ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA,

FROM 1670 TO 1808.

CHAPTER I.

The first settlers of South Carolina were of different religious persuasions. None had any particular connection with government; nor had any sect legal pre-eminence over another.*

This state of things continued for twenty-eight years. In that early period of the province divine service was seldom publicly performed beyond the limits of Charlestown, with the exception of an independent church formed near Dorchester in 1696. The inhabitants of the province were nevertheless kept in a state of social order; for they generally believed in a God, a future state of rewards and punishments, the moral obligation of the decalogue, and in the divine authority of the Old and New Testaments. The two first Acts of the Legislature which have been found in the records of the Secretary's office "enjoined the observance of the Lord's day, commonly called Sunday;" and prohibited sundry gross immoralities particularly “idleness, drunkenness, and swearing." Thus far the government aided religion in the infant colony. In the year 1698, one step further was taken by an Act "to settle a maintenance on a minister of the Church of England in Charlestown." This excited neither suspicion nor alarm among the dissenters, for the minister in whose favor the law operated was a worthy good man; and the small sum allowed him was inadequate to his services. The precedent thus set by the Legislature being acquiesced in by the people paved the way for an ecclesiastical establishment. In the year 1704 when the white population of South Carolina was between 5000 and 6000, when the Episcopalians had only one church in the province and the dissenters three in Charlestown and one in the country, the former were so far favored as to obtain a legal establishment. Most of the proprietors and public officers of

The New-England plan of co-extending settlements and religious instruction by making a meeting house, and a minister, appendages to every new town was far from being common in Carolina; but was substantially adopted in some cases. The New-Englanders near Dorchester, the Irish at Williamsburg, the Swiss at Purysburgh, the French at New-Bourdeaux all brought their ministers with them, and each of these groupes had the benefits of religious instruction from the time they became Carolinians.

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the province and particularly the Govenor Sir Nathaniel Johnson, were zealously attached to the Church of England. Believing in the current creed of the times that an established religion was essential to the support of civil government, they concerted measures for endowing the church of the mother country and advancing it in South Carolina to a legal pre-eminence. Preparatory thereto they promoted the election of members of that church to a seat in the provincial Legislature, and succeeded by surprise so far as to obtain a majority. The recently elected members soon after they entered on their legislative functions took measures for perpetuating the power they had thus obtained; for they enacted a law "which made it necessary for all persons thereafter chosen members of the commons, house of assembly, to conform to the religious worship of the church of England and to receive the sacrament of the Lord's supper according to the rights and usages of that church." This Act passed the lower house by a majority of only one vote. It virtually excluded from a seat in the Legislature all who were dissenters, erected an aristocracy, and gave a monopoly of power to one sect though far from being a majority of the inhabitants. The usual consequences followed. Animosities took place and spread in every direction. Moderate men of the favored church considered the law as impolitic and hostile to the prosperity of the province. Dissenters of all denominations made a common cause in endeavoring to obtain its repeal. The inhabitants of Colleton county, who were mostly dissenters, drew up a statement of their grievances which they transmitted by John Ash to the proprietors praying their lordships to repeal the oppressive Act. Ash being coldly received, and despairing of relief from those to whom he was sent, determined to address himself to the English nation through the medium of the press; but death prevented the execution of his design. The dissenters, in two years after, made another effort to obtain a repeal of the obnoxious law. They drew up a petition and sent it by Joseph Boone to be presented to the House of Lords in England. In this they severely animadverted on the law, its authors and abettors. In consequence of their application a vote was passed "that the Act complained of was founded on falsity in matter of fact was repugnant to the laws of England-contrary to the charter of the proprietors-was an encouragement to atheism and irreligion-destructive to trade, and tended to the depopulation and ruin of the province." The Lords also ad dressed Queen Anne, beseeching her "to use the most effectual methods to deliver the province from the arbitrary oppression under which it lay and to order the authors thereof to be prosecuted according to law." To which her majesty replied, "that

she would do all in her power to relieve her subjects in Carolina and protect them in their just rights."

Though the infant establishment of the Church of England was thus frowned upon by the ruling powers in England, and was disagreeable to a majority of the inhabitants of Carolina, yet no further steps were taken for restoring to dissenters their equal rights. The Episcopal party continued to maintain their ascendency in the assembly, and made legislative provision for extending and maintaining their mode of worship. In two years the colony was divided into ten parishes: St. Philips, Charlestown, Christ Church, St. Thomas, St. John, St. James, St. Andrews, St. Dennis, St. Pauls, St. Bartholomews, St. James Santee and each parish was made a corporation. Some of these were afterwards subdivided, and others occasionally formed as the population extended. Money was provided by law for building and repairing churches; lands were provided by donation, purchase, or grants from the proprietors, at public expense, for glebes and church yards;-salaries for the different rectors, clerks, and sextons of the established parishes were fixed and made payable out of the provincial treasury. Legislative acts were passed for the encouragement of Episcopal clergymen to settle in the province, and exercise their clerical functions in the several parishes designated by law. To such £25 was paid out of the public treasury immediately on their arrival in Carolina, and their annual legal salary commenced from the same period in case they were afterwards elected rectors of any of the established parishes by the resident inhabitants who were members of the Church of England.

This state of things with but little variation continued for seventy years, and as long as the province remained subject to Great Britain. In the course of that period, twenty-four parishes were laid off. Most of these were in the maritime districts and none more than ninety miles from the sea-coast.

The religious establishment which enjoyed so many and such highly distinguished privileges, was mildly administered. A free toleration was enjoyed by all dissenters. The law which excluded them from a seat in the Legislature was soon repealed by the Provincial Assembly. The friendship of the mother church, the patronage of government, and the legal provision made for clergymen, though partial and confined to one sect, were useful as means of introducing more learned ecclesiastics than would probably have been procured by the unassisted efforts of the first settlers. Religion assumed a visible form, and contributed its influence in softening the manners of dispersed colonists, who from the want of school-masters and clergymen were in danger of degenerating into savages. The prospect of attaining these advantages had a powerful influence

with the members of assembly in favor of an establishment. They saw with regret the increasing inhabitants destitute of public instructors, and knew their inability to reward or even to procure them. The society which about that time was incorporated in England for propagating the gospel in foreign parts, was able and willing to assist the infant colonies, both with ministers and the means of supporting them; but that could only be done in the mode of worship prescribed by the church of England. To obtain their aid, an establishment of the same form of public worship in the colony which prevailed in the parent state was deemed a prudential measure. The expected consequences followed. The society, on application, sent out ministers to Carolina and for a long time assisted to maintain them. They generally paid fifty pounds sterling to their missionaries; and besides, made valuable donations of books to be distributed by them or kept as parochial libraries. The Reverend Mr. Thomas, whose descendants of the fourth or fifth generation constitute a part of the inhabitants, was the first missionary sent out by the Society.

The number of Episcopal Clergyman who settled in Carolina anterior to 1731, is not known; but from that year till 1775, when the revolution commenced, their aggregate number was one hundred and two.* Most of them were men of regular education. Such of these and of others as arrived for nearly the first half of the 18th century were generally sent out as missionaries by the society for propagating the gospel

List of the clergy of the Protestant Episcopal Church in South Carolina subsequent to 1730, with the date of their arrival. The Rev. Messrs. Thomas Hasel, William Guy, Stephen Coulet, Joseph Hooper, Francis Varnod, John I. Tissot, William Cotes, arrived in 1731; Daniel Dwight, Lewis Jones, Andrew Leslie, Joseph Buguiou, Timothy Mellichamp, Thomas Morrit, in 1732; Thomas Thompson, John Fulton, in 1733; Robert Gowrie, Lawrence O'Neill, in 1734; Peter Duplessis, in 1736; John Fordyce, William Orr, in 1737; Stephen Roe, Robert Small, in 1738; Levi Durand, in 1741; William M. Gilchrist, in 1742; Samuel Quincy, Charles Bosche, Alexander Garden, Jun., in 1744; Henry Chiffelle, in 1745; Robert Betham, in 1746; Alexander Keith, in 1747; Richard St. John, in 1748; Robert Stone, Robert Cumming, John Giessendaner, in 1750; John Rowand, in 1751; Michael Smith, in 1753; William Langhorne, William Peasely, Charles Martin, James Harrison, Richard Clarke, Alexander Baron, in 1754; Jonathan Copp, Robert Barron, John Andrews, Jenkin Lewis, in 1756; Sergeant, Samuel Fairweather, Robert Smith, in 1758; Robert Cooper, Samuel Warren, John Tonge, in 1759; Abraham Imer, in 1761; Joseph Stokes, Joseph Dacre Wilton, Offspring Pearce, Dormer, in 1762; John Greene, Samuel Drake, George Skeen, John Evans, William Teale, in 1763; Isaac Amory, Robert Dunscomb, in 1765; Samuel Hart, James Crallan, John Hockley, John Fevrier, Dawson,

- Lousdle, in 1766; Tourqand, Charles Woodmason, Streaker, 1767; Thomas Panton, John Lewis, Richard Farmer, Robert Purcell, Thomas Morgan, James Pierce, in 1769; John Bullman, Henry Purcell, D. D., Edward Ellington, in 1770; Alexander Findlay, in 1771; Villette, Schquab, Thomas Walker, Steward, Edward Jenkins, in 1772; Smith, Davis, Charles F. Moreau, in 1773; Dundas, in 1774; Benjamin Blackburn, in 1775.

The following clergymen have arrived since the revolution: Thomas Jones, Thomas Frost, Charles Lewis, Thomas Mills, William Blackwall, Penuel Bowen; Stephen Sykes, William Jones, Graham, Matthew Tate, Gates, William Smith, Pogson, Cotton, Woodbridge, William Best, William Nixon.