Leedstown is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in Westmoreland County, in the

U. S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sov ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

. It is the site of the signing of the Leedstown Resolutions.

History

Sometime before 1678, Edward Bray had built a brick church, an ordinary, ferry, and wharf at the present Leedstown. Up to this date the site was known as Rappahannock. After 1678, it was known as Bray's Wharf or Bray's Church. By 1742, it was known as Leeds. Later it was known as Leedstown. Leedstown was created a town by an act of the

Virginia House of Burgesses The House of Burgesses () was the lower house of the Virginia General Assembly from 1619 to 1776. It existed during the colonial history of the United States in the Colony of Virginia in what was then British America. From 1642 to 1776, the Hou ...

in 1742. In colonial days, Leedstown was not only a place for commerce. General George Washington often visited Leedstown. There was a ferry across the river to Layton, on the south side of the river in Essex County (it operated until about 1927 when the Downings Bridge to Tappahannock opened). Following the Revolutionary War shipping at Leedstown began to decline as many planters moved west into the Kentucky and Ohio territories. Late in the 19th century, Leedstown had a slight revival steaming from visits of the Rappahannock River Steamboat Line.

References

GNIS entry
Unincorporated communities in Virginia Unincorporated communities in Westmoreland County, Virginia {{WestmorelandCountyVA-geo-stub