Fauquier County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1759-1919, use digital images found on the
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Fauquier County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1759-1919 (bulk 1830-1890). (Cite style of suit and chancery index no.). Local government records collection, Fauquier County Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.
Fauquier County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1759-1919, never came to the Library of Virginia. They were processed in the field by field processors between 1990 and 1999, and were sent for digitization from the locality.
Digital images were generated by PTFS through the Library of Virginia's Circuit Court Records Preservation Program in 2008.
Encoded by G. Crawford: April 2007; updated by C. Collins: January 2024.
Fauquier County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1759-1919, consists of cases concerning issues of equity brought largely by residents of the county and filed in the circuit court. These cases often involve the following actions: divisions of estates or land, disputes over wills, disputes regarding contracts, debt, divorce, and business disputes. Other less prevalent issues include freedom suits, permissions to sell property, and disputes concerning trespass. Predominant documents found in these chancery causes include bills (documents the plaintiff's complaint), answers (defendant's response to the plaintiff's complaint), decrees (court's decision), depositions, affidavits, correspondence, lists of heirs, deeds, plats, wills, records involving enslaved individuals, business records or vital statistics.
Commonly found surnames among the plaintiffs and defendants include Adams, Anderson, Armistead, Ashby, Bailey, Baker, Ball, Barbee, Beale, Blackwell, Bowen, Brent, Brooke, Brown, Byrne, Carr, Carter, Chapman, Chilton, Chinn, Cocke, Cooper, Crump, Davis, Digges, Dixon, Dodd, Dulin, Edmonds, Embrey (also spelled Embry), Fant, Farrow, Fishback, Fisher, Fitzhugh, Fletcher, Flowerree, Foley, Foster, Fox, Freeman, Gaines, Gibson, Glascock, Gordon, Graham, Gray, Green, Grigsby, Hall, Hampton, Harris, Harrison, Heflin, Helm, Hickerson, Hicks, Hitt, Hord, Horner, Hudnall, Hume, Hunton, Hutchison, Jackson, James, Jeffries, Jennings, Jett, Johnson, Johnston, Jones, Keith, Kelly, Kemper, Kincheloe, Lake, Latham, Lawson, Lee, Lewis, Maddux (also spelled Maddox), Marr, Mallory, Marshall, Martin, McClanahan (also spelled McClanaham), McDonald, Moore, Morehead, Morgan, Murray, Nelson, Norris, Obannon (also spelled Obanion), Owens, Page, Pattie, Payne, Peyton, Philips, Phillips, Pickett, Pollard, Porter, Priest, Ransdell, Rector, Rixey, Robinson, Rogers, Rust, Saunders, Scott, Seaton, Settle, Shackelford, Shumate, Sinclair, Smith, Stewart, Stone, Stribling, Strother, Suddoth, Sullivan, Taylor, Thomas, Thompson, Triplett, Turner, Utterback, Walden, Wallace, Ward, Warder, Weaver, Welch, Wheatley, White, Williams, Wilson, and Withers.
The Clerks Postage Account is involved in 25 suits between 1832 and 1850, while Fletcher & Bro is involved in 13 suits between 1886 and 1908.
These records also contain one folder of “Orphan Chancery,” which has been processed but not indexed. These records contain parts, often single items, of chancery causes that could not be further identified as belonging to a certain case.
Organized by case, of which each is assigned a unique index number comprised of the latest year found in case and a sequentially increasing 3-digit number assigned by the processor as cases for that year are found. Arranged chronologically.
Arrangement of documents within each folder are generally as follows: Bill, Answer, and Final Decree (if found.) However, some of these materials were scanned with the bills, answers, and decrees at the end of the case file.
Original Fauquier County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1759-1919, are retained in the locality. Contact the Clerk of the Circuit Court for access.
Additional post-1913 records may be available at the Fauquier County Circuit Court Clerk's Office.
Additional Fauquier County Court Records can be found on microfilm at The Library of Virginia web site. Consult
Lavinia Napper, a “woman of color” freed by the will of Giles Fitzhugh, petitioned the court for re-enslavement. Her emancipation was conditioned upon her removal from Virginia, and Lavinia stated that she “prefer[ed] slavery in Virginia to freedom out of it” because her friends and family lived in Virginia, and she did not want to live among strangers elsewhere. Citing a Virginia law passed in 1856, she hoped to voluntarily return to enslavement under Edwin Smith of Fauquier County, who was married to member of the Fitzhugh family.
Fanny (also spelled Fannie) Gillison, “a woman of color” emancipated in 1859 by a deed of Richards Payne, petitioned the court to be re-enslaved to William A. Bowen due to her “advanced age...with no reason to believe that from her own labor she will be able to support herself in comfort,” as well as her desire to remain in the county in which she was born and raised. Under Virginia law, individuals freed by their enslavers were required to leave the state within 12 months.