178 1] REV. WILLIAM SMITH, D. D. 59 



CHAPTER XLII. 



Dr. Smith preaches a Funeral Discourse on the Rev. Hugh Neill, of 



WHOM SOME ACCOUNT IS GIVEN — DeATH OF MrS. BlACKWELL, WiFE OF THE 



Rev. Mr. Blackwell — Notice and Elegiac Stanzas upon her Death 



ATTRIBUTED TO Dr. SmITH — ThE CONVENTION OF 1 782 IN MARYLAND — 



Success of Kent County School, and Development of Washington 

 College, Maryland — Death of William Moore, Esq., of Moore Hall. 



In the account which we have given in our former volume of 

 St. Paul's Church, in Third street, Philadelphia, the matrix of the 

 low-church parishes in Pennsylvania, we refer to the Rev. Hugh 

 Neill, one of the most respectable of the clergy of this Methodis- 

 tical side of the Episcopal body. Mr. Neill was born in New 

 Jersey, and had been bred a Presbyterian, and preached in that 

 sect in his native State until 1749, when he went to England and 

 took orders in the Church, and was licensed by the Bishop of 

 London for Pennsylvania, March 26th, 1750. He was sent, 

 however, by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, to 

 Dover, in Delaware, which, indeed, then made a part of Pennsyl- 

 vania, and here he remained until 1760, when he was transferred 

 to Trinity Church, Oxford, Pennsylvania, preaching on Sunday 

 evenings at Germantown. In 1765 he officiated in Philadelphia at 

 St. Paul's, and in 1766, having received from Governor Sharpe, of 

 Maryland, an induction as rector of the parish of St. Paul's in 

 Queen Anne county, he left Philadelphia for that charge, having 

 refused to receive any pay for his services. In order to show their 

 appreciation of this kindness, the vestry of St. Paul's, Philadelphia, 

 presented him with a piece of plate bearing the following 



inscription : 



The Gift of 



St. Paul's Church in Philadelphia 



to 



the Rev. Hugh Neill, 



in gratitude for his disinterested ministerial 



services to that Church. 



A. D. 1766. 



