The Virginia Piedmont Heritage Area Association (VPHA) is a nonprofit preservation and historic organization in

Middleburg, Virginia Middleburg is a town in Loudoun County, Virginia, United States, with a population of 673 as of the 2010 census. It is the southernmost town along Loudoun County's shared border with Fauquier County. Middleburg is known as the "Nation's Horse an ...

. Founded in 1995 as the Mosby Heritage Area Association (MHAA), its mission is to educate about, and advocate for, the preservation of the historic, cultural and scenic resources in the Northern Virginia Piedmont.

Name and location

MHAA took its original name from Confederate Cavalry officer

John S. Mosby John Singleton Mosby (December 6, 1833 – May 30, 1916), also known by his nickname "Gray Ghost", was a Confederate army cavalry battalion commander in the American Civil War. His command, the 43rd Battalion, Virginia Cavalry, known as Mosby's ...

, whose rangers fought throughout the region during the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

. During the Civil War the area was known as Mosby's Confederacy. In August 2020, the MHAA changed its name to the Virginia Piedmont Heritage Area Association. According to VPHA Chairman C. Dulany Morison, "... we have decided to respectfully retire our name and adopt one that more accurately captures the broad scope of our mission to highlight all the diverse history, from the time of the Native Americans through the 20th century, that has taken place in the Heritage Area." The Mosby Heritage Area, located about one hour's drive west of

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, is bounded by the

Bull Run Mountains The Bull Run Mountains are a mountain range of the Blue Ridge Mountains in northern Virginia in the United States. Located approximately east of the main chain, across the Loudoun Valley. The Bull Run Mountains, together with Catoctin Mounta ...

to the east, the

Blue Ridge Mountains The Blue Ridge Mountains are a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Mountains range. The mountain range is located in the Eastern United States, and extends 550 miles southwest from southern Pennsylvania through Maryland, West Virgin ...

to the west, the

Potomac River The Potomac River () drains the Mid-Atlantic United States, flowing from the Potomac Highlands into Chesapeake Bay. It is long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map. Retrieved Augus ...

to the north and the

Rappahannock River The Rappahannock River is a river in eastern Virginia, in the United States, approximately in length.U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed April 1, 2011 It traverses the entir ...

to the south. It encompasses the Virginia counties of

Loudoun Loudoun ( gd, Lughdan) is a parish in East Ayrshire, Scotland and lies between five and ten miles east of Kilmarnock. The parish roughly encompasses the northern half of the Upper-Irvine Valley and borders Galston Parish (which encompasses the ...

, Fauquier,

Clarke Clarke is a surname which means "clerk". The surname is of English and Irish origin and comes from the Latin . Variants include Clerk and Clark. Clarke is also uncommonly chosen as a given name. Irish surname origin Clarke is a popular surname i ...

Warren A warren is a network of wild rodent or lagomorph, typically rabbit burrows. Domestic warrens are artificial, enclosed establishment of animal husbandry dedicated to the raising of rabbits for meat and fur. The term evolved from the medieval Angl ...

and part of

Prince William William, Prince of Wales, (William Arthur Philip Louis; born 21 June 1982) is the heir apparent to the British throne. He is the elder son of King Charles III and his first wife Diana, Princess of Wales. Born in London, William was educat ...

, some . Portions of Evergreen Mill Road in Leesburg, in the heart of the Heritage Area, were once part of the historic Old Carolina Road, one of the most heavily trafficked Colonial roadways in Virginia. That road originally functioned as a north–south migration route for Native Americans, who also followed the buffalo along the route of what is now

U.S. Route 50 U.S. Route 50 or U.S. Highway 50 (US 50) is a major east–west route of the U.S. Highway system, stretching from Interstate 80 (I-80) in West Sacramento, California, to Maryland Route 528 (MD 528) in Ocean City, Maryland, on the Atlanti ...

(John S. Mosby Highway). Route 50 and Braddock Road in Colonial times were the main east–west corridors linking the port city of Alexandria to Winchester.

Historical activity

In 2015, Richard Gillespie, executive director of the Mosby Heritage Area Association, confirmed to Nicholas Fandos, a reporter for the

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

that the assertions made on the River of Blood at the Trump National Golf Club in

Lowes Island, Virginia Lowes Island is a census-designated place (CDP) in Loudoun County, Virginia, United States. The population as of the 2010 United States Census was 10,756. Along with nearby Countryside and Cascades, it is considered one of the three main componen ...

owned by

US President The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United Stat ...

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...

are false. In response to the monument's assertion that:

Many great American soldiers, both of the North and South, died at this spot, "The Rapids", on the Potomac River. The casualties were so great that the water would turn red and thus became known as "The River of Blood".

Gillespie replied, "No. Uh-uh. No way. Nothing like that ever happened there."

Historic preservation

The association campaigns for the preservation of historic buildings and landscapes. MHAA was instrumental in adding the historically black rural hamlet of Willisville, Virginia to the

National Historic Register The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

Landscape preservation

The MHAA has been an active voice in discussions about development policy in the region. C. Dulany Morison was elected Chairman of MHAA in 2019, pledging that his top priority would be to solidify MHAA's leadership role in efforts to preserve the Northern Piedmont area, threatened by a wave of requests by developers for special exemptions. The Heritage Association helps fund

conservation easement In the United States, a conservation easement (also called conservation covenant, conservation restriction or conservation servitude) is a power invested in a qualified private land conservation organization (often called a "land trust") or gove ...

MHAA programs

The association offers a wide range of lectures and tours on diverse historical topics. MHAA also provides in-classroom history presentations for students across the heritage area on topics including the Revolutionary War, Civil War, and the Civil Rights Movement.

References

External links

* {{Official website, www.piedmontheritage.org
Podcast and RSS
feed of 16 July 2009, talk by

Cokie Roberts Mary Martha Corinne Morrison Claiborne "Cokie" Roberts (née Boggs; December 27, 1943 – September 17, 2019) was an American journalist and author. Her career included decades as a political reporter and analyst for National Public Radio, PBS, ...

sponsored by Mosby Heritage Area Association at historic Oak Hill (James Monroe's home outside Leesburg, Virginia) on Shenandoah Valley Radio
''Middleburg Eccentric'' article on Cokie Roberts talk at Oak Hill

''Loudoun Independent'' article on Cokie Roberts talk
Non-profit organizations based in Virginia Historical societies in Virginia Environmental organizations based in Virginia