Spotsylvania County (Va.)

Robert & Betty Turnley
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 5:38pm

This interview with Robert & Betty Turnley was conducted on November 29,, 2000, by Christine Walsh. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

Milton Terrell
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 5:35pm

This interview with Milton Terrell was conducted on January 10, 2000, by Christine Walsh. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

Altamont Dickerson
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 5:29pm

This interview with Dr. Altamont Dickerson was conducted on November 30, 2000, by Christine Walsh and Merl Witt. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

Mr. & Mrs. Gordon Hilldrup
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 5:17pm

This interview with Mr. & Mrs. Gordon Hilldrup was conducted on April 2, 2000, by Christine Walsh. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

Eugene Buck Brumley
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 5:12pm

This interview with Eugene Buck Brumley was conducted on July 31, 2000, by Christine Walsh. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

Agnes Whitlock
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 5:04pm

This interview with Agnes Whitlock was conducted on September 24, 2000, by Christine Walsh. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

Hallie Rowley Sale
Oral History, Regional, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation, Virginia History
12/07/2009 - 4:59pm

This interview with Hallie Rowley Sale was conducted on August 11, 2003, by Christine Walsh. This interview is a project of the Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation.

African-American History of Spotsylvania, Virginia
African American, Education, Historic sites, History Feature Articles, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Virginia History, Walking and driving tours
11/02/2009 - 2:46pm

By the Spotsylvania Department of Tourism

From The Start ...

Blacks first arrived in isolated and sparsely populated Spotsylvania County along with white settlers in the early 1700's. Through the years before the Civil War, as slaves and occasionally as free men and women, they were an important force in area development. Occupations included labor as farm and plantation workers, as domestic servants, and as artisans, such as blacksmiths, carpenters, coopers, and fine needleworkers. They also worked in the iron industries, mining, construction, shipping on the Rappahannock River, and in their own businesses.

By the first half of the 19th century, Spotsylvania County's population reached about 11,000, overhalf of whom were black.
Alex Haley's award winning novel, Roots, cast his African ancestor, Kunta Kinte, as a slave of a Spotsylvania family.

A Fugitive from Persecution
African American, Antebellum Virginia, Dispatches, George Boxley, Punishments, Runaways, Slavery, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Underground Railroad, Virginia History
10/29/2009 - 12:01pm

From A History of Hamilton County, Indiana

At Spottsylvania, Va., prior to the war of 1812, lived a wealthy and influential citizen, George BOXLEY. He was a man of strong character, and, when he believed himself to be right, he was immovable. By honest toil, he had acquired his wealth, and, at the time of which we write, was the proprietor of a saw-mill, grist-mill and "carding-gin" or woolen-mill, all three being operated under one roof, in a building situated on the bank of one of the streams of Spottsylvania County. Like many persons of means in those days, he possessed a number of slaves, but became impressed with the injustice of the institution and liberated them.

Diary of a Tar Heel Confederate Soldier
Autobiography and Biography, Battle of the Wilderness, Civil War - U.S., Diaries, Dispatches, Spotsylvania County (Va.), Virginia History
10/28/2009 - 3:43pm

 

"We are all boys between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one."

Louis Leon joined North Carolina's Charlotte Grays in April 1861. He was to serve throughout the war and spent considerable time in Virginia. Captured at the Battle of the Wilderness on May 5, 1864, he spent the war's last months imprisoned at two notorious facilities: Point Lookout, Maryland and Elmira, New York. He published his war-time diary in 1913.

May 5—Moved this morning, feeling for the enemy, and came up to them at noon, five miles from the Run, in the Wilderness. It certainly is a wilderness; it is almost impossible for a man to walk, as the woods are thick with an underbrush growth and all kinds of shrubbery, old logs, grapevines, and goodness knows what. My corps of sharpshooters were ordered to the front. We formed in line and advanced to the enemy. We fought them very hard for three hours, they falling back all the time. Our sharpshooters' line got mixed up with Gordon's Brigade, and fought with them.