When the English colony was established at Jamestown on May 14, 1607, the conduct of worship and the building of a primitive chapel were given priority even as the first fort was built.

He had been the chaplain appointed to serve as spiritual leader of the three-ship expedition headed by Christopher Newport, and he lit the candle for the Anglican Church in Virginia a few weeks earlier when he first lifted his voice in public thanksgiving and prayer on April 29, as the settlers made what has come to be known as their "First Landing" near the entrance to the Chesapeake Bay.

As in England, the parish became a unit of local importance equal in power and practical aspects to other entities such as the courts and even the House of Burgesses.

Page was allowed to have his family seated in a special pew at the front of the church in the chancel ahead of the congregation.

Conditions at Jamestown had made it problematic to serve as capital of the colony, and during the second half of the 17th century, sessions of the House of Burgesses and Governor's Council had periodically relocated to Middle Plantation, or longtime Governor Sir William Berkeley's Green Spring Plantation, both relatively nearby, and considered both safer and healthier locations than Jamestown Island.

In 1691, the House of Burgesses sent the Reverend James Blair, the colony's top religious leader and rector of Henrico Parish at Varina, to England to secure a charter to establish "a certain Place of Universal Study, a perpetual College of Divinity, Philosophy, Languages, and the good arts and sciences...to be supported and maintained, in all time coming."

With support from his friends, Henry Compton, the Bishop of London, and John Tillotson (Archbishop of Canterbury), Blair was ultimately successful.

[14] The Reverend Mr Blair, who had been serving as Rector of Henrico Parish (then along the western frontier), was very aware of the fate of Henricus and the first attempt at a college there, both of which had been annihilated in the Indian massacre of 1622.

The peaceful situation with the Native Americans and the high ground and central location in the developed portion of the colony at Middle Plantation must have appealed to him, for he is credited with selecting a site for the new college on the outskirt of the tiny community.

Following its designation as the Capital of the Colony, immediate provision was made for construction of a capitol building and for platting the new city according to the survey of Theodorick Bland.

With only 110 families in 1724, the parish vestry could, however, only afford to plan a small church, and invited the colony's government to finance an enlargement to accommodate the needs not arising from the local residents.

Finished in 1715, the church soon had all the required furnishings: Bible, prayer books, altar, font, cushions, surplice, bell, and reredos tablets.

[16] As the American Revolutionary War began in 1776, the power of both the monarchy and the church as an institution controlled by the government came into question in the colony.

[10] The capital was relocated to Richmond in 1781 for greater security in the conflict with Great Britain, and when the new Constitution of the United States and the accompanying Bill of Rights were adopted, the concepts of Separation of Church and State and Freedom of Religion changed the role of Bruton Parish Church in its community.

Over the years, various changes were made to the church fabric, including reversing the interior to place the altar at the west, instead of the east, end.

Dr Goodwin was called to Rochester, New York, where he stayed until 1923, when he returned to Virginia, to teach at the College of William and Mary, and serve again at Bruton Parish.

[18] In 1938 Marie Bauer, a follower and the future wife of prominent mystic Manly P. Hall, claimed to have deciphered information hidden in George Wither's 1635 book A Collection of Emblemes, Ancient and Moderne that under the foundations of the first brick church at Bruton Parish was a secret vault containing lost writings by Sir Francis Bacon, including proof that Bacon was the true author of Shakespeare's plays and plans for a utopian society.

[19] Bauer received permission from the parish to conduct an excavation, and using coordinates she reportedly decoded from various tombstones on the grounds, uncovered the foundations of the original 1683 brick church.

Bauer then hired an engineering firm to conduct metal-detecting tests on the site, which concluded that "At a depth of from sixteen to twenty feet square…lies a body partially filled and much larger than an ordinary tomb.

"[21] Interest in the supposed vault was rekindled in 1985 after radar tests indicated possible disturbed soil beneath the site of the 1938 dig.

Following the arrest of three people caught digging on the church grounds in the middle of the night, the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation conducted a new excavation in the summer of 1992.

Following Bauer's original calculations, archeologists dug to a depth of twenty feet without locating any evidence of a vault.

A geologist from the College of William & Mary took several soil samples and concluded that the ground at that depth had lain undisturbed for three million years.

[22] Today Colonial Williamsburg's Historic Area occupies 173 acres (70 ha) and includes 88 original buildings and more than 50 major reconstructions.

At Jamestown, England established its first permanent colony in the Americas, and at Yorktown the Continental Army under George Washington won a decisive victory to end British rule.

The Church has been restored to its appearance during the colonial era, and name plates on its box pews commemorate famous worshippers from the time, including George Washington, James Madison, John Tyler, Benjamin Harrison, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Jefferson.

[Col. Robert Neville Mann and Catherine Creek-Mann, Camp-Kemp Family History (Cedar Bluff, Alabama: 1967), vol.

Peter Pelham was the first organist, and began the tradition of Candlelight Concerts by allowing locals to come in and listen while he gave lessons to promising students.

The current music program, led by Rebecca Davy and JanEl Will, carries on the traditions started by Pelham while keeping up with modern trends in worship.

In January 2011, the church decided to take Peter Pelham's tradition of instructing students to a new level and create the position of organ scholar.