The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry: A Case Study of Lunenburg County, Virginia, 1746-1832

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments I have drawn heavily on the advice, expertise, and goodwill of many friends, students, and professional colleagues over the course of this project. Three undergraduate research assistants— Pamela James, Scott Oleson, and especially Fred Rollman—pro­ vided invaluable help in gathering data from the county court order books, tax lists, and land records. Two longtime residents of Lu­ nenburg, Grace Marshall and Virginia Redd, were particularly hospitable during my trips to the county. The members of the staffs of the Virginia Historical Society, the Virginia State Library, the Virginia Baptist Historical Society, and the library of the Univer­ sity of Pennsylvania have been consistently helpful to me. I only regret that Will Rachal, longtime editor of the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography and an important presence in the manu­ script room at the Virginia Historical Society, passed away before this project was completed. Mr. Rachal was always generous in sharing his unparalleled knowledge of Virginia's manuscript sources and kind in his advice and criticism, and I lament his passing. Some of the evidence and arguments in this book have appeared in a different form in various scholarly journals. ^My initial formu­ lation of many of the problems discussed in Chapters 1 through 4 was published as "Social Change and Cultural Conflict in Virginia: Lunenburg County, 1746—1774" in William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 35 (1978): 455—76; the discussion of Lunenburg's politi­ cal style in Chapter 3 appeared in a more extensive form in the Journal of American Studies 12 (1978): 169—83; and portions of Chapter 6 appeared in "Cultural Conflict and Social Change in the Revolutionary South: Lunenburg County, Virginia," Journal of Southern History 46 (1980): 525­50 (co­authored with Rhys Isaac). The list of individuals who have helped me sharpen my concep­ xvi Acknowledgments tion and execution of this project is a long one. Lois Carr, Paul Clemens, Drew Faust, Mike McGiffert, John Modell, Michael L. Nicholls, Thad Tate, Lorena Walsh, and Michael Zuckerman have all been generous with their advice; Allan Kulikoff has been not only a source of useful advice and constructive criticism but also unfailingly open about sharing his own research with me. My manuscript benefited from careful readings by other scholars at several different stages. Jack P. Greene, in addition to reading and commenting on the final draft, has in his own work proven to be a constant source of stimulation. My colleague at the Universityof Pennsylvania, Richard S. Dunn, read two different versions of the manuscript and on each occasion offered both useful criticism and, at a crucial stage, much­needed encouragement. And I am espe­ cially grateful to Gary B. Nash, who managed to be both appreci­ ative and relentlessly critical in his reading of the manuscript. My final revisions may not satisfy Professor Nash on all points, but I will always admire the combination of seriousness and collegiality with which he approached my work. At the Universityof Pennsyl­ vania Press, my copy editor, Peggy Hoover, worked both speedily and constructively in improvingthe clarity of the manuscript. And finally, I want to acknowledge my deep debt—both professional and personal—to Rhys Isaac. We met and fast became soul mates in the enterprise of eighteenth­century Virginia history at the very beginning of this project; he has throughout the course of it all been the best of friends and the most inspirational of colleagues. In the space of time that it has taken me to finish this book, my wife Pamela has completed two advanced degrees and embarked on a promising career of her own, while at the same time continu­ ing to be the glue that holds our family together. My children, Kristin and Joshua, were barely walking when all this began, and now, as obstreperous teenagers, they are actually in a position to read this book and figure out some of what their father does for a living. For that reason, and for many others, I dedicate this book to them. The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry This page intentionally left blank ...