Industry And Independence- A Prince William Story
(as published in the Prince William Times)
The Prince William County story is a microcosm of the American story in many ways, such as the history of the great industrial achievements of early settlers on the one hand and on the other hand the unholy institution of slavery that made those achievements possible. An important substory here is the triumph of some ex-slaves who never gave up on their dreams of freedom and against all odds persevered to thrive and become prosperous after emancipation. This look at the Tayloe, Ewell, Chinn and Barnes families will illustrate this Prince William history.
Early Prince William Industry
First, a look at some of the early industrial enterprises in Prince William that were so important to the early American economy. Most folks have probably heard of Occoquan and Dumfries early history as economic and transportation hubs. Not as many may be aware of another important and related colonial industrial and farming operation in Prince William County- the Tayloe plantation and the companion Neabsco Iron Works.
The Tayloe family, specifically John Tayloe I, II, and III, had numerous plantations and business holdings in northeastern Virginia from 1710 to 1830. One was the Tayloe plantation in Prince William that encompassed 5000 acres. It featured an iron works located on Neabsco Creek near the intersection of Dale Boulevard and Route 95- near where the Americans In Wartime Museum is now planned to be located. In addition to the Neabsco Iron Works, they owned the Bristol Iron Works near Rollins Fork, Virginia, the Mt Airy plantation near Richmond Virginia, the Occoquan Ironworks, and an iron mine in Maryland to name a few. The family owned over 20,000 acres of land in Virginia and was among the richest in the country for a time.
The activities at Neabsco included farming, leatherworking, milling, shipbuilding, shoemaking and wood and metal working, as well as contributing to the production of weaponry for the American Revolution. Ships that were used to transport farm and industrial production were produced there. The businesses grew and expanded along with the family, with John Tayloe II buying the Occoquan Ironworks Company in 1756, eventually combining it with the Neabsco Iron Works. John Tayloe III owned two Northern Virginia stagecoach lines and established hotels and ordinaries along his stage routes, thereby helping to establish accessible overland transportation to areas not served by a waterway.
The Bel Air plantation that was near the intersection of Minnieville Road and Cardinal Drive had ties to the Tayloe enterprises and is another example of early Prince William industry. Charles Ewell was a co-founder of the iron foundry at Occoquan, and built the Bel Air mansion in 1740 on the foundation of a previous fort. George Washington- who was a cousin of Ewell- and Thomas Jefferson were regular guests at Bel Air. The mansion is now the residence of former Board Of County Supervisors chairman Corey Stewart.
Ewell also established a warehouse and successful mercantile business in Dumfries, which at one time rivaled New York as a shipping hub. Most of the production of Prince William County was sent to Scotland from Dumfries and traded for other
goods. Plantations that combined tobacco and iron production made sense for transportation to Europe since the tobacco was light but shipped in large containers, and the iron products were heavy and used for ballast in the ships.
Prince William was key to the industrial success of the colonies- so much so that the Neabsco operations were specifically targeted by the British in the War Of 1812.
The Reality Of Slavery
Of course, it’s impossible to discuss early farming and industry in Virginia and specifically these economic enterprises in Prince William without discussing the enslaved human beings whose work made those endeavors possible. John Tayloe I owned approximately 500 slaves, while his son John Tayloe II owned more than 700 by the 1820s. John Semple, who acquired the forge at Occoquan from Ewell and John Ballendine, had 26 male and 10 female slaves employed at his businesses when he died. Bel Air plantation had between 5 and 20 slave workers between 1740 and 1823. In 1755 there were roughly equal numbers of white males over 18 and enslaved people in Prince William County. (References: Historic Dumfries Virginia, Index To People Records Of Prince William County, Va.)
The Tayloe plantation slaves, as on most plantations, did much more than tend fields and keep house- many were skilled and managerial workers. They served as shoemakers, blacksmiths, joiners, carpenters, masons, sailors, spinners, weavers, colliers, and millers, among other skilled occupations. Under John Tayloe III’s management, as many as 250 slaves- or one third of his entire slave population- were skilled or semi-skilled workers who rarely performed fieldwork. The master shipbuilder at Occoquan was a slave named Reuben. At Tayloe’s Mt. Airy plantation, in the period from 1808 to 1823, 70 percent of the slaves were skilled. (Reference: Three generations of planter -businessmen: The Tayloes, slave labor, and entrepreneurialism in Virginia, 1710-1830).
African-American Success Stories
The story of African-Americans triumphing over racism, slavery and oppression to thrive and be prosperous is demonstrated in Prince William by two families in particular- the Chinn family in the Lake Ridge area and the Barnes family in Independent Hill.
Eppa Barnes, who had once been enslaved on a farm in Independent Hill, returned to the area in 1875 and married Amanda Lambert. In 1899, they purchased the Copen Farm, part of the farm where he had been a slave. The couple were successful farmers, and over their lifetime bought more than 300 acres surrounding the home and raised 12 children there.
Mary and Thomas Chinn were slaves on a farm near Occoquan, now part of Lake Ridge. After emancipation they bought part of the farm they were slaves on, eventually acquiring over 500 acres, building a general store and donating land for a church. These are but two examples of many former slaves who prospered in various areas of Prince William after emancipation despite the many hurdles and unequal conditions they faced.
Prince William’s early history is part of the larger story of a young country beginning to establish itself as independent and a force in the world while at the same time exploiting fellow human beings for financial advantage. As evidenced by our Civil War history- two of the most important battles in the war that eliminated slavery happened here- it’s the story of people coming together to fight to correct that travesty. And it’s the story of an exploited group of people who persevered, and continue to persevere to achieve success and equality.
Prince William: Setting The Stage for Land Speculation, Religious Freedom and Westward Expansion in A Young America
(As published in the Prince William Times)
Last month we took a look at an important early road in Prince William County: Davis Ford Road. This month, we’ll look at another historic road and an area along it: Dumfries Road and the Brent Town Tract. Along the way we’ll see how taken together these were early American examples of the quest for religious freedom, of land speculation and of promoting westward expansion.
Dumfries Road took the path of the current Va. 619 from Haymarket to Independent Hill, where it then continued on the path of what is now Va. 234 to Dumfries. It connected the farms and timbering operations around Haymarket and Brentsville to the commerce and shipping center that was Dumfries.
As the population of the county expanded westward, the county seat traveled with it along the road.
Dumfries was established in 1749, and by the 1760s it was quite a town, with numerous taverns and ordinaries, schools, a theater and opera house, grist mills, a bakery, a granary, a shipyard, a racetrack and a ferry to Maryland.It was a major shipping hub that had few rivals on the East Coast.
At the other end of Dumfries Road, Haymarket was established in 1800 at the crossroads of Dumfries Road and the Carolina Road, and was important as the early site of a district court, a clerk’s office and a jail.
Most folks are aware of the orchestrated effort to settle the American West after the Civil War. A similar thing happened right here in Prince William County almost 200 years earlier with the Brent Town tract.
The Brent Town experiment
The tract was granted to George Brent, Richard Foote, Robert Bristow and Nicholas Hayward by English King James II in 1686. The entire tract was in Stafford County at that time since Prince William County had not yet been formed. It was part of a plan by England to encourage the westward population of the British colonies and as a speculative undertaking by the grantees.
If a town could be established, the land would obviously be more attractive to prospective end users and thus more valuable.
Brent Town itself was planned for the western end of the 30,000-acre Brent Town tract. The exact location of the planned town isn’t known, but a blockhouse, or fort-like structure, was reportedly built in 1688 in what was to be Brent Town along the Iroquois Indian trail (also known as the Carolina Road) that went from the upper Potomac River to the falls of the Rappahannock. The fort was to serve as a defense against Indians roaming the trail. The Iroquois later moved their trail further west due to conflicts with Europeans.
The town was patterned after the English medieval system where each resident would have a 1-acre lot in town and a 100-acre farm outside of town. This was also for the settlers’ protection from Indian attack; the settlers would live in town where they could protect each other.
Brent Town was initially promoted as a haven for displaced Huguenots (Huguenots were French Protestants who broke away from the Catholic church and were persecuted in France for it). They were offered a form of asylum in England, but as the politics there changed and they didn’t feel welcome anymore, many of them emigrated to southeastern America. George Brent and the others wanted to take advantage of this situation to sell and lease their lands. That strategy ultimately didn’t result in many takers for various reasons.
Later, when the Protestants in Europe made a resurgence, Brent Town was marketed to Catholic refugees, which also didn’t result in many takers. The idea of Brent Town was finally abandoned, and the 30,000 acres were divided among the grantees’ heirs in the early 1700s.
The Brent Town Tract contains some of the oldest homes still standing in Prince William. Hazelwood, built by Richard Foote; Park Gate, built by Col. Thomas Lee, eldest son of Declaration of Independence signer Richard Henry Lee; and Pilgrims Rest, built by Henry Hooe and Jane Fitzhugh; were all built in the 1700s. Effingham was built in 1765 by Col. William Alexander, after whose family the city of Alexandria is named. He and his wife raised 16 children there, including one set of twins.
From Brent Town to Brentsville
Prince William County was split from Stafford County in 1731, and most of the Brent Town Tract ended up in Prince William. Even though the Brent Town concept wasn’t successful, the town of Brentsville was planned more than 100 years later.
It was established in the early 1820s on Bristow family land on the northern portion of the original tract. By then, Dumfries Road was a well-traveled route in both directions, and it served as Brentsville’s central avenue. Seventy lots were laid out on 56 acres, including a 3-acre town square and a 3-acre tavern square.
A courthouse and jail were established in this now central part of the county. It was the county seat from 1820 to January 1, 1894, with the courthouse and jail being constructed in 1822. By 1835, Brentsville had two taverns, a church, three stores and 19 homes. The oldest existing home -- the “White House” -- was built in 1822. St. James Episcopal Church was built in 1847.
County seat moves west-east-west
The first county courthouse was in north Woodbridge along the Occoquan. It moved to Cedar Run near what later became Brentsville in 1745 after Fairfax County was broken out of Prince William, then to Dumfries in 1759. It then went back to Brentsville in 1820, and to Manassas in 1894. The center of government moved with the geographic outlines of the county and the population growth.
The decision to move the courthouse from Dumfries to Brentsville was made by the General Assembly after 35 years of petitioning by residents. Dumfries had declined after its harbor silted in, and the population center moved west.
But just as conditions changed for Dumfries, they also later changed for Brentsville. Most of the platted streets were never constructed, and the town suffered heavy damage during the Civil War.
The Orange and Alexandria railroad was constructed through Manassas junction, making Manassas a transportation hub. Following that, the county seat was moved to Manassas, and Brentsville rapidly declined. Fortunately, the courthouse, jail, school and Union Church remain in Brentsville Historical Area Park to remind us of one of the most historically important places in Prince William.
It’s clear that roads like Dumfries Road and Davis Ford Road were key to early Prince William County’s growth. They facilitated trade, commerce and government and linked residents together.
They also now provide a window into the past and remind us that the past is indeed prologue.
By Martin Jeter
Contributing Writer