Re: "President Arthur St.Clair" message - is it dinkum?

["Spirit One Email" <laurel@spiritone.com>]

Dear Ian and others,

    I have gone to look at this site.  It is just wonderful in its
presentation.  Quite safe.  Please go to it and read so much more about how
Arthur St. Clair contributed to our country.   (probably born with a
Caithness Sinclair spelling but then changed his name to the old spelling of
St. Clair.  He pronounced the name, however, as Sinclair or Sink'ler)

As you have learned from John Q's readers,  there were "Presidents" of the
Continental Congress before the first election of George Washington.
These men were elected by their peers and not the general public.  We also
have a law that only a person born in the country can be a president, so
this would have eliminated St. Clair later on.
Here is the list that I found in a Masonic Library:

Peyton Randolph of Virginia, Sept. 5, 1774  Resigned, Oct. 22, 1774
Henry Middleton of South Carolina, Oct. 22, 1774
Peyton Randolph of Virginia May 10, 1775, Died, Oct. 22, 1775
John Hancock, of Massachusetts May 24, 1775
Henry Laurens of SOuth Carolina, Nov. 1, 1777
John Jay of New York, Dec. 10, 1778
Samuel Huntington of Connecticut, Sept. 28, 1779
Thomas McKean of Delaware, July 10, 1781
John Hanson of Maryland, Nov. 5, 1781
Elias Boudiot of New Jersey, Nov. 4, 1782
Thomas Mifflin of Pennsylvania, Nov. 3, 1783
Richard Henry Leeof Virginia, Nov. 30, 1784
John Hancock of Massachusetts, Nov 23, 1785 Resigned May 29, 1786, never
having
          served, owing to contin ued illness.
Nathaniel Gorham of Massachusetts, June 6, 1786
Arthur St. Clair of Pennsylvania, Feb. 2, 1787
Cyrus CGriffin of Virginia, Jan 22, 1788

The first and Second Continental Congresses held sessions as such until
March 2, 1781. On March 4, 1781, the Congress became known as the Congress
of the Confederation.
The First Session of the First Congress under the Constitution of the United
States met in New York City on Mar. 4, 1789, and adjourned on Sept. 29,
1789.  George Washington was inaugurated the first President in Federal Hall
in New York Cityon April 30, 1789 and the Government of the United States
under the Constitution began actual operation.

.  The Second Session met from January 4, 1790, to August 12, 1790 in New
York City.
    The Third Sessionof the First Congress of the United States met in
Congress Hall, in Philadelphia on Dec. 6, 1790; and Philadelphia remained
the temporary seatof the Government until May 14, 1800, the closing of the
First Session of the 6th Congress.

    The Congress first met in the Capitol in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 17,
1800, at the opening of the Second Session of the Sixth Congress.
(Source: Biographical Dir. of the American Congress 1774-1949)

This book also has a list of 'Founding Fathers Identified as Masons" but
Jefferson's name is not among them.  But as was pointed out on this
discussion list, he still was at Masonic meetings in some capacity.   There
is among the pages I copied a list of all the representatives of the 13
colonies.   Each person is given a rating but I failed to copy the meaning
of the rating but surmise the following:

  All the men listed as known Masons, such as Arthur St. Clair, has a rating
of "I".   I see that Thomas Jefferson has a "II" rating which probably means
he was possibly a Mason but not definitely known to be one.  I see elsewhere
that Robert Morris was said "to not be known as a Mason"  has a "II" rating
also.  The rest have a "III" which must mean that they definitely were not
Masons.

Note: this website has General Arthur St. Clair as the grandson of the Earl
of Rosslyn.   A totally incorrect statement.   There was no Earl of Rosslyn
until 1801.  He was a ggggg grandson of the George, 4th (Sinclair) Earl of
Caithness.   They also have his birthdate wrong.  I have notified them of
these inaccuracies.   Otherwise it's a great website.
Laurel

===========================
----- > My question is: who is this "President" Arthur St.Clair?  Is this
message
> just one of those hoax type e-mails, possibly a virus-connected site or
> I am unwilling to actually go to the website, so thought I'd ask if anyone
> had any information about the purported "President" Arthur St.Clair.
Other
> than that, methinks it's the "delete" button!
>
> Cheers,
>
> Ian Newman
> in Oz

>
> We at Virtualology.com are please to announce our launch of the website
> http://www.ArthurStClair.com .  This educational site has been designed as
> a research and student publishing resource honoring President Arthur St.
> Clair.
>



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