Colonel Joshua Fry (1699–1754) was an English-born American adventurer who became a professor, then real estate investor and local official in the
colony of Virginia. Although he served several terms in the
House of Burgesses
The House of Burgesses was the elected representative element of the Virginia General Assembly, the legislative body of the Colony of Virginia. With the creation of the House of Burgesses in 1642, the General Assembly, which had been establishe ...
, he may be best known as a surveyor and cartographer who collaborated with
Peter Jefferson
Peter Jefferson (February 29, 1708 – August 17, 1757) was a planter, cartographer and politician in colonial Virginia best known for being the father of the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson. The "Fry-Jefferson Map", creat ...
, the father of future U.S. president
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was previously the natio ...
. After Fry’s death on a military expedition,
George Washington
George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of ...
became commanding officer of the
Virginia Regiment
The Virginia Regiment was formed in 1754 by Virginia's Royal Governor Robert Dinwiddie, as a provincial corps. The regiment served in the French and Indian War, with members participating in actions at Jumonville Glen and Fort Necessity in 1754, ...
, a key unit in what became the
French and Indian War
The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the ...
.
[ which in turn cites his life by Philip Slaughter (New York, 1880).]
Early and family life
Born in
Crewkerne
Crewkerne ( ) is a town and electoral ward in Somerset, England, southwest of Yeovil and east of Chard all in the South Somerset district. The civil parish of West Crewkerne includes the hamlets of Coombe, Woolminstone and Henley – and b ...
,
Somerset
( en, All The People of Somerset)
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, England, Fry was educated at
Oxford University
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...
, but sought his fortune in the colonies.
In 1736 or 1737, he married the wealthy young widow Mary Micou Hill (1716-1772), who would survive him by nearly two decades. They had five children who grew to adulthood: John, Henry, Martha, William, and Margaret.
John
John is a common English name and surname:
* John (given name)
* John (surname)
John may also refer to:
New Testament
Works
* Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John
* First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John
* Secon ...
and
Henry
Henry may refer to:
People
*Henry (given name)
* Henry (surname)
* Henry Lau, Canadian singer and musician who performs under the mononym Henry
Royalty
* Portuguese royalty
** King-Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal
** Henry, Count of Portugal, ...
would briefly succeed their father representing Albemarle County in the House of Burgesses (1761-1765) and Henry may have also represented
Culpeper County
Culpeper County is a county located along the borderlands of the northern and central region of the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 United States Census, the population was 52,552. Its county seat and only incorporated community is Cul ...
in the Virginia House of Delegates in 1785-1786 and introduced an unsuccessful Emancipation resolution before the creation of
Madison County.
From emigrant to planter
Fry emigrated from England to the Virginia Colony about 1726. By 1739, he established a grammar school for sons of the local gentry, affiliated with the
College of William and Mary
The College of William & Mary (officially The College of William and Mary in Virginia, abbreviated as William & Mary, W&M) is a public research university in Williamsburg, Virginia. Founded in 1693 by letters patent issued by King William III ...
in
Williamsburg, which had received a royal charter in 1722. By 1732, Fry became the college's professor of mathematics and natural philosophy, and soon began a public career as justice of the peace of
James City County
James City County is a county located in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 78,254. Although politically separate from the county, the county seat is the adjacent independent city of Williamsburg.
Located ...
.
When he married the widow of a local planter in
Essex County, Fry resigned his teaching position and began operating what had been her plantation and its slaves. Fry also became a justice of the peace, as well as sheriff and coroner in that county. Although some Virginia planters supported their families by selling products from their plantations, Fry mostly surveyed, bought and sold real estate.
Albemarle county planter and official
Sometime before 1743 Fry and his growing family moved westward from Virginia's
tidewater area to the
piedmont
it, Piemontese
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, where he bought land along the
Hardware River in what was then called
Goochland County and began establishing an plantation and building a house he called "Viewmont." As European settlement was moving westward, the colony's legislature was in the process of establishing
Albemarle County
Albemarle County is a county located in the Piedmont region of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Its county seat is Charlottesville, which is an independent city and enclave entirely surrounded by the county. Albemarle County is part of the Char ...
from Goochland County, and commissioned Fry to establish the boundary. Fry's plantation was in the new county. He became its judge (supervising the justices of the peace as well as in effect the chief executive officer), as well as its official surveyor, and so often visited the new county seat at the horseshoe bend of the
James River, later called
Scottsville.
Albemarle County voters elected Fry to represent Albemarle County in the
House of Burgesses
The House of Burgesses was the elected representative element of the Virginia General Assembly, the legislative body of the Colony of Virginia. With the creation of the House of Burgesses in 1642, the General Assembly, which had been establishe ...
several times between 1745 and his death in 1754. Fry also became the county's first lieutenant (colonel of the local militia). In addition, Fry continued to involve himself with affairs of the colony, with his surveys described below possibly securing his appointment a member of the governor's council in 1750.
Meanwhile, various Virginia real estate speculators wanted the western lands surveyed, and in 1738 Fry and fellow surveyor Robert Brooke began petitioning the Virginia General Assembly to pay for surveys. The proposals went to committees, and were only formally rejected in 1744, when the legislators created Albemarle County, although they also agreed to pay Fry for a survey of the dividing line with the now-smaller Goochland County. In 1746, lieutenant governor
William Gooch commissioned Fry and
Peter Jefferson
Peter Jefferson (February 29, 1708 – August 17, 1757) was a planter, cartographer and politician in colonial Virginia best known for being the father of the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson. The "Fry-Jefferson Map", creat ...
to survey the lands of Lord Fairfax in the Piedmont region. In 1749, the pair received another commission, to establish the boundary between North Carolina and Virginia. Beginning in 1749, Fry also became involved with the
Loyal Land Company, which received grants across the Appalachian Mountains conditioned upon surveys being made (on less strict terms than imposed on the rival
Ohio Company
The Ohio Company, formally known as the Ohio Company of Virginia, was a land speculation company organized for the settlement by Virginians of the Ohio Country (approximately the present U.S. state of Ohio) and to trade with the Native Ameri ...
, possibly because of investments of multiple burgesses in the venture).
In 1750, the English
Board of Trade expressed interest in the colonial frontier. Acting governor
Lewis Burwell commissioned Fry and Jefferson to survey the colony's disputed boundary with the Maryland colony (whose royal deed only extended to the Appalachian Mountains, whereas Virginia's had no explicit western boundary). Fry also prepared "An Account of the Bounds of the Colony of Virginia of its back Settlements of the lands toward the Mountains and Lakes" and included a handwritten copy of "A Brief Account of the Travels of
John Peter Salley," which documented a 1742 expedition led by John Howard along the
Ohio River to the
Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...
. The manuscripts gained less renown than the detailed accompanying map, now called the Fry-Jefferson map.
In 1752 Fry accepted an appointment from Lieutenant Governor
Robert Dinwiddie
Robert Dinwiddie (1692 – 27 July 1770) was a British colonial administrator who served as lieutenant governor of colonial Virginia from 1751 to 1758, first under Governor Willem Anne van Keppel, 2nd Earl of Albemarle, and then, from July 1756 ...
as one of the commissioners (with fellow burgesses Lunsford Lomax and
James Patton also of the Loyal Company), and
Christopher Gist
Christopher Gist (1706–1759) was an explorer, surveyor, and frontiersman active in Colonial America. He was one of the first white explorers of the Ohio Country (the present-day states of Ohio, eastern Indiana, western Pennsylvania, and nort ...
of the
Ohio Company
The Ohio Company, formally known as the Ohio Company of Virginia, was a land speculation company organized for the settlement by Virginians of the Ohio Country (approximately the present U.S. state of Ohio) and to trade with the Native Ameri ...
to negotiate with the Native Americans to secure land west of the Appalachian mountains and south of the Ohio River. This expedition was also supposed to strengthen relations between the colonists and Native Americans, many of whom had contested the
Treaty of Lancaster
The Six Nations land cessions were a series of land cessions by the Haudenosaunee and Lenape which ceded large amounts of land, including both recently conquered territories acquired from other indigenous peoples in the Beaver Wars and ancestral ...
signed a decade earlier. While the
Treaty of Logstown was signed at Logstown (near what later became
Baden, Pennsylvania
Baden is a borough in southeastern Beaver County, Pennsylvania, along the Ohio River. The population was 3,912 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Pittsburgh metropolitan area. Baden is the former site of Logstown, a significant Native America ...
), giving the colonists claim to lands that later became Kentucky, it too would provoke controversy. It expressly allowed the British to build a fort at the Monongahela river about 18 miles downstream, but the French soon built
Fort Duquesne
Fort Duquesne (, ; originally called ''Fort Du Quesne'') was a fort French colonization of the Americas, established by the French in 1754, at the confluence of the Allegheny River, Allegheny and Monongahela River, Monongahela rivers. It was lat ...
nearby.
Death and legacy
In the early days of the what became
French and Indian War
The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the ...
, Fry was named the Commander-in-Chief of colonial forces, and given command of the
Virginia Regiment
The Virginia Regiment was formed in 1754 by Virginia's Royal Governor Robert Dinwiddie, as a provincial corps. The regiment served in the French and Indian War, with members participating in actions at Jumonville Glen and Fort Necessity in 1754, ...
, with orders to capture Fort Duquesne. During the advance into the
Ohio Country, Fry suddenly fell off his horse and died from his injuries on 31 May 1754 at
Fort Cumberland
A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...
, in the Maryland Colony. A young Virginia officer,
George Washington
George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of ...
, succeeded Fry in command of the regiment.
James Innes of North Carolina briefly succeeded Fry as Commander-in-Chief.
Joshua Fry is buried in an
unmarked grave
An unmarked grave is one that lacks a marker, headstone, or nameplate indicating that a body is buried there. However, in cultures that mark burial sites, the phrase unmarked grave has taken on a metaphorical meaning.
Metaphorical meaning
As a ...
within the
Rose Hill Cemetery in
Cumberland, Maryland
Cumberland is a U.S. city in and the county seat of Allegany County, Maryland. It is the primary city of the Cumberland, MD-WV Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 19,076. Located on the Potomac River, ...
. His widow would live her final years with their middle son Rev. Henry M. Fry and be buried at the Locust Hill graveyard in
Madison County, Virginia
Madison County is a county located in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 13,837. Its county seat is Madison.
History
Madison County was established in December 1792, created from Culpeper County. The c ...
. Peter Jefferson, to whom Fry bequeathed his surveying instruments, became the executor of his will and guardian of his youngest children. Several of Fry's sons and grandsons fought as patriots in the American Revolutionary War and continued westward into what became Kentucky and West Virginia. Philip Slaughter wrote a biography of Fry, which is available online. Viewmont, which Fry sold to his fellow burgess and Loyal Company surveyor, Dr.
Thomas Walker and which Gov.
Edmund Randolph
Edmund Jennings Randolph (August 10, 1753 September 12, 1813) was a Founding Father of the United States, attorney, and the 7th Governor of Virginia. As a delegate from Virginia, he attended the Constitutional Convention and helped to create ...
later owned, was eventually abandoned and burned down in 1800 and 1940, but a new house was built with the same name of the site, incorporating massive chimneys which survived the fire. A historical marker honoring Joshua Fry was erected at the site in 1963.
[Allen Browne, Landmarks: Lottie Moon and Joshua Fry, available at http://allenbrowne.blogspot.com/2012/08/lottie-moon-and-joshua-fry.html]
See also
*
Great Britain in the Seven Years' War
Great Britain was one of the major participants in the Seven Years' War, which in fact lasted nine years, between 1754 and 1763. British involvement in the conflict began in 1754 in what became known as the French and Indian War. However th ...
*
North Carolina–Tennessee–Virginia Corners
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fry, Joshua
1699 births
1754 deaths
Virginia colonial people
Burials at Rose Hill Cemetery (Cumberland, Maryland)
People from Crewkerne
House of Burgesses members
English emigrants to British North America
British America army officers
Deaths by horse-riding accident
Virginia Governor's Council members
English emigrants
People from Essex County, Virginia
People from Albemarle County, Virginia
Accidental deaths in Maryland