Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 5).djvu/473

Rh he made a powerful appeal to the legislature of New Jersey to confer upon the delegates in con- gress the authority to sign the articles of confed- eration. This letter, published in " New Jersey Revolutionary Correspondence," stamps him at once as a strong writer and clear thinker, and a whole-hearted patriot. He served in congres.- dur- ing the years 1777-'9. From 1778 till 1782 he was a trustee of the College of New Jersey. He was also an elder in the church of the celebrated Will- iam Tennent, on the old Monmouth battle-ground. During the Revolution, Monmouth county was fre- quently excited by the incursions of foraging par- ties of British troops and Tories. In an engage- ment with a party of refugees at Black's point near Shrewsbury, Col. Scudder was killed while leading a battalion of his regiment. He was buried with the honors of war in the old graveyard at the Ten- nent church. He was the only congressman that was killed in battle during the Revolutionary war.

'''SCULL. Nicholas''', surveyor, b. about '1700. About 1723 he was engaged in surveying in Penn- sylvania, and occasionally in the public service, acting in Indian affairs in the capacity of runner or as interpreter for the Delawares. He was also a member of Franklin's Junta club. In 1744 he became sheriff of Philadelphia county, and in June, 1T48, he succeeded William Parsons as surveyor- general of the province, serving till December, 1761. He made a map of the improved parts of Pennsylvania, which was published by act of par- liament in January, 1759. Hi- was sheriff of North- ampton county in 1753-'5. His sons, James, Peter, William. Edward, and Jasper were surveyors. Will- iam published a map of the province in 1770.

SEABRA, Vicente Coelho de (say-ah'-brah), Brazilian chemist, b. in Minas Geraes in 1766: d. in Lisbon, Portugal, in March, 1804. He was graduated at Coimbra in 1787. and. returning to his native country, took part in the conspiracy of Minas Geraes in 1788. He was banished to Portu- gal, where in 1789 he became corresponding mem- ber of the Academy of sciences of Lisbon, and in 1795 the University of Coimbra made him assistant professor of zoology, mineralogy, botany, and agriculture, lie wrote Klenn -utos de chiinica" (2 vols., Lisbon, 1787); " Fermentacao em geral " (1788); '-Calorico" (1789): "Memoria sobre a cul- tura do ricino on da mamona em Portugal " (1794): and "Nomenclature chimica Portugueza, Franceza e Latina," a work of great merit (1801).

SEABURY, Samuel, clergyman, b. in Groton, Conn., 8 July, 1706 ; d. in Hempstead, Long Island, N. Y., 15 June, 1764. He was educated partly at Yale, and was graduated at Harvard in 1724. After becoming a licensed preacher of the Congregational- ists in 1726, he was ordained deacon and priest in the Church of England by the bishop of Lon- don in 1731, and served as a missionary of the So- ciety fur propagating the gospel. He was rector of St. James's church. New London, from 1732 till 1743, and of St. George's church, Hempstead, L. I., from 1743 till his death, connecting with his work here the charge of a school and the care of mission stations both on Long Island and at Fishkill, N. Y. His extant publications are a sermon preached at New London (1742), and a pamphlet entitled "A Modest Reply to a Letter from a Gentleman to his Friend in Dutchess County" (New York, 1759). His son, Samuel, 1st bishop of the diocese of Con- necticut, b. in Groton, Conn., 30 Nov., 1729; d. in New London, Conn., 25 Feb., 1796, was graduaird at Yale in 1748, was a catechist of the Society for propagating the gospel, and a student of the- ology under his father, until 1752, and then for a year a student of medicine at the University of Edinburgh. He was ordained deacon by Dr. John Thomas, bishop of Lincoln, 21 Dec., 1753. and priest bv Dr. Richard Kbaldiston. bishop of Car- lisle, in Lon- don. 23 Dec., 1753. Reserved as a missionary at New Bruns- wick, N.J., from 25 May, 1754. became rector of Jamaica, in- cluding Flush- ing and New- town, L. L, 12 Jan., 1757, and rector of St. Peter's, West- chester, N. Y., 1 March. 1767. There he was prevented from the exercise of his ministry by the Whigs, by some of whom he was at one time seized and imprisoned in New Ha- ven for six weeks. He then retired to the city of New York, where he supported himself in part by the practice of medicine, serving also as chaplain of the king's American regiment under commis- sion of Sir Henry Clinton of 14 Feb., 1778. He was particularly obnoxious to the American party on account of his authorship of the series of pam- phlets signed A. W. Farmer, and entitled " Free Thoughts on the Proceedings of the Continental Congress" (16 Nov.. 1774); "The Congress Canvassed " (26 Nov., 1774) : and " A View of the Controversy between Great Britain and her Colonies " (24 Dec., 1774). He received the degree of D. D. from the University of Oxford, 15 Dec., 1777. Dr. Seabury was elected bishop of Connecticut by the Church of England clergy therein at Woodbury. 25 March, 1783. and applied to the English episcopate for consecration in London. He awaited their assent sixteen months, but it was withheld on account of unwillingness to act without the sanction of the civil authority, and failure at that time to procure such sanction ; one who was to exercise his office in a foreign state not being nl'le to take the oath of allegiance required by law of those who were consecrated bishops in the English church. He was finally consecrated bishop, 14 Nov., 1784, at Aberdeen, by Bishops Kilgour, Petrie, and Skinner, representing the episcopate of the Scottish church, who could not be deterred from exercising the powers of the episcopal office by the apprehension of the loss of temporalities of which they had been long since deprived. Bishop Seabury exercised episcopal jurisdiction with the acceptance of the laity as well as of the clergy in Connecticut, residing in New London as rector of St. James's church until his death, and also, by its invitation, over the church in Rhode Island. He was the first presiding bishop of the churches in the several states, united under the general convention in 1789, and joined with Bishops Provoost, White, and Madison in the consecration of Bishop Claggett, through whom every bishop of the Anglican communion subsequently consecrated in the United States traces his episcopate. Bishop Seabury 's knowledge of and devotion to the church system, applied with remarkable prudence and patience, made him peculiarly valuable to his church in this country in that formative period that succeeded the Revolution. The special benefits for which it