Benjamin West's Mother, Sarah Pearson, and Her Family

BENJAMIN WEST'S MOTHER71 The road in front of this meeting house divides the townships of Springfield and Marple, and the village here is called Marple. Ashmead's History informs that the land on the Marple side was sold to Robert Taylor in 1742 and five years later some of it was sold to John Morris, a weaver. Prior to 1831 a store was kept here by William Edwards, who was succeeded in business by Hampden and Burdsell. In 1831 Ebenezer R. Curtis established a store here, and the property continues to be owned in his family. The post office, Marple, was established in his store in 1849 and he was appointed postmaster.7 The large oak tree in this yard was planted by Joseph Rhoads II (1748-1809), of the fourth generation of the family in Pennsylvania , being brought from the woods on his property. A young oak tree grown from one of its acorns was planted a few years ago by his great-great-great-grandson, Joseph Rhoads, and is growing satisfactorily in the graveyard. Our time is not sufficient to refer particularly to the families of Friends who have been members of Springfield Meeting. Among their names may be mentioned, Bishop, Carey, Coppock, Crozer, Davis, Evans, Gibbons, Gleave, Hall, Hayes, Holland, Hugh, Lester, Levis, Lewis, Lownes, Maddock, Massey, Maris, Mickle, Morris, Moore, Ogden, Palmer, Pancoast, Pearson, Rhoads, Rudolph, Stanfield, Steedman, Taylor, Thomas, Williamson , Worrell, Yarnall, and Allen. BENJAMIN WEST'S MOTHER, SARAH PEARSON, AND HER FAMILY A paper read by Albert Cook Myers at the spring meeting of Friends' Historical Association held at Springfield Meeting House, Marple, Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Fifth Month 25, 1929. Here in Springfield Township in the year of our Lord 1738, the youngest of ten children, was born the great painter Benjamin West. His father John West was an innkeeper. The maiden name of his mother was Sarah Pearson. Although the parents had been birthright Friends and were attenders of Springfield 7. Ashmead—History of Delaware County, Pa., pp. 581. 72 BULLETIN OF FRIENDS' HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION Meeting, yet after their marriage, which occurred about 1718, they were no longer members of the Society, nor was their artist son on this account ever really technically a member of the meeting, notwithstanding he figures in history as the Quaker painter. The other facts of the life and works of West are commonplace knowledge. Court painter to King George III, President of the Royal Academy of the Fine Arts, in the year 1820 (March 11) he was laid to rest with England's honored dead in the crypt of St. Paul's. The mother's side of the house more especially has been assigned to me for brief presentation on this occasion. It was three-quarters of a century prior to the artist's birth that his maternal grandparents, the youthful Thomas Pearson and Margery, his bride of a bare six months, came voyaging over the sea to set up their abode in what was then the newly-established Province of Pennsylvania. Their, old home in England was in the Township of Pownall Fee, Parish of Wilmslow, in the northeast of the County of Chester or Cheshire. There both were born of Quaker parents in that seething fervid era of the rise of the Society. There also, 2 Mo. (April) 18, 1683, they were married, in a Friends' meeting at the house of Thomas Janney the Quaker minister, later in the year their shipmate to Pennsylvania. The parents of the groom at this time were not living, the father, Lawrence Pearson, having died 12 Mo. (February) 24, 1673, and the mother, Elizabeth Pearson, 6 Mo. (August) 13, 1662 ; the place of their interment was in Friends' burial ground in the adjoining Parish of Mobberley . The bride, Marger)' Pearson, who was born 12 Mo, (February ) 1, 1658, was the daughter of Robert and Ellen Smith. Her sister Mary Smith, born 12 Mo. (February) 24, 1660, came with her to Pennsylvania, and in 1685 was married under the care of Chester. Monthly Meeting to Daniel Williamson. Thomas Pearson, and likewise his brother Edward Pearson, followed in the footsteps of their father Lawrence and of their uncle Robert Pearson...