CARLYLE HOUSE HISTORIC PARK Docent Dispatch

August 2017

Thomas Blackburn: Forgotten Patriot

By Kerry Mitchell

Thomas Jefferson, George and Indian War ending it is unclear to Washington, , what extent he served. We do know , …when that in September 1766 he served as a thinking about the period before and Justice of the Peace for Prince William during the American Revolution these County. In 1772, Thomas was elected In This Issue names come up as some of the great to be one of the Prince William  Thomas Blackburn: Virginians who were involved in the representatives to the House of Forgotten Past founding of our nation. While these Burgesses. men were great on their own accounts,  Calendar of Events there were other Virginian men who helped shaped our nation. Thomas  Happy Hour Blackburn of Prince William County is one of these who history tends to glance over even though during the 1760s and , he was an important figure in American history. Thomas was born in Prince William County around 1742 to Richard and Mary (nee Watts) Blackburn. Richard Blackburn was a native from Ripon, England who came over in the early 1700s and settled in Gloucester Thomas’s election to the House County, before moving to coincided with the unrest brewing Prince William County in 1733. In between the colonists and Great CARLYLE addition to being a carpenter and Britain. After the Tea Party and HOUSE farmer, Richard was involved in Prince Susan Hellman Britain’s passage of the Intolerable Acts, Site Manager William County politics and served as a Thomas was amongst the group of Justice of the Peace. Not much is members who drafted the resolution Kerry Mitchell known about Thomas’s early childhood. Site Specialist that called for a day of prayer and He inherited his family home and farm, fasting for the people of Boston. Lord Allison Kelley Rippon Lodge in 1760. That same year Dunmore believed the resolution was Curator of Education he married Christian Scott with whom an insult to King George III and he he had six children with. By 1762, dissolved the House on May 26th. Thomas receives a captain’s commission Thomas was among the 22 ex-members from the governor. With the French 1

who met at and decided that are currently known to historians. they would support a continental Looking at Carlyle’s life, knowing of his CARLYLE HOUSE boycott of British goods. He went back travels and connections to other HISTORIC PARK to Prince William County to have the Virginia families it is highly likely that resolution passed by county leaders John Carlyle may have known both (which they did on June 6th). From 1774 Richard and Thomas Blackburn. As -1776, Thomas served in the first four Carlyle appears in Prince William and involved County records by the late 1730s, he himself in many committees dealing with may have run into or had his name the unrest. He was part of the known by Richard who was involved in committee that offered George Prince William politics. It is a better Washington the command of Virginia’s chance that he may have met and militia as well as the committee with known Thomas Blackburn. While George Mason and Henry Lee II that Thomas is 22 years younger than John raised troops to defend Virginia. In the Carlyle, he was good friends with spring of 1776, Thomas lost his seat to as mentioned in attend the 5th Virginia Convention to the article. There is always the chance Cuthbert Bullitt. that these two men would have After losing his seat to Bullitt, overlapped visits with each other while Thomas was appointed as a Lt. Colonel at Mount Vernon. It is mentioned in of the 2nd Virginia State Regiment. After Washington’s diaries that the Blackburn being passed over for a promotion, girls would visit Mount Vernon; perhaps Thomas gave in his resignation on June they too would run into Sarah and 10, 1777. While he was out of the army Anne Carlyle when they were there for officially, Thomas did not stay out of the spinet lessons. Thomas’s oldest, Julia, fight for long. He rejoined the Virginia was a few years younger than Anne Militia as a volunteer. He fought at the Carlyle and was said to be accomplished battle of Germantown, Pennsylvania in on the pianoforte. We do know that October 1777. During this battle, he Bushrod Washington had a townhouse was wounded in the leg which ended his here in Alexandria so it is quite possible military career. He returned to Rippon that Julia Blackburn Washington would Lodge in Woodbridge, Virginia to have been in the same social circles as continue farming and entertaining his Sarah Carlyle Herbert. many friends. This included George There is a connection between Washington whom Thomas became the Carlyle and Blackburn families that related to through marriage when his happens in the 19th Century. Sarah daughter, Julia Ann, married George’s nephew, Bushrod Washington. On July Carlyle Herbert’s brother-in-law, 7, 1807, Thomas passed away at Rippon Thomas Herbert has a son named Lodge where he is buried in the family Noblet Herbert who marries a Mary cemetery. Lee Washington. Together they have a son also named Noblet. How does this Did Carlyle know the Blackburns? relate to the Blackburns? Mary Lee Like John Carlyle, there are few Washington Herbert is the sister of letters from Thomas Blackburn (or his father, Richard) that have survived or John Augustine Washington, George’s great-nephew. John’s wife is Jane

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Charlotte Blackburn, Thomas’s CARLYLE HOUSE granddaughter. Noblet is, there for, Jane HISTORIC PARK Charlotte Blackburn Washington’s nephew and Sarah Carlyle Herbert’s great-nephew. While it does not directly link the Carlyle and Blackburn families, it does offer a neat insight to how Virginia families at the time are somehow linked to each other.

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