Sunday. 17th. Went to Church. Heard Bishop White preach, and see him ordain two Gentlemen Deacons—after wch. rid 8 Miles into the Country and dined with Mr. Jno. Ross in Chester County. Returned in the Afternoon.
William White (1748–1836), a native of Philadelphia, was the assistant minister and then, during the Revolution, the successor to Jacob Duché as minister for Christ and St. Peter’s Anglican churches in Philadelphia. White had recently returned from England, where earlier this year he had been consecrated an Anglican bishop, thus becoming empowered to consecrate deacons for the newly formed Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States of America, which he was instrumental in organizing following the Revolution. White’s sister Mary was the wife of GW’s Philadelphia host Robert Morris.
deacons: One of the deacons was apparently a son of Dr. Gerardus Clarkson (Pa. Mag., 12 [1888], 105).
John Ross’s farm, Grange Farm, or The Grange, was located on the old Haverford Road near Frankford in Chester County. He bought the property, formerly called Clifton Hall, from his father-in-law, Capt. Charles Cruikshank, in 1783 and renamed it in honor of Lafayette’s home in France (Pa. Mag., 23 [1899], 77–85).