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Volume 12, Issue 3

March 2021

Central Rappahannock Heritage Center

Newsletter

A place that loses its history loses its soul

Message From The Chairman

Your Board of Directors will meet on March 16, 2021.

In my February Message, I indicated that a Nominating Committee was being set up to identify and propose new candidates for the Board of Directors. The Committee - consisting of Kitty Farley, Kevin Jones, and John Reifenberg - met on 16 February 2021. They have identified potential candidates and continue to ask for your help in identifying others. They will need to present four nominees to the Board at the July meeting.

Continuing progress is being made in regard toward a “new normalcy” in the lives of all Americans and around the world. We now need to focus on reopening the Central Rappahannock Heritage Center as soon as possible while still observing safe protocols. Somewhat symbolically, I will appoint an Ad Hoc Committee at the 2021 March Board Meeting, to be given the task of planning for a reopening of the Center on at least a partial basis by June. Actual dates will be determined by the Covid-19 circumstances at the time.

Even though 2020 was a good year from the fiscal standpoint, the Center faces serious challenges going forward. Our already limited community visibility has been further diminished. Fund raising from sponsors is down and special events have been non existent. We cannot operate without our volunteers. Will they return? It is very hard to get people excited about an organization that remains closed! I am confident that we will prevail and return even stronger.

And now on a very pleasant note, your Center has awarded Honorary Lifetime Memberships to the following:

Mr.& Mrs. Ray Campbell
Mary Lou Dennis
Ms. Roberta Kerr
Barbara Kirkwood-Taylor
Mrs. Elizabeth Lee
Mr. & Mrs. Barry L. Mc Ghee
Blair D. Mitchell
Betsy Taylor

They are being recognized for the key roles they played in the founding of the Center.

Stay safe and well.

Jack A. Apperson, Chairman

The Heritage Center

Welcome New Members!

Everett Richardson

Richard Galbraith

Stephen and Casey Hu

Heritage Center memberships support the important work done by The Center.

The Central Rappahannock Heritage Center is a non-profit, all-volunteer archive whose mission is to preserve historically valuable material of the region and make it available to the public for research.

Please join us as part of the Heritage Center's preservation team. As a member, you will be helping to preserve our priceless local history.

Click here to become a member today!

Membership

Thank you for your support,

The Heritage Center

MANY THANKS TO OUR GENEROUS

2021 HERITAGE CENTER SPONSORS

Barbara Barrett

Barbara H. Cecil

Dovetail Cultural Resource Group

Kitty Farley and Vic Ramoneda

Jim and Betsy Greene

Mary Katherine Greenlaw

Lucy and Wayne Harman

Mary Jane O'Neill

Hon. and Mrs. J.M.H. Willis

To become a Heritage Center Sponsor, please visit our website. If you have any questions, please contact The Heritage Center at (540) 373-3704.

Women Making History

The late Anne Rowe is remembered for many things. She is quoted as saying when there was a need, the women of Fredericksburg have always stepped up. There are countless examples. Local women worked together on endeavors such as the Mutual Aid Society during the Civil War, Confederate cemeteries, the Mary Washington Monument, preserving “historic shrines,” Mary Washington Hospital, voter registration, saving Kenmore and many more. Each woman made a significant contribution.

Dorothy Vaughan McCormick (1893 – 1969) came to Fredericksburg to manage a law office for Samuel Peter Powell (1880 – 1944). A native of Pennsylvania, she got her law degree from the University of Michigan where, in 1919, she was the first woman to be admitted to the bar. After marrying Powell (1920), Commonwealth Attorney for Spotsylvania County and later Fredericksburg, she and her husband practiced law together. They lived at 307 Lewis Street, the home of another famous Fredericksburg woman, Jane Beale. The couple had two daughters, one became a lawyer and teacher and the other an orthopedic surgeon. The Powells never told their daughters that women couldn’t be lawyers or doctors.

Frances Bernard White (1850 – 1929) was married to Judge John Tackett Goolrick (1843 – 1925). Judge Goolrick was a Confederate veteran who may have suffered from what we now know as PTSD. Mrs. Goolrick, a writer and poet whose works were published in Harper’s Weekly, was custodian of the Mary Washington Monument and lived, with her family, in the Caretaker’s Cottage. A wife and mother to six children, she led an active life making many contributions to her community.

Carrie Hunter (1890 - 1977) came to Fredericksburg from Appomattox to teach school. She married Marion G. Willis; they had one son. She taught elementary school for years, wrote several text books used in Virginia schools, as well as American Women (a biographical dictionary), Those who Dared, Golden Days in Old Virginia and Legends of Skyline Drive.

The Heritage Center has more information on these three women as well as many others.

Beth Daly

Volunteer

Stapleton Crutchfield Jr.’s Mill

Grist Mills were an important part of the development of our region. The archival holdings of the Central Rappahannock Heritage Center (CRHC) provide researchers and historians a glimpse into an almost forgotten part of our heritage. Few early mills survive, but their impact on our landscape is still present today. The most intriguing question is how did a citizen go about establishing, building, and maintaining such an enterprise? The records held by the CRHC help us understand that by today’s standards, we might consider this to be an imperfect process. Damming a waterway in modern times can require an act of Congress with numerous engineering and environmental studies. Not so in the early days of our region.

Grist Mills took their name from their by-product. Grist is grain that has been separated from its chaff in preparation for grinding. The product made into grist is called mash when it is coarse, and cornmeal when it is finely ground. Wheat, oats, barley and buckwheat are also ground and sifted into flour and farina. Grist is also used in brewing and distillation to make a mashing.

Some were small custom mills where local farmers would bring their wheat to be ground into flour for making bread. Others were merchant mills that bought large quantities of corn and grain, ground them and then shipped their milled products to whatever local markets were available. The miller was paid for his services of milling by collecting a toll. A toll is a portion of the grain brought to the mill for grinding. Local laws and custom set the allowable amounts for corn and wheat. In the 1700’s and 1800’s, the usual toll was one-eighth for corn and one-sixth for wheat. Because milling was also a craft learned through apprenticeship, no one was allowed in the mill when it was operating or when the miller was measuring out his toll.

In the days before electricity, large and small mills operated the same way, by using water to power the workings that ground grist into flour or meal. As the waterwheel turned, it engaged the teeth of wooden gears inside the mill, which in turn caused the main shaft that powered the grindstones (also known as burrstones) to revolve. Grain was dropped from a chute into a hole on the upper stone where it would be split and ground between the grooves of the two grindstones. As the process continued, the ground material would fall through a chute, go through a sifter, and be ready for bagging.

In order for a mill to be successful, water was required. Records at the CHRC tell a story. The earliest official mention of a mill in Spotsylvania County is recorded in DEED BOOK D-1742-1751. The location is not readily apparent.

Feby. 1,1742. Thos. x AlIen of St. Geo. Par., Spts. Co., to his son, John Allen of same par. and county. Deed of Gift. ~ profits, etc., of a grist mill and 100 a. whereon sd. Thomas now lives, etc., after death of sd. Thomas and Elizabeth, his present wife, Land adjoining Hon. Wm. Gooch, James Jones, and Thomas Allen', Junr. Witnesses, Edmund Waller, Henry Pendleton. Feby. 1, 1742.

Another set of records located in WILL BOOK E-1772-1798 indicated a mill close to Fredericksburg…

Roger Dixon, Fredericksburg, d. Oct. 3, 1771, p. June 18, 1772. Wit. none. Ex. my brother, the Rev. John Dixon. Leg. son, Roger, my dwelling house and four lots adjoining in the town of Fredericksburg, my new mill on the Hazel Run, and the Race and lands I am to have of Mr. Lewis Willis, after the death of his (Roger's) mother. Sons, John and Philip Rootes Dixon; daughters Mildred, Eliza, Lucy, Susannah, Mary; wife Lucy.

This merchant mill, after numerous owners became Wellford’s Mill. Today, when we sit in an automobile at the intersection of Blue Gray Parkway and Lafayette Boulevard, we are on the site of the mill. The photograph below shows the mill and in the background Marye’s Heights, where the National Cemetery is located today.

Hazel Run Mill

Photo courtesy Spotsylvania County Museum

In the early days of our region if one owned both sides of a stream, building a mill was not an issue. However, potential effects on neighbors was often unforeseen. Mills had negative impacts as well. In times of drought, millponds could become stagnated and serve as breeding grounds for mosquitos. Dams also interfered with the passage of anadromous fish, such as herring and shad, seeking to reach their spawning areas. Upriver farmers and residents noted the drop in the available fish and complained to their elected representatives. In 1759, the General Assembly ordered mill owners to provide fish ways through their respective barriers. Passage over dams consisted of an opening or slope in the dam that was a least ten-feet wide. This solution appears to have been satisfactory, at least for a while, but this requirement was forgotten beginning in the 1800’s.

As previously mentioned, if one didn’t own both sides of the waterway, the mill dam and pond could have a potential adverse effects on neighbors. The records held by the CHRC give us an insight into the process. In 1837, Stapleton Crutchfield Jr. (1808-1859), a prominent landowner, petitioned the court to build a mill on his property known as Green Branch in the Partlow area of Spotsylvania County. At the time, Crutchfield was also Clerk of Court. As was customary, the court authorized Crutchfield to appoint a group of local citizens, hopefully with some knowledge of the construction process, to review and make recommendations (petition below).

As requested, the group met, and it is noted that among the group members were William P. Wigglesworth, John Holiday and James Coleman, whose families had been involved in mills in the past.

They recommended the mill dam be 17-feet high. It was determined the millpond would cause 3/4 quarters of an acre of the property of George Pollett to be overflowed, which they valued at the sum of $10 and ¼ of an acre of the property of Elizabeth Spindle to be overflowed, valued and condemned for $4. In an early exercise of eminent domain, Crutchfield was ordered to pay the adjacent landowners and his mill soon became a reality.

A research of aerial photographs, and confirmation with the current owner of the property reveal that the remnants of the dam still exist today.

Terry Dougherty

Board Member and Volunteer

Collections Update

The following new collections are being processed:

Numerous photographs of the Armstrong, Garrison, and Hearn families of the Fredericksburg region, dating from the late 19^th century to the present.

Book: Battle Maps of the Civil War, The Eastern Theater.

Three hymnals, one dating from 1919, stamped the Presbyterian Sunday School.

Book: A transcription of the Stafford County Court Record Book, 1749-1755.

Book: Where Valor Proudly Sleeps, A History of Fredericksburg National Cemetery, 1866-1933.

Book: Simply Murder, The Battle of Fredericksburg, December 13, 1862.

Book: Pioneers, Patriots, and Planters, A Historic Narrative of a Woolfolk Family.

During my time aiding researchers at The Center, something about photographs became clear. Often the original, main subject of the picture, “Aunt Gertie” maybe, or “Uncle Fred”, becomes not the new focal point. The unintended building that happens to be in the background, the then open field or forested view, or a monument as it appeared “back in the day” all contribute mightily to our collective history.

With these “new eyes” contemplate reviewing any photographs that you may have thought not worthy of archiving with us. Beauty may be in the eyes of the beholder, but so is historical significance!

Consider a donation today.

John Reifenberg

Collections Manager