Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty: The Llewelyn Conspiracy of 1777

North Carolina Office of Archives and History

Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty: The Llewelyn Conspiracy of 1777Author(s): Jeffrey J. CrowSource: The North Carolina Historical Review, Vol. 55, No. 1 (January, 1978), pp. 1-17Published by: North Carolina Office of Archives and HistoryStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23535379 .

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Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty: The Llewelyn Conspiracy of 1777

By Jeffrey J. Crow*

In recent years historians have been reevaluating the strength and scope of

loyalism during the American Revolution and investigating the sources of

loyalist sentiment. In North Carolina loyalists were unusually vigorous in their

defense of the crown from the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge in February, 1776, to the so-called 'Tory War" of 1781 and 1782. Josiah Martin, North Carolina's last royal governor, wrote in 1774, "the spirit of Loyalty runs higher here than in

any other Colony ... and ... there are in it more friends to Government from

principle...." 1 But principle alone could not explain all tory behavior. As one historian has suggested, loyalism meant different things to different groups of

people in different situations.2 Loyalists were not a homogeneous group cut from the same socioeconomic cloth. A study of loyalist claims made after the

Revolutionary War reveals that among North Carolina loyalists 46.5 percent were farmers; 29.5 percent, merchants and shopkeepers; 11 percent, of

ficeholders; and 3.5 percent, professional people.3 In North Carolina, as in other

colonies, loyalists came from all walks of and stations in life.

Little has been previously known about the influence of Anglicanism on the

loyalties of North Carolinians. Sarah McCulloh Lemmon, who studied the

Anglican church in the Revolutionary period, has asserted: "There is very little

information available on Anglican loyalists. From these facts one may conclude

that membership in the Church of England was not a factor in deciding the

political views of its laymen."4 In light of the fact that many of the

Revolutionary leaders were Anglicans, it would appear difficult to prove that

good Anglicans made good loyalists. However, the recent recovery of Chowan

County records from the Revolutionary period has brought to light an

*Dr. Crow is head, General Publications Branch, Historical Publications Section, Division of

Archives and History, Department of Cultural Resources, Raleigh. 1 Josiah Martin to the Earl of Dartmouth, November 4, 1774, William L. Saunders (ed.), The

Colonial Records of North Carolina (Raleigh: State of North Carolina, 10 volumes, 1886-1890), IX,

1084, hereinafter cited as Saunders, Colonial Records. The best accounts of loyalism in North

Carolina are Robert 0. DeMond, The Loyalists in North Carolina during the Revolution (Durham:

Duke University Press, 1940), hereinafter cited as DeMond, Loyalists in North Carolina; and Carole

Watterson Troxler, The Loyalist Experience in North Carolina (Raleigh: North Carolina Depart

ment of Cultural Resources, Division of Archives and History, 1976). 2 Paul H. Smith, "The American Loyalists: Notes on Their Organization and Numerical

Strength," William and Mary Quarterly, third series, XXV (April, 1968), 260-261.

3Wallace K. Brown, The King's Friends: The Composition and Motives of the American Loyalist

Claimants (Providence: Brown University Press, 1965), 195-210. 4 Sarah McCulloh Lemmon, "The Genesis of the Protestant Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina,

1701-1823," North Carolina Historical Review, XXVIII (October, 1951), 450.

VOLUME LV, NUMBER 1, JANUARY, 1978



2 Jeffrey J. Crow

astonishing loyalist conspiracy in the counties bordering Albemarle Sound and

reaching up the Roanoke River, a plot that sent tremors through the newly es tablished state government in the summer of 1777. This conspiracy involved a

group of Anglicans whose religious views plainly affected their political behavior. Indeed, it was the defense of the Anglican church that ultimately tied these men to the crown's cause. Though the tory plotters never accomplished their schemes, they briefly organized a secret society which could have done serious injury to the whig rebellion in North Carolina, had their cabal not been

quashed. Though first recognized as "the only Established church to have Publick en

couragement" by an act of the legislature in 1715, the Anglican church in North Carolina had never enjoyed the strength and influence it had attained in the

neighboring colonies of Virginia and South Carolina.5 Indeed, the Anglican clergy had no regular and certain establishment until 1765 when the Vestry and Orthodox Clergy Act was adopted. In North Carolina, churches and Anglican ministers were rare. The majority of Anglicans, moreover, were poor folk with little property or income. Throughout the colonies Anglican clergy constantly bemoaned the poverty of the struggling farmers in their parishes.6

North Carolina's last two royal governors, William Tryon and Josiah Martin, had taken a special interest in promoting the Anglican establishment. Indeed, Martin urged the Earl of Dartmouth to give "greater encouragement to the es tablishment of the Church of England" for political as well as religious ends. Martin believed that there was a "congeniality of the principles of the Church of

England with our form of Government." North Carolina's political problems, he

thought, grew out of the "distinction and animosities" prevailing between the es tablished church and dissenters such as the Presbyterians. In his opinion, the

Anglican church molded loyal and moderate citizens.7 When the Revolution erupted, the Anglican clergy tended to remain loyal or

neutral. The Reverend John Wills of New Hanover County was suspended from his post for his loyalty to the crown. Other Anglicans fled to the colony of Nova Scotia.8 The Reverend Daniel Earl of Edenton described the plight of Anglicans when he wrote in 1775: "The situation of the clergy in this part of the world is at

present truly critical, on account of the difficulty of comporting themselves in such a manner as to give no umbrage to the Inhabitants." Committees of safety had forced some ministers from the pulpit, deprived them of their salaries, and "in the American manner proscribed" them. To attempt to dissuade the Americans from their "present Resolutions" was to inflame them. "As for my own part," Earl declared, "I have as yet kept clear of any censure among my parishioners, and I never introduce any Topic into the Pulpit except exhortations

5Walter Clark (éd.), The State Records of North Carolina (Winston and Goldsboro: State of North Carolina, 16 volumes, numbered XI-XXVI, 1895-1906), XXIII, 6-10, hereinafter cited as Clark, State Records.

6Robert M. Calhoon, The Loyalists in Revolutionary America. 1760-1781 (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., 1973), 208-210. Also see Paul Conkin, "The Church Establishment in North Carolina, 1765-1776," North Carolina Historical Review, XXXI (January, 1955), 1-30.

7 Josiah Martin to the Earl of Dartmouth, November 4, 1774, Saunders, Colonial Records, IX, 1086.

8 DeMond, Loyalists in North Carolina, 55-56, 186.

THE NORTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL REVIEW



Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty 3

and prayers for peace, good order and a speedy reconciliation with Great Britain."9

Earl's caution was understandable inasmuch as numerous members of his

parish, including Samuel Johnston and James Iredell, were prominent revolutionaries. In more isolated and rural areas, however, where there were no churches and no clergymen, Anglicanism depended upon the devotion and in terest of the local squirearchy and the leadership it exerted. It was there that the link between church and state, shaped by the European experience, sometimes

proved the strongest. Because the Anglican church lacked ministers and an American episcopacy, the local parish vestry system, particularly in Virginia, grew in power and formed the crucial basis for the church. Such tendencies in

North Carolina were less pronounced because of the burgeoning presence of dis

senting sects, but Carolina Anglicans faced the same problems and difficulties as other southern Anglicans in maintaining their religion. Moreover, in a society where wealth, family, and, particularly, large holdings in lands and slaves earn ed the obeisance of the "lower orders," the coterminous powers of church and state reinforced each other and merged in strategically placed elite. Affluent

planters who were dominant in local political affairs also played leading roles in the church and its organization. The church, then, became a fundamental means of political and social organization to relieve the isolation of life on widely separated farms. Religion, in this case Anglicanism, provided social cohesion in the face of outside threats and pressures and gave people a sense of community. The Revolution unquestionably endangered the Anglican church. Those who felt

strong ties to the church often felt strong bonds to the crown and Parliament and recoiled at the heresy and insurgency of recalcitrant whigs who threatened to destroy the church-state connection. And so it was with a surprising number

of Anglicans who resided in Martin, Bertie, Edgecombe, Tyrrell, and Hyde coun ties as the radical whigs thrust North Carolina into the Revolution.10

9 Daniel Earl to the secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, August 30,1775, Saunders, Colonial Records, X, 237-238.

10 On the influence of the Anglican church on southern society, see William H. Seiler, "The

Anglican Parish in Virginia," in James Morton Smith (ed.), 17th-Century America: Essays in Colonial History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1959), 119-142, hereinafter cited

as Smith, nth-Century America; and Sydney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American

People (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1972), 188-192. For a suggestive discussion of the church as the focus of community development in the South before 1800, see Donald G. Mathews, "Religion in the Old South: Speculation on Methodology," South Atlantic Quarterly, LXXIII (Winter, 1974),

34-52; and Donald G. Mathews, Religion in the Old South (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,

1977). The literature on deference in colonial America is extensive. Among those studies focusing on

class conflict and the social structure are Bernard Bailyn, "Politics and Social Structure in

Virginia," in Smith, 17th-Century America, 90-115; J. R. Pole, "Historians and the Problem of Early American Democracy," American Historical Review, LXVII (April, 1962), 626-646; Rowland

Berthoff and John M. Murrin, "Feudalism, Communalism, and the Yeoman Freeholder: The

American Revolution Considered as a Social Accident," in Stephen G. Kurtz and James H. Hutson

(eds.), Essays on the American Revolution (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1973),

289-309; and Charles S. Sydnor, Gentlemen Freeholders: Political Practices in Washington's

Virginia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1952). On North Carolina, see Marvin L.

Michael Kay, "The North Carolina Regulation, 1766-1776: A Class Conflict," in Alfred F. Young

(ed.), The American Revolution: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1976), 71-123, hereinafter cited as Young, The American Revolu

tion: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism.

VOLUME LV. NUMBER 1. JANUARY, 197H



4 Jeffrey J. Crow

Who were these Anglican conspirators? The principal figure in the tory cabal was John Llewelyn, a planter of fairly substantial means who resided in Martin

County. According to the 1790 census, Llewelyn owned twenty slaves, and his will in 1793 recorded a total of twenty-four slaves. A man of property and social

prominence, he was named a justice of the peace by the Halifax congress in

December, 1776, which no doubt considered him faithful to the rebel cause.11 Of

equal social prominence was John Stewart, also of Martin County. Stewart held

thirty-three slaves.12

Perhaps the most interesting loyalist in the plot was William Brimage. Brimage had long served the crown as a judge and prosecuting attorney. In

November, 1769, Brimage was appointed to preside in the Vice Admiralty Court.

Though not a candidate, he had been elected to the provincial congress in

August, 1775, from Bertie County; he declined to attend. Even so, the new whig government appointed him judge of the court of oyer and terminer in Edenton. When he "refused to act" against loyalists in the April term of 1777, he drew

upon himself "the heavy resentment of the New State. . . ." Plainly a wealthy man, Brimage owned thirty slaves and at least 10,000 acres in eastern North Carolina.13

The conspiracy itself originated with John Llewelyn in late 1776. As reports filtered back from the Halifax congress which was meeting to draft a state con

stitution, Llewelyn detected a whig design so abominable that his Anglican allegiance quickly hardened into a strident loyalism.14 Reportedly, thirteen or fourteen members of the Halifax congress "wanted to introduce the Romish

religion," compel people "to worship Images," give the "Country to the French to be governed by them," and ultimately bring "Popery" to North Carolina. The

Revolution, according to Llewelyn, had occasioned "a great fall in our Religion,"

11 Clark, State Records, XXIII, 994; XXVI, 729; Will of John Lewellen, October 22, 1793, in

Edgecombe County Wills, Book VI, 82-83, Archives, North Carolina Division of Archives and History, Raleigh. Also see Martin County Tax List, 1779, State Archives, which assessed Llewelyn's property at £12,026, hereinafter cited as Martin County Tax List.

12 Clark, State Records, XXVI, 720; XXI, 194; XXII, 37, 47, 48. The Martin County Tax List, 1779, valued Stewart's property at £17,402. Information on individuals in the eighteenth century can be quite sketchy; often one must rely on censuses and tax lists from the post-Revolutionary period or other sources. On this point, see Marvin L. Michael Kay and Lorin Lee Cary, "Class, Mobility, and Conflict in North Carolina on the Eve of the Revolution," in Jeffrey J. Crow and Larry E. Tise (eds.), The Southern Experience in the American Revolution (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1978), 109-151. Slaveholding was important to economic and social status in the colonial period, and all slaves over the age of twelve were counted as taxables in North Carolina. Slave own ership remained a uniform measure of wealth during the Revolution since inventoried wealth was distorted by inflation. Gov. William Tryon noted in 1765 that a "Plantation with Seventy Slaves on it, is esteemed a good property. When a man marries his Daughters he never talks of the fortune in Money but 20 30 or 40 Slaves. . . ." Quoted in William S. Powell (ed.), "Tryon's 'Book' on North Carolina," North Carolina Historical Review, XXXIV (July, 1957), 411. On slaveholding as a measure of wealth, see William S. Price, Jr.,

" 'Men of Good Estates': Wealth among North

Carolina's Royal Councillors," North Carolina Historical Review, XLIX (January, 1972), 72-82; and Jackson Turner Main, The Social Structure of Revolutionary America (Princeton; Princeton Uni versity Press, 1965).

13 English Records, Audit Office Papers, 1765-1790, Loyalist Claims, Box E.R. 3, Folder 15,

William Brimage Claim, November 23, 1782, State Archives, hereinafter cited as Brimage Claim, Loyalist Papers.

14 The depositions against Llewelyn later given the court agreed without exception that the Mar tin County planter believed that Anglicans "were in great danger of loosing their Religion."




Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty

Both whigs and tories preyed upon anti-Catholic fears during the Revolution. This line engraving, titled "The Mitred Minuet," shows four bishops crossing hands over a copy of the Quebec Act as three British ministers (two of whom are Lords Bute and North) admire the scene and the devil hovers over their shoulders. The Quebec Act, passed by Parliament on May 20, 1774, greatly an

tagonized the patriots inasmuch as it extended Canada's boundaries to the Ohio River and granted French Canadians freedom to practice Catholicism. The engraving first appeared in the London

Magazine (July, 1774), p. 312, and is reprinted in Donald H. Cresswell (comp.), The American Revolution in Drawings and Prints: A Checklist of 1765-1790 Graphics in the Library of Congress (Washington: Library of Congress, 1975), p. 271.

and it now remained to all good Anglicans to "stand by the Protestant religion" and take up arms against the expected onslaught of papists, presumably in

vading from Quebec or France. Willie Jones of Halifax County and Whitmel Hill of Martin County were singled out as chief offenders among the whigs who had

"agreed to introduce Poppery. . . ,"16 The anti-Catholic edge of the Anglicans' concern typified the conspiratorial

fears of many whigs and tories who were trying to understand the holocaust

engulfing them. The French and Indian War had been fought against France, a hostile Roman Catholic presence in Canada that extended into the Great Lakes

15 The depositions relative to the Llewelyn conspiracy were taken in various counties (the names of the counties are given where that information is available) before submission to the court of oyer and terminer in Edenton. These depositions may be found in the following collections: Beaufort Rowan Counties, Miscellaneous Records, 1699-1865, Box 4, Folder 1, Edenton District Superior Court, Depositions Relative to Llewelyn Conspiracy, 1777; Edenton Superior Court Papers, 1774

1779; Chowan County Papers, XV, 1772-1777, March-October, all in State Archives. Many of these documents were published in J. R. B. Hathaway (ed.), North Carolina Historical and Genealogical Register, II (April, 1901), 208-217; (July, 1901), 390-405; (October, 1901), 566-577. Specifically, the

quotations above were taken from the Deposition of Armet Holies, Tyrrell County, July 15, 1777; Deposition of Daniel Leggett, Chowan County, August 13,1777; Deposition of John Stewart, Martin

County, July 19, 1777; Deposition of Joseph Taylor, June 4, 1777; "Examination of Peleg Belote in the Court of Bertie," August 12, 1777; Deposition of William May, Pitt County, June 19, 1777; Deposition of James Rawlins, Hyde County, August 6, 1777; Deposition of Thomas Harrison, Sr., Tyrrell County, July 14, 1777; Deposition of Thomas Harrison, Tyrrell County, July 14,1777. The records do not indicate the relationship between the two Thomas Harrisons.




6 Jeffrey J. Crow

and Mississippi Basin. That war had left a legacy of heightened anti-Catholic

animosity among colonial Americans. Both loyalists and whigs accused each other of being agents of Catholic expansion. One North Carolina whig charged that the British meant to impose the Roman religion on the colonies and that Lord North, the king's chief minister, was a "Roman Catholick."16 Loyalists, on the other hand, viewed with suspicion Benjamin Franklin's negotiations with the French for an alliance. Such colonial-wide issues, however, could not entirely

explain the conspirators' phobias. Instead, the Anglicans' consternation was grounded in the actions of the

Halifax congress which adopted the North Carolina Constitution of 1776. Article XXXIV disestablished the Anglican church. According to that democratic provi sion, public monies could no longer be used for the maintenance of the ministry or purchase of property and buildings for the church.17 Whitmel Hill, whom

Llewelyn considered an enemy, had served on the committee which draft

ed the state constitution and bill of rights. One of the largest slaveholders in the

colony and a staunch whig, Hill also played a prominent role on a committee in

vestigating loyalist activities.18 Willie Jones, generally regarded as North Carolina's foremost radical whig, had fought Article XXXII, which prohibited officeholding by persons denying "the being of God, or the Truth of the Protes tant Religion, or the divine Authority either of the Old or New Testament." That

provision thus excluded Catholics, Jews, atheists, and deists from filling any public office. Jones himself was said to be a deist, and his views and actions

possibly accounted for the repeated claim in the loyalists' depositions that cer tain whigs "had objected to the Trinity" or "Denied the Being of a God."19

Other activities by the Revolutionary state government also angered the

Anglican loyalists. The revolutionaries decreed that all citizens should take an oath of allegiance to the new regime and promised severe penalties to those who failed to swear the oath. Most objectionable was the draft, which required able bodied men, sixteen to fifty years of age inclusive, to serve in the militia and to

fight against the king's forces. Taken in concert, these whig measures deeply offended Anglican sensibilities

and stiffened loyalty to the crown. Llewelyn decided that the "Means proper" to

prevent the popish plot and interdict the whig rebellion was "an Instrument of

16 Deposition of Jacob Williams, Anson County, August 18, 1775, Saunders, Colonial Records, X,

127. Also see "An Address to the Ministers and Presbyterian congregations in North Carolina," by Francis Alison and others, July 10, 1775, in Saunders, Colonial Records, X, 225. For an analysis of

whig and tory views of conspiracies, see Bernard Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967), especially 144-159. On the whig view of a Catholic conspiracy, see David Brion Davis, The Fear of Conspiracy: Images of Un-American Sub version from the Revolution to the Present (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1971), 30-33. On the anti-Catholicism inspired by the French and Indian War and the Quebec Act of 1774, see Alan

Heimert, Religion and the American Mind: From the Great Awakening to the Revolution

(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966) 324-325, 388-389, 393-394. 17

Saunders, Colonial Records, X. 1011. 18 Marshall DeLancey Haywood, "Whitmel Hill," in Samuel A. Ashe and others (eds.),

Biographical History of North Carolina: From Colonial Times to the Present (Greensboro: Charles L. Van Noppen, 8 volumes, 1905-1917), III, 181-183; Saunders, Colonial Records, X, 594-603.

19 Blackwell Pierce Robinson, "Willie Jones of Halifax," North Carolina Historical Review, XVIII

(January, 1941), 25; Deposition of John Stewart, Martin County, July 19,1777; Deposition of Daniel

Leggett, Chowan County, August 13, 1777.





Writing Drawn to Which people Migh[t] Agree Under Oath. . .Llewelyn then wrote his own "Constitution" and formulated his own oaths for all friends of the

king.20 The document was drafted at the home of James Rawlins, a lay preacher or reader in the Anglican church, "and a number of the forms of the Constitu tion were Distributed by the hand writing of Wm. Lewelling [John's son] into the Countys of Martain, Edgecomb, Halifax, Bartie, and Tyrel...." Llewelyn also sent the document to Virginia, where purportedly "it had Taken Effect in Portsmouth and there about. .. ." The loyalist leader planned to organize secret

tory societies throughout the South.21

Llewelyn's cohorts combed the eastern counties of North Carolina recruiting loyalists. According to one account, "James Hays of Martin [County] travelled some thousand miles endeavoring to get as many people to associate as possi ble." The secret society reputedly extended from the Albemarle Sound to "New

Georgia." 22 Just how large the conspiracy became is not clear, but Llewelyn's lieutenants made inroads in North Carolina's eastern counties. At least ninety tories belonged to the society. An English newspaper quoted a gentleman leav

ing New Bern on August 23, 1777, as saying "that an Association of 3016 Per sons in favor of Government, had been discovered and defeated, and that the

principal Movers had been thrown into Prison. .. ,"23 Another deponent asserted that the "Scheme . . . extended to South Carolina, Haw River, and in short all the Southern part of the Continent.. . ." But Anson County was the most distant residence of any of the deponents.24

The loyalists approached prospective members of the secret society at various social functions such as a "Wheat Reaping." Most, however, were recruited at

religious services where lay readers such as James Rawlins presided.25 The

potential initiate would be taken aside and asked his opinion of the current state of affairs. If he responded, as one did, that "it was no matter if the King's Forces

were to come & put them all to the sword for it was what they deserved meaning the People of this State," he would be asked then to "stand up for his Religion."26

The appeal to one's religious convictions proved quite persuasive. One farmer

balked until assured that the society would secure Anglican ministers. Another

stated his belief that the whig oath "was very bad and would ruin his Sole." Af

ter swearing an oath to keep a secret, the recruits learned that there was a plan by the leading revolutionaries in the colony to impose "Popery" on the province. To thwart that attempt, loyal Anglicans had formed a society and drafted cer

tain "Articles of Agreement." A second oath was then administered to keep the

"constitution" secret. Because of their religious nature, the articles hardly seemed radical, and many conspirators later protested that they found "no

20 Deposition of James Rawlins, August 10, 1777. 21

Deposition of James Rawlins, August 6, 1777. 22 Deposition of Thomas Harrison, Tyrrell County, July 14, 1777; Deposition of Thomas Stubbs,

July 14,1777. 23 Brimage Claim, Loyalist Papers. 24 "Windsor, July 1, 1777—At a Court held this day for the Purpose of Enquiring into Sundrey

Suspicions agt. the Persons below mentioned," hereinafter cited as Windsor Depositions. 25 "Examination of Peleg Belote in the Court of the County of Bertie," August 12,1777; Deposition

of Thomas Rogers, Tyrrell County, July 12, 1777. 26 Deposition of Mary Walker, Tyrrell County, July 15, 1777; Deposition of William Howard,

Tyrrell County, July 15, 1777.




8 Jeffrey J. Crow

harm" in them. One provision upheld "the old & New Testament" and the "Church of England." Another required each member of the society to pay 10

shillings a year to "employ a Reader . . . one half of which is to be paid at Easter, the other at Whitsuntide. . . ." The third oath, however, insisted on fidelity to

King George, opposition to the draft, refusal to take the whig government's oath, the protection of army deserters, and the defense of "all draughted, dis

tressed, or them that are called Tories as oppressed persons, as far as is in yr. power. . . ,"27

Members of the society were expected to keep on hand a certain amount of

powder and shot, and the conspirators also employed secret signs and code words with heavy religious connotations. A "Friend of the party" would present

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a small stick with three notches cut into it to another member as a sign. The two

conspirators then would alternate letters in spelling out the words, "B-e T-r-u-e." Another sign involved pointing the left forefinger to the right arm before spelling the code words. The members scrupulously observed the oaths and rituals which were sworn on the Book of Common Prayer.28

To gain new members in the conspiracy, the loyalists also made certain class

27 Windsor Depositions; Examination of Peleg Belote, August 12,1777; Examination of John Clif

ton, Oyer and Terminer, Edenton District Court, September, 1777; Deposition of Nathan

Hathaway, July 4, 1777; Deposition of Salvinas Buttrey, 1777. 28 Windsor Depositions.




Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty

\1

Sir William Howe (1729-1814) was British commander in chief in the colonies, 1776-1778. Although confident that Howe would eventually invade North Carolina, John

Llewelyn at one point considered a journey to New York to

request a military commission from the British general. This depiction of Howe first appeared in An Impartial History of the War in America (London & Carlisle, 1780), Volume I, p. 204, and is reprinted in Cresswell, The American Revolution in Drawings and Prints, p. 41.

appeals. Because of his social position and leadership in the church, Llewelyn was able to elicit the respect and allegiance of simple Anglican farmers who

possessed little property but aspired to become members of the gentry. Poorer

Anglicans were thus told that when "the King would conquer the Country, and if their party held together, when the Gentlemen [whigs] were taken their party & the King's Soldiers should share their Estates. . .." The loyalists believed that once the king subdued the rebellion, "they should all keep their own Estates & not be hurt. . . ,"29 They were also told that members of the clergy, soldiers in the Continental Line, county officials, and even members of Congress had joined the secret association.30 Llewelyn's appeals to religion and class antagonisms stirred a strong loyalist reaction.

Within a short period a network of clandestine enclaves existed in the coun ties. The leader in each county, based on Anglican terminology, was known as the "Senior Warden."31 The loyalists also laid plans to take "possession of the

Magazine at Hallifax to secure the Arm's and Ammunition...." When Sir William Howe, commander of the British forces in America, marched south as the tories expected, "there would be a World of Bloodshed" for which they must be prepared. But through their society Howe would know "his friends from his foes."32

Just to be safe, however, Llewelyn, Rawlins, and several others made prepara tions to reach "General Howe" and secure a "Commission in order to Inlist men

29 Windsor Depositions; Deposition of David Taylor, June 20, 1777. 30

Deposition of Thomas Harrison, Tyrrell County, July 14, 1777; Deposition of John Stewart, July 19, 1777.

31 William Brimage was the senior warden for Bertie County. Deposition of Thomas Harrison, July 14, 1777, Tyrrell County.

32 Deposition of Thomas Harrison, Tyrrell County, July 14, 1777; Deposition of Thomas Stubbs, Tyrrell County, July 14, 1777; Deposition of James Harrison, July 16, 1777.




10 Jeffrey J. Crow

for Sup[p]ort of the present King of England." They approached wealthy

loyalists for money to finance the expedition. With high hopes presumably, Llewelyn set out for New York and General Howe. Llewelyn's ambitious jour

ney, however, got only as far as Scotland Neck, North Carolina, before he

became discouraged and turned back.31'

Llewelyn's aborted expedition perhaps led him to another scheme which por tended even greater danger to the whig cause, a "cold" plot that promised "vile

proceedings of Cruelty," and which had never been contemplated in the

"Constitution."34 Llewelyn's newest plot posed a dual threat. James Rawlins ex

plained "that a Certain David Taylor, a Patroler over the Negroes . . . Shou[l]d Disaffect the minds of the negroes & Cause them to run away, under the name

of a Rising & Draw the Soldiers out of Halifax in pursuit of them, whilst. . . Llewelling herding numbers of his Society as they termed themselves

was To take the magizene & Governor. .. ." The plot could not be implemented because the governor, Richard Caswell, was absent from Halifax, but it was to

be executed as soon as he appeared there.35 More deadly still was Llewelyn's plan "to kill all the heads of the Country"

during one bloody night of terror. Originally, Llewelyn had said that the tories

could accomplish their schemes "without Spilling blood ... by Confining the

heads of the County, and if How[e] shou[l]d come round to Carolina, Deliver

them up to him." But Llewelyn had decided on a more violent course.36

Despite the secrecy of his society, Llewelyn's loyalist sentiments evidently did

not go unnoticed among zealous whigs in eastern North Carolina. The Anglican leader was particularly bitter toward the wealthy whig planters, men perhaps a notch above him in social circles. He had told several associates that if he could

get "but ten Men to joyn him he Would fall to Work and kill them Every one

Speaking of Whitmal Hill and others that had [threatened] him as a Tory." By killing Hill and other prominent revolutionaries in the eastern counties, Llewelyn believed that the "Country Would Soon be Settled In Behalf of the

King. . . ." Llewelyn's audacious plot had met the approval of some men in the

society, but other Anglicans denounced his "Evil Intentions" as a betrayal of the

society's purpose.37

Llewelyn also carried a personal grudge against the brothers Nathan and James Mayo. Nathan Mayo had been active in the colonial militia and served as a justice of the peace in Martin County, but both Mayos were steadfast whigs. Llewelyn thought that "Nathan Mayo was A Very Busy Body & he believed [that Mayo] was put there to watch him and that Son of a Bitch would get kiled and that it was a general Taulk that James Mayo was to be kiled and because he was a man that was Very peticular in atacking any that was [thought] to be Enemies to the State." Llewelyn had instructed his compatriots to "Waylay" James's

33 Deposition of James Rawlins, Hyde County, August 6, 1777; Deposition of Thomas Best, Sep

tember 9, 1777. 34

Deposition of James Rawlins, Hyde County, August 10, 1777. 35

Deposition of James Rawlins, Hyde County, August 6, 1777. 36

Deposition of John Collins, July, 1777; Deposition of Henry Culpeper, September 3, 1777. 37 James Rawlins to the Worshipful Justices of Newbern; Deposition of John Collins, July, 1777.





brother Nathan from ambush along a Martin County road.38

Llewelyn's violent intrigues were never executed. In the summer of 1777 the

conspiracy burst apart. How it was exposed is not entirely clear. Col. Henry Irwin of the North Carolina Continental Line wrote Governor Caswell from Tar boro in July, 1777: "I am sorry to inform you that too many evil persons in this

[Edgecombe] and the neighboring counties have been joined in a most wicked

conspiracy; but I am in hopes it may be stopped as many have come in and made all the discovery they know of. About thirty of them made an attempt on this

place [Tarboro], but luckily I had about twenty-five men to oppose them, and I disarmed the whole and made many take the oath."39

But the whigs had arrested other Anglican conspirators before that attack. There is some reason to believe that David Taylor, the patroller who was

assigned to incite the slave insurrection, had gotten cold feet and revealed the

conspiracy to whig authorities—it was he and a relative who were the first to

give depositions on June 4, 1777. That same month at least one other member of the secret society had been seized with "all the papers in his pocket." Sup posedly, the society was sufficiently strong to return any tories confined or im

prisoned. At a meeting in the "goard patch," where the Martin County leaders of the conspiracy regularly gathered, various plans were discussed. Llewelyn desperately argued that the captured loyalist would have to be freed even if the

society "must kill" his captors.40 The subsequent attack on Tarboro, as reported by Irwin, may have been the climax of this meeting. In any event, as word of the

conspiracy spread, the Anglican loyalists sought to escape North Carolina. The most dramatic flight was that of William Brimage. Brimage, leaving Ber

tie County, made his way to Albemarle Sound, where he hired a boat to take him to Roanoke Island. On the way he and another loyalist, pulling two pistols from a handkerchief, commandeered the vessel and demanded to be taken to Currituck Inlet, from whence they expected to escape to Virginia. Brimage told his captives that he "had done no harm," but, being a suspected tory, he had decided to flee the state rather than "take the oath prescribed by the last

Assembly." Stormy weather on the Outer Banks, however, forced the pirated vessel to seek refuge on an island short of Currituck Inlet. There the two brothers who owned the boat made their escape, stranding the tories or over

powering them, because Brimage was imprisoned at Edenton, where he "was chained down to the Floor of the Common Gaol."41

Whig leaders throughout the eastern counties trumpeted the alarm once the

plot was discovered. Whitmel Hill believed the "traitorous conspiracy," while centered in Martin County, extended to "almost every County from North to

38 Deposition of Thomas Best, Martin County, September 9,1777; James Rawlins to the Worship

ful Justices of Newbern; Deposition of Isaac Barbree, September 8, 1777. The fact that Nathan

Mayo was also an elder in the Kehukee Baptist Association adds another intriguing dimension to

the religious turmoil that attended the political revolution then under way. On this point see Rhys

Isaac, "Evangelical Revolt: The Nature of the Baptists' Challenge to the Traditional Order in

Virginia, 1765 to 1775," William and Mary Quarterly, third series, XXXI (July, 1974), 345-368. 39 Clark, State Records, XI, xviii-xix. 40

Deposition of William Wallace, Martin County, September 8,1777; Deposition of William May, Pitt County, June 19,1777; Depositions of David and Joseph Taylor, Chowan County, June 4,1777.

41 Deposition of Daniel Austin, July 30, 1777; Deposition of Cornelius Austin, July 30, 1777;

Deposition of John Smith, July 31, 1777; Brimage Claim, Loyalist Papers.




12 Jeffrey J. Crow

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South of the State." Other whigs termed the loyalist scheme "a most bloody plan . . . laid by some of the enemies of America" and "a most accursed plot in favour of the British Tyrant." They anxiously recounted the plan which was to commence "with the assassination of the leading men in every County, and af terward none were to be spared but such as repaired to their [tories'] Standard."42

Gen. Allen Jones of the North Carolina militia bitterly condemned the "atrocious" leaders of the conspiracy. "The great Mr. Brimage," he declared, "is in Edenton Gaol being one of the heads of these Cut throats also ... Black John Stewart. ... I make no doubt but hanging about a Dozen will have exceeding good Effects in this State & give Stability to our new Government."43

Not every whig, however, agreed with Jones's draconian solution. Loyalist sentiment was vigorous in the eastern section of the state, one whig cautioned Governor Caswell. The tories might not remain "quiet" with so "many unhappy devils" standing trial for their lives. "Law should be strictly attended to," the

whig continued, "severity exercised, but the doors of mercy should never be shut—would a good Lawyer act [thus] at this time I am convinced it would be a

great means of giving dignity to Courts, strength to the Law, and restoring union to this distracted Country."44 The first acts of the new government could have important consequences for the rebel cause, in his view.

Governor Caswell, who probably agreed with one whig's characterization of the tories as "dam[n] rascals," took steps immediately to counteract the loyalist intrigues.45 Caswell ordered out the militia to guard the magazines from Halifax to the Cape Fear.46 Allen Jones approved of the governor's measures. Since Con tinental troops were departing from Halifax to join the campaign in the North, leaving "several atrocious offenders against the State in prison [and] many of

their adherents at no great distance," the militia must become the protective arm of government. According to Jones, "the designs of the Tories, the impor tance of the magasines in town, and the necessity of bringing the conspirators to

condign punishment" required the constant vigilance of the militia.47

Meanwhile, Edenton prepared for the September term of the court of oyer and

terminer at which the Anglican loyalists would stand trial for their lives. In ac cordance with an act passed by the General Assembly in May, 1777, the penalty for treason was death "without the benefit of Clergy" and the forfeiture of all

property to the state.48 Loyalists held in the Halifax jail were removed to Eden

ton "under a strong guard."49 Court officers brought indictments for misprision

42 John Gray Blount to Richard Caswell, July 5,1777; Jacob Blount to Thomas Burke, August 6,

1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 510-511, 513, 746-747. 43 Allen Jones to Thomas Burke, August 6, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 746-747. 44 Robert Smith to Caswell, July 14, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 551-552. 45

Capt. John Vance to Caswell, July 29, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 547-548. 46 Caswell to Gen. John Ashe, July 26,1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 535-536. Caswell reported to

Cornelius Harnett, who was representing North Carolina at the Continental Congress, that "We

have been alarmed with the rising of Tories, and forming of conspiracies; the former among the

Highlanders & Regulators ... and [the latter] in Bertie and Martin [counties]." Caswell to Harnett,

September 2, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 602-604. 47 Jones to Caswell, August 20, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 581. 48 Clark, State Records, XI, 769-773. 49 Caswell to Allen Jones, August 23, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 589.

VOLUME LV, NUMBER 1, JANUARY. 197H



14 Jeffrey J. Crow

of treason against those conspirators who had given depositions against John

Llewelyn. Llewelyn stood trial for treason. The indictments charged that the

loyalists "did maliciously and advisedly endeavor to excite a great number of

People to resist the Government. . . and did dispose sundrey People to favour the Enemy," protect deserters, oppose the draft, and assist the "King's Forces."50

Governor Caswell was not particularly sympathetic to the plight of men like William Brimage. "It appears to me beyond a doubt," the governor said, "that he has been one of the powers of their [tories'] diabolical plan."61 Caswell refused to

grant bail to Brimage, despite the former judge's pleas from "a poisonous and noisome dungeon." Convinced of Brimage's guilt, Caswell "did not think [it] proper to meddle in."52

Even so, the governor had difficulty in finding a jurist to try the case, since, ironically, the judge for the April term in Edenton had been William Brimage. Caswell said his first choice "refused" to preside over the trial.53 He then ap pointed Samuel Johnston, a conservative whig, to hold court. But Johnston

questioned the governor's power to make the appointment inasmuch as all other

magistrates had been appointed by the legislature. According to Johnston, neither the new constitution nor any act of the assembly empowered the gover nor to issue such a commission. Johnston's argument was reminiscent of the

struggle between the assembly and royal Gov. Josiah Martin in 1773 and 1774, when the executive and legislature had clashed over Martin's right to create courts of oyer and terminer without the assembly's assent. That controversy had helped solidify the whig movement in North Carolina. Johnston concluded: "I shall with great alacrity serve the public in this office to the best of my abilities, if it can be done consistently with my reputation for safety, but when the life of a man is in question, the greatest caution is necessary. . . ,"54

Finally, John Baptist Beasley, an Edenton whig and magistrate, agreed to try the conspirators. James Iredell, Samuel Johnston's brother-in-law and a leading Revolutionary thinker, acted as prosecuting attorney for the state. On Septem ber 16,1777, John Llewelyn "was convicted" of the "Crime of High Treason." The

jury also found a number of other Anglican loyalists guilty "of Misprision of Treason." Because of the wretched condition of the Edenton jail, the lesser of fenders were released on bail which was set as high as £1,000. John Llewelyn, however, remained in custody.55

Efforts to secure Llewelyn's release gained a surprising breadth of support. Governor Caswell was petitioned "to respite the Execution of that unhappy

50 Indictments against William Tyler, Absalom Leggett, and Daniel Leggett, Chowan County Court Papers.

51 Caswell to Maj. David Barrow, July 27,1777; Jacob Blount to Caswell, July 6,1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 513, 539.

62 Caswell to Cornelius Harnett, September 2, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 602-604. 53 Caswell to Allen Jones, August 23, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 589. 54 Johnston to Caswell, August 28,1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 598-599. For the fullest discus

sion of the court controversy, see H. Braughn Taylor, "The Foreign Attachment Law and the Com ing of the Revolution in North Carolina," North Carolina Historical Review, LII (January, 1975), 20 36. Also see Jack P. Greene, The Quest for Power: The Lower Houses of Assembly in the Southern Royal Colonies (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1963), 420-424.

55 Chowan County Court Papers, Edenton District, 1751-1787; Thomas H. Hall to Caswell, Sep tember 23, 1777; Joseph Blount, Robert Smith, and Charles Bondfield to Caswell, September 30, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 776-777. The aforementioned sources are the only ones available that





deluded Man and permit an opportunity of applying to the Mercy of the next

Assembly for Pardon, its being his first Deviation from Rectitude and Vir tue. ..Professions of a return to Llewelyn's "former good Character" were

promised from "the most considerable Men in Martin County." Indeed, Nathan

Mayo, one of the principal targets of Llewelyn's plot, accompanied Mary Llewelyn, the prisoner's wife, to Halifax to meet with the governor.56

Caswell and his council of state granted the reprieve. When the legislature met in November, 1777, Abner Nash, speaker of the House, presented Caswell's

request that the assemblymen review the petitions asking for Llewelyn's par don. The governor insisted that the decision be made by a joint ballot lest the two houses split on the matter. Both houses, however, refused to "intermeddle in the present case . . . unless something from the Judge who sat on the Tryal should be laid before the Governor and Council to induce them to think otherwise." In fact, the assembly recommended that the sentence be "carried into execution without delay" so as not to violate the law.57

Before the execution could be performed, however, John Baptist Beasley, who had presided over Llewelyn's trial, wrote the governor and asked for mercy for the Anglican loyalist. He pointed out that Llewelyn had not tried to escape from Edenton jail though presented with the opportunity. Llewelyn's death, Beasley argued, would bring "distressed circumstances" to his family.58 Beasley's pleas must have succeeded, for there is no record that Llewelyn was executed, but there is ample evidence in tax lists and censuses that he lived out his days as a Martin County planter.

Equally repentant was Daniel Leggett, one of Llewelyn's "Senior Wardens."

Leggett, in a penitent letter to Governor Caswell asking for bail, admitted that

he was unworthy because of his "horrid transgression & folly." He pledged a

"Ready Compliance to your Laws & Commands" and claimed that he never

knew "the general plan" but was "seduced by others." Leggett promised to do all "in My power to Suppress" any who "hurt the present Government."59

The one unregenerate loyalist proved to be William Brimage. Brimage was in

dicted for both treason and misprision of treason. The charges could not be

sustained, and he was released from jail in September, 1777. Two months later the Bertie County court ordered him to take the "State Oaths and become a Sub

ject" or suffer banishment. Brimage refused. He fled to New York in April, 1778, where he was welcomed by former North Carolina governors William Tryon and

Josiah Martin, both of whom considered him "a very respectable Man." Soon

thereafter Brimage was appointed attorney general for Bermuda, but in 1780

1781, when Cornwallis invaded the Carolinas, the loyalist briefly tried to return

to North Carolina and landed in Charleston. With the British evacuation of the

pertain to the trial. Many of the deponents became state witnesses. The names of the jurymen are

not included in these documents, but the eighteen loyalists finally tried were John Llewelyn, Daniel

Leggett, Absalom Leggett, William Tyler, Peter Tyler, James Hays, John Garrett, John Everett,

Daniel Bunting, William Savage, Sterling Savage, James Rogers, Malachi Manning, Willoughby

Wells, John Everit, James Harrison, William Llewelyn, and, in a separate but related case, Francis

Williamson. 56 Thomas H. Hall to Caswell, September 23, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 776-777. 57 Clark, State Records, XXII, 929; XI, 651; XII, 115-116, 118-119, 122, 268-272, 274, 277-278. 58 Beasley to Caswell, December 4, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 816. 59 Daniel Leggett to Caswell, December 4, 1777, Clark, State Records, XI, 816-817.




16 Jeffrey J. Crow

South, however, Brimage sailed for England and arrived in June, 1782. There he lived in exile, separated from his wife and young son who continued to live on a

plantation in Bertie County. Before leaving North Carolina, Brimage had had the prescience to place half his property in his wife's name; the whig government confiscated the other half, and it was sold to Wright Stanly of New Bern in July, 1786.60

Though the whigs had crushed the Llewelyn conspiracy, loyalism remained an

abiding menace in the eastern counties of North Carolina. In the summer of 1779 a militia colonel reported to Governor Caswell that a "combination of some of the people in Hyde Beaufort and Martin Counties [existed]. . . against the

authority and good government of this State, and that they have resolved to take the Magazine at Kinston."61 Caswell must have surely wondered if another con

spiracy of the proportions of Llewelyn's would again test the whigs' resolve. The Llewelyn conspiracy had been a bad scare for the new state government.

It was a curious blend of Anglican faith, personal malice, and loyalty to the crown. The disestablishment of the church by the whig government had pricked Anglican sensibilities. Simple membership in the Church of England, judging from the many revolutionaries who took up arms against the crown, did not en sure that all Anglicans would remain "friends of Government." But if the whig rebellion was perceived as a threat to the church, as the Llewelyn conspiracy suggests, then a large reservoir of loyalism might be tapped. In such cases

religious beliefs and political thinking commingled. The cry, "the church in

danger," proved persuasive and compelling to men who already hungered for a

stronger church and the presence of ministers and whose sense of community seemed to be distintegrating under the blows of the Revolution.

The whig response to the conspiracy must finally be termed ambivalent. The

whigs, realizing that every action by the new government set a precedent, moved

cautiously in dealing with the tories. Samuel Johnston refused the governor's commission to preside over the trial because of the fresh memories of the royal governor's arbitrary appointment of judges. Part of the caution may have been due to the social prominence of the tory leaders, but the antipathy toward

loyalists demonstrated in the Confiscation Act of 1779 and the brutal civil war fare of 1780-1782 was still minimal in 1777. In fact, the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge in early 1776 had temporarily subdued any loyalist challenge. But no one knew what the outcome of the whig experiment would be; independence had been declared but hardly secured. Tory neighbors, who, after all, were upholding the legitimacy of British authority over the colonies, might not always be the victims of reprisals but rather the instigators.62 Thus, Llewelyn escaped execu tion. Of the conspirators only William Brimage, the royal officeholder, turned out to be an irreconcilable loyalist. Other tories in the plot contritely swore

fidelity to the new regime and apparently suffered no long-lasting taint. "Black

60 Brimage Claim, Loyalist Papers.

61 Col. Thomas Bonner to Caswell, August 3, 1779, Clark, State Records, XIV, 184. 62 For a perceptive analysis of the tenuousness of whig control throughout the Revolutionary

South and of how the whigs were forced to tolerate many forms of loyalism and disaffection, see Ronald Hoffman, "The 'Disaffected' in the Revolutionary South," in Young, The American Revolu tion: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism, 273-316. Robert L. Ganyard suggests





John Stewart" lived to serve in the assembly and ratification conventions of the 1780s.

Paced with the uncertainty of the whig government and the expected reasser tion of royal power by the crown, Americans found matters of allegiance an un

easy choice. To a group of Anglican farmers in eastern North Carolina, the Church of England was inexorably tied to royal authority and, in their view, must be defended against the encroachments of godless or Pope-loving rev

olutionaries. Even so, the line between loyalist and whig appears to have been a thin one, for the Revolution was too sweeping and complex to be per ceived in its entirety by the humbler folk. It could only be understood in terms of

local issues which affected a person's life, property, and religion.

that Samuel Johnston's sympathy for the plight of socially prominent tories and his protection of

them inspired the fierce hostility of more zealous whigs in the October, 1776, election. That could

explain in part Johnston's reluctance to try the Llewelyn conspirators as well as the cautious man

ner in which the guilty were ultimately treated. See Robert L. Ganyard, "Radicals and Conser

vatives in Revolutionary North Carolina: A Point at Issue, the October Election, 1776," William and

Mary Quarterly, third series, XXIV (October, 1967), 568-587.

VOLUME LV, NUMBER 1, JANUARY, 197S



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Tory Plots and Anglican Loyalty: The Llewelyn Conspiracy of 1777

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