CHAPTER IX

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1735, March 26, Boston. Meeting of the First Lodge at which the following vote was passed:
“That any Member of this Lodge that goes abroad, or beyond Seas, Shall Still continue a Member & be entitled to all the priviledges of the Lodge, if he Constantly at- tends when here in Boston and pay his quarteridge or Clubb as the other Members doe
That no Member fhall offer to pafs his Word for a Brother for his Quarteridge, or Clubb, but Shall pay
Money down.” B.MS. 15.
1735, March 28, Philadelphia. The American Weekly Mercury of Philadelphia, pub- lishes the item quoted under
1734/5, February 21, supra.
1735, April 17, London—South America.
In the Grand Lodge of England a motion was agreed to for Randolph Took, Esq’ to be Provincial Grand Mas- ter for South America.
X Q.C.A. 254. This vote was inadvertent or the scrivener was in error
for since the institution of the office of Provincial Grand 133
134 FREEMASONRY IN AMERICA
Master (1727) the appointment thereto has always been a prerogative of the Grand Master. Preston (Portsmouth, 1804) 306. 1914 Mass. 255. The Deputation was issued by Lord Weymouth. Anderson (1738 Ed.) 195.
1735, After April 17, Charles Town, South Carolina.
The first Lodge at “Charles Town,” South Carolina, appears for the first time upon the Official English Lists in that for 1760, as No. 251. Later it took the place vacated by Bristol Lodge as No. 74. The Lists accredit the Lodge to 1735, and it was Warranted under Lord Weymouth, installed G. M. April 17, 1735.
P.C. (3rd Eng. Ed. 1764) 382.
Hammerton’s deputation as Pro. G. M. for South Carolina did not issue until after April 15, 1736 (q.v.), and he appears as the Master of the Lodge when it met “for the first time” on October 28, 1736, (g.v.). There accordingly is some ground for the arguments, which have been heard, that this Lodge was constituted by Hammerton under his commission and not by Lord Wey- mouth, direct, or that authority for the 1735 Lodge came from Boston.
See 1735, Dec. 27, énfra.
See also a discriminating and careful study of the situation in the first chapter of Mackey’s History of Freemasonry in South Carolina.
The date of the Constitution of this Lodge is given in the 6th Edition of Jachin and Boaz (London 1765) as November 12, 1735. No reliance can be placed upon that month and day, however. Bristol Lodge, Glouces- tershire, Constituted November 12, 1735, was No. 74 in
1735 135
the 1755 listing. It was erased in 1757, but the date of Constitution was retained in the lists against the num- ber, although no Lodge was given. This is the case in the Official List for 1761 (original in archives of Grand Lodge of Massachusetts), where ‘‘SSolomon’s Lodge in Charles Town, South Carolina,” meeting the Ist and 3rd Thursdays, is given as No. 251, with 1735 as the date of Constitution. It is inserted between Lodges Consti- tuted in 1756 and 1759, thus indicating about when the information officially reached the Grand Officers. Later Solomon’s Lodge was put in No. 74, vacated by Bristol Lodge. This brought it with the 1735 Lodges, where it should be, but the date of the Constitution of Bristol Lodge was left. Thus the date (other than the year) clearly does not belong to the South Carolina Lodge. Furthermore, its placement ahead of the Lodge at Sa- vannah does not indicate priority of Constitution, but merely the convenience of the engraver.’
1735, May 13. Franklin charges F. Hopkinson for binding a Mason