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Rockingham
County, Virginia |
Introduction |
INTRODUCTION
In this volume we present to the public
the results of the first serious attempt ever made to write and publish a
comprehensive illustrated history of Rockingham County, Virginia. That the task herein essayed has not been
undertaken before is remarkable, in view of the broad scope and inviting
character of the field; for the sons of Rockingham, both at home and abroad,
have been making history for many generations. They have made this fair land
between the mountains to blossom as the rose; they have cleared farms and
enriched them; they have founded homes and kept them in the light of sacred
fires; they have builded altars and worshiped before them; they have erected
schools and trained their children; they have sought peace and pursued it, yet
in the hour of battle they have set their bravest and best in the forefront;
they have borne loss and disaster without flinching, and in the midst of wasted
fields and homesteads have raised again the standards of a free and prosperous
people. Not only have the brave gone
forth for defense, and the strong to arduous labor, but the fair have also done
faithfully their noble part. In peace
or war, in prosperity or adversity, the women of Rockingham have risen always
to their high destiny. Their invincible
spirit has given motive to soldier and farmer and scholar; their hands have
ministered to sick and wounded, their prayers have soothed the dying; the
memorials raised by their toil and patience enhance the past and inspire the
future. We give them honor.
It has been the author’s purpose in this
history (1) to give due recognition to all the important phases of Rockingham
life, interests, and enterprises; (2) to emphasize those
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particular
interests and activities that have given the county its distinctive character
and influence; (3) to find and preserve some treasurers lost, or nearly lost,
in the lapse of time and the obscuring din of busy days.
Inasmuch as Rockingham is a great county,
mine has been a great task. How well it
has been performed, the intelligent reader must judge. No one more than the author will realize the
lacks and deficiencies in the result, but he hopes and believes that all will
at least credit him with a sincere purpose and an earnest effort. No opinion, however adverse, and no
criticism, however sharp, can take from him the joy that he has found in the
work. To him it has been indeed a labor
of love. The splendid achievements and
resources of the county have been appreciated as never before, and things in her
history have been found – often by seeming chance or rare good fortune – that
were before undreamed of.
At the laying of the corner stone for the
new Court House in 1896, Judge John Paul delivered an address that contains
much valuable information concerning the courts and civil officials of
Rockingham. This address has been found
very helpful by the author of this book.
In 1885 Mr. George F. Compton, now of Charlottesville, Va., published an
extended and interesting series of historical articles on the county in the
Rockingham Register; in 1900 Mr. John H. Floyd of Dayton wrote a series of ten
historical papers concerning Rockingham, and published them in the Harrisonburg
Free Press; in addition, many historical pieces, in books, magazines, and newspapers
have appeared from time to time. To all
these, so many as he has seen, the author makes due and grateful
acknowledgement; all that he has found published, in any available form, he has
listed, and in many cases described, in the appended Bibliography; at the same
time he begs leave to state that the bulk of the matter presented in this
volume has been collected and prepared by himself, with the generous aid of
many friends, from sources that may in a large measure be termed original. It would of course be impossible to
enumerate all the sources from which materials have been obtained; but some of
the more important ones are herewith indicated.
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First in natural order and importance are
the official records to be found in the land office at Richmond and in the
county clerk’s offices of Orange, Augusta, and Rockingham County. The records of marriages, of land sales, and
of court proceedings are rich in facts and interest and significance. Of almost equal importance with these
original records, are the many printed volumes of Hening’s Statutes and the
Acts of the General Assembly of Virginia.
Old almanacs and files of old newspapers have been found to contain
circumstantial accounts of important events that could scarcely be obtained
from any other source. Old files of the
Rockingham Register have proved of special value in this respect. Containing as they do particular and
contemporary accounts of practically every notable happening in the county
within the past ninety years, the successive issues of the Register are a very
treasure-house to the student and antiquarian.
A complete and well-preserved file of the Register, from the first issue
in 1822 to the present, would be sought after eagerly by any of the great
libraries of the country, and would command almost any price. Although the writer has not seen any
complete file of this paper, he has been exceedingly fortunate in securing what
is perhaps the best file in existence.
Through the generous kindness of Mr. R. B. Smythe, manager of he
News-Register Company, Harrisonburg, Va., he now has in his possession Register
files covering many years. These have
been found most helpful in the preparation of this book. Miss Hortense Devier, whose father, Giles
Devier, was for many years editor of the said paper, has made a generous loan
of extended files. In addition to these
files, many fugitive copies of the Register, some dating back almost to the
first issue, have been put into the author’s hands by his friends, as either a
gift or a loan. Special acknowledgement
is made to Hon. Geo. E. Sipe for access to files of the Old Commonwealth. For all these favors he is duly grateful.
He has also had put at his disposal files
of other periodicals, old ledgers and day books, and even personal manuscripts
and diaries. A manuscript account of
Harrisonburg,
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its
people, and the activities centering in it as the county-seat, written in 1892
by a lady who was born in the town in 1812, and giving realistic descriptions
of days and doings nearly a century ago, should be specially mentioned. The records of the Methodist church, dating
back in their beginning more than a hundred years, have been a source of much
information having a general as well as a particular interest. Photographers have contributed pictures,
authors have given their books, publishers have opened their presses in hearty
and generous co-operation. The
librarians at Richmond and at the State University, as well as at other places
where the author has gone gathering facts, have been obliging and helpful;
hundreds of persons all over the county, and in many other parts of our great
country, have responded cheerfully to personal letters requesting particular
information. It is indeed an embarrassment
of riches that has confronted the author; the task has been one of selection
rather than of collection, though he has sought far and long for some things
herein presented. He feels, therefore,
that he may be justly criticized, not so much for what he has given in this
book as for what he has been obliged to leave out. It has been deemed wiser, on the whole, to keep the volume within
reasonable size and cost than to include so much as to make it cumbersome in
bulk or expensive in price. We have
tried to make a book for the average reader, for every citizen, as well as for
the scholar and antiquarian.
Grateful acknowledgement is made to
special contributors and others who have given aid in supplying materials or
suggesting lines of choice, and the names of many of these will be found in the
proper connections throughout the volume.
Special mention is yet due in this place,
and is gratefully made, of the uniform courtesy extended to the author by Col.
D. H. Lee Martz, clerk of the circuit court in Rockingham, and by his assistants,
Mr. C. H. Brunk and Mr. J. Frank Blackburn.