First Presbyterian Church of Alexandria (Historical Marker)

Here follows the inscription written on this roadside historical marker:

First Presbyterian Church of Alexandria
"Old Presbyterian Meeting House"
— American Presbyterian and Reformed Historical Site —

Panel 1 - upper middle of east face:
The First Presbyterian Church of Alexandria founded A.D. 1772. House of worship erected 1774. Destroyed by lightning July 20, 1835. Rebuilt on the same lot A.D. 1836.

Panel 2 - lower-middle of east face:
May 9, 1798 Having been proclaimed a day of fasting and prayer by the President of the United States (JOHN ADAMS) because of the danger of war with France GEORGE WASHINGTON attended in this church the proclamation sermon preached that day by Reverend James Muir, D.D. Erected by The Washington Society of Alexandria May 9, 1938

Panel 3 - above the steps, north corner of east face:
The Old Presbyterian Meeting House has been placed on the National Register of Historic Places by the United States Department of the Interior. Originally Built 1775. Rebuilt After Fire 1837. Erected 1938 by The Washington Society of Alexandria, U.S. Dept. of the Interior. (Marker Number 22.)


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Regarding First Presbyterian Church of Alexandria:
The Old Presbyterian Meeting House was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2001. This church is also one of 445 American Presbyterian and Reformed Historical Sites registered between 1973 and 2003 by the Presbyterian Historical Society (PHS), headquartered in Philadelphia. Approved sites received a metal plaque featuring John Calvin’s seal and the site’s registry number (PHS marker location unknown).

The following text is taken from the Presbyterian Historical Society website:
Scottish pioneers built Old Presbyterian Meeting House in 1774, when Virginia's Toleration Act allowed Dissenters to have their own houses of worship. George Washington occasionally worshipped and attended Masonic meetings here. The congregation held the first memorial service, 22 February 1800, commemorating Washington's birthday. Such famous personages as John Marshall, Francis Scott Key and Methodist leader Francis Asbury spoke from the Meeting House pulpit. Closed in 1889, the congregation was reborn in 1949 under Southern Presbyterian auspices. Now a part of the Presbytery of National Capital Union, Old Presbyterian Meeting House is both Presbyterian Church in the US and United Presbyterian Church in the USA.


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Here follows a summary of the property from the Virginia Department of Historic Resources website:

Constructed in 1836-37, the Old Presbyterian Meeting House on South Fairfax Street in the Alexandria Historic District is the home of city’s second-oldest, and first non-Anglican, religious congregation. The well-proportioned two-story brick building was constructed on the site of an earlier church that was erected in 1775 and burned after being struck by lightning in 1835. The handsome edifice is late Federal style in design with a front-facing pedimented gable, flared brick jack arches over openings with keystones, and a five-stage brick and wood bell tower attached to the rear. Despite remodelings in the Victorian period and during the early 20th century, the Old Presbyterian Meeting House retains much of its original character. In addition to the church, the lot contains a half-gable-roofed brick manse, a form locally known as a “flounder,” built in 1787; and a cemetery with a number of original stone markers from 1772 to 1810. The tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the American Revolution, which was dedicated in 1929, is also located within the Old Presbyterian Meeting House property.


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Here follows a summary of the church from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

The Old Presbyterian Meeting House is a Christian church located at 321 South Fairfax Street in the Old Town neighborhood of Alexandria, Virginia. It is part of the National Capital Presbytery and the Synod of the Mid-Atlantic of the Presbyterian Church (USA).

The meeting house was originally built in 1775 in the Early Republic style, but was largely destroyed by fire in 1835. It was rebuilt in 1836, and a bell tower was added in 1843 and granite entrance stairs were installed in 1853. The campus was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2001. The church also lies within the bounds of the Alexandria Historic District.

History:
The heritage of the Meeting House dates from the early eighteenth century. Scottish Presbyterians were among the early European settlers of Northern Virginia and were involved in establishing Alexandria as a port in 1749. The Society of Presbyterians worshiped publicly in the city from the 1760s, and the congregation's first installed minister arrived in 1772. The Meeting House was erected in 1775. Largely destroyed by fire in 1835, it was subsequently rebuilt, maintaining a Reformed Protestant plain-style appearance. Except for a bell tower added in 1843 and granite entrance stairs installed in 1853, it remains little altered to the present day.

Alexandrians have gathered at the Meeting House for public worship many times over the years. Among other such services that George Washington attended here was one conducted by the Rev. Dr. James Muir for the National Day of Solemn Humiliation, Fasting, and Prayer in 1798. Alexandria's memorial services for George Washington in 1799 were held in this sanctuary. The church bell tolled in mourning during the four days between his death and burial.

The Meeting House remained open for worship throughout the Civil War, but the congregation dwindled afterward. In 1899 the building was closed for worship, and all of the church property was entrusted to Second Presbyterian Church, which accepted responsibility for maintaining it.

For the next half-century, it served as both a museum and a place of worship. In 1949, a new congregation, taking the name of "the Old Presbyterian Meeting House," was established here.

Music has been part of the Meeting House heritage from the earliest days, and the church has served as a venue for public concerts for more than two centuries. Its first pipe organ, built by Jacob Hilbus and installed in 1817, was—according to church historian Julius Melton—the first pipe organ installed in a Presbyterian church in the United States. The Hilbus organ was destroyed in the 1835 fire. The pipe organ in the apse, by Henry Erben, dates from 1849. The pipe organ in the rear gallery was installed in 1997 by the Lively-Fulcher Organ Company.

Adjoining the Meeting House is a Burial Ground and several buildings: Flounder House, a building with a shed roof and built in 1787, was originally a parsonage; Elliot House (1844) was originally a private residence; and the Education Building was constructed in 1957.

Burial Ground:
The Burial Ground is the final resting place of many patriots of the Revolutionary War, including one unidentified soldier who is honored by the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the American Revolution. Among the more than 300 persons buried in this graveyard are John Carlyle, founder and first overseer of Alexandria; Dr. James Craik, Physician General of the Continental Army and close friend of George Washington; William Hunter, Jr., mayor of Alexandria and founder of the Saint Andrew's Society, and Daniel Douglass, merchant and flour inspector of the Port of Alexandria.

Presbyterian Cemetery:
The Meeting House also maintains and operates the Presbyterian Cemetery on Hamilton Lane, about a mile west of the church and adjacent to Alexandria National Cemetery and other historic cemeteries. Opened in 1809, the cemetery is the final resting place of 17 patriots of the American Revolution, men killed in the War of 1812, and 62 Confederate veterans and a number of Union soldiers from the Civil War. Over the years, the Presbyterian Cemetery has provided burial space for merchants, ship captains, the Reverend Elias Harrison—the fourth pastor of the Meeting House, who died during the Civil War—a half dozen of Alexandria's mayors, numerous representatives of the city's governing council, a number of prominent businessmen and philanthropists, and at least one member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Congregation today:
A congregation of the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Old Presbyterian Meeting House today is led by the Reverend Dr. Robert R. Laha, Jr., Senior Pastor and Head of Staff; the Reverend Katherine A. Stanford, Associate Pastor; the Reverend Ann Herlin Staley, Associate Pastor; and a Session (governing body) of 26 ruling elders. The church has a vibrant congregation of more than 1,000 members that is very much engaged in the contemporary world. It is an inclusive, justice-seeking congregation welcoming members and visitors for worship, service, education, and fellowship. The church supports a variety of programs and ministries for people of all ages, from pre-school age through teenagers and working adults to older adults in retirement homes.

Music plays an important role in worship and broader aspects of life at the Meeting House. Worship services feature both the Lively-Fulcher pipe organ and the choir, which includes both professional and volunteer members. Special services may also feature the Erben organ, brass ensembles, the children's choirs, or other vocal or instrumental groups. "Concerts With A Cause," held periodically throughout the year, feature talented local artists, and a free-will offering collected at intermission benefits a designated local charity. During the Advent season, a half-hour program of "Noonday Noels," held on Wednesdays at noon, provides a brief musical offering and scripture reading.

Through the Presbyterian Church, the Meeting House maintains a very active local, regional, national, and worldwide mission and outreach program. Among other needs, it provides support each year for the Alexandria Tutoring Consortium, the Fund for Alexandria's Child, the Arlandria Health Center, the Family to Family program, which assists families in meeting their monthly bills, the Rebuilding Together Alexandria program, designed to help impoverished residents of the city make necessary property improvements using volunteer help, Alive!—Alexandrians Involved Ecumenically—and the Greater Washington Interfaith Power + Light program. The congregation also conducts annual mission projects with The Shack Neighborhood House in Scotts Run, West Virginia and has active mission partnerships with groups in Reynosa, Mexico; Islamabad, Pakistan; Pignon, Haiti; and Kenya. In recent years, the congregation has been actively involved in social justice advocacy on issues such as affordable housing and improved health services for the poor through the interdenominational Virginians Organized for Interfaith Community Engagement (VOICE). In 2011, the Meeting House launched a program to provide online access to Virginia prisons, permitting the families of prisoners from Northern Virginia to conduct video visitations with loved ones at distant facilities.

Among the several buildings adjoining the Meeting House, Flounder House now provides classrooms, meeting space, the church archives, and space for a local non-profit; the Elliot House now houses the church offices; and the Education Building includes classrooms, a large meeting room, and the Meeting House pre-school.

While the burial ground on the church property is no longer active, the well-kept Presbyterian Cemetery, which has been in continuous use for more than two centuries, continues to function as an active cemetery. In 2008, the Cemetery opened a columbarium to accommodate the interment of cremated remains.


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Here follows a summary of the Quasi-War with France from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

The Quasi-War was an undeclared war from 1798 to 1800 between the United States and French First Republic. It was fought almost entirely at sea, primarily in the Caribbean and off the East Coast of the United States, with minor actions in the Indian Ocean and Mediterranean Sea.

In 1793, Congress unilaterally suspended repayment of French loans from the American Revolutionary War, and in 1794 signed the Jay Treaty with Great Britain. Then engaged in the 1792 to 1797 War of the First Coalition, France retaliated by seizing U.S. ships trading with Great Britain. When diplomacy failed to resolve these issues, in October 1796 French privateers began attacking all merchant ships in U.S. waters, regardless of nationality.

Spending cuts following the end of the American Revolutionary War left the U.S. unable to mount an effective response, and within a year over 316 American ships had been captured. In March 1798, Congress reconstituted the United States Navy, and in July authorized the use of force against France. By 1799, losses had been significantly reduced through informal cooperation with the Royal Navy, whereby merchant ships from both nations were allowed to join each other's convoys.

The replacement of the French First Republic by the Consulate in November 1799 led to the Convention of 1800, which ended the war. The right of Congress to authorize military action without a formal declaration of war was later confirmed by the Supreme Court. This ruling formed the basis of many similar actions since, including U.S. participation in the Vietnam War and the Persian Gulf War.

Background:
Under the Treaty of Alliance (1778), the United States had agreed to protect the French West Indies in return for French support in the American Revolutionary War. As the treaty had no termination date, France claimed this obligation included defending them against Great Britain and the Dutch Republic during the 1792 to 1797 War of the First Coalition. Despite popular enthusiasm for the French Revolution, especially among anti-British Jeffersonians, there was little support for this in Congress. Neutrality allowed New England shipowners to earn huge profits evading the British blockade, while Southern plantation owners feared the example set by France's abolition of slavery in 1794.

In 1793, Congress suspended repayment of French loans incurred during the Revolutionary War, arguing the execution of Louis XVI and establishment of the French First Republic rendered existing agreements void. They further argued American military obligations under the Treaty of Alliance applied only to a "defensive conflict" and thus did not apply, since France had declared war on Britain and the Dutch Republic. To ensure the U.S. did not become involved, Congress passed the Neutrality Act of 1794, while President George Washington issued an executive order forbidding American merchant ships from arming themselves.

Caribbean, main focus of operations during the Quasi-War:
France accepted these acts on the basis of "benevolent neutrality". They interpreted this as allowing French privateers to enter U.S. ports, and to sell captured British ships in American prize courts, but not vice versa. However, the U.S. viewed it as the right to provide the same privileges to both. These differences were further exacerbated in November 1794 when the U.S. and Britain signed the Jay Treaty. By resolving outstanding issues from the American Revolution, it led to a rapid expansion of trade between the two countries. Between 1794 and 1801, American exports to Britain nearly tripled in value, from US$33 million to $94 million.

As a result, in late 1796, French privateers began seizing American ships trading with the British. An effective response was hampered by the almost complete lack of a United States Navy, whose last warship had been sold in 1785, leaving only a small flotilla belonging to the United States Revenue Cutter Service and a few neglected coastal forts. This allowed French privateers to roam virtually unchecked; from October 1796 to June 1797, they captured 316 ships, 6% of the entire American merchant fleet, causing losses of $12 to $15 million. On 2 March 1797, the French Directory issued a decree permitting the seizure of any neutral shipping without a role d'equipage listing the nationalities of each crewmen. Since American ships rarely carried such documents, France had effectively initiated a commerce war.

Diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict ended in the 1797 dispute known as the XYZ Affair. However, the hostilities created support for establishing a limited naval force, and on 18 June, President John Adams appointed Benjamin Stoddert the first Secretary of the Navy. On 7 July 1798, Congress approved the use of force against French warships in American waters, but wanted to ensure conflict did not escalate beyond these limits. As a result, it was called a "limited" or "Quasi-War", and led to political debate over whether it was constitutional. A series of rulings by the Supreme Court of the United States confirmed the ability of the U.S. to conduct undeclared wars, or "police actions".

Forces and strategy:
Since ships of the line were expensive to build and required highly specialized construction facilities, in 1794 Congress compromised by ordering six large frigates. By 1798, the first three were nearly complete and on 16 July 1798, additional funding was approved for the USS Congress, USS Chesapeake, and USS President, plus the frigates USS General Greene and USS Adams. The provision of naval stores and equipment by the British allowed these to be built relatively quickly, and all saw action during the war.

These vessels were enhanced by so-called "subscription ships", privately funded vessels provided by individual cities. They included five frigates, among them the USS Philadelphia, commanded by Stephen Decatur, and four merchantmen converted into sloops. Primarily intended to attack foreign shipping, they earned huge profits for their owners; the USS Boston captured over 80 enemy vessels, including the French corvette Berceau.

With most of the French fleet confined to Europe by the Royal Navy, Secretary Stoddert was able to focus resources on eliminating the few vessels that evaded the blockade and reached the Caribbean. The U.S. also needed convoy protection, and while there was no formal agreement with the British, considerable co-operation took place at a local level. The two navies shared a signal system, and allowed their merchantmen to join each other's convoys, most of which were provided by the British, who had four to five times more escorts available.

This freed the U.S. Navy to concentrate on French privateers, most of which had very shallow draft and were armed with a maximum of twenty guns. Operating from French and Spanish bases in the Caribbean, particularly Guadeloupe, they made opportunistic attacks on passing ships, before escaping back into port. To counter those tactics, the U.S. used similarly-sized vessels from the Revenue Cutter Service, as well as commissioning their own privateers. The first American ship to see action was the USS Ganges, a converted East Indiaman with 26 guns, but most were far smaller.

The revenue cutter USS Pickering, commanded by Edward Preble, made two cruises to the West Indies and captured ten prizes. Preble turned command of Pickering over to Benjamin Hillar, who captured the much larger and more heavily armed French privateer l'Egypte Conquise after a nine-hour battle. In September 1800, the Pickering and her entire crew were lost at sea in a storm. Preble next commanded the frigate USS Essex, which he sailed around Cape Horn into the Pacific to protect U.S. merchantmen in the East Indies. He recaptured several U.S. ships that had been seized by French privateers.

The first significant study of the war was written by U.S. naval historian Gardner W. Allen in 1909, and focused exclusively on ship-to-ship actions. This is how the conflict is generally remembered in the U.S., but historian Michael Palmer argues American naval operations cannot be assessed in isolation. When operating in the Caribbean

...they entered a European theater where the war had been underway since 1793...British ships chased and fought the same French cruisers and privateers. Both navies escorted each other's merchantmen. American warships operated from British bases. And most importantly, British policies and shifts in deployment had dramatic effects on American operations.

Significant naval actions:
From the perspective of the U.S. Navy, the Quasi-War consisted of a series of ship-to-ship actions in U.S. coastal waters and the Caribbean; one of the first was the Capture of La Croyable on 7 July 1798 by Delaware outside Egg Harbor, New Jersey. On 20 November, a pair of French frigates, Insurgente and Volontaire, captured the schooner USS Retaliation, commanded by Lieutenant William Bainbridge; Retaliation was recaptured on 28 June 1799.

On 9 February 1799, the frigate Constellation captured the French Navy's frigate L'Insurgente. By 1 July, under the command of Decatur, USS United States had been refitted and repaired and embarked on her mission to patrol the South Atlantic coast and West Indies in search of French ships which were preying on American merchant vessels.

On 1 January 1800, a convoy of American merchant ships escorted by USS Experiment fought off an attack by French-allied Haitian privateers near Hispaniola. On 1 February, Constellation severely damaged the French frigate La Vengeance off the coast of Saint Kitts. Silas Talbot led a naval expedition against Puerto Plata in early May, capturing the coastal fort and a French corvette. When French troops occupied Curaçao in July, USS Patapsco and USS Merrimack bombarded French positions on the island and landed marines to support the local Dutch troops before the French withdrew. On 12 October, the frigate Boston captured the corvette Le Berceau.

On 25 October, USS Enterprise defeated the French brig Flambeau near Dominica. Enterprise also captured eight privateers and freed eleven U.S. merchant ships from captivity, while Experiment captured the French privateers Deux Amis and Diane and liberated numerous American merchant ships. Although U.S. military losses were light, the French had seized over 2,000 American merchant ships by the time the war ended.

Conclusion of hostilities:
It has been suggested that since the war was primarily driven by domestic political considerations, neither side was able to identify what a successful resolution entailed. This was enhanced by the tendency of individual commanders to pursue their own objectives, and on the American side, focusing on ship to ship actions rather than overall strategy.

In any event, by late 1800 U.S. and British naval operations, combined with a more conciliatory diplomatic stance by the new French government, had significantly reduced privateer activity. The Convention of 1800, signed on 30 September, ended the Quasi-War. It affirmed the rights of Americans as neutrals upon the sea and abrogated the 1778 French alliance, but failed to provide compensation for the alleged $20 million in American economic losses. While the agreement ensured the U.S. remained neutral during the Napoleonic Wars it failed to resolve the underlying tensions with warring European nations, which led to the War of 1812.