Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 5.djvu/353

 MRGINIA BIOGRAPHY

789

governor of Virginia. This grant consisted of four hundred acres in Accomac county in reward for his service to the colony in trans- porting a party of immigrants thither. "The said land being due to the said Massy by Transportation of Eight persons."

(II) Peter Massie seems to have been the head of the house in this country, in the generation succeeding Alexander, unless we count the Alexander, who received the four hundred acres just referred to as the son of the emigrant. But of Peter Massie we know even less than of his predecessor. Nothing in short, save that on October 23, 1690, and on November 6, 1700, he was the recipient of two grants of land of eight hundred and fifty-five and three hundred acres respec- tively, in the one case for the transporta- tion of eighteen persons, and in the other of six persons, to the colony of Virginia. Indeed the records of these first American Massies are most inadequate and serve little more than to establish with comparative certainty the order of descent, and to dis- close to us the fact that they were already people of prominence in the colony, actively engaged in colonization and becoming large landowners in consequence.

(III) Of Captain Thomas Massie, who appears to have been the son of Peter Massie, just referred to, we have a much larger fund of information. The date of his birth we do not know, but he rose to great prominence in the colony, and left his name attached to a number of records and docu- ments which throw considerable light on his person. He was, it would seem, one of the great rural gentleman who collectively formed a sort of aristocracy of blood and culture, one of the most benign aristocracies the world has ever seen, and which was among the most determined of all the peo- ple of Virginia in resisting foreign tyranny, and contributed to the cause of freedom some of the greatest democrats who ever lived. This aristocracy, if so it may be called, has scarcely even to-day passed away in \'irginia. and is perhaps one of the most potent factors in preserving in that state. more than elsewhere, the associations and traditions of a generous age that is gone, in a form so vital as to exercise an instant influence in forming the character of the present generation. Thomas Massie not only owned a large landed estate but, like his forebears, added greatly to it by grant and purchase, his total additions amount-

ing to upwards of twenty-eight thousand acres. The dates of the grants were as fol- lows : November 13, 1721 ; November 2, 1726; October 13, 1727. He purchased, Alay 19, 1727, from John Woodson, four hun- dred acres. His home was apparently in St. Peter's Parish, New Kent county, and he was vestryman of that church in 1704 and a church warden in 1726. That he was a man of parts and well thought of by his neighbors, is shown by the fact that he was elected in 1723 to the Virginia assembly or house of burgesses for New Kent county, the first elective body in the United States and the prototj'pe of so much to follow, and served until 1726. His death, according to the St. Peter Parish records, occurred March 2, 1731. He married, March 23, 1698-99, Mary Walker.

(IV) William Massie, Colonel William Alassie as he is generally known, was born May 28, 1718, died 1749. He was not quite so conspicuous a member of the community as was his father. He is recorded in the St. Peter's parish records as having succeeded his father as vestryman of the church, on the latter's death, and was elected church warden, November 13, 1744. It is obvious from the records that he continued to reside all his life in his father's old home in that parish, as his death is noted there. He was burgess of New Kent county, 1748. He was married to Martha Macon, born August 12. 1722. died August 8, 1759, a daughter of Colonel William Macon, born November 11, 1694. married Mary Hartwell, September 24, 1719, and died November i, 1773, and thus introduced into his fnmily the blood of a French family not less distinguished than his own. The earliest mention of the Macon name occurs in the account of the knight- ing of one Jouserand de ]\Iacon in the Saone- Loire country of France, where they seem to have originated. A little later there is also mention of one Louis de Macon and Gabriel, his son, who were evidently the possessors of large estates, although the exact location of these does not appear. The connection between these members of the old French aristocracy, and the Macon fam- ily of Virginia, is somewhat hazy, but the balance of evidence is in favor of a direct line of descent. The family of Macon be- came Huguenot in belief at some period not ascertained, and it is only in the seventeenth century that we reach an ancestor, from whom the present house is directly trace-