Background

John Stark Ravenscroft was born on May 17, 1772 near Petersburg, Virginia, of a prosperous and genteel family of English descent. Samuel Ravenscroft had come to Boston, Massachussets, about 1679, but in 1692 settled in Virginia. John Stark's father was John Ravenscroft, a physician, his mother was Lillias Miller, the daughter of Hugh Miller, a Virginia gentleman of Scotch descent. Less than a year after John Stark's birth, the family moved to England and shortly thereafter to Scotland.

Education

Having been educated in Scotland and in North England, he returned to Virginia when sixteen years of age in order to look after the remains of his father's large property. In this effort he was so successful as to be placed in comfortable, even luxurious circumstances. He then studied law at the College of William and Mary. Here the youth was under little restraint, and he soon became known to his college-mates as "Mad Jack. "

Career

At his wife's solicitation, Ravenscroft purchased an estate of 2, 500 acres in Lunenburg County, near the home of her father, and became a country gentleman, highly respected in the community. But for eighteen years he did not once read the Bible and only occasionally attended church.

About 1810, however, Ravenscroft began to ponder over his spiritual condition and to seek to overcome his "besetting sins - passionate temper" and a "hateful habit of profane swearing". There was a congregation of Republican Methodists near his plantation. He began to attend their services and then to serve as their lay reader, but he came to doubt the authority of the sect's ministers, and decided to join the Episcopal Church and to become one of its clergymen.

He was ordained by Bishop Richard Channing Moore on May 6, 1817. After ministering successfully for a few years in Mecklenburg County, he was made the assistant of Bishop Moore at Monumental Church, Richmond, Va. Before he had moved there, however, he accepted the position of bishop of North Carolina, being consecrated in Philadelphia on May 22, 1823.

Efforts at organization of this very weak diocese had been made in 1790, in 1791, and in 1794, when the Rev. Charles Pettigrew was elected bishop. But he died in 1807, without having been consecrated. In 1817 a successful effort at revival had been made, but when Ravenscroft was chosen as the first bishop of the diocese there were still only a handful of ministers and a few hundred parishioners, mostly in the eastern part of the state.

The diocese was unable to pay a sufficient salary for his support, so an arrangement was made whereby he should serve half of his time as rector of Christ Church, Raleigh, North Carolina. The North Carolinians were little acquainted with the doctrines of the Episcopal Church and Ravenscroft sought to impress his interpretation of these doctrines upon the people. He endeavored to convert first the more intellectual and influential class and "with the aid of their example to build up congregations and parishes as opportunity might offer".

A large proportion of the prominent men of the state became members or friends of the Episcopal Church. Ravenscroft also exerted an abiding influence upon a number of his clergy and laity who later became bishops. Regardless of the weather and bad roads, he traveled each year from one end of his diocese to the other, a distance of more than five hundred miles, and once journeyed via Tennessee and Kentucky to a General Convention of the Church in Philadelphia. His strenuous activity wore down his vigorous constitution and in 1828 he gave up his charge at Raleigh and became rector of the small church at Williamsboro, North Carolina.

He died in Raleigh.

Achievements

• He set for North Carolina a standard of conservative churchmanship which has endured to the present day.

Works

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  • The Works of the Right Reverend John Stark Ravenscroft : Containing His Sermons and Charges : to Which Is Prefixed a Memoir of His Life

    (Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We h...)

  • The Works of the Right Reverend John Stark Ravenscroft: Containing his Sermons and Charges : to Which is Prefixed a Memoir of his Life Volume 2

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  • The Works of the Right Reverend John Stark Ravenscroft, D. D, Vol. 1 of 2: Containing His Sermons and Charges; To Which Is Prefixed a Memoir of His Life (Classic Reprint)

    (Excerpt from The Works of the Right Reverend John Stark R...)

  • The works of the Right Reverend John Stark Ravenscroft ...: containing his sermons, charges, and controversial tracts ; to which is prefixed, a memoir of his life

    (This is a reproduction of a classic text optimised for ki...)

  • The works of ... John Stark Ravenscroft

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  • The Works of the Right Reverend John Stark Ravenscroft D. D., Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Diocess of North-Carolina, Vol. 2 of 2: ... To Which Is Prefixed a Memoir of His Life

    (Excerpt from The Works of the Right Reverend John Stark R...)

Personality

He was vehement in "temper, speech, and manner" and "not an infrequent attendant at horse races".

He was a tall and powerful man, of commanding presence and manner. His fearless and uncompromising advocacy of his opinions was, however, often carried to the point of tactlessness. But his strong personal conviction and power made a deep impression upon his diocese.

Connections

On September 29, 1792, the course of his life was changed by his marriage to Anne Spotswood Burwell, the daughter of an old Virginia family, and a woman of beauty, tact, and high character. In 1814 his first wife died and four years later he married Sarah Buford of Lunenburg County, Virginia. She preceded him in death one year. Ravenscroft had no children of his own but had adopted two.

Father:

John Ravenscroft

A physician

Mother:

Lillias Miller

Spouse:

Anne Spotswood Burwell

Spouse:

Sarah Buford

Grandfather:

Hugh Miller