Let's try to describe the full extent of the final Northern Neck in Virginia. The southern boundary starts at the mouth of the Rappahannock River, where it flows into the Chesapeake Bay. It follows the stream up the river past Fredericksburg, which was not included because it was on the south side of the river. Shortly thereafter, the river branches, but the boundary follows the Rapidan River and flows past Germanna (again not included because it is on the south side of the river). In the upper reaches of the Rapidan River, it branches and acquires new names. The branch which determines the boundary is the Conway River, which originates high in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Let this be point A .
The northern boundary starts with the Potomac River at the Chesapeake Bay. The Potomac at Harper's Ferry (as we now call it) acquired a series of new names. Though the Colony of Virginia had argued briefly that this was the full extent of the Potomac, they agreed to follow the largest stream to its source. Calling this source Point B , then a line was to be drawn from B to point A . All of the land bounded by the two streams and this line was to be included in the Northern Neck.
Point B was well into the present state of West Virginia. Thus, a large part of the Northern Neck was west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. In this area, there was much confusion. Lord Fairfax had not begun to assert his authority there yet while settlers were coming in and taking up land. Out of the disputes which arose, we have the famous lawsuit between Fairfax and Jost Hite that went on past the deaths of both of the men. Jost could claim that the Colony of Virginia had given him a patent for the land and if Fairfax had an objection that he should take it up with the Colony. From such cases, we see how confused the geography of the region was.
When Louis Michel was exploring the Shenandoah Valley about 1706 and asserting that he had found silver, the proprietors of Pennsylvania and Maryland, besides the Northern Neck proprietors, all protested saying they felt that Michel's project was in their area. But Queen Anne issued a letter to the Lt. Governor of Virginia, newly appointed Alexander Spotswood, saying that he should arrange for land for the colony in this area that Michel and Graffenried proposed to settle. All of which shows that no one understood the situation.
One problem for the Northern Neck proprietors was that much of the Tidewater land, i.e., land close to the rivers and the bay, had already been settled when they received their land from Charles II. The settlers there did not take to the idea too well.
East to west, there were Tidewater lands, the Piedmont lands, the Valley lands, and the lands into the Allegheny Mountains. Geographically, it was quite varied.
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.