Gwynn's Island Project
Timeline

TIMELINE

Virginia, Mathews County & Gwynn's Island History

  • 1607 - 1st Englishmen arrive in Virginia
  • 1608 - “Hugh Wynne, tradesmen” arrives in Virginia in Fall. Passage paid by Captain Peirce, who in turn sold the headright to William Spencer.
  • 1610-1614 - 1st Anglo Powhatan War fought in Virginia
  • 1617 - 1st Virginia tobacco crop sent to England
  • 1635 - 1st Gloucester County land grant; 1000 acres granted by King to Hugh Gwynn, who built a log house and named it "Gwynnville". 
  • 1640 - Hugh Gwynn's runaway servants, including African John Punch, were punished based on skin color. Punch received sentence of lifetime servitude and is considered the 1st slave in Virginia.
  • 1776 - British Lord Dunmore used Gwynn's Island as base from which to attack Virginia. Attracted many enslaved people with promise of freedom. Smallpox rampant. Colonists held off his troops at Cricket Hill on the mainland, directly across from Gwynn's Island.
  • 1791 - Gwynn's Island landowners: Gwynn (561 acres), Brookes (261 acres), Keeble (156 acres), another Keeble (500 acres); Hudgins family bought their first 75 acres.   
  • 1808 - American international slave trade abolished
  • 1860 - Largest slaveholders in Mathews county: Henry W. Tabb (101 slaves) & Euphan W. Roy (77 slaves) 
  • 1861 - Virginia secedes from Union. Lincoln issues order to blockade Southern ports. Shepard Mallory, Frank Baker & James Townsend escape from Confederate Army, enter Union lines at Ft. Monroe, which triggers national debate. 1st Confiscation Act passed by Congress declaring freed slaves "contraband of war".
  • 1865 - Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders at Appomattox
  • 1866 - George Hilton & Walter Billups sell Gwynnsville to B.B. Dutton and move to Texas. Land subdivided and sold to many families, including five freedmen (William Smith, William Jones, Augustine Smith, Parker Hayes & George Coleman)
  • 1880 - Ellen Gwynn (Black), assaulted on mainland by Charles Guion (White) of Westville. Local newspaper outraged. Guion flees to NY where a reward was offered for his arrest.
  • 1883 - Hand-powered cable ferry between Gwynn’s Island and mainland begins
  • 1886 - 1st post office opens on Gwynn’s Island
  • 1897 - Robbery and almost lynching of Black man who stole John Carney's gold while everyone at a funeral
  • 1900 - Rising Sun Baptist Church established, along with school and cemetery for Black citizens
  • 1902 - 1st Black undertaker in Mathews County, Frank Knight, opens for business; handles Gwynn’s Island Black burials. New Virginia constitution legalizes school segregation & suppresses Black vote through poll tax and literacy tests. 1st gas engine bought to Gwynn's Island by Capt. Theodore Bensten.   
  • 1905 - 1st telephone installed at Gwynn’s Island post office
  • 1909 - 1st car (Oldsmobile) brought to Gwynn's Island
  • 1910 - White citizens buy Odd Fellows building & relocate destroyed Gwynn's Island school to this location situated next to Black neighborhood   
  • 1910 - Gwynn's Island population totals 811 people, 135 Black 
  • 1912 - Building boom on Gwynn's Island: "There are 15 homes being built at present and preparations being made to build more."
  • 1913 - Confederate monument erected at Mathews County. Gwynn's Island merchants pledge to neither sell nor furnish cigarettes. Dorothy Roy "a little colored girl caught fire and was so badly burned she died."
  • 1914 - White-only housing development opens in Mathews County. Tilghman Packing Company of Maryland opens plant on Gwynn's Island to pack herring and roe. Emma Booker appointed teacher of colored. WWI begins in Europe.   
  • 1916 - James H. Smith trial at Mathews for two counts of felony assault. Newspaper reports "Most of the colored people have moved away to Hampton. The few that are here are making preparations to leave."   
  • 1917 - WWI declared.  Draft registration at Mathews. "Thirty-nine colored men left for Camp Lee on Nov. 4, 1917." Spanish Flu hits. Schools closed; public gatherings discontinued.   
  • 1918 - Rev. John Haynes [sic], associated with Rising Sun Baptist Church, dies of Spanish Flu. Newspaper obituary reports "he was universally known and highly esteemed." 
  • 1920 - Gwynn's Island population: 579; 19 Black. Newspaper articles: "John Gale, a respected colored man, died on here last week from pneumonia." "Parker Hayse, an aged colored man, died (of TB) on here last week." "All of the colored people have moved from the Island except one family and they will leave soon." "The last colored family moved off the Island last week."
  • 1924 - Richmond Times article published on the "White Man's Paradise" of Gwynn's Island 
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