There was an interesting personality among our Germanna people. To properly understand him requires a base of historical information. I won't say that I can do that but I can give you some of the highlights. The man is George Hume (I) (sometimes spelled Home but always pronounced Hume) who in 1715, along with his father Sir George, and his brother Francis, rebelled in Scotland against the English by forcibly espousing the cause of James Stuart (sometimes called the Jacobite rebellion). After capture by English, the initial sentence of death for the two sons was changed to "transportation to Virginia," a euphemism for sending convict labor to the colonies.
George (I) and Francis Hume were second cousins to Alexander Spotswood in Virginia. Both ended up there and must have been at least a mild embarrassment to Spotswood, a servant of the Crown. However, Spotswood did what he could for the two and he installed Francis as the supervisor of the Germans at Germanna. (As a consequence, this is another individual at Fort Germanna who probably required a home.) Francis did not live long though and died in 1718. He was buried along the shores of the Rapidan River at Germanna.
George (I) Hume arrived later in Virginia in 1721 (at the age of 23) after his freedom had been purchased by Capt. Dandridge, an ancestor of Martha Washington. Hume was discouraged at first, writing home, "I find there is nothing to get here without recommendation. Tho mine was good yet it did me no manner of service for just as I came into ye country ye Gov. lost his place . . ." He went to the College of William and Mary and was accredited by it as a surveyor. This came naturally to him as he been trained in mathematics in Scotland.
Very quickly he became an important surveyor in the colony. His work ranged far and he had important commissions and posts such as laying out the town of Fredericksburg, being the surveyor for Spotsylvania, Orange and Frederick Counties, determining the bounds of the Fairfax patent, and being appointed a Crown surveyor in 1751. For a while he had an assistant by the name of George Washington but the claim that Washington was a student of Hume is not well founded. Simultaneously with his surveying work, Hume was busy acquiring property. To the end of his life in 1760, he worked as a surveyor at a time when being a surveyor meant being on a permanent "camping trip."
For many years he had wanted to give up "taking long tedious journeys where we are obliged to go perhaps several months without seeing a house, and living altogether on wilde meat." But he persisted in the trade, doing excellent work. His course of North 72 degrees West, the line between Frederick and Augusta Counties, is without error and still used today.
On 16 December 1727 he married Elizabeth Proctor. He was appointed a Lieutenant in the Colonial Militia in 1729. Later he was appointed a Justice of the Peace. So he went full circle from being a rebellious citizen against the crown to being a supporter of the crown. He lived in several locations but the last one was near Oak Park in present day Madison Co., VA.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.