Fourth Generation
Gabriel Newby, who quarreled with his in-laws, was our direct ancestor. Based on his age when he died, Gabriel was born about 1665, possibly after the family moved to Dublin. He came to Virginia, where he likely lived in Nansemond County near other members of the family. It appears he was a family leader in moving to North Carolina, based on a Perquimans Court record dated 25 March 1701 which states “Gabriell Nuby provd his Rights to 200 acrs of Land by ye Importation of Wm. Nuby, Gilbert Smith, Ralph Buffkin, Gabriell Nuby.”
This land grant was called a “headright.” The headright system was used in four of the Southern
colonies as an attempt to solve the labor shortage problem due to the raising of tobacco, which
required large plots of land and a large number of workers. It was also a way to attract new
immigrants. Immigrant colonists who paid for their passage were given one headright, typically 50 acres, and would receive an additional headright of 50 acres for each passenger for whom they paid the passage.
When Gabriel Newby came to North Carolina is not known, but it was likely in the 1680s. He married on 1 June 1689 to 18-year-old Mary Tomes, the daughter of Francis Tomes. Four years later, on 22 July 1693, Francis Tomes assigned the rights to a 278-acre land patent to Gabriel Newby. On 26 March 1699 Gabriel bought another 240 acres from Francis Tomes’ stepson Samuel Charles, land that had been given him by Tomes. In ensuing years, Gabriel bought additional plots of land and received additional land grants. He did not keep all the land. For example, after receiving 374 acres of a Lord Proprietor land grant in 1720, Gabriel sold 324 acres of the patent to Peter Person for £40 “and the other 50 acres to Anthony Haskitt.” He certainly was a large landowner, referring in a 1724 deed to one parcel as “my 640 acres.” At his death, Gabriel Newby owned well over a thousand acres of land and several slaves.
In several deeds from 1699 to 1723, Gabriel Newby was identified as a “wheelwright” (one who built wheels for wagons). But he evidently dabbled in the law, as he was noted in court records from Perquimans Precinct as “Gabrill Newby, Aturnney,” “Gabrel Newby, Atturney” and similar references.
In all likelihood, his law skills were limited to simple preparation of documents for others, since he was relatively skilled in writing, serving as clerk of his Quaker meeting for some years.
As mentioned earlier in this work, Gabriel Newby got into a serious spat with his father-in-law Francis Tomes and Francis’ wife at that time. In 1709 the only business before the Quaker yearly meeting for North Carolina was the settlement of a difficulty between Francis Tomes and Gabriel Newby. Francis Tomes accused “Gabriel as being wholly dead to his ministry to him, and he received no benefit by his ministry, and says he sways the whole meeting how he pleases, whether it be right or wrong.” But it was further noted in the records that Francis Tomes, “contrary to good order used amongst us, set with his hat on when Gabriel was at prayer and when he was preaching turned his back to him as a dislike to his testimony.”
The yearly meeting secured from each a promise to “live in peace and love and pass by all offenses that are past.” But the ‘let bygones be bygones’ stuff evidently didn’t work and one gets the impression from later records and Francis Tomes’ will that hostility between the two continued to the end of their days.
Besides raising ten children of his own, Gabriel Newby agreed to raise two orphans. On 9 March
1703 in the Perquimans Precinct Court, Gabriel filed a petition “for two orphants left him by Mary Hancock the late wife of Thoms Hancocke.” The court agreed to bind the orphans to Gabriel in return for “his endeavour to learne the boy the trade of a wheelwright” and at the expiration of their indenture to provide a year old heifer to the boy and “to ye girle at her freedome one Cow and Calfe.”
Gabriel Newby was a prominent Quaker, mentioned in a number of records as early as 1695 as a
colonial official residing in Perquimans Precinct. In 1703 Gabriel served in the lower house of the General Assembly. In November 1707 he joined the Proprietary Council during William Glover’s
presidency of the Council as one of the Lords Proprietors’ deputies. From that position Gabriel
supported the efforts of Thomas Cary to assume executive control in the colony. Newby served on
the Council during Cary’s term as governor from July 1708 until January 1711, when Cary and his
supporters were ousted. Thereafter, Gabriel Newby disappeared from provincial politics.
There’s actually a lot more to the story of Gabriel Newby’s support of Thomas Cary, a forgotten
corner of history which came to be known as Cary’s Rebellion. The quarrel that rocked the North
Carolina colony and led to this rebellion was essentially a religious conflict with political overtones.
The Quaker sect was firmly entrenched in North Carolina, to the point that for several decades it was essentially the only organized religion. In 1694, with the appointment of the Quaker John Archdale as governor, Quakers dominated all branches of government in the colony. Supporters of the Anglican (Church of England) faith felt that they were being discriminated against in political matters, an ironic reversal of roles for the two groups.
In 1699 a zealous Anglican, Henderson Walker, became governor. The next year, he persuaded the General Assembly to pass a vestry act establishing the Church of England as the colony’s official church, to be supported by taxes to be levied upon the colonists. At almost the same time Queen Anne came to the throne, thus necessitating the renewing of various oaths of loyalty by the colony’s officials and Assemblymen. The Quakers, unwilling to swear to an oath because of their faith, offered to affirm as they had done in the past. The Anglican establishment refused to accept this, and barred all Quakers from public office. The colony quickly split into two parties, the Church party and the Quaker party. Matters went from bad to worse, and politics became increasingly bitter as time went on.
In 1705 Thomas Cary was named governor. He supported the Church party, but the Quakers were
able to secure his removal from office. But William Glover, president of the council, was a far more ardent supporter of the establishment than Cary, and he withheld the order removing Cary from office.
Cary, meanwhile, switched his allegiance to the Quaker party, and in 1708 he managed to oust Glover from office and force him and the more ardent supporters of the Church party to flee to Virginia.
From 1708 to 1710, Cary and the Quaker party dominated the political life of the colony, and Gabriel Newby was in the thick of it.
This was the same time frame in which Gabriel Newby and his father-in-law had a serious falling out.
Since there is evidence the two were on opposite sides of the Cary’s Rebellion issue, the problems between the two probably had more to do with politics than with religion.
In January 1711, Edward Hyde arrived in North Carolina claiming the governorship of the colony.
While his commission as governor had not been “technically perfected,” Cary seemed willing to let Hyde assume office. But after taking office, Hyde began to pursue a policy hostile to the Quakers and Cary refused to recognize him and claimed the governorship until such time as Hyde could produce his commission. With this, the colony, already tense after years of bitter political and religious strife, split into two armed camps, and open warfare quickly ensued.
The two groups went at it for the next several months with hundreds of men, cannons and even a
“brigantine of six guns,” perhaps the first and only North Carolina navy. The governor of Virginia finally intervened and sent Royal marines to aid Hyde in July 1711. Cary and his chief supporters were seized and sent in chains to England, but with the help of friends there, they were able to secure their freedom. Cary returned to North Carolina and soon slipped into obscurity, as did Gabriel Newby’s short political career.
There is no record of Gabriel himself being punished for his involvement in Cary’s Rebellion. But he was mentioned as one of the people involved. In a letter to the Lord Proprietors, Edward Hyde wrote that “Thomas Cary and John Porter Esqre were impeathed of high crimes and misdemeanours” and that they “did confederate with ... severall other desperate and evil minded persons as also with Emanuel Low, Gabriel Newby and many others of the people called Quakers and raised an
insurrection against the lawfull Authority of the Lords Proprietors of North Carolina.”
In his will dated 26 March 1733, Gabriel Newby left “plantations” to sons Joseph, Francis and Jesse, indicating that each of the three already lived on the bequeathed land. He also left 300 acres to grandson William Newby. The youngest son, Samuel Newby, received “my maner plantation with all my other land whereever to be found belonging to me.” He also left his water mill to Samuel with the stipulation the Francis and Jesse got “the use of them sometimes they helping to keep ye mill in repair and if not to loose that previledge.” The will also mentions “all my negroes” but only mentions five by name.
The records of the Pasquotank Monthly Meeting note that “Gabriel Newbey, Sr.” died February
1735/1736 “in his 70th year.” His widow Mary died 11 January 1738/1739.
http://family.beacondeacon.com/the-history-of-the-hunt-family-by-roger-d-hunt-2011-at-www-k7mex-com-books-HuntBookComplete.pdf
