Dear Hokies History Majors-
Have any of you worked with the William Preston papers at Virginia Tech? I am doing a family history research project and I am trying to figure out if VT has made the Preston papers available in an electronic format. Much obliged if you have?
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How much Preston info you need?
I'm a Preston's Grove descendent. But still have lots of info.
Edit: now that I think about, I swear I have an old photo of someone with the last name French, if that's your connection. I'll have to go dig out my stuff at my parents' house. Pretty sure I remember it being marked Cpl. William (Henry?) French?
I think I am looking for a point in the right direction (especially since I have resources like the Virginia State Library and the Virginia Historical Society resources available as soon as we return to normalcy.) Strap in for a long OT post.
I am working on a family history project for my father, who has passed on the responsibility of carrying a huge archive of primary and secondary source documents he kept to me. Despite all these documents, there are some gaps he has asked me to fill in. Because I have some experience (I have a history degree), I am using this crazy time to try and gather the information for him so I can share it with him before his health gets much worse.
One of those stories involves John French. John's father Matthew was one of the first settlers of Giles County. Matthew settled in Wolf Creek, just southeast of Narrows, near what is now Boyd's Cemetary. Matthew's son John married Obedience Clay, daughter of Mitchell Clay, who owned a large parcell of land in the New River Valley near where the celanese plant in Narrows is today. John is my great, great, great, great grandfather.
Matthew and John served in the Montgomery County militia, under the command of William Preston, Major Cloyd (first name escapes me) and Thomas Shannon. Their service was memorialized with a large obelisk which still stands in Boyd's Cemetary. I took my dad to visit it two weeks ago.
Our primary resource on their history is a book called A History of Middle New River Settlements and Contiguous Territory, authored by David Emmons Johnston in the late 1880s. The book, in a description of the battle of Wetzell's Mills- an engagement just prior to the battle at Guilford Courthouse, shares that John French was commanded to watch the horses while Preston's riflemen held the left flank of Colonel Otho William's line. When the battle was engaged, French abandoned the horses. According to Johnston, a senior unamed officer (possibly Lighthorse Harry Lee, who had direct command over Preston), threatened to court martial John. The major in command over French's company, Joseph Cloyd, threatened to resign if French was punished.
None of this is cited, and certainly could be apocryphal. However, in the same passage, several other stated facts caught my eye. One describes William Preston falling from his horse, and Major Cloyd helping Preston (who was a sick man at that point) onto the major's horse. Another talks about how Preston and his troops were angry because the Continentals withdrew and "sacrificed the riflemen" as shields to cover their retreat-causing Preston and his troops to go back to the New River Valley before the battle of Guilford Courthouse. Of course, none of this is sited either.
Well, I didn't give it much mind, until I stumbled across a Ph.D. dissertation entitled "William Preston 1729-1783: the Making of a Frontier Elite" by Dr. Richard Osborn, authored in 1990 and later printed in several editions of the Smithfield Review (Virginia Tech's own frontier history quarterly magazine.) In the dissertation, Dr. Osborn references the exact same stories about Preston's activities around Wetzell's Mills as Johnston, minus the French court martial story. However, Dr. Osborn also has citations regarding those stories about Preston. Apparently, everything Johnston wrote (minus the French story) about Preston's militia came from the following primary sources:
1) William Preston's letters to Thomas Jefferson (particularly a letter of 13 April 1781 found in the Jefferson Papers)
2) A letter from John Floyd to William Preston dated 26 April 1781
3) A letter from Leticia Preston Floyd to Benjamin Rush Floyd (I don't have date information)
4) A letter from Charles McGlll to Thomas Jefferson 10 March 1781 (found in the Jefferson Papers)
Johnston's account seems to use these sources. I am trying to figure out if the John French story was detailed in the same resources, or if not, where did it come from.
I don't know if the Preston papers are the best place to start. Most of the resources seem to be part of the Jefferson papers collection. I do know that the Draper manuscripts collection also may have the story.
Unfortunately, I am long removed from being a student, and haven't had much luck navigating JStor (I have around 40 free articles left.) If anyone can help me connect the dots (long shot I know) it would be greatly appreciated.
If someone can find the source or an avenue to find it, I will order two shirts of their choice from TKPs new sponsor for them. Least I can do for the help. I am trying to find a needle in a haystack, and finding electronic, transcribed versions of the primary sources is challenging when I can't go into a research library.
Here are the resources I have:
Preston article: https://vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/bitstream/handle/10919/88162/SR_v13_osborn...
Johnston book: https://books.google.com/books?id=HT4VAAAAYAAJ&q=Wetzels+Mill#v=onepage&... Page 80-83 (Johnston misinterprets the letter to say the engagements included Guilford, Preston's own writings say Preston's command went back towards Winston Salem.
I am trying to get my hands on a copy of William Preston and the Alleghany Patriots. I am also researching to find the best academic treatisie of the Guilford Courthouse campaign.
Thanks for reading the long post.
I'll do some digging and see what I can find. I know we have stuff dating to when Monroe was governor, but probably have earlier letters too.
There was a donation of family materials to a museum in Richmond at one point. I'll see if I can find out what, specifically, that included.
It may not be quick, but I'll see what I can do.
Any relation to Capt. James H French mentioned in A History of Middle New River Settlements and Contiguous Territory?
Probably, but he isn't a direct descendant. Either Matthew's grandson Ezekiel or his great grandson John Lewis French moved from Giles County to the Mud Fork/Stony Ridge area of Tazewell County in the early to mid 1800s. I haven't tracked that piece down yet.
Obedience, great name
According to my dad, she went by "Biddie."
Maybe it fit her well?
My wife was a VT history major - she said the papers are available through JSTOR.
You can use your VT log-in info to get access to JSTOR after searching for Virginia Polytechnic here. If you can't log-in, let me know and I can see if I can get it for you.
Have you contacted Dr. Paul Quigley at VT? His students did historical research on Preston a few years back.
I have not. That is a good lead!
An update- I was deep into a late night rabbit hole digging around the Virginia State Library archives last night. On microfiche, I found the original land grant from Lord Fairfax to Matthew's father (also John) for 246 acres at the mouth of the South Potomac River (where it empties into the Potomac) in what is now Hampshire County WV.
I have actually visited the original French homestead- it is still called French's Neck as it is a unique tear drop shaped bend in the river. A developer tried to develop it as a vacation-river side home deal, but it must not have sold well because only a handful of lots have houses.
Accoriding to the Johnston book, John died in his early 50s, and his wife remarried a man who was younger than Matthew (Captain Michael Cresap- the Cresaps were important pioneers in western Maryland.) Matthew sold his inheritance to Cresap, moved to Culpeper, got married, and then moved to the New River Valley in 1775.
Keep us updated with your findings, French. I'm loving this thread and learning more about the history of SWVA and the surrounding areas.
One of the amazing things I have learned in reading the two dissertations I have read on William Preston and William Campbell is how quickly the land was populated in the New and Holston river watersheds. There are a surprising amount of surviving land grants still documented in the Virginia state library, so while I am sure there were squatters, many more had legal title purchasing subdivided lots from large landholders like Preston, James Patton, or others. The concept was like a subdivision- the English government would "gift" land to notaries like Lord Fairfax, who would then sell smaller parcells, with agreements that the new owners would develop the land (for example, one of the John French grants requires him to build a sawmill.) Much like today's debate around Kelo vs New London and the Public Welfare clause, the government, in giving away undeveloped land, is creating a tax base and increasing revenue.
After the revolution, the availability of land in western Virginia, Kentucky, and the Ohio Valley solved a different problem- paying off war debt. Instead of paying soldiers for their service during the American Revolution, soliders were given land parcells. Of course, this benefitted land speculators like Washington, who owned the parcells and were paid by the government for them to be distributed to soliders.
The "big whigs" in Southwest Virginia are names which come up again and again in the historical record- Preston, Campbell, Floyd, Clay, Cloyd, Lewis, Smith. The same names come up again and again, and most also had close ties with the political elite in the eastern part of the state through marriage or political patronage. These are fascinating reads.
If you give the First Families of Virginia a look, and start digging at names, you'll find they were all connected. Lots of marriages between families.
None of the families you mention are there, but it's almost guaranteed there is a marriage connection.
Preston family is definitely connected to Cary, Jefferson, Randolph, and Rolfe.
Update- found a WPA report from 1937 and a photo of the John French home (Matthew's son). Also, I found out that the land grant for the first John French was surveyed by James Genn. The grant was established in 1749. In 1748, George Washington kept a diary as a 14 year old on his first surveying trip. The head surveyor of the trip? James Genn. The area surveyed? The mouth of the South Potomac, right where French's land grant was a year later. I thought that was really cool.