"Here lies Dick Cole a grievous sinner
Who died shortly before dinner
Yet hopes in Heaven to find a place
To satiate his soul with grace."
Westmoreland, destined to share with Charles City County the distinction of being the birthplace of two Presidents of the United States, is a beautifully situated area with famous estates on its fertile lands. Among these should be mentioned "Stratford," the birthplace of two Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Richard Lee and Francis Lightfoot Lee, and of General Robert E. Lee.
New Tidewater Counties
Leaving the rapidly growing Northern Neck of Virginia, we return to the Tidewater area to see the developments there. Just as the 1622 Massacre had retarded settlements on the south bank of the York River, so the 1644 Massacre had delayed expansion on the north side of the York. Although in 1648 a petition was presented to the Assembly reciting "the great and clamorous necessities of divers of the inhabitants occasioned and brought upon them through the mean produce of their labours upon barren and over-wrought grounds" and praying leave to settle on the north side of Charles (York) and Rappahannock Rivers, the Assembly postponed the date of such settlement until 1 September 1649. It seems to have been about two years later, 1651, before Gloucester County was established, and Burgesses from the new county are first listed in April 1652.
It may be mentioned that this is an early example of the cause underlying a great deal of the migration in Virginia: "barren and over-wrought grounds," the toll that tobacco yearly exacted from the soil and the continuing need for new land to cultivate in order to produce profitable crops of tobacco.
Only a little later than the northward expansion of York, evidenced by the new county of Gloucester, came its growth to the west. In 1654, Captain Robert Abrell appeared in the Assembly as Burgess from New Kent County. Like Gloucester, it derived from an English shire of the same name, and was bestowed in honor of Colonel William Claiborne of Crayford, Kent, England, at this date a distinguished resident of the new county. Its bounds were "from the west side of Skimeno Creek to the heads of Pamunkey and Mattapony Rivers and down to the head of the west side of Poropotank Creek."
Expansion also had taken place on the south side of James River directly across from Jamestown. The easterly bound of James City across the river was Lawne's Creek established in 1634 when the county of Warrosquyoake (Isle of Wight) was formed. The west boundary on the south side of the river was Upper Chippokes Creek. This, too, had been set up in 1634. Now in 1652, this area lying between these two creeks became Surry. Though named for the English shire, the spelling of the Virginia county has always omitted the "e" the English Surrey uses. It is said the name was selected because Surrey in England has the same geographical position to London as the Virginia Surry has to Jamestown, then the seat of government.
With the formation of Surry County the needs of the population were satisfied for exactly 51 years. Not until 1703 was another south side division needed.
The Northern Neck and The Eastern Shore Divide