David Lewis Sr.

Map depicting locations of significance for David Lewis Sr.'s family within Albemarle County and Charlottesville. Reproduced from Cherie Lynn.

David Lewis Sr. (1685 - August 1779) was a prominent inhabitant of early Albemarle County.

Biography

Lewis was born around 1685 in Virginia. He was baptized on May 5, 1695 at St. Peter's in New Kent County. He spent the majority of his childhood with his family in Hanover County, being raised in the Presbyterian Church.

In 1734, Lewis, along with his brother-in-law Joel Terrell, entered 3,000 acres just west of the site of the present day University of Virginia. The following year, Lewis' brother Abraham Lewis entered 800 acres in the area, including the land that the university now occupies. While Abraham never actually moved onto his land, Lewis at once settled on the site of the present Birdwood Estate. By the time Albemarle County was officially organized in 1744, Lewis' residence was a well-known place within the county.

In 1745, Lewis was commissioned as a captain in the county militia. During the same time period, his neighbor Peter Jefferson was commissioned as a lieutenant colonel in the militia. Throughout the next few decades, Lewis was very active in local affairs, serving as one of the early magistrates of Albemarle County, a member of the House of Burgesses, an overseer of the clearing of several roads in the region, and an executor of other works of public convenience. During the French and Indian War (1754-1763), Lewis served in the armed forces of Virginia as a major.

In his old age, Lewis frequently taught school gratuitously for the benefit of the poor. While he never inflicted corporal punishment on his pupils (as was common during the time period), he would, on Friday evenings, tie bundles of rods onto the backs of his students and send them home if they had violated his rules during the week.

In January of 1773, the first Baptist service in the county took place in Lewis' Meeting House, which stood on the elevated ground south of Staunton Road. The church commenced with a membership of forty-eight people and was eventually presided over by George Twyman. Its services being heavily influenced by Presbyterian practices (as the majority of its members had grown up in that denomination), the church was variously referred to by the names of Albemarle, Buck Mountain, and Chestnut Grove.

Lewis died in Charlottesville in August of 1779 after over-exerting himself while cutting down a tree on a hot day.

Family and descendants

Lewis was married three times throughout his life; the identity of his second wife is unknown.

Around 1717, he married Elizabeth Anne Terrell and had eight children with her. His oldest child William Terrell Lewis was born in Hanover County in 1718 and kept a tavern on Staunton Road, about three miles west of Charlottesville, called at first Terrell's and subsequently Lewis' Ordinary. He married Sarah Martin and had eleven children with her (three of whom fought in the American Revolutionary War) before emigrating first to North Carolina and then to Nashville, where he died in 1802.

Lewis' other children with Terrell were Susan, Hannah, Sarah, David, John, Joel, and Ann. Susan married Alexander Mackey and lived for a time along Ivy Creek, near the crossing of the Whitehall Road. Hannah married James Hickman, son of the second sheriff of the county. Sarah married Abraham Musick, who lived in the vicinity of Mechums River. Ann married first Joel Terrell Jr. and then Stephen Willis. David Lewis Jr. owned numerous parcels of land along Mechums River and there carried on a mercantile business. He moved to North Carolina immediately prior to the outbreak of the Revolution, and though twice married had no sons. John was twice married, first to Sarah Taliaferro and then to Susan Clarkson, and had twelve children, many of whom fought in the Revolution as well as the 1794 Whiskey Rebellion.

In 1753, Lewis married Mary McGrath, widow of Dr. Hart of Philadelphia, and had three children with her, named Elizabeth, James, and Miriam. Elizabeth married John Martin, while Miriam married Colonel Gabriel Madison. James became a figure of great prominence in the county, serving as a magistrate, contractor, large landholder, owner and keeper of the old Stone Tavern, agent of President James Monroe, and employee of both the courts and his fellow citizens in the appraisement and division of estates. Living in the homestead of his father, James married Lucy, the daughter of John Thomas, and had eleven children with her. In 1818, James emigrated to Franklin County in Tennessee before returning to Albemarle County in 1826 and remarrying to Mary, daughter of Peter Marks.

Lewis was engaged to be married for the fourth time before he passed away in 1779. Through the descendants of his first marriage with Terrell, he is an eighth great-grandparent of President Barack Obama.

Legacy

Lewis Mountain (as well as the accompanying Lewis Mountain Road), which was located on his plantation just west of the university, was named after Lewis.