“W “is for Woodmason, Charles (ca.1720?)

“W “is for Woodmason, Charles (ca.1720?). Clergyman. Woodmason arrived in Charleston around 1752 and for ten years lived in Prince Frederick's Parish. In 1756 he applied for the position of itinerant Anglican minister in St. Mark's Parish in the South Carolina backcountry. He had to go to England for ordination and returned to South Carolina as an ordained Anglican priest and licensed to work in St. Mark’s. As a gentleman, an Anglican, and an Englishman, Woodmason had little initial sympathy or understanding of backcountry residents or their religious habits. Over time, however, he became a supporter of the Regulator movement. He moved to Virginia in 1773 and at some later time returned to England. Charles Woodmason's book, Journal of C. W. Clerk, Itinerant Minister in South Carolina, accurately described life in the Backcountry and defended the Regulators.