DISEASE LEADS TO HIS CHANGE OF HOME.
For several years previous to 1808, Mr. Peyton suffered with a disease of the stomach and bowels—a chronic disentary, which baffled the skill of his physicians. He consulted many of the eminent doctors of Virginia and Maryland in vain. The numerous remedies they prescribed were taken without good effect or gave only temporary relief. As a last resort he determined, on the advice of his family physician and his most intimate friends, to try the efficacy of the mineral waters of the Virginia Springs, and accordingly spent the summer of 1806-7 at that famous resort, the old Sweet Springs, in Monroe county. A use of the waters in a very brief period, gave him relief from his sufferings, and at the end of the season his health was re-established. He quickly decided, painful as was the severing of early ties, and the separation from friends, to leave the malarial regions of lower Virginia, and to make his home in the healthy and bracing climate, west of the Blue Ridge. Accordingly in 1808 established himself in Staunton.
AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY.
The deep interest taken by Mr. Peyton in all matters likely to promote the thrift of the people and the public prosperity, and to which repeated reference is made in the various sketches of his life, is illustrated by the following facts:
At a meeting of the people of Augusta, held in Staunton in June, 1811, to form an agricultural society, the first ever organized in the county, he was present and appointed on what was styled the Committee of Correspondence, a committee, no doubt, raised to induce by letters the leading men of the county to co-operate in the cause.
MILITARY SCHOOLS.
In view of the war threatened with England the year following a military association was formed in Staunton, and a committee was appointed at a public meeting to deliberate and report on the best means to be adopted in order to secure the establishment of military schools in the counties of Augusta, Rockbridge and Rockingham for the instruction of officers and men. This committee, of which Mr. Peyton was a member, reported to a meeting of the association held in Staunton June 20th, 1812. It does not appear by whom the report was written, but it embodies his sentiments on the subject, and is therefore given as follows, namely:
"The committee to whom was referred a resolution of the Staunton Military Association, which has for its object the establishment of military schools, having had the subject under consideration beg leave to report.
"The committee deem it unnecessary to refer to any other authority than the good sense and honest feelings of every man, to prove the great utility, at all times, but more especially at this, of military instruction to the people of this country. The subject, there at least, is a new and difficult one; and the committee are very sensible that any plea which they can suggest will have many palpable obstacles to encounter and may be exposed to various others, which they cannot foresee. They rely for every hope of success upon the acknowledged value of the object in view, upon the patriotism of the people, upon the order of the present times, and upon the success of the experiment, which this society has made.