page_title: Northern Virginia
section_title: Colonial period
hierarchical_section_title: Northern Virginia / History / Colonial period
caption_attribution_description: English: Map following surveys of 1736 and 1737 showing the Northern Neck Proprietary land in the Colony of Virginia.
context_page_description: Northern Virginia, locally referred to as NOVA or NoVA, comprises several counties and independent cities in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. It is a widespread region radiating westward and southward from Washington, D.C. With an estimated 3,159,639 residents in 2019, it is the most populous region of Virginia and the Washington metropolitan area.
  Communities in the region form the Virginia portion of the Washington metropolitan area and the larger Baltimore–Washington metropolitan area. Northern Virginia has a significantly larger job base than either Washington or the Maryland portion of its suburbs, and is the highest-income region of Virginia, having several of the highest-income counties in the nation.
  Northern Virginia's transportation infrastructure includes major airports Ronald Reagan Washington National and Washington Dulles International, several lines of the Washington Metro subway system, the Virginia Railway Express suburban commuter rail system, transit bus services, bicycle sharing and bicycle lanes and trails, and an extensive network of Interstate highways and expressways.
context_section_description: Historically, in the British Colony of Virginia first permanently settled at Jamestown in 1607, the area now generally regarded as "Northern Virginia" was within a larger area defined by a land grant from King Charles II of England on September 18, 1649, while the monarch was in exile in France during the English Civil War. Eight of his loyal supporters were named, among them Thomas Culpeper.
  On February 25, 1673, a new charter was given to Thomas Lord Culpeper and Henry Earl of Arlington. Lord Culpeper was named the Royal Governor of Virginia from 1677–1683. Culpeper County was later named for him when it was formed in 1749; however, history does not seem to record him as one of the better of Virginia's colonial governors. Although he became governor of Virginia in July 1677, he did not come to Virginia until 1679, and even then seemed more interested in maintaining his land in the "Northern Neck of Virginia" than governing. He soon returned to England. In 1682 rioting in the colony forced him to return, but by the time he arrived, the riots were already quelled. After apparently misappropriating £9,500 from the treasury of the colony, he returned to England and the King was forced to dismiss him. During this tumultuous time, Culpeper's erratic behavior meant that he had to rely increasingly on his cousin and Virginia agent, Col. Nicholas Spencer. Spencer succeeded Culpeper as acting Governor upon Lord Culpeper's departure from the colony. For many years, Lord Culpeper's descendants allowed men in Virginia (primarily Robert "King" Carter) to manage the properties.
  Legal claim to the land was finally established by Lord Culpeper's grandson, Thomas Fairfax, 6th Lord Fairfax of Cameron, who became well known in the colony as "Lord Fairfax", in a survey authorized by Governor William Gooch in 1736. The lands of Lord Fairfax (and Northern Virginia) were defined as that between the Rappahannock and Potomac rivers, and were officially called the "Northern Neck". In 1746 a back line was surveyed and established between the headwaters of the Potomac and Rappahannock rivers, defining the west end of the grants. According to documents held by the Handley Regional Library of the Winchester–Frederick County Historical Society, the grants contained 5,282,000 acres (21,380 km²). They included the 22 modern counties of Northumberland, Lancaster, Westmoreland, Stafford, King George, Prince William, Fairfax, Loudoun, Fauquier, Rappahannock, Culpeper, Madison, Clarke, Warren, Page, Shenandoah, and Frederick counties in Virginia, and Hardy, Hampshire, Morgan, Berkeley, and Jefferson counties in West Virginia.
  Lord Fairfax was a lifelong bachelor, and became one of the more well-known persons of the late colonial era. In 1742 the new county formed from Prince William County was named Fairfax County in his honor, one of numerous place names in Northern Virginia and West Virginia's Eastern Panhandle which were named after him. Lord Fairfax established his residence first at his brother's home at "Belvoir" (now on the grounds of Fort Belvoir in Fairfax County).
  Not long thereafter, he built a hunting lodge near the Blue Ridge Mountains he named "Greenway Court", which was located near White Post in Clarke County, and moved there. Around 1748 Lord Fairfax met a youth of 16 named George Washington, and, impressed with his energy and talents, employed him to survey his lands lying west of the Blue Ridge.
  Lord Fairfax stayed neutral during the American Revolutionary War. Just a few weeks after the surrender of British troops under General Cornwallis at Yorktown, he died at his home at Greenway Court on December 9, 1781, at the age of 90. He was entombed on the east side of Christ Church in Winchester. While his plans for a large house at Greenway Court never materialized, and his stone lodge is now gone, a small limestone structure he had built still exists on the site.
caption: Map of the Northern Neck Proprietary land grant c. 1737
exif: {}