[40]. Charles Lynch was born in 1736, at Chestnut Hill, his father’s estate, upon a part of which the city of Lynchburg now stands. His father was a “redemptioner” who came to Virginia from Ireland about 1725. The young adventurer subsequently married the daughter of the planter to whom the captain of the ship that brought him over had sold him, took up a large tract of land lying between the James and the Staunton rivers, and became a tobacco planter on a large scale. At his death the home on the James fell to his eldest son, John, and Charles took the part of the family lands that lay nearer the frontier. The mother, Sarah Lynch, then a widow, had joined the sect of the Quakers at the Cedar Creek meeting on April 16, 1750, and it is in the records of this congregation of Quakers that the following item appears: “14 of Dec., 1754. Charles Lynch and Anne Terrill published for the first Time their Intentions of Marriage.” The young couple established their home on the Staunton, in what is now the southwestern part of Campbell County.
For years Charles followed his mother’s teachings and was an active member of the Society of Friends; for some time he was “Clerk of the monthly meetings.” Later, however, the exigencies of the times caused him to forego some of his scruples and accept public office. In 1767 he became “unsatisfactory” to the peace-loving Quakers and he was “disowned for taking solemn oaths, contrary to the order and discipline of Friends.” It was in this year, 1767, that he was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses, where he held a seat till the colony became an independent State. He was prominent in the earliest organization of Bedford County, formed from Lunenburg County in 1753 (Henry Howe: “Historical Collections of Virginia” (1845), p. 188; Hening’s Statutes at Large, VI, 381), and was a member of the Virginia convention of 1776, which, by sending instructions to the delegates from Virginia in the Continental Congress, exercised a decisive influence on the movement for independence. He had been made a justice of the peace under a commission from Governor Dunmore in 1774, and when the county court was reorganized, according to the ordinance of the Convention, passed on the 3d of July, 1776, he retained the position.
At the beginning of the Revolutionary War his Quaker principles seemed still to influence his actions to an extent sufficient to keep him out of active military service. His loyalty was well known, however. Mr. Page says: “He did not enlist in the army, partly because of his Quaker principles, but chiefly because his presence was imperatively necessary at home. He had to rouse the spirit of his constituents to support the action he had advocated in the convention. He had to raise and equip troops for the army. He had, as it were, to mobilize the forces of his country, and attend to all the duties of a commissary department. In addition, he had to make some provision in the event of an attack from hostile Indians.” In 1778 the court of Bedford recommended him to the Governor for the office of Colonel of Militia in that county. He accepted the commission and organized a regiment, but the call to the front did not come till two years later when the war was shifted to the south and Lord Cornwallis was sent to co-operate with General Philips and Benedict Arnold in the invasion of Virginia.
The records of the court of Bedford County, the minutes of various Quaker meetings, the journals of the Virginia House of Burgesses and of the first Constitutional Convention, taken together with family documents and traditions, show Charles Lynch to have been a thoroughly capable and highly respected man, a leader among the men in his community. Before the close of the war he made a record for himself as an officer in the army. At the battle of Guilford Court House, March 15, 1781, a battalion of riflemen under his command behaved with much gallantry and aided in bringing considerable credit to the Virginia militia. [Henry Howe: “Historical Collections of Virginia” (1845), p. 212. W. G. Simms: “Life of Nathanael Greene” (1859), p. 186. Henry Lee: “Memoirs of the War” (1812), I, 341, 345. William Johnson: “Sketches of Life and Correspondence of Nathanael Greene” (1822), II, 3. Banastre Tarleton: “History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 1781” (1787), p. 272. C. Stedman: “History of the American War” (1794), II, 338.]
He lived for a number of years after peace had been declared with England, and voted for the new constitution. In the family burying-ground on his homestead plantation a tombstone bears the simple inscription:
“In memory of Colonel Charles Lynch, a zealous and active patriot. Died, October 29, 1796; aged 60 years.”
Many anecdotes are still in circulation among the old inhabitants of his neighborhood illustrative of his habits and character. The chorus of a once popular patriotic song runs as follows:
“Hurrah for Colonel Lynch,
Captain Bob and Callaway!
They never turned a Tory loose