Legislative Petitions of Alexandria, 1778-1861

Legislative petitions, a practice which was carried over from British law, were used as a means to seek remedy for grievance for a number of types of actions ranging from divorce to taxation. These lists may prove invaluable in determining neighbors, comrades or kin. Though now widely available to researchers, most of these petitions were abstracted by Hamilton J. Eckenrode and published as "Calendar of Legislative Petitions, Arranged by Counties; Accomac to Bedford," in the Fifth Annual Report of the Library Board of the Virginia State Library, 1907-1908. Mr. Pippenger has used the Eckenrode abstracts as a foundation for the present work, inserted the petitions which had been erroneously omitted, and made notations regarding further documentation or outcome of the petitions. Over 205 petitions which contain signatures of more than 6,000 different petitioners.