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Church of the Blind Preacher

Orange County · .5 mile north of Gordonsville. · location approximate

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Near here was the church of James Waddel, the blind Presbyterian preacher. Waddel, who had been a minister in the Northern Neck and elsewhere, came here about 1785 and died here in 1805. William Wirt, stopping in 1803 to hear a sermon, was impressed by Waddel's eloquence. He made it the subject of a classic essay.

1948 text, presented as a historical document.

Many of these markers have since been replaced or their texts revised. The marker program and its current texts are maintained by the Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Virginia Department of Historic Resources ↗

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

Marker data: Virginia Department of Conservation and Development, State Historical Markers of Virginia, 6th ed. (1948)

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