It is difficult to escape the conclusion that religious thought and observance were at a low ebb in Virginia in the latter part of the eighteenth century. It was an age of transition, in some respects not unlike that of today. Old ties were being broken, tradition and old-time loyalties no longer received their former adherence. No small responsibility attaches to that negligent and selfish minority of the clergy of the colonial church and to an equally reprehensible element in the early Federal days for remissness in their duties; and their culpable behavior tends to attract more attention than the loyal devotion of the majority of their brethren. It was inevitable that the established church should be regarded as a part of the repudiated British government and when its civil powers and ecclesiastical predominance were taken from it and much of its property ruthlessly confiscated, there ensued a period of confusion in religious matters, with an unfortunate colouring of vindictive animosity on the part of other communions. Concurrently the spread of Methodism took from the older church many of its erstwhile adherents. Indeed, for a disconcertingly long period after its "erection" in 1758, Leesburg appears to have had no building devoted to religious purposes, services, when held, having been at the courthouse. Cresswell, in his journal, confirms this as does the first Shelburne Vestry book and also an advertisement in Leesburg's 'True American' of the 30th December, 1800: "The Reverend Mr. Allen" it reads "intends to perform divine service in the Court House, on the 4th January, at half past eleven o'clock; he also proposes preaching every fortnight from that date." This situation was repaired between 1780 and 1785, when the Methodists, organized as a separate denomination in 1784, erected their stone church on Cornwall Street with galleries around three of its sides and with its interesting old-fashioned sounding board, which church came to be endowed with many associations until its needless destruction about 1901. Then, in 1804, the "Presbyterian Society of Leesburg," which had probably existed since 1782, was more formally organized as a church by the Rev. James Hall, D.D., of Concord, North Carolina, at that time the Moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly. The erection of the present quaint old brick church on Market Street, the oldest church building now standing in Leesburg, had already been begun in 1802 and was completed in 1804. It was dedicated in May, 1804, by Dr. Hall. Its first pastor was the Rev. John Mines, who served until 1822 and the first Elders were Peter Carr, Obadiah Clifford, and John MacCormack. Through the courtesy of the Presbyterians, their neighbors of the Episcopal faith held their services from time to time in this old church until the erection of the first Saint James Church on Church Street in 1812, long delayed because of conflicting views as to whether the new building should be in town or country.
This first Saint James Church "was built of brick and quite small, the windows not arched and there was a yard in front. This church was torn down in 1836 and a new one, much wider and larger built, the foundation brought more to the front. It was enlarged in 1848, the vestibule built over the remainder of the yard, bringing the front of the church even with the street."[123] This building continued to be used until the present Saint James Church of gray stone on the corner of Cornwall and Wirt Streets was completed in 1897.
To the diversity in origin of the county's population frequent reference has been made. The inhabitants of the southern part were far more in sympathy in political philosophy, in manner of living, in agricultural practices and in traditional background with the people of Fairfax than were they with, perhaps, the majority of the heterogeneous population of upper Loudoun. Also their leaders belonged to the class which has ruled in Tidewater Virginia since its English beginnings and they none too willingly faced the prospect, after the Revolution, of dividing their authority with and perhaps losing their dominance to the upper-country people. In 1782 they sought to create a new county coextensive with Cameron Parish; failing in that, a compromise was reached in 1798 by which the erstwhile area of Loudoun, south of Sugar Land Run, was returned to Fairfax—"All that part of the County of Loudoun" reads the act of division "lying between the lower boundary thereof and a line to be drawn from the mouth of Sugar Land Run, to Carter's Mill on Bull Run, shall be and is hereby added to and made a part of the County of Fairfax."[124] This action had the immediate result of greatly strengthening the political power of the Quakers, Germans and Scotch-Irish in the remaining part of the county and correspondingly diminishing the influence of the descendants of the old Tidewater aristocracy there.
In the year 1787 Colonel Leven Powell laid out the town of Middleburg on the road running to Ashley's Gap, for his purpose devoting fifty acres on the southerly edge of the 500 acre tract of land he had purchased from Joseph Chinn in 1763;[125] the town, of course, obtaining its name from the position it occupied approximately halfway between the major towns of Alexandria and Winchester as well as halfway between the courthouses of Loudoun and Fauquier. The first trustees were Francis Peyton, William Bronaugh, William Heale, John Peyton Harrison, Burr Powell, Josias Clapham, and Richard Bland Lee.[126]
The much older town of Waterford did not receive formal legislative sanction until 1801. Then by the fifth section of an act of the Legislature, the place is recognized as already in existence: "the lots and streets as the same are already laid off at the place known by the name of Waterford." The first trustees were James Moore, James Griffith, John Williams, and Abner Williams. Section 7 of the act further provided "that as soon as Mahlon Janey and William Hough, shall lay off into lots with convenient streets, so much of their lands not exceeding ten acres adjoining the said town of Waterford, the same shall thence-forth constitute and be deemed and taken as a part of the said town."[127]
The next year another old settlement was, in its turn, given legislative acknowledgment. Hillsborough, somewhat belatedly, was "established" on twenty-five acres already divided between a score or more of owners: Mahlon Hough, Thomas Purcell, the representatives of John Jenny (sic), deceased, Thomas Leslie, Thomas Hepburn, Joseph Tribby, Josiah White, John Foundling, Edward Conrod, Mahlon Roach, Thomas Stevens, Thomas Hough, Samuel Purcell, John Wolfcaile, Richard Matthews, James Prior, John Stevens, Richard Copeland, and Mahlon Morris. The first trustees were Mahlon Hough, Thomas Purcell, Thomas Leslie, Josiah White, Edward Conrod, Mahlon Roach, and Thomas Stevens.[128]
In 1810 Aldie makes its appearance. It was laid out by Charles Fenton Mercer, a great Loudoun figure in his day,[129] on a part of his plantation to which he had given the name of Aldie in tribute to Aldie Castle in Scotland, the seat of that Mercer family from which he believed himself descended. The act of establishment describes the town's location as "thirty acres of land lying on the westerly extremity of the Little River Turnpike road, in the county of Loudoun, the property of Charles F. Mercer, as soon as the same shall be laid off into lots with convenient streets." The Little River Turnpike road had been extended to that point but a few years before. The town's first trustees were named as Israel Lacey, William Cook, Matthew Adams, John Sinclair, James Hexon, David Gibson, Charles F. Mercer, and William Noland.[130]
Bluemont, under its earlier name of Snickersville which it bore until the year 1900, was established in 1824. As early as 1769 Edward Snickers had obtained a grant from John Augustine Washington of 624 acres at this point and before and after that time had acquired other lands in the neighbourhood. He it was who, according to our local tradition, conveyed the first bushel of wheat easterly across the Blue Ridge and gave his name not only to the village but to the gap through the Blue Ridge and, on the other side, to the historic ferry across the Shenandoah which he owned for many years. He was born about 1735, married Elizabeth Toliaferro about 1755 and died in 1790. In 1806 a postoffice had been established at the little village with Lewis Stevens acting as postmaster. When the town came to be formally "established" in 1824, its location was described as being upon "ten acres at the entrance of Snickers Gap, of the Blue Ridge Mountains in the county of Loudoun, property of Amos Clayton, Martha Clayton, William Woodford and others, as soon as the same shall be laid off into lots with convenient streets and alleys." The first trustees were James Cochran senior, Craven Osburn, Mordecai Throckmorton, Stephen Janney, Doctor E. B. Brady, Amos Clayton, and Timothy Carrington.[131]
The above list, with Leesburg, is the roll of earlier incorporated towns of the county. Hamilton (1875), Lovettsville (1876), Purcellville (1908), and Round Hill (1900), as the dates indicate, were not formally organized until much later. The pleasant little village of Lincoln remains unincorporated.
As the eighteenth century neared its end, an increasing number of representatives of the Tidewater gentry came to Loudoun and with their neighbours already living there, built far more pretentious homes than the county had theretofore known. As has been stated in the preface, to tell something of the stories of these old estates was the original incentive to the writing of this book; but those stories, involving as they do their share of romance, tragedy and drama, must in their more extensive narration, be left for a later volume. It is appropriate however, in this place, to very briefly comment on a few of these old plantations.