Elizabeth McClure and David Meade have served as proxies for the thousands who left Virginia for the western areas. By 1850, more than 400,000 former white citizens of Virginia were living in other states. The drain of this many people, many of them from the ranks of the ablest citizens, affected the state of Virginia. Not just by numbers (one in three of the people born in Virginia around 1800 left the state) but by quality of the people also.
Because most of the emigrants left their communities to build new homes under virtual frontier conditions, they tended to be the younger and more vigorous elements. With their energy and vigor, went talent and leadership. Of men born in Virginia prior to 1810, 227 of them served in the legislatures of other states. Ten of the first fifteen governors of Kentucky were born in Virginia. (Germanna students are aware of the contributions made by Germanna people as governors of other states.)
The state's rank in population among all the states dropped steadily. Until 1820, Virginia was the most populated state in the Union. By 1860 it had skidded to fifth, when Kentucky's population almost exceeded Virginia's. From 23 members in Congress, Virginia fell to only 11 in 1860. One of the motivators for this mass exodus was the promise of rich, virgin soil to replace the worn out soil of Virginia. In general, one could say that limited opportunities led the McClures and Meades to emigrate.
Especially in the Tidewater and the Piedmont areas, travelers reported poverty and wasted lands, poor crops, and feeble livestock. Albemarle County was described by a British visitor as, "Worn out, washed, and gullied, with the rivers carrying off the topsoil like a torrent of blood." In 1810, members of the Virginia legislature were lamenting that, "Many states have been advancing in wealth and numbers . . . the Old Dominion has remained stationary. How many sad spectacles do her lowlands present of wasted and deserted fields, of dwellings abandoned, of churches deserted."
For nearly 300,000 Virginians, the decision to emigrate was completely out of their hands. These were the blacks who constituted nearly one-third of the western movement. As with the whites, many blacks in Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, or Texas can trace their roots back to Virginia. Elizabeth's McClure's diary records the heavy traffic in slaves to the southwest. No longer useful in Virginia, the surplus was sold to till the new lands in the west. Some of the slaves went with their masters, as with the Meades, but a significant number of the slaves were for the purpose of sale. The words, "I'm bound away," had a double meaning for many.
The period of decline lasted into the twentieth century, when a new force emerged to reverse the picture. Since World War II, there has been a strong increase in the population, which in part is attributed to the growth in the national government, especially in northern Virginia area. The new people are descendants of the people who had moved away three and four generations previously, but many of the names are different from the earlier names who left.
Virginia is not alone in these cycles of growth, decline, and growth. Other states, on a different time scale have been going through the same cycle.
[The response of readers to this "miniseries" has been very favorable. I would add that the thoughts have come from Charles Bryan, as published in Beyond Germanna . I have only edited his thoughts for brevity without, hopefully, any change in his intent. It is to him that we should extend our thanks.]
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.