Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 4.djvu/83

and four daughters. All their sons became business men of prominence. Marie Antoinette, one of their daughters, married Wil liam Henry Henson (see Henson IV).

Sarah (Kerr) Hoge was the daughter of William and Mary Anne (Grove) Kerr, and granddaughter of Robert. Kerr, of Summerdean, Augusta county, Virginia, who emigrated from Scotland to America in 1763. The latter settled first near Philadelphia. Pennsylvania, owning flour mills on the Schuylkill, remained there until after the revolution, then settled in Augusta county, Virginia, on Middle river, where he founded the estate and homestead, yet known as Summerdean and still in the possession of his descendants. He married, in Fifeshire, Scotland, Elizabeth Bayley, of Wales, and had issue: David, died unmarried; Daniel. married Mary Kirkpatrick; Margaret, married Robert Dunlop; William, married Mary Anne Grove Elizabeth, married Isaac Grey. Children of William and Mary Anne (Grove) Kerr: Bayley, died in 1823. at Jefferson Medical College, Pennsylvania: Elizabeth, married Moses Wallace; David, married Jane Dunlop, his first cousin: Margaret, married Elijah Hogshead; Sarah, married Rev. Peter Charles Hoge; Robert Grove, married Cassandia McCutcheon; Samuel X., married (first) Elizabeth Clark, (second) Mary Drewry Rhodes, (third) Nannie Williamson; Mary Jane, married Dr. William N. Anderson.

Robert Kerr, the emigrant ancestor, de- scended from John Kerr, of the Forest of Selkirk, Scotland, who was living in 1357 and whose ancestors came from France with William the Conqueror.

The Bryan Family. Joseph Bryan, eighth child of John Randolph and Elizabeth Tucker (Coalter) Bryan, was born at his father's plantation, "Eagle Point." in the county of Gloucester, Virginia, August 13. 1845, died at his country seat. "Laburnum." near Richmond, Virginia, November 20, 1908. Since his death the press throughout the whole country has teemed with appreciatory articles dealing with his marvelous energy, intuitive sagacity, bold initiative. and consummate administrative ability, as a man of affairs. His success was indeed brilliant, but it is the other "shining half" that shall abide with us, when its more material complement, if not altogether forgot, shall, perhaps, be unregarded. Yet even here, there must needs be more or less of "catalogue," for 'tis a trite aphorism that "character," however virile and self-poised, always owes much to environment.

Jonathan Bryan, known as the "pestilential Rebel." (grandson of Josepl. Bryan, the first of the name in the Colonies, who settled in South Carolina some time during the second half of the seventeenth century) was born in 1708, left South Carolina (where he had several plantations) in 1733. joined Oglethorp in Georgia, assisted him in selecting the site of Savannah, took part in his "expedition" against the Spaniards in Florida in 1736, and finally settled down on a plantation (which he called "Brampton") on the Savannah river, a few miles above the newly-established town of the same name. He owned several other plantations in Georgia besides "Brampton."

For twenty years (1754-1774) he was a member of the King's council of that province, but he was "a furious Whig," and, on the first mutterings of resistance to the encroachments of the "Royal Prerogative," was so outspoken in his denunciations of any invasion of the rights of the people, that he was summarily expelled from that august body (1774). Whereupon, the "Union Society in Georgia," composed of equally recalcitrant gentry-folk, prayed his formal acceptance of a noble silver tankard of generous dimensions (still at "Laburnum") on which one may see inscribed: "To Jonathan Bryan, Esquire, who for Publickly Appearing in Favour of the Rights and Liberties of the People was excluded from His Majesty's Council of this Province, this Piece of Plate, as a Mark of their Esteem, is Presented by the Union Society in Georgia. Ita cuique eveniat de republica meruit."

Three years later (1777) we find him "Acting Vice-President and Commander-in-Chief of Georgia and Ordinary of the Same." He took a very active part in the revolution, was a member of the "Committee of Public Safety for Georgia," and, when he was surprised and seized on one of his plantations by a raiding party of British soldiers, General Prevost in a letter to Lord George Germain rejoices at the capture of such "a notorious ring-leader of Rebellion." (One sees that our Joseph Bryan came rightfully enough by his "Rebel spirit!"). He, with his son. James, was sent northward, by sea.