Thanks again Jon.

Your insights and encouragement are very helpful. VCRP
is a wonderful research; it is where I got the "Mace"
reference. I do research as both historian (college
major, lifetime hobby) and as a genealogist, with
years of law practice as a further asset, so I have
learned the value of searching both the larger history
and the personal history.

Within the last few weeks I found some information
about the origins of some early Virginia and NC
Quakers in London.

jc




--- Jon Kukla <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> There are some peculiarities about the research
> strategy that the VCRP
> agents used - and I comment on them in the
> introduction to Kneebone &
> Kukla et al eds Guide to the VCRP Microfilm.
>   ONE critically important fact that researchers
> using the Survey Reports
> need to remember is that the first essential purpose
> of the Survey
> Report was to order microfilm. The Survey Reports
> were NOT intended as
> "abstracts" of the material. SO, any collection was
> almost exclusively
> about Virginia, the agents in late 50s and
> throughout the 60s really had
> no reason to go into much detail in the Survey
> Report about that
> collection : If a bound volume was ALL about
> Virginia, one could simply
> describe that volume and say film it.
> Conversely if there were a handful of identifiable
> Virginia-related items
> among a large mass of other stuff, then those items
> got a more detailed
> description ... so they could be microfilmed.
> The irony, of course, is that the specific detail of
> the Survey Reports as
> microfilm orders can be inversely related to the
> amount of
> Virginia-related material in the archive AND on the
> film.
>   The real lesson for scholarship is to use the
> Survey Reports and index
> and any other guides to manuscript collections and
> archives as tools to
> get you to the microfilm -- which is where the real
> riches are!
>
> Your comments about the Mease/MAYS/MAYES/Maies
> entries demonstrates a
> SECOND reality - familiar to all experienced
> archival researchers and no
> less true about the VCRP survey reports, indexes,
> and microfilm :
> Subject headings always more problematic than name
> entries : if you know
> the names of people involved in your subject, you
> have a greater chance of
> finding information about that subject than with
> keywords and subjects.
>
> In short, without for a moment under-valuing the
> VCRP film and its related
> guides and finding aids, you have a good chance of
> coming across bits of
> new and useful information.  A few years ago, for
> example, I was working
> with the catalogue of the State Historical Society
> of Wisconsin looking
> for stuff about the Louisiana Purchase - there
> wasn't anything new to
> found via subject entries - but when I ran through
> my list of players I
> ended up with some wonderful documents that were
> very pertinent...... And
> again the real lesson for scholarship is to use
> finding aids as tools to
> get you to the manuscripts, books, or microfilm
> where the real riches are.
>
>
> Jon Kukla
>
> > Thanks very much John for your prompt reply. I am
> > going to London soon and will report if I find
> > anything "new."
> >
> > I have found some items in records such as the
> > published excerpts of papers of Queen Elizabeth,
> James
> > I and others that have Virginia connections
> apparently
> > not realized by the VCRP researchers.
> >
> > On the other hand, two depositions - indexed in
> the
> > VCRP but not copied and microfilmed - made in
> London
> > in January 1624/5 by Reverend William Mease (first
> > minister at St. John's, Hampton) and his then wife
> > Margry (indexed as "Mace") give significant
> details
> > about themselves and several events in Virginia
> not
> > published anywhere else. Included are the facts
> that
> > Mease moved from Hampton to Henricus Citie, where
> he
> > was a/the minister at the time of the March 22,
> 1621/2
> > native uprising and that Margry was one of the
> > "maidens for Virginia" (surname unknown because
> she
> > came aboard one of the first two such ships, for
> which
> > records have not survived).
> >
> > Hopefully, more such gems may yet be found.
> >
> > Mease is the "traditional" ancestor of the quite
> large
> > MAYS/MAYES family founded by William Maies
> (Reverend
> > Mease did have such a son) in Southside Charles
> County
> > (now Prince George County) ca. 1640-1650. Whether
> this
> > is acurate may or may not ever be learned.
> >
> > Interested persons may wish to respond directly to
> me
> > and/or to read my article about Reverend Mease in
> the
> > August/September 2001 issue of "Tidewater Virginia
> > Families."
> >
> > Joe Chandler Jr
> > [log in to unmask]
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --- Jon Kukla <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> >> Right offhand (based on some familiarity with the
> >> VCRP over the years) I'd
> >> suggest:
> >>
> >> One - the VCRP surveyors did a pretty thorough
> job
> >> in the major English
> >> archives over the course of 50 years - I'm quite
> >> confident that they found
> >> what was there.
> >>
> >> Two - Notice the dates that are "missing" - they
> >> correspond with the
> >> English Civil Wars, Commonwealth, and
> Protectorate -
> >> and the resumption of
> >> record-keeping fits roughly with the Restoration
> of
> >> the Stuarts, passage
> >> of the Navigation Act that created, and the
> >> Anglo-Dutch Wars that excluded
> >> Holland from the tobacco trade - in short with
> >> creation of the
> >> 18th-century British Atlantic empire and its
> >> administrative mechanisms...
> >>
> >> For that matter, the start date of 1639
> corresponds
> >> with the first real
> >> round of administrative mechanisms for royal
> >> colonies linked to Sir
> >> Francis Wyatt...
> >>
> >> Jon Kukla
> >>
> >>
> >> > Dear readers,
> >> >
> >> > This is the 3rd time I have published this
> inquiry
> >> over the last 6
> >> months or so and no one has replied -  not even
> >> someone from the
> >> Virginia State
> >> > Archives/Library where these records are
> housed.
> >> >
> >> > Can/will anyone answer these question:
> >> >
> >> > There are large gaps in the Port Books that
> have
> >> been copied and placed
> >> on microfilm at the Archives as part of the
> Virginia
> >> Colonial Records
> >> Project.
> >> >
> >> > For instance, there are Port Book records for
> ca.
> >> 1639/40/41 and then in
> >> the 1670s and 1690s.
> >> >
> >> > The FHC in Salt Lake City has an index of Port
> >> Books -
> >> > the years and ports, not personal names -  of
> >> English
> >> > Port Books from well before 1600 until well
> after
> >> > 1700.
> >> >
> >> > QUESTION: What accounts for the gaps in the
> Port
> >> Book
> >> > records that have been copied for the VCRP?
> >> >
> >> > (1) Are the records copied for the VCRP the
> only
> >> ones
> >> > that have Virginia connections from 1600-1700?
> >> >
> >> > - or -
> >> >
> >> > (2) Do the Port Books - especially London -
> have
> >> the
> >> > kind of gaps suggested by my experience above?
> >> >
> >> > Thanks!
> >> >
> >> > Joe Chandler Jr
> >> > Alexandria
> >> >
> >> > To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe,
> >> please see the instructions
> >> > at
> http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
> >> >
> >> >
> >>
> >>
> >> Dr. Jon Kukla, Executive Vice-President
> >> Red Hill - The Patrick Henry National Memorial
> >> 1250 Red Hill Road
> >> Brookneal, Virginia 24528
> >> www.redhill.org
> >> Phone 434-376-2044 or 800-514-7463
> >>
> >> To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe,
> please
> >> see the instructions
> >> at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
> >>
> >
> > To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe,
> please see the instructions
> > at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
> >
> >
>
>
> Dr. Jon Kukla, Executive Vice-President
> Red Hill - The Patrick Henry National Memorial
> 1250 Red Hill Road
> Brookneal, Virginia 24528
> www.redhill.org
> Phone 434-376-2044 or 800-514-7463
>
> Fax 434-376-2647
>
> - M. Lynn Davis, Office Manager
> - Karen Gorham-Smith, Associate Curator
> - Edith Poindexter, Curator
>
> To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please
> see the instructions
> at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
>

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