Bernard Moore

Bernard Moore (1720–1775) was a prominent landowner and member of the Virginia House of Burgesses representing King William County. His brother-in-law, powerful speaker John Robinson made unauthorized loans to Moore and other allies, discovered after Robinson's death in 1766, which caused his estate's administrator (and future jurist) Edmund Pendleton and creditors including George Washington to auction Moore's land and 55 slaves. Early and family life Moore was born to the former Elizabeth Todd Seaton, second wife of Augustine Moore (1685-1743), who had emigrated from England and become a successful merchant, then tobacco planter in the York River watershed in Virginia. The couple probably married in 1715, since Moore's English-born first wife Mary Gage died in childbirth in 1713. His father's family traced their lineage to a Lord Mayor of London and Sir Thomas More. His maternal grandfather, Thomas Todd (1660-1724) had a plantation in Gloucester County, Toddsbury. This man's first name honors the surname of his maternal grandfather, William Bernard, a merchant and member of the Governor's Council. His mother's first husband, Henry Seaton (1659-1713) had died, leaving land in Spotsylvania County as well as a King William County estate called Romancoke and a "Brick House", to his infant son George Seaton (1711-1750), so Augustine Moore raised him at his Chelsea plantation, together with his own children. Chelsea is near the Mattaponi River in King William County, about six miles upstream from its junction forming the York River at present day West Point. Augustine Moore took care that his children married well, so that his descendants became among the First Families of Virginia. His eldest daughter Elizabeth Moore (1716-1779) may have married first Lyonell Lyde or Lloyd (who died in 1737) before she married Col. James Macon (1721-17680) whose daughters Mary and Elizabeth married Burgesses William Aylett and Bartholomew Dandridge. The couple's first son, named Augustine Moore to honor his grandfather, may not have married and definitely died before 1760, when his brothers Bernard and Thomas inherited his lands pursuant to the terms of their late father's will. Bernard Moore was probably born at Chelsea plantation, though accounts differ as to his birth year between 1718 and 1725.