Text Box: The Washington Family Stone and Old St. Luke’s Church The mission of Old St Lukes is to offer Christian worship, and to teach American history as it touches this pioneer, frontier church. We are able to trace an amazing number of connections to the names and events that are known to the general public. But how they are tied to Old St Lukes is the teaching mission of this church, the history program and tours we offer, and the history content of this newsletter. The Washington family name begins with William Fitz (son of) Patric, As an adult, William was the tenant of land owned by the Bishop of Durham in Hertburn, County Durham, England. William adopted the name of the village as his surname, to be known as William de Hertburn. About 1180, as payment for his military duties, William next moved to Wessyngton (Norman French spelling) where he chose the manor house there and he changed his name again to become William de Wessyngton. In later generations, the spelling became Washington (or else our nation’s capitol today would be Wessyngton, District of Columbia). Time and generations march on and in 1500 Lawrence Washington was born. In 1539 he purchased Sulgrave Manor for 324 pounds, from King Henry VIII, who had dissolved the monasteries in England, and took possession from the previous occupant, the Priory of St. Andrew, Northampton. Lawrence’s coat of arms, showing stars and stripes, which is in a stained glass window of nearby Fawsley Church, might have been part of the inspiration for the American flag. Text Box: The Sulgrave Manor passed through successive generations until Col. John Washington, the great-grandfather of the first President of the United Sates, left England and emigrated to Virginia in 1657. John’s eldest son was named Lawrence, whose son was named Augustine, who married Mary Ball and in 1732 they gave birth to a son whom they named George Washington. Augustine died 1743, leaving his wife with six other children in a six room farm house called Ferry Farm, near Fredericksburg, Virginia. Lawrence became the family surrogate father, 14 years George’s senior. Lawrence later married Ann from the wealthy Fairfax dynasty, and adolescent George spent a great deal of his youth at Lawrence and Ann’s home, Mt. Vernon. Sulgrave stone at Old St Lukes The plaque on the wall of Old St. Lukes reads: This stone is from the fabric of Sulgrave Manor, Northamptonshire, England, the ancestral home of the Washington family. It is placed here in honor of George Washington and John Neville, united in their ideals of an orderly government, co-workers in suppressing the Whiskey Insurrection, the only armed conflict of which occurred on a hill adjacent to this church, on July 17, 1794. Erected by the Pennsylvania Society of the Colonial Dames of America September 30, 1928.