Chesterfield Co. 1815 Directory of Landowners
by Roger G. Ward. 2005. 38 pages, map, 5 1/2X8 1/2.
For a full description of the 1815 LAND DIRECTORY Records and a listing of available counties, see combined volume below
[Vd19] $9.00
The above title is also available as a digital e-book in PDF format:
[EVd19] $6.00 (electronic version)
1815 DIRECTORY OF VIRGINIA LANDOWNERS & GAZETTEER, vol. 1 Central Region
(Includes the counties of Albemarle, Amelia, Amherst, Buckingham, Charles City, Chesterfield, Cumberland,
Dinwiddie, Fluvanna, Goochland, Hanover, Henrico, independent city of Petersburg,
independent city of Richmond, Louisa, Nelson, New Kent, Nottoway, Powhatan, and
Prince George.) abstracted by Roger G. Ward. 1997, vi, 239 pages, indices, maps.
In 1782 the General Assembly of Virginia enacted new tax laws which
created within each county an enumeration of land and certain personal property. These
early land tax laws required a tax commissioner in each district of a county to record a
list of the names of persons owning land or town lots, the quantity of land owned and its
value, and the amount of tax owed. By 1813, a brief geographic description (usually
citing an adjacent stream, road, or other landmark) was required; in 1814, the distance
and direction from the courthouse for each parcel was also added to the tax rolls.
The present work is an alphabetical listing of all 1815 landowners found in
each county, as well as the accompanying description of the location of the said property.
We have not included the number of acres, taxes assessed, or any transactions between
landowners which may have been noted on the tax rolls; also, in many cases the
geographic location was provided as "adjacent to John Smith", etc. and, while useful many
times to a genealogist, was considered to be beyond the objectives of this project. The
reader is encouraged to consider the information here-in as an "outline" of early
landowners in Virginia rather than a "text" due to the year-to-year variation in
information provided to the clerk (or recorded by the clerk), omissions, lack of
"identifiers" to determine if "same name" was also "same person" within a district or
across districts, marginal quality/clarity (in a few cases) of the microfilm copy, and, not
least, errors on the part of either the original clerks or the current author while
transcribing.
Some of the approaches to utilizing the 1815 landowner information include:-
observe distinct clusters of the same surname within a county in order to clarify
the common surnames such as "Smith", "Anderson", etc;
- identify non-resident landowners and their county (or state) of residence (these
people often being former residents of the current county);
- determine neighbors with different surnames (often being relatives);
- use the 1815 information as a "bridge" from the 18th and 19th century deed/will
books to the 17th and 18th century land grants/patents in the county;
- evaluate the 1810 to 1840 census information which generally grouped
neighbors;
- substitute this information for missing deed/will books in the "burned" counties;
and, clarify/enhance vague deed/will information in the counties with more complete
records.
FORMAT OF PRESENTATION: Each entry is listed as: Surname,
name,
personal identifiers (if any); location/place-name of land; miles/direction from the 1815
courthouse. If multiple owners are listed for a property, the listing is duplicated under
each of the owner's surnames (i.e "Smith and Brown" is also listed as "Brown, --see
Smith"); when multiple owners share a common surname, the property is only listed
once. When a landowner had land at more than one location/place-name, the
miles/direction listing for each parcel is in the same sequence as the location listing (i.e.
James RV, Slate CK; 12N, 5SW.). In the few cases where a landowner had "many"
parcels, the miles/direction notation is attached to the location listing (i.e. Sandy RV-
5NE, Willow CK-7S, etc.)
[Vdl1] $32.00 (paper version)
The above title is also available as a digital e-book in PDF format:
[EVDL-1] $20.00 (electronic version)
Chesterfield Co. Revolutionary Public Claims
transcribed by Janice L. Abercrombie and Richard Slatten.. 2005. 57 pages, 5 1/2X8 1/2.
For a full description of the Virginia Revolutionary Public Claims and a listing of available counties, see:
Revolutionary "Publick" Claims series
To view a digital copy (pdf) of the index to this book, visit Index-Chesterfield
(Close the pdf file with the left arrow to return to Iberian's catalog)
[Pc15] $8.50 (printed version)
The above title is also available as a digital e-book in PDF format:
[EPc15] $5.00 (electronic version)
For more records pertaining to
CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, VIRGINIA see also:
Please see our HELP PAGE for mail-order instructions, wholesaler policies and other contact information.
|| Virginia/W.Va. || General Reference || Military Records ||
|| Other States || E-Books || New Titles || Home Page || E-Books ||
Copyright © 2026 Iberian Publishing Company
Chesterfield County was formed on 25 May 1749 from the lands belonging to Henrico County lying south of the James River. It was named for the Earl of Chesterfield, British statesman and diplomat. A boundary alteration to Chesterfield occurred in 1850 when the southwest corner of the county lying west of Skinquarter Creek was ceded to Powhatan County. The last change in Chesterfield's configuration occurred in 1922, when Farrar's Island was ceded to the county by legislative act.
The Chesterfield area was first settled in the 1610s, when an iron ore furnace was built below the falls near present-day Richmond. This early settlement was destroyed during the Indian Massacre of 1622. One of the settlements which survived this catastrophe was Bermuda Hundred, which is one of the oldest English settlements in America. A number of Huguenots settled in the Chesterfield area during the eighteenth century as the population moved outward from its base at Manakin Town.
CHESTERFIELD CO., VA 1810 CENSUS transcribed, with an index by John Vogt. 10 1/2 x 8 1/2, x, 27 pages, illustrations, maps, index.. This is the first surviving census for Chestefield, since both the 1790 and 1800 censuses have been lost. A complete index is included for easy access.
Chesterfield's initial settlement dated from the 1610s when it was part of Henrico County; by the 1810s it contained a number of large plantations with a heavy slave population, as well as a growing mining and iron ore industry; in all, census record covers 729 households, many of whom had roots in the county dating far back into the colonial era,