With the site’s 4th birthday in April 2017, a top to bottom review was due. All hyperlinks/URLs were tested and several inoperable links updated to their new addresses. A few were deleted where the target page is no longer available. …Continue reading →
John Ratcliffe married Ravensworth leaseholder Ann Moxley about 1750. He leased land in Parcel 1.1 in 1767 and in Parcel 1.2 in 1773, the only person identified so far with leases in both the north and south parts of Ravensworth. …Continue reading →
Richard Ratcliffe bought this 1000-acre part of Parcel 1.1.7 in 1798 from doctors Henry Rose and Augustine Smith. Ratcliffe merged the land with about 2000 adjacent non-Ravensworth acres, which he had acquired over three decades. He called his plantation Mount …Continue reading →
Role in Ravensworth: owner Parcel 1.1.7.3; founder/promoter of Town of Providence and Fairfax County Courthouse relocation Richard Ratcliffe was born c.1751 to John and Ann Ratcliffe. He married Louisiana “Locian” Boling (1760-1836), a close relative. They had nine children: Samuel …Continue reading →
Home to the Fairfax County courthouse, Providence was known as Fairfax Court House throughout much of the 19th century and particularly during the Civil War. Providence evolved to become today’s City of Fairfax and is its Old Town center. Historic …Continue reading →
With the establishment of the new United States Capital in 1790, Alexandria became part of the District of Columbia. As a result, the Fairfax County courthouse was no longer in the county, and the search started to find a new …Continue reading →
Fairfax County Court records list 33 deeds from William Fitzhugh (of Chatham) to leaseholders in Parcel 1.2 between 1767 and 1804.1 In addition to the leaseholders, 18 others are named in boundary descriptions that specify shared corners and lines with …Continue reading →
The road of approximately 34 miles was built between 1803 and 1810-12 from Alexandria to the Little River ford in Aldie, Virginia. That terminus further connected to established roads through western counties and through the Blue Ridge Mountains to the …Continue reading →
Chain of Ownership and Division Giles Fitzhugh inherited this parcel following the death of his father, Henry Fitzhugh (Colonel), in 1783. In 1796, he and his brother Battaile Fitzhugh sold/exchanged their Ravensworth lands with Battaile receiving this parcel and giving …Continue reading →