Virginia Genealogy is being developed as a genealogical and historical resource for your personal use. It contains information and records for Virginia ancestry, family history, and genealogy. Specifically, it provides sources for birth records, death records, marriage records, census records, tax records, court records, and military records. It also provides some historical details about different times and people in Virginia history.
Virginia County Names
Virginia County Names: Two hundred and seventy years of Virginia History
This book aims to tell how the Virginia counties got their names, and in telling the story it endeavors to show that the thoughts and feelings of the Virginians are reflected in the names the counties bear.
In the unfolding of this story I have been impressed, first, by the amount of history suggested by the names; and, second, by the fact that the naming of the Virginia counties furnishes more material for colonial history than the county-naming of any other State in the Union. Of course the history suggested in this way falls far short of being a history of Virginia, but it is not too much to claim that these county-namings are interesting and helpful in presenting some parts of the history of the Old Dominion from a new point of view. The names are the magnet; the facts of Virginia history are the iron filings: it has been my part to put the magnet among the filings.
I have been at much pains in my efforts to verify the facts herein presented, and when in doubt I have endeavored to attach to my statements the exact measure of doubt that I myself entertained.
To include all the facts that have a bearing on Virginia county names I have gone back in Scotch history to 1370; and have brought my work up to date by showing that among the exhibits of the Jamestown Exposition of 1907 were many honoring men after whom Virginia counties had been named.
The second part of the title of the book, “Two hundred and seventy years of Virginia History,” is given because of the fact that, with reference to Virginia history, I begin with 1607 and end, as far as the naming of the counties is concerned, with 1880, when the youngest county of the State was organized.
Recent Virginia Genealogy
Members of the Vance family appear among the early settlers and public figures of several Virginia frontier communities during the eighteenth century. James Vance was established at Opequon by the 1730s and married into the Glass family, while David Vance participated in the organization of Frederick County government. Later, John and Joseph Vance appear among the Presbyterian settlers of the Holston River valley. The surviving account does not establish the precise relationship among these different Vance families.
The Glass family was among the early Scotch-Irish families who settled along Opequon Creek in Frederick County, Virginia. Samuel Glass and his wife, Mary Gamble, came from County Down, Ireland, and established their home near the head spring of the Opequon in 1736. Their descendants remained closely associated with the creek valley, establishing homes at places known as Cherry Mead and Long Meadows, while other branches spread westward beyond the Allegheny Mountains.
The Hoge family was among the early Presbyterian families associated with the Opequon settlement in the northern Shenandoah Valley. William Hoge, a native of Paisley, Scotland, came to America as a young man and eventually settled with his family in Virginia about 1735. From this early household descended several families prominent in the religious and civic history of Frederick County and elsewhere in Virginia. The following account brings together the Hoge family references scattered throughout William Henry Foote’s Sketches of Virginia: Historical and Biographical, Second Series, arranging them by generation and family relationship.
Frank Armstrong, Jr., born December 24, 1900, in Clarksburg, West Virginia, has been with the National Fruit Product Company, Inc. since 1926, serving as treasurer since 1945 and president since 1950. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1922 and began his career with the Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company. Armstrong is a director of the Shenandoah Valley National Bank and has been actively involved in various business and community organizations in Winchester, including the Chamber of Commerce and Rotary Club. He married Margaret Tweltridge in 1927, and they have four children. The family resides in Winchester.
Judge Rose MacDonald Skoggs of Berryville has had a distinguished career spanning authorship, librarianship, and public service. Born Rose Mortimer Ellzey MacDonald in Lexington, Virginia, she pursued education at Norwood Institute, Shepherd College, the University of Virginia, and William and Mary College. She served as the first female member of the Virginia State Board of Education and judge of Clarke County’s juvenile and domestic relations court. An accomplished author, her works include “Mrs. Robert E. Lee” and “History of Virginia for Boys and Girls.” She is a member of the Society of Colonial Dames and the Garden Club of Virginia….
Whitwell W. Coxe, General Solicitor of the Norfolk and Western Railway, was born in Roanoke on April 24, 1884. Son of Joseph W. Coxe and Mary Keahlofer Syester, he earned his law degree from the University of Virginia in 1907. Coxe began his legal career with the firm Robertson, Hall and Woods, later partnering with prominent Roanoke lawyers. He became General Solicitor in 1936. Active in law and politics, Coxe served as president of the Roanoke and Virginia State Bar Associations and held various public offices. He was married twice and had six children.
Neighboring States
