Hanover County, Virginia Genealogy

United States &gt; Virginia &gt; Hanover County

Parent County
1720--Hanover County was created 2 November 1720 from New Kent County. County seat: Hanover

Neighboring Counties

 * Caroline
 * Goochland
 * Henrico
 * King William
 * Louisa
 * New Kent
 * Spotsylvania

Court
Chancery Court


 * Indexes and images to Hanover County, Virginia Chancery Records 1831-1913 are available online through Virginia Memory: Chancery Records Index. These records, often concerned with inheritance disputes, contain a wealth of genealogical information.

Family Histories
Bibliography


 * [Durrett] Durrett, Arthur Thurmond. Durrett Family History, ca. 1609-1949. MSS., available at FHL.
 * [Hendrick] Hendrix, GeLee Corley. "Benjamin Hendrick (1730-1818) of Virginia and Carolina and Some of His Descendants: Research in 'Burned' Southern Counties," The American Genealogist, Vol. 65, No. 1 (Jan. 1990):44-53. Available at FHL.

Immigration

 * Coldham, Peter Wilson. North American Wills Registered in London 1611-1857. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 2007. [Includes wills of residents of York River and Hanover County proved in London. These records often help establish an immigrant's place of origin.]
 * [http://www.immigrantservants.com/search/advancedResults.php?surname=&givenName=&varientSurnameSpellings=&gender=&dateOfBirthDay=&dateOfBirthMonth=&dateOfBirthQuantifier=&dateOfBirthYear=&placeOfBirthParish=&placeOfBirthTown=&placeOfBirthCity=&placeOfBirthCounty=&placeOfBirthColony=&placeOfBirthNation=&occupations=&religions=&orphan=&familyPosition=&immigrationYearQualifier=&immigrationYear=&portOfDepartureTown=&portOfDepartureCity=&portOfDepartureCounty=&portOfDepartureNation=&placeOfArrivalTown=&placeOfArrivalCounty=&placeOfArrivalColony=&shipName=&convict=&yearOfIndentureQualifier=&yearOfIndenture=&lengthOfIndentureYears=&lengthOfIndentureMonths=&yearOfFreedomQualifier=&yearOfFreedom=&placeOfIndentureTown=&placeOfIndentureCity=&placeOfIndentureCounty=Hanover&placeOfIndentureColony=Virginia&agentSurname=&agentGivenName=&agentTitle=&masterSurname=&masterGivenName=&masterTitle=&residenceParish=&residenceTown=&residenceCity=&residenceCounty=&residenceColony=&residenceNation=&landowner=&literate=&spouseSurname=&spouseGivenName=&spouseMarriageDateDay=&spouseMarriageDateMonth=&spouseMarriageDateQualifier=&spouseMarriageDateYear=&spouseMarriageLocationParish=&spouseMarriageLocationCounty=&spouseMarriageLocationColony=&spouseMarriageLocationNation=&deathDateDay=&deathDateMonth=&deathDateQualifier=&deathDateYear=&deathLocality=&deathCounty=&deathColony=&deathState=&testate=&proofServantStatus=&proofConvictStatus=&headright=&preServitudeSources=&postServitudeSources=&comments=&family=&sourceCitations=&interestedResearchers= List of imported servants and transported convicts from Europe] who served labor terms in Colonial Hanover County, Virginia (work in progress), courtesy: Immigrant Servants Database.

Land
Grants and Patents


 * Sullivan and Hudgins. 451 patents dated 1653-1819 in what is now Hanover County, Virginia placed on a map. DeedMapper, 2008. [Names of those who received land patents, dates, land descriptions, and references may be viewed free of charge (click "Index" next to the county listing); however, in order to view the maps, it is necessary to purchase Direct Line Software's DeedMapper product.]

Military
French and Indian War


 * Bockstruck, Lloyd DeWitt. Virginia's Colonial Soldiers. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1988. Available at FHL. [Identifies some Hanover County militia officers, soldier enlistments, and veterans; see place name index.]
 * Crozier, William Armstrong. Virginia Colonial Militia 1651-1776. Baltimore: Southern Book Co., 1954. Available at FHL; digital book at Ancestry ($). [Identifies some Hanover County militia officers; see place name index.]

Newspapers
Indexed images of the Virginia Gazette(1736-1780) are available online through the Colonial Williamsburgwebsite. In addition, Professor Tom Costa and The Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia have created a database of all runaway advertisements for slaves, indentured servants, transported convicts, and ship deserters listed in this source and other Virginia newspapers (1736-1803), see: The Geography of Slavery in Virginia. These newspapers are valuable resources for all regions of Virginia.

Probate
London Courts


 * Coldham, Peter Wilson. North American Wills Registered in London 1611-1857. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 2007. [Includes wills of residents of York River and Hanover County proved in London. These records often help establish an immigrant's place of origin.]

Taxation
At first glance, researchers might conclude that Virginia tax lists contain very little family history data, though one soon learns that valuable genealogical conclusions can be drawn from these records, nicknamed "annual censuses," such as: relationships, approximate years of birth, socio-economic status, identification of neighbors, the ability to distinguish between persons of the same name, evidence of land inheritance, years of migration, and years of death.

Virginia began enumerating residents' payments of personal property and land taxes in 1782. These two types of taxation were recorded in separate registers. Personal property tax lists include more names than land tax lists, because they caught more of the population. The Family History Library has an excellent microfilm collection of personal property tax lists from 1782 (or the year the county was organized) well into the late nineteenth century for most counties, but only scattered land tax lists. Microfilm collections at The Library of Virginia include land tax lists for all counties and independent cities for the years 1782 through 1978, as well as personal property tax lists for the years 1782 through 1930 (and every fifth year thereafter). Taxes were not collected in 1808.

Some tax records are available online or in print, though published abstracts often omit useful details found only in the original sources. Statewide indexes can help genealogists identify specific counties where surnames occurred in the past, providing starting points for research.


 * Coldham, Peter Wilson. "Rent Roll of Hanover County, Virginia, 1753-1763," The Genealogist, Vol. 14, No. 1 (Spring 2000):71-80. [Discovered at The National Archives, Kew, England, Reference AO 13/30/110-129.]
 * Woodson, Robert F. and Isobel B. Woodson. Virginia Tithables from Burned Record Counties: Buckingham, 1773-1774; Gloucester, 1770-1771, 1774-1775; Hanover, 1763 and 1770; James City, 1768-1769; Stafford, 1768 and 1773. Richmond, Virginia: I.B. Woodson, 1970. Available at FHL.
 * Indexed images of the 1789 and 1799 Personal Property Tax Lists of Hanover County, Virginia are available online, courtesy: Binns Genealogy.
 * Indexed images of the 1789 and 1800 Land Tax Lists of Hanover County, Virginia are available online, courtesy: Binns Genealogy.
 * Ward, Roger D. 1815 Directory of Virginia Landowners (and Gazetteer). 6 vols. Athens, Georgia: Iberian Pub. Co., 1997-2000. Available at FHL. [The source for this publication is the 1815 land tax. Hanover County is included in Vol. 1.]

Vital Records
Marriage


 * Ljundstedt, Milnor. "Hanover County, Virginia Marriage Licenses," [1780-1781] The William and Mary Quarterly, Second Series, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Jan. 1926):78. Available at JSTOR.

Websites

 * USGenWeb project. May have maps, name indexes, history or other information for this county. Select the state, then the county.
 * Family History Library Catalog