USA > Virginia > Rockbridge County > Rockbridge County > A history of Rockbridge County, Virginia > Part 18
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145
THE NEGRO ELEMENT
side, and on the east side to introduce a policy of gradual emancipation, deporta- tion, and colonization. John Letcher was also in favor of eventually keeping slavery out of the Western District. In the course of an interview at Washington College, General Lee said he had always favored gradual emancipation. He had considered the presence of the negro an absolute injury to the state and a peril to its futurc. He thought it would have been better had Virginia sent her negroes into the cotton country.
In 1860, the imminence of civil war depreciated slave values and gave a stimulus to a more active selling of them in the cotton states. In the Gazette for January 24, 1860, William Taylor advertises for 1,000 negroes for the Southern market. Another advertisement, dated May 10, 1860, reads thus: "I wish to pur- chase 500 likely young negroes of both sexes for the Southern market, for which I will pay the highest market prices in cash. My address is Staunton or Middle- brook, Augusta County, Va. J. E. Carson." About this time advertisements of runaway slaves were somewhat a regular feature of the newspapers.
During the war of 1861 the conduct of the negroes was highly creditable to the race, and there were few misdemeanors among them. Many of the slaves showed great fidelity in staying with the families of their masters and working the farms. In one instance a master was about to join the Confederate army and had to leave five children behind him. His man-slave told him to go on and he would himself see that things at home were attended to. The master was killed in battle, but the negro was faithful to his trust, and the children were enabled to go to school. A monument marks the grave of the old servant in the Timber Ridge burial ground.
American slavery was doomed by the war of 1861, no matter which side might triumph. The Federal government resorted to emancipation as a war measure, and it was made permanent by a constitutional amendment. Yet it is not generally known that an emancipation act was passed by the Confederate Congress in the closing days of the war.
The slave was commonly known by a single namie, instances of which are Mingo, Will, Jerry, Jude, Pompey, Dinah, Daphne, Rose, Jin, Nell, Let, Phœbe, Phillis, and Moll. One effect of emancipation was to ensure him a surname, which was often that of the family in which he had worked.
An interesting exception to a general rule was that of the Reverend John Chavis. In 1802 it was certified that he was free, decent, orderly, and respect- able, and had taken academic studies at Washington College. Another was Patrick Ilenry, for whom Thomas Jefferson built a cabin on his land at Natural Bridge and left him in charge of the property, so that it might be adequately shown to visitors. Jefferson conveyed some land to him in fee simple and he lived on it till his death in 1829. Henry's will is on record at Lexington. He had
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A HISTORY OF ROCKHRIIN,E COUNTY, VIRGINIA
the unique distinction of being a colored slaveholder, as the following document will show :
He it known to all whom these presents may come, that I, Patrick Henry, of the County of Rockbridge and State of Virginia having in the year of our Lord one Thousand eight hundred and fifteen purchased from Benjamin Darst of the town of Lexington a female slave named Louisa, and since known by the name of Louisa Henry; now, for and in con- sideration of her extraordinary meritorious zeal in the prosecution of my interest, her constant probity and exemplary deportment subsequent to her being recognized as my wife. together with divers other good and substantial reasons, I have this day in ofen court in the county aforesail, by this my public deed of manumission determined to enfranchise, set free, and admit her to a participation in all and every privilege, advantage, and immunity that free persons of color are capacitated, enabled, or permitted to enjoy in conformity with the Laws and Provisions of this Commonwealth, in such case made and provided. And by these presents I do hereby emancipate, set free, manumit, and disenthrall, the sand Louisa ahas Louisa Henry from the shackles of slavery and bondage forever, for myself and all per- sons whomsoever, I do renounce, resign, and henceforth disclaim all right and authority over her as, or in the capacity of a slave. And for the true and carnest performance of each and every stipulation herembefore mentioned to the said Louisa, alias Louisa Henry, I bind my- self, my heirs, executors, and administrators forever. In testimony whereof I have here- unto set my hand and affixed my seal this second day of December in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixteen.
PATRICK HENRY.
In 1910 the negroes of this county were sixteen per cent. of the population, and paid taxes on land and personalty assessed at $237.505. The gregariousness of the race is indicated in the fact that of the aforesaid amount. $155.653 be- longed in Lexington town and district.
It is worthy of mention that Amy Timberlake, daughter of a negress brought from Africa, lived to a greater age than any other resident of Rockbridge, so far as our information goes. She died in 1897 at the age of 107.
In the middle course of Irish Creck is a considerable community sometimes known as the "brown people." They live the simple life in their little log cabins which dot the valley and the bordering hillsides. In the veins of many of them is the blood of the Indian as well as that of the African, but the Caucasian type is dominant.
XVII
THE TOWN OF LEXINGTON
FOUNDING OF THE COUNTY SEAT-THE TOWN SITE-COUNTY BUILDINGS-THE FIRE OF 1796- LEXINGTON IN 1816 AND 1835-LEXINGTON IN RECENT TIMES- A LETTER OF 1781
When the county of Rockbridge was authorized in 1778, the population was probably not less than 4,000. It must have been well distributed, except that it had not penetrated so deeply into the mountain coves as was the case a century later. The Rockbridge people of that day were altogether rural. The nearest approach to a village was the school-hamlet at Timber Ridge. One cannot find in the United States nowadays an area so large as Rockbridge with its then popula- tion and without a full-fledged town.
But for the creation of the new county, ten and perhaps twenty years would have elapsed without placing a village in the center of the Rockbridge area. The county had to have a center of local government, and west of the Blue Ridge a county seat has always meant a town. The selection of the plateau at the mouth of Woods Creek was governed partly by the general attractiveness of the spot, but still more because of its central position and its being on the main line of travel between Staunton and the settlements on and beyond the Roanoke. It was also on a direct line of travel to the Kanawha and the West.
Thus we find that the same Act of Assembly which created Rockbridge also provided for laying off into streets and lots a tract of about twenty-seven acres. The net return from the sale of lots was to be applied to lessening the county levy. In the Act the statute-made town is called Lexington. We do not know who was particularly responsible for the choice of name, but the Lexington of Virginia, like the Lexington of Kentucky, appears to be a namesake of the village in Massachusetts, where the first battle of the Revolution was begun.
The first private owner of the tract was Gilbert Campbell, who left a new "hoose" and personalty of $179.41 on his decease in 1750. The property then passed to his son, Isaac, the possessor at the time of the War for Independence. The rectangle of 900 feet by 1,300 feet, provided by the statute, was divided into thirty-six lots, two of these being reserved for the county buildings. The original lots are 1281/2 fect broad and 195 feet deep. The three streets running in the longer direction were named Randolph, Main, and Jefferson. The cross streets were called Henry, Washington, and Nelson. With one exception these streets bear the names of Virginia statesmen of the Revolutionary period. An
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A HISTORY OF ROCKURIN.A. COUNTY, VIRGINIA
alley all around the circumference of five sixths of a mile is indicated in the original plat. The courthouse reservation was defined as fronting Main and extending from Henry to Washington.
The boundaries of Lexington were extended in 1847, 1850, 1874, and 1916. It is a curious fact that the title of the Act of 1850 conveys no hint that the statute concerns any other town than Clarksburg, the birthplace of Stonewall Jackson.
The first care of the county court was to provide for the public buildings. The specifications for the first courthouse are given in Chapter IN. The build- ing was to have been completed by November 1, 1778. Nothing appears to have been done, for next year we find the court ordering a courthouse twenty-five by thirty feet, flanked by two jury rooms, each twelve feet square. A stone founda- tion was to support a brick wall nine feet high. The roof was to be in the form of a T and covered with joint shingles. The courthouse now ordered appears to have been burned in 1787. In that year we find the justices con- tracting with William Brice to build a courthouse twenty-four by thirty feet on the ground, and with a wall eighteen feet high. Again the foundation was to be of stone and the wall of brick. Again the courtroom was to be flanked by a jury-room twelve feet square and provided with a chimney. In front there was to be a lobby twelve feet by twenty-four. The courtroom was to con- tain a gallery, and was to be lighted by two windows taking glass eight inches by ten, but with twenty-four panes instead of eighteen. Pine flooring and chestnut shingles were to be used. This second courthouse perished in the great fire of 1796. The justices to draw the plans for still another courthouse and jail were John Bowyer and John and James Caruthers. In 1798 a pillory and stocks were ordered. We are not informed as to the size of the original county "boarding house," but in Rockbridge, ad elsewhere, an "insufficiency of the jail" was for years a complaint entered by every incoming sheriff. In 1815 a stove was ordered for the "dungeon of jail" A new office for the clerk of the court was ordered in 1845. The present commodions and quite modern court- honte was opened in 1897.
April 11, 1796, the young village was scourged by the fire-fiend Accord ing to one version of the occurrence, some resident had burned the trash in his garden, and the coals were given new life by a rising wind. By another statement the fire began on the lot above the one occupied by the Methodist Church in 1889. The hay in a stable took fire, either from the pipe of a negro Fatter or from the embers under a wash-kettle. Both accounts agree that there was a westerly wind Little could be done to check the conflagration, and it extended as far eastward as the intersection of Main and Henry streets The courthouse burned down, and for a while the residence of AAndrew Reid was u cd as a substitute
149
THE TOWN OF LEXINGTON
The disaster of 1796 stimulated the people to devise a means for being less helpless in the event of another fire. So we find fifty citizens signing in the same year the following petition :
We, the inhabitants of the town of Lexington and its vicinity, under the impression of our late misfortune by fire, and sensible of the great danger to which we are dailey ex- posed from many unavoidable circumstances; do hereby mutually associate ourselves for the purpose of forming a fire company, to be known by the name of the Lexington Fire Company.
About thirty years later, another petition says there is an engine and hose, but no fire company. It remarks that the town levy on all real property is three per cent.
A petition of 1801 mentions an Act of Assembly whereby certain persons named therein were authorized to raise by a lottery $25,000 for the relief of the sufferers by the fire. It goes on to suggest, that as the Act was not carried into effect and the townsmen had in some measure recovered from their loss, the sum named be reduced to $5,000, and be used in building a schoolhouse in the town and in opening roads over South and North mountains.
A much better class of houses appears to have succeeded those destroyed in the great fire. One Isaac Burr, of New York, who kept a diary on his trip up the Valley of Virginia in September, 1804, says that "Lexington is a hand- some little village with good buildings." Burr must have been very fond of pie. He complains that he could get none except those made of apple or peach, and even these were exceedingly scarce.
A petition of 1805 finds a grievance in the playing of "long bullet," the nature of which seems now forgotten. It was played so much on the high- ways and near the town as to endanger the safety of people traveling about. Gambling was a feature of the game. Convictions were hard to secure, and that the practice might be stamped out, the aid of the Assembly was invoked.
For a quarter of a century there was no church building in the town, and religious services, as well as literary societies and singing schools, were held in the courthouse. On Washington's birthday, 1796. the sum of $2,500 was sub- scribed by forty-five men to erect a Presbyterian Church. The fire which quickly followed was probably responsible for some delay. At all events the church was not completed until the fall of 1802. It had an outside gallery and could seat 800 people. It stood near the main entrance to the present cemetery. and in 1844 was succeeded by the one now in existence. This, however, has been remodeled since the war of 1861. The Presbyterian house of worship has been followed. in the order of their mention, by the Methodist. Baptist. Episcopal, and Roman Catholic churches.
Unless the "Campbell schoolhouse" of 1753 stood near or on the site of
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A HISTORY OF ROCKURINE COUNTY, VIRGINIA
Lexington, the one built by William Alexander near where the union station now is would appear to have served the needs of the village in its earlier years. Apart from the Ann Smith Academy, the first pretentious effort in the educa- tional line seems to have been in 1819, when the "Central School of Lexington" was built by an association at a cost of $1,100. In 1834 it was still in use and incorporation was asked.
In IS11 there were eleven mechanics asking leave to incorporate as an asso- ciation.
In his semi-centennial address before the Franklin Society in 1873. Colonel J. T. I. Preston gives an interesting picture of Lexington in 1816. The town was still nearly or quite within the limits decreed in 1777. Main Street was not compactly built up, and there was but one brick building on its southward side. The finest structure was the Ann Smith Academy. Beyond it was a cornfield. At opposite sides of the college campus were two brick halls two stories high. The water supply was from a pump and from Back Spring Hauling water by sled was "quite an institution." lee-houses were unknown. The Presbyterian was the only church. There were two services separated by an "intervale" of one-half hour, and nearly as many people were present in the afternoon as in the morning. The large oak grove then reaching from the church gate to Woods Creek was a rambling ground during the noon inter- mission There were many merchants for a town of not over 600 people, but the trading was on a small scale. The store of William Caruthers was the largest. Goods were purchased in Philadelphia. Prices were higher than in 1873, and money was scarcer. The town physician was Samuel L. Campbell, an eccentric gentleman of fine sense, kind heart, good culture, and liberal views. His field was a large one, yet there was less sickness than in later years. The able and very genial bar, of which riotous stories were told, consisted of Chapman John- son, Daniel Sheffey, Briscoe Baldwin, and Howe Peyton.
In 1832 the lottery was still hardly thought of as a form of gambling. In that year Lexington was authorized to raise $12,000 by such means and use it in paving the streets and bringing water into the town
Martin's Virginia Gazetteer of 1835 tells us that Lexington had Presbyterian and Methodist churches, a printing office, five shoenrikers, five saddlers, four tay- ern, four carpenters, three hatters, two tanneries, two tinplate works, two cahi- net-makers, two wheelwrights, two jewelers, two blacksmiths, and one brick- layer. Three libraries were open to the public There were about 150 dwellings and nearly 900 inhabitants.
Howe, in his Sketches of Virginia, dated 1815, reports that the town had four churches, two printing offices, and 1,200 people. He quotes an English traveler af saying that "the town has many attractions. It is surrounded by
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THE TOWN OF LEXINGTON
beauty, and stands at the head of a valley flowing with milk and honey. House rent is low and provisions are cheap, abundant, and of the best quality. Flowers and gardens are more highly prized than in most places."
American opinion in the 50's sounds less appreciative. An observer of 1855 calls Lexington "an indifferent town and rather small, with muddy streets." Speaking of the town in 1859, Florence McCarthy, the Baptist minister, says it then looked as though it had been finished twenty years earlier, a new house being a very rare event. Yet in 1855, J. W. Paine was keeping a bookstore, and two years later Samuel Pettigrew had a daguerreotype studio. In this period the drinking habit was unpleasantly conspicuous. A petition of 1852, signed by 182 persons, says there are six unlicensed drinking places, and it asks for a search- warrant law. Just before the war of 1861 there were eight groggeries, and court day was no time for a self-respecting woman to appear on the street.
After the return of peace Lexington roused itself to a considerable degree of business activity, yet in 1873 a local newspaper said the streets were uncleanly and the sidewalks unworthy of the name. Eight years later there were paved streets, brick sidewalks, waterworks, and sanitary arrangements, but no rail- road. It took eighteen hours to come from Lynchburg, a distance of fifty miles.
Before there were banks in the Valley of Virginia it was a custom to con- ceal money. It is said that when Major William Dunlap died in 1834, there was the sum of $12,000 in specie lying buried on his farm near Goshen. In later years much time was spent by residents of the neighborhood in searching for it. The first bank in Rockbridge was the Lexington Savings Institution, in- corporated in 1843, but chartered under a longer name in 1834. It was still in operation in 1860, and gave five per cent. interest on time deposits. The Lexing- ton Building Fund Association was organized in 1854. In 1860 its assets were $51,611.75, and its expense account for the year was $1,114.94.
The coming of peace in 1865 found the town cemetery in a very much neglected condition. Few stones had been set up during the war, and much of the inclosure was a jungle of grass, weeds, and tree-sprouts. During the war there were 108 interments of Confederate soldiers from other states than Virginia. More than one-half were North Carolinians. But the cemetery is now well cared for. It lies high and level, commands a fine outlook, and is much beautified with flowers and shrubbery. It is the resting place of many of the eminent dead of Rockbridge. The most conspicuous feature is the pillar surmounted by a statue in heroic size of the great Confederate leader, Stonewall Jackson.
Lexington was incorporated December 18, 1841. On the first Saturday in January, 1842, and every second year thereafter, the free white male house- keepers and freeholders, twenty-one years of age or upward, were to elect seven trustees, these serving two years and four constituting a quorum. They were en-
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A HISTORY OF ROCKIRINI COUNTY, VIRGINIA
powered to appoint a board of three assessors. They could also adopt rules and regulations for the maintenance of order, grade and pave streets, put in water- works, and proceed against delinquents Their jurisdiction extended one mile beyond the town limits. They appointed a town sergeant, who acted as constable within the corporate limits.
During the last fifty years Lexington has been a place of about 3,000 in- Fal tants The business quarter is chiefly on Main street, and is quite compact. The business and professional interests are about such as may be looked for in an American town of this size. Yet Lexington has never been an industrial center. It is supported by a considerable country trade and by the two great educational institutions within its confines. The streets are generally paved. and the residence sections include many modern cottages setting back from the sidewalk in very attractive grounds. The improvement since the 50's is due more to the changed conditions of the postbellum era than to a marked increase in population. In 1850 the county seat was credited with 1.105 white and 638 colored inhabitants. In 1800 the total population was 2,135 In 1870 it had risen to 2,873, which is well-nigh as large as the figures for 1910. In 1874 the assessor found 1,451 white and 1,251 colored citizens and 501 students.
We close this chapter with a letter written from Lexington while it was yet an infant village.
Lexington Ist Feb. 178]
May st please your Excellency .
Accounts from all quarters lead us to expect vigorous Measures from our Enemies the next Campain. I have just received Duplicates of Letters sent from our Officers of Ihnois to others at Louisville which iform that the Spanish & American Ilinois Settlements are preparing defensively for heavy attacks. The original Letters I hear are sent forward to your l'acelleres. On conferring with Cols Bowmans & Trig we concluded it expedient to end 150 Men to Garrison the Mouth of Licking until Crockett shall arrive which we shall expect weekly. We apprehended the Expense we be less to Government than to wait until the Enemy arrived at our Seulements and better conduce to the Security of the pregle
Inclosed are Recommendations for certain officers in this County. Would there be any Impropriety in sending out some Blank Commissions as formerly ? 1 wd engage that no nancy be committed There are many vacancies for other (Haters than the e recommen led whe e Ranks are as yet unfilled
I have the Honor to be with the greatest Respect.
Your Excellency's Most obedient and humble Servant
T (\ leffer-m
Jons TODDY'S
XVIII
BUENA VISTA AND GLASGOW
At a point where North River exchanges an easterly for a southerly course, is a long and tolerably broad expanse of river-bottom. Immediately eastward are the high and broken foothills of the Blue Ridge. Westward is the rapid flowing river, and beyond is the rolling upland that extends to the North Mountain. The locality was long known as Hart's Bottom, because a portion was patented by Silas Hart, a pioneer magistrate whose home was near Staunton. John Robin- son came here shortly after the close of the Revolution, and by adding to his original purchase acquired a large estate. In 1889 the bottom was owned by Samuel F. Jordan, B. C. Moomaw, and one Gurney, of New York. By this time it was known as Green Valley. Near the flag station on what was then the newly built Shenandoah Valley Railroad was the Appold Tannery. Near this small industry were a half dozen dwellings for the employees.
About thirty years ago, a "boom fever" was spreading like an epidemic the entire length of the Valley of Virginia. "Development companies" sprang up like mushrooms, each one announcing that it designed to transform some old town or village into a hive of industry, or to create a brand-new town on a tract of farming land. Finely printed prospectuses were scattered broadcast, lot sales were held, bonuses were given to industrial "plants," and speculation ran riot until the inevitable reaction came. The result ranged all the way from moderate success to utter failure.
The effort launched at Green Valley was the earliest in the Valley of Virginia with the exception of Roanoke, and to this priority is largely due the fact that Buena Vista is an actual town and not a memory. A development company was organized with J. T. Barclay as its president. The issue of capital stock was fixed at $600,000. Within nine days this was oversubscribed by nearly twenty-five per cent. The land purchased and laid off into lots amounted to 900 acres. The streets, which are seventy-five feet wide, generally conform to the cardinal points of the compass. Those known as avenues bear the names of trees. The cross-streets are known by number. The blocks are of uniform size. Lots are 125 feet deep. Business lots are twenty-five feet wide and resi- dence lots are fifty feet wide. The business quarter is next the river and along the railroad tracks. The residence section lies toward the Blue Ridge and rises into some of the lower foothills.
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