Book Description

By: Wirt J. Carrington, Pub. 1924, Reprinted 2016, 590 pages, Hard Cover, New Index, ISBN #0-89308-497-2. According to most scholars and historians, this is probably the best and most complete history of Halifax County to be found. Halifax County was formed in 1752 from Lunenburg County. The territory at that time included present Pittsylvania, Henry, and Patrick Counties. It is surrounded by Mecklenburg, Charlotte, Campbell, Pittsylvania Counties and the state of North Carolina. This whole area of Southside Virginia is one of the most important areas of the state during this pre-1800 time period because of the major migrations across this portion of Virginia into North Carolina and South Carolina, as well as into other states to the west. This book begins with the formation and origins of the county, followed by miscellaneous extracts from Court records such as Deeds. Next comes a history of the town of South Boston after which a chapter is devoted to the "Road to the Wilderness" begun by DANIEL BOONE from Watauga through the wilderness of Kentucky via the Cumberland Gap. This is followed by other general history common to books of this type with a study of the rich, aristocratic, slave-owning whites. The major portion of this book is devoted to detailed genealogies of many of the early families of the county such as: Adams, Atkisson, Boynham, Barksdale, Belt, Booker, Boyd, Bruce, Calloway, Carlton, Carrington, Chastain, Chalmers, Chappell, Christian, Clark, Coleman, Craddock, Crews, Drinkards, Easley, Edmundson, Edmunds, Faulkner, Flournoy, Fourquream, Green, Hart, Henry, Hodges, Hudson, Hurt, Irby, Jeffress, Jordan, lacy, Lawson, Leigh, Logan, Lovelace, Medley, Morton, Owen, Palmers, Penick, Ragland, Scott, Stebbens, Stokes, Wade, Watkins, Willingham, Wimbish, and Yuille, all of which are filled with extremely detailed genealogies and dates. Chapter 10 deals with a section of abstracts of Wills of many of the early families, many of whom are not listed in the prior chapter of genealogies. Another chapter is devoted to Churches (Episcopal), and this is followed by Chapter 12 which contains: the marriages from 1753-1800 and 1800-1850 arranged alphabetically by groom.