1781; graduated at 
 Jefferson College 1805; licensed by Erie Presbytery October 20, 
 1808; settled over Pleasant Ridge Church, in the Presbytery of 
 Miami, in 1809; died August 27, 1835, aged fifty-four.
 
 244 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ROBERT G. WILSON, D.D., 
 
 was the first minister at Chillicothe, Ohio. He was born in North 
 Carolina, December 30, 1768; graduated at Dickinson College in 
 1 790 ; licensed by the Presbytery of South Carolina, April 16, i 793 ; 
 ordained May 22, 1794, as pastor of two churches in his native 
 State. It 1805 he accepted the call of the church at Chillicothe, 
 then recently organized, with a salary of $400. In 1824 he resigned 
 his charge, at the advice of Presbytery, to accept the Presidency of 
 the Ohio University. This office he resigned in 1829, and returned 
 to Chillicothe. He died on the i7th of April, 1851, in the eighty- 
 third year of his age. He did a good work for Presbyterianism in 
 Ohio, and has left an impression that will not soon be effaced. 
 
 In 1821 the Synod resolved to make a reorganization of the 
 Presbyteries. This new division resulted in the organization of 
 seven Presbyteries : Cincinnati, Miami, Columbus, Chillicothe, 
 Athens, Lancaster, and Richland. 
 
 In 1824, ten years after its erection, there were in the Synod 
 seven Presbyteries, sixty-two ministers, 143 churches, 5,745 com- 
 municants; showing an increase during that decade of about 100 
 per cent. 
 
 In 1829 the Synod of Cincinnati was erected, cutting off from 
 this Synod the three Presbyteries of Chillicothe, Cincinnati,, and 
 Miami. 
 
 In 1834 the Presbytery of Wooster was organized, comprising nine 
 ministers and twenty-nine churches. In 1835 the Presbytery of 
 Marion was organized, consisting of eight ministers, and eighteen 
 churches. 
 
 ARCHIBALD HANNA 
 
 was a Washington county man ; born February 12,1 790 ; graduated 
 at Jefferson College, 1815; studied theology with* Dr. Rhea; licensed 
 by the Ohio Presbytery in 1818. The next year he removed to 
 Wayne county, Ohio. In 1820 he was ordained and settled as 
 pastor of the congregations of Mount Eaton, Pigeon Run, and 
 Fredericksburg. In 1824 he gave up Pigeon Run, in 1831 Mount 
 Eaton. His last charge was Dalton. This he resigned in 1857. 
 He died at Dalton, Ohio, June 9, 1875, m tne eighty-sixth year of 
 his age. He had three sons, and one son-in-law in the ministry
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 345 
 
 Samuel (deceased), Joseph A., James W. and D. R. Colmery. All 
 his other sons and sons-in-law are elders in the church. Mr. 
 Hanna was a most faithful and laborious minister. 
 
 SYNOD OF WESTERN RESERVE. 
 
 This Synod was erected by the General Assembly in 1825, on 
 application of the Synod of Pittsburgh, from its own territory, and 
 consisted of the Presbyteries of Grand River, Portage, and Huron. 
 The Synod met at Huron, Ohio, on the fourth Tuesday of Septem- 
 ber of that year, Rev. Joseph Badger presiding. 
 
 In 1827 the Presbytery of Trumbull was organized out of the 
 Presbytery of Grand River. In 1830 the Presbytery of Cleveland 
 was organized from the territory of Huron. 
 
 In the year 1836, the Presbyteries of Maumee, Loraine and Me- 
 dina were organized. 
 
 At one time the Presbyteries of Detroit, St. Josephs, and Monro, 
 in Michigan, were attached to the Synod of the Western Reserve. 
 In 1834 the Synod of Michigan was organized, embracing these 
 Presbyteries. 
 
 THE STORM. 
 
 We approach the years 1837-38 with feelings of pain and the 
 remembrance of the deep troubles of the past. They are the same 
 feelings that move us as we refer to the years 1 860-61 in our coun- 
 try's history. The Church is sitting under the heavy shadow of a 
 cloud. The very atmosphere seems oppressive. The clouds are 
 everywhere gathering. There is the distant rumbling of the thun- 
 der, and fear fills the heart of the Church. The storm falls at last. 
 The Church totters and trembles and bows beneath its fury. Ses- 
 sions, Presbyteries, Synods, General Assemblies, are rent asunder. 
 Brethren who have talked and wept and prayed and labored together, 
 are parted to meet no more as fellow-laborers. 
 
 It is the old story of Paul and Barnabas over again ; disagreeing, 
 parting in wrath, going different directions, blaming each other, ex- 
 cusing themselves: "one Lord, one faith, one baptism," yet sun- 
 dered from each other as though they had never walked in the same 
 path.
 
 tjd PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. , 
 
 No sadder sight was ever witnessed upon earth not even the dis- 
 ruption of the Church of Scotland than this great American Pres- 
 byterian Church, torn asunder from North to South, from East to 
 West. But the Lord reigneth. The Church was safe even when 
 borne upon the raging billows. 
 
 The storm passed, but its consequences remained. Presbyteries, 
 Synods, and General Assemblies met once more, and the work went 
 forward. But there was an earnest looking about to see the result 
 of the sad division. It was like ^Eneas of old, with his comrades, 
 numbering the ships that were safe, and mourning over those that 
 had been borne away in the storm. The same glorious work was 
 to go forward, but under separate management. 
 
 In the Synod of Pittsburgh the division was unequal. A few 
 ministers and churches in the Presbytery of Ohio were organized 
 into the Presbytery of Pittsburgh, N. S. In the Presbytery of Erie, 
 the majority went with the New School. The other Presbyteries 
 were nearly unanimously with the Old School. 
 
 In the Synod of Ohio the division was attended by the follow- 
 ing results ; about two-thirds of the ministers, a little more than 
 this proportion of churches, and still more of communicants, cast 
 in their lots with the Old School. The remainder adhered to the 
 New. 
 
 The Synod of Western Reserve, in solid phalanx, adhered to 
 the New School. 
 
 Each branch then girded itself for the work of the Lord under 
 the new arrangement with zeal and new determination. 
 
 THE SYNOD OF WHEELING (O. S.) 
 
 was erected in 1 841 , composed of the Presbyteries of Washington, 
 Steubenville, St. Clairsville, and New Lisbon. The first meeting 
 was held at Steubenville, on the third Tuesday of October. 
 
 That year the Presbytery of Washington reported 21 ministers, 25 
 churches, and 3,552 communicants. Steubenville reported 18 
 ministers, 24 churches, and 2,292 communicants. St. Clairsville 
 reported n ministers, 20 churches, and 1,239 communicants. New 
 Lisbon reported 10 ministers, 24 churches, and 1,656 communi- 
 cants.
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 347 
 
 Many of the ministers and churches of these Presbyteries have 
 already come under our notice. 
 
 HENRY R. WEED, D.D., 
 
 was born at Ballston, N. Y., July 20, 1787; graduated at Union 
 College ; studied theology at Princeton, being the first student 
 matriculated; licensed to preach in 1815 ; January, 1816, ordained 
 and installed as pastor of the Church of Jamaica, L. I. Four 
 years after this he accepted a call to the First Presbyterian Church, 
 Albany, N. Y. In 1832 he went to Wheeling, W. Va., in charge 
 of which church he continued until his death, although in 1862, 
 under the pressure of years, he gave up the burden of his labor to 
 his co-pastor, Dr. D. W. Fisher. He died in West Philadelphia, 
 December 14, 1870, in the seventy-fourth year of his age. 
 
 Dr. Weed was a kind, faithful, and sympathizing pastor. He 
 preached the truth as it is in Jesus. With a cultivated intellect and 
 a warm heart his message was always attractive. 
 
 In 1841 the Synod of Pittsburgh erected the Presbytery of 
 Clarion out of the territory of the Presbytery of Allegheny. 
 
 SYNOD OF WEST PENNSYLVANIA (N. S.) 
 
 This Synod was erected by the General Assembly (N. S.) in 1843, 
 embracing the ministers and churches connected with the Presbyte- 
 ries of Erie, Meadville, and Pittsburgh. The first meeting of the 
 new Synod was held at Meadville, Pennsylvania, on the third Tues- 
 day of October, 1843, R CV - D. H. Riddle, D.D., presiding. 
 
 Of the Presbyteries composing this Synod, Erie was composed of 
 the majority of the old Presbytery of Erie before the division. 
 
 The Presbytery of Meadville had been erected by the Synod of 
 Pennsylvania, October 25th, 1842. Its first meeting was held at 
 Meadville, Pennsylvania, January loth, 1843, ^ ev - R- S. Lockwood 
 presiding. It embraced all the ministers and churches of the Pres- 
 bytery of Erie outside the county of Erie, the Presbytery of Erie 
 being confined to Erie county. 
 
 The Presbytery of Pittsburgh had been organized from the Pres- 
 bytery of Ohio by the Synod of Pennsylvania soon after the great 
 division.
 
 248 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 GEORGE A. LYON, D.D., 
 
 was born in Baltimore, Maryland, March 3d, 1806. He graduated 
 at Dickinson College in 1824. His theological education was ac- 
 quired at Princeton ; licensed to preach the gospel by the Presby- 
 tery of Carlisle, April pth, 1828 ; ordained and installed by the 
 Presbytery of Erie, as Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Erie, 
 Pennsylvania. 
 
 Dr. Lyon continued the pastor of this church until his death, which 
 occurred at Avon Springs, New York, March 24, 1871, in the sixty- 
 sixth year of his age. 
 
 PRESBYTERY OF ALLEGHENY CITY. 
 
 In 1853 the Synod of Pittsburgh erected the Presbytery of Alle- 
 gheny City out of the territory of the Presbytery of Ohio. This 
 change was with the view of forming the new Synod that was 
 erected the following year. 
 
 SYNOD OF ALLEGHENY (O. S.) 
 
 This Synod was erected in 1854, from that part of the territory 
 of the Synod of Pittsburgh lying west and north of the Allegheny 
 and Ohio rivers. Its first meeting was held at Allegheny City, 
 Pennsylvania, and was opened with a sermon by Rev. Wm. Annan, 
 who was appointed to preside. Rev. David Elliott, D.D., was the 
 first Moderator. It embraced the Presbyteries of Allegheny, Alle- 
 gheny City, Beaver, and Erie. It reported to the next Assembly 
 that it consisted of four Presbyteries, sixty ministers, and had 
 under its care eighty-eight churches and eight thousand one hun- 
 dred and twenty-four communicants. 
 
 HALLELUJAHS. 
 
 Thirty-two years have rolled away since the storm burst upon the 
 Church. There have been many dark and many joyous days days 
 of tearful sowing, and days of joyful reaping and bearing of sheaves 
 on either side, when a scene is witnessed in the streets of the City of 
 Pittsburgh that must have made the angels glad. A throng of minis-
 
 THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 349 
 
 ters and elders come in glad procession from the Third Presbyte- 
 rian Church, and are joined by a similar throng from the First 
 Church. The mingled bands walk in triumph around to the Third 
 Church, and, amid glad hallelujahs, the sundered branches of the 
 Presbyterian Church are made one, once more. To God be all the 
 glory ! 
 
 NEW SYNODS. 
 
 The whole Church is reconstructed in its ecclesiastical boundaries. 
 We have four Synods on the old territory: Cleveland, Columbus, 
 Erie, and Pittsburgh. 
 
 NEW PRESBYTERIES. 
 
 The same year of grace, 1870, twenty new Presbyteries are organ- 
 ized by these four Synods, viz. : In the Synod of Cleveland: Cleve- 
 land, Mahoning, St. Clairsville, and Steubenville. Columbus: 
 Athens, Columbus, Marion, Wooster, and Zanesville. Erie : Alle- 
 gheny, Butler, Clarion, Erie, Kittanning, and Shenango. Pitts- 
 burgh: Blairsville, Pittsburgh, Redstone, Washington, and West 
 Virginia. 
 
 These Synods and Presbyteries gird themselves anew for the 
 work. This year, 1875, they report to the General Assembly the 
 following statistics : 
 
 Ministers, 604; churches, 751 ; communicants added on exa- 
 mination, 5,563 ; total communicants, 84,588. Benevolent funds, 
 $336,088; total funds, $1,244,964. 
 
 The seed that was sown a century ago has taken deep root and 
 filled the land. " The hills are covered with the shadows of it, and 
 the boughs thereof are like the goodly cedars. She has sent out her 
 boughs unto the sea, and her branches unto the river." 
 
 The influence of these Synods has been most salutary in the re- 
 gion where they were first planted. The doctrines and practice of 
 the early fathers prevail to a greater or less degree to this day. 
 Their views of the Sabbath, as to its sanctity, its abiding obligation, 
 and its blessed influences, their views of Bible truth and Christian 
 duty, are substantially the views of the Church to-day. The influ-
 
 S^o PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ences of early Presbyterianism have given a stability and a perman- 
 ence to society here, that is like that of the everlasting hills. 
 
 But it has not stopped here. It is felt to-day all over the West. 
 The wide-rolling prairies are largely cultivated by the descendants 
 of those who, under God, planted the standard of Presbyterianism 
 here one hundred years ago. They carried with them and left to 
 their children the rich legacy of prayer and faith and trust they 
 had received from their fathers, and its influence is like that of the 
 early and latter rain upon the thirsty land of the Orient. 
 
 In all this we trace the good hand of our God. He kept this 
 land for us at the first. He planted this vine in this goodly soil. 
 He sent here strong, earnest men to do his work. He poured out 
 his Holy Spirit, and made his work to prosper during all the years 
 of this century. There have been the storm and the calm, the joy 
 and the sorrow, the weeping and the rejoicing. Both our fathers 
 and we have gone forth weeping and bearing precious seed ; but 
 how often, oh, how often. He has permitted us to return with rejoic- 
 ing, and bearing our sheaves with us ! 
 
 And now, for all the success and prosperity of the past one hun- 
 dred years, let us, this day, give God the glory. And let us gird 
 ourselves anew for the work of the Lord, striving to plant the 
 standard of the Cross still higher on the steeps of time, and looking 
 for a new and grander baptism of the Holy Spirit to enable us to 
 finish our course here with joy. 
 
 And may others take up this grand work when we lay it down, 
 and carry it forward yet more triumphantly, until all over this land, 
 from ocean to ocean, and from lake to gulf, and to the uttermost 
 ends of the earth, the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and his 
 name be praised ! 
 
 And when we go up to "see the King in his beauty," and stand 
 in the unveiled splendor of his glory on Mount Zion, and meet the 
 fathers of this wonderful century that is closing, and with them re- 
 count the victories of the past, with glad and joyous hearts, we 
 will be prepared to join in the loud acclaim : 
 
 " Bring forth the royal diadem 
 And crown Him Lord of all."
 
 SKETCHES 
 
 OF 
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY, 
 
 With aii Account of the Organization 
 
 OF THE 
 
 FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 
 
 In 1786-7. 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM M. DARLINGTON, ESQ.
 
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 
 
 N Western Pennsylvania there are many traces of its 
 occupation ages ago by that extinct race, the " Mound 
 Builders," whose works of earth and stone, fortifica- 
 tions, mounds, or places for interment often of great 
 magnitude, implements for war, agriculture, hunting, and domes- 
 tic use, are found throughout the entire country watered by the 
 Ohio river and its branches, and especially in the States of Ohio 
 and Kentucky. 
 
 Forty years since, an ancient fortification was plainly discernible, 
 enclosing a few acres of high land within a bend of Chartiers Creek, 
 at Woodville, seven miles from Pittsburgh, on the Washington road. 
 There is a mound yet remaining on the ridge at McKee's Rocks, 
 below the mouth of Chartiers ; near it dwelt Shingiss, the famous 
 warrior and King of the Delawares, when visited by Major George 
 Washington, in October, 1753. 
 
 There is another mound of smaller dimensions, much reduced by 
 the plow and surmounted by a venerable oak, to be seen in a field 
 on the banks of the Allegheny, above Sharpsburg. In it, about the 
 close of the last century,, was buried Guyasuta, the distinguished 
 Chief of the Seneca tribe of the Six Nations. His cabin stood a 
 short distance from this burial place. It is well known that the suc- 
 cessors of the " Mound Builders," the red race, occasionally used 
 the same place for interment. In the garden of the late James Ross, 
 near the present court-house, there was a small tumulus, and west 
 of it, on the brow of Grant's Hill, a circle of about eight feet in 
 diameter, formed by heavy stones set on their edge deep in the 
 earth. These were destroyed when Grant's Hill was graded.
 
 254 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 In the rear of Trinity Church, adjoining Virgin Alley and the 
 line of division between the Episcopal burying-ground and that of 
 the First Presbyterian Church, stood an ancient tumulus or mound, 
 long since levelled. In it and the ground adjacent were interred the 
 dead of the ancient race the Red Indians, the French of Fort 
 Duquesne, the British and Americans of Fort Pitt,* officers and 
 soldiers of the Revolution, and many of the early inhabitants of the 
 town, which, doubtless, occasioned the selection of that property 
 for dedication to the uses of the Episcopal and Presbyterian Churches 
 of the town of Pittsburgh by the proprietors, John Penn and John 
 Penn, Jr. 
 
 The Shawanese and Delaware Indians removed from the country 
 on the Susquehanna to the upper Ohio, or Allegheny, from the years 
 1727 to 1729. With them came the traders, the first of the white race 
 to make any kind of lodgment or settlement in the western parts of 
 the Province. Many of them were men of excellent character; others, 
 and especially the numerous hired men, were ignorant and dissolute, 
 rapacious in their dealings with the Indians, and occasioning as 
 much trouble to the Provincial authorities as the same class on the 
 far Indian frontier do to the Federal Government at the present 
 time. 
 
 At that period, the frontier settlements had extended to Peixtang, 
 now Harrisburg, and there the chiefs of the Six Nations requested 
 they should stop and not go farther. Especially did they desire the 
 authorities of the province to ' ' restrain the traders from carrying 
 rurn to the remoter parts, Allegheny and the branches of Ohio." 
 
 * Inscriptions taken from tombstones in Trinity churchyard, prior to 
 their removal, a few years ago : 
 
 "Here lies the body of Richard Mather, Esq., late Captain of Grena- 
 diers in the Royal American Regiment. He was born in Westchester, 
 in England. Died at Fort Pitt, ye 16th March, 1762, and left behind him 
 the character of a bravo soldier and an honest man." 
 
 "Captain Samuel Dawson, of the 8th Pennsylvania Regiment of Foot. 
 From his youth enured to arms in British Service, but from principle 
 took an early part in defence of American liberty, in which he distin- 
 guished himself as a gentleman and brave officer. Deceased Sept. Oth, 
 1779." 
 
 " Mlo-qua-coo-na-caw, or Red Pole ; Principal Village Chief of the Shn- 
 wanese Nation; died at Pittsburgh, the 28th January, 1797. Lamented 
 by the United States."
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 
 
 The Provincial laws in relation to traffic with the Indians imposed 
 heavy penalties for their infraction, but it was not easy to enforce 
 them in the wilderness. 
 
 The principal Indian towns to which the traders resorted or had 
 storehouses in the "remoter parts," were at Venango, Kittanning, 
 and Shannopin's Town. The latter was situated on the bank of the 
 Allegheny river, now in the Twelfth Ward of the City of Pittsburgh, 
 between Penn Avenue, Thirtieth Street, and the Two Mile Run. 
 It was small, had about twenty families of Delawares, and was much 
 frequented by the traders. By it ran the main Indian path from 
 the east to the west. In April, 1 730, Governor Thomas, at Phila- 
 delphia, received a message from ' ' the Chieffs of Ye Delawares at 
 Allegaening, on the main road," taken down (written) by Edmund 
 Cartledge, and interpreted by James Le Tort,* noted traders. 
 Among the names signed to the letter is that of " Shannopin (his X 
 mark)." The chiefs' message was to explain the cause of the death 
 of a white man named Hart, and the wounding of another, Robeson, 
 occasioned by rum ; the bringing of which in such great quantities in- 
 to the woods, they desired the Governor to suppress, as well as to limit 
 the number of traders. Shannopin's name is signed to several 
 documents in the archives of the State. He appeared occasionally at 
 councils held with the Governor. He died in 1749. In October, 
 1 736, the President and Council of the Province issued a proclama- 
 tion offering ten pounds reward for the apprehension of Solomon 
 Moffat, a blacksmith, who had in a quarrel killed an Indian of the 
 Six Nations, "at Allegheny, in the county of Lancaster;" although 
 " at Allegheny" is indefinite, sometimes referring to Kittanning or 
 other Indian towns on the river. This occurrence seems to be the 
 same referred to by Governor Hamilton in a message to the Assem- 
 bly in 1754, respecting the bounds of the Province, and reminding 
 them "that a person apprehended for committing a murder at 
 Shannopin's Town, which lies south of Logstown, was tried in the 
 
 * James Le Tort was a French Huguenot, Indian interpreter and trader. 
 Lived in the Province from childhood. He had a cabin at the Spring, 
 near Carlisle, in 1731 or earlier. Trading on the Allegheny and Ohio, 
 from 1729 to 1739, he appears to have penetrated as far as the rapids on 
 the latter stream, fifty miles below Parkersburg, well known as " Le 
 Tort's Falls," where he probably had a trading camp or station.
 
 2 S 6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Supreme Court at Philadelphia, and the evidence of the place being 
 within the limits of this Province was so clear to the Court and jury, 
 that he was convicted of manslaughter, and suffered his punishment 
 accordingly. 
 
 France claimed the country on the waters of the Ohio by right of 
 priority of discovery and exploration, first by La Salle in 1669-70, 
 when he penetrated as far west as the falls near the present city of 
 Louisville. It was resolved to expel the English traders and erect a 
 line of forts connecting Canada and Louisiana. In the summer of 
 1749, Captain Celeron de Bienville, with a detachment of two hun- 
 dred soldiers and thirty Indians, descended the Allegheny and Ohio 
 rivers to the mouth of the Wabash, for the purpose of taking mili- 
 tary possession of the country. As memorials of the French King's 
 possession, leaden plates* with suitable inscriptions were deposited at 
 different points along the rivers. A number of these plates were 
 found in after years. One deposited at the point of land at the 
 junction of the Ohio and Monongahela rivers, bore date " August 
 3d, 1749, at the Three Rivers."f Celeron encamped with his 
 troops for some days at Logstown (a little below the present town of 
 Economy), from which he expelled the English traders, by whom 
 he sent letters to Governor Hamilton of Pennsylvania, dated at 
 " Our Camp on the beautiful river at an old Shawnee village, 6th 
 and loth August, 1749," and stating that he was there "by orders 
 of the Marquis de la Gallisoniere, General-in-Chief of New France, 
 whose orders are very strict not to suffer any foreign traders within 
 his government." 
 
 In 1748 a number of prominent men in Virginia formed the 
 "Ohio Company," and received from the King a conditional grant 
 of 500,000 acres of land, to be selected by the Company west of the 
 Allegheny Mountains, and on which they were required to settle 
 one hundred families, and erect and maintain a fort. In 1750 they 
 employed Christopher Gist to explore and examine the country bor- 
 dering on the Ohio river and its branches. He was then residing 
 on the Yadkin, in the present county of Wilkes, North Carolina. 
 
 * A copy of the inscription on the plate found at the mouth of the 
 Great Kanawha can be seen iu " Craig's Olden Time." 
 
 f In the Seneca dialect, Da-ya-o'-geh. At the forks or point of land 
 between two streams.
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 257 
 
 He was a native of Maryland ; like his father Richard, a surveyor ; 
 a man of excellent character, energetic, fearless, and a thorough 
 woodsman. With a boy and two horses he arrived at Shannopin's 
 Town on the ipth of November, 1750, and remaining until the 24th, 
 swam his horses across the river, and then, taking the Indian trail, 
 passed through the tract now occupied by the city of Allegheny, 
 then down along the Ohio to Beaver creek, and thence to the Tus- 
 carawas river, near the present town of Coshocton, Ohio. There 
 he found a large town of the Wyandots, containing about one hun- 
 dred families. On Christmas Day he read prayers to the assembled 
 Indians, according to the forms of the Established Church of Eng- 
 land and Virginia, which were interpreted by Andrew Montour. 
 This undoubtedly was the first religious Protestant service ever 
 held in the valley of the Ohio and west of the mountains. 
 
 After exploring the Miami country, Gist returned to North 
 Carolina in May, passing through the region now Kentucky and 
 South-western Virginia. 
 
 During the following winter of 1 75 1-2 he was again employed by the 
 Ohio Company in exploring the country bordering on the Youghio- 
 gheny and Monongahela rivers in this State, and on the south side 
 of the Ohio in West Virginia as far as the great Kanawha ; he was 
 accompanied only by one of his sons. 
 
 In the latter part of the summer or fall of 1753 he commenced 
 the settlement for the Ohio Company at the place since well known 
 as Mount Braddock, in the present county of Fayette. 
 
 On the 25th day of August, 1753, \Villiam Trent* "viewed" the 
 
 * William Trent was a native of Pennsylvania, of which province his 
 father was one of the Supreme Judges, and afterwards Chief Justice of 
 New Jersey, where, on his land, was founded the city of Trenton. Cap- 
 tain Trent commanded a company from Pennsylvania, engaged on the 
 northern frontier of New York, in 1746-7, in warfare against the French 
 and Indians. Returning home he received the thanks of the Assembly 
 for his success. His residence was in Cumberland county, south of Car- 
 lisle. On the formation of that county in 1749, he was appointed by 
 Governor Hamilton one of the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas. 
 He was afterwards engaged in the Indian trade, and excepting George 
 Croghan, had more influence with the western Indians than any other 
 \v hite man, and was often employed by the Virginia and Pennsylvania au- 
 thorities in negotiations and conferences with the savages. At the great 
 treaty of Fort Stanwix, in November, 1768, he received from the Six 
 R
 
 2 5 8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ground in the forks of the Ohio on which to build the fort, it being 
 considered much preferable to the location at the mouth of Char- 
 tiers Creek, as originally intended by the Ohio Company. 
 
 On the 23d of November following, Washington, with Gist for his 
 guide, arrived here on their way to Venango. He carefully examined 
 both " sites " for a fort, and gave a decided preference to the land 
 in "The Forks." 
 
 Of Washington's journey to Fort Le Boeuf, and interview with the 
 French commander, Le Gardeur St. Pierre, you are no doubt fami- 
 liar from his journal, and also that of Gist. Among the Indians 
 who accompanied him on his way out he mentions the " Young 
 Hunter," another name by which Guyasuta, afterwards so cele- 
 brated, was then known. On their return, compelled by the ice 
 and snow to leave their horses and their companions, the journals 
 relate that, clad in Indian costume, with packs on their backs, they 
 struck through the woods for Shannopin's Town, and narrowly 
 escaped being shot by a treacherous Indian they fell in with. They 
 . reached the shore of the Allegheny below the mouth of Pine Creek, 
 on the morning of the apth of December, and occupied all day, 
 with " one poor hatchet" to work with, in making a raft to cross 
 the river,* which was filled with floating ice. Washington fell from 
 
 Nations for himself and other traders among whom were a number of 
 old settlers here George Morgan, Thomas Smallman, and John Ornis- 
 by, a grant of an immense tract of land, which they named Indiana, com- 
 p risi ng about two-thirds of the prese n t State of West Virginia, in com pen- 
 sation for their losses in the Indian war of 1763, stated to amount to the 
 sum of near 86,000 sterling. Acommitteeof Congress, in 1782, reported 
 in favor of the validity of the grant. But Virginia having, by her cou- 
 stitution in 1776, assumed sovereignty and dominion over all the terri- 
 tory within the limits of her ancient charter (although it had been judi- 
 cially annulled in 1624), and declared by express legislative enactment 
 in 1770 that all sales and deeds by Indians for lands within said limits 
 to be void and of no effect, the grant was rendered valueless to the hold- 
 ers, who had expended much time and money in their endeavor to 
 maintain it, as doubtless they would have done but for the Revolution. 
 This loss impoverished William Trent to the close of liis days. 
 
 * The late James Ross, Sr., said that he asked General Washington at 
 what point he and Gist pushed off to cross the river, and he replied : 
 "It was directly opposite George Croghan's house." Croghan's house 
 stood a short distance above the site of the Lucy Furnace, aud a few
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 259 
 
 the raft into the river, again happily escaping death. They reached 
 the island now known as Wainwright's, where they passed a very cold 
 night. Gist had his toes and fingers frostbitten. In the morning, the 
 ice being firm, they crossed to the main shore at the mouth of the Two- 
 mile Run, and thence proceeded to John Frazer's at Turtle Creek, 
 Queen AUequippa's at the mouth of the Youghiogheny, Gist's 
 house in the new settlement, Will's Creek and home. 
 
 The French built their fort at Venango, on the site of the present 
 city of Franklin, in the winter of 1 753-54 ; it was named Machault, 
 in honor of the French Minister of Marine and Colonies. They 
 were at the same time busily engaged with preparations for descend- 
 ing the Ohio. St. Pierre was ordered to Canada, and the command 
 of Fort Le Boeuf assumed by Pierre Claude de Pecaudy Sieur of 
 Contrecoeur. 
 
 In January William Trent was commissioned Captain by Gover- 
 nor Dinwiddie. He was then engaged in building a strong log 
 storehouse, loop-holed, at Red Stone. John Frazer was appointed 
 Lieutenant and Edward Ward Ensign. Trent was ordered to raise 
 one hundred men. He succeeded in getting about seventy. On 
 the i yth of February, 1754, he, with Gist, Croghan, and others, 
 met at the Forks, and in a few days he proceeded to lay out the 
 ground and have some logs squared and laid, the Half King Tanach- 
 arison assisting. Captain Trent was soon afterwards obliged to go 
 across the mountains to Will's Creek for supplies of provisions. On 
 the 1 3th of April, Frazer being absent at Turtle Creek, and Ward 
 left in command, he heard that the French were descending the 
 river ; he hastened to complete the stockading of the building, and 
 had the last gate finished when, on the morning of the i7th, the 
 French flotilla of 300 canoes and sixty batteaux, with 1,400 sol- 
 diers and Indians, and 18 cannon, was seen approaching near Shan- 
 nopin's Town. They moved down near the fort, landed their 
 canoes, formed and marched their forces within a little better than 
 gunshot of the fort. Contrecoeur immediately sent Le Mercier, 
 
 rods from the present residence of Judge McCandless. Two ancient 
 apple trees mark the spot. Of course General Washington referred 
 to the locality of the house, which was not built until 1759 or 1760. 
 In October, 1770, he visited Fort Pitt, and dined with Colonel Croghan, 
 at his house, as related in his printed journal.
 
 260 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 commander of the artillery, with two drummers, one of them as 
 an interpreter, and a Mingo Indian, called The Owl, as interpreter 
 for the Indians, and delivered Ward a written summons to surrender 
 the fort and retreat. Le Mercier looked at his watch ; the time was 
 about two. He gave Ward an hour to determine, telling him he 
 must come to the French camp, with his answer in writing. The 
 Half King advised Ward to temporize to tell the French com- 
 mander he must await the arrival of his superior officer. He went 
 to the French camp in company with the Half King, Robert 
 Roberts, private soldier, and John Davidson as an Indian interpre- 
 ter, and addressed Contrecoeur as the Half King had advised. It 
 was refused, and instant answer to the summons demanded, or force 
 would be used to take possession of the fort. Having but forty-one 
 men, of whom only thirty-three were soldiers, Ward surrendered the 
 fort, with liberty to move off with everything at 12 o'clock the next 
 day. That night he was obliged to encamp within three hundred 
 yards of the fort, with a friendly party of the Six Nations. Con- 
 trecoeur invited Ward to supper, and asked him many questions con- 
 cerning the English Government, to which he gave no satisfactory an- 
 swer. He was also solicited to sell the French some of his carpenter's 
 tools, but he declined to do so, although offered "any money for 
 them." The next day Ward marched with his men for Redstone 
 and Will's Creek. At the latter place he met Col. Washington, to 
 whom he reported the affair. Thus the war commenced here which 
 closed in America, with the surrender of Canada to the British, in 
 1760. 
 
 The French now vigorously set to work and cleared the Ohio 
 Valley of the traders, nearly all of whom were from Pennsylvania, 
 confiscating their goods, houses, and other property at different 
 points. William Trent, George Croghan, Robert Callender, and 
 Michael Teaff, were partners and lost heavily. In the original 
 manuscript account and affidavit attached, their losses aggregated 
 over six thousand five hundred pounds sterling. Among the items of 
 interest are : One house with stores about three miles above Fort Du- 
 quesne, on the northwest side of the Ohio above the mouth of Pine 
 Creek,* with large fields cleared and fenced, with ten acres of corn, 
 
 * Where Sharpsburg and Etna borough now stand, and where the 
 White Mingo and other Indians of the Six Nations formerly had a village.
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 26 r 
 
 which we were obliged to leave, and the house now in possession of a 
 French trader, 300. Several large canoes and batteaux to carry on 
 a trade with the several nations by water, lying at the mouth of Pine 
 Creek, of which the French immediately took possession, ^80. 
 One house with stores at the Sewickley bottom, about twenty-five 
 miles from Fort Duquesne, up Youghiogheny, with fields fenced and 
 grain in the ground, ^300. One house at the Logstown,* twelve 
 miles below Fort Duquesne, on the northwest side of the Ohio, 
 
 Fort Duquesne, f so named in honor of the Marquis Du Quesne 
 de Menneville, Governor of Canada, was a strong fortification of 
 earth and wood stockaded. It was of inconsiderable dimensions, as 
 compared with Fort Pitt, which afterwards enclosed its site. During 
 its occupancy by the French, religious services were held by the 
 chaplain in accordance with the ritual of the Roman Catholic Church. 
 The register of baptisms and burials at Fort Duquesne occurring in 
 the years 1753, T 754> an d J 755j is preserved at Montreal with the 
 French archives. Among them also is the record' of the services on the 
 occasion of the burial of the Sieur Marin, on the 2gth of October, 
 1753, at Fort Le Boeuf, of which he was commander. 
 
 The most conspicuous name of all, however, and one of great 
 historical interest, is that of the French Commander at Braddock's 
 defeat, Beaujeu. (Translation.) "Mr. Leonard (Daniel), Esq., 
 Sieur de Beaujeu, Captain of Infantry, commander of the Fort 
 Duquesne, and of the army, on the gth day of July, in the year 
 1755, and in the forty-fifth year of his age. The same day, after 
 having confessed and said his devotions, he was killed in battle with 
 the English. His body was interred on the twelfth of the same 
 month, in the cemetery of the Fort Duquesne, at the beautiful river, 
 under the title of the Assumption of the Holy Virgin, and also with 
 
 * Near Economy, eighteen miles below Pittsburgh. 
 
 f In 1786, Mr. Brackenridge wrote " thai the appearance of the ditch 
 and mound with the salient bastions and angles remained overgrown 
 with grass." 
 
 About fifty years ago, some workmen employed in excavating a cellar 
 for Shiras' brewery, at the Point, found the remains of the well, a 
 French officer's saddle, and the stumps of a row of oak palisades, quite 
 sound.
 
 262 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 all the usual ceremonies by us, Priest Franciscan, Chaplain of the 
 King, and of the above-mentioned fort. In testimony of which we 
 have signed. 
 
 " FR. DENYS BARON, 
 
 P. F. CHAPLAIN." 
 
 The name in full of Beaujeu was Daniel Hyacinthe Marie Lien- 
 ard de Beaujeu. He was the second son of Louis Lienard Sieur de 
 Beaujeu and Therese Mijean de Branssac, his wife, born in Montreal, 
 August 17, 1711. The family was originally from Dauphine, France. 
 Beaujeu had commanded at Detroit and Niagara, and seems to have 
 succeeded Contrecoeur at Fort Duquesne. 
 
 With the events of the next four years all are familiar. Wash- 
 ington's first campaign, skirmish with and death of 'Jumonville, on 
 the 28th of May, 1754, and the affair at Fort Necessity; its 
 surrender on July 9th, and the retreat to Wills Creek, and the 
 advance and terrible defeat of Braddock's army on the pth of 
 July, 1755, followed by the bloody devastation of the frontier by 
 the Indians. 
 
 William Pitt, the great Earl of Chatham, was placed at the head 
 of the British Ministry, and under his wise and energetic adminis- 
 tration the previous disasters to the British arms were reversed both 
 in Europe and America. A letter from London, in the Pennsylva- 
 nia Gazette stated, "that the great Mr. Pitt has the preservation and 
 interest of the Colonies in America so much at heart, that those 
 who are not sufficiently sensible of their importance say ' he is 
 America mad.' ' 
 
 General John Forbes arrived in Philadelphia, in May, 1758. He 
 was a son of Colonel John Forbes, of Pittencrief, Fifeshire, Scot- 
 land. In his younger days he was a physician, which profession he 
 left for the army, in which, by faithful services, he rose to high rank. 
 Brave, firm, prudent, and open to information and counsel. At 
 this time he was in his forty-ninth year, and in infirm health. 
 
 On the first of June, the following proclamation by the Governor 
 appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette : 
 
 "By the Honorable William Denny, Esq., Lieutenant-Governor 
 and Cornmander-in-Chief of the Province of Pennsylvania, and 
 Counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, upon Delaware,
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 263 
 
 "A PROCLAMATION. 
 
 " WHEREAS, The Time is now come when, by the wise Provi- 
 dence of God, we, who inhabit these Colonies, are called upon 
 to make one grand Effort for the Retrievement of our Honour, and 
 the Preservation of our inestimable Privileges, civil and religious, 
 against the insidious Attempts of a restless Popish Enemy, and 
 their savage allies : 
 
 "AND WHEREAS, It is our Duty at all times, more especially at 
 the Commencement of so interesting an undertaking, to turn our 
 Eyes for Succour and Direction to the LORD OF HOSTS, the God 
 of our Fathers, who has so often and so signally interposed in Behalf 
 of the Protestant Religion ; I have thought fit, by the Advice of my 
 Council, to appoint Friday, the Sixteenth Day of June, next, to be 
 observed as a Day of publick Fasting, Prayer, and Humiliation, 
 before the Lord. 
 
 "And I do exhort, and strictly enjoin all His Majesty's loving 
 Subjects within the Province and Counties aforesaid, to observe 
 the said Fast with becoming Reverence and Devotion ; to abstain 
 from all servile Labour on that Day, and to join in the most fervent 
 Supplications to Almighty God that He would be pleased, through 
 the infinite Merits and Intercession of his Son, Jesus Christ, to 
 forgive us our Sins, both national and private, to avert the Punish- 
 ment justly due to them, to check the growth of Vice and Infidelity, 
 to give Grace for Repentance and Amendment of Manners, to 
 relieve us from the Calamities we groan under, and grant Success 
 to the Arms of his Majesty and His Allies, especially to the several 
 Expeditions now carrying on in these Colonies for securing to us, 
 and our Posterity, the solid Enjoyment of Peace, Freedom, and a 
 pure Religion. 
 
 "And, lastly, I do recommend it to the several Ministers -of the 
 Gospel, to compose Prayers and Sermons suitable to the Occasion, 
 to be used in their respective Places of Worship that day ; and par- 
 ticularly that they would endeavor to inspirit their People with true 
 notions of Bravery and Publick Spirit, flowing from a due Sense of 
 the Justice of our Cause, the many Blessings we enjoy under his 
 Majesty's wise government, and His peculiar fatherly Regard, mani- 
 fested on all Occasions, for the Protection of these infant Colonies, 
 and the Preservation of the Protestant Interest in all Parts of -the 
 World.
 
 264 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 "And I do further require the said Ministers to Publish this 
 Proclamation to their respective Congregations, immediately after 
 Divine Service on some of the Lord's Days preceding the said Fast. 
 
 "GIVEN under my Hand, and the Great Seal of the said Pro- 
 vince, at Philadelphia, this Thirtieth Day of May, in the Thirty- 
 First Year of His Majesty's Reign, and in the Year of our Lord 
 One Thousand Seven Hundred and Fifty-eight. 
 
 " WILLIAM DENNY. 
 
 " By His Honour's Command : 
 
 RICHARD PETERS, Secretary. 
 
 " GOD Save the KING." 
 
 After reviewing the troops at Philadelphia, General Forbes set 
 out for Carlisle in the middle of June, the last division of the army 
 following on the 30th, the artillery with Major Grant. The troops 
 numbered rather less than 6,000 men. Its success was anxiously 
 hoped for, yet doubted by many, so despondent had the people be- 
 come by the continued ravages of the frontier by the savages and 
 French, from the time of the erection of Fort Duquesne. 
 
 Opening a new road through the forests and across the moun- 
 tains, and bridging the numerous streams and swamps, was an ardu- 
 ous task, occasioning unlooked-for delays in the march. 
 
 Early in September the advance of the army was at Ligonier, 
 under Col. Bouquet. On the nth, Major James Grant, with 800 
 men, marched towards Fort Duquesne to reconnoitre. Receiving 
 information that the French force amounted only to about 200 men, 
 he attempted, on the morning of the 1 4th, to draw them out by a 
 showy display of part of his Highlanders, posted on the hills, with 
 drums beating and bagpipes playing. The French, however, had 
 the day before received a reinforcement of 400 men from Illinois, 
 under Captain Aubrey, commander in the attack on Grant, who 
 met with a bloody defeat on the hill where our Court House now 
 stands, and along through the woods to where the baggage was 
 kept with a guard on the slope above the Two Mile run, about the 
 junction of Butler Street and Penn Avenue. Grant was captured, 
 but soon exchanged. In 1760 he was Governor of East Florida. 
 He afterwards rose to high rank in the British army, and served in 
 it during part of the War of the Revolution. He was in the battle 
 of Qermantown and Monmouth Court House ; at the latter he com-
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 265 
 
 manded, and defeated the American General Lee. He died at his 
 seat at Ballendalloch, near Elgin, Scotland, May 13, 1806, in the 
 eighty-sixth year of his age. At the time of his death he was Go- 
 vernor of Stirling Castle. 
 
 Captain Aubrey, the French commander, was taken prisoner the 
 next year at Niagara. He was afterwards Governor of the French 
 colony at New Orleans. Returning to France in February, 1770, 
 he lost his life by the sinking of the vessel off the French coast, near 
 the mouth of the Garonne. A detachment of the French troops, 
 under Captain Vitry, attacked Ligonier soon after Grant's disaster, 
 but, after an action of three hours, were repulsed. On Friday, the 
 24th of November, 1758, the French commander, De Ligneris, set 
 Fort Duquesne on fire and abandoned it. The same night the Light 
 troops of the army, under General Forbes, took possession. The 
 main body with the General arrived the next day. The place was 
 immediately named Pittsburgh, in honor of William Pitt. Sunday, 
 the 26th, was observed by the General's orders as "a Day of Public 
 Thanksgiving to Almighty God" for their success, and the Rev. 
 Charles Beatty, a Presbyterian minister, and chaplain to Col. Clap- 
 ham's Pennsylvania regiment, preached a thanksgiving sermon, 
 which, undoubtedly, was the first Protestant or Presbyterian sermon 
 ever delivered west of the mountains. On Monday, the 27th, the 
 troops had " a grand feu-de-joie," and on the following day a large 
 detachment marched to Braddock's battlefield to bury the bones of 
 the soldiers still lying above ground. 
 
 In Philadelphia there was great rejoicing on the receipt of the 
 news of the success of the army illuminations, bonfires, and ringing 
 of bells. The Governor appointed the 2oth of December as a day 
 of Thanksgiving. 
 
 General Forbes left Pittsburgh on the 3d of December, for Phila- 
 delphia, where he did not arrive until the 1 7th of January, having 
 been detained on the way by severe sickness, bad weather and roads. 
 On his arrival cannon were fired and the bells rung. He addressed 
 the following letter to Col. Bouquet. 
 
 " To COLONEL HENRY BOUQUET, OF THE ROYAL AMERICAN REGI- 
 MENT: 
 
 "PHILADELPHIA, 2 oth February, 1759. 
 " SIR : General Forbes, highly sensible of the many fatigues and
 
 266 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 hardships you and your officers and the troops in general under his 
 command have underwent during the course of the most extraordi- 
 nary campaign that has happened in this or any other country, and 
 willing at the same time to give some public testimony of his appro- 
 bation to the gentlemen under his command, has ordered me to 
 acquaint you and the commanding officers of corps that he has 
 directed a gold medal to be struck to the following purpose, which 
 he hereby authorizes the officers of his army to wear as an honorary 
 reward for their faithful services, and as soon as an opportunity 
 offers he intends to inform His Majesty of it. 
 
 " In the meantime, your officers and Col. Montgomery's may be 
 provided in town. 
 
 "The medal has on one side the representation of a road cut 
 through an immense forest, over rocks and mountains. The motto, 
 l Per tot Dis criminal On the other side, are represented the conflu- 
 ence of the Ohio and Monongahela rivers, a fort in flames in the 
 forks of the river, and the approach of Gen. Forbes, carried on a 
 litter, followed with the army marching in columns with cannon. 
 The motto, ' Ohio Brittanick Consilio Manuque.' 1 
 
 " This is to be worn around the neck with a dark blue ribbon. 
 
 "By the General's command, 
 
 " JAMES GRANT, 
 " Lieut, in His Majesty's 62^ Regt, II. B. 
 
 11 N.B. General Forbes is of opinion that such of our officers as 
 choose to provide themselves with the above medal should have a 
 copy of this letter, signed and attested by you, as a warrant for 
 their wearing it. J. G." 
 
 General Forbes died in Philadelphia, on the nth of March, 1759, 
 in the slate-roofed house on Second Street, the residence of William 
 Penn in 1 700. He was buried with unusual pomp and ceremony 
 on the 1 4th, in the chancel of Christ Church. The precise spot is 
 unknown. So distinguished a soldier deserves a monument. 
 
 The first Fort Pitt was a small stockade, with bastions, erected in 
 December, 1758. It stood on the bank of the Monongahela river, 
 between Liberty and West Streets, within two hundred yards of 
 Fort Duquesne. 
 
 General John Stanwix, the successor of General Forbes, arrived 
 at Pittsburgh in August, 1759, an d on the 3d day of September the
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 267 
 
 work of building a "formidable fortification" commenced, in obe- 
 dience to the orders of the Secretary of State, William Pitt. 
 
 Although occupied in 1 760, it was not finished until the summer 
 of 1761, under Colonel Bouquet, who also erected an additional 
 building in 1764, the brick redoubt now standing, and the only 
 relic of British domination in the valley of the Ohio. The stone 
 bomb-proof magazine was removed when the Pennsylvania Railway 
 Company built their freight depot, in 1852. Fort Pitt occupied all 
 the ground between the rivers, Marbury, now Third Street, West 
 Street, and part of Liberty Street. 
 
 The first town of Pittsburgh was built near the Fort, in 1760. It 
 was divided into the upper and lower town. In a carefully pre- 
 pared list of the houses and inhabitants out of the fort, made for 
 Col. Bouquet, April 15, 1761, by Captain William Clapham, and 
 headed "A return of the number of houses, of the names of the 
 owners, and number of men, women, and children in each house, 
 Fort Pitt, April 14, 1761," the number of inhabitants is two 
 hundred and thirty-three men, women, and children, with the 
 addition of ninety-five officers, soldiers, and their families re- 
 siding in the town, making the whole number three hundred and 
 thirty-two. Houses, one hundred and four. The lower town was 
 nearest the fort, the upper on the higher ground, principally along 
 the bank of the Monongahela, extending as far as the present Market 
 Street. In this list of the early inhabitants are the names of George 
 Croghan, William Trent, John Ormsby, John Campbell, Ephraim 
 Elaine, and Thomas Small. 
 
 In May, 1763, when .the Indian war, usually called Pontiac's 
 War, broke out, the inhabitants removed into the fort, and de- 
 stroyed the town by levelling the houses with the ground, that they 
 might not give shelter to the savages when making their threatened 
 attack, which soon commenced, and was renewed at intervals, hap- 
 pily unsuccessfully, until the battle of Bushy Run, on the 5th and 
 6th of August, gallantly fought and w6n by the troops under Col. 
 Bouquet, who compelled the Indians to raise the siege and retire. 
 In October, 1764, Col. Bouquet, at the head of an army, made a 
 treaty of peace with the assembled chiefs of the several Indian tribes 
 at the forks of the Muskingum. 
 
 The second town of Pittsburgh was laid out in 1765, by Col. John
 
 268 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Campbell,* by permission of the commanding officer at Fort Pitt. 
 It comprised the ground within Water, Market, Second and Ferry 
 Streets. Campbell's plan of lots was subsequently incorporated un- 
 altered in the survey made by George Woods for the Penns in 1784, 
 and is known as the "Old Military Plan." Two of the houses 
 built on lots in that plan are now standing on Water Street, near 
 Ferry. They are constructed of hewn logs weather-boarded. These, 
 with the two on the southeast corner of Penn and Marbury (Third) 
 Street, formerly owned and occupied by Gen. Richard Butler and 
 his brother, Col. William, are the oldest in Pittsburgh or west of the 
 Alleghenies. Of course the old brick redoubt of Col. Bouquet, be- 
 tween the Point and Penn Street, is excepted. It, however, was 
 not originally built for a dwelling-house, but as an outwork or addi- 
 tion to Fort Pitt. 
 
 Matthew Clarkson, a merchant of Philadelphia, engaged in the 
 Indian trade, arrived at Fort Pitt on his way to Fort Chartres, 
 Illinois, on the i8th day of August, 1766. He states, in his diary, 
 that on Sunday, the 24th, he "went and heard Mr. McCleggan 
 preach to the soldiers in Erse but little edified. He preached 
 alternately one Sunday in that language and the next in English." 
 The diary records the arrival, on September 6th, of Messrs. Beatty 
 and Duffield, the Presbyterian ministers sent out on a mission to the 
 Western Indians by the Synods of New York and Philadelphia. 
 
 It continues, September 7th: "Mr. Beatty preached this morn- 
 ing in the fort, and Mr. Duffield in the town. Dined with them at 
 the mess. Afternoon, went to hear Mr. Duffield in the town." 
 
 "September pth. This evening Mr. Duffield preached in the 
 town, a very judicious and alarming discourse." 
 
 * Col. John Campbell was an Irish gentleman, described as of fine 
 personal appearance, large, of strong mind, but rough in manner. He 
 was for a long time a prisoner at Fort Chambly in the war of the Revo- 
 lution. He was at Fort Pitt as a witness of the Indian treaty, on Septem- 
 ber 17th, 1778. Removed to Kentucky, where he owned a tract of several 
 thousand acres of land at the falls of Ohio, on which he laid out the 
 town of Carnpbellton, afterwards Shippingport, now part of the city of 
 Louisville. He was prominent in the early history of Kentucky. Mem- 
 ber of the convention to form the first constitution ; also, of the Senate, 
 of which he was Speaker. Campbell county was named in honor of 
 him. Died in 1790.
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 269 
 
 "September loth. This afternoon Messrs. Beatty and Duffield* 
 set off on the embassy among the Indians." 
 
 Foremost among the Protestant Christians in the task of convert- 
 ing the Indians were the Moravian Brethren. The mild endurance 
 and self-sacrificing spirit of Zeizberger, Heckwelder, Post, Roth, 
 Ettwein, Senseman, and others of that denomination, effected more 
 than the enthusiastic zeal of the French Jesuits in the early days of 
 Catholic Missions in Canada. 
 
 In the heart of the wilderness, on the upper Allegheny, near the 
 present Tionesta, in Forest county, at Goschoschunk, a village of 
 the Munsees, though in the Seneca country, David Zeizberger 
 preached to the Indians in the fall of 1767. In the summer of the 
 next year a log mission-house of considerable dimensions was 
 erected. It was dedicated on June 3oth, 1768. The meetings 
 were attended by great numbers of the Indians, arrayed in their best 
 garments, with their faces painted black and vermillion, and heads 
 decorated with foxtails. The missionaries removed three miles 
 above, on the north side of the river, and with their converts estab- 
 lished a little village of log huts, in 1769, named Lamunhannek. 
 There, on September ist, they began to build a chapel and dwelling- 
 house, which they inhabited before the winter, and consecrated the 
 chapel, in which was hung a bell sent from from Bethlehem, and for 
 the first time the valley of the Allegheny echoed " the sound of the 
 church-going bell." 
 
 In December .converts were baptized. The next year it was 
 deemed expedient to remove further west. In April, 1770, the 
 missionaries with their converts, in fifteen canoes, descended the 
 Allegheny to Pittsburgh, where the people of the town and garrison 
 were surprised at the unusual sight of Christian Indians. They pro- 
 ceeded down the Ohio and up the Beaver, where, on the east side, 
 five miles below the present New Castle, on the site of a former Wy- 
 andotte village, they made their encampment. After a few months, 
 they removed to the west side of the river, a high steep bank or 
 
 * Mr. Charles Beatty was long a distinguished member of the early 
 Presbyterian Church of this State. His journal of his tour to the West 
 was published in London, in 1768. It is very interesting, and should bo 
 reprinted, with a full biography of the author. 
 
 The Rev. George Duffield of Carlisle.
 
 370 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 table land of about five acres in extent, now in North Beaver town- 
 ship, Lawrence county, near Moravia station, on the Pittsburgh and 
 Erie Railway. There they built a regular formed village of about 
 25 or 30 log-houses, with stone chimneys, a number of which were 
 standing forty years ago. A log church was erected and dedicated 
 June 20, 1771, at which time the Mission numbered one hundred 
 persons. In June and August, 1772, they received large accessions 
 to the colony by the arrival of Ettwein and Roth, with the converts 
 from Wyalusing, now in Bradford county, on the Susquehanna. 
 Close by the town ran the old Indian path from Soh-kon, at the 
 mouth of Beaver, to the noted Indian town Kuskuske, nine miles 
 above the Moravian village, and where Edenburg now stands in 
 Lawrence county, on the south side of the Mahoning. The Indians 
 were averse to the mission, but restrained from hostilities by the 
 influence of George Croghan. Their threatening conduct, however, 
 determined the brethren to remove to the Tuscarawas river, in the 
 spring of 1773. Some blackened ashes of the smith-shop alone re- 
 main to mark the spot on the banks of the Beaver, where once stood 
 Friedenstadt, or the City of Peace. 
 
 On the 1 7th of October, 1770, Col. George Washington arrived 
 at Pittsburgh, on his way to examine the lands on the Upper Ohio, 
 and great Kanawha. In the journal of his tour he mentions lodg- 
 ing,* while here, "in what is called the town, distant about three 
 hundred yards from the Fort." The houses, which are built of logs, 
 and ranged " in streets, are on the Monongahela, and, I suppose, 
 may be about twenty in number, and inhabited by Indian traders." 
 
 The Rev. Daniel McClure, a missionary, who visited the Indians 
 on the Muskingum, in the summer of 1772, relates in his journal 
 that he " tarried about three weeks at Pittsburgh, and preached 
 several times to the people of the village, who lived in about thirty 
 log-houses ; and also to the British garrison in the Fort, a few rods 
 distance, at the request of the commanding officer, Major Edmund- 
 stone." 
 
 In 1774, after about ten years of peace with the Indians, the war 
 with the Shawanese, usually known as Dunmore's War, broke out, 
 
 * At (Samuel) "Semple's, who keeps a very good house of public en- 
 tertainment." It stood on the east corner of Water and Ferry Streets.
 
 PITTSBURGH IN THE LAST CENTURY. 
 
 directly occasioned by the infamous massacre of the family of Logan, 
 the celebrated chief, opposite the mouth of Yellow Creek (near the 
 present town of Wellsville, Ohio), and other outrages on the frontier. 
 Such was the opinion and sworn statement of General Richard But- 
 ler, a most competent judge. Thenceforward there was no general 
 peace with all the tribes until after Wayne's victory, in 1 794. This 
 year was one, also, of unusual trouble and trial to the settlers at Pitts- 
 burgh and the southwestern part, of Pennsylvania. The territory 
 was claimed by Virginia, whose jurisdiction the Governor, Lord 
 Dunmore, attempted by violent measures to enforce. Fort Pitt was 
 seized by a band of his armed partizans, headed by Dr. John Con- 
 nolly, who named the fort Dunmore. Civil officers were commis- 
 sioned by the Virginia authorities, court-houses erected, and Vir- 
 ginia courts regularly held within the limits of Westmoreland (now 
 Allegheny) and Washington counties. The people were divided in 
 their allegiance ; arrests and counter-arrests followed. Arthur St. 
 Clair wrote to Gov. Penn that the Pennsylvanians were determined 
 to abandon Pittsburgh, unless matters should be soon settled, and 
 that " it will be absolutely necessary to erect a town at the Kittan- 
 ning ; the trade must else take its course by the Lakes, which will 
 carry it quite away from this Province." After the war of the 
 Revolution broke out, a recommendation from Congress abated the 
 civil strife, and the controversy finally closed in favor of Pennsyl- 
 vania by the completion of Mason and Dixon's line, in 1 784, the 
 present boundary. 
 
 Passing over, on this occasion, the period of the Revolutionary 
 War, with the observation that the people of Western Pennsylvania 
 were unexcelled by those of any other section in the Colonial Union 
 in patriotic zeal and active resistance to the oppressive measures of 
 the mother country; furnishing men and supplies for the Conti- 
 nental armies, although their families and frontier homes were ex- 
 posed to the frequent incursions of the neighboring savage allies of 
 Great Britain. 
 
 Penn's Manor of Pittsburgh was originally surveyed in Feb- 
 ruary and March, 1769. It contained 5,766 acres. In May and 
 June, 1784, George Woods and Thomas Vickroy, of Bedford, sur- 
 veyors, by direction of Tench Francis, of Philadelphia, agent of the 
 proprietaries, laid out the town of Pittsburgh, and divided the resi-
 
 272 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 due of the manor into out-lots and farms. By the original plan, 
 four lots, forming the square between Smithfield, Second, and Third 
 Streets and Cherry Alley, were dedicated for the purposes of an 
 academy. 
 
 Five contiguous lots fronting on Sixth Street were dedicated to 
 religious uses, and were subsequently divided equally between the 
 Presbyterians and the Episcopalians. 
 
 At this time all the country north and west of the Ohio and Alle- 
 gheny rivers, to the Western line of the State, was claimed and 
 occupied by different tribes of Indians, whose title thereto was ex- 
 tinguished by deed to the State from the chiefs of the Six Nations, 
 for the sum of five thousand dollars, at the treaty of Fort Stanwix, 
 New York, October 23, 1784; and by deed from the chiefs of the 
 Wyandots and Delawares, for the sum of three thousand dollars, at 
 the treaty held at Fort Mclntosh (now Beaver), January 21, 1785. 
 In 1786 the population of Pittsburgh was less than four hundred 
 persons. It contained about one hundred log houses, one of stone 
 and one frame, and five small stores. On the 2pth of July of that 
 year, the first number of the Pittsburgh Gazette was printed. It 
 was the first newspaper published west of the Allegheny Mountains. 
 
 ORGANIZATION OF THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN PITTSBURGH. 
 
 In the General Assembly at Philadelphia, on Monday, December 
 4, 1786, the bill for disposing of the lands, and laying out a town 
 thereon, opposite to Pittsburgh, was read a second time and con- 
 sidered by paragraphs. The clause which reserved some lots for 
 building a court house, jail, and market house on was proposed to 
 be amended by adding, "and lots for a church and burying ground." 
 
 Mr. Fitzsimfnons opposed this, because it did not describe the 
 particular society they were intended for. 
 
 Mr. Brackenridge* facetiously replied that the religion at Pitts- 
 
 *Hugh Henry Brackenridge was born in Scotland, in 1748. Came to 
 America when a child with his parents, who settled in the southeastern 
 part of York county. Entered Princeton College at the age of eighteen, 
 and, after graduating, was for some time a tutor. Studied divinity and 
 was licensed to preach. In 1777 he was chaplain to a regiment in the 
 Continental army. Studied law under Judge Chase of the Supreme 
 Court of the United States. He came to Pittsburgh in 1781. In 1786 he 
 was elected a member of the Legislature. In 1792 the first two volumes
 
 FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, PITTSBURGH. 273 
 
 burgh was a true Catholicism. There was but one church there, 
 and every one went to it, never inquiring into the religion of others. 
 He supposed if they were so harmonized while living, they would 
 not be apt to quarrel when dead for only being laid alongside of 
 one another. 
 
 Some* further conversation passed, and it was agreed to insert 
 "house of worship and burying ground," after which the bill was 
 ordered to be printed for public consideration. 
 
 "On Tuesday, December 12, 1786, agreeably to leave given for 
 that purpose, a member read in his place a bill entitled 'An act to 
 incorporate a religious Christian society at the town of Pittsburgh, 
 in the county of Westmoreland, at this time under the pastoral care 
 of the Rev. Samuel Barr,' and having presented the said bill to the 
 chair, it was read the first time and ordered to lie on the table." 
 The same day Mr. Brackenridge called for the second reading of the 
 bill for incorporating the Presbyterian congregation at Pittsburgh. 
 
 While the clauses were under consideration, Mr. Brackenridge 
 moved to amend by striking out " Presbyterian Congregation," and 
 inserting "Religious Society." 
 
 Mr. Wynkoop was against the amendments. He thought it 
 behooved them to choose a religion before they applied to be incor- 
 porated; and wording it in so loose a manner would give rise to 
 future quarrels and bickerings. 
 
 Mr. Brackenridge insisted upon the amendment, for they were 
 not a Presbyterian congregation to his knowledge; they had no 
 particular church government. They had but one clergyman, a 
 gentleman of reputation, and a good preacher. There was no other 
 of that place except a German, but then he did not preach in 
 English. 
 
 of his celebrated work, "Modern Chivalry," was published at Philadel- 
 phia ; the third volume was published at Pittsburgh, in 1793. It was 
 printed at the office of the Pittsburgh Gazette, by John Scull, and was 
 the first book printed and published west of the mountains. The fourth 
 and last volume was not published until 1797, at Philadelphia, the 
 Whiskey Insurrection having occurred, in which Mr. Brackenridge 
 was accused of bearing an equivocal part, and he afterwards in 1795 
 wrote a book to exculpate himself. He was one of the Judges of the 
 Supreme Court for sixteen years, to the time of his death at Carlisle, in 
 1816. He was a man of great scholastic and legal attainments, eccentric, 
 witty, and independent. 
 S
 
 2 74 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 He observed that if a division took place among the inhabitants, 
 it would be in consequence of styling it a Presbyterian congregation; 
 they would be unable to support that one, the loss of which would 
 be great, as it was of the highest use in keeping up order, and 
 enforcing the practice of morality, an object he (Mr. Brackenridge) 
 had much at heart. Therefore he was guarded against making 
 such a distribution when he drew up the petition upon which the 
 bill was founded. 
 
 He had no objection to allowing it to be a Christian Church wherein 
 the gospel was preached ; this would have the approbation of the 
 people there, for no one dare use the word Presbyterian, or Church 
 of England, there they have no such distinction. As for choosing 
 our religion, he thought it an affront. Choose our religion ! It is 
 not a thousand articles of faith that constitute religion ; and we 
 have chosen it it is the Christian. But as for the mode of church 
 government, Presbyterian or Episcopal, we have no thought of it. 
 
 Our clergymen may belong to some clerical body. For all we 
 know he may have received orders from the Pope or Archbishop of 
 Canterbury, or have taken it up of his own accord, but how or 
 which way he became a minister is no part of our inquiry ; it lies 
 with himself. In the i5th and i6th centuries much noise was made 
 about this government, and about some obscure and minute points 
 of faith, but that cloud of darkness has passed away, and in this 
 enlightened age we smile at their frensies. It is a principle now of 
 our creed, that whatever clergyman of good reputation and morality 
 comes among us, he be permitted the use of our church ; and Mr. 
 Penn, the proprietor of the Pittsburgh manor, would give them 
 three or four lots for their accommodation, if they were incorporated ; 
 but he supposed Mr. Penn did not care what the religious society was 
 denominated. In short he would rather the bill should not pass 
 than suffer the words " Presbyterian congregation" to remain. 
 
 Mr. Findley wished to comply with the desire of the inhabitants ; 
 therefore, if the bill was published as amended, the House could 
 hereafter ascertain whether it was agreeable or no. Not that he had 
 the least doubt of what the gentleman had advanced, for, as he 
 (Mr. Brackenridge) resided at that place, he surely was best able to 
 speak the sense of the people. 
 
 Here an inquiry as to how this bill came on the files of the House
 
 FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, PITTSBURGH. 27$ 
 
 took place, and it appeared it was brought forward from the files of the 
 former House, where it had one reading, which being improper, Mr. 
 Brackenridge took it back and desired leave to present it ; then it 
 was read a first time, and ordered to lie on the table ; but, first, Mr. 
 Brackenridge made the alteration's he had proposed of styling it the 
 Religious Christian Society, at this time under the pastoral care of 
 the Rev. Samuel Barr, at Pittsburgh. 
 
 On Thursday, the i4th, the bill was read the second time and 
 debated by paragraphs. 
 
 Ordered that it be transcribed, and in the meantime printed for 
 public consideration. 
 
 In the Assembly, on the 2ist of September, 1787, "The bill en- 
 titled 'An Act to Incorporate a Religious Christian Society of the 
 Town of Pittsburgh, in the county of Westmoreland, at this time under 
 the care of the Rev. Samuel Barr.' " Read the second time Decem- 
 ber 1 5th last, was read the third time, and the several paragraphs 
 fully debated. 
 
 It was then moved by Mr. Findley, and seconded by Mr. White- 
 hill, to strike out from the title of the said bill the words " a Reli- 
 gious Christian Society," and in lieu thereof to insert "The Pres- 
 byterian Congregation," and on the question, will the House agree 
 to the proposed amendment ? it was carried in the affirmative. 
 
 Ordered that the bill be engrossed, for the purpose of being en- 
 acted into a law. 
 
 The bill passed finally on the 2pth of September, 1787, with the 
 title, "An Act to Incorporate the Presbyterian Congregation of the 
 Town of Pittsburgh and the vicinity thereof, in the County of West- 
 moreland." 
 
 On the 24th of the same month, the trustees received a patent 
 from " John Penn, Jr., and John Penn, of the city of Philadelphia, 
 and late proprietors of Pennsylvania, for two lots in Wood's plan, 
 being lots 438 and 439 and half of lot 437 (the remainder of which 
 is conveyed for the use of the Episcopal Church), for the nominal 
 consideration of five shillings, as well as of the laudable inclination 
 which they have for encouraging and promoting morality, piety, and 
 religion in general, and more especially in the town of Pittsburgh." 
 
 The lot No. 440, fronting on Wood Street, from Sixth Street to 
 Virgin Alley, was not included in the gift of the Penns ; it was pa-
 
 Vjb PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 tented in December, 1787, by the Rev. Samuel Barr, and the title 
 vested in the trustees in 1802. 
 
 The first building, "a church of squared timber and moderate 
 dimensions," was erected in the summer of 1786. It was the first 
 built in Pittsburgh, and the only one for about sixteen years. 
 
 The leading man and "main pillar" of this church for many 
 years from the beginning was one of the oldest and best citizens of 
 the State, John Wilkins, Sr. He was born June i, 1733, in Done- 
 gal township, Lancaster county, where he was (as he afterwards 
 wrote) educated in the principles of the Presbyterian Church. He 
 removed to Carlisle in 1763, and was a member of the church there. 
 At the outbreak of the Revolution he was among the first captains 
 in the State to organize a company of militia. Residing tempora- 
 rily in Bedford county, he was there elected a member of the con- 
 vention to form a State Constitution. He was commissioned cap- 
 tain in the Continental army in 1776, by Washington, and enlisted 
 and furnished a company at his own expense. He was in the bat- 
 tles of Brandy wine and Germantown. After leaving the army he 
 farmed and kept a tavern and store at Carlisle, where he lost large 
 sums by the great depreciation of Continental money. He removed to 
 Pittsburgh, in November, 1783, with a stock of goods, and opened a 
 store on the lot at the northeast corner of Fourth and Wood Streets, 
 where he built a dwelling-house and resided until his death (on Decem- 
 ber 1 1 th, 1 809). When he came to Pittsburgh as he long afterwards 
 wrote there was no church, market, or borough organization, of all 
 of which he urged the necessity. "A Presbyterian congregation 
 soon organized, George Wallace and myself appointed to collect 
 subscriptions and superintend the building. He left it nearly all to 
 me. I worked at it with my own hands, and with assistants chunked 
 and daubed it. I settled with the trustees October 23d, 1793." 
 Mr. Wilkins was one of the first elders of the church. He was ap- 
 pointed Associate Justice of the Common Pleas at the organization 
 of the county, Chief Burgess of the borough of Pittsburgh, Commis- 
 sioner of Public Buildings, and County Treasurer from 1794 to 
 1803. 
 
 The second building was of brick. It was completed in 1805, 
 as will be seen by the following advertisement in October of that 
 year:
 
 FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, PITTSBURGH. 277 
 
 " The Trustees of the Presbyterian congregation of Pittsburgh will 
 attend at the new meeting house, on Monday, the 28th inst., to let 
 the pews. JOHN WILKINS, President." 
 
 A considerable debt encumbering the church, resort was had to a 
 measure common at that time, but long since abandoned, of raising 
 money by lottery. An act of Assembly was passed, and the follow- 
 ing notice was published : 
 
 "BY AUTHORITY. 
 
 " Scheme of a lottery for raising the sum of three thousand dollars, 
 for defraying the expense of furnishing the Presbyterian church, in 
 the borough of Pittsburgh : $1,500 in prizes; 1,213 prizes; 1,787 
 blanks, less than a blank to a prize ; $5 a ticket. Prizes thirty 
 days after drawing ; if not demanded within twelve months, con- 
 sidered relinquished to the church. One prize of $800, the highest, 
 and one thousand prizes of $6, the lowest. (Only part of the 
 advertisement.) 
 
 JOHN WILKINS, \ 
 
 JOHN JOHNSTON, V Managers. 
 
 WILLIAM PORTER, ) 
 
 "Notice Owing to John Wilkins' indisposition, the Presbyterian 
 Church Lottery is postponed until the first Monday of November 
 next. 
 
 ' ' The Commissioners commenced drawing the Presbyterian 
 Church Lottery on the ad of this month, and continued three days, 
 when the following prizes were drawn : No. 43, $500. The highest 
 prize is yet in the wheel i of $800 so the wheel is rich. The 
 Commissioners will draw on Thursday next, at nine o'clock in the 
 morning, in the grand jury room in the court-house. Tickets may 
 be had of the Commissioners. John Wilkins, John Johnston, Com- 
 missioners. 
 
 "SECOND CLASS SCHEME OF A LOTTERY 
 
 in raising part of the sum of $3,000, for defraying the expenses of 
 furnishing the Presbyterian Church in the borough of Pittsburgh : 
 i prize of $1,000, i of $500, 3 of $250, 2 of $200, 10 of $100, n 
 of $50, 3 of 20. The prizes to be paid within the time limited by 
 law ; those not demanded within twelve months considered relin- 
 quished to the church.
 
 278 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION, 
 
 "Tickets to be had of the managers, at the different printing 
 offices, and of the following persons : 
 
 " Isaac Craig, James O'Hara, James Riddle, John Irwin (mer- 
 chant), James Gibson, Steele Semple, Philip Gilland, Thos. Baird, 
 Wm. Anderson, Wm. Steele, Wm. McCullough, E. Denny, Boyle 
 Irwin, Jas. Irwin, Alex. McLaughlin, John Darragh, Esq., Jas. B. 
 Clow, Wm. Wilkins, Alex. Johnston, James Adams, Robert Spencer, 
 Andrew Willock, George Robinson, Esq., Wm. McCandless, Esq., 
 Robert Knox, James Robinson, Esq., William Woods, Esq., John 
 Finley, James Sample, Esq., George Sutton, Henry Fulton, Alex. 
 Hill, Jacob Negley, John Fulton, Jacob Beltzhoover, William Gra- 
 ham, Peter Mowry, Thomas Jones." 
 
 The following is an exact copy of one of the tickets : 
 
 No. 2,155. 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH LOTTERY. 
 
 NO. 2,155 AUTHORIZED BY LAW. 
 
 This Ticket will entitle the possessor to 
 such prizes as shall be drawn to its number, 
 if demanded within twelve months after the 
 drawing, subject to twenty per cent, deduc- 
 tion. 
 
 Pittsburgh, June 3, 1807. 
 
 JNO. WILKINS. 
 President of the Board of Managers. 
 
 NOTE. Many acts of Assembly were passed in the first quarter of the 
 present century, authorizing lotteries to raise money in aid of churches, 
 school houses, turnpike roads, bridges, etc., throughout the State. 
 
 ADDENDUM. 
 
 Pittsburghers especially will appreciate the curious and interesting 
 information which Mr. Darlington has given in the foregoing article 
 concerning the early history of their city ; but the members of the 
 First Presbyterian Church will not be proud of this record, so far as 
 the story of the lottery is concerned. But such, unhappily, is the 
 truth of history. And, as further illustrative of the low state of 
 religion in the town of Pittsburgh in those early days, and of the 
 good work accomplished there by the Rev. Francis Herron, D.D., 
 it is thought proper to add here the following facts, as given in Dr. 
 Paxton's Memorial Discourse.
 
 FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, PITTSBURGH. 279 
 
 Dr. Herron took charge of this church in May, 1811. "The 
 church was found to be in an almost hopeless state of pecuniary 
 embarrassment ; but far worse than this, religion, by a large portion 
 of the people, was utterly discarded, and with many of its professors 
 had little more than the semblance of form." In order to remedy 
 the latter evil, one of the measures adopted by the (then) young 
 pastor was the organization of a prayer-meeting. " But in this he 
 met with discouragement, even from the best of his people, and 
 open and determined hostility from others. It was altogether a 
 novelty, an outgrowth, they said, of fanaticism, Methodism, etc. 
 Fathers and husbands prohibited their wives and daughters from 
 attending." " For eighteen months, with the assistance of Rev. 
 Thomas Hunt, the pastor of the Second Church, the meeting was 
 continued, with an attendance of one solitary man, six females, and 
 the two pastors. The two church sessions could furnish but one 
 praying elder." "Finally, Ur. Herron was waited upon and told 
 that this extravagance could not be endured, and that a stop must 
 be put to these meetings at once. To this he replied, with that im- 
 perial majesty so characteristic of the man : < Gentlemen, these 
 meetings will not stop. You are at liberty to do as you please ; but 
 I also have the liberty to worship God according to the dictates of 
 my conscience, none daring to molest or make me afraid.' From 
 that hour the opposition began to abate. The prayer-meeting gra- 
 dually increased, and the cause of religion in this church began to 
 prosper." 
 
 The pecuniary difficulties of the church became so great that at 
 last the church building was sold by the sheriff. Dr. Herron bought 
 it in in his own name ; sold off a small portion of the property ; 
 paid off every debt and incumbrance upon the church ; re-conveyed 
 the residue of the ground to the congregation ; and in July, 1814, 
 three years from the commencement of his ministry, reported $180 
 of surplus money in the treasury. Let those who may be disposed 
 to laugh over the lottery story set this over against it. 
 
 All these, together with many other interesting details of the early 
 history of this church, will no doubt be given at length in the His- 
 torical Discourse which is in preparation, as we learn, by the present 
 worthy pastor, Rev. S. F. Scovel, D.D. 
 
 A. W. 
 
 March, 1876.
 
 PITTSBURGH LONG AGO. 
 
 (From the Pittsburgh Evening Telegraph of Dec. 11, 1875.) 
 
 AN important portion of the people of this section are just now 
 particularly interested in their ancestral history, in the circumstances 
 and conditions which surrounded the pioneers of civilization in 
 Western Pennsylvania. Interesting and instructive papers on the 
 subject, prepared for the Memorial Convention now in session in 
 Pittsburgh, have already appeared in the Telegraph. It occurs to 
 us that readers may be pleased, through the eyes of an intelligent 
 foreigner, to catch a few more glimpses of this western country, and 
 especially of Pittsburgh, as they appeared nearly a hundred years 
 ago. 
 
 John David Schoepf, M.D., was attached, in the quality of a mili- 
 tary surgeon, to the German troops employed in Ameriqa by the 
 British in the war of the Revolution. During several years of the 
 struggle he was stationed on Long Island and in New York, and on 
 the return of peace, having obtained permission of his sovereign, he 
 spent nearly two entire years in traveling through the United States. 
 He was a learned naturalist as well as physician, and he possessed 
 many other qualifications of a very good traveler. It is to be re- 
 gretted that his travels have not been translated, a regret expressed 
 by the Nation lately when noticing an essay by him on North 
 American diseases, which an eminent Boston physician has recently 
 translated and published. 
 
 Dr. Schoepf visited Pittsburgh in the summer of 1783, and he ap- 
 pears to have been the first person who ever crossed the mountains 
 in a carriage. At any rate, he states that on arriving in the town, 
 not himself, but his vehicle, was evidently the chief object of curio- 
 sity to the "many well dressed gentlemen and highly adorned 
 ladies" whom he encountered at the tavern to which he was con- 
 ducted. The reason, he says, was that to make the entire journey 
 in a carriage (karriol he calls it) was a feat up to that time deemed 
 as good as impossible. He adds that as he drove past lonely d\vel- 
 
 280
 
 PITTSBURGH LONG AGO. 28 r 
 
 lings in the wilderness, his karriol caused intense excitement among 
 the inhabitants, mothers calling their children together to behold a 
 thing they had never before seen. The most respectable tavern of 
 Pittsburgh Dr. Schoepf describes as a small, crookedly built, wooden 
 structure a cabin, in fact on the banks of the Monongahela, of 
 which the outside promised very little, but he was reassured by the 
 appearance of the aforesaid gentlemen and ladies. 
 
 The traveler confesses himself rather disappointed in his long 
 westward journey by the absence of such sights as are usually ex- 
 pected in a mountainous country ; no extraordinary natural pheno- 
 mena, no waterfalls, no towering cliffs, no frightful abysses were 
 seen. What seemed to him most noteworthy were the continuous, 
 unbroken forest for the distance of two hundred and twenty miles 
 from Carlisle, and the singular uniformity of the forest, the same 
 kinds of trees and vegetation stretching along without interruption. 
 Few birds were seen, and all wild animals were of course frightened 
 out of view by the noise of the vehicle. He did see one young- 
 bear, which unexpectedly dropped, like a clod, from a tree by the 
 roadside, and tumbled off into the woods as fast as it could go. He 
 even saw no snakes, though occasionally hearing of the copperbelly 
 and the moccasin. 
 
 The civil and political history of Pittsburgh to the time of his 
 visit, Dr. Schoepf relates with entire accuracy, we believe, but to re- 
 peat any of his details, interesting as they are, would be carrying: 
 owls to Athens. His statement that the first stone house was built 
 during the summer of his visit, and his confident prediction that 
 many more good buildings must soon be in the place, as it was cer- 
 tainly destined to be a great and important town, may be worthy 
 of mention. So, also, his statement that the village contained 
 neither a house for public worship nor a house for the administra- 
 tion of justice. "There resides there, however," he adds, " a Ger- 
 man preacher who ministers to all of the same faith ; and once or 
 twice every year the State of Pennsylvania sends thither a judge to 
 administer justice." 
 
 Dr. Schoepf was not favorably impressed with the general charac- 
 ter of the Pittsburghers. That they are poor, seems to him the pro- 
 per result of their circumstances, but he asserts that they are also ex- 
 tremely lazy and inactive. Still worse, he states that they are dis-
 
 2S2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 satisfied when anybody offers them an opportunity by labor to earn 
 money, for which, however, they are ravenously greedy (heisshun- 
 grig). It was, it seems, a universal complaint the justice of which 
 the German traveler verified by experience that every insignificant 
 article made or prepared here was much dearer than the same thing 
 even in Philadelphia ; that the people here did not seek to become 
 rich through industry and moderate prices, but by extorting from 
 strangers and travelers at once as much as possible, and that, because 
 they disliked and shirked labor, they made any one soundly pay for 
 it who presumed to interrupt their comfortable state of indolence. 
 This repetition of the German doctor's hard saying is, perhaps, 
 almost a repetition of the sin of Ham. But we may take some com- 
 fort in the recollection that the first Romans were not models of any 
 of the fundamental virtues. 
 
 When Dr. Schoepf was here, some military companies, which had 
 garrisoned the post during the war, were on the point of taking their 
 departure, and great was the regret of the inhabitants. The trading 
 classes regretted the withdrawal of customers who helped to feed 
 them, while the hearts of the ladies were saddened by the departure 
 of many fine gentlemen as the death-knell of many social amuse- 
 ments. As an interesting fact it is mentioned that, during the long 
 war just ended, balls, games, concerts, and comedies had enlivened 
 the society of a frontier village four hundred miles westward from 
 the ocean. 
 
 This German physician's account of the birds, beasts, fishes, and 
 creeping things of this section really seems exhaustive. His report 
 of the coal beds is remarkable to have been written so long ago, and 
 neither petroleum nor the salt springs escape his observation. As to 
 the natural advantages of Pittsburgh as a mart of trade and indus- 
 try, he saw into the future almost to the present day. But all such 
 worthy topics we pass over merely to state that he became acquainted 
 with the celebrated Colonel Killbuck and the hardly less celebrated 
 Mistress Grenadier. Unfortunately the Colonel, having just returned 
 from a hunting expedition, was refreshing himself during the entire 
 seven days of the Doctor's sojourn, with a good drunk. Still he 
 made himself agreeable, and exhibited with 'graceful pride certain 
 letters which had been written by his son and daughter, who had 
 been educated in Princeton at the expense of Congress. In Madame
 
 PITTSBURGH LONG AGO. 
 
 Grenadier, elegantly lodged in the garden of the Fort, Dr. Schoepf 
 clearly perceived traces of her former good looks. 
 
 Dr. SchoepPs travels were published at Erlangen in 1 788.
 
 SECULAR HISTORY, 
 
 In its Connections with the Early 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH HISTORY, 
 
 or 
 
 SOUTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIA. 
 
 AN ADDRESS 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES VEECH.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY &c. 
 
 jN coming, Mr. President, to the task assigned me on 
 your programme, I cannot but feel some embarrass- 
 ment. The prominent aim of this Convention is to 
 commemorate men and events which are of the Church, 
 churchly. Joining to it the discussion of secular topics, by a mere 
 lay outsider, may to some seem an incongruity. And it would be 
 so were it not that the line of separation, if it exist at all, between 
 what is secular and what is religious, in our early history, is not of 
 easy discernment. They blend and run together, and to attain a 
 thorough knowledge of either demands a study of the other. This 
 source of embarrassment, therefore, vanishes upon near approach. 
 
 But then, the subject to which I am called "The Secular His- 
 tory of the Times we celebrate" is of such huge proportions as to 
 deter from any attempt to crowd it into the time and space to which 
 I am entitled. The effort would be so procrustean as to result in, 
 at best, but a meagre and mutilated outline. Volumes have been 
 written upon it, and yet the half has not been told. The charm of 
 local history is in details. Traditionary knowledge, and the too 
 often distorted perspective of general history, but sharpen the avidity 
 for more exact delineation. These old time memories have become 
 quasi sacred, and must not be trussed up in cold generalities. The 
 early years of " the times we celebrate " are clustered all over with 
 events which are not merely of curious interest, but of transcendent 
 importance. In them, and in their connecting antecedents, we must 
 seek the foundations and builders of our social fabric ; the fountains 
 of our material, political, religious, and educational progress, whose
 
 SSS PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 streams, like the great rivers whose sources are around us, have gone 
 and are still going forth, to diffuse wealth, civilization, and Chris- 
 tianity, not only over our own great West, but to lands in the far- 
 off Orient. We may safely say, if not in pride, yet surely not in 
 the sadness of JSneas, 
 
 " Quse regio in terris non nostri plena laboris !" 
 
 To free myself from presumption, and from the embarrassment 
 which springs from the magnitude of the .subject as given to me, I 
 venture to tone it down into Some Sketches of our Secular His- 
 tory, in its connections with the early Presbyterian Church History 
 of Southwestern Pennsylvania. 
 
 These notices, desultory though they must necessarily be, will 
 carry us back, for a while, beyond the century now under review. 
 History has, in general terms, given to the people of this region of 
 country a peculiar character, especially in its earlier developments,* 
 and to its material and religious growths, a peculiar stability and 
 sturdiness, which, if rightly given, must result, in great measure, 
 from events and influences which precede their formation into a dis- 
 tinct community. And such things sometimes reverse the law of 
 gravitation, and become, like the sun, more potent by recession. 
 It becomes us, therefore, to inquire whether the character thus given 
 be fact or flattery, and if fact, then what were the events and in- 
 fluences which combined to make it so, far off though they be. We 
 will look after these first, because, if found, the verity of the char- 
 acter will be an easy deduction. 
 
 The first successful efforts to plant English colonies in North 
 America were within twenty-five years after 1600. These were at 
 the North and at the South, leaving the temperate latitudes for future 
 occupancy. Cotemporaneous with these efforts was another scheme 
 of colonization, conducted under' the auspices of the same King, 
 which has had a more salutary and enduring influence upon Ameri- 
 can character than any other the colonization of Scotch in the 
 
 *"The great district of Pennsylvania for the development of the 
 Scotch-Irish character, in its energies, enterprise, religious and moral 
 principles, as well as its educational tendencies and usefulness, was 
 Southwestern Pennsylvania." 
 
 " A Tribute to the Irish and Scotch Early Settlers of Pennsylvania, by 
 a Descendant" (the late Judge Chambers, of Ghambersburg), p. 131.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 289 
 
 North of Ireland. For us, at least, no two classes of widely sepa- 
 rated events could have been better timed. The colonists in Ulster 
 and their descendants were, for about a century, trained in religious 
 faith and in physical endurance before this country became ready 
 for their reception ; so that when they did come they were enabled 
 to settle in controlling numbers just where they could best develop 
 their character and. growth, and from which they could diffuse them- 
 selves into other localities of strategic importance. 
 
 Much of now-a-days travel is in an organized form called excur- 
 sions. Allow me to suggest one which would be eminently Presby- 
 terian : Take the Pennsylvania railroad to Downingtown. There 
 get your late co-presbyter, Mr. Collier, to send over to Westchester 
 for the historian of Octorara, Mr. Futhey. With them in your 
 party you will need no hand-book. Go down the Brandywine to 
 Wilmington, thence to Havredegrace, at the mouth of the Susque- 
 hanna. From there, keeping some ten or twelve miles off the river, 
 go up to York, and return by way of Columbia and Lancaster to the 
 place of beginning. You will then have compassed, with consider- 
 able margin, the great original nursery of the Presbyterian Church 
 in the United States of America; an area not greater than the 
 counties of Allegheny and Washington, or Westmoreland. 
 
 I do not mean by designating these boundaries to fence out other 
 localities, in which Presbyterianism was planted and is yet grow- 
 ing ; for it is one of those plants " whose seed is in itself," and 
 
 "Vital in every part , 
 
 Cannot but by annihilating die." 
 
 There are many such in all the States north of the Potomac, even 
 in New England. But here in these contiguities of Delaware, 
 Maryland, and Pennsylvania, is the nursery par excellence, where 
 true, genuine, improved Scotch-Irish Presbyterianism found its most 
 favored soil and culture. There its "bow still abides in strength," 
 though perhaps with diminished elasticity. There its "branches 
 have run over the wall," sending forth healthy, luxuriant shoots 
 into the valleys of Pennsylvania and Virginia, among the mountains 
 of the Carolinas and Tennessee ; and eventually, as we shall see, 
 into these once ends of the earth. How many Presbyterian 
 churches there are in it I do not know. The great trouble in 
 their early history was to keep their meeting-houses far enough 
 T
 
 syo PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 apart. In it were founded and long flourished, at least four schools 
 of learning and divinity. In it were born, and trained or educated, 
 some of the most eminent and useful men of the nation as states- 
 men, judges, governors, lawyers, physicians, and especially minis- 
 ters of the gospel. Princeton College has drawn from it three of 
 her presidents, Hampden-Sidney two, and Schenectady one. From 
 it went forth Davies, the apostle of Presbyterianism and religious 
 toleration in Virginia ; Graham, the founder of the college at Lex- 
 ington; Waddell, the "blind preacher," whom Wirt has mirrored 
 in his " British Spy," and others of like spirit if not of equal fame. If 
 to these we add nearly all the fathers of all the branches of the 
 Presbyterian Church in Southwestern Pennsylvania McMillan, 
 Smith, Power, Dunlap, Finley, and Henderson if a nursery which, 
 in a single age, sent forth such an array of vigorous plants as these 
 be not entitled to pre-eminence, in what can pre-eminence con- 
 sist? 
 
 The planting of this nursery just there, and just when it came to 
 be planted, are events with- which our early history has close con- 
 nections and similitudes. To trace these may carry us into paths 
 of inquiry that are intricate and unfrequented, which, although they 
 may seem dark. at the entrance, will, we trust, have some light at the 
 outcome. 
 
 Pennsylvania was granted to William Penn and his heirs by 
 Charles II., March 4, 1681. Except Georgia it was the last of the 
 Old Thirteen to derive a patent from the Crown, and the only one 
 which had no ocean front. And yet, in climate, soils, woods, 
 waters, water courses, healthfulness, and easy access from the sea, 
 she got the best position in all the range of colonies. She was 
 equally fortunate in having for her founder and fundamental law- 
 giver one who, whether from the inward light that was the basis of 
 his faith, or from personal experience of the evils of intolerance, 
 made freedom in the worship of God a pillar of his political fabric, 
 and set it up so straight and strong as to inspire the confidence of 
 all peoples in its security. She had a peculiarly mild and whole- 
 some system of laws, and was without any of those grants of large 
 bodies of land and inequalities of wealth and social rank which dis- 
 couraged the rapid growth of many of the other Colonies. No other 
 Colony could present such inducements to thift-loving, law abiding
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 immigrants, who were in search of good freehold farms and free- 
 dom in religion, and to none other did they come so freely. 
 
 Though a little out of place, it may save repetition here to note 
 that in 1609 James I. of England gave to a company of Londoners 
 a vast territorial grant, under which Virginia claims to be the mother 
 of States. It had a front upon the Atlantic of four hundred miles, 
 of which Old Point Comfort was the middle point "and from the 
 sea coast of the precinct aforesaid up into the land throughout from 
 sea to sea, west and northwest " thus, as Virginia afterwards claimed 
 it, making a kind of truncated cone, widening westwardly on its 
 northern confines, so as to sweep over Maryland, this region of 
 country, the State of Ohio, and all west and northwest of it away 
 up to 54 40'. Had this patent been allowed to endure it would 
 have been a serious obstacle to colonization. Happily it was, in 
 1624, at the instance of the Company, revoked and annulled; and 
 although never restored, it was, as we will see after a while, made the 
 pretext by Virginia for the most arrogant pretensions. 
 
 The grant of Maryland, in 1632, by Charles I. to Cecilius Cal- 
 vert, hereditary Lord Baltimore, embraced an important part of the 
 old Virginia grant ; and, half a century afterwards, enabled Penn- 
 sylvania for a while to have a neighbor, who, however troublesome 
 in other respects, harmonized in the principles of religious tolera- 
 tion which Virginia denied. Lord Baltimore's domain was to be 
 from the Potomac, etc., northward, so as to include all that " lyeth 
 under the 4oth degree of northerly latitude from the equinoctial," 
 meaning the belt between 39 and 40, which, as things now 
 are, would have reached north of the old city of Philadelphia. 
 Longitudinally it was to extend from the Delaware Bay to the 
 "meridian of the first fountain" of the Potomac; which covered 
 what is now the little State of Delaware. So that had this grant 
 been allowed to become effectual according to its letter, it would 
 have put all our nursery into Maryland, where very soon religious 
 toleration become a mockery. 
 
 Penn's southern boundary was to be a circular line from the Del- 
 aware, " drawn at twelve miles distance from New Castle northward 
 and westward unto the beginning [ ? 39 or 40] of the fortieth de- 
 gree of northern latitude, and then by a straight line westward " to 
 the limits of five degrees of longitude from the Delaware.
 
 292 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 By reason of an alleged misplacement of the ideal line 40 some 
 nineteen miles too far to the south on the only authoritative map of 
 those parts (Captain John Smith's) extant at the dates of the chart- 
 ers to Lord Baltimore and Penn, and the impossibility of a circle of 
 twelve miles radius from New Castle drawn northward and westward 
 touching 39, the southern beginning of the 4oth degree, or 40 
 its northern beginning, unless by recognizing the alleged misplace- 
 ment, the heirs of William Penn, after a long and angry controversy 
 with the Lords Baltimore, running from 1682 to 1732, were enabled 
 to get an agreement fixing the southern boundary of their province 
 on an east and west line fifteen miles south of Cedar or South 
 Street, Philadelphia ; and in this way that much of our nursery was 
 saved. 
 
 By another misplacement of a line, another part was saved, until 
 the plants had taken such deep root as not to be easily eradicated. 
 The mouth of Octorara creek is several miles south of the north line 
 of Maryland ; but in 1682-3, soon after Penn and Lord Baltimore had 
 had a friendly conference about their bounds, the latter caused a 
 well-marked line to be run from the Susquehanna at the mouth of 
 that creek, bearing a little north of east, clear through to the Dela- 
 ware. This was of course taken for the intended boundary between 
 the provinces ; and some thirty or forty years afterwards an exten- 
 sive settlement under Pennsylvania, called Nottingham, was pushed 
 down to that line. When, under agreements entered into first in 
 1732, and finally in 1760, the disputes were settled and the line 
 came to be truly defined, it was found to run through this settle- 
 ment, throwing one part of it into Cecil county, Maryland, and the 
 other into Chester county, Pennsylvania. The settlers were, how- 
 ever, allowed to remain ; and so the Maryland part of our nursery 
 was saved. But this was not all of it. 
 
 The grant of Maryland was upon condition that its lands had not 
 before been settled by any Christian people hactenus terra inculta. 
 Some Swedes and Fins had, about 1628, set up the short-lived 
 colony of Swaanendael on the western shore of the Delaware Bay. 
 They had been conquered by the Dutch of New Netherlands, whose 
 principal domain was upon Manhattan and the Hudson ; and they 
 had been in turn conquered by the English. Thereupon the Dela- 
 ware Bay territory became an appendage to the province of New
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 293 
 
 York, which Charles II. had granted to his brother the Duke of 
 York. By this process the Duke, afterwards James II., claimed to 
 override the right of Lord Baltimore to the western bay shore of the 
 Delaware. Penn, being the fast friend of James, and anxious to 
 obtain a good outlet for his " too backward lying province," in 1682 
 bought out the Duke's claim, and eventually, by favor more than 
 right, became proprietary of the "three lower counties;" and he 
 and his heirs held them through long years of contention and jeal- 
 ousies until they got their limits established, and then they set up 
 for themselves. In this way the residue, or Delaware part, of our 
 nursery was rescued from a colony which had soon to succumb to 
 religious intolerance. It became a very important part : it held the 
 gateway. For a long time more immigrants from Ireland landed at 
 New Castle than at Philadelphia. 
 
 He who does not see the hand of a Higher Power in working out 
 these results from the blunders and ambiguities of these old colonial 
 charters, must be afflicted with a mental cataract which no human 
 surgery can remove. 
 
 It is claimed for the Plain of Shinar, upon which, for the purposes of 
 concentration, men began to build after the flood, that in all Asia no 
 more favorable locality could have been found from which to disperse 
 mankind over the earth. And it has, I believe, come to be a recog- 
 nized fact in natural history that plants and the lower animals have 
 had several distinct centres of creation and dissemination. The world 
 is full of analogies. Here, in these contiguous corners of three col- 
 onies, we find not only a centre of one of the most vigorous, stable, 
 and aggressive systems of religious faith and polity that has ever 
 blessed mankind, but the centre from which nearly if not quite all 
 the other centres of that faith on the continent have been derived. 
 Take a map of the Atlantic slope, and nowhere upon it, in the 
 range of the old British- American colonies, can we find a locality 
 possessing equal advantages of access, of protection and growth, and 
 of egress and diffusion into all the regions round it, north and east, 
 but especially south and west. It was central but not confined, in- 
 land but not interior ; with a soil and climate which encouraged 
 labor, fitted for products and pursuits suited to the very people who 
 were wanted to occupy it, and adapted every way to physical, intel- 
 lectual, and religious development. Not only was it the right place
 
 294 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 for the right men, but it was made ready for them at the right time. 
 Had the Scotch-Irish emigrants who embarked on the "Eagle Wing " 
 in 1636 been permitted to consummate their voyage, they would 
 have been compelled to settle on the cold, inhospitable hills of New 
 England, or the enervating, uncongenial lowlands of Carolina, only 
 to become absorbed in the surrounding population, or, like the 
 Scotch on the Cape Fear, become dwarfed by intolerance and barren 
 inactivity. They would have left Ulster to become the blighted re- 
 gion that it was before their advent thither, and before it had become 
 sufficiently populous to sustain its future emigrations; and, more 
 than all, before, by revivals in their religion, by galling exactions 
 and persecutions, and by repeated expulsions from it and the mother 
 country, their descendants and countrymen had become fully quali- 
 fied to found, in the New World, a church without a bishop, and 
 commonwealths without a king. 
 
 It was not until 1717, the era of the formation of the old parent 
 Synod of Philadelphia, some thirty-five years after the foundation 
 of Pennsylvania, that the Scotch-Irish began in any considerable 
 numbers to come to America. Although up to this time a very 
 large, if not controlling, number of the ministry of the American 
 Presbyterian Church were from Scotland and Ireland, it would seem 
 that their constituency were not in the same proportion. 
 
 The first great migration from Ulster to Pennsylvania and it 
 was to Pennsylvania that nearly all the emigrants came prior to the 
 Revolution was from about 1717 to 1750. At this time, under the 
 benign sway of the Toleration Act of 1689, religious persecutions 
 in Great Britain had ceased, or at least had become tempered down 
 into annoying hindrances and exactions. But the long leases which 
 landholders had granted upon the original colonization had ex- 
 pired, and they took advantage of the prosperity which had attended 
 the labors of the colonists and their descendants to advance the rents 
 to such high figures as to be ruinous to many of the tenantry, and 
 burdensome to all. Having heard of the better land across the sea, 
 where they could be their own landlords, where tithes were unknown 
 and taxes light, they at once determined to seek new homes there. 
 And thither they went. 
 
 James Logan, the secretary and chief counsellor of the Proprie- 
 tary Government for many years after 1701, an Irish Quaker, wrote
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 295 
 
 in 1729: "It looks as if Ireland is to send all her inhabitants 
 hither, for last week not less than six ships arrived, and every day 
 two or three arrive also. The common fear is that if they con- 
 tinue to come they will make themselves proprietors of the pro- 
 vince." Mr. Proud, in his History of Pennsylvania, says that up 
 to 1729 six thousand Scotch-Irish had come, and that for several 
 years prior to 1750 about twelve thousand arrived annually. In 
 September, 1736, one thousand families sailed for the Delaware from 
 Belfast alone. 
 
 At this rate it would not have taken long to fill up the nursery. 
 But they did not all settle there. Some went north into Bucks county, 
 some into New York and New Jersey ; but until it became pretty 
 well filled very many took their abodes in the old plantations, either 
 as additions, or in the places of others who moved further to the 
 front of civilization, up the Susquehanna into Donegal and Paxton, 
 or over it into the Kittatinny valley, or through it and over the 
 Potomac into the valley of Virginia. Many moved directly into 
 those localities after a brief sojourn among their friends, and after 
 having taken counsel from them as to the ways of wilderness life. 
 
 The Scotch-Irish, like emigrants of every nationality from the 
 Fatherland, did not seek to scatter themselves loosely over set- 
 tled communities. They moved compactly, and settled in colonies 
 sufficiently numerous to be self-sustaining, and to be able, in due 
 time, to secure a minister and school, wherever there were large 
 bodies of good land to be had "for taking up." This policy or 
 propensity of their own harmonized with the policy of the Quaker 
 government. Although they could be friendly, they could not fra- 
 ternize with the Quakers. Nor could they at all affiliate with the 
 Germans and "Palatine boors," who were constantly crowding 
 upon them. Moreover, they had no love for the Indian, and were 
 not averse to a fight with him " or any other man " upon just pro- 
 vocation. Hence it became a peculiarity of their very being to be 
 always pushing for the front lines of conflict with the wilderness and 
 the savage. But although they had no love for the Indian "as 
 such," they respected his rights, and almost inviolably obeyed the 
 requirements of the Proprietors not to settle upon his hunting 
 grounds before being purchased, or without permission. Nor did 
 they often, in their inceptive settlements, go to the land office for
 
 296 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 titles. When upbraided for this " squatter " habit, their reply was : 
 " The Proprietaries and their agents solicited colonists to come 
 freely, and we have come accordingly. We are improving your lands, 
 and when we come to ask for our titles we will pay for them." But 
 they were generally careful to see a fair prospect for a good title be- 
 fore they expended much of either labor or money. In this respect, 
 however, they were never wronged, unless from their own obstinate 
 neglect. 
 
 As not all who were within the lines of the Nursery were Scotch - 
 Irish, so neither were all who were of that nationality there and 
 elsewhere good Presbyterians. Predominantly they were. Some 
 of them only leaned that way, while, perhaps, there were some who 
 had no very decided religious leanings of any kind. But all of 
 them, except the most depraved, had a respect for the institutions 
 and ministers of religion ; and were imbued with a peculiar spirit of 
 combativeness, which fitted them for being pioneers in every aggres- 
 sive movement, material, political, and religious. To this spirit, 
 undefinable by any other standard than itself, is to be ascribed 
 much of their success, even in sanctified effort. 
 
 Historians of the Presbyterian branches of the Church in America, 
 generally begin their narratives with a relation of the trials and 
 trainings of the forefathers in Scotland and in the North of Ireland. 
 For me to do so in this presence would be an unpardonable inva- 
 sion of a province with which you are all familiar, and to which I 
 could add nothing new. I may, however, so far trespass as to say, 
 that the class of people to whom we give the appellative Scotch- 
 Irish, are very different from the Irish, who during these many 
 years past have crowded our ports, and swarm in all our cities. 
 Neither are they Scotch, nor a cross of the two races. Not a drop 
 of Celtic or Milesian blood lurks in their veins. They are as dis- 
 tinct to-day as they were two hundred and fifty years ago ; having 
 maintained their Scotch lineage unalloyed, save only perhaps by oc- 
 casional intermixtures of English blood taken from part of the re- 
 mains of Cromwell's army, who took refuge in Coleraine and else- 
 where, in the North of Ireland, upon the overthrow of the Com- 
 monwealth. As a race, they are only denizens of Ireland, to which 
 they were transplanted from Scotland, and where most of them can 
 yet find their kindred, and the graves of a common ancestry. And
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 297 
 
 yet by long residence and habitude they may be considered as in- 
 digenous to the nine counties of the old province of Ulster Antrim, 
 Armagh, Cavan, Donegal, Down, Fermanagh, Londonderry, Mona- 
 ghan, and Tyrone ; names, the most of which are as familiar to Penn- 
 sylvanians as Washington and Franklin. Although their religious 
 and educational trainings closely resemble those of the Scotch, and 
 always have done so, yet they differ in their predominant pursuits 
 and aspirations. Generally the Scotchman is content with the stinted 
 subsistence of his heaths and braes ; the Scotch-Irishman is for ever 
 grasping at or hoping for something better. Moreover, the early 
 Scotch colonists of Ireland were select stock. Many of them 
 though not lords were lairds, and all of them were men of grit and 
 enterprise, and above the average in intelligence. They went there 
 to better their condition, and all their history and that of their de- 
 scendants shows that whenever they cannot accomplish that they 
 leave. In many respects they have come to differ widely from the 
 parent stock. How it has been in their religious bearings, I will not 
 undertake to speak ; but politically they have been often antipodal. 
 The last of the Kings of the house of Stuart fixed his last hopes on 
 Scotland, while Derry and the Boyne extinguished them for ever. 
 Our Revolutionary annals disclose no instance of a Scotch-Irish Pres- 
 byterian Tory ; whilst everywhere, especially in the South, a distinc- 
 tive Scotch settlement abounded in Tories. We may, therefore, safely 
 consider the Scotch-Irish as a race of improved Scotch. Nor should 
 we receive this as a doubtful truism. We know that cereals, fruits, 
 and domestic animals, are often greatly improved by slight changes 
 of place and surroundings ; and why not men ? Transfer the thrift- 
 loving but penury bound inhabitants of our rugged hills or crowded 
 streets to the rich prairies or fast growing towns of the West, and 
 they or their sons rise to places of honor and influence, or come 
 back to us members of Congress or doctors of divinity. Individuals 
 often become great, or greatly good by opportunity by the provi- 
 dential opening of avenues through which they march to eminence. 
 Many have lain down in " cold obstruction," who might have 
 become leaders in the onward progress of humanity, but 
 
 "Their lot forbade." 
 
 And so of communities, or aggregations of men. Had the Scotch 
 colonists of Ireland remained at home, they probably would have
 
 2gS PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 made no distinguishing impression upon their social surroundings, 
 but upon their translation to Ulster, they found a land of high sus- 
 ceptibilities, blasted and barren by wars, and by the ignorance and 
 indolence of a degraded peasantry made such by a degrading re- 
 ligious superstition, with which they were obliged to be in contact 
 and in antagonism. They went to work to restore the land to fruit- 
 fulness, and to prove the superiority of the Protestant faith. In ac- 
 complishing these purposes, they developed energies of which they 
 would otherwise have remained unconscious, and their aims grew 
 higher and of wider range. 
 
 Upon coming to the wilds of America, they found themselves in 
 a wholly new and greatly enlarged sphere, without any of the clogs 
 and discouragements which beset them in the old country. Every- 
 thing beckoned them to increased exertion. Their prospects ex- 
 panded, and their powers expanded with them. No other class of 
 colonists grew so rapidly or so vigorously, because none others so 
 readily and tenaciously adapted themselves to the perils and priva- 
 tions of a new country. Ever advancing, never receding, as soon 
 as the great valley of the West was open to settlement they entered 
 it, fearless of the difficulties and dangers which confronted them. 
 And this brings us to inquire why and how they came into this re- 
 gion of country ; what, if any, were the peculiarities of this advance 
 position, and what influence these had in developing the character 
 and accomplishing the results to which they here attained. These 
 inquiries will call us off to events somewhat remote in time, but 
 nearer home than those which have hitherto engaged our attention. 
 
 Cupidity led the way in the controversy for dominion over 
 Western Pennsylvania and its contiguities, which sprung up about 
 the middle of the last century. It began in a struggle for the 
 Indian trade, which, for about half a century before the war of the 
 Revolution, was the great business of all the colonies south of New 
 England; founding families and fortunes, and demanding for its 
 conduct men of intelligence and energy, as well as of hardihood and 
 cunning. Most of the Indians found here at the inception of the 
 strife had come last, and not very remotely, from the borders of the 
 Lehigh and the branches of the Susquehanna. They were the rem- 
 nants of once powerful tribes. Trade with them was of some value ; 
 but their favor and friendship was of the greatest importance, be-
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 2q<) 
 
 __ > 
 
 cause they possessed the approaches to the territory northwest of the 
 Allegheny and Ohio Rivers, which was the great field of traffic. 
 For this the French had long contended, and with surpassing suc- 
 cess, until, by the superior energies of indomitable Scotch-Irish 
 Pennsylvanians, who sold cheaper and better goods, their supremacy 
 was endangered. Philadelphia became the great mart of the trade, 
 with depots of supplies at Lancaster, Harris's Ferry, Carlisle, Ship- 
 pensburg, and the mouth of Conococheague. To divert this, if 
 possible, southward, was the primary object of the old Ohio Com- 
 pany, a Virginia corporation of very ambitious pretensions ; while 
 the French saw that their only chance of turning it to Montreal was 
 by crowding off all the English traders and claimants, upon the 
 ground that they were intruders upon the domain of His Most 
 Christian Majesty. In this way began the strife in which Washing- 
 ton rose and Braddock fell. It soon became a contest of races and 
 religions. In espousing the quarrel, England unwittingly inaugu- 
 rated a train of events which conduced to the Independence we are 
 soon, for the hundredth time, to celebrate. For, not on Lexington 
 Common, but up here in a mountain fastness in Fayette, and by 
 Washington, was first 
 
 " Fired the shot heard round the world."* 
 
 The story is a familiar one, and I will not seek to rehearse it. I 
 refer to it only to introduce such of its incidents and sequences as 
 bear directly upon the inceptive settlement of Southwestern Penn- 
 sylvania. 
 
 There had for some time been lurking in the councils of Virginia 
 a notion, fast ripening into a belief, that Pennsylvania's five degrees 
 of longitude westward from the Delaware, were not long enough to 
 reach over the mountains. But the Penn proprietaries, their de- 
 puty governors, and wary adviser, James Logan, persistently as- 
 serted that the " forks of the Ohio " was within the grant. On the 
 other hand, when the Pennsylvania Assembly were asked to con- 
 tribute to the expulsion of the French, they very incautiously ex- 
 pressed a doubt whether the alleged intrusion was upon their terri- 
 tory, and refused any contribution of men or money ; basing their 
 refusal, however, upon the ground that the Penns would not recog- 
 nize their right to tax their manors and other unsold lands for that 
 * See Bancroft's Hist. U. S., IV., 118.
 
 joo PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 or any other purpose. Hence, Pennsylvania had no part in the 
 disastrous expeditions of Washington and Braddock, in 1754 and 
 1755; but she came in at the final expulsion by Forbes, in 1758. 
 This semi-abnegation of ownership was made an ingredient in the 
 poisoned chalice which Virginia commended to the lips of Pennsyl- 
 vania in after years. 
 
 The kind of people who found a new settlement other things 
 being indifferent often depends upon its routes of approach. All 
 history abounds in teachings to this effect. It was early seen that 
 the "short route" across the mountains into the Ohio valley was 
 from the mouth of Wills Creek (Cumberland, Md.), by a line nearly 
 coincident with the old National Road, to the mouth of Redstone, 
 or Brownsville, on the Monongahela. It was traced and used as a 
 trader's path as early as 1748, if not sooner, and was greatly pre- 
 ferred to the Juniata route, even by Pennsylvania traders, who came 
 up the valley to the mouth of the Conococheague, and thence up 
 the river to Wills Creek. Washington, in a letter urging its adop- 
 tion by Forbes' army, in 1758, thus briefly and truly gives its his- 
 tory : "The Ohio Company, in 1753, at a considerable expense, 
 opened the road. In 1754, the troops whom I had the honor to 
 command greatly repaired it as far as Gist's plantation ; and in 1755 
 it was widened and completed by General Braddock to within six 
 miles of Fort Duquesne." This road, however, diverged from the 
 line of the National Road a little east of Laurel Hill, and bore off 
 more northwardly ; but a branch went from the top of the hill, and 
 another from Gist's, at its foot, to Redstone. 
 
 Leading directly, by easy grades, no considerable curvature, seve- 
 ral meadows and few river crossings, from the Potomac borders of 
 Virginia and Maryland, and contiguous Pennsylvania, it became at 
 once, at the close of Pontiac's War, a popular highway of trade 
 and migration. A letter from Winchester, Va., April 30, 1765, 
 says: "the frontier inhabitants of this Colony and Maryland are 
 removing fast over the Allegheny mountains to settle and live there ;" 
 and during all the residue of that decade the current of emigration 
 over it was unceasing, though not very strong. These Maryland 
 and Virginia emigrants settled mostly in the Fayette part of what 
 was then Cumberland county, between the mountains and the Mon- 
 ongahela; a few in the mountains at Turkey-foot; more, perhaps,
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 301 
 
 in the southern parts of Westmoreland ; and some on the river bor- 
 ders of Greene and Washington. Characteristically they were rude, 
 caring more for game and good lands which cost nothing than for 
 any of the enjoyments of civilized life. Some of them, however, 
 became good citizens, and their descendants are there yet. They 
 all kept near this road and its connections, and the rivers. West of 
 the Monongahela there was, for many more years, no road ; and 
 mainly for that reason, except near its bank, no whites settled. 
 
 Virginia early saw the importance of this road, and adopted it. 
 In 1 766 she gave 200 to repair it and connect it with her settle- 
 ments on the South Branch of the Potomac and around Winchester, 
 with a view to attract the Indian trade. The connection was made 
 about half way between Cumberland and where Frostburgh now is. 
 Washington travelled it to Pittsburgh in 1770; and by it came Dr. 
 McMillan,* on his second tour to the West, in January, 1776. It 
 was generally known as Braddock's road, but to distinguish it from 
 the Pennsylvania road, which Forbes' army made, it was called the 
 Virginia road. 
 
 The very first assertion of sway over these new settlers was one 
 specially provocative of lasting disaffection. It was a cardinal rule 
 of the Penn Proprietors to allow no intrusions by settlers upon lands of 
 which they had not acquired the Indian title. And it is a noticeable 
 feature in the progress of settlements in Pennsylvania, that they 
 almost always preceded the proprietary purchases, and thereby often 
 compelled them. The advance settlements just adverted to were 
 interspersed with some Indians, chiefly of the Delaware tribe, who 
 were claimed by the Six Nations to be their conquered vassals, and 
 tenants by sufferance upon their hunting grounds. These lived at 
 peace with the settlers, and uttered no complaint. Not so, however, 
 with their lords paramount in New York, who were naturally imperious, 
 conscious of their power, and fond of swaying their sceptre, though 
 a barren one. Without any well defined ground of complaint, they 
 contrive to impress the King's agents for Indian affairs, and through 
 them the governors of Pennsylvania and Virginia, with the belief 
 that unless the settlers were removed something terrible would hap- 
 
 * Although Doctor McMillan did not receive the honorary degree of 
 D.D., from Jefferson College, until 1807, for convenience of designation. 
 I give him his title from the beginning.
 
 3 02 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 pen. Forthwith the governors go to work to proclaim them away. 
 Their warnings are unheeded, or answered only by increased migra- 
 tion. Thereupon military detachments are sent up from Fort Pitt 
 to drive them away. The soldiers, being kindly treated, hurt nobody. 
 They, perhaps, turned a few cabins inside out, but no sooner are 
 they withdrawn than the settlers put all to rights again, and resume 
 the statu quo ante. Some become alarmed and retire to their old 
 homes, but finding their neighbors unharmed, they come back. This 
 was in 1766-67. The running of Mason and Dixon's line in 1767 
 as far as to its second crossing' of Dunkard creek, in now Greene 
 county, indicated that all these intruders were within Pennsylvania ; 
 and Governor Fauquier of Virginia, glad to escape from his un- 
 pleasant position, did not gainsay it : so he left the Penn powers 
 to fight it out as best they could. Governor Penn, in January, 
 1 768, called the special attention of his Assembly to the subject, 
 saying their removal was indispensable to avert a war. The Assem- 
 bly was as badly frightened as was the Governor, whereupon, Feb. 
 3, 1768, they pass a law by which, after jreciting that " many dis- 
 orderly people (....) have presumed to settle upon lands 
 not yet purchased from the Indians, to their damage and great dis- 
 satisfaction, which may be attended with dangerous and fatal con- 
 sequences to the peace of this province," it is enacted that if any 
 settlers, after being required to remove themselves and families, by 
 personal notice or proclamation sent to them, should not so remove 
 within thirty days thereafter; or, if after having removed they 
 should return ; or, if any should settle after such notice, every such 
 person, " being thereof legally convicted by their own confession or 
 the verdict of a jury, shall suffer death, without benefit of clergy." 
 Such a bloody law could only be a brutem fulmen, and irritate but 
 not deter. To try its effect, Governor Penn sent out the Rev. Cap- 
 tain John Steele, of Carlisle, a Presbyterian, and three other citizens 
 of Cumberland county, to visit the settlements, distribute proclama- 
 tions embodying the law, and warn the settlers to quit. They go 
 out early in March, by Braddock's road, and report to the Governor 
 that they had done as commanded, had convened the settlers at 
 Redstone and at Gist's, read the Proclamation, reasoned with them 
 about it, and preached to them ; but all to no purpose. While at 
 Redstone [Brownsville] a deputation of Mingoes, from their town on
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 303 
 
 the Mingo bottom [below Steubenville] came to the meeting, and, 
 after sermon, delivered some wampum and a speech, saying : "Ye 
 are come, sent by your great men, to tell these people to go away 
 from the land which ye say is ours ; and we are sent by our great 
 men, and we tell you the white people must stop, and we stop them 
 till the treaty." The " treaty " in prospect came off at Fort Pitt in 
 April and May, 1768 between 1,000 and 2,000 Indians there, of 
 the Six Nations, Delawares, Shawnees, and other tribes sundry talks, 
 belts, and wampums ^1,000 in presents distributed; but the only 
 complaints were by the Pennsylvania Commissioners against the 
 Indians, for selling their lands to the settlers, and the interference 
 of the Mingo delegation at Redstone. And when they asked the 
 Mingo chiefs to join in a deputation to warn off the settlers, they 
 declined the task, the old Seneca chief Guyasutha saying, in sub- 
 stance, "You will soon buy our lands, and these people will be our 
 neighbors, and we don't want to offend them." And so ended the 
 " treaty," and the settlers did not go, nor did any of them "suffer 
 death without benefit of clergy." The old chief saw that "coming 
 events cast their shadows before," for in the ensuing autumn a 
 great "treaty" was had at Fort Stanwix (Rome, N. Y.), at which, 
 for ^10,000, the Penns bought from the Six Nations all the before 
 unbought portions of the province except that which was north and 
 west of the Allegheny and Ohio, and Conewango creek, the outlet 
 of Lake Chatauqua. 
 
 It is inferred that up to 1 768 no considerable settlements were 
 made in Southwestern Pennsylvania other than those in Fayette and 
 its borders, for none others were complained of. Mr. Steele estimated 
 their numbers at a hundred and fifty families, which would not ex- 
 ceed eight hundred souls. This estimate, however, was exclusive of 
 George Croghan's settlement up here on the Allegheny, above the 
 cemetery, and settlers under "military permits" at and around 
 Forts Pitt and Burd, and perhaps Ligonier, and along the roads 
 leading thereto. These all would not add more than two or three 
 hundred to the population.* 
 
 * The statement by Smollett, in his History of England, that the erec- 
 tion of Fort Pitt, etc., iu 1759-60, "gave perfect security to about four 
 thousand settlers, who now returned to the quiet possession of the lands 
 from which they had been driven," is sometimes quoted as evidence
 
 30 4 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 On the 3d of April, 1769, the Penn proprietaries opened their 
 land office in Philadelphia, for acquiring titles to lands in the " New 
 Purchase." Within the first month there were 3,200 applications/ 
 many of which were by speculators. For four or five years, how- 
 ever, the waves of immigration rolled in steadily, with ever-increas- 
 ing volume, bringing the people who gave to this region a character 
 which it has never lost, though materially modified by changes of 
 industries and the consequent influx of populations unknown to the 
 fathers. 
 
 Up until 1771 the settlers were left to the freedom of their own 
 will, uninfluenced except by the Indians and traders, and the agents 
 and feeble garrisons whom the King kept here to control them no 
 taxes, no courts, no ministers of the law,* nor of the Gospel, out- 
 side of Fort Pitt, except when sent here on some special mission, as 
 were the Rev. Messrs. Beatty and Duffield in 1766, and Mr. Steele 
 in 1768. 
 
 About twenty-one years elapsed between the erection of the coun- 
 ty of Lancaster (1729) and the counties of York (1749) and Cum- 
 berland (1750). A like period run before the erection of Bedford 
 the ninth of the series. The secret of this slowness has been at- 
 tributed to the wish to retain political power in the three old Quaker 
 counties of Philadelphia, Bucks, and Chester, each of which, by the 
 frame of government, had eight members of Assembly, while to each 
 new county was conceded but two or three. Be this as it may, the 
 increased and increasing ultramontane population demanded a 
 closer approach of the civil power than Carlisle. 
 
 On the gth of March, 1771, Bedford county was set up over all 
 
 of the population, at that date, of the region around Pittsburgh. Ad- 
 mitting that Smollett knew what he was writing about, and had some 
 reliable data for the statement all of which is very questionable the 
 context shows that his 4, 000 settlers covered the entire frontiers of Penn- 
 sylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, which did not then extend west of the 
 mountains. See Appendix, No. 3. 
 
 * Strictly this statement is not quite correct. In May, 1770, some ten 
 months before the erection of Bedford county, Arthur St. Clair, William 
 Crawford, Thomas Gist, and Dorsey Pentecost all historic names were 
 among the Justices of the Peace appointed for Cumberland county. But 
 they have left no trace of any exercise of their official functions until 
 after their re-appointinent for Bedford county, in March, 1771, and again 
 (except Pentecust), for Westmoreland, in 1773.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 305 
 
 of Southwestern Pennsylvania. The Act erecting it recognized 
 Mason and Dixon's line, including its prolongation beyond Mary- 
 land as its southern boundary, but made no provision for a western 
 one ; nor, except on the north and east borders of Greene, and in the 
 immediate western contiguities of Pittsburgh, did it ever attempt to 
 reach beyond the Monongahela, for reasons which we will presently 
 see. With the seat of justice a hundred miles away among the moun- 
 tains, its influence was necessarily feeble, its arms weak. It was, 
 however, subdivided into townships, a few justices of the peace 
 resident west of the mountains appointed, some roads laid out, and 
 taxes assessed. Many shunned its embraces. I know not how it 
 operated elsewhere than up in Fayette, among the "disorderly" 
 settlers. There it was fiercely repelled. Justices of the peace were 
 contemned, deputy sheriffs beaten off, and combinations entered 
 into to resist the laws. Even official surveys slackened, and settlers 
 squatted without right. This state of things sprang from inherent 
 antipathies, fostered by demagogues and festered by the "bloody 
 law;" and was based upon the uncertainty whether the resistants 
 were in Pennsylvania or Virginia. " When the back line comes to 
 be run," they said, "if we are in Pennsylvania we will submit." 
 But they were not particularly anxious to have it run. It must, 
 however, be said that not all were of this way of thinking ; for there 
 were not wanting those who were desirous to live under regular gov- 
 ernment, of which they could then have none other than that of 
 Pennsylvania. 
 
 Superadded to the causes of attachment and antipathy already 
 noted, there was another of most potent efficacy in favor of Vir- 
 ginia. This was in the great disparity between the two colonies in 
 the prices of lands. The Penns sold at ^5 sterling per hundred 
 acres, while the Virginia rate was only ten shillings. Without any 
 present payment a settler could, under either colony, acquire an 
 inceptive or preemption right by improvement, cultivation, and ac- 
 tual residence ; and the fact that this right extended to four hundred 
 acres, if properly designated, and there was no interference of a 
 prior like claim, or official grant, or survey duly returned, enabled 
 the settler to postpone his election under which colony he would 
 claim until he would come to pay for and perfect his title. For 
 
 this an indefinite indulgence was allowed. In this way many of the 
 U
 
 jo6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 choicest lands in Southwestern Pennsylvania, on both sides of the 
 Monongahela, were long held, some, perhaps, to this day. It will 
 readily be seen how this state of things presented to men a tempta- 
 tion, upon any plausible pretext, to change their allegiance, or, at 
 least, to hold it in abeyance. 
 
 The Bedford county machinery worked badly. The power was 
 too far from the weight of population. After less than two years of 
 trial, on February 23d, 1773, Westmoreland county was erected, 
 the last of the ante-Revolution counties. It covered all of what 
 was Bedford west of the lines of Cambria and Somerset, and is a 
 mother of counties. It undertook no definition of its southern or 
 western boundary other than "as far as the province extended." 
 Its seat of justice was fixed temporarily at the "house of Robert 
 Hanna," where, enlarged to Hannastown, some three miles north 
 of Greensburgh, it remained, until the town was burnt by the In- 
 dians and Tories, in July, 1782. The only other visible change which 
 it wrought was a further subdivision of its territory into townships, 
 some more roads, and an increase of officers and taxes, thereby 
 bringing the restraints and burdens of government into more close 
 contact with the people. This produced some friction, but so far 
 as any evidence has come down to us, the average aspect of society 
 for a while indicated order, contentment, and prosperity. The 
 baleful colonial policy of England was fast engendering the tempest 
 of revolution all over our Atlantic coasts, but as yet its mutterings 
 were scarcely heard across the mountains. Secretly, but surely, a 
 revolt of another kind, the elements of which had been long gather- 
 ing, was now being matured, and ere the new county of Westmore- 
 land was a year old, it suddenly burst forth upon Pittsburgh and 
 its surroundings, and rapidly spread into all the settlements upon 
 the Monongahela and Youghiogheny. 
 
 The controversy between Pennsylvania and Virginia for the owner- 
 ship of this region of country has in it too many complications to be 
 here unfolded. That controversy was inevitable, and some of the 
 grounds of it have been already foreshadowed. In the sequel we 
 can only point to such of its prominent elements and results as bear 
 directly upon the aim we are seeking to give to our subject. 
 
 William Penn is said to have himself drafted his charter for Penn- 
 sylvania. If so, he was a much better law-giver than scrivener.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 307 
 
 Besides the ambiguity as to his southern limit, he left the mode of 
 ascertaining his western boundary in great uncertainty. All that 
 was said about it was that it was to be five degrees of longitude from 
 the Delaware, his eastern bounds. This compelled those upon whom 
 his title devolved to claim that it should be run at the distance of 
 five degrees of longitude from the Delaware at every point, so as 
 to make a curvilinear line over hills and rivers of almost impos- 
 sible demarcation. 
 
 Mason and Dixon's line, when originally established, was only 
 for a boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland. Virginia was 
 in no wise a party to it. It was run by actual measurement upon the 
 ground, with every successive mile marked by posts. Its prolonga- 
 tion, in 1767, beyond the "meridian of the first fountain " of the 
 Potomac, not then ascertained, and beyond the Monongahela, ena- 
 bled the-Penns, by some ex parte surveys and computations, to con- 
 clude that, for a while, and as far as it went, the Monongahela 
 would serve pretty well for a temporary boundary. Upon their in- 
 terpretation of the charter, it would, south of Pittsburgh, be a very 
 fair compromise line. It would surrender more territory than would 
 be acquired, as any one can see by tracing a line parallel with the 
 Delaware upon a good map, running northwardly from the south- 
 west corner of the State, which is distant five degrees of longitude 
 from the Delaware, in that latitude. 
 
 The width of a degree of longitude varies according to the lati- 
 tudes it crosses, widest at the equator, contracting towards the poles. 
 Mason and Dixon made it, in the latitude of their line (39 43' 26") 
 to be 53 miles and 167 1-10 perches. Unless they had greatly 
 erred, the Penns were right in claiming that Pittsburgh, the great 
 bone of contention the gateway to the west was at least five or 
 six miles within their grant. And beyond all doubt the southeast 
 triangular half of what is now Greene county was within it, while, on 
 the other hand, it would throw out a very considerable portion of 
 the Forks of Yough, and make sad havoc, ultimately, of all the bor- 
 der counties north of the Ohio. Hence, at the first opening of the 
 land office, in 1769, for the " new purchase " of 1768, and for some 
 two or three years after, the Proprietaries did not hesitate to grant 
 rights to lands in that triangle, and may probably have granted some 
 on Saw-Mill Run and the lower valley of Chartiers. Upon the erec-
 
 3^8 PRESBYTER/AN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 tion of Bedford county, the people of Greene were included in the 
 taxables for Springhill township, the body of which was in Fayette, 
 but I cannot find that there were any residents across the river from 
 Pittsburgh subjected to taxation. Nor is it believed that at any time 
 prior to the adjustment of the dispute, and to the erection of Wash- 
 ington county, in 1781, any taxes had been collected, or any serious 
 attempt made to exercise jurisdiction west of the Monongahela. 
 This abstinence added to the readily accepted belief that in no event 
 could Pennsylvania extend beyond that natural boundary. But, up 
 to that river, in its whole extent below the crossing of Mason and 
 Dixon's line, even in that part of the Forks of Yough which the par- 
 allel line would exclude, jurisdiction was claimed and exercised. 
 No doubt there were knowing ones who knew this, and being a popu- 
 lous and valuable region, it was natural that some disaffection should 
 exist there. 
 
 There was still another source of disaffection west of the Mon- 
 ongahela and Ohio, over from Pittsburgh. George Croghan, the 
 Deputy Indian Agent-General, resident near Fort Pitt, a man of 
 energy and influence, had procured from the Indians at the Treaty 
 of Fort Stanwix, in 1 768, a grant of some 200,000 acres westward 
 from those rivers, and above Raccoon, provided it should not fall 
 within Pennsylvania. It was then, and for many years afterwards, 
 an accepted belief that such sales conferred a valid title. He pro- 
 ceeded, about 1771, to lay off his grant, or part of it, between Rac- 
 coon and Pigeon Creek, extending into the interior ten or fifteen 
 miles. He had a back line run, which is, perhaps yet known as 
 Croghan's line, and was trying to sell in lots of not less than ten 
 thousand acres, at ^5 per hundred.* This brought him and his 
 retainers and dependents into conflict with the chartered rights of 
 Pennsylvania in that direction. 
 
 Altogether, therefore, the Penn Proprietaries had a combination 
 of perplexities and influences against them which nothing but stub- 
 born right could resist ; and the times were not yet auspicious for 
 its predominance. It is no wonder, then, that they were willing, 
 for the present, to make the Monongahela their boundary. 
 
 About the time these boundary troubles began, and while they 
 
 * Washington's Journal of 1770; Pennsylvania Archives, IV., 424-5.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. jog 
 
 were ripening into revolt, two very different classes of people had 
 come into this region of country ; and as they contributed, though 
 in very diverse ways, to the stirring events' which enter so largely 
 into our history during the last quarter of the last century, they may 
 now be introduced. 
 
 Almost from the first plantation of Virginia up to the outbreak 
 of the Revolution, Great Britain had enforced the policy of sending 
 over to the middle and southern American Colonies, from England, 
 Scotland, and Ireland, many of the very worst and meanest con- 
 victed felons. James I. began it by ordering " dissolute persons to 
 be sent to Virginia. " In a statute of fourth George I. ( 1 7 1 8) , among 
 the reasons assigned for this shameless policy was, that " in many 
 of his Majesty's colonies and plantations there was a great want of 
 servants, who, by their labor and industry, might be the means of 
 improving and making the said colonies and plantations more useful 
 to his Majesty." "It was calculated that about the year 1750 not 
 less than from three to four hundred felons were annually brought 
 into Maryland."* Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania repeatedly 
 passed laws in restraint of this influx of a vicious population ; but 
 they were disallowed by the King, in Council, as being derogatory 
 to the supremacy of the Crown and Parliament. Of course, after 
 being landed they had the run of the colonies. It is known that 
 many of them were from the southern and western provinces of 
 Ireland, some even from Ulster. Naturally, they would drift to the 
 further shores of civilization, as far as possible beyond the reach of 
 law, ready for participation in any tumults that might arise. Many 
 of them are said to have congregated in and around Pittsburgh, and 
 especially along the borders of the Monongahela and upper Ohio 
 hangers-on upon the Indian trade, or retainers of men who aimed 
 at prominence around them. All of these went by the general 
 name of Irish, and were too easily confounded with the better class 
 of Scotch-Irish. We will see much of their power for mischief when 
 we come to the Whiskey Insurrection ; and they were specially con- 
 spicuous in the overt acts of outrage and violence which charac- 
 terized the early stages of the Virginia usurpation. 
 
 *Pitkin's Hist. U. S., Vol. 1., 132; Judge .Chambers' "Tribute," 35; 
 Col. Rec. of Pa., V., 499, 550.
 
 j/0 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 The other and better class were immigrants of Scotch-Irish lineage, 
 who came as well from the North of Ireland directly as from the 
 localities in which their countrymen had settled, conspicuously from 
 the nursery, and parts which it had contributed to populate. 
 
 Between 1771 and 1773 occurred the second of the great migra- 
 tions from Ulster, to which we have before adverted. " The cause 
 of this second extensive emigration was somewhat similar to that of 
 the first. It is well known that a great portion of the lands in Ire- 
 land are owned by a comparatively small number of proprietors, 
 who rent them to the farming classes on long leases. In 1771, the 
 leases on an estate in the County of Antrim the property of the 
 Marquis of Donegall having expired, the rents were so largely ad- 
 vanced that many of the tenants could not comply with the de- 
 mands, and were deprived of the farms they had occupied. This 
 aroused a general spirit of resentment to the oppressions of the 
 large landed proprietors, and an immediate and extensive emigra- 
 tion to America was the consequence. From 1771 to 1773 there 
 sailed from the ports of the North of Ireland nearly one hundred 
 vessels, carrying as many as twenty-five thousand passengers,- all 
 Presbyterians. This was shortly before the breaking out of the 
 Revolutionary War ; and these people, leaving the Old World in 
 such a temper, became a powerful contribution to the cause of 
 liberty, and to the separation of the colonies from the mother 
 country. 
 
 " These Scotch-Irish emigrants landed principally at New Castle 
 and Philadelphia, and found their way northward and westward into 
 the eastern and middle counties of Pennsylvania. From thence one 
 stream followed the great Cumberland Valley into Virginia and North 
 Carolina, and from thence colonies passed into Kentucky and Tennes- 
 see. Another powerful body went into Western Pennsylvania, and 
 settling on the head waters of the Ohio, became famous both in 
 civil and ecclesiastical history, and have given to the region around 
 Pittsburgh the name it so well deserves, of being the back-bone of 
 Presbyterianism." * 
 
 Besides these emigrants direct from Ireland, great numbers came, 
 as already stated, from the nursery; from Cecil county, Maryland; 
 
 * J. Smith Futhey's Historical Discourse at 150th Anniversary of Upper 
 Octorara Presbyterian Church, September 14, 1870, page 31.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. Jff 
 
 from Chester, Lancaster, and York counties, Pennsylvania; and from 
 New Castle county, Delaware. Dr. McMillan, Mr. Smith, Mr. 
 Power, Mr. Finley, and Mr. Henderson, all, when they came here, 
 found themselves among old friends and acquaintances. It is a 
 great mistake to suppose that they came here after the manner of 
 missionaries of modern times ; their people were here before them, 
 waiting for them to come to gather them into folds and watch over 
 them as good shepherds. Dr. McMillan's journal shows that wherever 
 he went, as well on the east as on the west sides of the Monongahela, 
 and up through the valley of Virginia, in his tours of 1775 and. 
 1776, he found well-known faces and some relatives. It is said that 
 during the period that intervened between Mr. Finley's first visit to 
 the West and his removal in 1 783, as many as thirty-four families, con- 
 sisting chiefly of young married persons connected with his congre- 
 gation of East Nottingham or the Rock, on the borders of Cecil and 
 Chester counties, had emigrated to Western Pennsylvania, and 
 settled within an area of not over forty miles diameter.* Twenty- 
 two of the men of this migration became elders, and prominent and 
 useful men in church and state. Philip Tanner, Mr. Power's father- 
 in-law, had been one of Mr. Finley's elders at East Nottingham. 
 He owned the land on Dunlap's Creek, in Fayette county, on which 
 Mr. Power resided when Dr. McMillan tarried with him on his re- 
 moval to Chartiers, in 1778. He also owned two tracts in the 
 vicinity of Rehoboth meeting-house, and it is believed died there 
 about the time of Mr. Finley's death. James Edgar, one of Mr. 
 Smith's elders, whose praise is in all the churches, as well as in our 
 civil annals, was from York county, where he was a church elder, 
 and from which, before his removal to Cross Creek in 1778, he had 
 been a prominent representative in several of the conventions and 
 in one Assembly of the State in the Revolutionary period. He was 
 a great man and greatly good,f and filled important stations, legisla- 
 tive and judicial, in Washington county. He brought with him and 
 attracted many of his York county neighbors. A research into the 
 antecedents of the long list of elders named by Dr. Smith in his 
 " Old Redstone " (page 456), warrants the assertion that at least one 
 
 * Dr. Smith's " Old Kedstone," 285 ; Life of Macurdy, 252. 
 t See the curious " Solemn League and Covenant," iu Dr. Creigh's His- 
 tory of Washington County, pages 47-50.
 
 3 iz PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 half of them were from the nursery. Rev. Mr. Henderson, the 
 pioneer of the Secession or U. P. Churches in the West, was from 
 Oxford, in Chester county, and had charge also of a church at Pen- 
 cader, in the border of New Castle county, Delaware. Very many, 
 perhaps all, of his people had come from that region, and from 
 Scotland and Ireland. Time would fail to tell of all the Scotch- 
 Irish worthies who infused themselves into our early settlements just 
 before the outbreak of the Revolutionary war, and at its close ; 
 "who, through faith wrought righteousness" throughout all our 
 border. 
 
 We return now to some of the prominent events and results of 
 the Virginia usurpation. We call it usurpation, for such it undoubt- 
 edly was east of the Monongahela. West of that river her sway 
 was entitled to a milder name. 
 
 Of all the Governors whom the King, in the closing years of his 
 supremacy, sent over to dragoon his restless American colonies into 
 "passive obedience," the most arrogant and rapacious was John, 
 Earl of Dunmore, " a needy Scotch peer of the house of Murray." 
 He had, in 1771, tried his " 'prentice hand" in governorship, over 
 New York, where he played " such fantastic tricks" in rapacity as to 
 bring his career to a hasty and ignominious close. Being too supple 
 a minion of arbitrary power to be retired, he was, in 1772, transferred 
 to his Majesty's ancient Colony and Dominion of Virginia, where 
 he found a wider scope for his land greed, which was insatiable, and 
 for his tyrannies, which knew no bounds but his own personal safety. 
 Virginia, as he and his Majesty's Council in that Colony understood 
 it, covered not only the south-eastern borders of the Ohio, but all 
 the territory north-west of that river to the Mississippi. About 
 this period those regions began to swarm with land jobbers and 
 adventurers of all kinds, and his cupidity went forth in that direc- 
 tion. He saw at a glance that the Monongahela below Redstone 
 was the great water avenue from Eastern Virginia to that territory, 
 and that Pittsburgh held the portals. They must be acquired at all 
 hazards. 
 
 In the summer of 1 773 his lordship projected and executed a land 
 hunt tour into the West. Washington was to have accompanied 
 him, to look after the land bounties of himself and other officers 
 and soldiers of the French War of 1755-63, but was prevented by
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY, 313 
 
 the death of a daughter of Mrs. Washington. Dunmore took Pitts- 
 burgh in his way, going and returning, and while here made the 
 acquaintance of one Doctor John Connolly, a renegade Pennsyl- 
 vanian prone to political intrigue, and schooled in all the wiles of 
 wilderness adventure ; the same who was of the dinner party which 
 Washington, when in Pittsburgh, returning from his voyage down 
 the Ohio in 1770, gave at the "very good house of public enter- 
 tainment" on the south-east corner of Water and Ferry streets, kept 
 by Samuel Semple, Connolly's prospective father-in-law, as related 
 by Washington in his journal of that tour. He was the right man 
 for Dunmore ; so much so that it might be a question whether he 
 swallowed Connolly, or Connolly him. 
 
 Doubtless Connolly had accompanied Dunmore into the West, 
 and while on the expedition and here the scheme of the usurpation 
 was concocted. A willing populace seemed ready for it ; and to 
 perfect it Connolly paid him a visit at his "palace" in Williams- 
 burgh, during the Christmas holidays of that year. Forthwith, upon 
 his return, early in January, 1774, without any notice to any of the 
 Pennsylvania officials at Philadelphia or elsewhere, the usurpation 
 was inaugurated at Fort Pitt, now christened Fort Dunmore. It 
 was both military and civil, Connolly being constituted Captain 
 Commandant of all the militia of Pittsburgh and its dependencies. 
 Efficient coadjutors were found in Dorsey Pentecost, who then re- 
 sided in the Forks of Yough, at whose house Dr. McMillan preached 
 his fifth sermon in the West, in August, 1775, and who afterwards 
 became his neighbor on the East Branch of Chartiers, and a promi- 
 nent man in Washington County, of whom we will hear more when 
 we get over there. He had been a Bedford county justice, but 
 was doubtless for good reasons left out of the commission for 
 Westmoreland. The unfortunate Col.' William Crawford, who was 
 then presiding justice of the courts of Westmoreland, soon came to 
 his aid, as did also many other men of distinction. These, backed by 
 Connolly's militia, composed, as Col. Crawford characterized them 
 before his defection, "of men without character and without for- 
 tune, and who would be equally averse to the regular administra- 
 tion of justice under Virginia as they are to that under Pennsylva- 
 nia," very soon bore down all opposition, and the usurpation be- 
 came complete.
 
 3 i 4 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Pennsylvania had, at this juncture, in Westmoreland, some very 
 resolute and loyal justices, among them Arthur (afterwards General) 
 St. Clair, then the prothonotary, etc., of the county; George Wil- 
 son, of Mt. Moriah Church vicinity of whom more hereafter ; 
 Thomas Scott, then residing near the meeting-house of Dunlap's 
 Creek Presbyterian Church, in Fayette, afterwards the first pro- 
 thonotary, etc., of Washington county, and the first member of 
 Congress from Western Pennsylvania, and several others in and 
 around Pittsburgh. They did all they could to counteract and 
 break down the usurpation ; but, having no militia to sustain them, 
 they were utterly powerless. At its earliest announcement by Con- 
 nolly, St. Clair had him arrested and committed to the jail at Han- 
 nastown, from which he was soon discharged on bail 'for his appear- 
 ance at court there. When court came he appeared, with his 
 "militia" in his train, defied the court, and shut the court-house 
 door upon the judges. For stoutly, but discreetly, asserting their 
 powers and privileges, Connolly had three of the justices of the 
 court who resided at and near Pittsburgh Andrew McFarlane, 
 JEneas McKay, and Devereaux Smith sent off under arrest to 
 Augusta jail, at Staunton, from which Dunmore had the manliness 
 to release them. Subsequently, the Westmoreland jail was assaulted 
 and broken by mobs, led by Simon Girty, "and such," under 
 orders from Connolly and Crawford, and prisoners, committed by 
 Pennsylvania justices, were set at liberty. These are but samples of 
 the enormities that were perpetrated. During the year 1774, and 
 up to the middle of 1775, when Lexington and Concord and Bunker 
 Hill bad turned the current of feeling into other channels, the ad- 
 herents of Pennsylvania in the infected district were subjected, in 
 their persons, houses, and property, to all sorts of insults, violence, 
 vexatious suits, and oppressions. And yet, perhaps, because of the 
 resistless supremacy of the Virginia partizans, no blood was shed. 
 
 To induce a withdrawal of the invasion, Governor Penn had re- 
 course to negotiation with Dunmore, and a special embassy to his 
 palace ; but without any other result than to disclose more fully the 
 conflicting claims of the parties. The Governor proposed to make 
 the Monongahela a temporary line of jurisdiction, but his lordship 
 indignantly scouted it, saying that under nothing short of his Ma- 
 jesty's orders would he relinquish his hold upon Pittsburgh.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 Dunmore affected to be, and perhaps was, intensely loyal to his 
 King. So was Connolly, and they were equally reckless. Under 
 orders emanating from Connolly, aided by aggressions of the land- 
 jobbers, the Indian War of 1774, known in history as Dunmore'sor 
 Cresap's War, was brought on. It was purely the result of murders 
 and aggressions by Virginians, and the Indians had discernment 
 enough to so regard it. During its short-lived fury they never 
 crossed the Monongahela in their rage for plunder and revenge. 
 Dunmore afterwards upbraided them for this partiality. It was not 
 until the War of the Revolution had brought the British, and refu- 
 gees and Tories in Canada and Detroit, to aid and instigate them, 
 that they ever afterwards invaded the soil of Pennsylvania. 
 
 To " chastise" the Ohio Indians for their retaliation and par- 
 tiality, Dunmore, with numerous recruits to his forces from his par- 
 tizans along the Monongahela below Redstone, led in person one 
 division from Pittsburgh, down the Ohio to Hockhocking; and 
 after betraying Col. Lewis into almost a defeat at Point Pleasant, 
 made a hasty peace at Camp Charlotte. While his campaign was 
 going on, the first Congress of the Revolution was sitting at Phila- 
 delphia ; and he had sense enough to see that he would soon be 
 needed at home, and that two things within his power to promote 
 might greatly aid the cause of the King the favor of the Indians 
 and intestine feuds between the colonies and he shaped his policy 
 accordingly.* He returned by the route he went, and signalized his 
 bivouac at Fort Burd (Brownsville), by causing Thomas Scott to 
 be committed for trial for treason against Virginia, at an Augusta 
 Court, to be held at Fort Dunmore, from which he was not re- 
 leased until accumulated resentment and the beginning of the war 
 
 * Notwithstanding the manifest treachery of Dunmore in these tran- 
 sactions, and his palpable antagonisms about this time to the dearest 
 rights of the colonists, the second Revolutionary Convention of Vir- 
 ginia, in session at Richmond, in March, 1775 the same in which Patrick 
 Henry made his celebrated " we must fight liberty or death" speech 
 passed a most fulsome commendatory resolution of his conduct in this 
 campaign. And when, in 1802-3, his son, "without one solitary ray of 
 native genius," and of " manners bold, forward, and assuming," made a 
 visit to Virginia, he was feted, feasted, and toadied to, by the "first 
 families,'' as if a son of her greatest benefactor. See Wirt's "British 
 Spy," Letter 1, and letter of Wirt to Dabney Carr, January 16, 1804, in 
 Kennedy's Life of Wirt, Vol. I., Chap. IX.
 
 j/6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 for liberty had burst his prison bounds, and set many of Connolly's 
 captives free. The year of jubilee had come to Pittsburgh. 
 
 Ere midsummer of 1775 a mighty change had come over the 
 temper of the colonies, compelling, almost everywhere, their op- 
 pressors to yield to the upheaval of popular resentment, or be 
 buried beneath it. Dunmore had fled in terror from his palace in 
 Williamsburgh, to play governor on shipboard, and pirate on the 
 inlets of the Chesapeake Bay. Connolly's enormities and Tory pro- 
 clivities had at length so roused the indignation of the Pennsylva- 
 nians, that a party of them from Hannastown swooped down upon 
 Fort Dunmore, and rescued the justices and tax collectors there im- 
 prisoned. Under the guidance of Sheriff Carnahan and Col. George 
 Wilson, they captured the arch offender himself, and hurried him 
 off towards Philadelphia. By reprisals upon three of the justices, 
 including Col. Wilson, and sending them off to Fort Fincastle, at 
 Wheeling, Connolly's friends procured his release ere he reached 
 his destination. Early in July, soon after his return to Pittsburgh, 
 he fled, to condole with his lordship at Portsmouth in Virginia, and 
 devise new schemes of mischief. He never returned, to the great 
 relief, as well of the oppressed, as of many of his coadjutors in op- 
 pression. On his way from Dunmore, after a visit to Gage at 
 Boston, with a Lieut. -Colonel's commission to raise a regiment of 
 Tories and Indians in the West, he was captured near Hagerstown 
 in Maryland, and consigned to the Continental Congress at 
 Philadelphia, by whom he was kept a close prisoner there and at 
 Baltimore, with occasional releases on bail and on parole all of which 
 he violated, and therefor was re-committed until near the close of 
 the war, when he retired to Canada as a British officer on half- 
 pay, waiting and watching perhaps to the end of his life for some- 
 thing to turn up, whereby he might " feed fat his ancient grudge" 
 against the United States. He merited a halter more than did 
 Andre.* 
 
 It might be supposed that upon the downfall of the Dunmore 
 dynasty the usurpation would have been withdrawn. But not so. 
 Spurning the tyrannies of his lordship at home, Virginia clung to 
 his aggressions abroad. The early battles of the Revolution seem 
 to have paralyzed the Proprietary government of Pennsylvania into 
 * See Appendix, No. 1.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 317 
 
 utter unconcern about our boundary troubles. Frequent appeals 
 for relief brought no response. In the meantime, amid the cry, 
 to arms ! new actors come upon the stage, who are too busy with 
 affairs of greater moment to give any heed to a mere border strife. 
 Men and munitions of war had to be provided, and new govern- 
 ments organized, " founded upon the authority of the people only." 
 Men from the disputed territory were marching to the front, under 
 the banners of the Colony to which they respectively adhered ; and 
 for the present that was all that was needed. This lull in the strife 
 enables us to go back a little to gather up some of its ingredients 
 which have a bearing upon the purpose for which we are consider- 
 ing it. 
 
 Upon the revocation of the old charter of 1609 to the London 
 Company, Virginia became a royal colony, with just such territorial 
 limits as occupancy gave to her without interfering with any other 
 k'rant from the King. The Dominion of Virginia was a different 
 thing, consisting of all the domain of Great Britain in America 
 adjoining the Colony, which had not been granted to some other 
 Colony or Proprietary, as were the Carolinas, Maryland, and Penn- 
 sylvania. But by an adroit annexation of the Colony to the Do- 
 minion, Virginia came, in time, to consider them as one and the 
 same thing ; and practically, for many purposes, they were so. For 
 this, however, she had no other basis than having been, for a long 
 time, constituted keeper for the King of this ungranted dominion. 
 It was upon this ground that Dunmore asserted her right to rule in 
 the disputed territory, assuming that it was outside of the grant to 
 William Penn, and had been settled under Virginia. Grant his 
 premises, and his conclusion is a fair one. He probably knew that 
 Virginia, as a Colony, had repeatedly, and in every form of repu- 
 diation, disowned the old charter of 1609 ; and it comported better 
 with his exalted sense of his vice-royal prerogative to put the usurpa- 
 tion upon a loftier pretence. This was all well enough while Vir- 
 ginia remained a loyal Colony ; but upon her revolt, and throwing 
 off her kingly keeper-ship, she thereby severed herself from the 
 Dominion, and henceforth had to it nothing more than a right in 
 common with the other States of the Old Thirteen. Those who 
 swayed her councils about this time probably saw this, and were, 
 therefore, driven to evoke from its grave of ages the old charter of
 
 ji8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 1609, for the double purpose of saving the transmontane territory 
 of which she had possessed herself, and from which her eastern 
 settlements were widely separated, and of frightening off the in- 
 ceptive Colonies of Transylvania and Vandalia, then rising in the 
 West. Ultimately, as our early national history discloses, by her 
 dominant rank as a State, and by combining with other States which 
 claimed "from sea to sea," she pertinaciously kept up a show of 
 title to the vast territory northwest of the Ohio, now five or six 
 States, to which she had no more right than had the State of Dela- 
 ware. This, however, does not concern us now, or here; and I 
 have adverted to it only to give strength to the assertion that, even 
 to the territory west of the Monongahela, she had no other founda- 
 tion of right than priority of settlement and acquiescence. The 
 States united had much stronger ground upon which to challenge 
 her title there than she had to interfere with Pennsylvania east of 
 that river. But time and recognition have cured all defects. 
 
 The first Constitution of Virginia, adopted June 29, 1776, has in 
 it these very singular provisions : " The territories contained within 
 the charters erecting the Colonies of Maryland, Pennsylvania, 
 North and South Carolina, are hereby ceded, released, and for ever 
 confirmed to the people of those Colonies, respectively, with all the 
 rights of property, jurisdiction, and government, and all other 
 rights whatsoever which might at any time heretofore have been 
 
 claimed by Virginia The western and northern extent 
 
 of Virginia shall, in all other respects, stand as fixed by the charter 
 of King James I., in the year 1609, and by the public treaty of 
 peace between Great Britain and France, in 1763." It was very 
 kind in her to stop at the Mississippi ; and no doubt Maryland and 
 the Carolinas breathed freer after this, and so would Pennsylvania 
 have done, had it not been that Virginia still maintained her aggres- 
 sions east of the Monongahela. 
 
 Settlements in Virginia west of the Blue Ridge began about 1 730. 
 To provide for their government, that Colony, in 1 738, erected the 
 whole territory westward of that mountain barrier into the counties 
 of Frederick and Augusta. The line of separation between them 
 was a prolongation of the southwest line of what is now the county 
 of Shenandoah to the southern terminus of the west boundary of 
 Maryland, at Fairfax's stone, " the head fountain " of the Potomac,
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. j/9 
 
 and thence indefinitely "west and northwest," covering what are 
 now some fifty or sixty counties and four or five States, " omitting 
 fractions." 
 
 During 1774, '5, and '6, the disputed territory and all west of it to 
 the Ohio was treated by Virginia as part of Augusta county. Pre- 
 cisely when, how, and with what limits, if any, what came to be 
 known as the District of West Augusta was erected, it is bootless now 
 to inquire. It is enough for us to know that during those years 
 Virginia ruled it by that name. Courts composed of Dunmore's 
 justices, most of whom resided in the disputed territory, were held 
 at Fort Dunmore (Pittsburgh) upon adjournments from Staunton. 
 Taxes were levied, and perhaps some of them paid ; roads, mills, 
 taverns, and ferries were authorized ; ear marks and title deeds re- 
 corded ; and many other judicial functions exercised adapted to the 
 times, and especially to crushing out whatever of loyalty to Penn- 
 sylvania showed itself in the disputed territory. Deserted by the 
 government at Philadelphia, what could its friends do but submit to 
 the inevitable and 'bide their time? It was not long until the only 
 undisputed jurisdiction of Pennsylvania west of the mountains was 
 crowded into a little region around Hannastown, reaching no 
 where more than from ten to twenty miles towards the Monon- 
 gahela. 
 
 We can now see why it was that when Dr. McMillan was sent out 
 by his Presbytery, in 1775, and again in 1776, his commission was 
 cautiously worded, to go to "Augusta and Westmoreland." From 
 the time he got two days' journey up the Shenandoah valley, if he 
 kept his bearings towards the setting sun, go where he would, he 
 was within the bounds of his mission. And if at most places where 
 he preached, between the mountains and the Monongahela, he had 
 b^en challenged to elect his allegiance, he could have answered : 
 " Non nobis inter vos tantas componere lites." 
 
 In the journal of Dr. McMillan's first tour into the west it is thus 
 written : 
 
 ' ' Saturday [Sept. 9, 1775] preached at Josiah Richards', on Robe- 
 son's run, and rode about thirteen miles to Fort Pitt, and lodged at 
 Mr. Ormsby's. 
 
 " The zd Sabbath [IQ//J] preached at Fort Pitt, and rode about 
 seven miles to Thomas Ross', where I tarried till Tuesday."
 
 ?20 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Mr. Ormsby was John Ormsby, who then resided on or near the 
 southeast corner of Water and Ferry Streets, and was perhaps keep- 
 ing the " very good house of public entertainment " which Samuel 
 Sample had kept in 1770; for, though a sturdy Pennsylvanian, 
 Lord Dunmore had lodged with him about a year before, and tried, 
 in vain, to seduce him into his scheme of usurpation. He also 
 owned the ferry opposite. The Doctor notes no expense that day. 
 Thomas Ross was the Doctor's brother-in-law, and lived near where 
 Wilkinsburg now is.* 
 
 Chronology often brings together events which increase in interest 
 by their coincidence. Perhaps at the very hour Dr. McMillan was 
 preaching at Fort Pitt, Connolly was in council with General Gage 
 at Boston concocting his "infernal scheme" against the western 
 frontiers, for which purpose Dunmore had sent him to Gage in a 
 ship of His Majesty's navy, so as to elude the vigilance of General 
 Washington, who was then fast closing in his lines on his old fellow 
 officer in Braddock's campaign. On the day after Dr. McMillan 
 preached at the fort it was taken possession of by a Virginia com- 
 pany commanded by Captain (afterwards General) Neville, which 
 had arrived a few days before, so as to hold it against the machina- 
 tions of Dunmore and Connolly. And commissioners sent out by 
 Congress were here awaiting the coming in of the western Indians 
 to have a peace conference with them. The commotion caused by 
 these events, though he is silent about them, doubtless induced the 
 good Doctor to make part of a Sabbath day's journey to his sister's, 
 on his way homeward that evening. Unconsciously he was in the 
 beginnings of the great future for the West, for his country, his 
 church, and himself, which he lived to enjoy and helped to create. 
 
 Although Dr. McMillan was not the first Presbyterian minister 
 to preach at Fort Pitt, it is so highly probable as to be almost cer- 
 tain that he was the first of that faith to preach west of the Monon- 
 gahela. Inconsiderately, and without duly estimating the well 
 defined and long enduring line of separation which that river made 
 in our early settlements, our standard church historians! have given 
 
 * He was the ancestor of William B. Ross, the present (1875) Chief of 
 Police of Allegheny City, who seems to have a good deal of the old Doc- 
 tor's pluck iu him. 
 
 t "Old Redstone," 228, 329; Life of Macurdy, 276.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 321 
 
 credit to the supposition that some one or more of the ministers who 
 were sent or came out to the frontiers prior to Dr. McMillan did 
 cross over and preach there. 
 
 Mr. Beatty your worthy grandfather, sir who was chaplain to 
 a division of Forbes' army, in 1758, and who, beyond all doubt, 
 was the pioneer Protestant preacher in the West, did not then go 
 across the Monongahela. Neither did Mr. Allison, who accom- 
 panied Col. Burd to Redstone, in 1759. Nor did Messrs. Beatty 
 and Duffield, when at Fort Pitt in 1766, go over the river, except 
 up the hill opposite the fort, to see the place " from which the gar- 
 rison is supplied with coals." 
 
 Except in a limited portion, hereafter to be more particularly 
 noticed, of what is now Greene County, a few Indians had almost 
 undisturbed possession of all west of the Monongahela until 1771-2. 
 It is not likely, at that early day, that any other ecclesiastical body 
 than the Synod would send out any missionary into this region, or 
 that any would come without being sent, unless to obtain land ; and 
 west of what was then considered the limits of Pennsylvania was not 
 the place to go for such purpose by a minister of the Gospel of 
 Peace. 
 
 A careful examination of the Records of the Synod from 1770 to 
 1775 discloses no evidence from which it can be fairly inferred that 
 any appointment of a missionary, or of supplies, was designed to 
 apply to the westward of the Monongahela, or, if embraced in the 
 sometimes general terms of the appointment, that any went there. 
 
 It is not worth while to notice those missionaries or supplies sent 
 out prior to 1773, because of lack of people to go to. The ap- 
 pointments of Mr. Finley, in 1771, and of Mr. Craighead,* or Mr. 
 King,f in 1772, may, therefore, be passed without further notice. 
 So may that of Mr. Power, in that year, which was executed as to 
 the "Forks of James River," in Bottetourt County, Virginia. J 
 
 * Rev. John Craighead, pastor of Rocky Spring Church, in Franklin 
 County, 1768-99, and a captain in the Revolutionary War. 
 
 f Rev. John King, D.D., pastor of Mercersburg Church, 17691811, 
 whose successor was the late Rev. David Elliott, D.D. Dr. King was in 
 part the theological instructor of the late President Matthew Brown, 
 D.D., Rev. Dr. Herron, and of many others. 
 
 \ "Old Redstone," 227-8. 
 V
 
 jZ2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 At the Synod of 1773 no appointments or supplies were ordered 
 for this region of country. More crying demands came from other 
 places. "The harvest truly was plenteous, but the laborers few." 
 
 At the Synod of 1774 [Records, 454-5], application was made by 
 Rev. Messrs. Robert Cooper* and James Finley, "that some supplies 
 be sent to the numerous and increasing vacancies on the extensive 
 frontiers of Pennsylvania, and to form them into congregations as 
 far as they can." In pursuance of this three supplies were ordered 
 Rev. Messrs. John Hanna, William Foster, f and Mr. Samuel Smith, 
 a licentiate of New Castle Presbytery, the latter to go four months 
 " on the frontier parts of Pennsylvania, and in Virginia, if his state 
 of health will admit of it." [Records, 460.] At the Synod of 
 1775, it is noted that Mr. Smith fulfilled his appointment, and that 
 Messrs. Hanna and Foster did not. [Records, 463.] Mr. Smith 
 being in bad health, no doubt went South. He must have died 
 soon after, for we can trace him no further. 
 
 At the Synod of 1 775, the treasurer was ordered to pay Mr. Irwin| 
 ^9 95. 3d. on account of his mission to the western frontiers of 
 Pennsylvania and Virginia. [Records, 470.] He was probably ap- 
 pointed by the First Presbytery of Philadelphia, after the adjourn- 
 ment of the Synod. It is presumed that Mr. Irwin went, as Mr. 
 Smith did, into the valley of Virginia, where there were many im- 
 portunate vacancies. 
 
 The only thing that looks like direct evidence to sustain the sup- 
 position referred to, that I have seen, is the statement made to the 
 late Rev. Dr. Joseph Smith, by his step-father, Rev. T. Hunt, son- 
 in-law of Mr. Power, that the latter had "repeatedly informed him" 
 that in the summer of 1774 he had spent three months in missionary 
 
 * Pastor of Middle Spring Church, Cumberland County, 1765-97. 
 
 t Pastor of Upper Octorara, Chester County, 1768 to 1780 ; grandfather 
 of Hon. Henry D. Foster, of Greensburg, and of A. W. Foster and the 
 late J. Heron Foster, of Pittsburgh. He was a brother-in-law of Rev. 
 John Carmichaol, pastor of Brandywine Manor, who married Dr. Mc- 
 Millan and Catharine Brown, "Tuesday, August 6th, 1776, in troublous 
 times." Both the brothers-in-law were distinguished patriots and 
 "political preachers" in Revolutionary times. 
 
 \ Rev. Nathaniel Irwin, licensed by the Presbytery of New Castle, in 
 1773; ordained by the First Presbytery of Philadelphia in 1774, of which 
 l.e was long a member.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. J2J 
 
 labors through all the settlements of what are now Washington, 
 Allegheny, Westmoreland, and Fayette Counties."* Nothing would 
 be more natural to a person speaking in general terms, or to a 
 person taking note of what he said, without thinking of the distinct 
 line of separation between the two sides of the river, than to asso- 
 ciate Washington with the other counties of Southwestern Penn- 
 sylvania. 
 
 What seems very conclusive that neither Mr. Power nor any other 
 minister went west of the Monongahela in the year 1774, is that 
 during all that year, from April to November, covering the probable 
 seasons of missionary labor, that entire region, through all its bor- 
 ders and interior, was in a state of terror from the Indians in what 
 is known as Dunmore's War, as already noted. The settlers there 
 fled, or sent off their families to forts or other places of security 
 east of the Monongahela, over which the Indians did not go, because 
 it was against Virginians only that they were in pursuit of revenge. 
 It is, therefore, highly improbable that any minister ventured into 
 that enemy's country during that year. During the next year there 
 was peace, and in August Dr. McMillan was there. Neither he nor 
 any one else, in a form of evidence to be relied upon, has given us 
 to know that he had any precursor. Some John, a Baptist, un- 
 doubtedly, preceded him, but he was the John, the forerunner of 
 Presbyterian ministers west of the Monongahela. 
 
 Nor ought we to give implicit credence to the traditionary recol- 
 lections of those who make the Rev. James Finley to have come into 
 this region in 1765, and again in 1767.^ We can refuse our belief 
 in this statement without at all impeaching the perfect truthfulness 
 of those from whom it has been derived. Nothing is more common 
 than for narrators of early events, after a long lapse of years, and 
 without written memorials to guide them, to put them beyond their 
 true dates. In 1 765 this entire region, beyond sight of the King's 
 forts, was an uninhabited wilderness, save by a few Indians, and 
 more savage beasts. In 1767 it was not much better. Mr. Finley's 
 earliest advent is said to have been to look for "good land for his 
 six promising boys." If so, the time is fixed four or five years too 
 
 * "Old Redstone," 228 ; Life of Macurdy, 276. 
 t -T6., 279, 280-284 ; Life of Macurdy, 251, 2.
 
 j-V PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 soon. He could not but know that prior to 1769, as already noted, 
 intrusions into Southwestern Pennsylvania for any such purpose 
 would be unavailing, and subject him to the pains and penalties of 
 the bloody law, " without benefit of clergy." What seems to set the 
 question at rest, is a passage in his circular letter on the New State 
 project, which will be noticed in another connection, dated" Dunlap's 
 Creek, March ye i8th, 1783.* I have been labouring for the good 
 of this settlement these thirteen years, &c.," which puts his advent 
 to 1770, when he could very properly come, as well to preach as to 
 get land. He was probably in the West in that year, certainly in 
 1771, and perhaps in several of the succeeding years up to 178^, 
 when he removed to Rehoboth. 
 
 While sitting for the correction of errors, we may as well dispose 
 of another which has crept into nearly all our ecclesiastical histories ; 
 one of more serious import than those already noticed, because 
 highly derogatory to the character of the founders of our early 
 churches. It is that we had no Meeting-houses until 1790, some 
 fifteen years, at least, after our Presbyterian settlements had become 
 able to erect them, and long after many of them had settled pastors. 
 The author of " Old Redstone" is not otherwise responsible for this 
 error than in having copied into his book a paper in which it proba- 
 bly originated, without correcting it,f a duty which he would have 
 discharged had he lived to complete his projected new edition of 
 that valuable but somewhat disjointed work. 
 
 The attentive reader of the minutes of the Old Redstone Presby- 
 
 *This letter was doubtless written at the bouse of his son Ebenezer, 
 whom he had seated on a tract of land on that creek, in Fayette County, 
 which he bought in 1771 or 1772, on which his descendants yet reside. 
 In the tax-roll of Rostravor Township for 1773, in now Westmoreland 
 County, he is charged as the owner of land there. So is Mr. Tanner, his 
 elder, who accompanied him. The letter, in full, is found in Penn'a 
 Archives, X. 41, 44. Rehoboth Meeting-house was upon his land, for 
 which he provided a title by his will, dated November, 1794. 
 
 fl believe this error originated in one of a series of papers, entitled 
 " Early Recollections of the West," by the late Judge Wilkeson, of Buf- 
 falo, N. Y.. who once lived on Chartiers, first published in the "Ameri- 
 can Pioneer," Vol. II. (page 159), which are copied into Dr. Smith's "Old 
 Redstone " (page 44). From these it has been carried into Dr. Gillett's 
 revised edition of the " History of the Presbyterian Church, Ac.," Vol. I.,
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 335 
 
 tery, from 1781 to 1793, which form the staple of Dr. Smith's his- 
 tory, will not have failed to note the implied correction which they 
 furnish. With a single exception (at James McKee's, Congruity, 
 Sept., 1790), all its meetings are at places designated by the names 
 of churches, as Laurel Hill, Chartiers, Bethel, &c., some of them 
 expressly at Meeting-houses, as at the Lower or Upper Meeting- 
 house in the Forks, Round Hill, and Rehoboth. It cannot be 
 supposed that they met at a tent, or in the open air, especially in 
 January, nor would the members know where to assemble, unless 
 at a fixed and well-known locality. 
 
 We have, however, conclusive evidence that there were several 
 meeting-houses I prefer that name to churches in Southwestern 
 Pennsylvania many years prior to the erection of Redstone Presby- 
 tery. I speak here of Presbyterian Meeting-houses only. Mount 
 Moriah, near the southwest corner of Fayette County, at which Dr. 
 McMillan preached his first sermon in the West, shows on record a 
 deed dated July i, 1773, for four acres, including a spring, where a 
 " meeting-house is now building,"* It is a Presbyterian Meeting- 
 house, though, being on the outer verge of George's Creek Congre- 
 gation, it has been in some measure superseded. Dr. McMillan's 
 journal shows that he preached, on the 3d Sabbath of August, 1775, 
 at the "Forks Meeting-house, "f which, from the context, must have 
 been Round Hill; and on September i3th, of the same year, he 
 preached at a Meeting-house on Long Run, one of the predeces- 
 sors of the existing Meeting-house of that name in Westmoreland 
 County. There were doubtless Meeting-houses at Mt. Pleasant, 
 Sewickley, Laurel Hill, and Dunlap's Creek, the scenes of Mr. 
 Power's early labors, not later than 1777. 
 
 We need not wonder at the early existence of meeting-houses in 
 the wooded West. One could be* erected and finished in two* or 
 
 *See Appendix, No. 2. 
 
 \ The copj'ist of the extract from Dr. McM.'s journal, or the printer of 
 "Old Redstone," page 182, by omitting a line in the MS., deprives the 
 reader of the evidence of this meeting-house. Under the head of The 
 third Sabbath of August, it should read as follows : " Preached at Mr. 
 Pentecost's. ... I tarried here until Wednesday, when I 
 rode about six miles [and preached at the Forks Meeting-house. In the 
 afternoon I traveled six miles] further," &c. The words in brackets 
 being omitted in the extract.
 
 j/26 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 three days, at an expense only of the time and willing hands. A 
 few sturdy men with axes and an auger, a yoke of oxen and a log- 
 chain, a crosscut saw and frow, were all that were needed, and by 
 the next Sabbath it was ready for the minister and the people. 
 There was no " laying of corner-stones," with all the trumpery and 
 trumpetry of modern times. Grant that they were rude, they were 
 cheery, in harmony with the homes of their builders, rearing their 
 humble clapboard roofs with weight-poles to hold them against the 
 wind, away in the country, on some wooded slope, or in some quiet 
 vale, beside some noiseless spring or prattling rill fit locations at 
 which to drink of the Water of Life, and hymn the Songs of Zion 
 in unison with the bird-notes of the bushes and the deep diapason 
 of the forest. Their places have been supplied by edifices of more 
 costly structure ; while as to all but a few, the glorious old forest 
 trees which sheltered and adorned them have decayed or been cut 
 away, and, in too many instances, their worshippers have not had 
 enough of the grace of taste to plant and protect substitutes. A 
 treeless country church is worse than a tombless grave. 
 
 Thus far, I have endeavored to confine these ramblings over our 
 early annals to the eastern borders of the Monongahela, with only 
 occasional glances to the other side. I have kept the western side 
 of that river for separate consideration, because as to the colony 
 under which most of its settlements began, their ages, and the pre- 
 dominant character of its early settlers, it was as distinct as was Ken- 
 tucky from Ohio, with the " bloody river " rolling between ; and in 
 some respects still is. We are, however, now at a stage from which 
 our history, on both sides, begins to run in parallel lines, if not to 
 blend ; and the points of interest move, with the " star of empire," 
 to the westward. Henceforth it is from that quarter light will 
 come, under which to read understandingly much of our political 
 and religious history during the closing years of the last century. 
 We must, therefore, cross over into that Mesopotamian region, and 
 look into the beginnings of things there. 
 
 Viewed as a whole for as such we must for a while consider it 
 north of the latitude of Mason and Dixon's line, it may not be 
 inaptly called a peninsula. It was certainly isolated. For purposes 
 of access to the Great West it was intercepted by the Monongahela 
 and Upper Ohio. It had no army roads, nothing but Indian trails
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 3x7 
 
 u]>on the crests of its hills. Nor was it penetrated by any con- 
 siderable Avater-courses upon which the Indian or the trader could 
 piddle his light canoe. Though abounding in game, its forests 
 were not productive of peltry; and its rugged contour was not 
 attractive to the hunter or the husbandman. Except as to a small 
 part, it was not, even after 1769, considered open to settlement 
 under Pennsylvania ; while as a part of the King's ungranted Do- 
 minion of Virginia, he had by proclamation, soon after its undis- 
 puted acquisition by the Treaty of Paris of 1763, prohibited its 
 settlement an interdict which had been scrupulously obeyed by 
 his Governors up to the accession of Dunmore, though not always 
 by his subjects. 
 
 Viewed as to the times of its settlement, it is to be considered in 
 two very distinct parts its river borders, and its interior. 
 
 Of its river borders, that formed by the Monongahela was the 
 soonest settled; and of this, that portion which, after 1767 was 
 found to be in Pennsylvania, was the earliest. This was the settle- 
 ment upon Muddy Creek, in (now) Greene County, spreading out 
 northwards towards Ten Mile, and southwards towards Whiteclay 
 Creeks. A respectable historian, who seems to have drawn his data 
 from the land office at Harrisburg, makes its beginnings in 1769;* 
 which is corroborated by its adjacency to settlements about or before 
 that time in what is now Fayette County, and by the further fact 
 that some of the very earliest official surveys in the West, under 
 Pennsylvania, were in that region. Nowhere in all Western Penn- 
 sylvania is the lay of the land more inviting. Most of the hills of 
 Greene County have been pushed back upon its southern and 
 western borders. The roll of taxables for Springhill Township, 
 Bedford County, for 1773, hereinbefore referred to, testifies to a 
 probable population then in that settlement of not less than five 
 hundred, and the aggregate of taxes for the preceding year indicates 
 a not rapid increase. Like the early settlers in corresponding parts 
 
 * The reference here is to " Early History of Western Pennsylvania, 
 etc., by a Gentleman of the Bar. Pittsburg, Daniel W. Kauffrnan ; Har- 
 risburg, William O. Hickok, 1846." At page 48 he says Greene County 
 was settled iu 1796, evidently intended for 1769 the two last figures 
 having been transposed. It was in 1796 that the county was erected out 
 of that part of Washington. See further as to this, Appendix, No. 3.
 
 js8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 of Fayette, they had come mostly from the Potomac borders of 
 Maryland and Virginia, the Kittatinny Valley, a few, perhaps, from 
 the Nursery, and some from Ireland. John Armstrong's, where 
 Dr. McMillan preached his second sermon in the West, was on 
 Muddy Creek ; and in that vicinity is the oldest Presbyterian 
 church in Greene County for a while the only one. Mr. Arm- 
 strong was doubtless an acquaintance of the Doctor. The first 
 call for supplies to the old Presbytery of Redstone was from Muddy 
 Creek and the South Fork of Ten Mile (Jefferson). 
 
 Lower down the river, in choice locations, and up its largest 
 affluents, settlements were early formed. Old Virginia had for a 
 long time made a special business of persecuting Baptists. Hence 
 they took refuge on Muddy Creek, Whiteclay, and Ten Mile, and 
 lower down upon Pike Run and Peters Creek, at an early day, 
 where they were ministered to by Elders Corbly and the Sutton 
 brothers. A Baptist church in the last-named locality celebrated its 
 centennial in November, 1873. Dr. McMillan preached twice in 
 its Meeting house in 1775, and in one on Pike Run in 1776. 
 
 The Ohio river border came to be the abode of white men at a 
 somewhat later date. When Washington made his canoe tour down 
 the Ohio to Kenhawa, in October, 1770, and returned on horseback 
 from the Mingo Bottom across to Pittsburgh, by way, it is presumed, 
 of Robeson's Run and Chartiers, in November, he does not note a 
 single settler except Alexander McKee, at the mouth of that creek. 
 Settlers would not have escaped his observing eye, nor would he 
 have failed to note them; for he says in his journal that people 
 from Virginia and elsewhere were then exploring and marking all the 
 valuable lands along the Ohio as far as he went, and would probably 
 come to settle the next year. They undoubtedly came within the 
 next two or three years. They were on the very outskirts of civili- 
 zation, in close contact with the Indians across the river, eking out 
 a rude subsistence from game, fish, and by a paltry trade in rum 
 and peltry. It was their destiny a few years hence to become a 
 coast-guard to the better classes of men who ere long peopled the 
 interior. 
 
 The Rev. Joseph Doddridge, M.D., who spent all his life after 
 1773 on the Ohio river border, at and near Wellsburgh, whose 
 valuable notes on the early settlements, &c., of this region, so often
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 329 
 
 quoted, are of the highest authority, viewing things from his stand- 
 point, says that settlements began in the peninsula, in 1772, and 
 rapidly pushed on to the Ohio in the next year and afterwards.* 
 Though too late in the beginning, he is no doubt right as to the 
 progress. He (as were also his distinguished brother Philip, 
 Robert Patterson, James Allison, William Wylie, Alexander Camp- 
 bell, the founder of- the sect of " Disciples," and others), was of the 
 first class in the Canonsburg Academy, in 1791, and doubtless all 
 his life kept an eye towards the interior, but does not state the era or 
 period of its settlement. It was probably in such numbers as to at- 
 tract notice in 1772 and 1773, tne ^ ast years of the second great 
 Scotch-Irish emigration from Ulster to Pennsylvania, already re- 
 lated. Unlike the river border settlements, it seems to have had a 
 centre, and then spread outwardly ; and that centre was the Char- 
 tiers congregations of Dr. McMillan and Mr. Henderson. f * Dr. 
 Doddridge, referring of course to the border settlers, says they came 
 chiefly from Maryland and Virginia ; and being himself an Episco- 
 palian minister, laments that although many of them were of Episco- 
 pal parentage and training, they did not bring much of their re- 
 ligion with them. He further says, that the Scotch-Irish generally 
 took to the interior, and leaves it to be inferred that they did bring 
 
 * There are historians who locate settlers the Zanes at Wheeling, 
 Isaac Williams near the mouth of Buffalo, the Tomlinsonsa nd others at 
 Grave Creek, <fcc., at as early a date as 1769 and 1770. They were doubt- 
 less like the McAfees and Boon&in Kentucky, roving pioneers and hun- 
 ters, or looking out for good locations in the future. There were perhaps 
 others of the same kind in the peninsula and. on its borders, but they do 
 not entitle their abodes to the dignity of settlements, and I prefer to 
 follow Doddridge. 
 
 f There can be no doubt as to Pigeon Creek and Chartiers being the 
 first Presbyterian congregations organized west of the Monongahela. 
 But which of the two outranks the other can perhaps never be de- 
 termined. Dr. McMillan's testimony leaves-it in doubt. All we have 
 from him to the point is his journal, which reads thus: "The first 
 Sabbath of February (1776), preached at Mr. McDowell's (on Chartiers). 
 Monday, set out to see my sister (Mrs. Ferguson, near the Mononga- 
 hela), stayed with them till Friday. Friday, returned again to my con- 
 gregation. Stopt at Thomas Cook's, on Mingo Creek, where I continued 
 till Sabbath. The second Sabbath of February, preached at Arthur 
 Forbes" (which was in the Pigeon Creek neighborhood). This looks 
 as if he, at that time, considered both as one congregation.
 
 330 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 their religion with them. This- all the world knows. Moreover, 
 they did not seclude themselves far away among people of no re- 
 ligion. They were like the sheep upon the thousand hills of the penin- 
 sula, somewhat gregarious in their habits, and not averse to high 
 lands. With them it was first, good farms at cheap rates and good 
 neighbors ; then the cabin, the clearing, the minister, the meeting- 
 house, and the school. And the fact that they had no minister of 
 their faith among them \mtil 1775, is presumptive proof that they 
 had not been long there. That a very large proportion by some 
 estimated as high as seven-eighths of these interior settlers were of 
 Scotch-Irish lineage, and Presbyterians of the various branches of 
 that faith, is a well accredited fact. And there they established, and 
 have ever since maintained, a new nursery, from which have been 
 disseminated the benefits and blessings of religion and education all 
 over- the West and Northwest. Although many of them who had 
 come from the "Old Country," had been residents of Pennsylvania 
 long enough to have formed some attachment to its laws and gov- 
 ernment, and others were " to the manner born," they came, noth- 
 ing loth, into what they supposed was Virginia, under assurance 
 confirmed by the immunity long enjoyed by their brethren and 
 kindred in the Shenandoah Valley, that tithes and intolerance 
 would never reach them there.* 
 
 Up to 1776 it does not appear that the improvised district of West 
 Augusta took much care of His Majesty's subjects west of the 
 Monongahela, except in the immediate vicinity of Pittsburgh. The 
 most that it did was to authorize some roads from places in the 
 Youghiogheny settlements and Fort Dunmore, into the interior, to 
 Paul Froman's Mill, on Chartiers, to Dunfields [where?], to Pente- 
 cost's Mill, on the east branch of Chartiers, and one as far as Cat- 
 fish's Camp. Says the same high authority already cited (Dr. 
 Doddridge) : "In the section of country where my father lived 
 there was, for many years after the settlement of the country, 
 ' neither law nor gospel.' . . . During a long period we knew 
 nothing of courts, lawyers, magistrates, sheriffs, or constables. 
 Every one, therefore, was at liberty to do whatever was right in his 
 own eyes." Game and lands were free, and plenty for all. Slan- 
 ders and insults were settled by single combat. For other offences 
 * See Appendix, No. 4.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 331 
 
 there was a code more imperative in its requirements than printed 
 statutes the unerring little finger of public scorn, thicker than all 
 the loins of the law books. " Hating out" was a more effective 
 punishment than fines and imprisonment. Being, for a while, at 
 peace among themselves a:>l with the Indians, the settlers were con- 
 tent to be let alone. And had it not been for the growing troubles 
 east of the Monongahela, and apprehensions of " fightings from 
 without," they might have safely remained so for a much longer pe- 
 riod. These, however, and a rapidly augmenting population in the 
 peninsula west of the Monongahela, gave to Virginia an opportune 
 pretext for annexing to it the disputed territory, and by sub-division 
 to strengthen her sway over the whole. To accomplish this she, 
 in October, 1776, erected the united territory, and much more of 
 what is now West Virginia, into three counties, Monongalia, Ohio, 
 and Yohogania. The new arrangement went into effect in Decem- 
 ber of that year ; but it never worked well, especially in the disputed 
 districts, where duality of dominion led to increasing evasions of 
 both civil and military duty. Men vibrated in their allegiance as 
 caprice or interest prompted, l^and titles became uncertain, ani- 
 mosities festered, and enmities became indurated. Throughout the 
 whole territory immigration slackened and progress halted. And 
 yet for some purposes it was well that jurisdiction was divided. 
 What was left of Westmoreland was an exposed frontier under con- 
 stant alarms from Canadian British, Tories, and Indians. So was the 
 peninsula, but in greater degree, because of its longer border. ,The 
 National Government was almost powerless for protection. Neither 
 of the two States could afford much aid. The enemy was upon them 
 in the east, and their resources were exhausted. Each had to leave 
 its ultramontane people to defend themselves. This was more easily 
 effected by severed allegiance and ready concentration of home 
 effort than it could have been by relying upon a united but discord- 
 ant and scattered action. Each had an important interior to protect 
 for supplies, the safety of which depended upon the vigilance and 
 strength of the border lines. Happily these were maintained under 
 the guidance and co-operation of common commanders at Fort 
 Pitt, through whom intestine conflict was warded off. By this 
 process the fathers of Western Pennsylvania and contiguous Virginia 
 were disciplined to self-reliance, the broadest and strongest basis
 
 jjs PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 upon which to rear elevated and enduring character. In this, if I 
 mistake not, lies the secret of that back-bone-ism in church and 
 state, which the Scotch-Irish ancestry of this region early appro- 
 priated, and have never surrendered, and which, we trust, their 
 descendants never will surrender or lose. 
 
 This digression into a side path enables me to escape any fur- 
 ther notice of the workings upon our territory, of these Old Vir- 
 ginia counties, than to say, that Monongalia included a small part 
 of Washington, upon the Ten Mile ; about one-third, the south- 
 western part, of Fayette, and all of Greene. Ohio county embraced 
 about one-third of Washington on the west, below Cross Creek; and 
 Yonogania, the "lost pleiad," covered all the other parts of the 
 undisputed, as well as of the disputed territory, north and east of the 
 other two, in Washington, Beaver, Allegheny, Westmoreland, and 
 Fayette, losing itself amid the perplexities of an undefined boundary. 
 The court-house of Monongalia was on the land of Theophilus 
 Phillips, near New Geneva; that of Ohio, at "Black's Cabin," near 
 West Liberty; and that of Yohogania, on the "plantation of An- 
 drew Heath," on the western bank of the Monongahela, about 
 where the line of Washington and Allegheny counties strikes that 
 river. Almost all our old original meeting-houses were in Yoho- 
 gania; Buffalo, and perhaps Cross Creek, were in Ohio; Mr. Dodd's, 
 Dunlap's Creek, and Mount Moriah, in Monongalia. The early 
 records of Ohio and Monongalia are lost ; those of Yohogania sur- 
 vivej almost the only monument of its existence. Its courts did a 
 large and varied business, civil, criminal, military, and mixed. 
 Dorsey Pentecost was its clerk, and it even had some lawyers. Of 
 its sheriffs, legislative representatives, and " gentlemen justices," 
 were some of the most distinguished and useful men in our early 
 annals, in church and state, in war and in peace.* 
 
 We cannot afford here to follow this boundary controversy 
 through all its mazes and doublings. All that concerns us now is 
 to know how it terminated. 
 
 Virginia gave but little heed to the cession to Pennsylvania which 
 
 she had embodied in her Constitution. Nor did anybody else. 
 
 It meant nothing but a haughty condescension to let us keep what 
 
 she had no rightful power to take away. Practically it left the ques- 
 
 * See Appendix, No. 5.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 333 
 
 tion just where it found it what were the true limits and extent of 
 the grant to William Penn ? There being no tribunal competent to 
 decide it, the parties were left to work out its solution as best they 
 could. 
 
 During the years 1777 and 1778, various propositions for a final 
 adjustment of boundaries were submitted between the parties, but 
 all rejected. At last, in December, 1778, Virginia proposed a joint 
 commission to agree upon them. To this Pennsylvania acceded in 
 March, 1779. Commissioners from each State met in Baltimore, 
 in August of that year ; and, after a series of lengthy and able ex- 
 postions in writing of their respective pretensions, came to the fol- 
 lowing agreement : 
 
 " BALTIMORE, August 31^ t, 1779. 
 
 " We, George Bryan, John Ewing, and David Rittenhouse, com- 
 missioners for the State of Pennsylvania, and we, James Madison, 
 and Robert Andrews, commissioners for the State of Virginia, do 
 hereby, mutually, on behalf of our respective States, ratify and con- 
 firm the following agreement, viz.: To extend Mason and Dixon's 
 line due west five degrees of longitude, to be computed from the 
 river Delaware, for the southern boundary of Pennsylvania ; and 
 that a meridian drawn from the western extremity thereof to the 
 northern limits of said State, be the western boundary of Pennsyl- 
 vania for ever. (Signed.) 
 
 GEORGE BRYAN.* JAMES MADISON. 
 ' JOHN EwiNG.f ROBERT ANDREWS.")) 
 
 DAVID RITTENHOUSE.! 
 
 * An eminent Philadelphia lawyer, appointed a Judge of our Su- 
 preme Court, in 1780, and re-appointed in 1787. Author of the Constitu- 
 tion of 1776, and of the eloquent preamble to the Act of 1780, " for the 
 gradual abolition of slavery." He was an elder in the Presbyterian 
 Church. 
 
 t Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia, Provost 
 of the University of Pennsylvania, and author of an old college text 
 book on Natural Philosophy. lie was a commissioner on the Eastern 
 end of our boundary with Maryland, in 1760, and for our southern 
 boundary with Virginia, in 1784, and was appointed for the western, 
 but declined. 
 
 J.The eminent Astronomer and Mathematician, State Treasurer from 
 1776 to 1789, first director of the U. S. Mint, and engaged in determining
 
 334 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 We may well pause here to inquire how it came to pass that parts 
 of Western Pennsylvania, so important as those between the meri- 
 dian line agreed upon, and the crooked curvilinear line parallel 
 with the Delaware, clear through to the Lake, so long insisted upon 
 by the Penns, and after them by the Commonwealth, are not 
 now parts of the States of West Virginia and Ohio, which they 
 would have been had the repeated offers of Pennsylvania been 
 acceded to. 
 
 The correspondence of the commissioners at Baltimore is a model 
 of diplomacy, calm, dignified, but exhibiting the highest order of 
 tact in thrust and parry. I will not undertake to summarize the 
 arguments employed.* The parties set out widely apart, coming 
 together by gradual approaches. The Pennsylvania Commissioners 
 began the negotiations by claiming three degrees of latitude, from 
 42 to 39, but because that claim, if recognized in its whole extent, 
 "might disturb the settlers on the south side of the Potomac," they 
 proposed to adopt the west boundary of Maryland, with an extension 
 of it down to 39, and make that parallel of latitude our southern 
 boundary to the western limit of the State. The Virginians met this 
 by saying that the parts south of Maryland and the Potomac which 
 it was offered not to " disturb," belonged to the grant to Lord Fair- 
 fax, and were as much beyond our reach as any part of Maryland. 
 They therefore proposed to Pennsylvania to make a prolongation of 
 Mason and Dixon's line her southern boundary to the full extent 
 of her five degrees of longitude, saying nothing about a western 
 boundary. The Pennsylvanians acceded to this offer, provided, 
 however, that Virginia would give to them for a western boundary 
 
 and running our Southern and Western boundaries with Virginia, in 
 1784-85, and our Northern with Now York, in 1795. He died in 1796. 
 
 Not the afterwards President of the U. S., but a relative. At this 
 time he was President of William and Mary College, and was after- 
 wards Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church of Virginia. His 
 father, Gabriel Madison, was olerk of Augusta Courts, in the years of our 
 boundary troubles. 
 
 || Professor of Mathematics in William and Mary College. A Protes- 
 tant Episcopal preacher. He and Rev. Mr. Madison served Virginia 
 in determining our boundaries with that State, in 1784-85. 
 
 * The correspondence in full is in Hening's (Va.) Statutes at large. 
 Vol. X., 621.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 a meridian line clear through to 42, " which shall include as much 
 land as will make Pennsylvania what it was originally intended to be, 
 viz. : three degress in breadth by five in length, except so much as 
 has been heretofore relinquished to Maryland." The Virginia Com- 
 missioners met this by a flat denial of any right of Pennsylvania to 
 compensation, but "that all cause of discord might be removed," 
 offered to relinquish to her all territory west of Maryland down to 
 39 30', to the extent of five degrees of longitude from the Dela- 
 ware on that half way parallel. The Pennsylvania Commissioners 
 accepted this offer, upon condition that Virginia would allow our 
 western boundary to be a meridian from the end of that parallel, 
 "as far as Virginia extends" northward, that is, clear through to 
 42. The Virginia Commissioners could not grant this addition to 
 their half-and-half offer, but proposed the meridian for our western 
 boundary, based upon an extension of Mason and Dixon's line. To 
 this the Pennsylvania Commissioners at once acceeded, and on the 
 self same day the agreement was signed. We may regret that they 
 did not hold on a little longer to 39, so as to have given us at least 
 the Pan-handle. We, however, have no right to complain. They 
 did exceedingly well. It is presumed that the Commissioners of 
 neither State supposed that our western limit would come so little 
 short of the Ohio, that great natural boundary recognized by every 
 other State than Pennsylvania which its current laves. 
 
 It very soon became a question whether this "compromise" did 
 not conduce to more troubles than it cured. The agreement was 
 subject to ratification by the Legislatures of the contracting parties. 
 Pennsylvania, within thirty days after the meeting of her Assembly 
 in October, 1779, S ave ^ ner unqualified approval, as well she might 
 do, seeing that it expanded her western limits full half a degree, 
 without any equivalent loss on the south. Virginia saw this, but too 
 late to recede with honor, and being thereunto incited by some of 
 her ceded citizens, held back a while to devise some scheme by which 
 settlers and speculators claiming under her could hold their lands at 
 Virginia prices. To subserve this purpose she, in December, 1779, 
 sent out into the lately disputed and ceded territory three commis- 
 sioners, "to adjust land titles" therein, under one of her recently 
 enacted statutes, upon ex parte hearings. Their sittings were at 
 Coxe's Fort, on the west side of the Monongahela, and at Fort
 
 jj6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Burd* (Brownsville), on the east side. No event in the whole con- 
 troversy so roused the ire of Pennsylvania. Her Executive sent a 
 courteous but decided remonstrance to the Governor of Virginia. 
 It was unheeded. President Reed threatened armed resistance to the 
 intrusion, if not withdrawn. There was imminent danger of a 
 renewal of the strife. Thereupon Congress interposed, with a per- 
 suasive resolution for peace, which had a healing effect. But it was 
 not until June, 1 780, that Virginia could bring herself to a confirma- 
 tion of the agreement, and then only by clogging it with a condition 
 as above indicated, so modified, however, as to be effective only in 
 favor of priority of grant or settlement. This was in effect asking 
 Pennsylvania to sanction the usurpations upon her undoubted terri- 
 tory east of the Monongahela, and the grants of her lands therein by 
 the usurper,- thereby enabling men who had defied or disowned her 
 rightful jurisdiction to get their lands at ten shillings per hundred 
 acres, while her own grantees would have to pay at the rate of five 
 pounds. She therefore for a while withheld her assent to this appen- 
 dage to the Baltimore agreement. It had in it some provisions 
 which redeemed it from indiscriminate disapproval. West of the 
 curvilinear line, beyond which Pennsylvania had not claimed, its 
 justice could not be gainsayed, while in its operations east of that 
 line it could be so construed as to protect her own grantees, whose 
 rights had first attached. If not acceded to, Virginia would proba- 
 bly make its rejection a pretext for re-opening the controversy, in 
 the hope of thereby regaining some of the territory she had lost. 
 These views of the situation, and an "earnest desire to promote 
 peace with a sister State," induced Pennsylvania, in September, 1 780, 
 to confirm the agreement upon the conditions which Virginia had 
 imposed. And here, so far as the States were concerned, the con- 
 troversy closed, the last of a series with Maryland, Connecticut, 
 and Virginia which Pennsylvania had to encounter to maintain the 
 integrity of her territory. Never encroaching upon her neighbors' 
 
 *The sittings of this land commission at Fort Burd has given rise to 
 the statement in many of our histories, beginning, I believe, with Find- 
 ley's History of the Whisky Insurrection, page 19, that Virginia courts, 
 meaning ordinary county or district courts, sat there, which is an error. 
 No Augusta or West Augusta courts ever sat elsewhere than at Staunton 
 or Pittsburgh, and Fort Burd was on the line between Monongalia and 
 Yohogania.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY, 337 
 
 borders, she has always gained by their intrusions upon hers. The 
 results have added to the many proofs that, in the moral government 
 of the world, the wrongs which communities inflict will be 
 
 " Bloody instructions, which being taught, return 
 To plague the inventor ." 
 
 It remained yet to run and mark the lines. This it was intended 
 to do early in 1781, but Virginia being then the seat of war, it had 
 to be postponed. In view of its speedy accomplishment, Pennsyl- 
 vania, on the 28th of March, 1781, a few days after the first centen- 
 nial of her own existence, erected all her territory west and south of 
 the Monongahela and Ohio, into the county of Washington the 
 "first" of names, and the first of counties after the province 
 became a Commonwealth. Until then it belonged to, Westmore- 
 land ; but its seat of justice was too far off, the antagonisms of its 
 officers and people too inveterate to expect efficient or harmonious 
 action. Virginia began to withdraw her jurisdiction from the dis- 
 puted and ceded territory, but, like a discomfited army, kept up for a 
 while longer a rear guard to cover her retreat. Pennsylvania had 
 to advance with cautious steps. The want of defined lines of 
 dominion on the two Virginia sides of the new county was made the 
 pretext, not only for disaffection, but for absolute denial of duty, 
 civil and military, and for actual violence within many miles of 
 where they would certainly be established. The Executive Council 
 of Pennsylvania did all they could to have them run, beginning 
 their efforts in 1780. The Virginia Executives seemed to co-ope- 
 rate ; but multiform excuses and the intrigues and open resistance 
 by the Virginia partizans produced vexatious and disheartening 
 delays. Wrote Thomas Scott, the newly appointed prothonotary, 
 etc., of Washington, October ipth, 1781: "We groan under the 
 difficulty of an unrun boundary." From the first it was intended 
 that the lines, when run, should be permanent ; but repeated fail- 
 ures to do so and incessant groanings constrained a resort for a 
 while to temporary lines. The new State project, presently to be 
 noticed, and the non-attendance by the Virginia Surveyor, caused 
 still further delays. At length, in November, 1782, when "surly 
 winds made forests bare," they were run and marked, from where 
 
 Mason and Dixon left off, to the supposed corner, and thence to the 
 W
 
 jjS 1 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Ohio, by Col. Alexander McClean, the long-time Register, Recorder, 
 and Surveyor of Fayette (then of Westmoreland), and Col. Joseph 
 Neville, of Virginia. Under instructions, based upon Mason and 
 Dixon's computations, they extended the due west line twenty-three 
 miles. . It was afterwards found that less than twenty-two miles were 
 wanting to complete the distance of the charter an error which, as 
 well as perhaps another, in after years caused some losses and 
 litigation.* 
 
 It was not until the fall of 1784 that Mason and Dixon's line was 
 permanently completed and marked. The nice point was to fix its 
 western terminus. To do all this some of the most eminently scien- 
 tific men of the age were employed. On the part of Virginia they 
 were the Rev. Messrs. Madison and Andrews, her negotiators of 
 the Baltimore agreement, united with John Page, afterwards Gover- 
 nor of that State, and with Andrew Ellicott, then of Maryland, who 
 run more boundary lines for States and the Nation than any other 
 man. Pennsylvania appointed her old favorites, the Rev. Dr. John 
 Ewing and Mr. Rittenhouse, joining with them John Lukens, her 
 Surveyor-General, and Thomas Hutchins, afterwards the Geographer 
 General of the United States. They undertook the task, they said, 
 "from an anxious desire to gratify the astronomical world in the 
 performance of a problem which has never yet been attempted in 
 any country, and to prevent the State of Pennsylvania from the 
 chance of losing many hundred thousands of acres secured to it by 
 the agreement at Baltimore." 
 
 Mason and Dixon had made their markings from actual measure- 
 ments upon the ground. It was upon the suggestion of Mr. Jeffer- 
 son, when Governor of Virginia, that the new "problem" was 
 adopted for determining the distance by astronomical observations. 
 To solve it, two of the artists of each State, provided with the proper 
 astronomical instruments and a good time-piece, repaired to Wil- 
 mington, Delaware, near to which, on the line, they erected an 
 observatory. The other four, in like manner furnished, and with 
 commissary, soldiers, and servants, proceeded to the west end of the 
 temporary line, where, on one of the highest Fish Creek hills, they 
 also erected a rude observatory. At these stations each party, during 
 
 *Soe Appendix, No. 6.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 339 
 
 six long weeks of days and nights preceding the autumnal equinox 
 of 1784, took a series of observations of the immersions of Jupiter's 
 moons and of other celestial phenomena, for the purpose of deter- 
 mining their respective meridians and latitude, and adjusting their 
 time-pieces. This done, one of each party from the eastern station 
 come to the others at the western, and find that their stations are 
 twenty minutes and one and an eighth seconds apart. The Wilming- 
 ton station was 114 (four pole) chains and 13 links west of the 
 Delaware. Knowing that twenty minutes of time were equal to five 
 degrees of longitude, they make allowance for said 114 chains and 13 
 links, and for the one and an eighth seconds (equal, they say, to 14 
 chains and 96 links), and upon these data they shorten back on the 
 line to the exact point, and fix the south-west corner of the State by 
 setting up a square unlettered white oak post, around- which they 
 rear a conical pyramid of stones, "and they are there unto this 
 day/' on the slope of a deep narrow valley near the Board-tree 
 tunnel of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. 
 
 Upon the completion of the southern line, it became too late in 
 the year to run any part of the western. In the summer of 1785, 
 it was carefully run and marked, to the Ohio River, and some forty 
 or fifty miles beyond it. The Pennsylvania artists were Mr. Rit- 
 tenhouse and Col. Andrew Porter, who had been commissary to the 
 Western party in 1784 the father of our late ex-Governor, David 
 R. Porter. The Virginia commissioners were Joseph Neville and 
 Andrew Ellicott, the latter acting for Pennsylvania north of the 
 Ohio, where Virginia pretensions ended by reason of her cession of 
 the Northwest Territory to the United States in 1784. It was not 
 until 1786 that the line was completed to the lake by Col. Porter 
 and Alexander McClean. Thereupon, Pennsylvania began negotia- 
 tions with the United States for the purchase of the Erie Triangle, 
 which New York, in 1781, and Massachusetts, in 1784, had ceded 
 to them, including all their claims west of a meridian passing by the 
 most westerly bent of Lake Ontario. This line was established by 
 Mr. Ellicott in 1790, and the purchase consummated in 1792, at a 
 cost of about $155,000, including what was paid to the Indians. 
 It contains 202,187 acres. In this way has Pennsylvania filled out 
 her fair proportions, and come to possess what no other State has, a 
 port of entry upon one of the great Northern lakes, another at the
 
 34 o PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 head of the Ohio, and yet another at the head of one of the best 
 bays of the Middle Atlantic. We return to our friends over the 
 river. 
 
 Within the year preceding the erection of Washington County a 
 great change was coming over the population of Southwestern Penn- 
 sylvania. In March, 1780, Pennsylvania passed her "Act for the 
 gradual abolition of slavery." Many of our early settlers had 
 brought their negro slaves with them. Kentucky was then having 
 its turn as the El Dorado of the West. Thither many of the best 
 of our pioneer settlers removed, carrying with them from our new 
 nursery those germs of religion which, ere long, grew so luxuriantly 
 in that then Virginia county. Not only was the population rapidly 
 changing, but discontent and alarm pervaded our entire territory, 
 especially west of the Monongahela and upon the Allegheny border 
 of Westmoreland. Wrote General Brodhead, then U. S. Com- 
 mander at Pittsburgh, September 23d, 1780: "The emigrations 
 from this new country to Kentucky are incredible; and this has 
 given opportunity to disaffected people from the interior to purchase 
 and settle their lands." And again, December 7th, 1780: " I learn 
 more and more of the disaffection of the inhabitants on this side of 
 the mountains. The King of Britain's health is often drank in com- 
 pany." He gave it as the opinion of many of his Virginia officers, 
 well acquainted in this part of the country among them Col. John 
 Gibson that "should the enemy approach this frontier and offer 
 protection, half the inhabitants would join them."* Their horizon 
 of vision was doubtless limited to Pittsburgh and its immediate sur- 
 roundings, where there were not many Scotch-Irish Presbyterians 
 at that period. But that there was a deep, lurking leaven of Toryism 
 in these parts in those days is beyond question. Even so late as 
 April 20, 1782, General Irvine, who had been in command at Fort 
 Pitt since November, 1781, a most discreet and able officer, wrote : 
 " I am confident, if this post was evacuated, the bounds of Canada 
 would be extended to the Laurel Hill in a few weeks." This 
 opinion was based not solely upon the disaffection of the people, 
 but also upon the weakness of the governments, State and National. 
 There was a deeply seated, sulky disappointment at having been 
 
 * See further as to this in Appendix, No. 1.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 341 
 
 abandoned by Virginia to Pennsylvania, which readily soured into 
 aversion to both, and to the United States, who they thought had 
 failed to afford them due protection against the savage foes in their 
 rear. Happily, by the vigilance of the officers in command, and 
 the virtues of those who sustained them, British rule was averted, 
 and the disaffected were forced to take hold upon other schemes 
 that were less obnoxious, but not less destructive of good govern- 
 ment. The British power in the East seemed unable to rally from 
 the surrender of Cornwallis, in October, 1781; and the stubborn 
 Scotch-Irish Whigs of Westmoreland and Washington were encour- 
 aged to a more vigorous stand, even if they had to rely upon their 
 own resources. It is to them, and to General Irvine, who was 
 Scotch-Irish all over, that Southwestern Pennsylvania is indebted 
 for its survival of the perils and calamities of 1 782. 
 
 The fitful and careless recession of the old regime in civil affairs, 
 and the constantly impeded advances of the new, in the lately dis- 
 puted and ceded territory, left the people pretty much to the machina- 
 tions of those whose importance depended upon hindering the growth 
 of their loyalty to Pennsylvania. It required some time to get the 
 machinery of the new county in running order, and men at their 
 places to run it. The old Presbytery of Redstone met for the first 
 time on the ipth of September, 1781, just thirty days before the 
 surrender at Yorktown ; and within thirty days thereafter, at the 
 house of David Hoge, at Catfish's Camp, was the first attempt 
 at a court for the county of Washington. The former started 
 on its career in perfect harmony, the latter in discord. The Con- 
 stitution of 1776 required of all officers, legislative, executive, 
 judicial, and military, an oath or affirmation to "be true and faith- 
 ful to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," and to do nothing 
 "prejudicial to the Government thereof." The court was held by 
 justices of the peace, elected in the preceding July ; and upon the 
 pretext that because the lines were not run, the assumption of power 
 by Pennsylvania was premature, this " iron-clad oath" deterred all 
 the old " gentlemen justices," or any Virginia partizans, from be- 
 coming candidates. James Marshall, the newly-appointed Lieu- 
 tenant of the county, its chief military officer, and its register and 
 recorder, was a sturdy Pennsylvanian. The prothonotary, etc., 
 Thomas Scott, had been almost a martyr for his allegiance. Hence,
 
 342 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the court and the entire military and civil corps were at variance, 
 if not with the majority, at least with the most noisy of the people 
 and their old leaders. Wrote Mr. Scott just after the court : " Our 
 county is unhappily divided into two grand parties the Pennsyl- 
 vania and the Virginia each claiming some special indulgences, 
 the one for their steady attachment to the State, the other for their 
 transfer, as they call it, from the other State." To conciliate the 
 latter party, Daniel Leet, a sober-minded Virginian, and Col. John 
 Canon, not so much so, had been appointed sub-lieutenants, but 
 they refused to qualify and serve. What more could Pennsylvania 
 do than to leave the disease to work its own cure, under the nursing 
 of a steady, decisive, but kindly sway. Just at this juncture there 
 came to her aid an influx of population who were either thoroughly 
 Pennsylvanian, or had no selfish ends to subserve by being any- 
 thing else. The brunt of the war in the East being over, many of 
 our discharged soldiers there who had fought through their terms 
 of service for almost no pay, and many others who had been con- 
 nected with the army, were forced to seek new homes in our valleys 
 and hills, now certainly secure against slavery and religious intole- 
 rance. They came from the old nursery and its transplantations, 
 and from the Cumberland . or Kittatinny Valley, and from New 
 Jersey. Like their precursors, they took to the interior. If the 
 outer limbs were disordered, the trunk was sound. Gradually and 
 noiselessly, but surely, by diffusing intelligence and religio'us prin- 
 ciples throughout the body politic, it became restored to healthful 
 action, though not without occasional eruptions, as we will soon 
 see. 
 
 Washington county held all its territory, unbroken, until 1 788, 
 
 when Allegheny county was erected. In 1796, Greene was taken 
 
 from it; and in 1800 another part was taken to make up the county 
 
 of Beaver. In rapidity of population it outgrew all its compeers.* 
 
 i 
 
 1790. 1800. 1810. 1820. 
 
 * Westmoreland 16,018 22,726 26,392 30,540 
 
 Washington 23,866 28,298 36,289 40.038 
 
 Fayetto 13,325 20,159 24,714 27,285 
 
 Allegheny 10,309 15,087 25,.317 35,921 
 
 Greene 8,605 12,544 15,554 
 
 Beaver 5,776 12,168 15,340 
 
 In 1800 Armstrong was formed from parts of Allegheny, Lycoming,
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 3-!3 
 
 With what capital it started I have not the means of knowing, there 
 being no census until 1790. Upon its erection it was estimated by 
 Col. Marshall to have upwards of 2,500 men fit for military duty. 
 In 1 784 he organized its militia into five battalions, of seven and 
 eight companies each, which shows a greater strength at that date 
 than did Westmoreland, including Fayette. If to this we add that 
 it had at least the apostolic number of well organized Presbyterian 
 churches more than in all Western Pennsylvania besides we may 
 set it down as being in a pretty safe condition. 
 
 The Virginia party maintained its ascendency for two or three 
 years, after which it began to give way. At the October election 
 of 1781, an entire "Virginia ticket" was elected. So in 1782 and 
 1783. Some of the chosen were good men, but nearly all were 
 very pronounced partizans, a few of them openly hostile to Penn- 
 sylvania rule always excepting James Edgar, whose pre-eminence 
 commanded universal confidence. A decided change in favor of 
 the Pennsylvania party began to manifest itself in 1784, and thence 
 onward increasingly ; so much so that in a few years those who had 
 been blatant Virginia partizans were wholly retired, until the new 
 party convulsions, enkindled by love of France and hatred of the 
 excise law, brought them again to the. front. Until then for I do 
 not wish to go down the line any further a very large proportion 
 of the elective, as well as judicial, officers of the county were Pres- 
 byterians, many of whom were, when elected, or afterwards became, 
 ruling elders ; one of them, Mr. Marquis, a minister* pretty un- 
 
 and Westmoreland, chiefly the last; and in 1803, Indiana was taken 
 chiefly from Westmoreland, with a part from Lycoming. Fa3 r ette was 
 taken from Westmoreland in 1783-84. Prior to 1800, Allegheny included 
 all north of it to Lake Erie. 
 
 * Sup'm Ex. Council. 
 
 Assembly. 
 
 Sheriff. 
 
 Commissioners. 
 
 1781 aDorsey Pentecost 
 J(for two years). 
 
 James Edgar, 
 Jno. Cannon. 
 
 alVIath. Ritchie 
 aW.Mcfleerv. 
 aMath. Kitch'ie 
 Jno. Stevenson 
 The same. 
 Unknown. 
 
 a Van Swearinsren 
 (elected yearly). 
 
 Do. 
 
 Do. 
 
 Jas. Marshall. 
 Do. 
 
 Do. 
 
 D. "Williamson. 
 
 Thomas ('rookfr. 
 aJohn McDowell, 
 oGeoA'allaml it>ham 
 
 aGeo. McUormick. 
 
 Demas Lindley. 
 
 Jas. Allison. 
 Jas. McOready. 
 Jas. B? ad 'forJL 
 Thomas Marouis. 
 
 
 
 1783John N>ville (for 
 three years). 
 1781 
 
 1785 
 
 1788 David Rertick 
 1787 (for three years). 
 
 Those in italics, as also Wm. McFarland, elected coroner in 1781-82-83,
 
 3 44 PRESB YTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 erring indications of the predominant character of the people. 
 O si sic omnia ! 
 
 As in the economy of the human body, so in the body politic, 
 ill humors sometimes gather at the surface, but dissipate without 
 coming to a head. So it was with the antipathies to Pennsylvania, 
 which were coagulated by the boundary compromise of 1779-80. 
 Among their minor developments was resistance to her military 
 rule ; but necessity soon compelled acquiescence. Then to taxa- 
 tion, to which the people of the disputed and ceded territories had 
 been but little accustomed, and from which the compromise pro- 
 vided for their entire exoneration prior to 1781. To this indis- 
 pensable burden of government, by indulgence and special favor, 
 they gradually became reconciled. In the midst of all these, and 
 while Virginia was slowly and sullenly receding from the new 
 county territory, and Pennsylvania was firmly but kindly advancing 
 to its government, a trouble of more portentous aspect arose. This 
 was the NEW STATE project. Though numbered among the " dead 
 issues" of the past, it has something to do with our subject, and 
 must therefore be noticed. It will be seen to have been not wholly 
 insubstantial. 
 
 Soon after the opening of the War for Independence, the Conti- 
 nental Congress, to induce enduring enlistments, promised to offi- 
 cers and men bounties in land, when it had not a rood to give. The 
 great unsettled West was looked to as the source of supply, to be 
 obtained by conquest. This consisted prominently of the valuable 
 territory northwest of the Ohio, to the Mississippi and the lakes, which 
 Great Britain had acquired from France by the treaty of 1763, the 
 
 and Win. McCombs in 1784-85-86, were, or afterwards became, ruling 
 elders; and James Edgar and John McDowell were, in 1783, elected to 
 the Council of Censors a State revisory body under the Constitution 
 of 1776. Tney, and Matthew Ritchie and James Allison were also Asso- 
 ciate Judges, under the Constitution of 1790. 
 
 Those marked thus (a) had been officers, civil or military, or both, 
 under the Virginia regime, all in Yoaogania county, except Wm. Mc- 
 Cleery, in Monongalia. Col. Marshall, elected Sheriff in 1784-85-86, 
 the County Lieutenant and Register and Recorder of 1781, etc., was the 
 very antipode in party affiliations to Pentecost and Cannon, whom he 
 denominated "ring-leaders of sedition." But he and Cannon got into 
 the same bod in 179-1.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 settlement of which she had persistently discouraged and forbidden. 
 Among the obnoxious Acts of the British Parliament complained of 
 in the Declaration of Independence, is one " for abolishing the 
 free system of English laws in a neighboring Province, &c., and 
 enlarging its boundaries." This was the Quebec Act, and the en- 
 largement was the annexation of this N. W. Territory to Canada, 
 expressly bounding it upon Pennsylvania. Its terrors to many of 
 the colonists, especially to our New England friends, consisted in 
 its spread and toleration of the Roman Catholic religion. This was 
 in 1774, and if not within the bounds of some prior colonial grants, 
 die Parliament had a right to do with it as they pleased ; if it was, 
 then upon the revolt of the colonies, England had a right to take it 
 from them if she could. It soon became an apple of discord. 
 
 Six of the old thirteen colonies which became states in 1776 
 Massachusetts, Connecticut, Virginia, North and South Carolina, 
 and Georgia, claimed by charters or otherwise to extend westward 
 to the Pacific, or at least to the Mississippi. New Hampshire and 
 New York had conflicting claims to what in 1792 became the State 
 of Vermont. New York claimed all west of her settlements, 
 between N. Lat. 42 and 45, that had at any time been conquered 
 and held by the Six Nations of Indians, her constant allies and 
 proteges, which included the peninsula between the Lakes Ontario, 
 Erie, and Huron, but which was cut off by the Treaty of Peace of 
 1783. Massachusetts claimed to cover the same territory. To these 
 we are indebted for the Erie triangle. Connecticut claimed all west 
 of her to the " South Sea ;" under which she for a while set up her 
 "town" of Westmoreland, on the East Branch of the Susquehanna, 
 in Pennsylvania, and ultimately secured the property in her Wes- 
 tern Reserve in Ohio, to the extent of 120 miles west of Pennsyl- 
 vania, north of 41. Three of the States Rhode Island, New 
 Jersey, and Delaware could have no westward pretensions, and 
 Maryland very little. Pennsylvania had a half-way, or keystone 
 position, between these two classes of states ; having valuable terri- 
 tory west of the Atlantic slope, but not reaching very far towards 
 the Mississippi or Pacific, and hedged in on two sides of her south- 
 west angle by what was claimed to be Virginia. She had a perilous 
 and perplexing position. 
 
 These great inequalities in territorial areas and pretensions con-
 
 3j(> PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 duced to strifes and jealousies between the larger and smaller States, 
 which greatly impaired their vigor in the struggle for Independence, 
 and after it was achieved, gave to the old Continental Congress a 
 foretaste of the angry discussions which the "peculiar institution" 
 has inflicted upon Congress and the country in modern times. 
 Although "these united Colonies" had, on the 4th of July, 1776, 
 declared themselves "free and independent States, with full power 
 to levy war, conclude peace, and do all other things which inde- 
 pendent States may of right do," including, of course, the right to 
 make conquests of the enemy's territory, and hold it for the good 
 of the whole ; yet Virginia, in 1778, in bad faith to her sister States, 
 sent Col. George Rogers Clarke, with Virginia troops, but with 
 boats and munitions of war belonging to the States united, obtained 
 from General Hand at Fort Pitt, to conquer and hold for herself 
 alone the Illinois country, part of this same northwest territory. In 
 1779, she deliberately promulgated the dogma that the United 
 States could " hold no territory but in right of some one individual 
 State," and she and the other large claiming States adhered to it, 
 which was as much as saying to the little States, This is our war, not 
 yours whatever of blood and treasure you expend is to enure solely 
 to our benefit, and to obtain land to reimburse our expenditures, 
 except what we may choose to give you. And if the United States 
 should conquer Canada, Nova Scotia, or Jamaica, they cannot 
 hold them, because forsooth not within the chartered limits of Vir- 
 ginia, or some other State. It was no wonder the war languished. 
 
 Just before the Revolution, many new colony schemes sprung up 
 in the West, which were in whole or in part grounded upon the ter- 
 ritory north and south of the Ohio, claimed afterwards by Virginia. 
 Dunmore, the King's Vice-gerent, scowled furiously upon any gotten 
 up south of. the Ohio, as was Henderson and company's colony of 
 Transylvania, in Kentucky, but rather favored projects of a like na- 
 ture north of the Ohio, especially those in which he was, or hoped 
 to become, a partner or participant, as he was in the Wabash and 
 Illinois companies under purchases from the Indians. And no 
 doubt Col. Croghan had given to him, and his nephew Connolly, 
 interests, vested or expectant, an his Indian purchase between Rac- 
 coon and Pigeon Creek. 
 
 The most prominent of these inceptive colonies, and the one
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. J-f? 
 
 which most nearly concerns us, was the Walpole grant, or Vandalia. 
 Its territory was to be, without denning it minutely : Northwestern 
 Virginia, from Fairfax's stone, through the Forks of Greenbrier and 
 New Rivers to the North Carolina line, and so much of Kentucky 
 as is east of the meridian of the mouth of Sciota, but without trench- 
 ing upon Pennsylvania. This was in project from 1770 to 1773. 
 Dr. Franklin, then in London, was its earnest and efficient advo- 
 cate. Upon his advocacy its charter passed the scrutiny of the 
 King's Council against the opposition of Lord Hillsborough, Secre- 
 tary of State for the Colonial Department, which so chagrined him 
 that he resigned. But his system of no new colonies in the west re- 
 mained, and Lord Chancellor Thurlow took care that the charter 
 should never be sealed. But for this, and the rising revolt of the 
 colonies, the star of Vandalia would now be shining in the galaxy 
 of States, instead of West Virginia, the severance of which is some 
 retribution for the arrogant obstinacy and land greed of the old 
 parent. The new State should have taken the name. 
 
 When the Articles of Confederation, proposed in 1776, were 
 from time to time under consideration in Congress and by the 
 States, the four smaller States, especially Maryland, with whom 
 Pennsylvania always acted, and sometimes New York, struggled 
 hard to have a provision incorporated empowering Congress to 
 limit the extent of those that claimed to the Pacific or the Missis- 
 sippi, but all in vain. The States south of the Potomac, headed by 
 Virginia, always by bluster, and the concurrence of Massachusetts 
 and Connecticut, and sometimes New York, succeeded in prevent- 
 ing it. For this reason it was not until 1781 that the Articles were 
 finally adopted, Maryland, the last, coming in under protest. 
 
 It was in the midst of these strifes and struggles that our new 
 State project began to be agitated. Indeed, there is some evidence 
 that it was part of the plot of Dunmore and Connolly to erect a new 
 colony here, taking the Vandalia grant for a nucleus, and annexing 
 to it Pennsylvania west of the Laurel Hill and the Allegheny river, 
 and Ohio west of Sciota, with Pittsburgh as the seat of empire. 
 Be this as it may, no sooner did it seem to be a foregone conclusion 
 by the agreement at Baltimore, that Virginia would have to yield her 
 usurpation, than the scheme was openly avowed. Virginia had 
 so long withheld her conditional ratification of the agreement, that
 
 3f8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 good men were apprehensive of a re-opening of the strife in per- 
 haps redoubled fury, and the disappointed and designing factionists 
 were encouraged to hopeful exertion. In the meantime, the de- 
 population and perils of the northern frontier of Westmoreland had 
 driven her courts to become peripatetic, sitting sometimes at Mt. 
 Pleasant and elsewhere, because of the dangers at Hannastown ; and 
 petitions were pouring in upon the Assembly of Pennsylvania, ask- 
 ing the erection of a new county ultimately Fayette out of all her 
 territory south of the Youghiogheny, into which, as already noticed, 
 Indian aggressions never came after Braddock's war.* A bill to 
 that effect was reported and favorably considered. This seems to 
 have effectually weaned the people in that quarter from the New 
 State project. Pending its final passage, Pennsylvania concluded 
 to accept the conditions which Virginia had imposed, and thus 
 closed the boundary controversy. This turned the necessities for a 
 new county to the west of the Monongahela, and Fayette had to go 
 over until 1783. But " hope deferred" did, not sicken her people's 
 allegiance to Pennsylvania. The delays in running the lines were 
 alike the cause and the consequence of further agitations of the New 
 State project. Meetings were held all over the late county of Yo- 
 hogania to promote it. Petitions were sent down to Congress after 
 the articles of Confederation were adopted, asking the compromise 
 with Virginia to be annulled, and the curvilinear parallel line re- 
 stored, or that Congress should provide for determining the bounds 
 under one of its granted powers. These were of course unheeded, 
 not even received Congress no doubt believing they had enough 
 to do without opening a controversy which had been closed. 
 
 The agitators were not dismayed by this repulse. A new element 
 to favor the scheme had come to their aid. Early in 1780, New 
 York proposed to surrender to the United States all her territorial 
 claims west of a meridian from 42 to 45, passing by the most 
 
 * It was not because of any "incursions of the savages" into the 
 neighborhood of Laurel Hill Meeting-house, that the members of Red- 
 stone Presbytery were prevented from holding their first meeting there 
 on September 19, 1781, according to appointment of Synod, but because 
 of apprehended incursions at or near their homes, west of the Monon- 
 gahela. Mr. Power, who lived on the eastern side, was not afraid he 
 was at the meeting at Pigeon Creek. " Old Redstone," 312-13.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 349 
 
 westerly bent of Lake Ontario, or at least twenty miles west of 
 Niagara River. This concession was thought, at that time, to be a 
 valuable one, as the United States were hoping to be able to get a 
 boundary in that direction as far north as Lake Nippissing. Failing 
 in that, it would be a good beginning. Thereupon Congress, on 
 the 6th of September, 1780, in an earnest report and resolution, 
 acknowledged the generous offer of New York, and asked the other 
 States having claims to the western country to "go and do like- 
 wise." And, on the loth of October of the same year, they supple- 
 mented their former resolution by a still more earnest appeal, and 
 an assurance that the territories so ceded should be formed into 
 distinct States, of not less than one hundred, nor more than one 
 hundred and fifty miles square. Other assurances were given, 
 calculated to appease all the States, especially Virginia. Here 
 were New State schemes in abundance, and Pennsylvania had some 
 "claims to the western country." 
 
 Now, it was not only the late Virginia partizans who were capti- 
 vated with the hope of a New State. Good and true Pennsylvanians 
 began to favor it. Even so loyal a citizen as Thomas Scott gave it 
 a not unfavorable consideration. In January, 1781, after he had 
 served a term as Councilor for Westmoreland, he wrote to Joseph 
 Reed, President of the Supreme Executive Council, inquiring 
 whether the resolutions of Congress of September and October, 
 1780, were understood to embrace Pennsylvania, whether the State 
 would come into the measure, and whether, if it did, would it carry 
 the settled as well as the unsettled parts? "If so," he says, 
 "I believe it will meet but few objections on this side of 
 the mountains. But, should the unsettled parts be relinquished, 
 and the settled parts retained, the people would think them- 
 selves intolerably aggrieved. Give up all, and let us take our 
 chance, or keep all, and let us grow, is the cry of many. 
 Others say, let us, by dint of opposition, force our relinquish- 
 ment to Congress (on their recommendation) by those States 
 (Virginia and Pennsylvania) whose procrastinated quarrel about 
 our country hath hung us up, our wives, children, and livings, 
 an easy prey to the savages these so many years ; the settle- 
 ment whereof hath, in so many instances, been totally neglected, 
 an 1 at best been considered but a mere bye-business. This will at
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 once reconcile all our territorial differences, and enable us to 
 exert our united strength against our common enemy." After 
 alluding to a memorial which had been prepared to be sent to the 
 Assembly, "respecting the price of our land," he adds, "should 
 that memorial be unsuccessful, I do not think there are many, per- 
 haps not ten men on this side' of the mountains, that would not lift 
 arms against the State." * 
 
 I have quoted thus copiously from Mr. Scott's letter because it is 
 the most full and candid cotemporary statement extant of the sub- 
 stantial grounds upon which the New State project was, or could be, 
 placed. The two great grievances which it was to cure were, the 
 gross inequalities in the prices of lands which the Virginia condition 
 had established, and the lack of adequate aid from either State, or 
 from the United States, to protect the settlers from the savages. 
 The first was remedied by indefinite and long-extended indulgence 
 for payment not yet wholly foreplosed ; the other was removed 
 by the earnest, if not always effectual, assistance rendered by Penn- 
 sylvania and Congress, after Virginia influence had ceased its 
 thwartings. For a while, as we have seen, the great trouble was the 
 delay in running the lines of boundary. But sensible people soon 
 began to see that the delay was not the fault of Pennsylvania. The 
 accession of Gen. Irvine to the chief command at Pittsburgh, from 
 the fall of 1781 to the peace of 1783, was a great relief. He 
 brought order out of confusion, and held the settlers up steadily and 
 hopefully to their own defence. They had become inured to this. 
 They had their block-houses and forts and stations dotted all over 
 the exposed territory, to which their wives and children resorted in 
 times of danger, with vigilant scouts and rangers to patrol the 
 border lines and give the alarm. All they wanted was encourage- 
 ment and ammunition. They had learned to 
 
 " Front death and danger with a level eye, 
 Trust in the Lord, and keep their powder dry;" 
 
 and they did it in faith and patience. Going to church with their 
 rifles and powder-horns was no fiction. The interior settlements, 
 though sometimes frightened as were some of us during the late 
 " unpleasantness " never run, except to the relief of the borderers ; 
 
 * Pennsylvania Archives, VIII., 713.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 351 
 
 and if these sometimes suffered by sudden inroads of the savages, 
 they quickly rallied and returned, or "held the fort" in hope, 
 especially where they had Scotch-Irish Presbyterians to back them 
 up. In spite of all their perils and privations, they grew in strength 
 and population with unprecedented rapidity. During all the pe- 
 rilous years, from 1777 to 1793, I know of no recorded instance 
 of a failure of a church meeting of any kind west of the Mononga- 
 hela, or east of it either, south of Forbes's road, "by reason of 
 incursions of the savages," except the failures of Presbytery to 
 meet at Laurel Hill, Sewickley, and Mt. Pleasant, in 1781 and 
 1782, which need not have occurred, except upon the injunction 
 of Laertes, that "best safety lies in fear." There was no need of a 
 New State for these reasons. 
 
 Precisely what limits it was proposed to ask for the New State 
 what territories it was to occupy, has never been disclosed. When 
 first broached, in 1780, it certainly was, in some way, to include as 
 much of Pennsylvania east of the Monongahela as it could get, and 
 all west of that river to the Ohio, and go southward into Virginia as 
 far as one of the rivers Kenhawa, so as to embrace all of the old 
 Indiana, or Traders' grant, and a goodly part of Vandalia, both of 
 which were then plying Congress not to become States, but to have 
 their titles recognized. Northwards it was to take in what is now 
 Ohio, east of the Sciota or Muskingum, but perhaps only as far 
 north as 41, so as not to interfere with Connecticut's claim. Its 
 promoters saw the importance of conciliating rivals and obtaining 
 allies. East of the Monongahela it must have had trouble to 
 fix its boundaries. It wanted Pittsburgh, and the Forks of Yough 
 wanted it ; but Pittsburgh and the people east of it, and southeast 
 of the Youghiogheny, shunned its embraces. Although it began in 
 love of Virginia, finding it unrequited, she, as well as Pennsylvania, 
 was disowned. 
 
 In 1782 the most active, if not the most open, promoters of the 
 scheme were Colonels Cannon and Pentecost, each of whom had 
 taken the "iron-clad oath," the former as Assemblyman, the latter 
 as Councilor. Hugh Henry Brackenridge (but then calling himself 
 Hugh Montgomery Brackenridge), the famous but somewhat eccen- 
 tric lawyer of Pittsburgh, afterwards a judge of the Supreme Court, 
 testified on oath, in July, 1782, that he heard Pentecost "on his
 
 3 $3 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 
 
 return from Council declare that the line (meaning that with Vir- 
 ginia and this Commonwealth) would never be run, and that this 
 country never would be Pennsylvania or Virginia, but a New State " 
 and that meetings of "a seditious nature" were being held upon 
 anonymous advertisements in his handwriting. Pentecost attempted 
 a noisy disclaimer of this, but thereby afforded only more convinc- 
 ing proof of its verity.* 
 
 Up until early in 1 782 the scheme had been looked upon as the 
 mere effervescence of maddened Virginia partizans, and a belief 
 indulged that it would soon expire by its own convulsions. The 
 disease now assumed a new diagnosis. As allies, Indiana and 
 Vandalia became more and more hopeless. Virginia assailed them 
 with vindictive fury, and Congress at last turned them over to her 
 for redress. Virginia had offered to cede to the United States the 
 Northwest Territory, but with valuable reservations, and upon 
 condition that all her territorial claims southeast of the Ohio should 
 be guaranteed to her by Congress, which it had refused to do. 
 This made her cause somewhat unpopular, and the territory north- 
 west of the Ohio began to be looked upon as an easy prey to adven- 
 turers of every kind who could get a footing upon it. But in any 
 event, the peninsula west of the Monongahela must go with it. This 
 secured, the scheme could go north, south, east, or west, " for 
 quantity." It was not until 1784, after Virginia had withdrawn 
 her condition of guaranty, that the offered cession to the United 
 States of the Northwest Territory was accepted and consummated. 
 For a while it seemed almost to have no owner. Even Virginia had 
 persistently voted in Congress to relinquish to Great Britain all of 
 it north of a line from the mouth of Miami of the Lake to the 
 Illinois, and thence down that river to the Mississippi. It was the 
 Northern and Middle States that saved to the Union Michigan and 
 Wisconsin, and those goodly parts of Illinois and Minnesota. 
 
 In April, 1782, General Irvine wrote to Governor Harrison, of 
 Virginia, and again, in May, to the Executive Council of Pennsyl- 
 vania ' ' An expedition much talked of is to emigrate and set up a 
 New State. A day is appointed to meet for the purpose. A certain 
 Mr. Johnston, who has been in England since the commencement 
 
 * Pennsylvania Archives, IX., 572-GG2.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 353 
 
 of the present war, is at the head of the emigrating party, and has a 
 form of constitution ready for the new government. I am well 
 informed he is now in the East trying to procure artillery and 
 stores. Some think he is too trifling a being to be worthy of notice. 
 Be this as it may, he has many followers. And it is highly probable 
 that men of more influence than he are privately at work. Should 
 they be so mad as to attempt it, I think they will either be cut to 
 pieces or be obliged to take protection from and join the British. 
 Perhaps some have this in view, though the great majority are, I 
 think, well meaning people, who have at present no other views 
 than to acquire large tracts of land."* And so late as September, 
 1782, in Instructions to Major Craig, whom he was leaving in tem- 
 porary command of Fort Pitt, he warned him that " there are men 
 in this country who are not too good, in order to favor a scheme of a 
 New State, to devise plans to get possession of this post, particularly 
 the stores," and that alarms might be got up on purpose to get 
 volunteers in whom he would find difficulty to get out.* 
 
 At what point the new government was to be " set up " has not 
 been revealed. It was somewhere on the Muskingum, as the Tusca- 
 rawas branch was then called, recently depopulated by the disgrace- 
 ful slaughter of the Moravian Indians, in Williamson's expedition, 
 and the terrible failure of Crawford's campaign. That very region 
 had been impliedly set apart by Congress to fulfill its promises of 
 bounty lands to officers on Continental establishment ; and if, as 
 now seemed probable, it was part of the scheme to take from Penn- 
 sylvania her ungranted territory west of the Allegheny, it would be 
 robbing her of what she had set apart as donations to her soldiers, 
 and to redeem their depreciation certificates. The scheme had 
 become alarming. 
 
 It must be borne in mind that up to the adoption of the Federal 
 Constitution, in 1788-89, there was no positive prohibition, by 
 statute or constitution, of a New State anywhere upon the public 
 domain, or that of any one or more of the States. Kentucky and 
 Vermont had set up for States, and persisted until 1792, when they 
 were admitted a slave State to counterbalance a free one thereby 
 becoming precedents for like enterprizes in modern times, which 
 
 * "Olden Time," IT., 537, and Irvine Papers, MSS. 
 X
 
 354 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Congress has recognized as constitutional. Hence, there was no 
 criminality, moral or political, in such schemes, except so far as they 
 assailed the sovereignty of the States to be affected by them. And 
 this, it was supposed, might be readily condoned under the spirit of 
 the resolutions of Congress of 1780. 
 
 Opportunely, at this crisis, a Court of Congress, under one of 
 the Articles of Confederation, which sat at Trenton, had just 
 decided unanimously in favor of Pennsylvania, as against the claim 
 of Connecticut, thereby impliedly affirming her right to all the ter- 
 ritory within her charter, even as against the royal grants to older 
 colonies. And to crush out all such schemes of intrusion or dis- 
 memberment, present or future, she, by an act passed December 
 2d, 1782, declared that every attempt to set up a New State, in 
 whole or in part, upon her territory, should be treason. Matters 
 were now becoming serious. 
 
 It was to feel the pulse of the people on our Western borders on 
 this wild and now illegal scheme, and if possible dissuade them from 
 its further pursuit, that the Rev. James Finley was, in the spring 
 of 1783, sent out by the State among them. His appointment was 
 procured at the instance of John McDowell, the member of Council 
 for Chester County,* who certified that he was a proper person to 
 employ, being well acquainted with most of the principal people, 
 was expected there this spring, and could therefore act without 
 being suspected of being in the service of the State. He accord- 
 ingly came, in March, armed with a hundred copies of the Act of 
 December, 1782, before referred to, of another Act for disposing 
 of the donation and depreciation lands when acquired from the 
 Indians, and of a Proclamation embodying the decision against 
 Connecticut. In his report to the Executive Council, dated " Cecil 
 County, Maryland, April 28, 1783," he says he was six weeks in 
 
 * Misled by identity of names, in an article from my pen on this sub- 
 ject with others, formerly published, I inadvertently said that this was 
 John McDowell of Chartiers, who was never a member of the Supreme 
 Executive Council of the State. And here I correct an error into which 
 Dr. Creigh's printer of his History of Washington County, page 252, has 
 fallen, by putting mem be rs of Assembly under the heading of "Repre- 
 sentatives to the Supreme Executive Council," and omitting the latter 
 altogether, who were': 1781, Dorsey Pentecost; 1783, John Neville; 1786, 
 David Redick; 1780, and last, Henry Taylor.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 the disaffected country that east of the Youghiog#/ (in the 
 Fayette part), the inhabitants being mostly opposed to the New 
 State, he passed them by. "A considerable number of those be- 
 tween said river and the Monongahela, as well as a great part 
 of Washington County, I found to be fond of it, being misled by 
 a few aspiring and, I suspect, ill-designing men, or by men who 
 had not thoroughly considered the whole matter, which latter was 
 the case of some of the clergy.'''' His modes of operation were to 
 caution the people after sermons, talk to the "ministers and other 
 gentlemen," and write argumentatively and persuasively to others, 
 but never disclosing his agency. " The New State's men alleged I 
 was too officious the law intimidated and discouraged the popu- 
 lace even the ringleaders were for eating in their own words." He 
 hoped he had done some good, "yet the people seemed rather 
 hushed than convinced." He feared that, being disappointed as to 
 a New State, they would try to evade the payment of a tax, unless 
 in flour, to be run, he suggested, by a State agent to New Orleans, 
 for, says he, "those settlements are nearly destitute of cash."* 
 This was advising the very measure of relief which Robert Morris 
 had proposed in 1782, but which Pentecost had openly resisted. 
 
 Now, it is presumed that Mr. Finley's conferences with the clergy 
 west of the Monongahela were chiefly, if not wholly, with Presby- 
 terians^-McMillan, Smith, Dod, and Clark. Does he mean that 
 some of them had been misleading the people ? His language looks 
 that way. And if they did so because they "had not thoroughly 
 considered the whole matter," who can blame them? It was a cap- 
 tivating scheme, and, until recently, not forbidden. And if they had 
 not been as "wise as serpents" to discern its seditious origin and 
 the mischiefs it would work, it was perhaps because they were as 
 " harmless as doves." Be this as it may, the project quickly died 
 out, and disaffection receded, until again provoked to action in 
 other forms by other influences and other laws, soon to be con- 
 sidered. And yet, in looking back upon the New State project, one 
 may be pardoned for at least a half-drawn sigh at its decapitation. 
 With Pittsburgh for its capital, so natural as to seem to have been 
 made for it, how cosily would it have sat in the sisterhood of States. 
 
 * Pennsylvania Archives, X., 40-44.
 
 jjd PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 The decade of years that followed the demise of the New State 
 embryo was a period of comparative quiet and good order in all 
 the counties, new and old, of Western Pennsylvania marked 
 improvement upon the like period which preceded it. Many of 
 the late disturbers of the peace gradually went off into the further 
 West, giving place to a more desirable influx of people from the 
 southeastern and interior counties of the State, from New Jersey, 
 and from Ireland and Scotland. Even Pentecost, who, to con- 
 ciliate himself and his friends, had been, in 1783, appointed to the 
 Presidency of the Courts of Washington County, after two or three 
 years of brooding over his fallen estate, retired in disgust to a 
 neighboring State, without the courtesy to his late colleagues in 
 council of sending them his resignation. No muffled drum was 
 beat upon the going of these factionists, and if more of them and 
 their followers had gone it would have been all the better for the 
 fair fame of the country they left. They could not, however, have 
 taken away all the elements of discord and distrust which had 
 become inherent in the very being of our settlements. For I have 
 come far short of the aim of much of the preceding sketches, if it 
 has not been made manifest that there .were many of our early 
 settlers who had an ineradicable aversion to the burdens of govern- 
 ment ; and that many more, even the best of them, were ever 
 ready to challenge whatever came in the form of questionable taxa- 
 tion, especially if such were formulated after any English model, 
 from some of which they had fled, and others of which they had 
 just successfully resisted. 
 
 The war for Independence had resulted in its achievement, 
 but it lingered long in the demoralization it had wrought, and 
 in the crushing load of debt which it had incurred. The West 
 did not escape the one, nor shun its share of the other. But it 
 claimed that, in bearing its part of the burden of taxation, it should 
 be put at least upon an equality with the more favored seaboard 
 settlements. A disregard of this perhaps unintentional was 
 among the most potent of the provocations to that great social 
 convulsion, dignified in history as the " Western Insurrection" 
 which, at the close of the decade we have been last considering, 
 "reared its miscreated front athwart" the paths of our peace and 
 good name. As a distinct deformity, when traced to its parentage,
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 it will be found to be an offspring of Debt and Whiskey, then, 
 as now, 
 
 " - the direful springs 
 
 Of woes unnumbered 
 
 but as to the principles, or, if you please, the prejudices, which 
 engendered it, it will be found, though not to be justified in its 
 vagaries and excesses, yet entitled, if not to commendation, still to 
 some palliation for the spirit in which it originated. For in its 
 beginnings it was a gentle, though sometimes dashing, current of 
 opposition to a most unequal, slavish, and oppressive mode of 
 taxation. That in the end it became a roaring, destructive flood, 
 was owing to an afflux of influences, which the times and the 
 temper of the people combined with the mistakes of the govern- 
 ment to foment and swell. 
 
 Excise, as a specific form of taxation, is one that is levied upon 
 the products of home manufacture, generally at the places whe're 
 produced, or first exposed to sale. It differs from impost duty, or a 
 tariff, which is exclusively upon foreign importations, and from a 
 direct tax, which is upon ..landed property. From the very nature 
 of an excise tax it demands for its levy and collection a systematized 
 espionage upon the industries of the people from whom it is to be 
 drawn. In every country where it has ever been resorted to it has 
 had a demoralizing influence, always conducing to either resistance 
 or evasion, of which the course of events in our own country now 
 affords humiliating proofs. To resist or elude it is one of the 
 hereditary prerogatives of an Irishman, be he Protestant or 
 Catholic. To kill an exciseman has been reckoned an ample 
 expiation for a multitude of sins. By every native of the Emerald 
 Isle it is regarded as the most humiliating badge of subjection which 
 England has ever imposed, and if the parents have nothing else to 
 transmit to their posterity, they bequeath to them, unto the third 
 and fourth generation, a hatred of excise laws, and of all who make 
 or enforce them. Nor was it much better in Scotland.* 
 
 * Burns' ready genius never conceived a more popular song than 
 "The diel cam' fiddling through the town, 
 
 And danced awa' wi' the Exciseman; 
 And ilka wife cries ' Auld Mahoon, 
 1 wish you luck o' the prize, man I '
 
 jjS PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 If such were the antipathies to excise by those of our people who 
 were of Scotch and Irish lineage, what could we expect of those of 
 them who had come from Virginia and Maryland, and their descend- 
 ants ? These had never taken kindly to taxation in any form ; and 
 neither they nor their ancestry in the colonies whence they came, 
 had ever heard of excise, except in the tales that were told of its 
 extortions and evasions. That it had ever been a Pennsylvania 
 measure was enough to condemn it in their estimation. Our scat- 
 tered German settlements regarded it as a rather searching mode of 
 impairing their thrift and lusty convivialties ; while our few Quaker 
 friends, though non-resistants, were not unwilling to be conformists 
 to the popular feeling. So that taking Western Pennsylvania as a 
 whole, the attempt to erect upon it an excise system was like setting 
 up a column on the side of a volcano. Sooner or later an eruption 
 must come, and the structure topple and fall. 
 
 _ After the long, and I fear fatiguing, rambles through which I have 
 been leading you, and when they ought to be coming to a speedy close, 
 a full narration of the immediate causes, the events and the conse- 
 quences, of this once-renowned insurrection, will be neither expected 
 nor attempted. All who in any way participated in it have passed 
 away beyond the reach of human censure or applause, and were glad, 
 while they lived, to have it forgotten. Respect for their memories 
 would seem to require that it be allowed to rest undisturbed, under 
 the cover of oblivion which time has spread over it. Many of 
 them were, perhaps, conscious of having done some wrong without 
 knowing why they did so. Others, and they the greater number, 
 who had no such compunctions, were unable, had they attempted 
 it, to rescue themselves from the load of indiscriminate opprobrium 
 which was cast upon them from distant and high places. They had 
 
 " We'll mak our maut, we'll brew our drink, 
 
 We'll dance and sing, and rejoice, man ; 
 And rnony braw thanks to the meikle black diel 
 That danced awa' wi' the Exciseman." 
 
 And yet, at the very time the poor fellow composed this snatch, he was 
 being compelled to play Exciseman, to eke out a subsistence for his 
 family at 50 a year ; consoling himself for the degradation by saying, 
 " I would much rather have it said that my profession borrowed credit 
 Jrom me, than that I borrowed credit from rny profession."
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 359 
 
 been borne into it and through it, on a resistless current, which 
 sprang not from any purpose to sever the Union, or defy its govern- 
 ment, nor yet from the mere odium of a name, but from substantial 
 injustice and oppression. They had met and expressed their oppo- 
 sition to the law, and sent petitions for its repeal. Their petitions 
 were unheeded, their meetings denounced as treasonable. Obnox- 
 ious men were set over them to assess and collect the tax, and 
 because a few of the baser sort maltreated them, the whole commu- 
 nity, even our magistrates and ministers, were stigmatized by high 
 officials as aiding and abetting the violence. For the persistent and 
 judicious efforts by many of the best of the people to calm the rage 
 of the flood, and hush its roar, they were branded as accessories to 
 its fury. And when they had almost succeeded when the waters 
 had assuaged, and the dove was on her way with the olive-leaf of 
 peace, an army greater than had fought the fiercest battles of the 
 Revolution was marched out, and after staying a few days, and find- 
 ing that " order reigned in Warsaw," they marched home again, 
 taking with them as criminals not the leaders of the tumult, for they 
 had nearly all escaped but many of the very men who had labored 
 the wisest, if not the noisiest, to sustain the government which 
 accused them, driven like cattle through mud and cold to Philadel- 
 phia, and paraded through its streets with ignominious badges upon 
 their hats, imprisoned, then discharged, or tried and acquitted. 
 And because the distillers at length got protection, and a favoring 
 conjuncture of events the subjugation of the Indians by Wayne's 
 legions, and the opening and security of the navigation of the Mis- 
 sissippi brought relief, all these things were used as proofs that 
 their resistance had been rebellion, and their complaints groundless. 
 Those who did undertake to narrate the " incidents " of the commo- 
 tion, or write its "history," were themselves deeply implicated; 
 and what they wrote was less to vindicate the people than to excul- 
 pate themselves and abuse their political opponents. These ques- 
 tionable forms of defence were confronted by seemingly calm, elabo- 
 rate, and ingeniously constructed State papers, penned by the Secre- 
 tary of the Treasury, upon partizan views, and partizan, often illusive, 
 testimony ; and from these our standard histories have been com- 
 posed ; and at least one generation of the men and women of " the 
 four counties " held up to the world as having been so frenzied by
 
 j(,o PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the love of whiskey as to become " regardless of social duty, and 
 fatally bent upon mischief," fanatics, and traitors.* 
 
 It is not for me to undertake here and now to relieve an impor- 
 tant period of our early history from this incubus of obloquy. But 
 as at least a minor object of this Convention is to set the fathers and 
 founders of Western Pennsylvania in their true positions, social and 
 political as well as in others, some memorial of how they stood in 
 that one which was the most anomalous, and has been most misre- 
 presented of any that they had to occupy, will not be inappropriate 
 to the occasion. For if they were bad citizens they could not have 
 been good men. 
 
 A credulous reading of current histories, and of more or less 
 ephemeral publications based upon them, had led me to believe that 
 in this most extraordinary social convulsion the people were wholly 
 wrong and the government wholly right. A more careful study of 
 it, in the light of antecedent, as well as of cotemporaneous collate- . 
 ral events, and of original documents, has convinced me that there 
 were wrongs on both sides, consequential and transient on the one 
 side, causal and persistent on the other. That the Acts of Congress 
 which developed it, the warnings which attended its progress, and 
 the measures which consummated its suppression, had the sanction 
 of Washington's great name, are enough alone to make any right- 
 minded man pause in questioning their perfect propriety. But all 
 that he did was done as official duty. He approved the laws 
 
 * It will be understood that the references in this paragraph are to the 
 publications by the Messrs. Brackenridge father and son, William 
 Findley, and Albert Gallatin, on the one side ; and to the Reports of 
 Alexander Hamilton, Marshall's Life of Washington, and Hildreth's 
 History of the United States, to which should be added Mr. Neville B. 
 Craig's publications, on the other side. Much the fairest, though not 
 the fullest, of all the publications I have seen, is a paper read before the 
 New Jersey Historical Society (published in its Proceedings, Vol. VI., 
 120), by the late Rev. Dr. Carnahan, President of the College at Prince- 
 ton. Being a native of Western Pennsylvania, an ear and eye witness 
 of many of the occurrences of the "Insurrection," his statements are 
 reliable, and his views impartial. I am glad to be able, generally and 
 in the main, to concur with him. Important disclosures from records, 
 and many right deductions from them, have been made by Mr. Town- 
 send Ward, formerly Librarian of the Pennsylvania Historical Society, 
 in a paper read before it, published in its Memoirs, Vol. VI., 119.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 because the Congress had passed them and the Constitution authorized 
 them; he warned the transgressors because the law made it his duty 
 to warn them ; and he hurled the power of the Government upon 
 them because it was one of the sworn duties of his high office to 
 " take care that the law be faithfully executed." There is some 
 evidence in his writings* that he questioned the expediency of an 
 Excise law, because, as ciaimed by its opposers, it was "of odious 
 character with the people, partial in its operations, unproductive, 
 unless enforced by arbitrary and vexatious means, and committing 
 the authority of the Government in parts where resistance is most 
 probable, and coercion least practicable." No language could 
 better than this depict it in its bearings upon Southwestern Penn- 
 sylvania, in 1792. That the President dealt, in the end, surpassing 
 clemency to its transgressors, is further proof that he did not deem 
 their sin very heinous. 
 
 That it was "of odious character with the people" is already 
 abundantly obvious, especially with those who have Scotch or Irish 
 blood in their, veins. Even in England, whence we imported it, 
 Dr. Johnson, the prince of Tory lexicographers, defines it to be " a 
 hateful tax." Sir William Blackstone, no great stickler for liberal 
 laws, writes of it in his Commentaries as "odious," and " hardly 
 campatible with the temper of a free nation." A higher authority 
 than these, with all true Americans, was the Continental Congress 
 of 1774, which denounced it as the " horror of all free States the 
 most odious of taxes." 
 
 That an excise system, at the period to which we refer, must 
 needs be " unequal in its operation," is no less obvious than its 
 inherently odious character. Especially was this true as to Penn- 
 sylvania. As in the times of the New State agitation, it held a 
 peculiar position, so now. Up until near the close of the last cen- 
 tury it was the only State that had any surplus grain-producing terri- 
 tory west of the mountains. Kentucky, Western Virginia, and the 
 Northwest Territory formed no exceptions ; they were consumers 
 
 * The President's Proclamation of September 15, 1792, which was 
 drafted by Secretary Hamilton, had in it, that the Excise laws were 
 " dictated by weighty reasons of public exigency and policy." The Presi- 
 dent struck that out. See the Proclamation, etc., ill Sparks' Washing- 
 ton, X., 532, and 530, 250.
 
 36a PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 rather than producers. This region of country was specially 
 adapted to the production of grains. Indeed it produced nothing 
 else that was marketable, except beeswax, ginseng, and snake root. 
 Spirits whiskey and brandies were the distillates of grains, apples, 
 and peaches. They could have no commercial value without remu- 
 nerative access to the marts of trade and commerce, and of these 
 we had none. Almost impassible mountain barriers shut us off 
 from the eastern markets. Freights, whether by wagon or pack- 
 horse, rated at from five to ten dollars per hundred pounds. To 
 "go west" with any of our surplus products was so perilous by 
 reason of the Indians, and so precarious by reason of the uncer- 
 tainties of sale, as to be tantamount to the hazards of a lottery ; 
 or if run to the Spanish possessions on the lower Mississippi, liable to 
 loss on the way, or confiscation if reached. Assuredly the people of 
 Western Pennsylvania were not fit subjects for an excise law. 
 
 The Federal Constitution requires that "all duties, imposts, and 
 excises shall be uniform throughout the United States ;" but it does 
 not require them to be specific, that is, a uniform rate upon the 
 taxable article, irrespective of its relative value. Direct taxes, and, 
 to a large extent, imposts, are not so levied. Unfortunately for the 
 fairness and justice of the tax we are about to consider, it was made 
 to be specific in its most objectionable form, thereby not only 
 giving to it an odious name and mode of collection, but excluding 
 any equity of apportionment, according to the relative values of 
 distilled spirits as between one part of the country and another. 
 Improved land in Westmoreland could be assessed at five 
 dollars per acre, in Lancaster at fifty, and a per centage of 
 taxation be just and fair. But a tax of seven cents per 
 gallon on whiskey made in Chartiers was one-fourth of its value, 
 while if made on the Brandywine it was perhaps less than an 
 eighth. There it was a product of profit, here of necessity. It 
 was almost the only form of surplus product we had which could be 
 pack-horsed across the mountains, and with it or its proceeds 
 procure iron, salt, powder, and lead, and the other necessaries 
 of life and agriculture. And when salt was five dollars per bushel, 
 and iron and steel from twenty to thirty cents per pound, a few 
 kegs of whiskey was a treasure. To impair it was assailing the very 
 vitals of our being ; for Shylock reasoned well
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 363 
 
 You take my life 
 
 When you do take the means whereby I live." 
 
 As for money we had no other resort than what was picked up 
 from emigrants to the further west, or saved from the proceeds of a 
 venture to Carlisle, or Winchester, or New Orleans ; and for all 
 this, and more if they could have gotten it, our people had 
 inexorable demands. As to Western Pennsylvania, therefore, in 
 its isolated, necessitous condition, the excise was clearly partial, 
 unequal, and inequitable ; for " equality is equity," and there could 
 be no equality between it and any other whiskey-producing com- 
 munity in the nation. 
 
 In primitive times in this country, when coin was almost 
 unknown and paper money valueless, whatever was most abundant, 
 if portable and not perishable, and ultimately convertible into 
 cash, became the standard of value the currency of the com- 
 munity; just as in the Indian trade it was ten buck-skins for a 
 match-coat, five doe-skins for a calico shirt, or three fawn-skins for 
 a pound of lead. So it was in our early settlements five pounds 
 of ginseng for a wool hat, ten of beeswax for a straw bonnet, three 
 gallons of whiskey or applejack Tor a quarter of tea. A hundred 
 gallon copper still would buy a good farm, two barrels of whiskey 
 a corner lot, a five-gallon keg for a pound of powder, five barrels 
 for a rifle^ gun. To tax it, therefore, was adding twenty-five per 
 cent, to these prices. Moreover, men could not see any more 
 justice in taxing their grain in the shape of whiskey than if in flour 
 or meal. A still-house was just as much a necessity as a mill. The 
 consequence of this state of things was, that distilleries were dotted 
 all over the country. I think I have seen it stated that there was at 
 one time, in all the four western counties, five hundred and seventy- 
 two. In some neighborhoods every fifth or sixth farmer was a 
 distiller, who, during the winter seasons, manufactured his own and 
 his neighbors' surplus grain into whiskey, "on the shares," so much 
 whiskey returned for a given quantity of grain or rye-meal supplied. 
 But then they were small concerns, sometimes of one little still, but 
 oftener of two, one for singlings, the other for doubling ; hundreds of 
 them not making as much in a season as is now made by one of our 
 modern mammoth distilleries. But then they made a better article. 
 It was not, as now, made to kill. It established a name and a
 
 364 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 reputation for the commodity, which it will perhaps never lose, 
 whether made on the Monongahela. or the Wabash. Often the 
 stills were set up in the cellar of the house in which the family 
 resided, or in some contiguous out-house, the same spring supplying 
 the milk-house and the worm-tub ; and the kegs and barrels stored 
 away under the porch, in a cave, or in the spring-house, with the 
 cider and vinegar, or cream crocks, as convenience demanded. To 
 have a gauger smelling and spiering round among these with 
 his rod and note-book, was rather more than a Scotch-Irish woman 
 could stand, whether by day or by night. 
 
 As a luxury in drink, our Eastern friends could have their wines, 
 which were unknown here, except for sacred use, and then not 
 always to, be had.* Our whiskey, either " straight " or with maple 
 sugar, tansy, and mint, or as decoctions of herbs and barks and 
 roots, was esteemed a cure " for all the ills that flesh is heir to." 
 It was the indispensible emblem of hospitality, and accompaniment 
 of labor in every pursuit ; the stimulant in joy, the solace in grief. 
 It was kept on the counter of every store, in the corner cupboard of 
 every well-to-do family. It was bitters in the morning, an appeti- 
 zer at noon, a night-cap at nigKt. The minister took it before 
 going to church and after he came back. At home and abroad, at 
 coming and going, at marryings and buryings, at house-raisings and 
 log rollings, at harvestings and huskings, in the varying forms of 
 drams, egg-nogg, apple-toddy, and punch, hot and cold, it was the 
 omnipresent beverage of old and young, men and women ; and he 
 was a churl who stinted it. To d^ny it altogether required more 
 grace or niggardliness than most men could command, at least for 
 daily use. 
 
 And yet our forefathers were not drunkards. Ordinarily they 
 had not time to get drunk, and constant bodily exercise and 
 "homely fare" neutralized the intoxicating virus. Except on 
 
 * " I have been asked by a Presbyterian minister, and some of his 
 people, to request you to spare one gallon of wine for the use of a Sacra- 
 ment. If it is in your power to supply them with this article, I have no 
 doubt you will do it, as it cannot be obtained in any other place in this 
 country. Mr. Douglas, or the bearer, will apply for it." MS. Letter, 
 Col. James Marshall to General William Irvine, Pittsburgh, dated 
 Washington County, 2Qt/i May, 1782.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 3*5 
 
 special occasions, a drunken man was as rare as a spotted horse. 
 Laboring men and everybody, even the minister and the lawyer, 
 labored in the olden time lived out their three score and ten, and 
 took their drinks as regularly as their meals. True, there were 
 topers who were always drunk, and did nothing else. They were 
 loathed and despised. There were no saloons and sample-rooms in 
 those days ; and taverns were not the resorts of the neighbors except 
 to hear the news of the day, which it was the business of the land- 
 lord to deal out along with a half-pint of his best, for two and six- 
 pence, according to the court rates. If these habits were wrong, an 
 excise law was not their corrective. " Canst thou draw out Levia- 
 than with a hook?" 
 
 Nor were they laggard or obstinate in the payment of all the 
 ordinary taxes assessed upon them. Indeed, they were commend- 
 ably prompt in this respect, more so than were the people in many 
 of the Eastern counties.* And taxes were by no means light in 
 those times. Not only had the county and township taxes to be 
 met, but the United States, having no source of revenue under their 
 control, were dependent upon loans at home and abroad, upon their 
 paper promises, known as continental money, and, in large measure, 
 upon quotas, as they were called, apportioned among the States, and 
 by the States among the counties. This was levied chiefly as a direct 
 tax, which, of course, could be adjusted according to valuations. In 
 this respect, therefore, there was no lack of loyalty to either the 
 State or the nation. In resisting the excise tax they struck for 
 principles, not amounts. 
 
 These are general views of the situation. Under whatever of light 
 they afford, let us look more closely at some of the specific grievances, 
 
 * " COMPTROLLER GENERAL'S OFFICE, 
 
 September 9, 1786. 
 
 " SIR : The honorable situation in which the county of Fayette is 
 placed by the punctual discharge of her taxes, reflects high credit upon 
 the officers employed in the laying, collecting, and paying the same, as 
 well as upon the county at large. May you long continue. Your exam- 
 ple will have a good influence upon others. The bearer is riding the 
 State for money, but from you we ask none. You have anticipated our 
 
 demand. I am, <fec., 
 
 "JOHN NICHOLSON. 
 
 " Ephraim Douglass, Esq., 
 
 Treus'r Fayette county."
 
 S66 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 and of the proximate causes and immediate occasions of the 
 " Insurrection." 
 
 We need have no detailed narrative of why and how it was that 
 Pennsylvania had excise laws. It is enough here to know that we 
 had them, and that we stood alone in this respect among all the 
 neighboring States. Those which were enacted before the Revolu- 
 tion no otherwise concern us than in the trainings to aversion and 
 evasion which they gave to many of our early settlers. It was not 
 until it became incumbent to provide for the debts which the war 
 had incurred, that they were extended to the western counties. But 
 finding them obnoxious and likely to revive the late disaffection, 
 there was no attempt to enforce them. 
 
 Efforts were made to collect some without compulsion, but with 
 very discouraging results. They brought not a dollar to the trea- 
 sury ; all that was obtained by compoundings and extortion having 
 been appropriated by the collectors for their compensation. The 
 trouble was to get honest and efficient collectors. Some who were 
 honest, after repeated trials and troubles, gave it up, resigned or 
 absconded. We had plenty of good and competent men, but no 
 inducement was strong enough to overcome their abhorrence of the 
 service. The whole excise system became a mere slumbering mon- 
 ster, to be watched and shunned. 
 
 The immunity thus enjoyed by the western counties gave a pre- 
 text to those of the east to grumble and hold back. This excited 
 the Executive Council of the State to try us again. In 1785 they 
 sent out, as collector of the three counties, a broken down Philadel- 
 phia Market Street tavern-keeper, by the name of Graham. He 
 collected some in Fayette without any obstacle. He then went to 
 Westmoreland and got a little there. But, in the darkness of night, 
 at his hotel, he was called to the door of his room by a man in 
 disguise, who told him he was Beelzebub, and had called for him to 
 hand him over for torment to a legion of devils who were in waiting 
 without. He managed, with assistance, to escape their clutches ; 
 and thinking he had found the fiend in a man of the town, he prose- 
 cuted him, but the man proved an alibi. Whereupon the discom- 
 fited exciseman, fearing that some other deil might "dance awa' " 
 with him, fled with all convenient speed into what he was told was 
 the more sober and submissive county of Washington, then covering
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 all west of the Monongahela. There he fared worse than at Greens- 
 burgh. His treatment is described so graphically, and in terms so 
 apropos to our purpose, by Dorsey Pentecost, in a letter to the 
 State Executive Council, dated April 16, 1786, that I cannot do 
 better than copy from it : 
 
 "His pistols, which he carried before him, were taken and 
 broken to pieces in his presence ; his commission and all his papers 
 torn and thrown in the mud, and he forced to stamp on them, and 
 imprecate curses on himself, on his commission, and on the authority 
 that gave it to him. They then cut off half his hair, cued the other 
 half on one side of his head, cut off the cock of his hat, and made 
 him wear it in a form to render his cue the more conspicuous. 
 This, with many other marks of ignomy, they imposed upon him [and 
 his horse], and in that plight marched him, amidst a crowd, from the 
 frontiers of this county to Westmoreland, calling at all the still- 
 houses on the way, where they were treated gratis, exposing him to 
 every insult and mockery that their invention could contrive. They 
 set him at liberty at the entrance of Westmoreland county, but with 
 threats of utter deso lution should he dare to return to our county."* 
 
 The locality of this precedent for other similar outrages upon excise- 
 men, in after years, is said to have been out here in the good Scotch- 
 Irish Presbyterian neighborhood of Cross Creek, the home of Col. 
 James Marshall and James Edgar, which may account for the fiery 
 zeal of Pentecost to emblazon it, and invoke the "most severe 
 punishment" on the offenders. Graham never returned, except to 
 institute a prosecution for riot against twelve of the "banditti" in 
 the court at Washington, of which they were, in due time, convicted, 
 but afterwards pardoned so far as to remit the fines imposed. If I 
 mistake not, one of these offenders meritoriously, I presume rose, 
 in after years, to high places in Washington county, representing it 
 in the Assembly, and eventually in Congress.f The excise officers 
 were beginning to fare not much better in other parts of the State, 
 when, by the organization of the Federal Government in 1789-90, 
 it was kindly (?) taken off our hands, whereupon the law was 
 repealed. 
 
 * Pennsylvania Archives, X., 757. 
 
 f Colonial Records, XVI., 24, and Creigh's History of Washington 
 County, 78.
 
 j(.S PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Excise was a favorite financial measure with Alexander Hamilton, 
 whom President Washington called to the head of the Treasury 
 Department. He was a bold, ambitious, and able man, but per- 
 haps cared more- for the success of his measures in Congress than 
 with the people. Washington had great confidence in him, and 
 justly, for perhaps, at that vital juncture, there was no other man in 
 the nation who could so resolutely and so well have reduced our 
 confused and crippled financial condition to order and activity. 
 Like the great Earl of Chatham, he touched the corpse of public 
 credit and it rose in health and vigor. But then he burdened it too 
 heavily, and was too anxious for a hasty display of its restoration. 
 Had he withheld any scheme of domestic excise until the equili- 
 brium of the country in the relations of its diverse parts had been 
 better established, and the people become inured to the workings 
 of a stronger government than they had been accustomed to, all his 
 measures, this one especially, would have fared better, the peace of 
 the country been maintained, and the party, of which he was then 
 the acknowledged head, had a longer supremacy. But he rushed 
 boldly on, impelled to a more heady movement by the antagonisms 
 he had to encounter, which were controlled by his hated rival, Mr. 
 Jefferson, and fostered by the phrenzy which revolutionary France, 
 on the one hand, and stubborn England on the other, combined to 
 diffuse in angry clouds all over the country. 
 
 A bill which provided for the collection of revenue from domestic 
 distilled spirits was introduced into the Second Session of the First 
 Congress, which sat at New York in 1790. It led to long, earnest, 
 and angry discussion ; and failing then of enactment, was adjourned 
 to the Third Session of that Congress, which sat at Philadelphia in 
 1791. Before this the Pennsylvania Legislature had unwittingly 
 repealed her direct tax, leaving her excise law unrepealed a little 
 longer on her statute book, though virtually repealed by the 
 inability to enforce it, and by its supercedure under the Constitu- 
 tion of the United States. 
 
 The Excise Act of Congress became a law on the third of March, 
 1791. While pending, the Legislature of Pennsylvania took the 
 alarm; and, in January, 1791, passed a series of resolutions, con- 
 demning an excise law on domestic products as "subversive of 
 peace, liberty, and the rights of the citizens," and sending to their
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 369 
 
 senators a hope (for instructions had not yet come in vogue) that 
 they would oppose every part of the bill which militated against 
 those rights for the bill was an " omnibus " revenue bill, of sixty- 
 two sections, relating as well to "distilled spirits imported from 
 abroad" as to "spirits distilled within the United States, and 
 appropriating the same " one of the earliest precedents for joining 
 incongruous subjects in the same law. But for this, and for the 
 commendable and needy objects to which the expected revenues 
 were devoted, including the war debts of the States which Congress 
 had assumed, it is believed it could not have commanded a majority 
 of votes in either House, or the approval of the President. But it 
 passed, and was approved ; and, of course, had to be enforced 
 if it could be in all its heterogeneous provisions, and in all places 
 of the country. 
 
 To comprehend the forms and growth of the convulsions it pro- 
 voked, we must first take in such of the provisions as shaped them. 
 Including some modifications in 1792, they are the following: 
 
 That the United States should be divided into fourteen districts,. 
 each under the control of a supervisor each State into surveys, 
 under the control, each, of an inspector (the four western counties, 
 and the Somerset part of Bedford, were the fourth Surveys of 
 Pennsylvania) each county to have at least one office of inspection 
 each Survey to have as many other officers as the President 
 should deem it advisable to employ, or the supervisor to appoint, for 
 entering, inspecting, gauging, watching, etc. Every person owning 
 a still, whether for sale or use, was required, in the month of June 
 yearly, or if procured after June, by purchase, or removal into the 
 county, then within thirty days thereafter, under the penalty of one 
 hundred dollars (increased in 1792 to two hundred and fifty dollars), 
 to make entry of his still or stills, and of what he intended to do with 
 them, at the office of inspection for the county ; if to be used for 
 distilling (of which, having it set up in stone, brick or otherwise so 
 as to be used, was made evidence) he had his option either to pay 
 yearly sixty cents (reduced in 1792 to fifty-four cents, or ten cents 
 per month) per gallon of the capacity of the still, including its head, 
 or nine cents (reduced in 1792 to seven) per gallon of spirits 
 distilled and of sales thereof, of which the distiller was to render 
 sworn accounts from a book of daily entries. If the still exceeded 
 Y
 
 370 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONTENTION. 
 
 the capacity of fifty gallons, and the place to be used was within ten 
 miles of an office, the distiller was bound, under another penalty of 
 one hundred dollars, and forfeiture of liquor and casks, within three 
 days of his beginning to use it, to make a particular entry in writing 
 of every house, vault, cellar, or apartment in which he intended to 
 carry on the business, or keep any of the spirits distilled ; and to 
 have distiller of spirits written or painted on every such place 
 of distillation or deposit. If, when the act went into effect, any 
 person, who had previously been a distiller, had any liquor on 
 hand, he must report the same to the inspector, and have the casks 
 containing it marked old stock, which he was not allowed to keep 
 on hand over a year, unless in vessels containing at least two 
 hundred gallons [poor chance for old whiskey]. Every cask 
 containing twenty gallons or upwards (and none that contained 
 less) must be gauged, marked, and, when sold or removed, be 
 accompanied by a certificate of tax paid no removals between 
 sunset and sunrise and gaugers to have access at all times, in day- 
 light, to enter the places "entered" as aforesaid, and "by tasting, 
 gauging, or otherwise," take an account, and samples "at the 
 usual price." 
 
 The entire law is full of snares and pitfalls to entrap the unwary, 
 and bristles all over with forfeitures and penalties ; but as an 
 attempt to enforce only one of these the penalty of $250 for non- 
 entry of stills, &c., in June was the immediate occasion of the 
 resistance, all others may be passed by without further notice. 
 
 Soon after the passage of the Act of 1791, General John Neville 
 was appointed Inspector of the Survey. That he was honest and 
 capable is unquestioned ; and yet a more unfortunate appointment 
 could hardly have been made. His friends claim that he was sur- 
 passingly kind and generous, and that "if any man could have 
 executed this odious law he was the man." His enemies, on the 
 other hand, assert " that his former popularity had made his accept- 
 ance of that office particularly offensive," and that he was "cun- 
 ning, vindictive, and selfish." The solution of this paradox is, that 
 he had long and successfully courted popular favor ; was elected to 
 the State Council from Washington county in 1783; and after- 
 wards, from that county, and from Allegheny, to the Assembly, of 
 which he was a member when the anti-excise resolutions of
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 January, 1791, were passed, and voted for them. During all this 
 period he was an open opponent of the State excise law, and had 
 trained the people to believe that opposition to excise was a virtue. 
 It was certified, and so far as appears, was not denied, that he not 
 only justified the maltreatment of Graham, but had said that the 
 "old rascal should have had his ears cut off." And when remon- 
 strated with for taking an office so offensive to his old friends and 
 the people generally, he spoke of them derisively, putting their favor 
 low down in comparison with the value to him of the emoluments 
 of the office. He had, moreover, risen to great wealth, had a 
 "princely estate," and lived in a manorial mansion, richly fur- 
 nished, and surrounded by quarters for fifteen or twenty negro ser- 
 vants. His abrupt change of front on the excise question was, of 
 course, attributed to selfish motives, and a willingness to lend his 
 high social and political influence to enforce a law which was not 
 only odious, but which he had denounced as "subversive of the 
 peace, liberty, and rights of the citizens." We will see that his 
 relations to the law and his neighbors were the immediate provoca- 
 tives of the violence which gave to the resistance the character of an 
 insurrection. 
 
 The law was not put in force in the western counties in 1791, 
 because of no office of inspection having been opened in time, and 
 inability to find- competent men for subordinate offices under it 
 who were hardy enough to brave its unpopularity. The only one 
 procured was Robert Johnson, a tenant of Col. Presley Neville, the 
 inspector's son. In September he was caught in the Pigeon creek 
 region, in Washington county, and maltreated somewhat after the 
 formula established upon Graham, with the old Tory addition of a 
 coat of tar and feathers. Similar acts of lawless violence were per- 
 petrated, in quick succession, in the same vicinity, and on Mingo 
 and Peter's creeks. The offenders having operated in disguise, 
 stealthily, and in the night, generally eluded detection and punish- 
 ment. Now was the time for the Government to have put forth its 
 power. Obsta principiis oppose the beginnings shotted cartridges 
 at first, blank ones afterwards, are the only effectual modes of sup- 
 pressing mob rule. The State officers did all they could to ferret out 
 and obtain testimony against the transgressors, but failed. Until 
 too late there was no movement in that direction by the officers of
 
 37 2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the United States, and when they did move, it was in such a fitful, 
 dastardly, and distrustful manner as served only to bring their efforts 
 into derision, and the government into contempt. Throughout all 
 the troubles there was a persistent determination, on the part of the 
 Federal officers, to draw into the United States Court at Philadelphia 
 not only violations of the excise law, but every riot, arson, and 
 assault and battery connected with it.* Our officers of justice were 
 not only slighted, but traduced. Alexander (Judge) Addison pre- 
 sided over all the courts in the counties of the survey. He was the 
 Sir Mathew Hale of his day 
 
 " for deep discernment praised, 
 And sound integrity, not more than famed 
 For sanctity of manners undefiled ;" 
 
 and every associate judge and sheriff in the four counties, and nearly 
 all the justices of the peace, were men of nerve and integrity. If not 
 blatant advocates of the excise law, or busy detectives, they were 
 friends of the Government, and ready at all times to sustain it. 
 Although neither they, nor jurors generally, could uphold the 
 wisdom and. justice of the law, they never failed, even in the most 
 deeply infected counties, to arrest, convict, and punish offenders, 
 upon sufficient evidence. Yet Mr. Secretary Hamilton, in his 
 labored report of August, 1794,- upon the insurrection, declared it 
 as " a truth too important not to be noticed, and too injurious not 
 to be lamented, that the prevailing spirit of the local officers in the 
 survey has been either hostile, or lukewarm to the execution of the 
 laws : and the weight of an unfriendly official influence has been one 
 of the most serious obstacles with which they have had to struggle." 
 And George Clymer,'f' the supervisor of the district, having, in the 
 
 * During this volcanic period Col. James Paull was sheriff of Fayette, 
 than whom a braver and truer man never held that office anywhere. 
 
 He was a decided friend of the Government. Yet because, under the 
 advice of his counsel, he declined to subject himself to an action for 
 false imprisonment, by executing a defective warrant for the arrest of 
 some of his neighbors accused of being concerned in one of the attacks 
 upon the house of Wells, he was indicted in the United States Court at 
 Philadelphia ! What had the courts of the United States to do with the 
 official duties of sheriffs? The indictment was not prosecuted. 
 
 f Grandfather of the Hon. Heister Clymer, of Berks, and one of the 
 signers of the Declaration of Independence. He had more nerve then.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 fall of 1792, come out to Pittsburgh as a detective, got scared, pro- 
 cured a guard, and hurried back to Philadelphia, to vent his abuse 
 not only upon our civil magistrates, but upon our ministers of the 
 gospel, and have his adventures commemorated in a mock-heroic 
 epic, after the model of Trumbull's McFingal. 
 
 The act of May, 1792, made some slight but immaterial changes 
 on the law of 1791. It lowered the rates a little, and allowed dis- 
 tillers to take and pay for monthly instead of yearly licenses, but 
 raised the penalty for non-entry from $100 to $250. It also 
 required offices of inspection and entry to be opened and maintained 
 in each county, and that entries therein of stills, buildings, cellars, 
 vaults, &c., used, or intended to be, in the manufacture and storage, 
 should be made yearly, in June, and only then. Without much 
 time to think about it, many distillers complied with this require- 
 ment, wherever they had opportunity, by the establishment of offices. 
 Others hesitated until too late ; and in the most deeply disaffected 
 parts of the country many were deterred from compliance. 
 
 The inspector's "Bower Hill" residence was in Allegheny 
 county, some eight or nine miles southwest of Pittsburgh, near the 
 roads to Washington. Very unwisely, for the dignity of his office 
 and character, and the sanctity of his house, he made it an " office 
 of inspection," with sign up. Another office was at the tenant 
 house of Johnson, on an adjoining tract of land. The only other 
 office in the survey, prior to June, 1792, was at the residence 
 of Benjamin Wells, on the southern bank of the Youghiogheny, 
 opposite Connellsville, in the county of Fayette, of which Wells, 
 the deputy, or collector for Fayette and Westmoreland, was the 
 keeper. All efforts during that year to get places for offices any- 
 where in the counties of Washington and Westmoreland were 
 unsuccessful, nor was any attempted for the Bedford part of the 
 survey. A Captain Faulkner, of Wayne's army, then recruiting at 
 Washington, had, in August, given General Neville permission 
 to open an office in his house ; but some rowdies on Pigeon creek so 
 frightened the Captain, when out there hunting deserters, that he 
 quickly revoked the permission. Wells undertook, in June, 1792, 
 to have a kind of peripatetic weekly office at Greensburgh, which he 
 soon abandoned, and another at Uniontown ; but on the first 
 appointment there he did not appear, and on the next got fright-
 
 374 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ened and hid himself; so that the distillers who attended, assuming 
 that he did not mean business, went home and gave it up. 
 
 It will be seen from the synopsis of the laws already given, that 
 the penalty for non-entry of stills, etc., could be exacted only 
 in case an office was kept open during June in each county. Those 
 who conducted the early campaigns against the excise were good 
 generals. It was a point of the highest strategic importance to 
 prevent the establishment of offices in the several counties, or, if 
 established, to suppress them, and keep them so during all the 
 month of June. This, as we have seen, was effectually accom- 
 plished at the outset in Washington county, which, as Secretary 
 Hamilton reported, " has uniformly distinguished its resistance by a 
 more excessive spirit than has appeared in the other counties, and 
 seems to have been chiefly instrumental in kindling and keeping 
 alive the flame." It certainly established the precedent upon a 
 pretty firm basis. That no attempt was made in 1792 to suppress 
 any other of General Neville's offices is some evidence that the 
 people of his vicinage were trying to preserve their former respect 
 for him, and that the resistance was progressive ; while, as to Wells, 
 he seems to have been frightened into inactivity after his failures at 
 Uniontown. For a while all was quiet in all parts of the survey. 
 Many distillers within the lawful range of the established offices 
 had entered their stills, especially those of the largest capacity, 
 who were rather anxious that the smaller ones those who distilled 
 "on the shares" should be induced not to enter, and quit the 
 business, so as to enable them to monopolize it. Many did quit. 
 
 The time for entries for 1 793 was coming round. This thing of hav- 
 ing no offices in the two largest and most populous counties of the sur- 
 vey was discouraging to the secretary and supervisor, and encouraged 
 to further resistance by the people and distillers of the two lesser 
 counties. Perhaps two-thirds of the distillers in the western 
 counties were thereby exempt from the tax, and their whiskey from 
 seizure, unless caught beyond the lines. The people of Washington 
 county had a long, tempting river border, from which they could 
 ship to the lower markets, or send it across into the Ohio part 
 of the northwest territory, to which the excise laws had not been 
 extended. Some were cautious or conscientious enough to be 
 willing to pay the duty at the places of shipment, but the collector
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 375 
 
 of Ohio county, Virginia, then all of the Panhandle, gave public 
 notice that he could receive none except on what was made in his 
 own county. The greater part of Fayette, Westmoreland, and 
 Bedford could pack their whiskey in twenty-gallon kegs across the 
 mountains with impunity, because vessels of that capacity were not 
 required by the law to be marked as legal, or be accompanied by 
 certificates. Only the Monongahela and Youghioghjeny river bor- 
 ders of the four counties were hedged in by a yigilant surveillance, 
 and had to run the gauntlet. Many looked upon the whole system 
 as tumbling to pieces, and few, if any, were willing to go to its relief. 
 The Secretary saw and lamented these embarrassments, bet could 
 not remove them. The defects were in the law, the localities, and 
 the temper of the people, which were beyond his reach. He asked 
 the Congress which sat in 1792-' 93 to cure them, but without suc- 
 cess ; so he had to resort to expedients, as well before as after that 
 failure. 
 
 The first expedient was, in September, 1792, to procure the Presi- 
 dent, who had retired for rest to the shades of Mount Vernon, to 
 sign the proclamation, which I have referred to (in a note), contain- 
 ing a general warning to transgressors. It had a good effect. Then 
 came the flying mission of the supervisor, before noted, whose pur- 
 pose was to procure evidence upon which to indict, in the United 
 States Court, the assailants of Faulkner, and those who had composed 
 a little meeting in Pittsburgh, in August, 1792, which had passed 
 some intemperate and indiscreet resolutions, which the Secretary 
 deemed to be violations of some Act of Congress, but which neither 
 the Attorney-General nor he could find.* This dastardly, inde- 
 
 * This meeting was composed of John Badolet, Bazil Bowell, Shesba- 
 zer Bentley, David Bradford, Edward Cook, John Canon, Thomas 
 Gaddis, Albert Gallatin, Neal Gillespie, John Hamilton, John Huey, 
 Mathew Jameson, Peter Lisle, Alexander Long, John McClelland, 
 Robert McClure, James Marshall, Benjamin Parkinson, David Phillips, 
 James Stewart, John Smilie, William Wallace, and Samuel Wilson 23 
 a grand jury. John Canon, chairman ; Albert Gallatin, clerk. 
 
 The supposed indictable proceedings were as follows: 
 
 " And whereas, some men may be found among us so far lost to every 
 sense of virtue and feeling for the distress of this country as to accept 
 offices for the collection of the duty [on stills and spirits] 
 
 " llesolved, therefore, that in future we will consider such persons as 
 unworthy of our friendship, have no intercourse or dealings with them,
 
 376 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 fensible and abortive effort of vindictiveness nullified the salutary 
 influence of the proclamation. 
 
 Another expedient had a better effect. It was to pay cash to 
 complying distillers for whiskey for Wayne's army, then in camp at 
 Legionville, at or near where Economy now is, and afterwards on 
 its movements against the British Indians. To sustain this expe- 
 dient efforts were made to seize illicit whiskey, but with very partial 
 results. 
 
 It was more to the purpose to obtain offices and officers for the 
 other counties, in time for the June entries of 1793. On the first 
 of June of that year the inspector gave notice, through the " Ga- 
 zette," that offices. for entries, &c., were opened at his own house, 
 and at the house of R. Johnson, in Allegheny county; at B. Wells', 
 in Fayette, and at Philip Reagan's, in Westmoreland none yet "for 
 Washington or Bedford. But if one had been 'obtained for West- 
 moreland, it was soon suppressed ; for Secretary Hamilton, in his 
 oft quoted report of August, 1 794, says that all efforts to obtain an 
 office jn that county, as well as in Washington, up to 1794, had 
 utterly failed. So, as to offices, things stood as they were in 1792. 
 In the fall of 1793, however, Captain John Webster gave notice of 
 his being the collector for Bedford county. Still forbearing towards 
 the inspector, no attempt to suppress him or Johnson was made in 
 1793, except, it was said, that at some militia muster he was hung 
 and burnt in effigy. But Wells being notoriously timid, and 
 obnoxious on general account, a riotous visit was made to his house 
 in a night in April, 1793; but he being "out," it had no other 
 effect than to frighten the inmates. Nobody was hurt. 
 
 Notwithstanding these covert, disorderly, and illegal demonstra- 
 tions of a still lurking propensity to mischief by the lower strata of 
 society, it was confessed on all hands that the excise law gained 
 ground in 1793, at least until near its close. It would have con- 
 tinued to gain had the Treasury officers let distillers alone for a 
 while, in the counties where they had offices, so as to put them on a 
 
 withdraw from them every assistance, and withhold all the comforts of 
 life which depend upon those duties that as men and fellow citizens we 
 owe to each other, and upon all occasions treat them with that contempt 
 they deserve ; and that it be and hereby is most earnestly recommended 
 to the people at large to follow the same line of conduct towards 
 them." Riles' Itegister, Vol. II., 54.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. J77 
 
 level with those where they had none, and turned their attention to 
 a steady and vigorous detection and prosecution of the riotous offen- 
 ders. The offences were all cognizable by our local courts, which 
 were open and ready. The arm of justice is always more effective 
 in close attack than when wielded from a distance. But, supposing 
 the offences to have been " obstructing or hindering an officer of 
 inspection in the execution of the act, or of any of the powers or 
 authorities thereby vested in him" (which by the act of 1791 was 
 punishable by a fine not exceeding $200), and thereby within the 
 jurisdiction of the United States Court ; the same Congress which 
 did not amend the law as to county offices and the Ohio territory, 
 seeing the weakness of the judicial arm at so gfeat a distance, and 
 the cruelty to alleged, and so far as tried, innocent defendants, and 
 the hardship to witnesses of dragging them a seven-days' journey 
 from their homes and business, did, in March, 1793, enact a law 
 enabling the Federal Court to hold special sessions near to the places 
 where the offences were charged to have been committed. Says 
 Findley, "those who anxiously wished to see the dignity and 
 authority of the laws supported, expected that a special session 
 would have been held in the western counties with all convenient 
 speed. If this had been done," he adds, " I am certain there would 
 have been no insurrection." 
 
 Instead of taking this course, the Secretary and his subordinates 
 declare their determination to resort to the vindictive expedient of 
 " prosecuting delinquents, in the cases in which it could be clearly 
 done, for non-compliance with the laws." Of course it could 
 be " clearly done " against delinquents in only about one-third of 
 the survey, while distillers and their friends in the other two-thirds 
 could look on and laugh. We will presently see the fearful results 
 of this expedient. 
 
 At this juncture a new god was added to mythology. A frightful 
 myth he was a Darwinian development of the times. He bore the 
 classic name of Tom the Tinker. It was said he was one John 
 Holcroft, and that his Olympus was on some of the hills of Mingo 
 or Peter's creek. But truly, he was a multiform deity ; at least he 
 was Briarean in his functions. His mundane recreations were to 
 destroy the stills and mills, and burn the barns of complying dis- 
 tillers, and terrify others into non-compliance. He sometimes
 
 378 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 warned before striking ; but the warnings and the blows were 
 always in the dark, and of difficult detection. The stills and mills 
 of several complying distillers within the range of General Neville's 
 offices were destroyed, or materially injured, the barn and contents 
 of another burnt, and fire and ruin threatened to others. The barn 
 of one in Wells' county was burnt. " It was given out," says Secre- 
 tary Hamilton, upon information from General Neville, February 
 27, 1794, " that in three weeks there would not be a house standing 
 in Allegheny county of any person who had complied with the 
 laws." Here, then, was the dilemma of a distiller: if I comply, 
 my property, perchance my life, and the lives of my family, may 
 be the sacrifices ; if I don't comply, I must either tear down my 
 stills, empty my whiskey into the creek, feed my grain to the hogs, 
 get my salt, iron, and tax money as best I can, or pay the penalty 
 of $250 with costs of suit. Is it any wonder that they failed to 
 comply ? 
 
 One of the earliest outside raids of Tom and his lesser gods in- 
 deed it is said some of them came from his empire was a renewed 
 visit to Wells, in November, 1793. This time they found him "at 
 home," and by threats and other "persuasions," induced him to give 
 up his commission and books, and come under solemn promise no 
 longer to act as an exciseman. But the old man did not keep his 
 word in that behalf, deeming the obligation and very justly not 
 binding, because given under duress. So he soon after procured a 
 new commission and books, and went at it again, in time for the 
 entries of June 1 794. We will see how he fared in the next attack. 
 
 Now, all the offices in the four counties were supposed to be cap- 
 tured, except the two for Allegheny. The people began to hope 
 that they would yield to the storm of indignation without a formal 
 siege or attack. But General Neville was made of sterner stuff. 
 Threats were tried, but without avail. He assumed a defiant atti- 
 tude, as much as to say, " come and take me." Instead of yielding, 
 the people soon found that he had re-instated Wells, and had pro- 
 cured one John Lynn to rent part of his house in Canonsburgh for 
 an office for the county of Washington. This was about the first 
 of June, 1794. Hardly was the sign up before this office was sup- 
 pressed. Dr. Carnahan, then a student of the academy, relates the 
 case thus : "He (Lynn) was taken from his bed, carried into the
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 379 
 
 woods, where he received a coat of tar and feathers, and was left 
 tied to a tree, but so loosely that he could easily extricate himself. 
 He returned to his house, and after undergoing an ablution with 
 grease and soap, and sand and water, exhibited himself to the boys 
 of the academy and others, and laughed and made sport of the 
 whole matter." Secretary Hamilton tells the tale in somewhat 
 higher coloring, but he was not there to see.* 
 
 Reagan, in Westmoreland, had also been induced to let half of his 
 double log-house, on Big Sewickley, for a branch office for the 
 Elder Wells, which he put under the care of his son John and 
 Reagan, men of courage and tact in the art of defence. They 
 converted the office into a quasi block-house, with arms and port- 
 holes, and withstood several nightly attacks during all the month 
 of June. It is not likely they received any entries of stills. 
 Whether Webster got any is unknown. The volcano was about to 
 erupt. All it wanted was the "lid off." Neville and the marshal 
 soon removed it. But before the catastrophe comes let us pause 
 and take a hasty retrospect. 
 
 These flank movements indicated an unruly and reckless element 
 of society, powerful, by its insignificance, by the impunity it had so 
 long enjoyed, and by the chronic aversions of the community to the 
 law and the men against whom they warred. Like a deeply-seated 
 disease in a sickly body, it was hard to arrest, and could be reached 
 only by bringing it to the surface. All good men frowned upon 
 these demonstrations, not only because they were riotous, cruel, 
 and contagious, but because they were calculated to repress any 
 sympathy elsewhere, and invoke the avenging arm of the govern- 
 
 * Some weeks before this occurrence, two reputable citizens of 
 Canonsburgh one, the old postmaster, whom some of us remember, 
 the other, the father of an eminent living professor in one of our theo- 
 logical seminaries came together to Pittsburgh, each with a quantity 
 of whiskey. That of the one was seized and sold for the excise, by the 
 exciseman Johnson, at a considerable profit to himself. Thereupon 
 the other remarked, before all the company, "that the excise business 
 was a fine way to make money, and wished that Johnson would give 
 him the office." Soon after this a feud sprang up between the two 
 citizens, and the sufferer charged the other with wanting to be an 
 exciseman, and open an office in the town; which he indignantly 
 denied. An angry controversy ensued through the Pittsburgh Gazette, 
 in June and July, 1794.
 
 380 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ment upon the innocent. The only apology which can be made 
 for them is that they were the natural outgrowths of the social and 
 political condition of the people, stimulated to precocity and 
 virulence by the misconceptions and blunders of the Treasury 
 Department of the government, in its fitful efforts to force an affec- 
 tion for an odious and unjust law. " Leviathan is not so tamed." 
 Moreover, the modes pursued were supposed to have illustrious 
 precedents. It was by such demonstrations of popular disfavor that 
 the Stamp Act of 1765 had been nullified in all the colonies, and 
 eventually repealed.* The same career had been successfully run 
 against the State excise law; and why could it not be against that 
 of the United States ? As a legislative power the National Govern- 
 ment was new and untried. Our people hardly knew it. They had 
 done their own fighting in great measure, and found themselves. 
 They could not see why it was that a law confessedly wrong in. the 
 State could be right in the United States ; nor why the repeal of 
 one should be so soon followed by the enactment of another. 
 "They flattered themselves," says Dr. Carnahan, "that they were' 
 only carrying out Whig principles, and following Whig examples. 
 These ideas, pervading the great body of the people, caused those 
 who were orderly and peaceable citizens to look with an indulgent 
 eye at these first acts of insult and violence to the Federal excise 
 officers." 
 
 As to the excisemen, or deputies, who were the victims of these 
 visitations, it is enough to say of them that their reputations were 
 not strong enough to bear the loathsome load which they under- 
 took to carry. Dr. Carnahan, who was their cotemnorary, and 
 
 * One John Hughes was the stamp-master at Philadelphia. He was a 
 friend of Dr. Franklin, and, of course, unfriendly to the Proprietary 
 party. When the news reached the city that his commission and the 
 stamps were on a ship in the bay, a town meeting was called, by the 
 ringing of bells and beating of drums. A great crowd assembled, 
 passed some terrible resolutions, and sent a delegation of "insurgents," 
 such as James Tilghman, Hubert Morris, Archibald McCall, and Charles 
 Thompson, to the stamp-master, who was sick in bed, to demand his 
 papers and the non-execution of his office. To the latter he agreed 
 but riot having his commission, could not give it up. In his report of 
 these incendiary proceedings, he charges them all to the "Presbyterians 
 and Proprietary emissaries." So our insurgents had at least one ortho- 
 dox precedent. Hazard's Register, Vol. II., 244.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 probably knew some of them, says they were " generally of low 
 character, had very little sensibility, and were willing, for the 
 paltry emoluments of the office, to incur the censure and contempt 
 of their fellow citizens." Perhaps the good Doctor is a little too 
 rough. Some of them, we know, have respectable descendants. 
 Such, however, seems to have been the general estimate of their 
 character. General Irvine, well known about Pittsburgh at and 
 before this period, one of the commissioners of peace and amnesty 
 sent out by Governor Mifflin, in August, 1794, wrote : " I believe 
 it will be found that some of the officers (of the excise) here have 
 behaved shamefully." 
 
 Up to this period the excise laws, and the obnoxious men and 
 measures used to enforce them, were almost the only employed 
 powers of the Federal Government which had come in contact with 
 the people of Western Pennsylvania ; and its relations to them in 
 other respects had not been such as to attract their confidence. 
 Great Britain had been allowed, for ten years, against treaty obliga- 
 tions, to retain possesssion of armed posts within our N. W. Terri- 
 tory, thereby facilitating and inciting the Indians to frequent raids 
 and rapine. The disastrous failures of Harmar's and St. Clair's 
 campaigns had spread terror all over the West ; and Wayne's army 
 had been held in check for almost two years, while the government 
 was parleying with the wily savages about peace and a boundary. 
 These failures and delays kept up the perils of navigating the Ohio; 
 and Spain was allowed, contrary to treaty and asserted natural right, 
 to obstruct the free use of the Mississippi. Very many of our peo- 
 ple were- dazzled with the meteor glare of republican France. 
 Hamilton, the father and nurse of the excise, was believed, and not 
 without some evidence, to be a semi-monarchist, and too fond of 
 England. Mr. Jay, appointed to negotiate a treaty with the British 
 Ministry, was accused, though unjustly, of being hostile to the 
 West. These all constituted an array of alienating influences which 
 required some forbearance to subdue. The only countervailing 
 considerations were based upon the obligation of all good citizens 
 to obey the laws enacted by the government they had consented to 
 establish. But this was, to them, an abstract ideal duty, which 
 required some motive of interest to recognize, and some affectionate 
 regard to appreciate. Obedience and protection, said they, are
 
 -o, PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 jo2 
 
 reciprocal obligations; and a government that withholds the one 
 must not expect the other, at least not to partial and oppressive 
 laws. 
 
 If the government had but deferred its attempts to enforce the 
 excise laws for a year or two longer, all would have gone well. 
 Wayne soon vanquished the Indians. The western posts were 
 given up. Spain yielded the free and rightful navigation of the 
 Mississippi. The French Revolution had become revolting, a 
 "reign of terror;" and the wise counsels and firmness of Wash- 
 ington had preserved the country in peace and prosperity. 
 
 I am the last man to call in question any of the doings of the 
 first and wisest and purest of our Presidents. But it is to be 
 lamented, that our perplexing foreign relations, at this juncture, so 
 burdened his mind as to compel him to devolve upon others the 
 details of executing the laws relating to domestic affairs which Con- 
 gress had enacted. He could not have been truly informed of the 
 condition of the western counties, their privations and grievances. 
 He was not a Scotch-Irishman. The representations, which he saw 
 and heard, all came from interested and prejudiced partizans. His 
 published writings disclose no evidence that he was ever consulted 
 upon the aggravating measures, until they produced a crisis which 
 made it his duty to interpose. Be all this as it may, instead of for- 
 bearing, it was, most inopportunely, determined to press compliance 
 with the excise laws with the utmost rigor; not against those who 
 had piled up the perils of compliance, but against distillers who had 
 not elected to encounter those perils. Nay, more, at the very time 
 Congress was engaged in passing a law to enable them to be sued in 
 their own courts, the District Attorney, doubtless at the instance of 
 the revenue officers, persisted in suing them before the U. S. Court 
 at Philadelphia. This was an outrage greater than some, at least, 
 which the poor excisemen had suffered. It was the spark to the 
 magazine. Says General Irvine, in the letter from which I have 
 already quoted, " I do not mean now either to condemn or justify 
 the proceedings here, but I may safely venture to say, that the 
 people on the west of the mountains labor under hardships, if not 
 grievances that are not known, or at least not understood, in other 
 parts of the United States, in more instances than the excise ; but 
 in this particularly it can be demonstrated that they labor under
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY, 
 
 peculiar hardship, for instance, carrying a man to Philadelphia or ' 
 York to be tried for crimes, real or supposed, or on litigation 
 respecting property, perhaps under the value of forty shillings : this 
 is intolerable.'" Pass we now to see what became of it. 
 
 Prior to 1794 but few suits had been instituted against delinquent 
 distillers in any of the western counties, and those which had been, 
 were either not prosecuted, or had been quietly settled. As the 
 law then stood, these had to be brought in the Court of the 
 United States for the District of Pennsylvania, which then sat only 
 at Philadelphia, and perhaps at York. 
 
 The suits to which General Irvine refers were, probably, disputes 
 about petty forfeitures, and the indictments against the falsely 
 accused assailants of Captain Faulkner, and against Sheriff Paull, of 
 Fayette, already referred to. These, and the constant dread of 
 suits in that court for the penalty of $250 for non-entry, had come 
 to be considered an intolerable grievance. The costs and the 
 expenses of attendance and counsel might exceed the penalty. As 
 well now might some of us be sued before a court in Maine or 
 Oregon. It was a new thing to our people to be sued so far from 
 home. The distillers were generally farmers, many of them strug- 
 gling to pay for and improve their lands, and help their neighbors ; 
 so that, in many cases, as already seen, it was a dread of ruin, per- 
 haps death, if they complied, and certain ruin if sued at Phila- 
 delphia for non-compliance. It might cost them their all. 
 
 Although Congress could not be brought to repeal the excise 
 laws, it was not deaf to the well-founded complaints of being sued 
 in a strange and far distant court. Its benignant enactment of 
 1793, by which the District Court was allowed to hold sittings near 
 the places of alleged offences, had, for some cause, been disregarded, 
 without experiment or reason. Moreover, the fees of officers of 
 that court, and of witnesses before it, were, perhaps, treble of what 
 they were in the State courts, and the marshal could call jurors 
 from any places in the State without any control upon his im- 
 partiality. 
 
 To remedy all this, during the last week of May, 1794, a bill 
 was in rapid progress of passage through Congress, with almost a 
 certainty of enactment, which provided that suits of every kind, 
 under the laws for collecting revenues from spirits distilled in
 
 384 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 the United States, and from stills, arising at a greater distance than 
 fifty miles from the places appointed by law for holding District 
 Courts of the United States; might be brought in the State Courts. 
 It passed, finally, on the 3d of June, and was approved on the 5th 
 by the President. 
 
 As if to elude the intent of Congress, and aggravate one of the 
 greatest of the grievances, the newly-app6intei District Attorney, 
 perhaps at the instance of high officers of the Revenue Department, 
 who were watching the progress of this law (for Congress then sat at 
 Philadelphia), on the 3ist day of May, 1794, sued out of the 
 United States District Court some seventy-five writs against dis- 
 tillers, all over the State, in which thirty-four of the defendants 
 resided in Fayette county, and six in Allegheny, the only counties 
 in the west wherein offices had been kept up. Not only had the 
 alleged offences in these two counties been allowed to slumber for 
 eleven months, but there was no need of haste in bringing the 
 suits, except to forestall Congress, for the writs were not returnable 
 until the i2th of August, and no attempt to serve them was made 
 until about the middle of July. 
 
 These are important facts, which nearly all the historians of this 
 convulsion have overlooked. Those who have noticed them have 
 either blunted their application by a confusion of dates, or were 
 misled to say that the act could not apply to offences before its 
 passage, which every lawyer knows is a mistake. The credit 
 of their orderly disclosure is due to Mr. Ward, of the Pennsylvania 
 Historical Society, in his paper hereinbefore noted. He brought 
 them out by collating the Court Records with the Journals of Con- 
 gress. If not an intentional, it was certainly, in its results, a most 
 disastrous evasion of a very salutary enactment, as we will presently 
 see. 
 
 General Neville was a Virginian, of English descent. He seems 
 to have had no clear comprehension of the tenacity of purpose 
 which is one of the elements of Scotch-Irish character, nor of the 
 excesses into which those imbued with vicious propensities will run 
 against men and measures popularly obnoxious. Those which had 
 been practiced against excise officers and complying distillers had, 
 by long impunity and success, crystalized into an avalanche, which 
 moved by the law of crescit eundo. General Neville could not but
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 note its growth, nor be heedless of its approach, nor fail to see that 
 sooner or later it must overwhelm him and his house, unless arrested 
 by conciliation, suspense of his functions, or the strong arm of the 
 government. He would have been perfectly justifiable in saying to 
 his superiors, I can hold out no longer. I have done all I could to 
 uphold the law and its officers. One after another my outposts are 
 captured. I am in the enemy's country, with no base of supplies, 
 no reinforcements, no counter movement, no relief: I must surrender. 
 Perhaps he did so remonstrate, and his superiors bade him hold the 
 fort against the slow siege, while they went to work to provoke a 
 fierce assault. If no such orders, the subordinate was inexcusably 
 reckless. Sometimes " the better part of valor is discretion." 
 
 The inspector had repeated warnings of his fate if he persisted. 
 He had more than once, when out from home, escaped capture and 
 maltreatment. " Letters from the inspector in March," says Secre- 
 tary Hamilton, " announce a plan of collecting a force to seize him, 
 compel him to resign his commission, and detain him prisoner, per- 
 haps as a hostage." A hostage ! for whom? for what? The excise 
 officers held no captives. Did they mean to make some? Per- 
 haps they did, and Tom had found them out, and was beginning to 
 organize his forces. Andrew Boggs testified that "a. few days 
 before the 4th of July (1794), Major -- mentioned to me that 
 it would not be long before I would hear of a party of four or 
 five hundred, who would join to suppress the excise office in this 
 (Allegheny) county, and that they would march to General Neville's. 
 I communicated this to Colonel Neville," the General's son, who 
 doubtless informed his father, for " in a letter from him of the tenth 
 of July," says the Secretary, "he observed that the threatened 
 visit had not yet been made, though he had still reason to expect it." 
 It came full soon. In the meantime he prepared for it, by barri- 
 cading his windows with plank, arming his negroes, and concerting 
 a signal from the house to their quarters, upon which being given, 
 they were to fire. The inspection office had become a fort ; just 
 enough so to provoke its capture. 
 
 On the 1 4th of July, Major Lenox, the United States Marshal, 
 
 came to Pittsburgh, from Fayette county, where he had, successfully, 
 
 and without insult or injury, served the thirty-four writs on distillers 
 
 ihere, and was pleased. He had yet to serve the six in Allegheny 
 
 2
 
 J86 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 county, alt of which were against distillers in the domains of Tom 
 the Tinker, on the Peter's creek border of Washington county, but 
 on the wrong side of the line to be safe against the penalty of the 
 Excise law. They were all within a few miles of Gen. Neville's 
 " Bower Hill " home and office. Instead of going out, in the pano- 
 ply of his high commission alone, or with an unofficial guide, to 
 serve those writs, he allowed or invited the inspector to accompany 
 him. The marshal may be excused ; the inspector cannot be. It 
 was a solicitation to insult and violence a defiance of the hosts of 
 the enemy. 
 
 It was in the time of wheat harvest, when squads of reapers were 
 gathered upon every alternate farm ; the distilleries cold, but perhaps 
 some of the men "warm" with their liquid fires. In the same 
 neighborhood there was also, on that day, a legally called militia 
 meeting, at which many were in attendance ; and, as was usual in 
 such cases, they had their arms and ammunition. In the course of 
 the day, the marshal and his obnoxious guide had served five of the 
 writs, unmolested. But towards evening word got out that the 
 " Federal sheriff" and Neville were serving writs on the distillers, to 
 take them to Philadelphia. Some said this could not be so, or 
 if so that it was illegal, for they had heard of the law which allowed 
 them to be sued at home. An inspection of a copy of one of the 
 writs soon set this matter at rest, and showed that the writs were 
 two months old (they bore test May i3th), and were each for the 
 penalty of $250, incurred for not having entered the still, or stills, 
 of the defendant in June of the year 1793, leading them to suppose 
 that for the June of 1 794 other writs would follow. Here was ruin 
 double distilled ; it must be averted at all hazards. 
 
 The last of the six writs to be served was on one William Miller, 
 a captain of militia, who had seen service, a favorite with the people, 
 a cousin of Major Kirkpatrick, the brother-in-law of Neville, whose 
 friend and supporter he had been. When this writ was served it 
 was about sunset. Men were coming from the field and the 
 muster. They all knew what the marshal and Neville were doing. 
 " The Federal sheriff," said Miller afterwards to Brackenridge, "was 
 reading the writ, and General Neville on horseback in the lane, 
 where he called on the sheriff to make haste. I looked up and saw a 
 party of men running across the field, as it were to head the sheriff
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 387 
 
 [the marshal]. He set off with General Neville, and when they got 
 to the head of the lane the people fired upon them. That night it 
 was concluded to go on to Neville's and take him and the marshal. 
 I felt myself mad with passion. I thought $250 would ruin me; 
 and to have to go to the Federal Court at Philadelphia would keep 
 me from going to Kentucky this fall, and I was getting ready. I 
 felt my blood boil at seeing General Neville along, to pilot the 
 sheriff [marshal] to my very door. He had been against the excise 
 law as much as anybody. I was always for him in his elections, and 
 it put me mad to see him coming to ruin me." 
 
 There is the whole secret, sued at Philadelphia, and Neville 
 assisting in the service of the writs. John Holcroft, the reputed 
 Tom the Tinker, was about, and his " ladle was hot." As it was 
 late, and Neville's house was between Miller's and Pittsburgh, and 
 the marshal and he had come and gone together, it was quite logical 
 to assume that the marshal would lodge there that night, but really 
 he had gone on to Pittsburgh. Ere sunrise the next morning the 
 1 6th some thirty or forty men and boys, about half of them with 
 guns, are seen approaching the mansion and inspection office at 
 Bower Hill. Neville was up, and just about to ride. He was disap- 
 pointed. He had expected the visit in the night. He however was 
 ready. The corps d'armee, headed by Holcroft, demanded to see 
 the marshal. The answer is, " He is not here gone to Pittsburgh." 
 They are disappointed. "Then we demand that you surrender your 
 commission, and stop this business." A horn is blown in the house. 
 The negroes fire, simultaneously with a volley from the house. 
 Several of the assailants are wounded, one mortally. The fire is 
 faintly returned, and they retreat. This was the Sumpter attack of 
 the war. Blood was shed, and blood was up. Hurriedly and 
 alarmingly the tocsin sounded through all that long summer day. 
 Sickles hung upon the trees. Men took down their rifles, picked 
 their flints, and filled their powder horns, while the women run the 
 bullets. 
 
 The inspector, alarmed, bewildered, and rightly judging that the 
 attack would be renewed, sent to Pittsburgh for the judges to protect 
 him they have no power ; for General Wilkins to order out the 
 militia he can't do it; for the sheriff to come and command the 
 posse he dare not do it, the posse would be with the assailants ;
 
 388 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 for Major Butler, of Fort Fayette, to send out soldiers he sent 
 eleven. Major Kirkpatrick comes to his relief and takes command, 
 and inspects, perhaps strengthens, the defences. Vain effort. 
 
 Up to this crisis all the outrages seem to have been without con- 
 cert, stealthy, in the dark, detached, and confined to a few of the 
 baser sort. Now all is changed, and "such a change !" So sud- 
 den, yet so thorough as almost to preclude the idea of suddenness. 
 A better class comes to the front, and in the broad blaze of day. 
 An efficient military organization existed in the vicinity of these 
 distillers. This was supplemented by a semi-political, semi-judicial 
 society, known as the " Mingo Creek Association," founded in 
 March of this year, and now in all the glow of youthful vigor. Its 
 stated sittings were at the old Mingo meeting-house, prior, however, 
 to the advent of Dr. Ralston. It was largely composed of members 
 of a strong regiment, commanded by Colonel John Hamilton, then 
 the sheriff of Washington county. All writers agree that this anoma- 
 lous association was the cradle of the "rebellion." It certainly 
 was the first to fly to arms and the last to yield. Moreover, the 
 settlements on Mingo, in Washington county, and on Peters' creek 
 in Allegheny, were in close contiguity. And it is probable that some 
 of the associators, of whom, it may be, were the killed and some of 
 the wounded, were among the assailants of Neville's house on the 
 morning of the i6th. But there was a further incentive to their 
 fury. 
 
 The same act of Congress of June 5th, 1794 which provided 
 for delinquents being sued in the county courts, had also required 
 that entries of stills, &c., be thereafter made, upon notice given, in 
 the nearest office of inspection, whether in or out of the county.* 
 So the Washington county people saw that their age of impunity 
 was passed, unless they could crush out Neville and his offices. 
 This hastened their alacrity to go to the relief of their Allegheny 
 brethren. They went with a rush, armed and organized, the good 
 with the bad commingling, some for plunder, more for revenge ; 
 others because they were compelled to go; some, it may be, to 
 temper the rage of the hour. By noon of the next day the i yth 
 they had rendezvoused, five hundred strong, at the site of an old 
 
 *On this point legal gentlemen may refer to the United States vs. 
 Jacob Wolf, Addison's Reports, 312.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 refuge from Indian attack, known as Couche's Fort, some four 
 miles from Neville's, in the vicinity of Bethel meeting-house, 
 whereat the venerable Rev. John Clark then ministered. The good 
 old man labored and spoke to dissuade them from their mad enter- 
 prise, but in vain. Reason had gone to the rear, passion ruled. 
 They heard him patiently, but set a precedent for some of our own 
 times, by parrying his monitions with " you are departing from 
 your profession by meddling in politics." 
 
 Under the control of a committee of three, with Major James 
 McFarlane as commander, on they go, some mounted, more afoot, 
 a motley crowd : 
 
 "Nor martial shout, nor minstrel tone, 
 Announced their march their tread alone ; 
 At times one warning trumpet blown ; 
 At times a stifled hum." 
 
 The committee take their stand on an eminence, at a safe distance 
 from the citadel, with the horses in the rear, in charge of the non- 
 combatants. Neville flies. Kirkpatrick and his eleven soldiers, 
 with more chivalry than courage, are the forlorn hope. The 
 negroes are concerned only to save their bacon in an outhouse. 
 " A parley ensues under cover of a flag, sent by the insurgents to 
 the house, to demand that the inspector come forth, renounce his 
 office, and stipulate never again to accept an office under the same 
 laws." So writes Secretary Hamilton, all other narrators concur- 
 ring. The answer is, he has retired to a place unknown. " His 
 commission and official papers were then demanded, with a declara- 
 tion that if not delivered they would be taken by force. Kirkpat- 
 rick replied that he had sufficient force to defend the house [!], and 
 would not surrender the papers. McFarlane informed him that he 
 would wait until the women and children had withdrawn, then he 
 would begin the attack, unless his demands were complied with. 
 The women withdrew, and then the firing began on both sides." So 
 Dr. Carnahan, whose narrative is sustained by other cotemporaries. 
 The discrepancies in the diversified accounts are not material. 
 
 After several rounds on both sides, the firing seemed to cease 
 from the house. Whereupon McFarlane, supposing a parley was 
 desired, stepped from behind a sheltering tree, and ordered the 
 firing to cease. At once he received, from the house, a mortal shot,
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 and in a few minutes expired. The assailants were now an ungo- 
 vernable mob, infuriate, insatiate. Without orders, some one 
 snapped his priming in the straw of a contiguous .barn. Soon it 
 was all ablaze, and the fire spread from it to other outbuildings, six 
 in number, and thence to the mansion house, which, being all of 
 wood, were soon consumed, with all that they contained. " Kirk- 
 patrick surrendered, and with his command was permitted to leave 
 uninjured." Three or four of the soldiers were wounded, and one 
 lost his coat. 
 
 The more soberminded of the assailants stood aghast at the ruin 
 they had wrought. It was more than they intended; but they 
 could not "trammel up the consequence." Arson, murder, 
 treason ! flashed their horrors from the smoking ruins, and restored 
 some to their right mind. Others drowned their dismay in the con- 
 tents of the liquor casks which they rescued from the well-stored 
 wine-cellar. 
 
 During the assault the marshal and Colonel Presley Neville, the 
 inspector's son, and Major Isaac Craig, his son-in-law, came with a 
 supply of ammunition, but were captured, and held at the outer 
 lines. They were afterwards released, unhurt, after extorting from 
 the marshal a promise never again to serve any writs west of the 
 mountains. His captors tried to extend this obligation to not 
 making a return of service upon those he had served. But, on 
 his saying that his oath of office disabled him from that, they let 
 him go. This shows not only what had been the aim of the array, 
 but that reason was not utterly dethroned, and that however infuriate 
 was the rage towards Neville, it did not extend to the marshal. 
 The writs were returned served, but the suits were never prosecuted. 
 
 Slowly and sadly the dead and wounded are borne from the field. 
 Great was the crowd at the Mingo church graveyard, at the 
 funeral of McFarlane. It was the Sabbath. At once a meeting is 
 appointed at the meeting-house on the next Wednesday, to devise a 
 mode of extrication from the perils that impended. Runners are 
 sent in all directions; to Pittsburgh, for Brackenridge to come and 
 tell them the law; to Washington, for David Bradford,* the prose- 
 
 * This man, Bradford, who was as "unstable as water," denying 
 to-day what he had done yesterday, timid when he should have been 
 resolute, and reckless when he should have boen cautious, became, by
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 cuting attorney, who had been a noisy declaimer against the excise 
 law ; and for Colonel James Marshall, then perhaps the most popular 
 man in the cQunty, who had hitherto only countenanced the opposi- 
 tion. At first they refuse any further co-operation, then hesitate, 
 then "saying they would ne'er consent, consented." To them, 
 and many others who had a name and property to conserve, tar and 
 feathers, fire and ruin, were held up as " spurs to prick the sides of 
 their intent." Terror and alarm pervaded all the borders of Peter's 
 creek and Mingo, Pigeon creek and Chartiers. They spread like an 
 April fire in the forest. Those who had participated in the attacks 
 upon Neville now found themselves in the predicament of Macbeth 
 after the murder of Duncan : 
 
 ' I ain in blood 
 
 Slept in so far, that, should I wade no more, 
 Returning were as tedious as go o'er." 
 
 And on they went, heedless of consequences. The guilty saw no 
 
 his folly and subserviency to the lawless classes of the people, the 
 " hero " of the insurrection. He plotted the robbing of the mail to 
 gratify resentment, and procured the Braddock's field parade, covertly 
 to rob Fort Fayette, but openly for display and his own glory. He 
 instigated every scheme to magnify the rebellion, and was the marplot 
 of every effort to calm it down, only in the end to go down with it him- 
 self. 
 
 He was a Marylander, having come into what became Washington 
 county, while it was under the Virginia regime, and represented one of 
 its counties in the Legislature of that Commonwealth. He settled at 
 Washington as a lawyer, and held a respectable, though a second-rate, 
 position in a Bar, of which Addison, Campbell, Pentecost, Purviance, 
 and Ross were members. He was a brother-in-law of Judge James 
 Allison [The Hon. John Allison, a grandson, and now (1876) Register 
 of the Treasury of the U. S., has Bradford's papers], one of Dr. McMil- 
 lan's Chartiers' Elders, and is said to have sustained the same relation 
 to Judge Charles Porter, of Fayette, an Elder of Dunlap's creek. 
 Although he had signed the terms of amnesty, his crimes before and 
 after so doing were so great that he had to flee upon the approach of the 
 enemy. 
 
 Through much tribulation he managed to elude pursuit and capture, 
 and made his waj' into the Spanish territory on the lower Mississippi. 
 There he became a successful planter, and won his way to wealth and 
 a fair social position. He is said to have died about 1809. A grand- 
 daughter became the wife of Richard Brodhead, U. S. Senator from 
 Pennsylvania, 1851-'57, and a son is said to have married a sister of 
 Jefferson Davis.
 
 3g2 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 other refuge than to compel the innocent to combine with them, 
 and thereby force the government to forgiveness. To shrink was 
 cowardice, to recant was treason to the common cause- From ban- 
 ners floating upon poles, and in processions, and placarded upon 
 trees and sign posts, were the watchwords, "Liberty and no excise 
 death to cowards and traitors." 
 
 The meeting at Mingo came off as appointed. It was one of the 
 masses from all the surrounding country, but few from a distance. 
 Many of the best men of the land were there, some upon compul- 
 sion, others to prevent, if possible, rash measures. Col. Cook, an 
 associate judge of Fayette, one of Mr. Finley's Rehoboth Elders, was 
 chairman; Craig Ritchie, Esq., of Canonsburgh, secretary. Brad- 
 ford and Marshall were for war, and were the chief speakers. 
 Brackenridge made a long " chameleon speech," shifting from 
 grave to gay so adroitly that at its end, as ever afterwards, it could 
 not be told whether he was wiring in or wiring out. The avowed 
 purpose of the leaders was to commit the whole west to adoption of 
 the crimes already perpetrated, and by combination to procure impu- 
 nity. More by tact than by argument, this failed of accomplish- 
 ment. Impressed with the belief that by procrastination the fury 
 would subside, the men at the helm procured the only result of the 
 meeting to be to call another, of delegates from all the townships 
 in the survey, to be held at Parkinson's ferry (Monongahela City) 
 on August 1 4th, ' ' to take into consideration the condition of the 
 western country." This was the culminating point of the convul- 
 sion, the perihelion of the baleful planet. For a while it shed alter- 
 nate gloom and glare all over the western counties, in its convul- 
 sive efforts to advance beyond its destined bound. In quick succes- 
 sion came the robbing of the mail ; the cabal of the conspirators 
 Bradford, Canon, Marshall, Parkinson, and three others at 
 Canonsburgh ; the suppression of all the other offices in the survey, 
 embracing those of Wells in Fayette, which was burnt, and in West- 
 moreland, which was eventually captured. That of Webster, on 
 Stony Creek, was given up, and the sign taken down from Bouquet's 
 old brick " Redoubt," in- Pittsburgh. Every arm of the excise was 
 cut off, and the law, for a while, " repealed."* The expiring 
 
 * It was not repealed by Congress until April 9th, 1802. It was 
 renewed by act of July 24th, 1813, but with much less obnoxious provi-
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 393 
 
 blaze of the fiery orb was in the display at Braddock's field, on the 
 ist and zd days of August. It went up like a rocket and came 
 down the merest stick. 
 
 At last the avenging arm of the Government, too long withheld, 
 was raised for the restoration of order. In proportion as it terrified 
 the turbulent, it gave confidence to the many good citizens who 
 had hitherto been discouraged, or deterred from interference in the 
 commotions which oppression had provoked, but the enormities of 
 which it had become unmanly to palliate and criminal to justify. 
 Henceforth, every meeting of the people tended to submission. The 
 army came only to witness its consummation, and, in the end, to 
 perpetrate greater outrages upon the rights and liberties of the inno- 
 cent, than any, or all, which the excise officers had suffered. The 
 Government ^mptinsated them for all their losses, and restored 
 them to their offices. But for the wrongs which many of the best 
 of our people endured, on the " dreadful night " of November ijth, 
 and in the prisons of Philadelphia, there was no redress. 
 
 My task is done. I set out in this, I fear too tiresome, ramble, 
 not to give a history of the insurrection, but only to trace its rise 
 and progress, its causes and its character, the basis upon which it 
 rested, and the materials of which it was constructed. The facts 
 are familiar; I have aimed only to set them in a just and orderly 
 array. If the deductions I have drawn from them seem to any of 
 you to be strained, or illogical, all I can say is, that they are such 
 as a careful study and an unbiased purpose constrained me to make. 
 The subject, I know, is a fossil, dead, dry, and denuded. But every 
 now and then it assumes a spectral form, and stalks athwart the 
 paths of past memories, pointing its slow unmoving finger of scorn 
 at the stain upon our escutcheon, which long accredited history has 
 incrusted. I have felt that it is high time to lay the ghost, and wipe 
 out the stain. If I have done a work of supererogation, it is because 
 you invited me to the effort ; if too much of it, I could not make it 
 less, consistently with the duty imposed of doing all that truth re- 
 
 sions. Our people endured it then without complaint. This act was 
 repealed December 23, 1817 ; and no renewal until after the late Southern 
 Rebellion. Its mode of operation seems exceedingly productive of cor- 
 ruption. Better repeal it, or go back to the license plan of 1813.
 
 394 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 quired to rescue this goodly heritage we now for a while possess, 
 from the reproach of having been the seat of a " rebellion" incited 
 only by a hatred of government and a love of whiskey.* Turn we 
 now to some of the more pleasing features and sequences of the con- 
 vulsion. 
 
 Except in some of the insane ravings of Bradford, and a hint from 
 Brackenridge that vindictiveness by the Government might lead to 
 that extremity, there was, at no time, in the eruptive period, any 
 well-developed design to secede from the Union, or the State. The 
 New State project had been too long dead to be revived ; and many 
 of the active anti-excise men had been among its decided oppo- 
 nents conspicuously, Colonel Marshall. Besides, they could not 
 stand alone ; and where could they go ? As General Wilkins said, 
 " it was only the excise law that was repealed, "%nd its officers dis- 
 owned. All others, though for a while silent, remarked in full force. 
 One of the resolutions prepared by Bradford and Marshall, for the 
 first Parkinson's Ferry meeting, was to that effect. f The disease 
 was on the surface ; the vitals were sound. 
 
 Throughout all the reign of terror that followed the fatal i5th of 
 July, every minister of our faith I speak not of others and nearly, 
 if not quite all the elders conspicuously Judges Edgar and Mc- 
 Dowell, of Washington, and Cook, of Fayette were untiring in their 
 efforts to restrain violence and promote submission. And it is a 
 most commendable characteristic of the people, however turbulent, 
 that no minister was ever threatened or insulted. Indeed, they, for 
 a while, were almost the only persons that dare be outspoken against 
 the fury of the times. If their counsels were not always heeded, it 
 was because of countervailing influences too low for them to reach, 
 or too obdurate for them to subdue. 
 
 Especially was the Rev. Samuel Porter, of Congruity, and still 
 more especially, Dr. McMillan, active and efficient. They were 
 men " of the people and for the people ;" bold, but prudent ; fertile 
 of expedients and undaunted by a failure. If repulsed once, it was 
 
 * See Appendix No. 6. 
 
 f "That we will, with the rest of our fellow-citizens, support the laws 
 and government of the respective States in which we live, and the laws 
 and government of the United States, the excise law and the taking 
 citizens out of their respective counties only excepted."
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 395 
 
 "try, try again." This was the palmy period of the Doctor's vigor 
 and influence. To his multiform labors he added now, and for 
 some years afterwards, those of a politician ; by which must be un- 
 derstood, not the tricks and flattery by which too many rise to popu- 
 lar favor, but a watchfulness over, and moulding of, public senti- 
 ment on great questions of State, and selecting the best available 
 men to subserve the common weal. And whatsoever his hand found 
 to do, in that as in all other things, he did it with all his might. 
 
 Before the President, as a last resort, ordered out the army, he 
 kindly sent three commissioners, Senator Ross, Attorney-General 
 Bradford, and Judge Yeates, with whom Governor Mifflin joined 
 General Irvine and Chief-Justice McKean, to negotiate terms of 
 peace, and offer amnesty, and eventually pardon, for all- past 
 offences, upon condition that a sufficiently decided majority of the 
 people would openly declare their submission to the laws in general, 
 and to the excise law in particular. All males over eighteen years 
 of age, the guilty and the innocent, were required to vote, and then, 
 those for submission to sign an obligation to that effect. The day 
 appointed was September nth, at the usual places of holding elec- 
 tions in districts and townships. To obtain the requisite evidence 
 ' of submission was vitally important : to the community generally, 
 to save it from armed invasion ; to the turbulent and criminal, to 
 screen them from punishment. To the rebellious it was a boon, 
 but repulsive to those who had not offended ; hence, many declined 
 to attend. The evidence obtained was not satisfactory, and the 
 army came.* 
 
 The "seat of war," as we have seen, was chiefly upon Peters, 
 Mingo, and Pigeon creeks. Within one of the election districts, 
 presumed to be Somerset or Nottingham, and reaching over much 
 of the Doctor's Pigeon Creek congregation, there were many who 
 had special need of the offered amnesty. These came in force, but 
 on purpose to oppose submission ; and the Doctor attended to pro- 
 mote it, taking with him Judge Edgar, whose township did not need 
 his services. Speakers were there to advocate and oppose. The 
 
 *The Commander-in-Chief of the army, sent to suppress the Insur- 
 rection, was Colonel Henry Lee, of Virginia, "Light-borse Harry "of 
 the Revolution, and then Governor of Virginia. He was the father of 
 the late " Confederate " General, Robert E. Lee.
 
 396 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 judge made an able, conciliatory address, but to no good pur- 
 pose. He was hissed and pelted with mud and stones. The table 
 upon which the papers to be signed were laid was carried away, 
 and the meeting broken up in an uproar. Some of the members of 
 the Doctor's church were implicated, as well in this as in the pre- 
 ceding disturbances. He was alarmed, but not disheartened. A 
 Communion of the Supper had been appointed for an early day. 
 At once he had it postponed, with a view to debar the perverse from 
 the ordinance, or bring them to a better state of mind. To this 
 end, a meeting was appointed at the meeting-house, and Mr. Porter 
 sent for to preach and persuade. At the set time he came. There 
 was a large attendance ; for the people had begun to repent of their 
 folly and wickedness. The Doctor prayed and exhorted. Mr. 
 Porter preached from Romans xiii. 1-7. Coming to the application 
 of his discourse to the times, he noticed some frowns, and many 
 rising to leave. At once he changed his tone, told an anecdote, 
 and so held the audience. By reason and pleasantry nearly all were 
 brought to agree to submit.* Although too late to be effective with 
 the commissioners, it restored the recusant to favor in the Church, 
 and had a salutary influence over all that turbulent region. 
 
 All this was within the acknowledged sphere of ministerial duty. 
 But the Doctor went further, and carried his commanding influence 
 into a field from which the clergy are generally excluded. 
 
 In October, 1794, just as the "Insurrection" was cooling down 
 into submission, and when the army was on its march to quench the 
 embers, a member of Congress was to be elected from the district 
 composed of the counties of Washington, which then included 
 Greene, and Allegheny, which then extended to Lake Erie, but 
 without much population north of the Allegheny river. Four can- 
 didates had been announced : Thomas Scott, of Washington, then 
 a member ; David Hamilton, also of Washington county ; John 
 Woods, of Pittsburgh, brother-in-law of James Ross, then United 
 States Senator, and Hugh Henry Brackenridge, the long-time 
 enemy of Woods, well known in those days as a versatile lawyer, 
 
 * Memoir of Rev. Samuel Porter, by Rev. Dr. Carnahan, in Sprague's 
 Annals, Vol. I. The elder Jirackenridge tells the story somewhat dif 
 ferently, in his " Incidents," Part II., 20; but I prefer to follow Dr. Car- 
 nahan.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 and afterwards as an author, and a Judge of the Supreme Court of 
 Pennsylvania. Scott was a fair man, had owed his two prior elec- 
 tions to having been on general tickets, had voted for the excise 
 law, and was therefore supposed not to have much show of success. 
 Hamilton had been a blatant and fierce insurrectionist. Woods had 
 been decidedly the other way, but, having sustained defeats in 
 former contests, had lost whatever of prestige his qualifications had 
 given him. Brackenridge was commonly believed to have paltered 
 with the people in a double sense during the recent convulsions, and 
 had not the entire confidence of either party. Moreover, having, in 
 earlier life, " resigned"' his license from the Presbytery of New 
 Castle to preach, and learned to swear, he was not the man for Dr. 
 McMillan. Though his popularity was rapidly waning, there 
 seemed some danger, in the Doctor's eye, of his election. He saw 
 the necessity of bringing out some new man of strength. To this 
 end he called together a few good and trusty men, at Canonsburgh, 
 about ten days before the election, and had Albert Gallatin 
 announced as a candidate. It is said, and is probably true, that 
 this was done without Mr. Gallatin's knowledge. He did not 
 reside in the district never did ; but lived in Fayette, near " Mount 
 Moriah" and New Geneva, and was then a candidate for re-election 
 to the Assembly from that county. The Doctor caused his tickets 
 for Congress to be printed and distributed ; not a very arduous 
 undertaking, as there were but six election districts in Washington 
 county, and not more in Allegheny. 
 
 Why Dr. McMillan took hold of Mr. Gallatin may appear rather 
 inexplicable. It is probable they were personally unacquainted. 
 He was not a Presbyterian, though born and nurtured in the Cal- 
 vinistic city of Geneva. In the early stages of opposition to the 
 excise law, he had been a leader of the array against it, a member 
 of the Pittsburgh meeting of August, 1792, and probably the author 
 of its "intemperate" resolutions, for which Secretary Hamilton 
 sought to have him indicted. But at all the deliberative meetings 
 which had taken place after the convulsion culminated, he had 
 openly, fearlessly, and effectively advocated submission ; and by 
 tact and eloquence broken every movement towards further resist- 
 ance. This gave him favor and influence with all right-minded 
 men. He was with the current. He was the proper man for the
 
 39 8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 place, in the Doctor's discerning eye, and for success. In this he 
 reckoned rightly, for Gallatin was elected by a decided plurality, and 
 was also, on the same day, elected to the Assembly from Fayette, 
 in which his term of service expired before he was required to take 
 his seat in Congress.* In this way Dr. McMillan was instrumental 
 in bringing into the national councils one of the ablest statesmen of 
 the age. 
 
 This coup d'etat of the Doctor was not calculated to give him 
 much favor in the eyes of Brackenridge, but it served to impress 
 him with an exalted estimate of the Doctor's power in the State, as 
 well as in the church, and led him to assume that he would have 
 great influence with Gallatin. An occasion came to put that matter 
 to a test. 
 
 A great ferment was raised in the country, and in the Congress 
 of 1796, over Jay's treaty of November, 1794, with England. 
 Though it secured the surrender of the western posts, and averted a 
 war, it was fiercely denounced as an abandonment of important 
 rights. 
 
 Its sanction was made a test question between the two great par- 
 ties of the nation, then just being crystalized into enduring antago- 
 nism. To carry it into effect required some legislation by Congress, 
 and the battle was being fought in the House, of which Gallatin was 
 a member. Brackenridge, though in private station, manifested 
 great anxiety in favor of the treaty by voice and pen. Judge Addi- 
 son, then of Washington, Pennsylvania, also advocated it. Though 
 soon to become hostile, these distinguished men were then friends, 
 and worked together. Gallatin, though of the Franco -democratic 
 school, had not yet given such decided indications of where he 
 stood on the treaty question as to preclude a hope of drawing or 
 driving him into its support. It was to accomplish 1 this that Brack- 
 enridge, through his friend, Judge Addison, invoked the aid and 
 influence of Dr. McMillan, the evidence of which is in the following 
 extracts from letters of Brackenridge to Addison : 
 
 Under date of February 8, 1796, he writes : "I tell you a plan 
 that would shake Gallatin in all his politics of opposition to the 
 
 * The Legislature set aside the elections of this year for all its mem- 
 bers in the four western counties, because of the " Insurrection." They 
 were all re-elected in February, 1795, except one who declined.
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 treaty if one McMillan could be set upon him. What if you were 
 to ride out and converse with Father Polycarp, or rather (I forget 
 what) and put him upon him. He does not want sense, and I 
 presume you could get him to understand the debate before the 
 House." 
 
 Again, under date of April 3oth, 1796, he writes: " The fact is, 
 that unless Cardinal McMillan can be brought over, Gallatin will 
 conquer, and have the popular side. I have some trust in his under- 
 standing, so that if complimented on his judgment and firmness in 
 Tom the Tinker's day, he may sit right. He will give the tone to 
 all the missionaries of his ministry. No pains ought to be spared 
 to engage him." 
 
 Again, in the same letter: "A small letter from McMillan to 
 Gallatin would settle the matter, for it is on McMillan he counts, 
 and is secure. It ought to be demanded of McMillan, that as he sent 
 him, he should keep him right." 
 
 It seems the Judge did visit the " cardinal," and was successful in 
 enlisting his influence in favor of the treaty, for, on the lath of 
 May, 1796, after sermon on a fast-day, at Chartiers, the Doctor 
 announced to the people that ' ' business of a public nature of great 
 importance " demanded their consideration. At once the congre- 
 gation resolved itself into a council on political affairs. The Doctor 
 was chosen chairman, and Craig Ritchie, secretary. The chair 
 stated the critical condition of the country, and the imminent dan- 
 ger of war with England and the Indians, if the treaty was not car- 
 ried out in good faith. After discussion, a strong resolution was 
 adopted in favor of the treaty. A petition to Congress, in accor- 
 dance with the resolution, was signed by all present, and the Doctor 
 directed to write to all his ministerial brethren west of the moun- 
 tains, requesting them to call meetings to take the sentiments of 
 their people on the subject,* thus carrying out the wishes of Brack- 
 enridge in close conformity with his " plan." 
 
 Brackenridge exults over the achievement, in another letter to 
 Addison, dated May 2oth, 1796 : " The obtaining of the patronage 
 of the Rev. John McMillan, whom I denominate the Patriarch of 
 the Western Church, was a grand acquisition. It secures our flanks 
 
 * Creigh's History of Washington County, 114.
 
 400 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 perfectly. But for this, Findley [of Westmoreland] and Gallatin 
 would not have respected our attempts to regulate them. They will 
 now dread it." 
 
 The movement, however, failed to "regulate" Gallatin into sup- 
 port of the treaty. He spoke and voted on the other side. Findley 
 dodged, But the required legislation was had, and all went off as 
 Brackenridge wished, except that he was not able to prostrate Galla- 
 tin. He maintained his favor with the people against every assault, 
 until called to the head of the Treasury Department by Mr. Jeffer- 
 son, in 1 80 1, where he remained until 1814, the longest tenure of 
 that office ever held by any incumbent. 
 
 After this the Doctor seems to have given no special attention to 
 political affairs. They had come to be swayed by men with whom 
 he could not affiliate, and by influences which he did not care to 
 encounter. Henceforth, until the end of his long pilgrimage, he 
 gave his energies, his time, his means, his very being, to the cause 
 of his Master, his congregation, the church he loved, and the college 
 he founded. 
 
 When Dr. Guthrie was told that Chalmers, the champion of the 
 Free Church of Scotland, was dead, "Ah !" said he, "men of his 
 calibre are like the great trees of the forest, we don't know their 
 size till they are down." So it has been with Dr. McMillan. The 
 honors that are now being paid to his ' character, his labors, and 
 his teachings, prove that, however justly they were recognized while 
 he lived, the lengthening shadows of the grave but add to their 
 grandeur. That he had his peculiarities is most true. He could 
 not have been great without them. And they were such as exactly 
 suited the times in which, and the people among whom, he lived 
 and labored. Those who did not know him, or upon whom his 
 reproofs have fallen, have called him rude, unfeeling, and repulsive. 
 They have not judged him rightly. Not much sand-paper and 
 varnish had been used in his make-up. But a kinder heart never 
 beat in a manly breast. If there was any one foible of humanity 
 which, more than another, he abhorred, it was pride ; and he smote 
 it in whatever form it reared its head, whether it was in dress, equi- 
 page, person, or religion. His teachings on that branch of ethics 
 seldom required more than one lesson. That he built up, from the 
 shade of a sugar tree, perhaps the largest church in the country, and
 
 THE SECULAR HISTORY. 401 
 
 held the pastorate for more than half a century over as intelligent 
 and refined a people as was anywhere in the West, may be success- 
 fully pleaded in bar to all these accusations. No people ever loved 
 their pastor more. Their descendants still revere his memory, and 
 garland his grave. He aided pecuniarily, and otherwise, and gave 
 gratuitous instruction, to more poor young men than has ever been 
 given by any other man, though possessing tenfold the means. He 
 denied himself the luxuries of life that others might luxuriate in 
 learning, and sent forth heralds of the cross in a multitude which no 
 man has yet numbered. He fought error and infidelity in every 
 shape which it assumed. He was a sleepless watchman upon the 
 towers and at the portals of his Zion, and if he could not hurl 
 impostors over its ramparts, he transfixed them to the walls and held 
 them there. 
 
 For all this he was admirably fitted by nature and by grace. 
 Byron, in one of his poems, ejaculates: "Oh! for a forty-parson 
 power!" What degree of power he wished for I cannot tell. We 
 are wont to estimate the power of steam by the unit of strength of 
 a horse ; but parson-power is a new test. If any mortal man in the 
 ministry ever possessed it forty-fold, it was Dr. McMillan. Perhaps 
 Sidney Smith was thinking of that when he compared Daniel Web- 
 ster to a "steam engine in trowsers." If he had seen the Doctor 
 in his prime, and heard his stentorian voice, and witnessed his ges- 
 tures with his whole massive frame, he would have had to say he 
 was an engine in small clothes. He had a most commanding pre- 
 sence, and was endowed with a physical constitution which, until 
 worn out, was a stranger to disease, and knew no fatigue. For 
 many years the youngest man in his Presbytery, he was its leader 
 from the start ; not because he sought to be, but because he could 
 not disown the prominence for which God had made him. And 
 although it was among the last wishes of his life that the world would 
 soon forget that such a man as he had ever lived, the world and the 
 Church will be waning to their final goal when his memory will 
 cease to be revered. For whether you trace the career of Western 
 Presbyterianism in the gospel he preached and its influences, or in its 
 religious, ecclesiastical, educational, or missionary history, or in its 
 secular relations, you cannot escape commemorating the life and 
 labors of John McMillan. 
 2 A
 
 APPENDIXES TO SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 No. i. 
 JOHN CONNOLLY AND TORIES. (See pp. 313 and 340.) 
 
 Tins once renowned, but now forgotten renegade, was respectably con- 
 nected. He was a half-brother of Gen. James Ewing, of York county, a 
 valuable Revolutionary officer, eminent also in civil services, and one of the 
 first trustees of Dickinson College. His wife was a daughter of Samuel 
 Semple, Washington's host, at the S. E. corner of Water and Ferry 
 Streets, in 1770, as related in the text. Washington thought well of him 
 then, and subsequently corresponded with him about western lands. He 
 says he was a nephew of Col. Croghan, the Indian agent, and was a 
 " very sensible, intelligent man, who had traveled over a good deal of the 
 western country, both by land and water," and had much at heart a 
 colony on the Cumberland river. 
 
 While he was a prisoner, in 1777, Gen. Ewing became bondsman for 
 his good behavior, and took him to his farm to regain his health ; but he 
 soon betrayed this confidence, and was recommitted to prison. 
 
 He owned much of the land on which the city of Louisville is built, 
 under deeds from Dunmore, in common with Col. John Campbell, one of 
 his Pittsburgh confreres and Virginia justices, to whom he made deeds of 
 partition and mortgage after his imprisonment. 
 
 When arrested in Maryland, with two accomplices, he had most of his 
 papers very artfully concealed, under Dumnore's supervision, in the 
 " mailpillion " of his portmanteau horse. Enough were found to con- 
 demn him, and reveal his purposes. He tried to seduce Col. John Gibson, 
 of Pittsburgh, uncle of the late Chief Justice Gibson, but failed. He suc- 
 ceoded better in corrupting Alexander McKee, Matthew Elliott, and 
 Simon Girty, who joined the British in 1778. 
 
 Early in 1781, after his release from prison, he is believed to have 
 plotted an attack upon Pittsburgh and other western ports, as related in 
 the following extract from a letter of Gen. Washington to the President 
 of Congress, dated April 25, 1781 : " I have received the following intel- 
 ligence, viz.: Col. Connolly, with his corps, to proceed to Quebec as soon 
 as possible, to be joined in Canada by Sir John Johnson, with a number 
 
 402
 
 APPENDIX TO SECULAR HISTORY. 403 
 
 of Tories and Indians, said to amount to three thousand [the number must 
 be exaggerated]. Their route to be by Birch Island, Lake Ontario, and 
 Yenango. His object is Fort Pitt and all the adjacents posts. Connolly 
 takes with him a number of commissions to persons now residing at Pitts- 
 burgh ; and several hundred men at that place have agreed to join to 
 make prisoners of Col. Brodhead and all friends of America. The latter 
 part of this intelligence agrees exactly with a discovery which Col. Brod- 
 head has lately made of a correspondence between persons at Fort Pitt 
 and the commandant at Detroit, some of whom have been seized by him. 
 I have communicetad the above to Col. Brodhead, and directed him to 
 secure or remove every suspected person in the vicinity of his post" 
 " Pennsylvania Archives," ix., 102. 
 
 This letter strongly corroborates the statements of Gen. Brodhead, as 
 qopied in the text. The late. Neville B. Craig, in his " History of Pitts- 
 burgh" (p. 162), intimates^, doubt upon this evidence whether Connolly 
 was not over sanguine in counting upon many Tories here. He, however, 
 seems not to have seen G-en. Brodhead's letter. 
 
 He renewed the effort against Pittsburgh in 1782, and had gone so far 
 as to have his forces collected on Lake Chatauqua, ready for a descent, 
 when a spy reported that Gen. Irvine, then in command at Pittsburgh, 
 had all things in readiness to repel the attack, and it was abandoned. It 
 is probable that he instigated the raid which was consummated in the 
 burning of Hannastown, in July, 1782. 
 
 His last appearance was in Kentucky, in 1788, in an effort to procure 
 discontented spirits there to join with the Governor of Canada in the 
 seizure of New Orleans, and the opening of the Mississippi to western 
 commerce, but he was driven away. 
 
 His career in detail may be traced through all the documentary annals 
 of his day : Washington's Journal of 1770 ; Pennsylvania Archives and 
 Colonial Records, and Journals of Congress ; also, in Craig's " Olden 
 Time;" Spark's Washington, vols. II., III., VIII., IX.; and see Bancroft's 
 U. S. VII., 161 ; Albach's " Western Annals," 492 ; Butler's Kentucky 
 (2d ed.), 183, and Creigh's Hist. Wash. Co., Appendix, pp. 18, 19, 20. 
 
 No. 2. 
 
 MOUNT MORIAH AND COL. WILSON. (See p. 325.) 
 The deed is to Col. George Wilson and John Swearingen as trustees. 
 The latter was the father of Van Swearingen, a distinguished officer in 
 Morgan's rifle regiment in the Revolutionary war, for a while a West- 
 moreland justice of the peace, residing in (now) Fayette, opposite Green-
 
 404 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 field, one of the trustees for organizing Washington county, and its firs 
 sheriff. 
 
 Col. George Wilson is a historic character. He was a Virginian, from 
 Augusta county, where he had been an officer in the French and Indian 
 war of 1755-62. He came to the West about 1768-'9, and settled on the 
 land where New Geneva now is, owning the land on the river, on both 
 sides of George's creek, to which it is believed he gave name, and being 
 from a locality in Augusta, called Springhill, he caused that name to be 
 given to the township in which he resided. He was a Pennsylvania jus- 
 tice of the peace there while it was part of Bedford county, and his 
 commission was renewed for Westmoreland. Pennsylvania had no more 
 resolute officer than he was in all our boundary troubles, of which fre- 
 quent mention is made in the text of the preceding sketches. He died in 
 the service of his country as Lieutenant-Colonel of the Eighth Pennsyl- 
 vania Regiment, Col. ^Eneas McKay, at Quibbletown, N. J., in April, 
 1777. He was the grandfather of the late Hon. William G. Hawkins, 
 Senior, of Allegheny county, Pa., and of Lawrence L. Minor, Esquire, 
 and the late Mrs. John Crawford, of Greensboro, Greene county. Dr. 
 McMillan enjoyed his hospitalities for three days and nights upon his 
 emergence from 'the bewildering forest paths of West Virginia, as told in 
 " Old Redstone," 181. 
 
 No. 3. 
 BEDFORD COUNTY TAX ROLLS, 1773. (See p. 304.) 
 
 These old rolls show that all the settled parts of Western Pennsylvania, 
 which in 1773 became Westmoreland county, were then included in eight 
 townships, the taxables of which were as follows : 
 
 Landholders. Tenants. Single. 
 
 Armstrong 42 1 9 
 
 Fairfield 75 2 7 
 
 Hemprield 171 22 17 
 
 Mt. Pleasant 83 13 13 
 
 Pitt 52 20 13 
 
 llosstrevor 88 19 14 
 
 Springhill* 308 ' 89 58 
 
 Tyrone 92 8 13 
 
 These townships are believed to have embraced the following territo- 
 rial areas, viz.: Armstrong, most of what is now the county of that name, 
 and some, if not the greater part of Indiana county. Fairfield stretched 
 Ix'Uvf'en the Laurel Hill and Chesnut Ridge Mountains. Hempfield took 
 
 * Of whom, say 150, of all classes, were in Greene county.
 
 APPENDIX TO SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 iii a wide slope around Greensburgh. Mt. Pleasant, a large district 
 around the village of that name. Pitt embraced about all of Allegheny 
 county, between the rivers Allegheny, Monongahela, and Youghiogheny. 
 It makes a poor show. Rosstrevor covered all of the forks of Yough, up 
 into Fayette county. Springhill extended over all the southwestern part 
 of Fayette, and all of Greene and Washington, then believed to be in 
 Pennsylvania. Tyrone covered all the residue of what is now Fayette, on 
 both sides of the Youghiogheny. 
 
 Many of those assessed as landholders were non-residents ; as Rev. 
 James Finley, in Rosstrevor, and George Washington, in Tyrone, in which 
 he owned about 1,600 acres at and around Perryopolis, in now Fayette, 
 over the river from Layton's Station. 
 
 No. 4. 
 
 ORIGIN OF SETTLERS, &o. (See p. 330.) 
 
 Among the most interesting minor studies of our early history is to 
 trace the origin of first settlers in the names of localities. For example, 
 take in 
 
 WESTMORELAND COUNTY. Hempfield, a township of that name in Lan- 
 caster county ; transferred again to one in Mercer county. Mount Pleas- 
 ant, a township in Adams, formerly York county, and a Hundred in Cecil 
 county, Md., transferred also to Washington county, and other Pennsyl- 
 vania Scotch-Irish localities. Huntingdon, a township in Adams, for- 
 merly York county. Rosstrevor, corrupted to Rostraver, a seaport town 
 and watering place in the County Down, Ireland. It has a monument 
 erected to the memory of Gen. Ross, killed at the battle of North Point, 
 near Baltimore, September, 1814. 
 
 FAYETTE. Springhill and George, from Col. George Wilson, as before 
 noted. Menallen, a township in Adams, formerly York county. BuU- 
 skin. a creek in Berkeley county, Va. German, because settled by Ger- 
 mans. 
 
 WASHINGTON COUNTY affords the most instructive derivations. Unlike 
 the other western counties, when erected, it had no townships, except 
 parts of the Fayette townships of Springhill and Menallen. By the act of 
 1781 erecting it, its trustees, John Armstrong, James Edgar, Daniel Leet, 
 Hugh Scott, and Van Swearingen, all of whom I believe were Presbyte- 
 rians, three of them elders, were required to divide it into townships, 
 they took the Continental number of thirteen. Of these were Amwell, 
 the name of a township in Hunterdon county, adjoining Morris county,
 
 f o6 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 ! ; . 
 
 N. J., and of a Presbyterian church in the same vicinity, from which came 
 the Lindleys, Cooks, Rev. T. Dodd, and others. Cecil, from Cecil county, 
 Md. Fallow field, a township in Chester county, and again transferred 
 to Crawford county. Nottingham, a township in Chester county, and a 
 district in Cecil county, Md., as told in the text. Hopewell, a township 
 in York, Cumberland, and Bedford counties, and again in Beaver. Done- 
 gal and Strdbane are Irish all over, and common in all our Scotch-Irish 
 counties. Bethlehem, perhaps, because settled largely by Quakers. Run- 
 ning out of names, Mr. Edgar procured one to be named Smith, in which 
 he and his pastor, Rev. Joseph Smith, resided. 
 
 ALLEGHENY COUNTY has no names of townships indicative whence its 
 early settlers came. Pittsburgh once had some streets of honored names, 
 as Pitt, St. Clair, Irvine, Hand, Wayne, &c., but they are nearly all 
 effaced by numbers ; and what were wont to be known only as num- 
 bered streets, are now avenues ! some of which are not wide enough for 
 two carts to pass without danger of collision. 
 
 No. 5. 
 
 YOHOGANIA COUNTY RECORDS. (See page 332.) 
 
 They begin with December 23, 1776, and end in 1781. 
 
 The following are the " gentlemen justices " who " swore into " their 
 commissions : Joseph Beelor, Joseph Becket, John Campbell, John Can- 
 non, Isaac Cox, William Crawford, John Campbell, Zachariah Connell, John 
 Decamp, Thomas Freeman, Benjamin Frye, John Gibson, William Goe,Wm. 
 Harrison, Benjamin Kirkendall, John McDowell, John McDonald, George 
 McCormick, Oliver Miller, Samuel Newell, Dorsey Pentecost, Matthew 
 Ritchie, James Rogers, Thomas Smallman, Andrew Swearingen, John 
 Stephenson, Geo. Vallandingham, Edward Ward, Joshua Wright, and 
 Richard Yeates. And the following did not " swear in :" Thomas Brown, 
 James Blackiston, John Carmichael, Benjamin Harrison, Jacob Haymaker, 
 Isaac Leet, Sen'r, James McLean, Isaac Meason, John Neville, Philip 
 Ross, and Joseph Vance. 
 
 Clerk Dorsey Pentecost ; deputy, Ralph Bowker. 
 
 Sheriffs William Harrison (Isaac Leet, his deputy), George McCor- 
 mick (his deputies, Hugh Sterling, Joseph Beelor, Benj. Vanmetre, and 
 John Lemon), and Matthew Ritchie (John Sutherland, deputy). 
 
 County Lieutenant Dorsey Pentecost. 
 
 Colonels John Cannon, Isaac Cox, John Stephenson. 
 
 Lieutenant-Colonels Isaac Cox, Joseph Beelor, Geo. Valandingbam. 
 
 Majors Gabriel Cox, William Harrison, Henry Taylor.
 
 APPENDIX TO SECULAR HISTORY. 407 
 
 Captains and Lieutentants (Too many to name). 
 
 Attorneys Geo. Brent, Wm. Harrison, Samuel Irvin, Philip Pendle- 
 ton. 
 
 Legislators John Campbell, Wm. Harrison, and Matthew Ritchie. 
 
 The first election in the county was held on the Sabbath day a bad 
 beginning. 
 
 Several justices refused to serve as sheriff because of uncertainty of 
 boundaries with Pennsylvania. 
 
 For the first eight months the court seems to have sat at Pittsburgh, 
 then for two months at the house of Andrew Heath, thenceforth at the 
 new court house on his " plantation." 
 
 The following are the specifications for the court house and jail ordered 
 August 22, 1777 : " The Goal and Court House are to be included in one 
 whole and entire building of round, sound oak logs, twenty-four feet 
 long, and sixteen feet wide, two story high. The lower story to be eight 
 feet high, petitioned in the middle with squared hewed logs, with locks 
 and bears to the doors and windows, according to law, which shall be the 
 goal. The upper story to be five feet high in the sides, with a good cab- 
 bin roof, with convenient seats for the Court and Bar and clerk's table, to 
 remain in one room, with a pair of stairs on the outside to ascend up to 
 said room, which shall be the place for holding Court, with two floors to 
 be laid with strong hewed logs, the whole compleat and finished in one 
 month from the date hereof, and to be erected on the plantation of 
 Andrew Heath," at such place as three of the justices appointed a build- 
 ing committee should select. 
 
 October, 1777. The building committee ordered to have a stone chimney 
 built in the Court House and jail, in the middle, with three fire places, 
 two below in the jail, and one above in the court room, have it chunked 
 and plastered, a good loft of clapboards, a window in each " glebe " of the 
 C. H., of four panes, of eight by ten. 
 
 April 29, 1778. A pair of stocks, whipping post, and pillory ordered to 
 be built in the C. H. yard, and order renewed November 24, 1778. 
 
 November, 1778. Addition ordered to the building of a room sixteen 
 feet square, one story high, of good logs, cabin roof, and outside wooden 
 chimney, seats, sheriff's box, &c., for a court room. 
 
 Every sheriff ente;s his protest against sufficiency of the jail. 
 
 Repeated appointments of justices to take lists of tithables in designated 
 districts, and to tender oath of allegiance. 
 
 The following preachers take oath of allegiance in court at several 
 times : William Taylor, William Reno, John Whittaker, and Edward 
 [Robert ?] Hughey. 
 
 March 24, 1778. Deed of bargain and sale, Thomas Cook, and Michael
 
 408 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 Thomas to [John McDowell for] John McMillan, " clerk," of Fagg's 
 Manor, for three hundred and thirteen acres of land, acknowledged in open 
 court, and ordered to be recorded. [Date September 9, 1777. Price 
 195 15s. 6d., subject to purchase money, quit rents, &c., to " lord or 
 lords of the fee " the doctor's home place.] 
 
 June 25, 1777. James Johnson fined twenty shillings for two profane 
 oaths and two profane curses. Same day, same amount for three oaths 
 and one curse ; and same day same sum for four oaths. 
 
 August 26, 1777. '' Robert Hamilton, a prisoner in the Sheriffs cus- 
 tody, came into Court, and in the grocest and most imperlite manner in- 
 sulted the Court, and Richard Yates, Gentleman, in particular. Ordered, 
 that the Sheriff confine the feet of the said Robert in the lower rails of 
 the fence for the space of five minutes." 
 
 June 24, 1778. Cotton and wool cards ordered to be distributed in 
 Col. Cox's and Col. Stephensou's battalions, according to the number of 
 women therein. 
 
 October 28, 1777. " Ordered, that the inhabitants of this county have 
 leave to inoculate for the small-pox at their own houses, or such other 
 convenient places as they may think proper." 
 
 These are specimens of these curious old records, illustrative of the 
 wants and simplicity of I he times. * 
 
 No. 6. 
 THE WHISKEY INSURRECTION. (See page 394.) 
 
 The following is from Foote's " Sketches of Virginia," First Series, 
 pages 476 and 560 : 
 
 The meeting of the Synod of Virginia, at Harrisonburgh, in Septem- 
 ber, 1794, was signalized by an effort of the military to put down the free- 
 dom of debate in an ecclesiastical body. The Synod was then composed 
 of the Presbyteries of Hanover, Lexington, Transylvania, Redstone, and 
 Ohio. In Pennsylvania, that popular outburst, known as the " Whiskey 
 Insurrection," had taken place; and many of the insubordinate were 
 members of Presbyterian congregations. Part of the armed force raised 
 in Virginia to quell the insurrection was then encamped at Harrison- 
 burgh. The town and country were greatly excited, and the proceed- 
 ings of Synod closely watched. As the scene of the insurrection was 
 within the bounds of two of the Presbyteries, Rev. Moses Hoge, D.D., 
 after conference with some of his brethren, proposed an address to the 
 people within those bounds, inculcating obedience to the laws. Rev. Wil- 
 liam Graham opposed it as uncalled for, as prejudging, in an ecclesiastical
 
 APPENDIX TO SECULAR HISTORY. 
 
 court, the case of a people that felt themselves aggrieved, politically, by 
 the workings of a law that pressed upon them as tyranically as did the 
 Stamp Act upon the Colonies. He maintained that there were wrongs to 
 be redressed rather than a rebellion to be crushed ; and that the circum- 
 stances of the discontented had been misjudged. 
 
 The avowal of these sentiments, in Synod, was followed by an appeal 
 so strong that the motion for an address was lost by a small majority. 
 The excitement among the soldiery was great ; violence was threatened 
 to Mr. Graham. Tar and feathers were provided. An officer of high 
 grade, residing in Rockingham county, sent to the Synod a demand of the 
 yeas and nays on the question, and the reason for the decision. This was 
 refused by Synod* The popular rage increased, and the inflamed soldiery 
 were hardly restrained from violence. Mr. Graham, by the advice of 
 friends, retired from the scene of confusion. Dr. Hogs went boldly 
 among the soldiers and citizens, and exhorted them to quietness, and not to 
 disgrace themselves. So great was the influence of his proposed resolu- 
 tion and earnest remonstrances, that a general demand was made for him 
 to preach to them previously to their march westward. He did so ; taking 
 for his text Mark xii. 17, and left upon the audience an impression of 
 delight. 
 
 It need hardly be added that the Rev. Dr. Hoge was born on Opequon, 
 Virginia, was of Pennsylvania Scotch- Irish parentage, had been a pupil of 
 Mr. Graham, was then a pastor at Shepherdstown, Virginia, afterwards 
 President of Hampden-Sidney College, and Professor of Divinity there. 
 He was the father of Rev. Dr. James Hoge, of Columbus, Ohio, and of 
 Revs. John Blair Hoge and Samuel Davies Hoge. He died in 1820. 
 
 Rev. William Graham was born of Scotch-Irish parentage, near Harris- 
 burg, Pa.; graduated at Princeton, 1773, and in 1775 established a classi- 
 cal school at Timber Ridge, in the Valley of Virginia, which, after various 
 changes and removals, still under Mr. Graham's direction, became the 
 College at Lexington, Va. When, in 1791, the Synod of Virginia resolved 
 to patronize two schools for classical and theological training, it put the 
 one in Rockbridge county, Va., under Mr. Graham's care, the other, to be 
 established in Washington county, Pa., to be under the care of Rev. John 
 McMillan. This one became Jefferson College, at Canonsburg; and Reid 
 Bracken, the first on its roll of graduates, in 1802, became a son-in-law of 
 Mr. Graham. Mr. Graham died at Richmond, Va., at the house of Col. 
 Robert Gamble, the father-in-law of William Wirt, June 8, 1799.
 
 THE 
 
 FUTURE IN THE LIGHT OF THE PAST 
 
 CLOSING ADDRESS, 
 
 BY 
 
 PROF. SAMUEL J. WILSON, D.D., LLD.
 
 " ' 
 
 THE 
 
 FUTURE IN THE LIGHT* OF THE PAST. 
 
 |T is," says Webster, "a noble faculty of our nature 
 which enables us to connect our thoughts, our sym- 
 pathies, and our happiness with what is distant in 
 place or time ; and, looking before and after, to hold 
 communion at once with our ancestors and our posterity. Human 
 and mortal although we are, we are nevertheless not mere isolated 
 beings, without relation to the past or the future. Neither the point 
 of time, nor the spot of earth, in which we physically live, bounds 
 our rational and intellectual enjoyments. We live in the past by a 
 knowledge of its history ; and in the future by hope and anticipa- 
 tion. By ascending to an association with our ancestors ; by con- 
 templating their example and studying their character ; by partaking 
 their sentiments and imbibing their spirit ; by accompanying them 
 in their toils ; by sympathizing in their sufferings and rejoicing in 
 their successes and their triumphs ; we mingle our existence with 
 theirs, and seem to belong to their, age. We become their cotem- 
 poraries, live the lives which they lived, endure what they endured, 
 and partake in the rewards which they enjoyed. And in like man- 
 ner, by running along the line of future time, by contemplating the 
 probable fortunes of those who are coming after us, by attempting 
 something which may promote their happiness and leave some not 
 dishonorable memorial of ourselves for their regard, when we shall 
 sleep with the fathers, we protract our own earthly being, and seem 
 to crowd whatever is future, as well as all that is past, into the nar- 
 row compass of our earthly existence. Neither is it false or vain to
 
 414 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 consider ourselves as interested and connected with our whole race, 
 through all time ; allied to our ancestors ; allied to our posterity ; 
 closely compacted on all sides with others ; ourselves being but links 
 in the great chain of being, which begins with the origin of our 
 race, runs onward through its successive generations, binding to- 
 gether the past, the present, and the future, and terminating at last, 
 with the consummation of all things earthly, at the throne of God." 
 Thus, profoundly, eloquently, and delicately has the great orator 
 expressed the spirit of this occasion. For two days we have been 
 " living in the past ; we have contemplated the example and studied 
 the character of our illustrious ancestors in the ecclesiastical line ; 
 .we have accompanied them in their toils, we have sympathized in 
 their sufferings, and rejoiced in their successes and triumphs." But 
 in order to complete the view, it is necessary that we look forward, 
 as well as backward ; that we contemplate the future as well as the 
 past. Behind us lies the eventful past, with its thrilling adventures, 
 its heroic endurance, its toils, its self-denials, its perilous journey- 
 ings, its arduous services, its mighty sermons, its wonderful revivals, 
 its obstacles, its discouragements, and its splendid successes. These 
 are all achieved. The history is written, the record is made up. 
 But before us lie unwritten and unknown histories, and responsibili- 
 ties as weighty as the destinies of our country, as wide as the world, 
 and as high as the throne of God. From this point, radiant with 
 the memories of the past, and crowded with the interests and issues 
 of the present, it is well for us to look down, for a little, into the 
 future. " What is to be the practical outcome of all that we have 
 heard, and learned, and felt ? Shall we listen to these recitals com- 
 placently, felicitating ourselves upon our " pleasant lot and goodly 
 heritage," with just a grain of gratitude for all that our forefathers 
 have done and suffered for us, and then settle ourselves at ease in 
 Zion? If so, woe be unto us! God forbid that we should be 
 incited by what we have heard to no higher task than to instituting 
 comparisons between the privations of former generations and the 
 luxuries of this generation. "A most lame and impotent conclu- 
 sion " that would be ! Rather let the motto and the moral of the 
 occasion be, " unto whomsoever much is given of him shall much be 
 required." If amidst the perils of the wilderness, with their scanty 
 resources, the fathers achieved so much, we should be ashamed that
 
 THE FUTURE IN THE LIGHT OF THE PAST. 415 
 
 we have done so little ; and if privilege is to be taken as a standard 
 of, or as an incentive to, duty, what should be the measure of devo- 
 tion ! Our opportunities of doing good are to theirs as the railroad 
 is to the Indian trail, or the mountain bridle-path ; as the electric 
 telegraph is to the stage coach ; as the modern mower and reaper 
 are to the old-fashioned scythe and sickle ; as the steam-engine is to 
 the ponderous, slow-going water-wheel. Fathers and brothers, 
 there is danger that the upshot of all this historical review will be 
 our saying to ourselves complacently : "How much better off we 
 are than our forefathers were ! How much better time we have 
 than they had !" We sometimes delude ourselves with the belief 
 that we are grateful, when we are only congratulating ourselves that 
 God gives so much and requires so little. Rather let us remember 
 that privilege and duty are correlative terms. Where the Lord 
 gives much he also requires much. Let all the voices of the past 
 awake us to duty. Let the echo of the war-whoop be a trumpet-call 
 to summon us to heroic doing and daring as good soldiers of the 
 cross. 
 
 From the able and interesting histories to which we have listened 
 one fact emerges, to which we should give most earnest heed. The 
 fact is this, that the foundations of this Western Zion were laid in 
 times of revival. Is not this the crowning fact of the history ? In 
 the rude forts which were for a defence against savages ; in the log 
 huts of the pioneers; in the primitive "meeting-houses," and in 
 the groves, where the sacramental table was spread, there were glo- 
 rious displays of divine grace. As years roll on, and as, one by 
 one, the distinctive lines in the picture of these times wear out, this 
 one of revivals will be the last to be obliterated. 
 
 In times of revival divine truth is more vividly perceived and 
 more profoundly felt than at other times ; and those who are then 
 born into the kingdom are, ordinarily, men and women of robust 
 faith, sturdy principle, deep conviction, and stalwart resolution. 
 Just such men and women God gave to the Church in those days ; 
 and he gave them to the Church in times of revival. Does not the 
 Church need reinforcements of this kind now? How are they to be 
 obtained? The answer is contained in the history to which we have 
 been listening. The Spirit of God awaits the invitation of the 
 Church to manifest his power in the conversion and consecration of
 
 416 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 millions in this land ; and when that day comes, we shall have a 
 generation of Christians who will not be frightened out of their wits 
 when Tyndall sneers at prayer, when Spencer says "evolution," or 
 when Darwin says "ape." In such a revival we should find the 
 solution of all our difficulties. It would open men's hearts, and 
 empty their pockets, and fill the treasury of the Lord ; it would take 
 the Gospel to the masses and bring the masses to the Gospel, and it 
 would confound infidelity. While pseudo-scientists and philoso- 
 phers are attempting to prove that the Bible is a fable, a revived 
 Church will take that Bible as its standard, and make its truths the 
 faith of the world. Let such power come through revival, and a 
 pittance of the wealth of the Church will not have to be squeezed 
 into the treasury of the Lord by skillful expedients ; but resources 
 will be contributed as spontaneously and as profusely as the Israelites, 
 at Sinai, contributed material for the construction of the Taber- 
 nacle ; let such power come, and ministers will be ready to preach 
 the Gospel to perishing sinners without waitii g to see whether or 
 not their t's are all crossed and their i's all dotted ; let such power 
 come, and tens of thousands of professing Christians will find some- 
 thing more and something better to do in the Church than to tax 
 the energies of pastors and elders in nursing, fondling, and cod- 
 dling them. 
 
 Another lesson in this connection is, that these revivals were pro- 
 duced, sustained, and carried forward, under God, by the discrimi- 
 nating preaching of the distinctive doctrines of the Gospel. The 
 ruin of man through sin, and his recovery through grace, were the 
 truths which were thundered by McMillan ; which were the burden 
 of the "silver tongue " of Marquis, and the substance of the " war 
 sermon" of McCurdy. Nor did they preach these doctrines in a 
 hesitating, half-apologetic manner, as though human pride might be 
 wounded by the announcement ; as though they were not quite sure 
 that civilization had not outgrown the Gospel ; but they preached 
 them with conviction and authority, and consequently with power. 
 They "believed" and therefore they "spoke." If we are to have 
 revivals such as our fathers witnessed, they will come through the 
 preaching of the truth as the Holy Ghost has revealed it. In this 
 regard we have not advanced a step beyond our ancestors. 
 
 Moreover, with a wise forecast, and in a most catholic spirit, the
 
 THE FUTURE IN THE LIGHT OF THE PAST. 417 
 
 fathers made provision for the future of the Church, in the found- 
 ing of academies and colleges. They founded literary institutions 
 in the wilderness within sound of the Indian's war-whoop, and 
 within sight of the smoke of the Indian's wigwam. Thus, ani then, 
 and there, they laid the foundations of our strength and greatness ; 
 and they laid them on the immovable rocks of Calvinistic doctrine 
 and liberal education. As the fathers laid the foundations, so must 
 the structure reared upon the foundations be conserved and carried 
 forward to completion. We must not let the lamp go out which 
 was lighted in the wilderness. As there was room in the camp of 
 Israel for Eldad and Medad to prophesy, so now there is room and 
 there is opportunity for all who love Christ to labor in his cause ; 
 yet there will ever remain a necessity for an educated ministry ; and 
 as the race advances in intelligence the standard of ministerial edu- 
 cation must become higher and higher. Even in the pressing ne- 
 cessities of the times, the fathers " laid hands suddenly on no man." 
 In the light of the past, therefore, may we not interpret the 
 future? The prime need of the Church is revival; revival to in- 
 vigorate her faith, to quicken her zeal, to widen her vision, and to 
 stimulate her benevolence. In order to bring about such a result 
 the Lord has but one means, and that is the preaching the truth as 
 he has revealed it. If, therefore, the Church be loyal to her Lord 
 and to his truth, unswayed by any gusts of passion or by any spirit 
 of policy, holding right on her way, true to her charter and her 
 commission, then there awaits her another century of success greater 
 even than that which is past. But if she be disloyal to the truth, 
 and through cowardice deny her Lord even in his own house, and 
 at his own altars, then indeed has she commemorated her first and 
 her last Centennial. In the truth of God lies her safety and success. 
 Along the line marked out by the example and footsteps of the 
 fathers lies her history, if she is to have a history at all. 
 2 B
 
 APPENDIXES TO RELIGIOUS HISTORY. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 THREE of the communications in this Appendix are from venerable 
 and esteemed brethren, who are among the few that yet remain as 
 connecting links between the ministry of our fathers and that of 
 our younger brethren of the present day. Each of these men has 
 his own biography, which it is yet too soon to sketch. The infor- 
 mation which they have given is most thankfully received, and will 
 be welcomed by all our readers. 
 
 APPENDIX A. 
 
 . 41.) 
 
 THE VANCE'S FORT REVIVAL. 
 
 Still more recently Dr. Stockton's account has been published in 
 the Presbyterian Banner, as well as given to me in a private letter. 
 It is cheerfully introduced here for the sake of the " truth of his- 
 tory." A. W. 
 
 January, 1876. 
 
 Efforts are now being made to gather up the early history of the 
 Presbyterian Church in Western Pennsylvania, and it is the duty of 
 all to make that history as true as possible. And in regard to the 
 
 419
 
 420 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 "history of the origin of the work of grace in Vance's Fort," it is 
 believed by the Session of the Church of Cross Creek, and others, 
 that there are some corrections which ought to be made while I have 
 the evidence in my possession. 
 
 [After quoting the account as given in the text on the authority of 
 the Rev. Joseph Stevenson, and of his son the Rev. John M. Steven- 
 son, D.D., of New York, Dr. Stockton proceeds as follows :] 
 
 In this account it is believed there are three inaccuracies, viz. : 
 i st. There were pious men in both Wells' and Vance's Fort before 
 Joseph Patterson came into Cross Creek. Meetings for religious 
 worship began to be held in Wells' and Vance's Forts in the winter 
 of 1 776-77. In Wells' Fort the meetings were led by John Morrison, 
 Robert McCready, Wm. McCandless, and Samuel Strain ; and in 
 Vance's Fort by Major Wm. Vance (on whose farm the fort was), 
 James Campbell, John Stone, Robert Barr, and Wm. Wilson ; also 
 in the summer of 1779 by James Edgar. All these were in Vance's 
 Fort before Mr. Patterson arrived in the country, and each led the 
 worship in his turn. Again. 2d. Thos. Marquis and his wife Jane 
 were converted before the arrival of Mr. Patterson in Cross Creek. 
 In answer to the prayers of the pious, the Holy Spirit was poured 
 out on the meeting in Vance's Fort, and a number were led to 
 Jesus. This revival occurred before the autumn of 1778, and Mr. 
 Marquis and his wife were among the number of the converts at 
 that time. Accordingly, when Rev. James Power preached at the 
 gate of Vance's Fort, the first gospel sermon ever heard in Cross 
 Creek, on the i4th of September, 1778, twenty-one children were 
 baptized after the sermon, and then and there Mr. Marquis and his 
 wife Jane presented their first-born to receive the rite of baptism. 
 At this time Mr. Patterson had not crossed the mountains. Again, 
 ^d. The congregations of Cross Creek and Upper Buffalo united, 
 and made out a call for the ministerial services of the Rev. Joseph 
 Smith, on the 2ist of June; 1779. This was several months before 
 Mr. Patterson came into the country. Mr. Smith, of Chanceford 
 and Slate Ridge, visited and preached several sermons in Buffalo 
 and Cross Creek, in April, 1779, and then returned to York county. 
 Mr. James Edgar arrived in Cross Creek in the summer of 1779. 
 He had been an elder in Slate Ridge. He was present, and in a 
 great measure influenced the congregations to make out the call for
 
 APPENDIXES. 421 
 
 Mr. Smith, on the 2ist of June. He was appointed to carry the 
 call down to the Presbytery of Newcastle, which met at Carlisle, Pa., 
 and before his return he revisited York county. He had been ac- 
 quainted with Mr. Patterson there, and mainly through his influence 
 Mr. Patterson was induced to remove to Cross Creek, which he did 
 in the autumn of 1779. Mr. Patterson was ardently pious and zeal- 
 ous, was soon chosen to be an elder in Cross Creek, and afterwards 
 was licensed to preach the gospel, and was ordained and installed 
 pastor of the congregation of Raccoon. 
 
 If it be inquired on what authority I make this statement, I an-- 
 swer, upon the authority of Robert McCready, Joseph Vance, Sr., 
 and James Edgar. All these were for many years venerated elders 
 of the church of Cross Creek. Robert McCready was a Scotchman, 
 converted under the ministry of Rev. Mr. Strain, in York county, 
 Pa., taught school for some time in that county, came to Cross 
 Creek in the winter of 1776-77, was present at the first sermon 
 preached by Rev. Power, at Vance's Fort, and in education was 
 superior to most of the pioneers. Joseph Vance was the oldest son 
 of Major Wm. Vance, the proprietor of the fort, was bred up in the 
 fort, was converted under the ministry of Mr. Smith, and appointed 
 an elder of Cross Creek along with Thomas Marquis and Joseph 
 Patterson, and for some years was an influential member of the 
 Legislature of Pennsylvania. James Edgar was an elder in the 
 church in York county, afterwards was a judge of the court in 
 Washington county, and one of the strongest pillars of the Presby- 
 terian Church in Western Pennsylvania in his day. Three more 
 competent and credible witnesses cannot be found in the pale of the 
 Presbyterian Church. I have been the pastor of the congregation 
 of Cross Creek, Pa., for forty-nine years. The above statement was 
 taken from the lips of elders McCready and Vance, while they were 
 living, and from the papers of Judge Edgar, now in my possession, 
 and it is published now for the sole end of vindicating the truth of 
 history.
 
 422 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 APPENDIX ^-(Seep. 54.) 
 
 FURTHER ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE FALLING WORK. 
 
 THE following illustration of the falling work has not appeared 
 elsewhere since 1805. It is taken from an account written, as is 
 supposed, by a gentleman of the Pittsburgh bar, under date of June 
 24, 1804, and published as a communication in Cramers Pittsburgh 
 Almanac for 1805. The writer graphically describes his approach 
 on horseback to an assemblage of worshippers gathered around a 
 tent by the roadside. It is the evening of a communion season, 
 and he tarries for the service. At the close of this he witnesses the 
 falling exercises, which he thus describes: "The hearts of the peo- 
 ple now became softened, even unto repentance. They are at first 
 gently stricken they swoon they die for a moment a righteous 
 death. Recovering their breath, they shriek and cry aloud. Two, 
 nay, even four, could scarcely hold one. Respiration is quick, 
 heavy, and painful the countenance is distorted the body con- 
 vulsed they now sigh, now cry, and weep bitterly. 
 
 " My feelings were alarmed, and my soul sighed for an explanation 
 of this extraordinary work. The voices of the ministers were drowned. 
 'Tis now eleven o'clock [P.M.]. They endeavor to disperse the 
 people, going themselves. Many retire to their tents and homes. 
 Remaining on the ground, my attention was particularly called to a 
 female for I observed no males in this situation who seemed to be 
 more violently worked than any of the rest, for there were about 
 fifty thus stricken, and who were nearly all at the same time hollow- 
 ing aloud, and sending up prayers to Heaven. This female was 
 prostrated her whole length on the ground. Her feet were held. 
 She was strong and robust, and of a middle age. She spoke, with 
 very little intermission, as fast and as loud as she could hollow, for 
 near an hour. Her address was to the feelings of sinners. I thought 
 it well worded and sensible, and still more so on being informed 
 that the girl was blind, and had been so since the age of three years. 
 Having perfectly exhausted herself, she fell into a deathly sleep, and 
 neither moved hand nor foot nor head while I tarried, for I could 
 not but watch her with more than common curiosity. Her pulse
 
 APPENDIXES. 423 
 
 was scarcely to be felt, and her joints were fixed in their sockets ; 
 nor could her arms or fingers, which were fully extended by her 
 sides, be moved without a risk of dislocating them. The features 
 of her face were much drawn, and nothing of life seemed to remain 
 but a long, slow breathing. Expressing a wish to remove her to a 
 covering, I was informed that she had frequently been left in this 
 torpid state, if I may be permitted the expression, all night. No 
 signs of any alteration on her, and it being nearly two o'clock in 
 the morning, leaving two to take care of this 'patient of God,' I 
 mounted my horse and resumed my road to Pittsburgh. The moon 
 shone remarkably bright, the night was calm, and as still as the silent 
 vaults of the dead. This added to the solemnity of the reflections 
 that would naturally occur from an event so extraordinary, nay, so 
 new, so mysterious." 
 
 This account is the more noticeable as being from a non-clerical 
 source. The writer was probably returning on Sabbath (lawyer 
 like) from a meeting of court at Steubenville, and he halts at the 
 Cross Roads Church (Macurdy's), which stood by the wayside. We 
 are indebted for the account to James Veech, Esq., who rescued it 
 from oblivion by copying it from an old number of the almanac. 
 
 The following is another illustrative instance of the bodily exer- 
 cise^ of a recent date, and in another hemisphere. It is found in 
 the Foreign Missionary for July, 1874: 
 LETTER OF REV. A. L. BLACKFORD, Rio JANEIRO, APRIL 24, 1874. 
 
 " GOD'S POWER UPON THE SOUL. On Sabbath, April 5, we cele- 
 brated the Lord's Supper, and received and baptized four converts 
 from Rome, and on the i2th inst., thirteen children were baptized. 
 The case of one of the four converts, above alluded to, is peculiar, 
 and an unusual manifestation of the direct power of God with men. 
 He is a very intelligent and active man, and quite well educated. 
 In May or June of last year, his father also a very intelligent man, 
 and a retired military officer and himself came into our service, 
 the first time they had ever been at Protestant worship. The ser- 
 mon was on the text:. 'Prove all things, hold fast," etc., and 
 taught that true religion is a rational thing, and not only bears, but 
 courts, the strictest scrutiny of reason. As they passed out, the old 
 gentleman said to me, ' That discourse expressed my views.' Hence-
 
 424 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 forward father and son and other members of the family were very 
 regular attendants, and the children came to our Sabbath-school. 
 The son was, however, an avowed infidel, and taught his views 
 boldly and loudly in public evening lectures, in a school which he 
 was directing ; and further, had his lectures published. He was 
 evidently sincere in his views, and desirous of knowing the truth. 
 He took all the books we could furnish him in Portuguese and 
 Spanish on the evidences of Christianity. And I have since learned 
 from his father, that for a good while they had spent long hours 
 at night reading, studying, and discussing the subject ; the son 
 all the while calling himself, and believing himself to be, a pure 
 materialist. He had heard and read of spiritualism, and, though 
 holding its ideas in contempt, concluded one day in February 
 last to try some experiments on his own account. On the 2oth 
 of that month he came to my study in a strange and dolorous 
 state of mental excitement. He told me what he had been doing, 
 showed me a lot of writings, some in intelligible words, and 
 the rest in signs, marks, and scratches, which to me was so much 
 meaningless scribbling, which he said his hand had been forced to 
 make by some unseen but irresistible power ; and most of which he 
 considered he could read and interpret, and which, as he rendered 
 it to me, was a strange mixture of truth and the wildest nonsense, 
 and yet to him it evidently had all the force of reality. I was soon 
 satisfied that argument was useless in such a case, and hence avoided 
 it. Two days later I was surprised to see him in his place on Sab- 
 bath. The sermon was on the sympathy of Jesus. He listened 
 with a quiet, but very earnest attention ; and there was a very un- 
 usual manifestation of feeling in the congregation. At the close of 
 the service the young man was found sitting in his seat, unable to 
 move hand or foot, or open his eyes. The body was not rigid, yet 
 would remain in the position in which it was or was placed. He 
 continued thus for about half an hour, during which time he opened 
 his eyes but once, and for an instant only. Yet, on coming to him- 
 self, he knew perfectly what had been done and said around him. 
 Amongst his first words were : ' I accept the Bible now as true, and 
 the inspired Word of God, and Christ as a divine Saviour, and I 
 intend to profess my faith in this Presbyterian Church.' These 
 and other truths he steadfastly affirmed, whilst for some days he
 
 APPENDIXES. 425 
 
 seemed fully persuaded that he had visions, and received direct 
 divine spiritualistic instructions and prophetic intimations. In- two 
 or three days he gave up spiritualistic experiments as useless and 
 wrong and delusive. The night before his attack on Sabbath, he 
 had slept scarcely any, and very little for several nights and days 
 previous. His idea was that during his lethargic state his spirit was 
 out of the body and looking on it, and cognizant of all that was 
 passing ; and thoughts like these passed through his spirit : There 
 lies what I contended was all there was of me, now a mass of inert 
 matter, and the spirit, which I ignored or denied, now looks upon 
 it and reasons about it. 
 
 ' I do not mean now to analyze the facts ; I cannot even give an 
 adequate idea of them. My impression, as an eye-witness, is that 
 his cognizance of what was passing was not through his bodily senses. 
 He believes that God took hold of him thus to show him his errors. 
 And, as it were, a voice speaking thrilled through his soul, saying : 
 ' Power belongeth unto God ! Power belongeth unto God !' He 
 says that when the conviction of God's being, power, and omni- 
 presence rushed in upon his soul, it seemed as if it would crush him 
 out of existence ; but when he saw Christ as a divine Saviour, and 
 felt himself pardoned, peace came, and love and confidence filled 
 his spirit. It took a good many days to restore the ordinary quiet 
 of body and mind, and his family and friends were in great suspense 
 as to the result. I could not doubt from the beginning that the 
 Spirit of God was at work with him. I did not feel called upon to 
 separate with any nice distinction how far his extraordinary expe- 
 rience might be the effect of divine power, and what in it might be 
 caused by human weakness, preconceived ideas, and the struggles 
 of unbelief and hostile spiritual powers to maintain the ascendancy 
 over a once faithful ally. We were satisfied that the evident re- 
 sults a quiet and humble faith in Christ as his Saviour was a vic- 
 tory of the divine word and Spirit, and hence we received him to 
 the visible Church of God."* 
 
 * In a recent interview with the writer of the above, I learn that this 
 man still maintains a consistent Christian character, and that his father, 
 mother, and sister have also become members of the Church. 
 
 A. W. 
 
 April, 1876.
 
 426 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 APPENDIX C.-0&'/ 59-) 
 
 FURTHER NOTICES OF ELDER ROBERT CAMPBELL. 
 BY REV.^ ADAM TORRANCE. 
 
 .NEW ALEXANDRIA, PA., Dec. 24, 1875. 
 REV. A. WILLIAMS, D. D. : 
 
 DEAR BROTHER: I preached in Donegal Church, Sabbath, -May 
 19, 1838, Rev. Samuel Swan, the pastor, being absent attending a 
 meeting of the General Assembly. At the close of the. afternoon 
 sermon, and after the benediction had been pronounced, Mr. Camp- 
 bell, a large, gray-headed man of over four-score years, immediately 
 spoke and requested the congregation to be seated a few minutes, 
 which was accordingly done. He then commenced an exhortation, 
 the most remarkable one, in some respects, I ever heard from a 
 layman. The pastor's return was not expected for several Sabbaths, 
 and no further supplies were provided, and his object was to per- 
 suade the people to come to church and sing and pray and hear the 
 Scriptures read. He urged the duty by the consideration that it 
 was the way and the place to obtain God's blessing that Sabbaths 
 spent altogether at home were apt to be spent in a careless and drowsy 
 manner that it would cheer the heart of their pastor to learn on his 
 return that the prayer-meetings had been well attended. Mr. C. 
 made a happy use of many Scripture texts in the course of his ex- 
 hortation, and concluded by saying, in his peculiar manner and 
 utterance: "Now, brethren, old and young, do come out next 
 Sabbath, and every following Sabbath, otherwise the grass will 
 grow up so rank about these church doors and these hitching-trees, 
 that strangers passing by will conclude that it is a forsaken church." 
 
 Mr. Campbell took me home with him, and during the evening 
 and the following morning gave me an account of some of the inci- 
 dents of his life, and of some of his religious experience, which was 
 exceedingly thrilling and interesting, some notes of which I made 
 on my return home, and from which I take the following facts : 
 
 His father, Robert Campbell, settled with his family in Ligonier 
 Valley, prior to the Revolutionary War. On a certain day in the
 
 APPENDIXES. 427 
 
 month of July, 1776, the father being absent from home, a party 
 of Indians came suddenly on his two sons, Robert and William, 
 while in a field some distance from the house hoeing corn, and 
 made them prisoners. The Indians immediately made for the house, 
 where were Mrs. Campbell and the younger children Thomas, 
 Polly, Ibby, Sarah, and an infant on the mother's breast. The 
 mother, attempting to escape with her infant in her arms, received 
 a fatal blow on her head with a tomahawk, and, falling upon her 
 child, killed it, as it was found dead and the mother lying on it. 
 
 All the children as above named were taken captives. Two horses 
 were also taken, on which the youngest two girls were carried. But 
 Sarah, the youngest, being unable to hold herself on the horse be- 
 hind an Indian, was killed and left about a mile from the house. 
 The Indians, with their captives, crossed the Kiskiminetas somewhere 
 below Saltsburg, and pursued their way into the northwestern part 
 of New York State. The captives were separated, and part of them 
 taken into Canada. Thomas was bought of the Indians by an Eng- 
 lish officer and sent to England. The two sisters, after being four 
 years in captivity, were liberated and returned to Ligonier Valley. 
 William obtained his liberty and returned about the close of the 
 war. 
 
 Robert, the principal subject of this narrative, after being in cap- 
 tivity six years, seized an opportunity which offered, and, with an- 
 other white prisoner, made his escape, and through many dangers 
 and with much privation and suffering, made his way back to Ligo- 
 nier Valley; and when I was at his house, in 1838, owned and 
 lived on the tract of land formerly owned by his father, and on 
 which his mother had been killed and the children made prisoners. 
 
 He enjoyed but limited advantages of religious instruction in his 
 early youth, yet being of an inquiring turn of mind, he gave con- 
 siderable attention to the doctrines of the Bible, and tried to under- 
 stand them, as they were generally believed and taught. But as he 
 himself said, he subjected those doctrines too much to the test of 
 reason and experience, and left out of view the incomprehensible 
 perfections of God. The doctrine of the resurrection of the body 
 appeared to his mind utterly incredible. 
 
 A circumstance occurred during his captivity which served to 
 strengthen his unbelief in that doctrine.
 
 428 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 A fellow-prisoner, who twice attempted to escape, was pursued 
 and recaptured both times. By attempting to escape a second time, 
 he forfeited his life, and was accordingly bound to a sapling at the 
 head of a ravine, and with a pile of wood built around him and 
 fired, he was burned to ashes. All the white captives in possession 
 of the Indians of that place Robert Campbell being one of them 
 were obliged to witness the scene, as a warning against attempts to 
 escape. The night follo'wing there was a very heavy fall of rain, 
 and soon afterwards Campbell visited the scene of the burning and 
 found the ashes and remaining brands, and everything else on and 
 about the spot, completely swept away by the land-flood. 
 
 Where, he asked himself, are the particles of which that body was 
 composed ? Some of them evaporated and diffused through the air, 
 others mingled with ashes and various forms of rubbish and swept 
 into the stream below ; and how can they ever be collected and re- 
 united so as to form a living body ? Such were his silent reflec- 
 tions on the subject, and more than ever was his unbelief in the doc- 
 trine of the resurrection confirmed. 
 
 After his return to Ligonier Valley he occasionally heard sermons 
 by uneducated preachers, but received no light on the subject of his 
 doubts. Hearing of a minister who was to preach at a certain place 
 (I think it was Dr. Power)', he resolved to go and hear him. The 
 doctrine of the resurrection was not the leading subject of the ser- 
 mon, but was a branch of the principal subject, and was briefly 
 explained, and some of the objections to it answered. The minis- 
 ter's last answer to objectors was given in the words of the Saviour 
 to the Sadducees : " Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the 
 power of God." At this point of his narrative Mr. C. raised his 
 hand, and, with peculiar emphasis, said : " That word ' the power 
 of God ' brought a flood of light into my soul, and sent all my 
 doubts adrift, and the devil has never since been permitted to 
 trouble me on that subject." 
 
 ADAM TORRANCE.
 
 APPENDIXES. 4*) 
 
 APPENDIX D.-0&'/. 6o -) 
 
 DR. JENNINGS' REMINISCENCES. 
 
 SHARON, PA., January 8, 1876. 
 REV. A. WILLIAMS, D.D. : 
 
 MY DEAR BROTHER : I cheerfully accept your invitation, as 
 chairman of the committee on the publication of the histories fur- 
 nished at the Memorial Convention, to add something that might be 
 useful. This I attempt, believing that as time progresses reminis- 
 cences of the past will be more interesting to posterity. 
 
 Having resided in different places, within the bounds of the 
 " four Synods," from the years 1810 to 1830, and having had a per- 
 sonal acquaintance with a majority of the ministers and with many 
 of the elders, and with some of the ecclesiastical occurrences, I ought 
 to be able to add something to the excellent productions of my 
 junior brethren. 
 
 THE FALLING WORK, 
 
 so denominated, occurred chiefly between the years 1802 and 1807. 
 Though I saw but few cases, I observed the effects of it on many 
 persons afterwards. The "solemn weight of eternal things," which 
 had prostrated the body, continued to impress the minds of its^ sub- 
 jects more than is usual with Christians. The results, in most 
 cases, were salutary and permanent. Private duties were more 
 generally performed ; attention to public ordinances was punctual ; 
 the Lord's Supper was celebrated with much solemnity and deep 
 feeling. The communion tables, in the summer season, were spread 
 in the grove near the church, covered with white linen. The com- 
 municants passed along and were seated, with streaming eyes, sing- 
 ing the hymns, " 'Twas on that dark, that doleful night," or, 
 "How condescending and how kind," or other affecting verses. 
 After which, impressive words and prayer were uttered by ministers 
 in deep sympathy with the sufferings of the Son of God. Such 
 occasions were attended with conviction on the minds of the uncon- 
 verted, more than at other times. Many that had been subjects of 
 the bodily exercise remained monuments of God's grace. I often
 
 430 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 saw a man serving the Lord's table, as an elder, who had been a 
 physician, and so hostile to the work of God that he was reputed to 
 have said that if any of his family fell, he would raise them with a 
 cowhide. At one time, talking near the assembled congregation, 
 he felt a sudden impression and endeavored to flee, but fell to the 
 ground by the power of the Holy Spirit, which eventuated in a 
 saving change. His demeanor in after life was in conformity to his 
 profession and office. There were cases of prostration of body, and 
 wailing, which I saw and heard, where there was no visible change 
 in the life. Such helped to show the correctness of the opinion of 
 President Edwards, as given by him in his work on "Revivals," 
 that being overpowered in body is no evidence, separately con- 
 sidered, of a change in the soul. 
 
 CAUSES OF A DECREASE OF SPIRITUALITY AND IN THE NUMBER 
 OF CONVERSIONS. 
 
 First. The common use of whiskey probably contributed more to 
 this decrease than any other single cause. There is reason to be- 
 lieve that its use was not so general previous to the Insurrection as 
 it was subsequently ; and especially it was not so much in use during 
 the revival. The people practiced on a former mistaken notion that 
 spirituous liquors were necessary to labor, medicinal to those in a 
 new country, and their use a mark of hospitality. Being under 
 their influence was not always looked upon as disgraceful and dan- 
 gerous. Hence, many of the sons of parents who had been eminent 
 for piety, acquired such habits of intoxication that they were carried 
 to an early grave. The assembling together of the younger persons 
 on holidays at shooting- matches, rafflings, huskings, the harvest 
 field, log-rollings, "raisings," and the various frolics connected 
 with the preparation of flax and wool for garments, were thought by 
 many good people to make the use of ardent spirits necessary ; and 
 with their use the spirit of the Lord decreased His influence, and 
 conversions were not so numerous as in former years, nor the piety 
 of the Church so distinguished. 
 
 The Second cause that diminished the good results of the great 
 revival, was the war with Great Britain, in 1812. The excitement 
 of separating from family and friends, the perils of going to fight 
 the Indians, and " to take Canada," led some to forget the God of 
 their fathers, and others to indulge more freely in strong drink, in
 
 APPENDIXES. 431 
 
 order to keep up their spirits. The depressions when news of defeat 
 would arrive, the excitement on intelligence of victory, with the 
 illumination of houses; the firing of cannon, and the increase of 
 the spirit of war, were all unfriendly to the spirit of religion. That 
 these and other causes decreased the spirituality of the Church, I 
 learned from the lips of the former pastor of my childhood, Rev. 
 Thomas Marquis, about the year 1820. 
 
 Thirdly. Gradual neglect of Prayer another cause. The last 
 public exhortation which Rev. Elisha McCurdy made was in the 
 lecture room of the First Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, at the 
 meeting of our Presbytery. He rose, and in his solemn, measured 
 way said : " Brethren, I have seen great changes in the state of the 
 church. There have been times when it appeared that all would 
 come to desolation, which alarmed true Christians, so that they began 
 to call upon God, and soon the Spirit began to move upon the dry 
 bones, and then the same truths that had been heard a hundred 
 times without effect before, would melt the people into repentance, 
 and sinners would be gathered in." His oft repeated watchword 
 was then given, most affectionately: "Wake up, brethren, wake 
 up." 
 
 NOTICES OF SOME PROMINENT ELDERS.* 
 
 As it could not be expected that the Ecclesiastical historians of the 
 Memorial Convention should give notices of the many elders of early 
 days who are worthy of being held in remembrance, I take the op- 
 portunity to give a short notice of a few whose example should, in 
 some particular, be imitated. I must confine myself to those who 
 officiated previous to 1830, and who have gone to their rest. 
 
 The first that should be noticed is EBENEZER FINLEY, the son of 
 Rev. James Finley, who crossed the mountains with his father in 
 1772, at the age of fourteen years. He is described in " Old Red- 
 stone," page 284, as having had "a perilous adventure with the In- 
 dians." It is as an elder of Dunlap's Creek Church, in Fayette 
 county, and as an extraordinary laborer in Sabbath-schools and in 
 praying societies, that he should be remembered. After the service 
 was over at the church, he would hasten to New Salem, five miles 
 
 * Dr. Jennings was appointed some years ago, by the Synod of Pitts- 
 burgh, as historian of the eldership, in place of Rev. Joseph Smith, D.D., 
 deceased. A. W.
 
 432 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 distant, where grog-shops, horse-racing, and similar conduct pre- 
 vailed, and such were his exhortations and influence that, under God, 
 these evil influences ceased, and now there are three houses of wor- 
 ship in that village. 
 
 He sometimes experienced a wonderful elevation of soul by the 
 Spirit of God, which, while it absorbed him, did not prevent him 
 from being " diligent in business." It is recorded by the late pastor 
 of that church, Dr. Samuel Wilson, and the same has been told me 
 by his son and successor, of the same name, that upon one occa- 
 sion, when in the harvest field (whether ' ' in the body or out of the 
 body," he could scarcely tell), he was so stimulated by divine influ- 
 ence that he reaped vastly more than was usual for one man. He 
 was so devoted to family worship that the evening before he died he 
 wished to be lifted out of bed to engage in that duty, but when he 
 could not, he still led in the worship, and then soon slept in the Lord. 
 
 MICHAEL FINLEY, brother of Ebenezer, and an elder of Rehoboth 
 Church, Westmoreland county, was also an ardent, devoted servant 
 of the Lord. Those who attended the religious convention at Pitts- 
 burgh, in 1842, will remember the deep feeling manifested by him 
 at that time, both in speech and in prayer. William and Joseph 
 Finley were also brothers of the two preceding, and elders of Reho- 
 both Church. They were the sons of that worthy minister, who 
 crossed the mountains in 1770 or 1771. 
 
 HON. CHARLES PORTER should be mentioned as the first who took 
 a decided stand to resist the common use of whiskey, and endured 
 reproach because he would rather pay extra wages than give it to his 
 harvest men. His good example in this respect was soon followed 
 by many others. He was a long-headed statesman, and a judicious 
 counselor in the church. 
 
 ROBERT BAIRD, an elder also of Dunlap's Creek Church, loved the 
 Sacred Scriptures, and committed large portions of them to memory. 
 He was the father of the Rev. Dr. Robert Baird, who crossed the 
 ocean numerous times to promote the kingdom of Christ, and being 
 diligent in business, he stood "before kings" and pled the cause 
 of temperance and religion. 
 
 DR. JACOB JENNINGS, the pastor of Dunlap's Creek Church, was 
 aided by other useful elders during this period, but limited space 
 does not permit further notice.
 
 APPENDIXES. 433 
 
 BENJAMIN WILLIAMS, an elder of Mingo Church, and long one of 
 the most efficient trustees of Jefferson College, and a director of the 
 Western Theological Seminary, was eminent for gentlemanly deport- 
 ment, devoted piety, and for the interest he took in the cause of 
 temperance and the affairs of the church generally. He was peculiar 
 in this, that he set apart a fixed portion of the proceeds of his mills 
 for benevolent objects: and that others might not know of his bounty, 
 he made me the almoner of it. 
 
 JOHN HANNEN, of Allegheny city, was an intelligent elder, sym- 
 pathetic in his spirit, bland in his manners, and yet one who did not 
 decline to defend the oppressed, and to oppose the sins of intempe- 
 rance and slavery, when to do so was not popular. 
 
 FRANCIS G. BAILEY, of Pittsburgh, with peculiar suavity and zeal 
 in his master's service, gave much of his time to the visitation of the 
 sick and the poor, and the families of the Church of which he was 
 an overseer. He was one of the chief helpers of his pastor, Rev. 
 Francis Herron, D.D. 
 
 WILLIAM COURTNEY, of Hiland Church, exercised great hospi- 
 tality, judiciously avoided unnecessary discipline in the church, and 
 was willing often to cross the Ohio river by night, through some 
 dangers, to aid in the religious exercises on the neighboring island, 
 where God was pouring out his Spirit upon the people there. 
 
 CHARLES HAWKINS, of Washington, was gifted in social and 
 public prayer, both as to the matter and manner. His power of 
 peculiar usefulness in that way was probably the result of his hu- 
 mility and his habits of private devotion. With no more than an 
 ordinary education, he was taught by " the Father that seeth in 
 secret," and was able to give wise counsel to those inquiring the 
 way of salvation. 
 
 JOHN NESBIT, of Bethany Church, Allegheny county, furnished evi- 
 dence that, like Enoch, "he walked with God." He had a peculiar 
 unction of the Holy Spirit, and none could be with him long with- 
 out being greatly profited and stirred up by his godly conversation. 
 
 SAMUEL RIDDLE, SR., of Montours Church, Allegheny county, 
 possessed a strong and discriminating mind, and when employed in 
 defending the truth of God against its adversaries, he did it wisely 
 and ably. As a counselor in matters of difficulty, his services 
 were very valuable. 
 2C
 
 434 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 HUGH LEE, of Cross Creek, Washington county, was eminently 
 a practical man, prepared " for every good work." He had seen 
 the work of God in the great revival (as had nearly all the elders I 
 have mentioned), and he kept up a lively state of piety till the close 
 of life. He labored under impaired sight of one eye for many years. 
 He is the father of the elder of his own name, and was the father-in- 
 law of the late excellent George Marshall, D.D. 
 
 JOHN MILLIGAN, of Steubenville, combined more of all the ex- 
 cellencies and usefulness of an elder than is usually found in one 
 man. His former pastor, Dr. O. Jennings, and his more recent 
 one, Dr. C. C. Beatty, esteemed him as one of the best of men. 
 He was blessed with a pious posterity. 
 
 There were many other elders not officiating so near the begin- 
 ning of our first ecclesiastical century, who may be enrolled as par- 
 ticularly useful and worthy by some future historian. 
 
 EARLY MINISTERS IN OHIO, 
 
 who labored within the territory now occupied by the Synods of 
 Cleveland and Columbus. 
 
 Having been led to dwell and travel in different places within 
 these Synods, from 1819 to 1830, I have had opportunities of ex- 
 tensive acquaintance with the former ministers. None are now left 
 of all who preached in that half of the State of Ohio, in 1828, but 
 Rev. Dr. C. C. Beatty, and perhaps one more. I shall write only 
 of those I knew. 
 
 I was present at the formation of the Presbytery of Steubenville, 
 in October, 1819, and not one of those eight ministers now survive. 
 REV. LYMAN POTTER, the eldest, brought " forth fruit in old age." 
 When his voice and strength were so far exhausted that he could 
 not be heard in a church of ordinary size, he filled his saddle-bags 
 with Bibles and the few tracts that could be obtained in those days, 
 and went back into the State, where there were a few settlers in 
 different places, and gathered them into small houses and preached. 
 This lovely old gentleman won many by his kindness, and ever 
 spake as a dying man to dying men. 
 
 REV. JOHN WRIGHT was ordained by the Presbytery of Ohio, in 
 1806, pastor of the Hock-hocking and Rush Creek Churches, as a 
 licentiate. He itinerated extensively in Virginia and North Caro- 
 lina, and in the destitute settlements of Ohio, and perhaps did more
 
 APPENDIXES. 435 
 
 than any other one to prepare the way for the organization of 
 churches in the latter State. He was a man of great energy, and 
 when on a visit to Liverpool, England, to attend to the business of 
 the estate of a deceased brother, the inhabitants of that city, hear- 
 ing that a preacher had come from the wilds of America, turned out 
 numerously to hear one whom they supposed to be an Indian. His 
 chief place of labor was Lancaster, Ohio, where he gathered a large 
 Church, and was much beloved by the people. 
 
 The REV. JAMES CULBERTSOX, D.D., settled in Zanesville. He 
 was a preacher with an unusually deep-toned and solemn voice, and 
 highly respected for his many excellent characteristics ; but he was 
 called away rather suddenly in the midst of great usefulness. 
 
 REV. JAMES HOGE, D.D., was tall, with dark hair and eyes, plain 
 and grave as a man, impressive and solemn as a speaker, and was 
 much beloved by the brethren of the Synod of Ohio. He lived to 
 see the city of Columbus and his church attain the ability to enter- 
 tain the General Assembly, in 1862. He was the head of the Pres- 
 byterian family in that part of Ohio, and greatly honored by the 
 whole Church. He took no active part in causing the division of 
 the Church in 1837. He was long an efficient trustee of the Ohio 
 University, at Athens. His life and writings are worthy of more 
 permanent record. 
 
 I knew many of the first ministers in Ohio, who were laborious, 
 faithful servants of the Lord Jesus, and who have entered into their 
 rest, though they were about a generation subsequent to those who 
 first preached in Western Pennsylvania. Space will only permit me 
 to record their names, as worthy to be remembered by posterity. 
 Such were Rev. Messrs. James Snodgrass, of Wayne county ; James 
 Scott and'James Cunningham, of Knox county; Thomas Barr, of 
 Euclid and Wooster; John Rhea, D.D., of Beach Spring; Joseph 
 Treat, of Sharon ; John Seward of Aurora ; William Hanford, of 
 Hudson; Caleb Pitkin, of Charlestown ; Clement Vallandigham, 
 of New Lisbon; James Rowland, of Mansfield; and Stephen I. 
 Bradstreet, of Cleveland. My memory fondly lingers upon the 
 names of these departed servants of God. "The righteous shall 
 be had in everlasting remembrance." Ps. cxii. 6. 
 Very truly your fellow-laborer in the Lord, 
 
 S. C. JENNINGS.
 
 436 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 p.S. Before closing this communication, allow me to mention 
 a little more fully another of the worthy elders of the early days, 
 whose name is still affectionately cherished by the few surviving old 
 students of Jefferson College. It was Prof. SAMUEL MILLER, who 
 long held the Chair of Mathematics and Natural Sciences in that 
 institution. As his name has been mentioned in Dr. Brownson's 
 Educational History,* the only additional notice of him which I 
 shall now give, is in reference to his peculiar religious experience, a 
 subject of which he was ordinarily reticent ; but he once favored 
 the writer with an account of something like a vision of the Saviour, 
 which he seemed to himself to have experienced on one occasion as 
 he was walking the streets of Canonsburg at night, under deep 
 anxiety and distress of mind. Whether it was a vision or a voice 
 he could scarcely say ; but it was such an impression of the Saviour's 
 presence and suitableness to his necessities as led him at once, with 
 joyful confidence, to commit his soul's everlasting interests into his 
 hands, as one who was near him of a truth. He ever afterwards, 
 during his long life, remained an humble and faithful disciple of 
 Him who had thus given him light in his darkness. This experi- 
 ence was the more remarkable from the fact that Prof. Miller was 
 characteristically a matter-of-fact man, and one of the last to be 
 subject to any sort of hallucination. 
 
 The experience of Luther, on several occasions, was of a some- 
 what similar sort ; and the peculiar influences which manifested 
 themselves in the bodily exercises of the early part of this century, 
 render such experiences as that of "Master" Miller less a matter 
 of surprise than otherwise they might have been. 
 
 S. C. J. 
 
 * See p. 80.
 
 ' " ' 
 
 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION. 
 
 THE Memorial Convention of ministers and elders from the four 
 Synods of Pittsburgh, Erie, Cleveland, and Columbus, called for 
 the purpose of commemorating the planting of Presbyterianism in 
 Western Pennsylvania one hundred years ago, assembled in the 
 First Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, on Tuesday evening, Decem- 
 ber 7, 1875. 
 
 Rev. David McKinney, D.D., was called to the chair, and opened 
 the Convention with prayer. 
 
 The following nomination of permanent officers was made by 
 the chairman of the committee of arrangements, and approved by 
 vote of the Convention : 
 
 President. Rev. Charles C. Beatty, D.D., LL.D. 
 
 Vice- Presidents Rev. William D. Howard, D.D., Rev. George 
 Hill, D.D., Rev. Alexander Donaldson, D.D., Rev. Loyal Young, 
 D.' D., and Rev. John Robinson, D.D. 
 
 (The two latter brethren were providentially hindered from being 
 present.) 
 
 Secretaries. Rev. Robert Carothers and Rev. John S. MacCon- 
 nell. 
 
 REMARKS OF DR. BEATTY. 
 
 Dr. Beatty, on taking the chair, thanked the convention for their 
 partiality, and stated that he was suffering from illness, in addition 
 to his infirmity of sight, and was not able to preside. He took 
 occasion to state that on the 24th of November, 1758, his venerable 
 
 437
 
 43 8 PRESBYTERIAN CENTENNIAL CONVENTION. 
 
 grandfather, Chas. Beatty, came here with the army that took pos- 
 session of the then lately evacuated Fort Duquesne, and the next 
 day, or very soon after, preached a Thanksgiving sermon, in the 
 presence of the whole army. This was the first Protestant sermon 
 preached west of the Allegheny mountains. He returned to the 
 east, but some eight years later was sent out by the Synods to visit 
 the frontier settlements here, and some Indian settlements west of 
 the Ohio. In his journal for the month of September, 1766, he 
 records having preached at Fort Pitt to a small congregation the 
 village then numbering some thirty families. In company with Dr. 
 Duffield, he went to points in Ohio, where he preached the first 
 sermon delivered on the soil of that great State. This was previous 
 to the coming of Dr. McMillan, and thirty years prior to the birth 
 of the speaker, who now (he said) stood here as one of the oldest 
 ordained ministers in the denomination. This was the reason why 
 one so infirm and so incapable had been honored with the chair- 
 manship of this convention. He thanked his friends for the honor 
 they had shown him, and tendered them his grateful acknowledg- 
 ments. 
 
 Dr. Howard then consented to take the chair. 
 On motion of Dr. Williams, the hours of meeting were fixed as 
 follows: 9 A.M., 1:30 P.M., and 7:30 evening the first half-hour 
 of each session to be spent in devotional exercises. 
 
 Dr. Howard then introduced Rev. D. X. Junkin, D.D., of New 
 Castle, who delivered a discourse upon "The Life and Labors of 
 Rev. John McMillan : the Gospel he Preached, and its Influence 
 upon the Civilization of Western Pennsylvania." 
 
 The Convention then adjourned until Wednesday morning. 
 The sessions of Wednesday and Thursday, besides devotional 
 exercises and Christian conference, were occupied in hearing the 
 several historical discourses, in whole or in part, which are contained 
 in this volume. 
 
 The meetings were. well attended, notwithstanding the unfavor- 
 able state of the weather. 
 
 On Wednesday evening, the large assembly which was present, 
 after listening to the account of the Lord's wonderful doings in the 
 great revivals of 1802-3, were ready to welcome the proposal of 
 Dr. Junkin, that every one should spend a quarter of an hour before
 
 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION. 439 
 
 retiring this evening, in special prayer for the blessing of God on 
 this Convention, and the Churches it represents. 
 
 A portion of Thursday afternoon was spent in the transaction of 
 business. Arrangements were made for the publication of the dis- 
 courses delivered on this occasion, and a large number of pledges 
 of $10 and $5 each were received towards meeting the expenses of 
 publication. It was also agreed that any profits which may arise 
 from the sale of the volume shall accrue to the "Elliott Lecture- 
 ship" in the Western Theological Seminary. 
 
 The authors of the several discourses were appointed a committee 
 to superintend the proposed publication. 
 
 The closing exercises of the convention were held on Thursday 
 evening. The house was thronged, and after the singing of an 
 appropriate anthem, informal addresses were delivered by the 
 venerable President, Dr. Beatty, Prof. Saml. J. Wilson, D.D., 
 LL.D., Rev. George W. Chamberlain, and Rev. Cyrus Dickson, D.D. 
 
 Dr. Beatty's address consisted chiefly in reminiscences of Rev. 
 Elisha P. Swift, D.D., as the founder of the Western Foreign Mis- 
 sionary Society, and is reproduced in substance on page 174 of this 
 volume. 
 
 Dr. Wilson's stirring and seasonable remarks have been given on 
 page 411. 
 
 Mr. Chamberlain, missionary to Brazil, gave a most interesting 
 account of the first attempt to introduce Protestantism into South 
 America, more than three hundred years ago, by missionaries from 
 Geneva. 
 
 The closing address by Dr. Dickson was a characteristically elo- 
 quent plea for a more vigorous prosecution of the work of evangeli- 
 zation in our own vast country a work to be carried on in the 
 spirit of those pious and heroic fathers and mothers in Israel whose 
 deeds have been rehearsed on this occasion. 
 
 Hearty votes of thanks were then given to the citizens of Pitts- 
 burgh and Allegheny for their hospitalities ; to the authorities of the 
 First Presbyterian Church for the accommodations afforded ; to the 
 assembled choirs of the city churches for their excellent music ; and 
 to the conductors of the city press for their favorable notices of the 
 Convention especially to the Evening Telegraph for its full reports 
 of the several discourses.
 
 440 
 
 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION. 
 
 The Convention then adjourned sine die. It was a season long 
 to be remembered. 
 
 NOTE. It not being found practicable to secure a complete list of the 
 members of the Convention, it is not thought best to give only a partial 
 one.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 A. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Academies, . . . .100 
 
 Addison, Judge, . . 213, 372 
 
 Alden, Joseph, ... 86 
 
 " Timothy, . . 95 
 
 Allegheny College, . . 95 
 
 u Presbytery, . . 238 
 
 " City Presbytery, 248 
 
 Allen, Moses, ... 216 
 
 Alrich, William P., . . 89 
 
 Anderson, John, . . 49, 216 
 
 " James, . . . 106 
 
 Armstrong, John, . . 96, 328 
 
 B. 
 
 Back-bone-ism, . . . 332 
 Badger, Joseph, . . 45, 159 
 Bailey, Francis, . . . 432 
 Baird, Robert, . . . .431 
 Baptists in West Penn 'a, . 328 
 Barr, Joseph W., . . .183 
 
 " Samuel 233 
 
 Beatty, Charles, . 200, 268, 321 
 " Charles Clinton, 90, 13fi, 145 
 " Mrs. Hetty E.. . 109, 130 
 Bedford County tax rolls, . 404 
 Bethel, revival at, . . . 44 
 Biographies of Missionaries, . 183 
 " of Ministers, . 203 
 
 Black, James, . . . 89, 112 
 Blackford, A. L., . . . 422 
 Blnirsville Seminary, . . Ill 
 Board of Trust, . ". . .156 
 Bodily Exercises, . . 46-56 
 " " further illus- 
 
 trations of, . . . .421 
 Boundary troubles, . 305, 332-6 
 Boyd, John, and Abraham, . 219 
 Brackenridge, H. H., . . 351 
 " H. M., 392, 397-9 
 
 Brad dock's Road, . . . 301 
 Bradford, David, . . . .390 
 
 441 
 
 PAGE 
 
 85 
 89 
 184 
 84 
 85 
 106 
 106 
 88, 91 
 his Edu- 
 
 . 69 
 
 . 89, 105 
 
 183 
 
 Breckenridge, Robert J., 
 Brewer, William H., 
 
 " Josiah, 
 Brown, Matthew, 
 
 " Alexanders., 
 
 " Richard, 
 
 " J. Howard, . 
 Brownson, James I., 
 
 cational History, 
 Brugh, William I., 
 Bushnell, Wells, 
 
 c. 
 
 Campbell, Alan D., . . 133, 141 
 
 " Alexander, . . 329 
 
 " Richard, and R. G., 96 
 
 " Robert, . . 58, 425 
 
 " James R., . 185-7 
 
 Camp-meeting, .... 49 
 
 Canon, John, . . . 342, 351 
 
 Canonsburg Academy, . 31, 44, 76 
 
 Canonsburg Academy, recent 
 
 history of, . . . 107 
 
 Canonsburg, two citizens of, . 379 
 
 Carnahan, James, . . 378, 380 
 
 Chartiers, M'Millan's arrival, 15 
 
 " communion at, . 29 
 
 " revivals at, . . 44 
 
 Clark, Alexander D. 96 
 
 " James, . . . 88 
 
 " John, . . 213,389 
 
 Cloud, John, . . 187 
 
 Clymer, George, . . 372 
 
 Coe, Ebene/er, . 59 
 
 Colleges 
 
 Allegheny, . . . 9.~> 
 
 Franklin, . . . 96 
 
 Jefferson, . . 31, 77 
 
 War of, . . . . 82 
 
 Washington, . 78 
 
 Western Reserve, . . 97
 
 442 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Colonial settlements, . 288-292 
 Colt, Judab, arid wife, . . 57 
 Concert of prayer, ... 45 
 Confederation, Articles of, . 347 
 Connoly, John, . . 271, 313, 346 
 " " and Tories, . 402 
 
 Convention, proceedings of, . 436 
 Counties, old, of W. Virginia, 331 
 Courtney, William, . . . 432 
 Craig, Isaac, . . . 353, 390 ! 
 Crawford, William, . . 313 
 
 Croghan, George, . . 308, 346 
 Cross Creek Academy, . . 102 
 " " revivals, . 43, 47 
 Cross Roads, .... 46 
 Culbertson, James, . . 243, 434 
 Cutler, Carroll, . . .97 
 
 D. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Excise, Robert Burns on, . 357 
 " Washington's views on, 361 
 
 laws repealed, 
 F. 
 
 . 392 
 
 Paggs' Manor, Academy, . 16 
 " " revivals at, . 52 
 
 Fairchild, Ashbel G., . . 239 
 Falling Work. (See Bodily 
 
 Exercises.) 
 Female Seminaries. (See 
 
 Seminaries.) 
 
 Finley, James, . . 210, 323, 354 
 " Ebenezer, . . . 430 
 " Michael, . . . 431 
 Forbes, Cochran, . . . 104 
 " General, . . 262, 265 
 Foreign Missionary Society, 146, 165 
 
 Darlington, William M., his 
 
 Foreign Missionaries, 178, 183-203 
 
 History of Pittsburgh, . 251 
 Davis, Julia A., ... 188 
 
 Foster, William, . . 
 Franklin College, 
 
 322 
 96 
 
 Dennv, William, his Proclama- 
 
 Fraser, John, .... 
 
 86 
 
 tion, 262 
 
 French Claims, 
 
 256 
 
 Diefendorf, Sanders, . . 106 
 
 Future in Light of the Past, . 
 
 413 
 
 Donaldson, Alexander, . . 103 
 
 
 
 Dodd, Thaddeus, . 41, 44, 75, 211 
 
 G. 
 
 
 Doddridge, Joseph, . . 328 
 
 
 
 Dominion of Virginia, . . 317 
 
 Gallatin, Albert, 
 
 397 
 
 Duffleld and Beatty, . . 268 
 
 Gist, Christopher, 
 
 256 
 
 Duulap, James, . . 80, 212 
 
 Glade Run Academy, 
 
 104 
 
 " Joseph, ... 32 
 
 Goheen, George W., 
 
 104 
 
 Dun more, Earl of, . . 312, 316 
 
 Graham, William, 
 
 408 
 
 " Fort (Pittsburgh), 319 
 
 Green, Lewis W., 
 
 141 
 
 Duquesne, Fort, . . . 261 
 
 Greene County, Pa., 
 
 327 
 
 
 Greersburg Academy, 
 
 100 
 
 E. 
 
 
 
 
 H. 
 
 
 Eaton, Johnston, . . .231 
 
 
 
 Eaton, S. J. M., his Ecclesias- 
 
 
 248 
 
 tical History, . . .206 
 
 Halsey, Luther, 
 
 128 
 
 Edgar, James, 43, 57, 60, 311, 420 
 
 Hanna, Archibald, . 
 
 244 
 
 Kdi;-<! worth Seminary, . . 109 
 
 Hannastown, . . . 306, 
 
 316 
 
 Educational History, by Dr. 
 
 Han n en, John, 
 
 432 
 
 Brownson, .... 69 
 
 Hamilton, Alexander, 368, 372, 
 
 381 
 
 Edwards, Jonathan, . . 90 
 
 " John, 
 
 388 
 
 Elders, examples of 
 
 " Hating out," 
 
 331 
 
 Robert Campbell, . . 58, 425 
 
 Hayden, Daniel, 
 
 243 
 
 Kiienezer Coe, ... 59 
 
 Hays, George P., 
 
 220 
 
 James Edgar, ... 57 
 
 1 lanlships endured, 
 
 220 
 
 Philip JaoKson, . . . 57 
 
 Hawkins, Charles, . 
 
 432 
 
 John Lowrie, .... 59 
 
 Henderson, Matthew, . 19, 
 
 312 
 
 James Smiley, . . . 221 
 
 " Nancy, . 
 
 188 
 
 Others in Appendix D., . 430 
 
 Herron, Francis, . 132, 233, 
 
 279 
 
 Eldersridge Academy, . . lo:> 
 
 Hill, George, .... 
 
 214 
 
 Elliott, David, . 87, 139, 145 
 
 Hitchcock, H. L., 
 
 97 
 
 Erie Triangle, .... .".:?! 
 
 Hodge, Archibald Alexander, 
 
 144 
 
 Ewing, William, . . . 1()7 
 
 Hoge, James, . . 99, 242, 
 
 434 
 
 " John, . . . 333, 338 
 
 David, .... 
 
 314
 
 INDEX. 
 
 443 
 
 Hoge, Moses, .... 408 
 
 Hollidaysburg Seminary, . Ill 
 
 Horn blower, William H. . 145 
 
 Hughes, Thomas Edgar, 44, 100, 217 
 
 " James, . . .213 
 
 " Joseph Smith, . . 243 
 
 " John, . . . .380 
 
 Hunt, Thomas, . . .50 
 
 Indians, . . .254, 270, 272 
 
 " raids by .- 40,315,348 
 
 " treaty with, at Ft. Pitt, 303 
 
 Insurrection. (See Whiskey 
 
 Insurrection.) 
 
 Insurrection, course of minis- 
 ters in, 394 
 
 Irvine, General, . 340, 350, 380 
 
 Irwin, Samuel, . . . 189 
 
 Nathaniel, . . .322 
 
 J. 
 
 Jackson, Philip, 
 
 Jacobus, Melancthon W., 
 
 Janeway, Jacob J., . 
 " Thomas L., 
 
 Jamieson, Jesse M., 
 " Rebecca, 
 
 Jay's Treaty, 
 
 Jefferson College, 
 
 Jennings, Jacob, 
 
 " Obadiah, . 
 
 Jennings, SaniuelC., hisRemi- 
 
 nisceuces, .... 428 
 
 Johnston, David, ... 76 
 " Robert, . . 53, 231 
 
 Jones, John M., . . . 104 
 " Samuel, ... 86 
 
 Junkip, David X., his McMil- 
 lan discourse, ... 9 
 
 57, 232 
 . 142 
 . 137 
 . 138 
 . 189 I 
 . 190 | 
 . 398 
 31,77 
 214, 431 
 . 235 
 
 K. 
 
 Kennedy, John H., . 
 Kerr, Joseph, 
 King, John, 
 
 L. 
 
 Laird, Matthew, 
 Lea, Richard, 
 Lee, Hugh, 
 
 " Richard Henry, 
 
 " Robert, 
 LeMoyne, F. W., 
 Lester, William H., 
 Lindley, Demas, 
 
 " ' Fort, 
 Linn, Alonzo, 
 Ijogan, James, 
 Lord, Willis, . 
 
 86 
 191 
 321 
 
 192 
 
 133 
 
 433 
 
 89 
 
 219 
 
 91 
 
 102 
 
 42 
 
 42 
 
 86 
 
 294 
 
 99 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Lottery for 1st Church, Pitts- 
 burgh, 277 
 
 Lower Buffalo revival, . . 46 
 
 Lowrie, John, .... 59 
 
 " John C., . . . 193 
 
 " Louisa A., . . . 194 
 
 ' Samuel T., . . 151 
 
 " Walter, . . .176 
 
 Lynn, John, .... 378 
 
 Lyon, George A., . . . 248 
 
 M. 
 
 Macurdy, Elisha, . 46, 158-161 
 
 His " War Sermon," . . 49 
 
 Last public exhortation, . 430 
 
 Marquis, Thomas, . . 41, 215 
 
 Marshall, George, . . . 102 
 
 Martin, Wm. J., 89 
 
 Mason & Dixon's Line, 302, 307, 337 
 
 McClure, Daniel, . . . 270 
 
 McCluskey, John, . . . 102 
 
 McConaughv, David, . . 87 
 
 McDonald, William K., . . 89 
 
 McDowell, John, . . . 15 
 
 McEwen, James, . . . 195 
 
 McFarlane, James, . . . 388 
 
 McGill, Alexander T., . . 141 
 McGready, James, ... 46 
 
 McGutfey, William H., . . 101 
 
 McKennan, James W., . . 89 
 
 McMillan, John, . . 11-34 
 
 His use of manuscript, . 38 
 
 Educational efforts, . .113 
 
 Notice of, . . . .210 
 
 Degree of D.D., . . . 301 
 
 His commission, ... . 319 
 
 As a politician, . . . 305 
 
 Character and influence, . 401 
 
 McMillan, William, . 84, 96 
 
 McPherrin, John, . . . 158 
 
 Mechlin, George W., . . 10-1 
 
 Meeting-houses, . . 205, 324 
 
 Mesopotamia!! region of West 
 
 Pennsylvania, 
 Miller, Academy, 
 
 " Samuel, . . . 
 " .William, 
 Milligan, John, . . . 
 
 " Robert, 
 Mingo, meeting at, . 
 
 " Creek Association, 
 Missionary History, 
 Missionaries, biographies of, . 
 
 " first sent out, 
 
 Mission stations, first estab- 
 lished, 
 
 326 
 106 
 4H5 
 386 
 433 
 89 
 392 
 388 
 155 
 183 
 178 
 
 178 
 
 Mitchell, John A., . . .195 
 Moravians, . . . . 269 
 
 Mound builders, . . . 253
 
 444 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 325, 4U3 
 . 89 
 . 224 
 
 Mt. Moriah Church, 
 Murraj', Nicholas, 
 Music, church, . 
 
 N. 
 
 Neville, John, . . 370, 378, 384 
 
 " Presley, . . 371, 390 
 
 Nevin, Edwin, ... 96 
 
 " John W., . . 138, 140 
 
 " Theodore H., . . 136 
 
 Nesbit, John, .... 432 
 
 New Colony schemes, . . 346 
 
 New Hagerstown Academy, . 106 
 
 New State project, . . 344-355 
 
 Newton, John, .... 195 
 
 Kursery of American Presby- 
 
 terianism, .... 289 
 Nursery, the new, . . . 330 
 
 o. 
 
 Ohio Company, 
 Orinsby, John, . 
 Orr, Robert W., 
 
 . 299 
 . 320 
 86, 197 
 
 P. 
 
 Parkinson's Ferry meeting, . 392 
 "Parties," Pennsylvania and 
 
 Virginia, .... 342 
 
 Patterson, Joseph, . 40, 48, 313 
 
 " Robert (Rev.), . 231 
 
 " Robert (Prof.), 75, 86 
 
 Paxton, William M., . . 144 
 
 Paull, James, . . . .372 
 
 Pentecost, Dorsey, 304, 313, 332, 351, 
 
 356, 367. 
 
 Pierce, George Edmund, . 97 
 Pigeon Creek, McMillan at, 25, 329 
 Pinney, John B., I'.i.s 
 
 Pitt, William, ..... 2* 52 
 
 " Fort, 266 
 
 Pittsburgh 
 
 at McMillan'sadvent, . . 24 
 
 Mr. Darlington's Htotory, . 2.">:{ 
 
 First Presbyterian Churchy 272 
 
 Dr. Shoepf's account, . . 280 
 
 as capital of New Stale, :M7, 35") 
 
 Porter, Samuel, 214, 2-j:;, :;'.U <; 
 
 41 Charles, . . . 431 
 
 Joseph, . . . 199 
 
 " Harriet J., . . . 2<iu 
 
 Potter, Lyiiinn, . . . 433 
 
 Power, James, . . 72, 210 
 
 " Prayer Tests," . . 61 
 
 Praying societies, ... 44 
 
 Priority of schools discussed, . 72 
 
 Psalmody, .... 222 
 
 Presbyteries 
 
 Allegheny, 
 
 Allegheny City, 
 
 Beaver, 
 
 Blairsville, 
 
 Erie, 
 
 Grand River, . 
 
 Hartford, 
 
 Lancaster, 
 
 Ohio, 
 
 Pittsburgh, 
 
 Redstone, 
 
 Steubenville, 
 
 Washington, . 
 Presbyterian Church, 
 planting, 
 
 . 238 
 . 248 
 . 240 
 . 240 
 
 . 217, 229 
 . 234 
 
 . 230, 240 
 . 232 
 
 . 215, 229 
 . 232 
 
 . 212, 228 
 . 234 
 . 236 
 its first 
 
 . 207 
 
 R. 
 
 Ralston, Samuel, . 33, 55, 215 
 Reed, William, . . .200 
 
 Reid, A. M 110 
 
 Redstone, old Presbytery, its 
 
 first meeting, . . . 341 
 
 Religious History, ... 37 
 
 Revivals, early, . . 38-49 
 
 Rhea, John, .... 235 
 
 Riddle, David H., . . . 87 
 
 " Samuel, Sr., . . 432 
 
 Ritchie, Craig, . . . 392, 399 
 
 Rodgers, William S., . . 201 
 
 Ross, James, .... 73 
 
 " A. F., ... 96, 106 
 
 " Thomas, . . . .320 
 
 S. 
 
 Sabbaths of our fathers, . . 63 
 
 Sacraments of our fathers, . 227 
 
 Satterfield, James, . . . 219 
 
 Scarcity of money, . . 221, 363 
 
 Scotch-Irish, . . 289-296, 310 
 
 Scott, John W., ... 88 
 
 " George M., . . 53,216 
 
 " Thomas, . 314, 337, 341, 349 
 
 Seminaries, Female 
 
 Blairsville Ill 
 
 Edgeworth, . . . .109 
 Hollidaysburg, . . .111 
 Pennsylvania College, . . 112 
 Steubenville, . . .111 
 
 Washington, . 110 
 
 Semple, Samuel, . . 313, 320 
 Settlers, origin of, . . 330, 405 
 Shannopin's Town, . . . 255 
 ! Slavery, abolition of, in Penn- 
 sylvania, .... 340 
 Smiley, William, . . .221 
 Smith, David, . . . .214 
 " Joseph, . 60, 72, 211
 
 INDEX. 
 
 445 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Smith. Joseph, (President), 96 
 
 " (Elder), . 282 
 
 " William, . 86 
 
 Smol let's History, . 303 
 
 Snodgrass, James, . 235 
 
 Snyder, Henry, . 86 
 
 Speer, William, . 237 
 
 Southwestern Penn'a, 299, 305, 326 
 St. Clair, Arthur, . . .314 
 Steele, John, . . . .302 
 Sirubenville Seminary, . . 109 
 Stevenson, Joseph, . . 41, 236 
 Stinson, "Father," his story, 54 
 Stockton, John, . 41," 102, 114 
 " his account of the 
 
 Vance's Fort revival, 418 
 
 " Joseph, . . .218 
 
 "Storm," the (or disruption), 245 
 
 Storrs, Charles B., . . .97 
 
 Swaney, Alexander, . . 106 
 
 Swift, Elisha P., 137, 143, 171-6, 239 
 
 " Elliot E., his missionary 
 
 history, ... . 154 
 Synods 
 
 Allegheny, . . . .248 
 Ohio, . . . . .241 
 Pittsburgh, . . . .228 
 Western Reserve, . . 240, 245 
 "Wheeling, . . . .246 
 "\Vest Pennsylvania. . . 247 
 New, 249 
 
 T. 
 
 Tait, Samuel, . . . 157, 218 
 Tanner, Philip, . . .311 
 
 Taylor, A. A. E., . . . 99 
 Temperance, .... 237 
 Ten-Mile Neighborhood and 
 
 Church, . . . 41-44 
 Theological Education, . .112 
 "Tom the Tinker," . . 377,386 
 Torrance, Adam, his letter, . 425 
 Toryism in Western Pennsyl- 
 vania, 340 
 
 Trent, William, . . 257-9 
 
 U. 
 
 Union of Colleges, ... 89 
 
 University, Western, . . 94 
 
 " ofWooster, . . 98 
 
 Upper Buffalo revival, . . . 43 
 
 V. 
 
 Vallandingham, Clement, . 231 
 Vance's Fort revival, . 40, 418 
 Vandalia, .... 347, 352 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Veech, James, his Secular His- 
 tory, 285 
 
 Vermilion Institute, . . 105 
 
 Virginia, her h'rst Constitution, 318 
 
 Virginia, W., its settlement, 318, 331 
 
 " " its old counties, 332 
 
 W. 
 
 Washington, Academy, . . 75 
 " College, . . 78 
 
 " county of, . . 374 
 
 " First Church of, 234 
 
 " Seminary, . . 110 
 
 Washington, George, . 258, 270 
 His course towards the In- 
 surrection, .... 382 
 Watson, John, .... 79 
 Waugh, Joseph, . . .112 
 Weed, Henry R., 247 
 
 West Alexander Academy, . 102 
 Western Pennsylvania 
 Its first settlement, . 22, 298 
 Insurrection. (See Whiskey 
 
 Insurrection.) 
 
 Western Missionary Magazine, 162 
 Western Foreign Missionary 
 
 Society, . 146, 165-171, 177 
 Western Reserve College, . 97 
 Western Theo. Seminary, 114, 119 
 Whiskey in Western Pennsj'l- 
 
 vani'a, .... 364, 429 
 
 Whiskey Insurrection, 366, 393, 408 
 
 Wick, William, . . 218 
 
 Wilkins, John, . . 276 
 
 Williams, Aaron, . 86, lt)9 
 
 " his Religion History, 35 
 
 Williams, Benjamin . . 432 
 
 " Samuel R , .86 
 
 Wilson, George, 314, 316, 404 
 
 " Joshua L., . . 243 
 
 " RobertG., . . 244 
 
 ; Wilson, Samuel J., . 91, 144 
 
 " his Closing Address, 413 
 
 Witherspoon Academ3 r , . 105 
 
 Women 
 
 pious and patriotic, . 25, 26 
 
 two praving, ... 60 
 
 wife of Joseph Smith, . 61 
 
 wife of Joseph Patterson 61 
 
 wife of Judge M'Dowell, 62 
 
 Woods, George, . . 94 
 
 Wright, John, . . 158, 242, 433 
 
 Wylie, Andrew, . . 81, S3 
 
 " William, . . .219 
 
 Y. 
 
 Yohogania County, 
 Young, Loyal, . 
 
 332, 406 
 . 105
 
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