250 and Counting

Tag: Virginia History

  • March 27, 1775: Thomas Jefferson Gets an Important Appointment

    Cover art for March 27, 1775: Portrait of Thomas Jefferson, 1791, by Charles Willson Peale.

    We hate to say it, but Thomas Jefferson was kind of a nepo baby.

    Jefferson was part of the Second Virginia Convention, and no doubt he got there honestly, as a man who had lots of property and was well-regarded, even at the tender age of 32. But when Peyton Randolph needed someone to replace him in the Second Continental Congress, he called on Jefferson—who was his cousin.

    On the positive side, Jefferson acquitted himself well in both the Virginia House of Burgesses, where he represented Albemarle County, and simultaneously at the Second Continental Congress. So while he probably didn’t need the familial boost, it surely didn’t hurt.

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  • March 26, 1775: Thomas Monteagle Bayly

    Cover art for March 26, 1775: B&W detail of a (c. 1820) painting by George Catlin of the Virginia House of Delegates.

    Never let it be said that we can’t find the less-obvious folks in American History. Thomas Bayly was definitely one of them.

    Bayly was a one-term congressman to the US House of Representatives as part of the 13th Congress (as this is written, we’re in the 118th). By most accounts he wasn’t especially distinguished, but only serving for the one term didn’t mean that he was politically finished. A few years after he left Congress, he was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates, and he was part of the Virginia Constitutional Convention.

    Bayly was “minor” enough in history that we were only able to find a single image of him—the one in the cover artwork. And it’s actually a black-and-white rendering of a color painting that’s been zoomed in to the point where you can see the texture on the canvas. It’s a detail from a painting of the entire House of Delegates around 1820.

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  • March 25, 1775: Letters to and From George

    Cover art for March 25, 1775: AI-generated image of George Washington writing a letter. Via Canva.

    George Washington was a frequent letter writer, something that the creators of the stage play 1776 would poke some fun at. But the documentation he kept plays an important part not only in the history of the American Revolution, but in the more mundane details of life during that time in American History. What’s more, we’re fortunate that so much of the correspondence both to and from Washington remains extant to this day. (Not all of it, as you’ll hear today, but it appears that most of it does.)

    Today we present two letters: one written from the Second Virginia Convention from George to his brother, and another written to George the same day by a merchant he frequently dealt with. The merchant died not long after writing the letter, so it’s not known whether Washington received it before the merchant died. What we do know is that the death resulted in an unexpected expense for Washington.

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  • March 23, 1775: A Wedding Announcement and a Birthday Celebration

    Cover art for March 23, 1775: Portrait of Dr. William Foushee, ca. 1820 (public domain image; attribution on the image is to someone named "Eugene")

    This show isn’t just about the big moments in American history, though we’ve been giving you those. We also take the time to look at some of the smaller things, which may have an effect later on down the line. And today we can mark two of those events.

    First up is a wedding taking place in Southampton County in Virginia, across the bay from Williamsburg. The bride was an educated woman who carried on that tradition afterward, and the groom was a future mayor of Richmond, the city’s first, in fact.

    Meanwhile, up in Pennsylvania, America’s first botanist was celebrating a birthday. Unfortunately it was one of his last.

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  • March 20, 1775: The Second Virginia Convention

    Cover art for March 20, 1775: portrait of Peyton Randolph by John Wollaston, circa early 1770s

    The people in Virginia were getting pretty upset about what was going on between the Colonies and the British Parliament. They called a convention and, as we’ve noted over the past several days, each county sent delegates with specific instructions, many of which recommended that the colony commit itself to resisting the British and supporting any efforts made by other American entities in that respect.

    The Second Virginia Convention finally met on this day in 1775, and they elected Peyton Randolph as its president. This was no surprise to anyone, as Randolph had been the president of the First Virginia Convention, and of the First Continental Congress.

    Randolph was also briefly the president of the Second Continental Congress but had to return to Virginia and was replaced by John Hancock. Shortly thereafter he had a fit of apoplexy (what we now call a hemorrhagic stroke) and died in October 1775.

    So even though he didn’t live to learn of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Randolph is frequently considered to be one of our Founding Fathers.

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  • March 19, 1775: The Watauga Purchase

    Cover art for March 19, 1775: Historical marker in Elizabethtown, Tennessee, commemorating the Watauga Purchase.

    The Watauga Purchase was one of several land purchases in the area of the Watauga River made around the same time. But this one was first, and we know this because it’s literally on Page One of the deed book, which still exists in the Archives of two different states (one is a copy, of course).

    Interestingly, while this territory is sometimes considered by historians to be a self-governing area, the residents actually considered themselves to be British subjects, even after the war began, and to a certain extent even for a short period after the Declaration of Independence was signed. That likely ended when the Cherokees (who were aligned with the British) attacked several settlements, although they were badly beaten in the attempt.

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  • March 16, 1775: The Augusta Resolves

    Cover art for March 16, 1775: the original broadside of the Augusta Resolves, on display in the Augusta County courthouse.

    Over the last few days we’ve heard from several counties in Virginia sending delegates and instructions to the Second Virginia Convention, which would meet in another few days. Many of these counties published their instructions, called “Resolves,” in newspapers, so that anyone who was literate would know where the freeholders of those counties stood.

    And today it’s Augusta County which weighed in by publishing their Resolves in the Virginia Gazette. Augusta County is quite close to both Fincastle and Botetourt counties, at what is now the western edge of the state. And we have to think that it’s meaningful that these communities, which were relatively far from where anything meaningful was taking place, was taking notice of those events and acting proactively, when only a few weeks earlier they would have been indifferent to it, because after all, it didn’t really affect them. Not yet, anyway.

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  • March 14, 1775: Lord Dunmore Calls for Help

    Cover art for March 14, 1775: John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore by Sir Joshua Reynolds, via Google Art Project

    John Murray, the Fourth Earl of Dunmore, or more commonly Lord Dunmore, came to the Colonies in 1770 to become the Royal Governor of New York, but fate intervened and he wound up as the Royal Governor of Virginia instead.

    He might have fared better in New York, but given the events of the Westminster Massacre you learned about yesterday, we’re not sure it would have made much difference. Dunmore wasn’t an especially good politician in general, and he didn’t hold the Colonists in an especially high esteem. And that’s the sort of thing that A) isn’t easily concealed, and B) doesn’t always go over well with your constituents. Not always.

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  • March 11, 1775: The Botetourt Resolutions

    Cover art for March 11, 1775: A detail from the Virginia Gazette from that day, with some of the text from the Botetourt Resolutions.

    The Botetourt Resolutions was a document prepared by the freeholders of Botetourt County in Virginia that sent instructions to its representatives in the Second Virginia Convention.

    Botetourt doesn’t get a lot of attention nowadays, largely because the Fincastle Resolutions arrived first and laid down nearly identical sentiments. But as we’ll see in the next few days, these two counties weren’t the only ones with the sort of opinions that they expressed.

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  • March 4, 1775

    Cover art for March 4, 1775: Photograph of Cuthbert Powell

    The Powell Family was a prominent one in the Loudoun County, Virginia area. It’s about due west of Washington, DC. If you’ve ever been anywhere between Leesburg and the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia, you’ve been to Loudoun County.

    The Powells were among the first to fight for Virginia during the American Revolution, and as the Thirteen Colonies broke away and became the United States, they found themselves with a sense of noblesse oblige and took to representing their area in the political arena. Today we celebrate one of that family, a man born on this day in 1775.

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