Upcoming Events at PWCo Historic Sites

Please mark your calendars for these special events: 

November 12
Open-Hearth Cooking Class at Brentsville10am – 1pm, $40 per person; space limited, reservations required.
Gear up for the Thanksgiving season by learning the skills of open-hearth cooking. Join an experienced open-hearth cooking historian and learn the basic skills needed to prepare food over an open fire. You will learn how to build a fire and will prepare and cook three different dishes. End the program by enjoying a taste of the food you cooked. Class will take place in the ca. 1850 Haislip Farmhouse. 
Brentsville Courthouse Historic Centre

December 10
Rippon Lodge Holiday Open House and Welcome Home Celebration11am – 4pm $5
Rippon Lodge will be decked out for the holiday season.  Join in on the welcome home celebration of the portraits of Thomas and Christian Blackburn.  Living history, music and 18th century country dancing will take place.  Refreshments and holiday crafts for kids will be available.
Rippon Lodge Historic Site

December 11
Slave Holidays11am - 4pm; $7
Staff will provide unique hands-on tours about enslaved life during the holiday week from Christmas to New Years.  Learn about how the enslaved community celebrated the holidays and how they resisted against the institution that kept them enslaved.  Tours begin on the hour with the last tour at 3 pm. 
Ben Lomond Historic Site

December 17     
Civil War Christmas at Brentsville3pm – 9pm; $5  
Join us for a celebration of the holiday season in the old Union Church featuring music by Brentsville High School students, refreshments, children’s crafts, and a visit from the real Victorian Santa all by a roaring bonfire.
Brentsville Courthouse Historic Centre

Will: William Griffiss

WILLIAM GRIFFISS Will

Prince William County Will Bk M, pg 363

19 Apr 1824; proved 07 Nov 1825

In the name of God Amen I WILLIAM GRIFFISS make and declare this my last will and testament hereby revoking all others heretofore made by me.  In the first place I give and bequeath all my goods chattles and personal property of any discription to my beloved wife MILLY GRIFFISS during her natural life subject nevertheless to the payment of all my just debts and my funeral expences and excepting also one new feather bed and bedding one gun one cow a pair of spoon moulds and a pewter dish hereinafter specifically divided.  In the second place, I give and bequeath to my son RICHD. JOHN R. GRIFFISS the above excepted new bed and bedding and gun but should my son aforesaid die without issue then it is my will and desire and I hereby devise the sd. Bed and bedding and gun to my son WILLIAM GRIFFISS, to whom I now devise the above excepted buffalo cow and spoon moulds to him the said WILLIAM and his heirs forever.  And it is my will and desire and I hereby devise and direct that on the decease of my wife all that part of my property herein before devised to her during her natural life with the increase thereof shall be equally divided among my five children hereinafter named to wit to my son RICHARD JOHN R. GRIFFIS one fifth part to WILLIAM GRIFFISS one fifth part to my daughter KITTY ANN one fifth part to my daughter ELIZABETH ROTTER one fifth part and to my son SAMUEL S. HARRISON one fifth part to them and each of them and their heirs forever.  To my son PAREGRINE to whom I have already given as much as I shall be enabled to give to my other children I hereby give and bequeath one pewter dish as a token of affection.  I hereby constitute and appoint  my wife MILLY GRIFFISS and my son RICHC. JOHN R. GRIFFISS the Executor & Executrix of this my last will and testament.  To all which I hereby subscribe my name and affix my seal this 19^th day of April in the year of our lord one thousand eight hundred and twenty four.

WILLIAILM GRIFFISS

Signed sealed & delivered in presence of

WILLIAIM H. FITZHUGH, LEWIS ADIC

At a Court of Quarterly Sessions held for Prince William County  November 7^th 1825.  This last will and testament of WILLIAM GRIFFISS decd. was presented to the Court and being proved by the oaths of WILLIAM H. FITZHUGH and LEWIS ADIC is ordered to be recorded.

Teste, PHIL. D. DAWE

Newspaper Tidbits

The Washington Post

May 27, 1893

ARRESTED HIS WIFE.  Rev. Dr. Payton Takes His Unfaithful Wife to a Police Station.

Baltimore, May 26.—Rev. Oscar C. Payton, of Manassas, Va., arrested his wife in this city to-day and took her to a police station, where he charged her with having broken her marital vows.

Rev. Mr. Payton says they were married six years ago.  They have no children.  Six weeks ago, he says, his wife told him that she wanted to come to Baltimore to visit some friends.  He gave his consent, and his wife left home.  During the interval they corresponded, and he sent her money.  Finding that she refused to return home, he sent his wife's brother here and upon his report the husband came to town.  Mrs. Payton was known here as a Mrs. Carr.  She is about twenty-five years of age.  She says that she never loved her husband; that he was cruel to her, and that he was too old.  Mrs. Payton will go back to Richmond, Va.

~ ~ ~ ~

The Washington Post

May 22, 1909

MOTHER OF 11 WEDS AGAIN.  Was Congratulated by Roosevelt on the Birth of Triplets.

Manassas, Va., May 21.—William Breeden, Jr. and Mrs. Nicholas Breeden, his sister-in-law, of Prince William county, were married here yesterday.  Mrs. Breeden has eleven living children, of whom there were two sets of twins and one set of triplets in succession.

When Mrs. Breeden's triplets were born the fact was reported to Theodore Roosevelt, then President, and Mr. Roosevelt replied with a congratulatory letter.

Loose Papers: Report by Treasurers of Sales of Delinquent Lands to the Commonwealth

From PWCo Clerk's Loose Papers

Abstract of Form of Report by Treasurers of Sales of Delinquent Lands to the Commonwealth, under Act approved February 26, 1886

Office of the Treasurer of the County of Prince William

Brentsville – June 8, 1887

Date of sale:  Feb. 7, 1887

I hereby report that, after giving the notice required by law, on the 2^nd day of May, eighteen hundred and eighty-seven, I sold the following described tracts or parcels of land, lying in the county of Prince William, state of Virginia, to the Commonwealth of Virginia, there being no other bidders for 1885 herein named, for taxes, penalties, costs and levies due thereon respectively:

Name of person charged with taxes	Quantity of land charged	Local description of land	Am't of taxes and penalty due	Am't of levies and penalty due	Quantity of land sold
Samuel C. Boggs	196	Near Lansdown	2.55	3.25	196
Wallace Brewer	64	On Occoquan River	.74	1.05	64
R. M. Clarke, trustee	104 ½	Adjoins Hutchinson	1.81	2.30	104 ½
J. E. Cole	18 ¾	On Cabin Branch	.29	.39	18 ¾
R. L. Cardell	250	On North Run	4.30	5.41	250
Nancy Carney	100	Adjoins Carter	.87	1.08	100
J. C. Carter	17 ½	Part Falkland	.61	.75	17 ½
J. H. Carter executor	38	Part Falkland	1.43	1.61	38
Bladeu Dulany	50	On Broad Run	2.17	2.40	50
M. J. Foley & R. H. Henson	1117	Poplar Hill	4.06	5.07	117
Chas. H. Hunton, est.	1 lot	Buckland	2.17	2.56	1 lot
J. B. Hunton & E. Smith	19 ½	Part Buckland Mill	.85	1.02	19 ½
Hunton & Brother	4 lots	Buckland	4.33	5.25	4 lots
Hooe & Johnson	148	Adjoins McLean	7.72	8.57	148
Augustus Jacobs	207	Part Enfield	9.35	1114	207
Same	141 ½	Adjoins Ish	1.86	2.17	14 ½
Silas Jewells	25	On Lucky Run	.32	.42	25
John Kerns	112	Albaton	1.48	1.83	112
Sallie Leache	4 ¾	Part Waterloo	.22	.26	4 ¾
John Langzher & others	6	Part Mile Tract	.26	.38	6
Olivia D. Lee	5 ½	Near Greenwich	.23	.42	5 ½
Horace McCall	1 lot	Buckland	1.30	1.89	1 lot
C. A. Marstellers, est	15 ½	On Darkins Branch	.40	.46	15 ½
Morum issued land unimproved	1210	On Potomac River	7328	9161	1210
Jesse Nailor	9	Part Liberia	.39	.44	9
Bartholomew Oastley	270	On Chappawamsic	3.51	4.38	270
John H. Purcell est	188	Adjoins Beavers	1.65	2.04	188
Benjamin Pridmore	141	Forest	1.83	2.29	141
Catherine Petty	50	Forest	.65	.82	50
L. G. Prescott	½	Gainesville	.61	.71	½
Amos Purdon	120	On North Run	1.62	1.95	120
T. B. Robinson	295	Leesylvania	1532	1916	295
John Robertson	34 ½	Past Liberia	1.79	2.02	34 ½
Henrieta Robertson	10	On Piny Branch	.35	.36	111
H. C. Smith	23	Bailey & Burg	.51	.61	23
J. C. Shea	16	On Manassas Gap Road	.58	.62	16
J. R. Shirly, est	1	Near Gainesville	.11	.21	1
R. H. Swart, est	92	Part Mt. Atlas	3.20	3.78	92
Delia Smith, est	443	Near Lansdown	5.49	6.87	443
J. W. Smith	150	Near Lansdown	1.96	2.46	150
William Strother	24	On Goose Run	.30	.39	24
John Towles	129 ½	Near Gainsville	2.82	3.41	129 ½
T. B. Warder, est	11	On Cattail Branch	.25	.38	11
G. A. Whiting	9 ¼	On Cedar Run	.61	.73	9 ¼
Thornberry Warder	71	Studley	.91	1.15	71