liberties at an earlier period. The charter of 1145 gave the burgesses the borough of Richmond to hold for ever in fee farm at an annual
rent of £29. Other charters were granted by Earl Conan in 1150,
by Earl John II. in 1268 and by Edward III. (the first royal charter)
in 1328, and confirmed in subsequent reigns. A charter of incorporation
was granted by Queen Elizabeth under the title of aldermen
and burgesses in 1576, and another by Charles II. in 1668 under
the name of mayor and aldermen. This last, though superseded later,
was restored in the reign of James II. and, until the passing of the
Municipal Reform Act of 1835, was regarded as the governing
charter of the borough. Although Richmond received a summons as
early as 1328, it was not represented in parliament until 1584, from
which time it usually sent two members. In 1867 the number was
reduced to one. Since 1885 the representation has been merged in
the Richmond division of the North Riding. The charter of Earl
John II. points to the existence of a market before 1268, but there is
no grant of it extant. In 1278, Edward I. granted the same earl a
yearly fair to be held at Richmond from the 3rd to the 16th of September
inclusive. Queen Elizabeth granted the burgesses a market
every Saturday, a market every fortnight for animals and a fair
each year on the vigil of Palm Sunday. At one time there appear to
have been as many as four annual fairs. There is now only one,
which takes place on the 2nd and 3rd of November. The weekly
market is still held on Saturday, and there is a fortnightly market for
cattle. In the middle ages Richmond had an important market for
corn and wool. There is evidence later of traffic in lead, and also of
a flourishing manufacture of hand-knitted stockings. As the town
possesses the only railway station in Swaledale, the market is still of
consequence. But the stocking industry decayed with the introduction
of machinery. William the Lion of Scotland was imprisoned
in the castle in the reign of Henry II., but otherwise the town owes its
importance chiefly to its lords. The honour was a valuable possession
in the middle ages, and it was usually in royal or semi-royal hands.
See R. Gale, Registrum Honoris de Richemund (London, 1722); C. Clarkson, The History and Antiquities of Richmond (Richmond, 1821); T. D. Whitaker, A History of Richmondshire (London, 1823); Victoria County History, Yorkshire.
RICHMOND, the capital of Virginia, U.S.A., the county seat of Henrico county, and a port of entry, on the James river (at the head of navigation), about 100 m. S. by W. of Washington, D.C., and about 125 m. by water from the Atlantic Ocean. Pop. (1850) 27,570; (1860) 37,910; (1870) 51,038; (1880) 63,600; (1890) 81,388; (1900), 85,050, of whom 32,230 were negroes and 2865 were foreign-born; (1910 census) 127,628. Richmond is served, by the Atlantic Coast Line, the Chesapeake & Ohio, the Seaboard Air Line, the Southern and the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac railways, and by the Old Dominion, the Virginia Navigation and the Chesapeake steamship lines. The city has a beautiful situation on the hilly ground (maximum elevation, about, 250 ft. above sea-level) along the north and east banks of the James, at a bend where the river changes its south-easterly course for one almost due south. It occupies seven hills, from which fact it has been called “the Modern Rome.” The western stretch of the river, opposite the city, breaks into rapids which have a fall of about 116 ft. in 9 m. and provide abundant water power. Belle Isle (the site of a Confederate prison camp during the Civil War), about ½ m. long by about ¼ m. wide, is in this part of the river; a little farther down stream are a group of small islets, and opposite the south-eastern boundary of the city is Mayo's Island. Within the city's lines the river is crossed by two bridges (to Manchester) for vehicles and pedestrians, and three railway bridges. The river has been improved by Federal engineers since 1870; in June 1909 (up to which time $1,799,033 had been expended for improvements) there was a channel 100 ft. wide and 18 ft. deep, nearly continuously from Hampton Roads to the Richmond wharf, and the maximum draft at low Water was 16.1 ft.
About three-fourths of the city's total street mileage (120 m.) is paved, Belgian block or macadam being used on the principal thoroughfares. About 637.8 acres are devoted to city parks, among which are William Byrd Park (300 acres), in the western part of the city, Joseph Bryan Park (262.6 acres), Chimborazo Park (29 acres), near its eastern boundary, Gambles Hill Park (8.8 acres), Monroe Square (7½ acres), Jefferson Park (6.3 acres) and Marshall Square (7 acres). The State Capitol Square (10 acres) is not owned by the city. Half a mile N.W. of the city are the Fair Grounds, where a state fair is held annually.
Of Richmond's public buildings, several have great historic interest. St John's Episcopal church, built in 1740 (and subsequently much enlarged), is noted especially as the meeting-place of the Virginia Convention of March 1775, before which Patrick Henry made a famous speech, ending, “I know not what course others may take, but as for me, Give me liberty, or give me death!” The Capitol (begun in 1785 and completed in 1792—the wings were added in 1906) was designed from a model and plans of the Maison Carrée, at Nîmes, supplied by Thomas Jefferson, while he was minister to France. Aaron Burr was tried for treason and then for misdemeanour in this building in 1807, the Virginia secession convention met here in 1861, and during the Civil War the sessions of the Confederate Congress were held here. In its rotunda is Jean Antoine Houdon's full-length marble statue of Washington, provided for by the Virginia General Assembly in 1784, and erected in 1796; its base-bears a fine inscription written by James Madison. In a niche is a Houdon bust of Lafayette, a replica of the original presented to the city of Paris by the state of Virginia. The Old Stone House (the oldest building in the city) was erected as a residence in 1737, and is now used for a museum. Masons' Hall, whose corner-stone was laid in 1785, is said to be the oldest exclusively Masonic building in the United States. The Executive Mansion of the Confederate States of America, built in 1819, purchased by the city in 1862, and leased to the Confederate government and occupied by President Jefferson Davis in 1862-65, was acquired in 1890 by the Confederate Memorial Library Society, and is now a Confederate Museum with a room for each state of the Confederacy and a general library in the “Solid South” room; it has valuable historical papers, collected by the Southern Historical Society, and the society has published a Calendar of Confederate Papers (1908). The former residence of Chief-Justice John Marshall, built in 1795, is still standing; and the Lee Mansion, which was the war-time residence of General Robert E. Lee's family, has been occupied, since 1893, by the Virginia Historical Society (organized 1831; reorganized 1847) as the repository of a valuable library and collection of portraits of historical interest. Libby Prison, which stood on the northern bank of a canal, near the river, in the eastern part of the city, was taken down in 1888-89, and its materials removed to Chicago, where it was reconstructed, in as nearly as possible its original form, and became the Libby Prison War Museum.[1] The Valentine Museum is in a house on Eleventh and Clay Streets, in which Aaron Burr was entertained while he was on trial, and which with $50,000 and his collections, was devised to a board of trustees in 1892 by Mann S. Valentine. The museum includes 3300 books, many being of the 15th and 16th centuries, a department of engravings, a Virginia Room with portraits and relics, some tapestries, an excellent collection of casts and valuable American archaeological specimens.
The more modern buildings include the City Hall, a fine granite structure (completed in 1893), with a tower 180 ft. tall; the Library building which houses the state library (about 80,000 volumes, with many portraits and a valuable collection of old manuscripts), the State Law Library and also the offices of most of the state officials; the Post-Office and Customs House; the State Penitentiary; the Chamber of Commerce; and, among the religious edifices, the Sacred Heart Cathedral (Roman Catholic), presented to the city by Mr and Mrs Thomas F. Ryan; the Monumental Church, built on the site of the Richmond Theatre, in the burning of which, in 1811, Acting-Governor George W. Smith and fifty-nine others lost their lives; and St Paul's Church, where Jefferson Davis was attending services, on the 2nd of April 1865, when he received news from
- ↑ As built in Richmond in 1845 by Luther Libby, it was a brick structure, three storeys high in front and four in the rear. It had six rooms, each about 100×45, ft., was used as a tobacco warehouse and a ship-chandler until 1861, and then until the capture of Richmond was used as a prison, chiefly for Federal officers. Frequently it was terribly overcrowded (by as many as 1200 prisoners at a time), the inmates often suffered great privations, and many died or were physically disabled for the remainder of their lives.
