The Dragon Swamp, in the "freshes" of the Pianketanke River, retains a ghostly aura. The miles of coiling creeks and marshes were known before 1658 as the Dragon Swamp. Ancient tribes of the Pamunkey and Mattaponi hunted when the old forests were there.
John Axoll was among early English settlers. His farm was on high ground north of Axol Creek, named before 1658. Boundaries of many land grants in St. Stephen's Parish, New Kent County, name the Dragon Swamp, Axol (Exol) Creek, Exoll's Branch, Axoll's path, and Axol's church road.
A 700-acre grant to John Pigge on April 5, 1658, was north of the Mattaponi River, "on branches of Winkepin Swamp, beginning at a corner tree at Ralph Leftwich's line." The 300-acre grant to Leftwich on Axol Creek was not issued until Aug. 10, 1658; perhaps he owned an earlier grant, or lived there before the grant was issued. The grant to George Morris in 1683, bounded by Leftwich, included land Morris had in 1668.
In 1656, two years before the grants to Pigge and Leftwich, John Cosby's land on the Dragon Swamp was not far from a large grant to William Claiborne. Others on the Pianketanke River by the Kiskiack Indian Path, were Robert Abrahall, and Anthony Haynes (Heynes) of Warwick County. Several of these large landholders sold the acreage: before 1700 many early settlers on Dragon Swamp were moving north and westward into Essex, Stafford, Campbell, Albemarle and Augusta counties. In 1703, a new grant to David Pritchett included 75 acres north of Axol Swamp, part of the 300-acre grant to Ralph Leftwich in 1658.
Thomas Swann of Swan's Point in Surry county, obtained land on the swamp that he soon sold. John Madison, John Broach, William Banks, Jacob Lumpkin, William Byrd and George Morris were in St. Stephen's Parish.
The ruins of Axol Baptist Church beside the narrow road between Carlton's Corner and Axol Creek expose an older church of brick, enlarged and veneered with brick of later make. Old roadbeds there were traveled for miles by horse and buggy, or by members who walked the paths through wetlands and deep ravines.
Axol Baptist was among many churches organized during great Protestant activity before the Declaration of Independence, when support of Anglican parishes rapidly diminished. In 1771, two Protestant ministers were jailed in Urbanna for preaching without license.
No very old tombstones are in Axol cemetery across the road from the ruins. The oldest stone marks Joanna Watkins, born June 2, 1807, died April 5, 1880. Richard W. Carlton was born Nov. 18, 1842; died Jan. 21, 1923. His wife, Lucy Garrett Carlton, his daughter, Laura Hope Carlton, and sister, Lucinda, are buried near him. Robert Purcell died in 1898, and his wife, Mary Ella Bird Purcell, died in 1926. Ellen Purcell is buried by her husband, Junius M. Williams.
Robert H. Muse, born in 1850, and his wife, Louvenia, lost their son, John Richard, in 1904 when he was 29 years old. Other names are Watkins, Thruston, Waring and Garrett.
Records of King and Queen County, formed in 1691 from New Kent, were lost in a courthouse fire in 1833, and in the destruction of the courthouse and surrounding homes in 1864 by Gen. Kilpatrick. New Kent courthouse was also burned, leaving no records of the first settlers of King and Queen.
The Rare Books and Manuscripts Collection, in the College of William and Mary, preserves excellent files, indexed by surname, of many Colonial families between the York and Pianketanke rivers who kept lengthy pedigrees and manuscript histories. Researchers may review the carefully guarded Bible records, letters and other documents.
Q. Please help me contact other researchers on ROBERTSON in Isle of Wight and Norfolk. Was William Davis Robertson, born 26 Oct. 1826, the son of Jonathan Robertson and wife Mary? In 1849, William married Eliza Ann DAVIS, daughter of Blanks and Jane Eliza AYDELOTT of Portsmouth. Children: William Davis Jr. born 1850; Mary E. born 1851, married Lewis Wilson WALKER; Sarah E. born 1856, married W.A. SNYDER; Ella V. born 1860, married Edwin MILTIER; John B. born Aug. 1861 in Carrsville, Isle of Wight, married Cora OUTTEN; Araminta, born 1864, married William SAVAGE; Augustus M. born 1867, married Emma ASHE; Claudius Watkinson (my grandfather) born 1868, Portsmouth, married Linda VanPELT, daughter of Richard VanPelt of Hertford, N.C.; Judson Lynne, born 1873, and Ruth, born 1878. Reply to Donna Oakley, P.O. Box 132, Ft. White, FL 32038.
GET-TOGETHER. PITTMAN family reunion, Fort Worth, Texas, Oct. 15, 1994; (Pittman families were in Accomac and Isle of Wight, Va.). Contact: Frances Pittman Malcolm, P.O. Box 210633, Bedford, TX 76094-7633.
BOOKING IT. Poquoson genealogist Lucille Richardson McMillan has completed her second book: Five Roads from Cloverdale; 500 pages; families of Richardson-Wills in the Blue Ridge Mountain counties. Excellent photostats of ancestors and their homes. Birth dates through generations bring the families to the present. Major related families in the every-name index include Marshall, Brown, Brugh, Engle, Fariss, Jones, Karnes, McMillan, Miller, Old, Overstreet, Pugh, Sperry, Sykes, Thomas, Vaughan, Watson, many others. The hardbound book, red and gold, is available from the author at $45. Lucille R. McMillan, 45 Hudgins Road, Poquoson, Va. 23662.
CAPITAL ASSETS. A bus trip to Raleigh, N.C., state library and archives is planned for May 25. The trip is sponsored by Norfolk Genealogical Society. Contact Bonnie Dick, 2449 Southern Pines Drive, Chesapeake, Va. 23323; or call 487-9337.
* Write to Rollings, c/o Daily Press, 7505 Warwick Blvd., MP 1203, Newport News VA 23607.