Sampson Mathews ( – January 20, 1807) was an American merchant, soldier, and legislator in the colony (and later U.S. state) of Virginia.
A son of John and Ann (Archer) Mathews, Mathews was an early merchant in the Shenandoah Valley region, where he and his brother George Mathews ran a series of stores across the valley with contacts extending to Atlantic trade networks. Mathews also took part in the Indian Wars and colonial revolutionary efforts. He was a member of the Augusta County Committee of Safety that drafted the Augusta Resolves, a precursor to the Declaration of Independence, and the Augusta Declaration, a precursor to the Articles of Confederation.
Mathews was elected to the inaugural Virginia State Senate in 1776. During the American Revolution, he toured the western frontier to fortify the colonial border from Indian attacks, and oversaw sail manufacture for the Continental Navy's Virginia fleet. When turncoat Benedict Arnold enacted a surprise raid on Richmond in January 1781, Mathews led Virginia militia forces in defense.
Mathews was an original trustee of Liberty Hall (later Washington and Lee University), when it was made into a college in 1776. This is the nation's ninth-oldest institution of higher education. Mathews was a member of the Mathews political family, which saw numerous members take part in state and national affairs over successive generations.
Early life and Indian Wars
Sampson Mathews was born c. 1737 in Augusta County, Virginia to Ann (Archer) and John Mathews. His parents were among the first European settlers of Augusta County, likely having immigrated to America during the Scotch-Irish immigration of 1710–1775. His father was a notable member of the early Augusta County community, serving as a militia captain and public officer, and as a member of the Augusta Parish vestry. The Mathews were among the Anglican minority in the predominantly Presbeterian county. Sampson Mathews was educated at the Augusta Academy, a classical school founded in 1749. In his adolescence he worked in crews to build roads in the county.
On the outbreak of the French and Indian War in 1755, Mathews was elected captain in the Augusta County militia, and accompanied George Washington under British General Edward Braddock on his ill-fated Braddock expedition. Up to four of Mathews' siblings, as well as his father, also took part in the expedition. Braddock's expedition met with the French and Indians in a meeting engagement, from which the French and Indians gained the advantage. After suffering devastating casualties, the British retreated in disarray.
On returning home, Mathews was elected sheriff of Augusta County in 1756, and also assumed the functions of chancellor of the county. For a time he worked as a reader for the Augusta Parish Anglican Church, though this was apparently suspended due to a thinning of the population following the French and Indian War. He was elected to the vestry for Augusta Parish in 1961, and served as such until 1770, when a shift in political population caused the minority Anglicans to lose control of the vestry.
Mathews married Mary Lockhart in 1759, with whom he had four children: John, Sampson, and two daughters who went on to be Mrs. Samuel Clark and Mrs. Alexander Nelson. By 1762, Mathews and his brother George Mathews had gone into a mercantile business in Staunton, Virginia. Quick success lead them to open numerous other stores and outposts in the Upper Valley, and to accumulate thousands of acres of land in the region. In their outposts they sold basic supplies but also specialty items including "spelling books, silk, hats, “ozgn”, handkerchiefs, silver, and even a tailor-made suit," and acted as unofficial bankers. Their enterprise grew to involve an extensive Atlantic trade network, and included the buying and selling of convict servants from Britain, and a small number of African slaves. The brothers were among the "soul-drivers" in Virginia who bought convict servants wholesale from British transport ships at port, and traveled along established routes selling the convicts to farmers, planters, and others. Lodine-Chaffey suggests that the brothers' treatment of both convict servants and slaves was suspect, due to the frequency in which the servants and slaves escaped them; the brothers reported three slaves missing in 1769, and ten convicts missing in 1773. In total, their dealings in all ventures accounted for a "great share" of the trade in the region.