Tag: Westover Landing VA

On the James River.

Wikipedia says: Westover Plantation is a historic colonial tidewater plantation located on the north bank of the James River in Charles City County, Virginia. Established in c. 1730–1750, it is the homestead of the Byrd family of Virginia.

…During the American Civil War, Westover was used as headquarters of the Union Fifth Corps and one of the wings burned during this time. After the death of William Byrd III’s widow in 1814, Westover was sold out of the Byrd family. Since then, Westover has had three subsequent owners, including lawyer John Armistead Selden (a member of the Selden family and the Lee family), whose detailed diaries of daily life at Westover remain in publication as a popular primary source on the economic and cultural history of nineteenth-century Virginian agriculture, and Confederate Army officer Augustus Harrison Drewry. Drewry, who is best known for commanding the gun batteries of Fort Darling during Battle of Drewry’s Bluff in 1862, lived at Westover until his death in 1899 and made many changes; including rebuilding the burned wing, connecting the dependencies and enlarging the dining room so that it ran the depth of the house.