PUBLIC "-//Library of Virginia//TEXT (US::Vi::vi03229::A Guide to the Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727)//EN" "vi03229.xml" A Guide to the Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727 Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727 1134950 Sarah Nerney Library of Virginia © 2010 By The Library of Virginia. All Rights Reserved.

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Machine-readable finding aid derived from MARC record, created by Sarah Nerney, 17 June 2010 Description is in English 2013-11-21 Converted to schema conforming EAD by dtd2schema.vh.xsl. A Guide to the Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727 A Collection in the Library of Virginia 1134950 Sarah Nerney

Library of Virginia 2010 LVA Staff Library of Virginia Descriptive Summary The Library of Virginia Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727 1134950 Library of Virginia 2 p. English Lancaster County (Va.) Circuit Court. Administrative Information Access Restrictions

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Preferred Citation

Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727. Local government records collection, Lancaster County Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia 23219.

Acquisition Information

This item came to the Library of Virginia in a transfer of court papers from Lancaster County.

Historical Information

Lancaster County was named for the English county. It was formed from Northumberland and York Counties in 1651.

Virginia's General Assembly passed Tobacco Acts in 1723 and 1729 that attempted to control the quantity and quality of tobacco grown in the colony. The 1723 act established limits on the number of plants that certain classes of persons could grow with slaveowners being allowed less plants. Each vestry of every parish had to appoint two people every year to count the number of plants being grown and report the numbers to the clerk of court by the month of August. Any number of plants over the allowed number were to be destroyed by the planter or, if the planter would not, by the counters. The act of 1729 provided various adjustments to and elaborations on the 1723 act. For full text of the acts which were not published in Hening's Statues, see The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography (Vol. 20, pp.158-178.)

Scope and Content

Lancaster County (Va.) Census of Tobacco Plants, 1727, is a list for Christ Church Parish that records the names of all tithable persons and how many plants they were growing. Slave names are given along with their owners. A total of the number of plants in the county is given at the end of the list. Some persons are described as "boy" and may be either slaves or boys between the age of 10 and 16.

Index Terms Corporate Names: Lancaster County (Va.). Circuit Court. Subjects: African Americans -- Virginia -- Lancaster County. Agriculture -- Virginia -- Lancaster County. Slaveholders -- Virginia -- Lancaster County. Tobacco -- Virginia -- Lancaster County. Tobacco industry -- Virginia -- Lancaster County. Geographical Names: Lancaster County (Va.) -- History -- 18th century. Genre and Form Terms: Lists -- Virginia -- Lancaster County. Local government records -- Virginia -- Lancaster County.