William Stith

William Stith (1707 – September 19, 1755)[1] was an early American historian and a minister.[2] He was the third president of the College of William & Mary (1752–1755), where Stith Hall was named for him.

William Stith
3rd President of the College of William & Mary
In office 1752–1755
Preceded by	William Dawson
Succeeded by	Thomas Dawson
Personal details
Born	1707
Died	(1755-09-19)September 19, 1755
Alma mater	College of William & Mary The Queen's College, Oxford

Early life

Stith was the son of Captain John Stith and Mary Randolph, a daughter of William Randolph (1650– 1711).[1][3][lower-alpha 1] Stith's grandfather was Major John Stith, who participated in Nathaniel Bacon's rebellion.[1][4]

Stith was educated at the College of William & Mary's Grammar School and The Queen's College, Oxford.[2][5] On May 27, 1728, he received his B.A. degree. On April 12, 1731, while still in England, he was ordained a minister of the Anglican Church.[2] He then returned to Williamsburg.[2]

Career

William Stith (1747) The History of the First Discovery and Settlement of Virginia: being an Essay towards a General History of this Colony, Williamsburg: William Parks.

In October 1731, he became a master of the College of William & Mary's Grammar School. He also began his role at the Virginia House of Burgesses as a chaplain.[2] Stith was a minister for 16 years at the Henrico Parish in Henrico County beginning in 1736.[2] He was also a minister in York County, Virginia of the York-Hampton Parish. In the 1740s and 1750s, three of his sermons were published.[2]

The Sinfulness and Pernicious Nature of Gaming, 1752 was preached by Stith in Williamsburg before the Virginia General Assembly on March 1, 1752.[6] The General Assembly had considered amending the 1748 Act for preventing excessive and deceitful gambling, but tabled the measure after hearing the sermon.[6] The sermon was published in 1752 and became one of the best selling titles that year.[6]

He is the author of one of the earliest histories of Virginia, The History of the First Discovery and Settlement of Virginia: being an Essay towards a General History of this Colony, published in Williamsburg by William Parks in 1747.[7][8]

He was also the College of William & Mary's third president (1752–1755) and is the namesake of Stith Hall, a residence hall on the campus.[9][10]

Marriage and children

He married his first cousin, Judith Randolph, the daughter of Thomas Randolph of Tuckahoe on July 13, 1738.[2][lower-alpha 2] They had three daughters: Judith, Elizabeth, and Mary.[1]

Notes

1. Goode states that his parents were Captain John Stith and Mary Randolph and that they married in 1688.[4] Page states that they had married in 1712,[3] which would have been five years after William's birth in 1707.[4][1]
2. He was also said to have married her around 1744.[1][3]

References

1. Gordon, Armistead C (1914). "The Stith Family". In Tyler, Lyon G. (ed.). William and Mary College Quarterly Historical Magazine. XXII. Richmond, Virginia: Whittet & Shepperson. pp. 44–45. Retrieved February 25, 2011.
2. Flora, Joseph M.; Vogel, Amber (2006-06-21). Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary. LSU Press. p. 384. ISBN 978-0-8071-4855-6.
3. Page, Richard Channing Moore (1893). "Randolph Family". Genealogy of the Page Family in Virginia (2 ed.). New York: Press of the Publishers Printing Co. pp. 249–272.
4. Goode, George Brown (1887). Virginia Cousins: A Study of the Ancestry and Posterity of John Goode of Whitby, a Virginia Colonist of the Seventeenth Century, with Notes Upon Related Families, a Key to Southern Genealogy and a History of the English Surname Gode, Goad, Goode Or Good from 1148 to 1887. J. W. Randolph & English. p. 211.
5. Tyler, Lyon Gardiner, ed. (1915). "Burgesses and Other Prominent Persons". Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography. II. New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company. pp. 330–331.
6. Bond, Edward L. (2004). "Spreading the Gospel in Colonial Virginia: Sermons and Devotional Writings". Lexington Books. Retrieved January 11, 2020.
7. "Discovery: Stith History of the First Discovery and Settlement of Virginia". The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-01.
8. Fiske, John (1897). Old Virginia and Her Neighbours. Houghton, Mifflin and Company. pp. 255–256.
9. "William & Mary - Bryan Complex". Wm.edu. Retrieved 2016-07-02.
10. "Stith Hall". William & Mary. Retrieved January 11, 2020.

Further reading

• Stith, William (1747). The History of the First Discovery and Settlement of Virginia.