U.S. Data Repository http://www.us-data.org/ -- USGenNet Inc. -- Please read the U.S. Data Repository Copyright Statement on the following page: ------------------------------------------------------------------- Smith, William (b. about 1747) ------------------------------------------------------------------- Aler's History of Martinsburg and Berkeley County, West Virginia by F. Vernon Aler, 1888 Printed for the Author by The Mail Publishing Company, Hagerstown, MD. CHAPTER VIII. Historical Pen Sketches of the Early Residents of Berkeley County by the late Hon. Chas. James Faulkner. Pages 107-108 WILLIAM SMITH, most generally known as "Burgess Billy Smith," was born in Sleepy Creek about the year 1747, in that portion of the colony of Virginia which was subsequently embraced in the County of Berkeley. He had an insatiable ambition to become a member of the legislature. Shortly after the creation of the County of Berkeley in 1772 he became a candidate for the House Burgess, and continued his candidacy, without success, for several years, from which he acquired the soubriquet of "Burgess Billy." After the revolutionary war was ended and the State constitution of 1776 was adopted, dividing the legislative department into a Senate and House of Delegates, he pressed his claims for election to the House of Delegates from year to year, but still without success. When Morgan was formed into a separate county in 1820 he regularly entered the field every year for a seat in the legislature. At the April election in 1830 the aspirations and struggles of a long life were gratified by an election, but the adoption of the new constitution in the following August set aside the election and dashed and disappointed the hopes of his life. He never afterward had the heart to aspire to the place, and died a few years afterward, deeply impressed with the incapacity of the people to select competent and proper agents to serve them. He was a man of remarkable astuteness and cunning, and although unable to read or write, no one was ever found smart enough to take advantage of those deficiencies. He was said to have been the first child born in the Sleepy Creek Valley. ------------------------------------------------------------------- If you've reached this file through a SEARCH, you can access other biographies for Berkeley County, WV by going to the following URL: http://www.us-data.org/wv/berkeley/bios.html ------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------- If you've reached this file through a SEARCH, you can access other biographies for Berkeley County, WV by going to the following URL: http://www.us-data.org/wv/berkeley/bios.html -------------------------------------------------------------------