Goochland County Road Orders, 1728-1744

About the report:

The establishment and maintenance of public roads was an important function of the County Court during the colonial period in Virginia. Each road was opened and maintained by an Overseer or Surveyor of the Roads charged with this responsibility and appointed by the Gentlemen Justices. He was usually assigned all the ?Labouring Male Titheables? living on or near the road for this purpose. Major projects, such as bridges over rivers, demanding considerable expenditures were executed by Commissioners appointed by the Court to select the site and contract with workmen for the construction. Where bridges connected two counties, a commission was appointed by each and they cooperated in executing the work.

The Road Orders contained in the Goochland County Court Order Books covering the period 1728-1744 are the principal extant evidence concerning the early roads of the County. During this period Goochland stretched southward to the Appomattox River and west to the "Ledge", or Blue Ridge, and contained all or parts of the present Counties of Albemarle, Amherst, Appomattox, Bedford, Buckingham, Campbell, Cumberland, Fluvanna, Nelson and Powhatan. Insofar as possible, all the Orders were extracted verbatim and the capitalization, spelling and punctuation have been reproduced without any attempt at correction or consistency.

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