Oldal 85 [85]
OCR
OO mz- —— — — — — — ' b. HrsTORIC. (GARDE WS. O'R OVTEREIN TA she walked in her fading beauty and her elegant apparel, and wept, until she died. Not far from the house the ashes of the beautiful Evelyn Byrd lie, near those of her grandfather, William Byrd the first, in the yard of old Westover Church, which, if we may liken Westover itself to an emerald clasp upon the necklace of the golden James, we might call a pendant. | The first Westover Church, which was built in the early part of the seventeenth century, stood on the shore of the river, still nearer Westover. The present church, which was erected about 1740, is somewhat back from the James, upon Herring Creek, a lazy, brown stream, bordered near the river by marshes, which give way to banks crowned with pines and cedars, sycamore, holly, and beech trees. It is a plain, low, rectangular structure of red brick, dwarfed by the great trees by which it is surrounded. The little church has passed through many vicissitudes. For many years the Byrds worshipped there, but early in the nineteenth century, when the Byrds had passed away and the Episcopal Church suffered its great depression in Virginia, its sacred offices were almost forgotten and it was used as a barn. Later still, during the War Between the States the graveyard wall was thrown down, the tombs broken, and McClellan’s troopers stabled their horses within the venerable walls of the edifice. After the war, the building was restored by James Hamlin Willcox, and is now again used as a church. A gentleman relates that, as a boy, his negro mammy carried him to service in this church. On weekdays he was allowed to go barefoot, but on Sundays his reluctant feet were forced into shoes. Safely ensconced in the pew, he would slyly wiggle his feet out of confinement and then wriggle his toes in the sand between the stone slabs of the floor. Through the old diamond-paned windows he would watch the bees clustering upon the roses that clambered about the embrasure, and, at last, to their drowsy hum, that blended [52]
