Burbage Family
In the year 1555, John Burbage was the Bailiff and, ex officio, Chief Magistrate of Stratford-upon-Avon, the birth-place of William Shakespeare. Subsequently, this office was held by Francis Burbage, and later on by John Shakespeare, the father of the great poet.
The record of this Court has shown that, during John Burbage's term of office, he presided over a trial in which John Shakespeare was sued for a sum of money. These facts appear in William Shakespeare's biography as published in George L. Duyckinck's edition of his works, by Porter & Coates, Philadelphia, Pa.
The next point of interest is the intimate association of Shakespeare with James Burbage and his son, Richard, in the dramatic profession, in London. Under the title "Shakespeare," in the ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, it is stated that James Burbage had been a fellow townsman of Shakespeare; and a transcript of a letter written by Lord Southampton, introducing and commending William Shakespeare and Richard Burbage, was found among Lord Elsmere's papers filed while he was Lord Chancellor, in which it is said that Shakespeare and Richard Burbage were from the same county" and almost the same town."
That the advent of the two Burbages in London preceded that of Shakespeare by some years, is the concurrent testimony of all writers on the subject. James Burbage had been an actor in a company of players organized by the Earl of Leicester, sometimes called Burbage's players, which gave performances in London and elsewhere, long before the erection of any building in England, specially designed for such a purpose. To James Burbage belongs the distinction of having erected in London; in 1575, the original Black Friars Theater, the first theater built in England.
In an article in Scribner's Magazine for May, 1891, Alexander Cargill says: "This place (the Curtain Theater) and 'The Theater' as Burbage's place was distinctively known, were the only two theaters in the city proper, when young Shakespeare first arrived in London." From the facts already stated, Shakespeare's connection with the Burbages, in London, is quite natural, on the assumption that he went there to enter the dramatic profession. Accordingly, the writer of the article in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Dr. Baynes, referring to Shakespeare's early career in London, says: "But from his first coming up (to London), it seems clear that he was more identified with the Earl of Leicester's players of whom he was more identified with the Earl of Leicester's players of of whom his energetic fellow townsman, James Burbage, was the head, than any other group of actors."
It is further stated by the same writer, on documentary evidence, that the Burbages originally introduced Shakespeare to the Blackfriars Company and gave him an interest as part proprietor in the Blackfriar's property. Knight, in his biography of Shakespeare, says there is no reason to doubt that Shakespeare first went to London accompanied by Richard Burbage, who, at the time of his death, owned the Blackfriar's Theater, and an interest in several others. He had become the greatest tragedian of his time, was the first actor to perform the part of Hamlet in the great play of that name, as well as the part of the Moor in Othello. He is often spoken of as the "Garrick of the Elizabethan Stage," and Lord Southampton calls him "Our English Roscius," one who fitteth the action to the word and the word to the action most admirably. Some writers contend that Shakespeare wrote the part of Hamlet expressly for Richard Burbage, and the write, in Scribner's Magazine, says: "There can be no question that it was by the histrionic excellence of Burbage that Shakespeare was influenced and encouraged in the writing of more than one of his great plays." Thus it appears that the Burbages were efficient in preparing and cultivating the field from which Shakespeare was to reap an immortal fame which, in its turn, has served to perpetuate their names in history.
It now remains to indicate, briefly, the lines along which the genealogy of the Burbage family in Adams County may be traced back to the London Burbages should any one have opportunity and an inclination to do so. It is well known that the English colony established at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607, was the result of a commercial enterprise undertaken by a company organized in London.
In a large work recently published by Alexander Brown entitled "The Genesis of the United States," he shows from records in England that Richard Burbage was a member of this company. He died in London in 1618, leaving a son, William. The land records of Virginia show that, in 1636, a William Burbage and also Captain Thomas Burbage resided in the colony at Jamestown. From 1636 to 1638. the authorities at Jamestown granted patents to Thomas Burbage for several tracts of land in Virginia, among which was a tract of 1,250 acres located in Accomac County. Virginia, adjoining Worcester County, Maryland. The Record of Wills in Worcester County shows that Burbage died there as far back as 1726. In this record the names of both Thomas and William Burbage recur in successive generations. This fact, together with the close proximity of the locality to the land owned by Thomas Burbage in the adjoining county of Accomac, creates a strong presumption of relationship between the Maryland and Virginia Burbages, especially when considered in connection with the well known historical fact that many of the Jamestown people emigrated to the eastern shore of Maryland soon after Jamestown was settled.
Thomas Burbage's death is accounted for in Henning's Virginia Statutes, Volume 1, page 405. wherein the order of the Court is shown directing a division of his lands so that his widow could choose her dower. In this order, William Burbage is to have the remainder as heir at law, but in some of the records he is mentioned as "head right" in connection with these lands. But in none of the records at Jamestown, thus far discovered, is any evidence found indicating that William Burbage died in that vicinity. This strengthens the presumption that he crossed the bay, settled on the land in Accomac County, and thus became the head of the various branches of the Burbage family in Maryland. Their presence there can be accounted for in no other way from the present state of facts. It is to be regretted that opportunity to confirm this view of the matter by examination of the records of Accomac County has not been had.
Thomas Burbage, who died in Worcester County, Maryland, in 1722, aged ninety-six years, was the ancestor of the Adams County Burbages. One of his sons, the Rev. Edward Burbage, who also died in Worcester County, Maryland, in 1812, was the father of Levin Duncan Burbage who settled near the present site of Bradysville; of Thomas Burbage, near Bentonville; of Dolly Burbage (Mrs. Smashea), of West Union; of Elizabeth Burbage, full brothers and sisters, and of Joel Burbage, a half brother, who lived near Decatur, together with his three sisters, Ann, Sarah, Rhoda, (Mrs. Schultz) and Mary. They emigrated together, via Pittsburg and the Ohio River, and landed at Manchester in the Spring of 1816. Two years later, Levin D. Burbage went to Maryland and back, traveling alone on horseback, through what was then almost a continuous wilderness.
All of these people were devout Christians and members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, as was their father before them, and his sincerity was evinced in his refusal to accept from his father a proffered gift of some slaves, on the ground that slavery was contrary to the spirit of Christianity. This brings the history of the Burbage family down to a time within the memory of its oldest surviving members, and of these we have space for only a brief sketch of the career of one, who having represented the county in a public capacity, should be mentioned along with others sustaining similiar relations to the public. We refer to Captain William D. Burbage, who was the youngest of the nine children born to Levin Duncan Burbage and his wife, Sarah H. Cropper, daughter of John Cropper.
Captain Burbage was born on his father's farm near Bradyville, December 31, 1835.
The father having died in 1840, and the mother in 1841, the boy was left in the care of Edward, his only brother and guardian, who resided at the parental homestead until 1846, when he moved to a farm which he had purchased, located about two miles from West Union on Beasley's Fork. At that time much of the land in this neighborhood was covered by primeval forests and the business of farming consisted largely of work in the woods, especially during the time when the planting, cultivating or harvesting of crops did not require attention. In such a community, physical labor is respectable and young men and boys have no fear that hard work will degrade them in the general estimate of individual worth. Thus stimulated by environment and blessed with health and strength, young Burbage grew to be an efficient "farm hand," a fact of much importance in his first efforts to acquire an education.
Naturally, educational facilities in the country were quite limited— the usual annual term in the public schools consisting of three months. Yet the boy who could be spared to attend the entire term was exceptionally favored. During one of these years the subject of this sketch was in school but seventeen days, and up to the year 1853, he had scarcely contemplated the possibility of ever acquiring more than the mere rudiments of learning.
But about this time, Wm. M. Scott came into the neighborhood and engaged to teach for a term of three months in the Ellison school house, as it was called, and to this fact, more than any other, Captain Burbage attributes a change in his career which has resulted in his becoming a student for life.
Scott was an excellent teacher and possessed the rare faculty of inspiring in his pupils a feeling of self-reliance whereby almost any one may largely educate himself.
This idea of self-culture took practical form in 1860, when Scott, Burbage and Robert S. Cruzan—all teachers at the time—rented a double log cabin on Moore's Run and started what they called "Trinity Institute." In this they were soon joined by other teachers, and several students who had not yet engaged in teaching.
The plan was for each teacher to conduct recitations in those studies in which he was farther advanced than the others, while they served in like manner in respect to such studies as they were severally best fitted to conduct, as determined by experience and mutual agreement, until the curriculum of an ordinary college course should be mastered.
What the ultimate development of this enterprise might have been, had not the war of 1861 broken it up, can never be known; but it was the unanimous judgment of all—teachers and pupils alike, that they had never made more rapid progress—even in studies none of them had previously pursued, than they made in that school during its life of two summers.
Captain Burbage was the principal teacher of the public schools in Winchester in 1861, and finished his career as an educator by completing a term as Superintendent of the Public Schools of Manchester in 1869, in the room, in which ten years before, he had ceased to attend the public schools as a student. In 1862, he entered the Army as Second Lieutenant of Company E, 91st O. V. I., in which he served till the close of the war. receiving promotions, meanwhile, to the rank of First Lieutenant and Captain, in succession, according to the rule of seniority. During the summer of 1866, a vacancy was created in the lower House of the Ohio Legislature by the death of the lamented Col. H. L. Phillips, and Capt. Burbage was elected to fill the vacancy, having as a competitor for the place, his old friend and comrade in the army, Mr. F. D. Bayless, who was the Democratic candidate. Captain Burbage regards his efforts to secure the enactment of the law under which the public turnpikes of Adams County were established, as the most important of his services in the Legislature.
He was elected Mayor of Manchester soon after returning from Columbus, and while serving in this capacity, was very much puzzled on one occasion as to how he ought to decide a question of law argued before him by the distinguished attorney E. P. Evans, father of one of the two editors of this history.
Experience in the Legislature and the Mayor's office intensified a long felt desire on the part of the Captain, to know more about the laws and institutions of our country.
Accordingly, after moving his family to Kansas, where his father-in- law, the late George Pettit then resided, and after looking over the West for a while to discover ways and means to support his family and pursue his studies, he finally received, in September, 1869, an appointment in the Treasury Department in Washington where he has remained for thirty years, graduating, meanwhile, in the Law Department of Columbian University, and employing his leisure time thereafter in the study of scientific and philosophical literature touching the great problems of individual and social life, with a view to contributing, in some small degree at least, to the well-being of mankind.
From History of Adams County, Ohio from its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time - by Nelson W. Evans and Emmons B. Stivers - West Union, Ohio - Published by E. B. Stivers - 1900