Virginia Vignettes

Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller, whose barrel chest and blunt manner inspired his nickname, was a thirty-seven-year veteran of the United States Marine Corps who rose from enlisted man to the rank of lieutenant general. Puller was born in West Point, Virginia, on June 26, 1898. A second cousin of General George S. Patton and the [...]

Bacon’s Castle is the oldest datable brick residence in Virginia, a rare surviving example of Jacobean architecture in America. Built in 1665 by immigrant Arthur Allen, a supporter of the colonial governor and member of the House of Burgesses, Allen was driven from his house in 1676 when Nathaniel Bacon and men staged an uprising [...]

Actually, Virginia has many watersheds. All the land that drains to a particular body of water is called a watershed. A river’s watershed is made up of smaller watersheds as creeks and streams filter into larger ones before finally flowing into a single river. Virginia has 13 major watersheds, with the most dominant being the [...]

Yes, five major ones. A geological region is a specific land area, each differentiated by rock strata and elevation. The environmental character of Virginia’s regions has led to differences in agricultural planning, energy resource availability, and workforce and industrial opportunities.
The sand, silt, and clay of the Tidewater region on the coast of Virginia and the [...]

Not many! An unmarried, divorced, or widowed woman possessed a legal personality as feme sole and was solely responsible for her affairs. She could own titles and sign contracts and wills. On the other hand, a married woman was under the cover of her husband’s authority as feme covert and had few property rights. Land she brought to the [...]

Private Wesley Culp of the 2nd Virginia Infantry was killed on or near Culp’s Hill at the Battle of Gettysburg on July 2, 1863. Culp was born in Gettysburg in 1839. A relative of his, Henry Culp, owned Culp’s Hill and the adjacent land, which the family had farmed since 1787. An apprentice carriage maker, [...]

Elizabeth Van Lew was a Richmond Unionist and abolitionist who spied for the United States government during the Civil War. Leading a network of a dozen or so white and African American women and men – possibly including Mary Elizabeth Bowser, a former Van Lew family slave who worked as a servant in the Confederate [...]

Belle Boyd was one of the most famous Confederate spies during the Civil War, repeatedly and under dangerous circumstances managing to relay information on Union troop strengths and movements to Confederate commanders in the field. According to Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson, the intelligence she provided helped the general to win victories in the Shenandoah Valley [...]

In 1686, a French Huguenot named Durand was traveling through the colonies, recording his observances in a journal. Shortly before Christmas, he stopped at the home of Colonel William Fitzhugh, “whose houses stand along the banks of the great Pethomak river,” where he was treated to a lavish celebration. William Fitzhugh was one [...]

Heavily indebted after Thomas Jefferson’s death, the Jefferson family was forced to sell Monticello in 1828. Charlottesville druggist James Barclay purchased the property in hopes of creating a silkworm farm, which failed; in 1836, he sold the estate to Commodore Uriah Levy, a War of 1812 veteran and a pioneering Jewish officer in the Navy, [...]