QUAKER-ROOTS ARCHIVES http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl?list=QUAKER-ROOTS ============================================================ Date: Sat, 02 May 1998 09:00:59 -0500 From: Dan Treadway <treadway@netins.net> To: QUAKER-ROOTS@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <354B271A.BA30BA93@netins.net> Subject: Re: Ouster of Virginia Quakers Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit There were no Quakers anywhere before about 1650, and the real movement began in northern England in 1652. I think it is safe to say there were no Quakers in America before 1655. In general, Virginia was a colony run by aristocrats, loyal to the king in the British Civil War and to the Church of England throughout. There were some Virginians who sympathized with the Puritans. Here is what I have written about my ancestor Richard Ewen: > The same Puritan movement that induced so many Englishmen to move to > New England in the 1630's was at work among the Virginia colonists. > These Virginia Puritans, like their New England bretheren, sought to > escape the established Church of England which held sway in Virginia as > well as England. To this end, some of settled in Maryland. Richard > Ewen, who made the move in 1649, was among the leaders of this group. > > Months after Richard Ewen's arrival in Maryland, Charles I was > executed, and in July, 1654, the new English government replaced Lord > Baltimore's governor, one William Stone, with a board of ten > comissioners. When these comissioners first met, on 16 Oct 1654, one of > them was Richard Ewen. Later that same month, a General Assemby was > held at Patuxent, and Richard Ewen was a burgess from Providence county. > This assembly submitted to the government by the comissioners, and > agreed that no alteration would be made in it except by the authority of > Cromwell. > > Baltimore's governor, however, had another plan. He set up his > office at St. Mary's, and raised a militia, which promptly made a raid > on Patuxent, seizing and carrying back to St. Mary's the colony's record > books along with some arms and ammunition. The comissioners sent > messengers demanding to know by what authority this action was taken. > Stone imprisoned the messengers, and not long after set out with about > two hundred soldiers to defeat the Comissioners and their followers. > > There was a battle, after which only four or five of Stone's men > remianed free; fifty or so were dead or wounded, the rest captives. The > Puritan party lost four dead. > > When, in 1657, the comsissioners returned power to Lord Baltimore's > representatives, they received favorable terms, receiving indemnity and > retaining arms, ammunition, and the right to hold office in the colony. > Richard Ewen was one who did hold office under this new arrangement, > being made a Major in the militia in 1658. He was also appointed > Justice of the Peace that year, but asked to be excused because of his > military obligations, which was allowed. In 1659 he was Speaker of the > House of Burgesses, but he seems to have died during the session, as > Robert Slye was Speaker at the end of the session. > Several of these Virginia Puritans became Quakers in the second half of the 1650s, but it is clear they were not yeat Quakers when they left Virginia in 1649. Don in SA wrote: > My Quaker ancestors came to Virginia in the 1640s but a few years later had > moved to Maryland. A note in one of my research books states simply that > their move to Maryland occurred during the period 1649-1656 when all Quakers > were forced to leave the colony of Virginia. > > Does anyone have information about events of this period and the forced ouster > of the Quakers? -- Dan Treadway Email: mailto:treadway@netins.net Web page: http://www.netins.net/showcase/treadway ______________________________ - ----------------------------