The purpose of this blog is to provide a platform to document and share my research concerning my direct ancestor, William Longmire of London, and later, the colony of Virginia. Here I will present various documentation and observations of William’s unlikely rise from Transported convict slave to later becoming a recorder, or scrivener for the court . It is also my aim to prove that the William Longmire who wrote a letter in 1725 from Newgate Prison days before his scheduled execution is the same who landed somewhere along the Rappahannock River shores in the Northern Neck of Virginia in April, 1726 and eventually met and worked for Lord Fairfax, William Fairfax, and Col Thomas Turner in King George County, Virginia. I will also show that the majority of the ledger and double entry accounting work for the periods of 1743 – 1748 found in the Edward Dixon Business Papers at the Library of Congress was the work of William Longmire. Later, after making some documentary progress, I might delve into and add my two cents worth for those who are interested in William’s descendants.

This blog is a work in progress. To my near, and dear, relatives please forgive my liberal use of the term “hat thief” throughout as I find it proper enough. This is a blog afterall and my own brand of humor is most probably a derived trait from the man I write about. Somewhere up there I think he agrees:) Meanwhile, others who may have documented knowledge or good secondary sources to add to the body of work, especially any information on William’s wife, Susannah, are encouraged to weigh in or contact me through comments or e-mail. Parts of this blog will be used to correct genealogical misinformation which has taken root on the internet. Though most of the research presented here is my own I wish to acknowledge “those who came before”, namely my distant cousin Roger E. Barnes whose book I brought along many years ago as I scoured the records in the King George County Court House. And to my cousin, Liz Wendelken, who gave me great encouragement and always said I would “crack the case”.  Both of them propelled me on this path in their own singular ways and their research has been greatly valued over the years.

To see a full document featured here click on it to expand. Each topic heading at the top of this page has it’s own set of posts and documents. For those of you who appreciate and demand citations and footnotes please take note that as this work progresses I will insert the appropriate documentation, bibliography, appendix, etc. Suffice to say that many of the documents will speak for themselves. Speculative and other gleanings will most oftentimes be found in the Musings section. You can also navigate several pages which are not so apparent in the dashboard by scrolling to the bottom of various pages and clicking on archival posts.