History of Loudoun County

Loudoun County was once the northwestern frontier of Virginia, a dangerous place to visit until the 1722 Treaty of Albany kept the American Indian nations west of the Blue Ridge. With this buffer, settlers began slowly to move into the piedmont of present day eastern Loudoun and the rolling lush lands of the Loudoun Valley in the western part of the county.

Divided by the Catoctin-Bull Run ranges of low, rounded mountains, lower Loudoun (east of the range) and upper Loudoun (west of the range) developed rather differently. Part of the Fairfax Proprietary, lower Loudoun’s lands were granted to large landowners from Tidewater Virginia eager for an investment for the time when their tobacco lands further east would wear out. The Loudoun Valley was broken up into smaller grants—a few in the Middleburg/Upperville region given to Tidewater planters, but most given to immigrants from an overflowing Pennsylvania—the Quakers, Scots-Irish, and Germans interested in starting small farms. The Quakers had significant influence in the central Loudoun Valley, settling in and around such communities as Waterford (now a restored historic village), Hillsboro, Goose Creek (now Lincoln), and Unison. Their stone buildings are a major feature of the Loudoun landscape. Germans settled in the northern end of the Loudoun Valley, especially in the area around Lovettsville, leaving a number of log structures as their architectural legacy. Unlike the settlers to the east, neither of these groups believed in the use of slaves, thus inaugurating a division that would be important in the years leading up to the Civil War.

Loudoun was granted county status in 1757 during the French and Indian War. It was named for the Commander-in-Chief of British and colonial forces facing the French in North America, John Campbell, the fourth Earl of Loudoun (of Ayrshire, Scotland). Leesburg, founded in 1758, became the county seat, with the first courthouse built in the center of town in 1761.

Loudoun’s agriculture flourished with its rich lands, growing tobacco in the east, and wheat, oats, rye, and corn in the west. During the Revolutionary War, the county contributed much of its grain to George Washington’s Continental Army, earning it the nickname “Breadbasket of the Revolution.” By 1775, Loudoun County had the largest militia in Virginia, and by the first census in 1790, it was Virginia’s most populous county.

When the British invaded Washington, D.C. during the War of 1812 and burned many of the public buildings, Loudoun’s county clerk hid critical federal documents, including the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, in the vault of a family home, Rokeby, southeast of Leesburg. In the 1820s, President James Monroe built a home in southern Loudoun that his friend, Thomas Jefferson, designed. At Oak Hill, the President would retire periodically from the hustle and bustle of Washington, and it was at Oak Hill, in 1823, he wrote the Monroe Doctrine.

By 1860, Loudoun was one of Virginia’s most prosperous counties; its agricultural production at or near the top for such crops as corn and wheat. The county’s success in part was based on good land, but also on the labor of 5,501 slaves—one-quarter of the county’s population at the time.

Loudoun raised large numbers of men for the Confederate forces, but still was significantly divided. On the issue of secession, the county voted 1626 to 726 to secede from the Union, ratifying Virginia’s vote. Those voting against were heavily concentrated in northwestern Loudoun—in the areas settled by Quakers and Germans a century earlier.

Loudoun saw a small but savage battle in October of 1861 at Ball’s Bluff, northeast of Leesburg, when a Union force was driven into the Potomac with heavy losses. Early Confederate success was replaced with Federal occupation by 1862. It was through Loudoun that Lee’s army marched to and from Antietam, followed on the return by Federal troops under McClellan. A year later, Union forces marched through Loudoun on the way to Gettysburg. Each time, the county was wiped clean of forage and horses, often leaving county residents in dire straits. A number of county residents fought back as members of Mosby’s partisan rangers. Mosby, often call the “Gray Ghost of the Confederacy,” was known for his enormously successful hit and run tactics.

After the Civil War, a number of small African-American communities sprang up near former plantations. With the expansion of a railroad west through Loudoun, communities such as Ashburn, Hamilton, Purcellville, and Round Hill, grew along the route as they became business centers for farmers and summer vacation havens for Washingtonians. Loudoun’s agriculture continued to flourish, adapting to changing markets near the turn of the century by switching from chop farming to dairy and raising beef cattle and fine horses. A number of America’s wealthy bought former plantations in Loudoun and turned them into showplaces known for their architecture and livestock. Oatlands and Morven Park are two that are open to the public today.

In the 1960s, Loudoun began to grow substantially, growth that has continued to this day, bringing a six fold increase in population in a forty-year span. The building of Dulles International Airport in the early 1960s fueled economic development. In its wake, a gradual hi-tech boom came to the eastern Loudoun-western Fairfax area. Accordingly, many have moved to eastern Loudoun and become residents of planned communities such as Sterling Park, Sugarland Run, Cascades, and Ashburn Farms, making that section a veritable part of the Washington suburbs. Others have moved to the county seat or to the small towns and rural communities of the Loudoun Valley.

As Loudoun begins the 21st century, a divisive issue is whether its historical rural agricultural base can be saved in the wake of encroaching growth and development.

The Loudoun Museum preserves and interprets the artifacts of Loudoun’s three-century journey to let both Loudouners and visitors gain a sense of what Loudoun has been as it continues to evolve.