The Long Journey of “Scotch John” Michie
Founded in 1966, the Louisa County Historical Society is 50 years young with 2016. One of the Historical Society’s proudest achievements is the relocation and restoration in 2013 of an 18th Century farmhouse originally built by Robert Michie in historic Green Springs, a Western District of Louisa County.
Since 2013, the two-story, 16’ by 16’ Michie House has been permanently re-situated on the grounds of the Sargeant Museum on Fredericksburg Avenue in Louisa, and It has been fully restored to the condition it likely was in when it was originally built in 1790. There’s even an amazing backstory to the Michie House, and that’s the tale of Robert’s father, “Scotch John” Michie.
On January 16, 1716 at age 30, John Michie was deposited from a dank and cramped British prison transportation ship onto a frozen wharf at the Port of York, Crown Colony of Virginia. He was accompanied by 112 other Scots recently convicted of treason by a Liverpool Court as a result of their participation in the Jacobite Rebellion of 1715. Once in the New World, John Michie would work his way along the York, Pamunkey, South Anna, and North Anna waterways until he was financially able build a large family homestead just south of the town of Louisa. By the time of his death in 1777, “Scotch John” Michie owned over 10,000 acres of prime land in Louisa and Albemarle Counties.
The story begins with John Michie’s birth in 1685 in Abedeenshire, Scotland. The reigning monarch of Great Britain at time was Charles II of the Stewart dynasty. John’s father, Robert Michie, had married Margaret Farquharson. The Farquharson family was one of the most powerful clans in Scotland and the Michies were a notable sub-Clan to them. The Farquharsons derived their influence from their long-standing military alliance with the Stewarts. In 1714, after the Stewarts’ permanent fall from power, a Stewart Pretender to the throne and his allies whipped up civil unrest in Scotland, clamoring for a Stewart restoration to the joint English/Scottish throne. One of the dissidents, Colonel John Farquharson, likely John’s uncle, mustered a force of several thousand locals including John Michie. In the late summer of 1715, this home grown army of Scots invaded England. A larger, better equipped English army trounced the Scottish force at Preston in Northwest England in early November 1715. Nearly 300 Scots including Michie were taken prisoner and marched to nearby Liverpool for a quick trial, conviction, and sentencing to transportation to the North American colonies. They were the lucky Scottish prisoners. The suspected ringleaders of the rebellion including Colonel Farquharson were whisked off to London for judicial proceedings with more serious consequences.
After a two month sail across the Atlantic during most of which he was shackled, Michie disembarked the prison transportation ship in the New World without means. He had not agreed to be an indentured servant, a restrictive employment condition that some of his fellow Scottish transportees had already accepted. Instead, he set out to be self-made. At 30, he was one of the older of the Scottish convicts and likely had marketable trade skills that he had been taught as a result of his services to the Farquharson Clan. Chances are that one skill would have been basic carpentry, making him an invaluable resource in the building boom then going on at the Port of York. Large numbers of wharfs and warehouses were being erected to accommodate the increasing amounts of “sweet scented” York River tobacco being exported to Great Britain. Michie also could have been a recruit for the work teams hired to begin construction on the Scotchtown Plantation in Western Hanover County beginning in 1717. Admiring their industry, the owner of the Scotchtown property at the time, Charles Chiswell, nearly exclusively employed emigrating Scots. Chiswell may also have discovered that Michie possessed another valuable skill. The Farquharsons’ need for military equipment and living in the iron rich eastern Highlands of Scotland, likely gave Michie iron-working and armorer experience. Chiswell was a renowned metallurgist and had established an iron furnace not only at Scotchtown and but also on the north bank of the North Anna River near Sturgeon Creek.
From 1716 to 1728, working his way up the York River Valley, Michie likely met and worked with or for many of the most prominent men in the western Virginia Colony including Mann Page, Christopher Carr, John Poindexter, and Nicholas Meriwether. Finally, in 1732 Michie began construction on his family homestead on the South Anna River between Beaver and Harris Creeks. The property lies today on Horseshoe Farm Road about five miles south of the current Louisa County Courthouse. Nicholas Meriwether and John Poindexter were adjoining property owners. In 1735, Scotch John’s third son Robert would be born there.
During the American Revolution, Robert Michie was appointed a colonel in the Virginia Continental Militia and fought under the command of the Marquis de Lafayette. His older brother, William, had enlisted in the Continental Army in 1775 and was with Washington’s Army at Valley Forge when word of Scotch John’s death reached him in the winter of 1777. As a result of his father’s death, William was released from his Army contract. He returned to Louisa and moved his family to the Albemarle County property that his father had bequeathed to him. There, he build and operated a tavern just outside of the town of Charlottesville – the original Michie Tavern - which remains in business today just below Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Younger brother, Robert, used his inheritance to establish a homestead in the Green Springs District Louisa County and in 1790, on a section of that property, he would build a small 16’ by 16’ home for his newly married son, William. The house remained there until 2013 when it was gently moved to the Sargeant Museum grounds and lovingly restored.
For more information on the Louisa County Historical Society’s 2016 calendar of events celebrating Louisa County, they invite all interested in local history to go their Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/Louisa-County-Historical-Society or just stop by the Sargeant Museum at 214 Fredericksburg Avenue, Louisa. The Museum’s hours are 10 am to 4 pm Monday through Friday.
Original Article
The original article above was published on The Lake Anna Breeze on February 2nd, 2016.
http://lakeannabreeze.com/news/the-long-journey-of-scotch-john-michie
