Familie Loyall in Norfolk (Virginia, USA)
Anläßlich meiner USA Reise besuchte ich in Chicago (Illinois) am 4.9.1985 die große Stadtbibliothek. Dort fand in verschiedenen genealogischen Nachschlage-werken den Familiennamen Loyal (Loyall), leider hatte ich nicht genügend Zeit, um ausführlich und systhematisch zu suchen. Mir fiel aber bei der Durchsicht der genealogischen Quellen auf, daß sich der Familienname im Gebiet um Norfolk (VA) besonders konzentriert.
In folgenden Staaten ließen sich Familienmitglieder Loyal ermitteln: Virginia, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Georgia. Hierbei fällt die Konzentrierung in den östliche Staaten auf, Zentrum bildet der Staat Virginia.
Am 26.8.1995 besuchte ich in Frankfurt/M. das Zentrum für Genealogie der Kirche Jesu Christi der Heiligen der letzten Tage (Mormonen). Dort befindet sich das "International Genealogical Index" (1994), in dem ich zahlreiche amerikanische Familieneintragungen zu Loyal fand. Trotz der Vielzahl der Eintragungen fehlt ein größerer Zusammenhang. Vermutlich gehen die einzelnen Familienstämme auf verschiedene Europaauswanderer zurück. Dies bedeutet, daß es wohl einige Stammväter gibt. Bisher fehlt eine Verbindung zu unserer Stammlinie bzw. zum Gebiet von Lothringen.
Vermutlich stammten viele amerikanische Stammväter aus England. Dort läßt sich der Familienname bis in die erste Hälfte des 17. Jahrhunderts verfolgen.
GEORGE LOYALL, THIRD CONGRESSMAN
For two centuries the name Loyall has been known and honored in Norfolk Borough and city. The eleventh name signed to the famous protest against the Stamp Act, March 31, 1766, was Paul Loyall. But Paul was well know here before these troubles began with the Mother Land, for he served Norfolk as mayor from June, 1762, to June, 1763. He must have made an able and popular official, for he was elected for a second term (1772-73) and again to a third term, beginning June 1775. Our colonial mayors served each a year, and were not permitted to serve a second, successive term. During Loyall's third term the Revolution came to Norfolk, bringing fierce fighting, death, arson and destruction. No record is kept of the conclusion of his term, for there was no Norfolk in June, 1776, not so much as one inhabitant. I have never seen it stated, but I am sure the Mayor Paul Loyall saved for posterity the beautiful, silver Mace, now this city's proud possession. No doubt it was he, who prudently hurried to Kemps Landing (Kempsville) with the Mace and buried it there in a temporary grave, from which it was later resurrected. If so, future generations will rise to salute Paul across the dim vista of lengthening years. He was called to serve a fourth term as mayor, when the Borough was slowly and painfully attempting to rebuild amidst dust and ashes (November, 1781); but that term, for some reason, was only seven months.
His friends and neighbors elected Loyall to the State Senate in 1779, and he served as senator for ten years (1789). It is our guess (unsubstantiated by any documentary evidence) that the reason he served only seven years as mayor was because no citizen, however popular and efficient, should hold two offices simultaneously. Personally, we think that contention is logical.
Dr. T. J. Wertenbaker gives this interesting portrait of the athletic mayor, a picturesque story of colonial Norfolk, as it was in 1767, the year after the detested Stamp Act: "This has always been a town for sailors, ships, and men of all nationalities. Be they good or bad, we have them from every nation under heaven, as all the flags of all peoples are reflected in the placid waters of our harbor. The British sloop-of-war `Hornet' (an appropriate name, as it proved) dropped anchor here, and Captain Jeremiah Morgan was short of men for the `Hornet's' crew."
No wonder the ships of that day were always short of hands, for the life of the typical sailor in the Eighteenth Century was worse than slavery. Jeremiah knew that he would have trouble securing recruits, so he resorted to savage strategy. In the blackness of midnight he rowed with thirty men to a wharf and there tied up his tender. There was nothing tender about the men in it, except the name. All were well fortified for the dirty work to be done, at one of the low saloons, too many of which lined the waterfront and lanes leading up to Main street. Then they started looking for involuntary recruits. They burst into the cheap lodging houses and taverns, cursing the occupants and knocking them hither and yon. When they found a sailor, they made him prisoner, and if the stout young man offered fight he was knocked senseless or tied up like a chicken is trussed and flung into the tender.
Norfolk's, police force were amateurs and volunteers, called the "night watch." The watch rallied to the assistance of the men being shanghaied, the alarm was sounded, the fighting and rioting increased until the section of the town that lay south of Main street became a veritable battleground.
Paul Loyall instinctively took command of the forces of law and order-- a befitted a former mayor-- and was getting the better of Jeremiah and his drunken crew when Jeremiah became so infuriated at Paul's interference that he lunged at him with a dirk. But Paul's friends were too quick, and Jeremiah, missing his aim, was forced to retreat to his tender. Most of the captives were released and many of Jeremiah's men were taken prisoners and had the privilege of sobering up in the little jail on Main street, and of facing the judge the next morning.
II
George Loyall, the future congressman, was born in Norfolk, May 29, 1789 (a month after George Washington was inaugurated in New York, April 30, 1789.) We presume that this new arrival into a troubled world was the grandson of Paul, the hero described above. For there was another George Loyall who was mayor of Norfolk from June 1797, to June 1798-- when George, Jr., was only eight years old.
He was educated at William and Mary, graduating (1808) at nineteen years of age. He studied law, but did not practice. He visited England for a year (1815), the year of Waterloo, and returned to begin his public career as a member of the House of Delegates. Like his predecessor in the House of Representatives, George Loyall found his legislative experience in Richmond good apprenticeship for politics and statecraft. After ten years (1817-1829), he stood for Virginia's Second Congressional Convention and was elected (1829). Norfolk Borough and the counties of Princess Anne, Norfolk and Nansemond had an able delegation in that convention-- Littleton Waller Tazewell, Joseph Prentis, Robert Barraud Taylor, High Blair Grigsby and George Loyall-- they were giants.
The Second Constitution for Virginia complete, George Loyall, decided to stand for the House of Representatives and contest the seat Thomas Newton had held for thirty years. It was an heated and bitter campaign and George was elected. Newton did not concede his election and the contest was carried to the floor of the House of Representatives in Washington. They seated George Loyall.
That was the Jacksonian era, and the administration split the dominant Democratic party into Jacksonian Democrats and Whigs, who followed Henry Clay. Two years later the rivals met again on the Hustings, but this time Newton defeated Loyall and resumed his former seat in the House, serving from March 4, 1831, to March 3, 1833. The fight was to be renewed the third time in the fall of 1832, when Thomas Newton declined to become a candidate. Loyall was elected and served for two years from March 4, 1833, until March 3, 1837. Andrew Jackson gave place to Martin Van Buren, March 4, 1837, and George Loyall surrendered his seat the same day to his successor, Dr. Mallory. So it comes that Newton was Norfolk's second and fourth Representative, and Loyall our third and fifth.
As a loyal Democrat, Loyall received a lucrative and influential office. He was appointed navy agent and held the post from 1837 to 1861, (except for two Whig years).
After the War Between the States and Reconstruction, George Loyall passed to his eternal reward, February 24, 1868, and sleeps in Elmwood.
III
When the Loyal name is mentioned, the people of America, especially north and west, recall the marriage of Admiral David Glasgow Farragut and Virginia Loyall in 1843. She was the daughter of William Loyall, the brother of George, a son of the mayor (1798) and a grandson of stout old Paul of the colonial Borough. From "Norfolk in By-Gone Days," by the Rev. W. H. T. Squires, D.D., published Aug. 11, 1938 (in "Squires Scrapbooks," Norfolk, Va., Public Library, Vol I, p. 185)
Mr. (George) Loyall had held the office as (Navy agent) for thirteen years (in 1850) during which time he disbursed more than $14,000,000 of the public money without the loss of a cent to the treasury.
Mr. Loyall is a gentleman of no ordinary talents. The following remarks respecting his style as an orator are from the pen of one who had listened to a political speech which he delivered more than twenty years ago.
"His manner was pleasing and impressive; and his action evidently reflected that polish which true oratorical taste and long experience only can impart. His voice was full and its tones are remarkably distinct.
"He advances openly and honestly in the demonstration of his subject. The main object of the investigation is perpetually exhibited to the eye of the understanding, and the hearer follows the orator in the clear and luminous track of his argument, without being confounded by subtile wanderings, or bewildered by needless intricacies. His course is onward; he is seldom fascinated by the glitter of an ornament, or beguiled by the fading beauty of a flower; his occasional illustrations do not appear to have been previously culled and collected, and are almost as well adapted for one subject as another; but they spring directly from the one under consideration. Hence, he invariably leaves a distinct and lasting impression on the mind of the viewer." From Historical and Descriptive Sketches of Norfolk and Vicinity, by William S. Forrest, 1853, p. 265-266.
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