Wythe County was organized by an Act of the
Virginia Assembly on December 1, 1789, and was named for George
Wythe, a noted lawyer of Eastern Virginia, one of the signers of the
Declaration of Independence and the designer of the Virginia Seal.
The first county court session was held at the home of James
McGavock at Fort Chiswell on May 25 the following year, where the
Montgomery County Court had been meeting for several years. On
that date the court accepted the offer of Christopher Simmerman who
donated ninety acres for the town, and the offer of John Davis who
contributed the remaining ten acres with a large spring.
When Wythe County was formed the area included part of what is now
the eastern part of Smyth County, the western part of what is now
Pulaski County, all of Grayson and Carroll counties, and most of
what is now Bland County. By 1861 the county limits had been
permanently established.
Wytheville
On June 22, 1790, the court was held at the home of Christopher
Simmerman and the justices chose several of the leading citizens to
direct the survey in laying off the one hundred acres for a town and
a place for his "permanent court house." The town survey was
completed by November 24, and Robert Adams was paid for his work.
Each lot was one-half acre in size. At this time the town had
no specific name, other than Wythe Court House, a name often used in
the early days.
On October 19, 1792, the General Assembly passed an act establishing
the town as Evansham, probably pronounced Evans-ham as it was named
for Jesse Evans, a prominent local citizen at the time.
On March 6, 1839, following the great town fire, the name was
changed to Wytheville at a time when the town had 500 inhabitants.
Rural Retreat
The name Rural Retreat first appeared in Wythe County on a
marriage return sent to the court by Lewis Sid Marshall, Minister of
the Gospel, on April 28, 1827. This predates by six years the
establishment of the Rural Retreat Post Office in 1833 when the same
Lewis S. Marshall was named as the first postmaster. At this
time, no town existed where the present Town of Rural Retreat is
located. Following the custom of the day, the mail was
delivered to the home of the postmaster who had the right to name
the office. Marshall lived on the Great Road near the
residence of Martha Brown DeBord, now deceased. When the
railroad came to the western end of Wythe County in the mid-1850s,
the depot at present Rural Retreat was named Mt. Airy, for the
little town located on the Great Road (now US 11), established in
1811 by Valentine Staley. The town wa sometimes referred to as
Staleytown.
As the railroad town grew, the post office,
named Rural Retreat, was moved to the Mt. Airy Depot, causing great
confusion. In the aftermath of the destruction of the depot by
the Federal troops, the name Rural Retreat was given to the new
depot and the town in 1866, to coincide with the name of the post
office. Stores, banks, hotels, churches, mills, shops,
newspapers and telephones reached the town in due time and Rural
Retreat was incorporated on July 24, 1911, and received a new
charter in 1954.
In present Wythe County, genealogists and historians are able to
find family family and genealogical records, published, in three
major locations. These are the Wythe County Circuit Court
Clerk's Office at the Courthouse on South Sixth Street, the F.
B. Kegley Library at the Wytheville Community College Library, and
The Wythe County Genealogical and Historical Association at 115 E.
Main Street. |
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