Sarah Nerney – The UncommonWealth

Archives

A Knight Unlike Any Other: John Mitchell Jr. & The Knights of Pythias

While processing Nottoway County chancery causes several years ago, Local Records Archivist Louise Jones came across a most unusual item fastening several papers together: a…

Sarah NerneyDecember 16, 2015

Archives Digital Projects

Sometimes You DO Find a Needle in a Haystack: The Augusta Co. Cohabitation Register

Cohabitation registers are among the most important genealogical resources for African-Americans attempting to connect their family lines back through the murky past to their enslaved…

Sarah NerneyJuly 29, 2015

Archives Conservation Digital Projects

Henry County Cohabitation Register Update

The conservation of the original pages of the Henry County Cohabitation Register has recently been completed. Previously, only a poorly and confusingly microfilmed version of this…

Sarah NerneyFebruary 25, 2015

Conservation Manuscripts & Special Collections

Montgomery County’s Prairie Flower Boys

In the courthouses of Virginia, one can often find records that are not and were never under the official purview of the clerks of the…

Sarah NerneyFebruary 4, 2015

Archives Digital Projects

Elizabeth City County Chancery Causes Online

The Library of Virginia is pleased to announce that digital images for Elizabeth City County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1747-1913, are now available online through the Chancery…

Sarah NerneyOctober 29, 2014

Archives

Montgomery County’s African American History

The varied experience of the African American residents of Montgomery County, Virginia, reveals itself in many documentary sources, but perhaps none as unexpected to some…

Sarah NerneyJuly 2, 2014

Archives

Independence didn’t come cheap

The fledgling United States of America found that a considerable public debt had been generated by the struggle for independence against Great Britain. Such was…

Sarah NerneyJuly 3, 2013

Archives Digital Projects

Washington and Scott Co. Cohabitation Registers Now Online

The Library of Virginia is pleased to announce the addition of Scott County and Washington County to the cohabitation register digitization project. This project, via the Virginia…

Sarah NerneyJune 7, 2013

Archives

Tobacco Census: Fixing the "Frauds and Mischiefs" of the Tobacco Trade

Virginia’s agricultural production, as well as its economy, was dominated by tobacco for over three centuries, ever since John Rolfe sent his first shipment of…

Sarah NerneyMay 22, 2013

Conservation

History Restored: Free Negro Registers Conserved

While watching the February 2012 episode of NBC’s Who Do You Think You Are? featuring actor and Petersburg native Blair Underwood investigating his family history, Library of…

Sarah NerneyMarch 27, 2013

Archives

Wills, Slavery, and Freedom in Augusta Co.

In November of 1860, executor William F. Smith was in a pickle. Charged with settling the estate of Elizabeth P. Via of Augusta County, he…

Sarah NerneyFebruary 20, 2013

Archives

"And the piano, it sounds like a carnival"

In May of 1883, H. W. Gray, president of the Schomacker Piano-Forte Manufacturing Company, brought suit against Bettie L. Payne in the Frederick County Circuit…

Sarah NerneyOctober 24, 2012

Archives

Halifax Tax Ledger Turned Child’s Scrapbook

During a recent cataloging project, what at first seemed like a standard exercise revealed a nice surprise. From its exterior, the Halifax County (Va.) Capitation and…

Sarah NerneyOctober 10, 2012

Archives Digital Projects

Surry Co. Cohabitation Register Goes Digital!

The Library of Virginia is pleased to announce the addition of Surry County to the cohabitation register digitization project. This project, via the Virginia Memory website, aims to…

Sarah NerneyJuly 18, 2012

Archives

"Tell the court that I love my wife…"

Commonwealth vs. Richard Perry Loving and Mildred Delores Jeter was the criminal case that began in 1958 in Caroline County and terminated in a landmark civil…

Sarah NerneyFebruary 8, 2012