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Robert Pleasants Letterbook, 1771-1773 W&M ScholarWorks Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects Theses, Dissertations, & Master Projects 1976 Robert Pleasants Letterbook, 1771-1773 Betsy August College of William & Mary - Arts & Sciences Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wm.edu/etd Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation August, Betsy, "Robert Pleasants Letterbook, 1771-1773" (1976). Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects. Paper 1539624952. https://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21220/s2-n8ay-sm90 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses, Dissertations, & Master Projects at W&M ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects by an authorized administrator of W&M ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ROBERT PLEA SAMIS LETTER3O0K„ 1771 - 1773 A Thesis Presented to The Faculty of the Department of History The College of William and Wary in Virginia In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree of faster of Arts by Betsy August APPROVAL SHEET This thesis is submitted in partial fulfillm ent of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Approved, August 1976 Thad W* fate Jopn/E* Selb Charles T* Cullen TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGMENT IS®®®****1 • ®««©*©®®®®©©e>»©«*,><5 «• i V LIS i OF FI G UR ES v ABSTRACT • e*®©®®®®®©**®*®®*©*®©®©®*®®.® vi, IN iROOUCTION ®o®e®*®e**®®®#ffl«eo«»®e»©®9®® 2 I® BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND ®®*«®®«©®®©©.e®®®« 2 I I * MERCANTILE ACTIVITIES® .••••••••••••*•••• 7 ill® the slavery issue© **«®©o ©*©©#• »•©«•©»& 21 IV® PEACE T ESI I MO NY® • •ee»®0®«ee®«®a«©©ee« 34 V• EDITQRIAL POLICY. • » * ® ® « © • « « • « © * » « © * « « © 4 / THE LEi TERBCOK • *®®«©®®®«©«®#©©®.®®®*®e®®® 50 I. 1771* 50 II. 1772 * . * . »©e**»®«»ee®e>»®«®ie©®®ce OJ I I I . 1773. ® . ® 119 INDEX® * ® * • * ®«®*e® « * © ® c e® « •*© » « ©9 e ® ® * el 31 BIBLIOGRAPHY • • * © ® # © ♦ « ® ® « « « * « « » * © » © « © © © ® © 184 i i i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The editor wishes to thank Professor Thad UI. Tate for his guidance and criticism in the development of this project. Appreciation is also extended to Professor Charles T# Cullen for his recommendations concern­ ing the editorial method and to Professor John E. Selby for his reading of the manuscript. Special thanks goes to Miss Margaret Cook for ori~ ginally suggesting the letterbook as a possible thesis topic. The 3pe- / cial Collections staff of Swem Library usas also very helpful in allow­ ing me access to the manuscript and permitting me to use thair fa cilitie s. LIST OF FIGURES F ig u re Following Pag 1. Simplified Genealogical Chart of the Pleasants Family ........................ , ABSTRACT A segment of the 1etterhook of Robert Pleasants is presented to make available in useable form correspondence of a prominent Quaker planter and merchant living in revolutionary Virginia,, The introduc­ tion attempts to place these letters within a historical perspective. After presenting biographical information about ths Pleasants family there follows a discussion of Robert Pleasants* mercantile activities* Other sections of ths introduction concentrate on Pleasants* beliefs concerning slavery and pacifism and their relation to contemporary events. The main body of the thesis contains 106 letters dating from November 1771 to December 1773. They are addressed rnainly to Pleasant relatives and his business associates. These letters contain informa­ tion about Pleasants' economic activities and to some extent his fami ly affairs. The transcription has sought to follow the manuscript as faithfully as possible. Certain editorial changes» however* have boon mads to standardize the letters* Annotation is intentionally sparse but does attempt to identify individuals,, places, and events and to provide explanatory information. ROBERT PLEASANTS LETTERBOOK, 1771 ~ 1773 INTRODUCTION I . BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND The importance of the Society of Friends in the settlement of Vir­ ginia has not been generally recognized. This is unfortunate since by the eighteenth century Quakers were not without influence? they were con­ siderable in number as wsll as in substance. One Quaker in particular is worthy of notice* Robert Pleasants of Curies. Throughout the second half of the eighteenth century Robert Pleasants not only held a prominent position of leadership among the Society but also was a wealthy and re­ spected planter and merchant. From his plantation on the upper Jamas River Pleasants corresponded with Quakers and non-Quakers throughout the English-speaking world. These letters indicate that by his early fiftie s, Pleasants was a devoted and active Friend who sought to follow the Quaker doctrine in a ll he did. The Pleasants family dates its origins in America back to approxi­ mately 1665 when Pleasants9 great-grandfather, John Pleasants (1645-1698), immigrated to Virginia. The son of a weaver, John Pleasants cams to the Now World from Norwich, England, ss a factor or assistant to a merchant. Not long after his arrival Pleasants was “convinced of the Blessed Truth ^and7 became a s tric t professor thereof held by the people called Quakers'*^ ^The Edward Pleasants Valentine Papers. Abstracts of Records in the Local and General Archives of Virginia, II (Richmond, Va., 1927), p. 1064. 2. figure: i SIMPLIFIED GENEALOGICAL CHART OF THE PLEASANTS FAMILY John Pleasants (d * 1698) John (1672-1713) 1750 1769 John 1* Margaret 2c Mary ^ 3, Miriam (1697-1771) Jordan Woodson Hunniout { d . 1745) --------f - — Jonathan Thomas Mary ( d *1775) (d®1??5) 17 53 John; J r , Dorothy Anne (d®1765) Gray Briggs Roger Atkinson (1730-1807) (1725-1784) Samuel Jane (Sammy) 1749 (d.1 011) Elizabeth s? Robert Langley 1762 Samuel =~ Mary Pemberton (1737-1807) (1738-1821) 1748 1760 1* Mary Webster =s ROBERT =» 2, Mary Thomas H ill ( d«17 57) (1722-1801) (ca.1707-1777) r Robert, Jr, Mary Ann Margaret Thomas (Bobby) ( d , 17777) Pleasants, Jr, (d * 1796) 3* and apparently was instrumental in establishing the monthly meeting at 2 Curies* In 1679 Pleasants was ordered not to allow Quakers to meet at his home and was fined 1500 pounds of tobacco* Three years later he and his wife were brought before the law for "living as a man and wife without legal marriage*'1 In addition, they were charged with not attend­ ing church and refusing to baptise their children* Again they were 3 fined, this time 7000 pounds of tobacco* Although these accounts indicate that life in Virginia was not an easy one for friends, Pleasants nevertheless amassed large tracts of land and became a man of wealth and influence* Granted ”548 acres in Henrico Co* on the north side of James River and four Mile Creek” in 1679,^ he eventually developed his land into a 5000-acrs plantation e known as Curies* Twice Pleasants was elected to the House of Burgesses, a position he did not solicit, but declined to serve when required to take the customary oaths.^ Upon his death in 1598 Curies reverted to 7 his son, John, ths grandfather of Robert Pleasants* Robert Pleasants was born at Curies in 1722, the second of nine children* His father, John (the third of that name), married three times* ^Henrico, or the Monthly Meeting at Curies, was one of the older monthly meetings belonging to the Virginia Yearly Meeting* Certainly wall established by 1699 when its records begin. Curies Meeting after 1723 was generally referred to as the "Monthly Meeting held at White Oak Swamp*” In 1841 its membership was transferred to Cedar Creek Monthly Meeting which in turn became Richmond Monthly Meeting in 1875* Phebs R« Jacobson, Quaker Records in Maryland (Annapolis, Md., 1966), p« 124. ^Stephen B* Weeks, Southern Quakers and Slaveryt A Study in In s til tutional History (Baltimore, Md., 1896), p« 44-45* 4Cdwin Q^0ri parry ,"Genealogical Chart of the Pleasants Family,“ MS, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond, Va., ca. 1961. ^William Wade Hinshaw st al«, sds*, Encyclopedia of Quaker Genealogy, VI (Ann Arbor, Mich., 1950), p. 145. ^ I b id * 7Uilll of John Pleasants, September 27, 1690, in The Valentine Papers, II, p* 1053-1063* 4 . His firs t wife, Margaret Jordan of Nansemond County, mas iha mother of Robert as well as his two brothers, John, Jr. and Samuel, and three sis­ ters, Dorothy, Elizabeth, and Anne. When Margaret Jordan died.in 1746 John remarried four years later and by this marriage to Mary-Woodson had thr ee children, Thomas, Jonathan, and Mary. A third marriage in 1769 Q to Miriam Hunnicutt le ft no children. Very little is known about ths lives of Pleasants’ brothers and sis­ ters. His two half-brothers, Jonathan and Thomas, died early in 1776, within five months of each other and while quits young, both being 9 about 21 years of aga. John, Jr. lived in Cumberland County and died 1H in 1765 leaving Robert as guardian for his two children.' Pleasants’ o th e r b ro th e r, Samuel (1737-1807), had by a t le a s t 1762 moved to P h ila ­ delphia where he established a successful mercantile business. Marrying Mary Pemberton (1738-1821), the daughter of Israel Pemberton, "King of th e Q uakers," in 1782, Samuel became a Quaker o f c o n s id e ra b le in flu e n c e in Philadelphia© He was designated by the Pennsylvania Assembly to sign B ills of Credit issued on provincial authority, and he was also a mana- 11 ger of the Pennsylvania Hospital. Later during the American Revolu­ tion, Samuel was one of twenty-two Quakers arrested by ths Council of Pennsylvania on anti-revolutionary charges and exiled to Winchester, Vir- 12 ginia, for six months. Robsrt Pleasants’ three sisters all married wilTKMWn r * n i n i Him in imi » i w i m m i»m ■■ m u ■ m— b i-t — t i 1 M *m- ■ -- I m ,— ——n—,------------------- MMMmwwwiniii w»nwi>irm ^The Valentine Pacers, II, p« 1128, 1167, and 1202c 9W1I1 of Jonathan Pleasants, May 11, 1776, in The Valentine Papers, II, p.
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