“Henry County.  A proud look back.”

In 1975, a group of well-known local historians including Lela Adams, Doug Belcher, R.P Gravely, Jr., Martha Pace Lawing, O.E. Pilson, and Virginia Stone Windell, put together a booklet entitled “Henry County. A proud look back.”  This booklet was printed by First National Bank of Bassett and included articles written by the mentioned historians to showcase Henry County and the part this area played in the development of this nation.  Booklets were sold to friends and residents of Henry County and eventually were placed in the hands of area elementary students (mainly fourth and fifth graders) who were studying local history in their classrooms.  These articles were first published in local newspapers and then eventually printed collectively in one booklet telling the story of Henry County and our ancestors who helped make it which included the Indian Era, the Frontier Forts, the Courthouses of Henry County, the Early Churches in Henry County, and the Early Education and Schools of Henry County.

Henry County, Virginia was established in 1777.  It was originally created by the Virginia General Assembly from the western part of Pittsylvania County in late 1776 but formally became Henry County on 1 January 1777.  It was named Henry County in honor of Virginia’s first governor, Patrick Henry, who had many acres of land in this area.

In the early 1980’s as a fourth grade student attending Campbell Court Elementary School, Mrs. Charlotte Bishop’s class was one of the county classrooms to receive these booklets as an aid to our lessons on Henry County.  As I thumbed through the booklet, the section entitled The Revolutionary Period written by Lela Adams was of most interest to me.  Before this time, I am embarrassed to admit that I was under the impression that my family members only consisted of the ones sitting around the Sunday dinner table and the ones we saw at Christmas and on special occasions.  It never dawned on me that it took close to 5,000 people to do what they did, meet who they met, live where they lived, and so on for me to be here.  If just one of those many times great-grandparents chose a different route, I would not be here!  That still to this day astounds me.

As I looked through this section of the booklet, I was specifically interested to see if there was a person listed that shared the same last name as me which was Ross.  And there was a name on the ninth page of this section that grabbed my attention – Daniel Ross:  Lt. in Militia.  I was really excited and could not wait to go home and ask my parents who he was and if he was related to me.  My parents did not know but Mom knew of a person that could surely help us and lead us in the right direction as she had just started working part time at the library.  Dad and I visited Mrs. Shirley Bassett at the Bassett Public Library and she took us down to the basement where the genealogy “department” was located at that time.  We made a great discovery that Daniel Ross, Jr. who I had found in the booklet, was my three times great grandfather.  This set us on somewhat of a frenzy and really began my family’s love of genealogy.

It only takes that one spark to ignite a love and passion that you may not know exists.

Thank you to the historians who contributed to this booklet which is still used today.

Fran Snead