The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863, page 169 by Various Authors
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live in Dublin, and support his family by teaching the Latin, Greek, and French languages; and in the mean time the grand jury of Cork awarded him £800 for his losses at Bear Haven. In his new abode he was able to give his children an excellent education; one became an officer in the British service, and three entered college. The former was John Fontaine, and the family determined that he should visit America for information; and after travelling through Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, and Maryland, he purchased a plantation in Virginia. Peter, another brother, received ordination from the bishop of London, and with Moses, who studied law, both embarked for Virginia in 1716. Francis, the last son, remained at college.
There were two daughters in his family. The eldest, Mary Anne, married Matthew Maury, a Protestant Refugee from Gascony, in 1716, and the next year he joined his relations in this country. His son was the Rev. James Maury, of Albemarle, Virginia, a very estimable and useful clergyman of the Church of England. James was another son of the French preacher who made America his home, bringing with him his wife, child, mother-in-law, and thirteen servants, in 1717. Francis, in 1719, was ordained by the Bishop of London, on the particular recommendation of the Archbishop of Dublin, and then also sailed for Virginia. He became a very eloquent and popular preacher, and settled in St. Margaret's parish, King William county.
In the year 1721, Mr. Fontaine lost his most faithful, exemplary, and pious companion. 'A melancholy day,' he records in his autobiography, 'it was, that deprived me of my greatest earthly comfort and consolation. I was bowed down to the very dust; but it made me think of my own latter end, and made preparations to join her once more.' At the conclusion of his memoirs, he uses the following remarkable language:
'I feel the strongest conviction, that if you will take care of these memoirs, your descendants will read them with pleasure; and I here declare t