Part 3

_James, David, and William Geddy_, 1736-about 1780. James Geddy, gunsmith, father of David and William (also of James Geddy, Jr., the silversmith), established his shop in Williamsburg sometime before 1736; he died in 1744. He and two of his sons did cutlery work, brass casting, and iron founding as well as gunsmithing; the sons also purveyed rupture bands and a vermifuge for horses, and offered to cure "the most inveterate Pole-evils and Fistulas ... and all Diseases incident to Horses." During the Revolution William was paid for repairing arms and casting ball; he died in 1784.

_John Moody_, 1776-1779. Smith and farrier, from Philadelphia by way of Norfolk, advertised his shop near the church in 1776. Was paid on several occasions for shoeing horses, but little more is known of him before his death in 1779.

_Hugh Orr_, 1738-1764. Captain Orr called himself both blacksmith and "hammer man," and settled in Williamsburg by 1738. His house and smithy were on Duke of Gloucester Street. He may have acted as farrier, and either he or a slave trained to do so performed phlebotomy--bleeding. He served as armorer for the colony for three years and may have been an officer in the Williamsburg militia. He is buried in Bruton churchyard.

_Thomas Pate_, 1760-1814. Did blacksmith work for John Custis and Lord Botetourt among others, and repaired arms for Virginia troops during the Revolution. The location of his shop is not known, but his purchase of more than 3,000 pounds of bar iron from Robert Carter in 1773 alone indicates a lively trade.

_William Willis_ (or _Willess_), 1768-1770. Came from Birmingham and opened his gunsmith and blacksmith shop "near the playhouse" and "below the Capitol," but soon moved to Norfolk.

_Suggestions for Further Reading_

Alex W. Bealer, _The Art of Blacksmithing_. rev. ed. New York, Funk and Wagnalls, 1976.

Garry Hogg, _Hammer & Tongs: Blacksmithery Down the Ages_. London, Hutchinson Co., 1964.

J. G. Holmstrom, _Modern Blacksmithing and Horseshoeing_. Chicago, F. J. Drake & Co., 1941.

John Jernberg, _Forging: Manual of Practical Instruction in Hand Forging of Wrought Iron_.... Chicago, American Technical Society, 1917.

William Allyn Richards, _Forging of Iron and Steel_. New York, D. Van Nostrand Co., 1915.

F. W. Robins, _The Smith: The Traditions and Lore of an Ancient Craft_. London, Rider and Co., 1953.

H. R. Bradley Smith, _Blacksmiths' and Farriers' Tools at Shelburne Museum: A History of Their Development from Forge to Factory_. Shelburne, Vt., Shelburne Museum, 1966.

Albert H. Sonn, _Early American Wrought Iron_. New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1928.

Aldren A. Watson, _The Village Blacksmith_. New York, Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1968.

_The Blacksmith in Eighteenth-Century Williamsburg_, first published in 1971, is based largely on an unpublished monograph by Harold B. Gill, Jr., of the Colonial Williamsburg research staff. It has been prepared with the assistance of Thomas K. Ford, editor until 1976, Colonial Williamsburg Department of Publications.

Transcriber's Notes

--Retained publication information from the printed edition: this eBook is public-domain in the country of publication.

--Silently corrected a few palpable typos.

--In the text versions only, text in italics is delimited by _underscores_.

--Marked a lacuna in the original printed edition with "{...}".