The 1917 Courthouse stands on the footprint of the first Chesterfield County courthouse built in 1749 and demolished in 1917, against the will of local citizenry. This early preservation case was the subject of heated debate between concerned . . . — — Map (db m133671) HM
Amelia County. Area 371 Square Miles. Formed in 1734 from Prince George and Brunswick, and named for Princess Amelia, daughter of King George II. William B. Giles, Governor of Virginia 1827-30, lived in this county. . . . — — Map (db m18924) HM
Once located to the south was Leatherwood, the plantation of Patrick Henry, governor of Virginia and great orator of the American Revolution. Henry is especially famous for his “Liberty or Death” speech made in 1775 in Saint John’s Church in . . . — — Map (db m104505) HM
After the Battle of Cold Harbor in June 1864, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant made plans to shift the Army of the Potomac to the south side of the James River with the objective of capturing Petersburg. On June 15th, the 18th Corps of the Army of the . . . — — Map (db m184370) HM
Fort Wead was built in June, 1864 by members of the 1st NY Engineers, assisted by the labors of various infantry units of the Army of the James. The fort was named after Col. Frederick M. Wead of the 98th NY Infantry, killed at the battle of Cold . . . — — Map (db m184750) HM
District of Columbia
• Howard University - District of Columbia
• University of the District of Columbia - District of Columbia
Maryland
• Bowie State University - Bowie, Maryland
• Coppin State University - . . . — — Map (db m291565) HM
Built 1860 by W.L. Moody, noted county merchant, for his bride, Elizabeth Bradley; sold after he moved to Galveston to his father-in-law, F.M. Bradley, one of this county's most influential men. Price was $2,800 in gold.
In Greek Revival style, . . . — — Map (db m272124) HM
The Early Years
Beginning around 1748, Richmond coal was shipped to the major coastal cities of Colonial America.The market was primarily for smithing and home heating since steam engine development for industry and transportation was still . . . — — Map (db m238290) HM
This headstock, or headframe, is an exact replica of the one erected here in 1836 and stands directly above the 625' Middle Shaft mine. Weighing 17 tons, the replica is constructed with mortise and tenon joints fastened with wooden dowels, . . . — — Map (db m238298) HM
English merchant and politician William Hatcher imigrated to Virginia around 1634. Hatcher acquired over a thousand acres of land through the headright system. His grants were scattered throughout what would become Chesterfield County as well as . . . — — Map (db m183352) HM
As part of British Maj. Gen. William Phillips Apr. 1781 campaign in Virginia by the 21st he sent Lt. Col. Robert Abercrombie's Light Infantry from Barrett's Ferry, where it enters the James River, to destroy the state's naval docks, ships, . . . — — Map (db m302955) HM
Half a mile south is Ampthill, built by the 1730s for Henry Cary Jr., a prominent building contractor. Cary's son, Archibald Cary, acquired the house in 1750. He was a member of all five of Virginia's Revolutionary Conventions, chaired the . . . — — Map (db m314303) HM
25 April 1781
In the late afternoon and evening of 24 April 1781, Virginia militia regiments of Brigadier General Peter Muhlenberg’s Corps of about 1,000 men marched into Petersburg in order to counter an expected attack by the invading . . . — — Map (db m266084) HM
Came to Texas from Virginia, 1852. Organized and was captain of Co. G, 7th Texas Infantry, the first Freestone County unit to go into battle in the Civil War.
Captured at Fort Donelson, Tenn. Feb. 1862. Exchanged, soon won promotion to colonel . . . — — Map (db m271690) HM
"The busiest place in Dixie" City Point, Virginia, played a significant role in the final year of the Civil War. General-in-Chief of the Union Army Ulysses S. Grant established his headquarters here on June 15, 1864. Union ships sailed . . . — — Map (db m131786) HM WM
Dr. Lilli Vincenz was a pioneering leader whose work as a journalist, filmmaker, and psychotherapist empowered the national gay civil rights movement. In 1965 she participated in the first gay rights protest at the White House, and in 1969 she . . . — — Map (db m287817) HM
The Petersburg Area. Throughout this area you will find attractions for the entire family, from museum houses and gardens to a zoo, from fine dining to camping, from Civil War Trails and battlefields to white-water kayaking.
Charles . . . — — Map (db m57322) HM
Russell Grove Presbyterian Church and the Russell Grove School were established as a result of the efforts of Mrs. Samantha Jane Neil, a Presbyterian missionary and teacher of African-American children after the Civil War. At first the school . . . — — Map (db m28927) HM
Southside Virginia Community College has two campuses: the Christanna Campus in Alberta, which opened in 1970, and the John H. Daniel campus in Keysville, which opened in 1971. The college is part of the statewide system of community colleges . . . — — Map (db m30868) HM
In 1714, at Governor Alexander Spotswood’s urging, the Virginia General Assembly funded the Virginia Indian Company, charged with building a fort on the banks of the Meherrin River in what would become Brunswick County. The fort would provide . . . — — Map (db m20197) HM
Saint Paul’s College began as a small parochial school founded by a newly ordained Episcopal deacon, the Rev. James Solomon Russell. Born into slavery, Russell attended seminary school in Petersburg. Within a year of graduation he had managed . . . — — Map (db m30870) HM
Union Grove School is representative of the many one-room schools for African-American students in Buckingham County and throughout the area. The African-American members of the community built Union Grove around 1925, and like most schools, . . . — — Map (db m21148) HM
North of this sign is the birthplace of Dr. Carter G. Woodson. Dr. Woodson was born December 19, 1875, to former slaves, James Henry and Eliza Ann Riddle Woodson. Young carter left Buckingham to work in West Virginia when he was 17 years old. . . . — — Map (db m31608) HM
Beginning in 1937, Ambassador and Mrs. David K. E. Bruce anonymously gave money to 11 sites in Southside Virginia to build libraries. The Bruce libraries, as they were called, became the first public libraries to allow access to African . . . — — Map (db m31019) HM
Southside Virginia Community College has two campuses: the Christanna Campus in Alberta, which opened in 1970, and the John H. Daniel campus in Keysville, which opened in 1971. The college is part of the statewide system of community colleges . . . — — Map (db m31025) HM
After the Civil War, in the Red Oak area of Charlotte County, many freed slaves were welcomed to worship at Antioch Baptist Church, a traditionally white church. The Antioch congregation helped raise money to build Salem Baptist Church in . . . — — Map (db m30999) HM
Late on the morning of Monday, April 3, 1865, part of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia briefly halted here at the Chesterfield County seat. The day before, a series of Federal attacks had broken through Lee’s lines at . . . — — Map (db m19518) HM
Virginia State University was chartered by the Virginia legislature in 1882 as the Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute. Delegate Alfred W. Harris, an African-American attorney in Petersburg, championed the charter and supported it . . . — — Map (db m26005) HM
Parents in the Cartersville area of Cumberland County met in 1909 to discuss the need for a centralized high school to replace the one-room schools serving white children in the area at that time. The county Superintendent of Schools led the . . . — — Map (db m31609) HM
Julius Rosenwald, a former president of Sears, Roebuck & Co., continued the efforts made by numerous philanthropists to bring education to African Americans in the South. During the early 1900s, funding for schools was scarce; the South had half . . . — — Map (db m21159) HM
Jackson Davis, an educational reformer and amateur photographer, was born in Cumberland County, VA, to William Anderson and Sally Wyatt (Guy) Davis on September 25, 1882. He attended the public schools of Richmond, VA, and received his B.A. . . . — — Map (db m21150) HM
Prior to the Civil War, Dinwiddie County was home to several private academies for those who could afford to pay for their education. While it was mostly affluent males who were educated, Pegram’s Academy, Female Academy, Girard Heartwell . . . — — Map (db m26834) HM
In 1938 the Virginia Assembly chartered a residential care facility for mentally retarded African-American males between 8 and 21 years of age. The Petersburg State Colony for the Negro Insane, as it was named, was located on the present site . . . — — Map (db m23455) HM
In 1911 a group of Dinwiddie County’s African-American residents established the Rocky Branch School in Sutherland. The school was a typical two-room schoolhouse. It had been moved from original location across from Ocran Methodist Church on . . . — — Map (db m26833) HM
In 1872 the Banister Baptist Association built a private African-American training school in Halifax County. Originally the campus consisted of four wooden buildings and a dormitory. The school year was six months, and the grades went only as . . . — — Map (db m30988) HM
Many churches in the second half of the 19th century and early part of the 20th century helped fill African Americans’ need for schooling. Frequently the church would raise funds to build the school, with county governments occasionally . . . — — Map (db m30961) HM
Determined to provide elementary education for young African Americans, the Rev. Parham B. Ragland started a school in his backyard some time around 1875. Though the "Backyard School" was private, Rev. Ragland was able to garner financial . . . — — Map (db m30970) HM
In 1880 a German Lutheran minister, the Rev. W. R. Buehler, a well-educated man who had worked for five years as a missionary in Africa, moved with his family to Green Bay, Virginia. He had not been in Green Bay long when the black community, . . . — — Map (db m31035) HM
On May 13, 1947, several African-American leaders in Lunenburg County met at First Baptist Church in Victoria to discuss the need for a centrally located building large enough to accommodate countywide gatherings and educational activities . . . — — Map (db m31856) HM
Boydton Academic and Bible Institute was opened in 1879 in building that had been abandoned by Randolph-Macon College when it moved to Ashland in 1868. Dr. Charles Cullis, a humanitarian from Boston, purchased the property in 1878 and opened . . . — — Map (db m30917) HM
Thyne Institute was established by Rev. J.Y. Ashenhurst, United Presbyterian Church, and a group of local citizens to provide an opportunity for African Americans (known as “freedmen” in the late 1800s) to obtain an education. In 1876 73 . . . — — Map (db m31003) HM
The Blackstone Female Institute was conceived in 1891 by George Pierce Adams, a Blackstone merchant, and Joshua Soule Hunter, a Methodist minister. Originally designed as a school to prepare young female students to enter Randolph-Macon . . . — — Map (db m31045) HM
Mt. Nebo Church was founded shortly after the Civil War in 1867. A northerner named Mr. Rickets bought the place called Oak Hill and began preaching to a group of African Americans at this place in the woods. The audience increased as people . . . — — Map (db m20242) HM
When the Russell Grove School in Amelia County grew too big for its building, land was found in Nottoway County near Burkeville for a new school. Built in 1892 to educate African-American girls, the new school was named Ingleside Seminary. It . . . — — Map (db m31042) HM
Petersburg established a public school system in 1868, two years before the state’s mandate. Colored Elementary School #1 was conducted in the old church building of the African Baptist Church, which stood to your left. The building had been . . . — — Map (db m26011) HM
Disrupted by the convulsions of the First World War, efforts to replace the increasingly inadequate Peabody School on Fillmore Street stretched out from 1913 until 1920, when the new Peabody-Williams School opened on Jones Street. Charles . . . — — Map (db m26012) HM
Beulah African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church was founded in 1868. Originally, it was known as The Colored Methodist Church of Farmville. The original wooden-framed building was destroyed, by fire in 1898. The cornerstone on the present . . . — — Map (db m31318) HM
Founded on March 5, 1839 as the Farmville Female Seminary Association, Longwood is one of the oldest colleges originally for women in the country. In 1842 the cornerstone was laid for the first true college building, which is today known as . . . — — Map (db m31316) HM
The First Baptist Church was organized in 1866 as an outgrowth of the predominantly white Farmville Baptist Church. In 1949, following the death of the Rev. C. H. Griffin, the Church voted unanimously to call his son, L. Francis Griffin, as . . . — — Map (db m31310) HM
Hampden-Sydney College, in continuous operation since November 10, 1775, was established “to form good men and good citizens.” One of the few remaining all-male colleges, it was named for John Hampden (1594-1643) and Algernon Sydney . . . — — Map (db m31324) HM
In 1954, after the Supreme Court ruled in Brown vs. the Board of Education of Topeka, that United States schools must integrate, Senator Harry S. Byrd and several Virginia governors followed the policy of “massive resistance.” Integration was . . . — — Map (db m31321) HM
On this site of the former R.R. Moton High School, the actions of some brave African-American students to achieve equal educational opportunities for blacks eventually led to the end of legal segregation in American public schools.
Moton . . . — — Map (db m31319) HM
On the morning of Monday, April 3, 1865, part of Confederate General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia briefly halted here. The day before, a series of Federal attacks had broken through Lee's lines at Petersburg and ended the siege there. . . . — — Map (db m311949) HM
The gravestones on the Old Brick House property are those of Richard Kennon (1684-1688), oldest son of Richard and Elizabeth Kennon; Henry Isham Kennon (1718-1747); and Angelina Vaughan (1826-1848). None of these stones mark actual graves in . . . — — Map (db m288674) HM
F. Southall Farrar, farm demonstration agent for
Southside Virginia, organized the state’s first
corn clubs for boys in 1909. Such clubs, a feature
of the nation’s emerging agricultural extension
movement, had originated in the Midwest . . . — — Map (db m107770) HM
The Petersburg Area. Throughout this area you will find attractions for the entire family, from museum houses and gardens to a zoo, from fine dining to camping, from Civil War Trails and battlefields to white-water . . . — — Map (db m310320) HM
On April 25, 1781, a British army force of 2,500 soldiers under the command of Genera! William PhilIips attacked Petersburg, hoping to capture the American military supplies here and eventually link up with General Cornwallis’ army coming to . . . — — Map (db m267239) HM
This two-room house, moved to this location in 2002, is the former home of Emily Winfree (1834-1919). The house once stood near the intersection of Porter and Commerce Streets in south Richmond in what was then the separate city of Manchester. . . . — — Map (db m202875) HM
This tree marks the site of Battery 17 of the inner defenses of Richmond, 1862-1865, and
is planted in soil taken from battlefields. A memorial to Confederate soldiers. — — Map (db m270939) HM WM
Mary Randolph, a native of Chesterfield County and author of the first American regional cookbook, lived nearby at Presquile Plantation during the last two decades of the 18th century after her marriage to David Meade Randolph in 1782. The couple . . . — — Map (db m11678) HM
On May 4, 1864, Maj. Gen. Benjamin F. Butler began to load 38,000 men of the Army of the James on transport ships at Newport News and Yorktown, Virginia. Their goal was a neck of land in Chesterfield County known as Bermuda Hundred. Butler was to . . . — — Map (db m271157) HM
On 27 April 1781, Brig. Gen. Benedict Arnold led the British army's 76th and 80th Regiments, the Queen's Rangers, and some other units in an assault at Osborne's in Chesterfield County. The Americans posted a number of Virginia Navy ships near here . . . — — Map (db m266705) HM
In 1611, Sir Thomas Dale established the second English settlement in Virginia called Henrico in honor of Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, son of King James I. The town was located four miles southwest on a peninsula of high land on the James . . . — — Map (db m9612) HM
Positions in the Battle of Petersburg
On 25 April 1781, this part of the community of Pocahontas served as the rear guard staging area for American Major General Frederick von Steuben’s Virginia militia in their defense of Petersburg against . . . — — Map (db m266085) HM
Col Samuel Drake (1787-1863), justice of the peace, coroner, inn owner, militiaman, son of James Drake (1740-96, Revolutionary soldier, Methodist minister & blacksmith of Little Deep Creek), owned 1048 acres, inc Caxamalca Plantation and 18 slaves. . . . — — Map (db m53565) HM
William Ransom Johnson lived near here at Oakland. Called the “Napoleon of the Turf,” he dominated American horseracing early in the 19th century. He trained more than 20 champions and achieved national fame from the 30 North-South match races held . . . — — Map (db m28915) HM
A prosperous Bermuda Hundred merchant, Richard Kennon was in Virginia prior to 1670 and represented Henrico County several times in the House of Burgesses.
Kennon married Elizabeth Worsham in 1675 and settled here on Conjurer's Neck after . . . — — Map (db m103890) HM
Dating from the mid-1890’s, this asymmetrical Queen Anne-style dwelling was built for Waverly P. Cousins and his wife, the former Mary Herndon.
Lured from Chesterfield County, Virginia, in 1880, Mr. Cousins prospered in Danville’s . . . — — Map (db m270743) HM
The Arrohateck Indians lived along the James River north of the Appomattox. They met Smith and his comrades on their initial journey up the James, paddling out to meet the English on a small island. “In the midway staying to refresh our selves in . . . — — Map (db m16336) HM
[Front]:
This house, the oldest in Chesterfield, was built ca. 1798 for John Craig (1755-1839), veteran of the American Revolution, merchant and miller, and county official. Craig’s father Hugh moved his family from Ireland to Virginia in . . . — — Map (db m28329) HM
From May 1864 until the end of the Civil War in April 1865, this land was the site of a large hospital for Federal troops who fought in the Bermuda Hundred Campaign and the Siege of Petersburg. Historic Point of Rocks is within the historic boundary . . . — — Map (db m73972) HM
(left panel)
Visiting Richmond National Battlefield Park
The concentration of Civil War resources found in the Richmond area is unparalleled. The National Park Service manages 13 sites, giving visitors an opportunity to examine the . . . — — Map (db m37022) HM
Confederate forces began construction of this earthen fort known as Battery Dantzler on May 18, 1864. The Confederates occupied this position after the Battle of Ware Bottom Church. In that action, Union Major General Benjamin F. Butler's Army of . . . — — Map (db m185614) HM
The Appomattox River is one of two rivers that borders the City of Hopewell. The Appomattox River originates in Appomattox County and flows eastward through central Virginia in the counties of Chesterfield, Dinwiddie and Prince George as well as the . . . — — Map (db m291773) HM
Although Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865, the formal surrender ceremonies for his cavalry, artillery, and infantry occurred over the next three days. Lee did not attend. On . . . — — Map (db m271512) HM
In this field on April 14, 1865, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee settled into his last camp with a small group of staff officers. After four Years of campaigning and the clamor of tens of thousands of soldiers, Lee unsaddled Traveller, and entered . . . — — Map (db m271510) HM
Archibald Cary established an iron forge on the south bank of Falling Creek in 1750. The Chesterfield forge, as it was known, converted pig iron into bar iron. Initially unprofitable and shut down, the forge would be restarted and become . . . — — Map (db m101039) HM
Located at this site was the beginning of one of the earliest residential communities in Chesterfield County.
Historic Village Of Bensley
Created by Albert Bensley in 1909, the Village of Bensley was marketed as a modem, convenient . . . — — Map (db m101044) HM
Located at this site was the beginning of one of the earliest residential communities in Chesterfield County.
Historic Village Of Bensley
Created by Albert Bensley in 1909, the Village of Bensley was marketed as a modem, convenient . . . — — Map (db m101037) HM
Point of Rocks takes its name from a 60-foot high sandstone cliff located here along the Appomattox River. The site was used by Native Americans as a camp and observation point, and was mentioned by Captain John Smith in his notes on Virginia. A . . . — — Map (db m109399) HM
Dedicated to all
Chesterfield County
veterans who served
their country
[On the other side of the wall is a series of plaques:]
Afghanistan
2001
Chesterfield County
Remembers
Brandon T. Islip, . . . — — Map (db m133672) WM
Thin black lines indicate changes in relevance. Between each pair of lines entries are ordered geographically but all have the same relevance.
* Inflectional forms of words are their plurals, singulars, and possessives as well as gramatical tenses and similar variations.
