a view to keeping the highways in a permanently good condition. Previously there had been much complaint that when the course of a road was altered by the large trees blown across it, the land of the adjacent plantations had been encroached upon and the fences ruthlessly broken down. Under an Act of Assembly passed in this year,[1] surveyors were appointed whose duty it was to establish a system of highways in their districts wherever lacking; first, a convenient road to the church was to be made, and this was to be followed by the construction of roads to the court-house, to Jamestown, and finally from county to county. These highways were required to be forty feet in width. The surveyors had the assistance of laborers, who upon an appointed day were sent to them by the owners of the adjacent estates, the planters being compelled, upon the call of their vestries, to furnish as many persons for this public service as they had tithables in their families. Each surveyor was assigned certain limits and his proportion of tithables. If he showed indifference to the performance of his duty, the County Court, upon complaint being offered, instructed the clerk to communicate the fact to the church wardens of the parish through the minister, and to command them to enforce the provisions of the law.[2] There were instances in which a private citizen was granted a certain amount of tobacco
- ↑ Hening’s Statutes, vol. II, p. 103.
- ↑ Records of York County, vol. 1675-1684, p. 89, Va. State Library. There were frequent presentments by grand juries of delinquent surveyors. See Records of Lower Norfolk County, original vol. 1675-1686, f. p. 40; Records of Middlesex County, original vol. 1679-1694, p. 672. In some cases the highways were only thirty feet wide. See Records of Middlesex County, original vol. 1680-1694, orders March 3, 1683-1684. The instructions of court sometimes merely required that the road should be cleared to the breadth of a cartway. Records of Northampton County, original vol. 1657-1664, p. 85.
