Visitors to the Handley Library can enjoy a new exhibit put together by Archives intern Matt Geczy featuring items from the Jeannette and Robert G. Harper Family Papers. This new collection consists of personal and business papers of the Gray family of Berkeley County, West Virginia, and shows the family’s role in the history and development of Berkeley County from the late 1700s through the Civil War, when it became part of the newly formed state of West Virginia, and into the early twentieth century.
The story of the Gray family begins in 1765, when John Gray immigrated to Virginia from Scotland with his older brother, David. Their remaining five siblings later joined them. The Grays acquired land, established farms and businesses, and became prominent members of their communities and churches.
Some highlights on display include a copy of a land grant issued to John Gray and signed by President James Madison, a transcript of the docket book with Captain James William Gray’s eyewitness account of John Brown’s Raid on Harpers Ferry, a farm account book, and family photographs.
The Grays were part of a larger Scottish and Scots-Irish diaspora that settled in the Shenandoah Valley and later pushed westward over the Appalachian Mountains to the newly established states of Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. While the Grays remained in Berkeley County, the materials in this collection show an extended network of family and business relationships developed through this process of immigration, settlement, and westward expansion.
In addition to its historical value, the Harper Family Papers provides valuable genealogical information for individuals researching the Gray family and other families and individuals connected by marriage or through personal and business relationships.
The exhibit is located just outside the Stewart Bell Jr. Archives in the basement of the Handley Library. A full inventory for the collection is available by clicking here.
To make inquiries about the Harper Family Papers, or any of our collections, contact us at archives@handleyregional.org or telephone 540-662-9041, ext. 17. The Archives is open to the public Monday to Wednesday, 1pm to 8pm, and Thursday to Saturday, 10am to 5pm.
Image shows a page from Captain James William Gray’s account of John Brown’s Raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859. Jeannette and Robert G. Harper Family Papers, 1777 THL, Stewart Bell Jr. Archives, Handley Regional Library and Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society.