Place Information
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Loudoun County ( "LOUD-un") is a county located in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and is part of the Washington Metropolitan Area. As of July 1, 2008, the county is estimated to be home to 289,995 people, a 71 percent increase over the 2000 figure of 169,599. That increase makes the county the fourth fastest-growing in the United States during that period. Its county seat is Leesburg. As of 2007, the town had been county seat for 249 of the last 250 years. As of 2007, Loudoun County has the highest median household income in the United States at $107,207, beating neighboring Fairfax County at $105,241. The two counties have been trading places as the wealthiest county in the US for the past couple of years.
History
Loudoun County was established in 1757 from Fairfax County. The county is named for John Campbell, Fourth Earl of Loudoun and Governor of Virginia from 1756–59. Western settlement began in the 1720s and 1730s with Quakers, Scots-Irish, Germans and others moving south from Pennsylvania and Maryland and by English and African slaves moving upriver from Tidewater. By the time of the American Revolution, it was the most populous county in Virginia. During the War of 1812, important Federal documents and government archives were evacuated from Washington and stored at Leesburg for safe keeping. Local tradition holds that these documents were stored at Rokeby House and thus that Leesburg was briefly the capital of the United States. Early in the American Civil War, the Battle of Balls Bluff took place near Leesburg on October 21, 1861. Future jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. was critically wounded in that battle along the Potomac River. During the Gettysburg Campaign in June 1863, Confederate Major General J.E.B. Stuart and Union cavalry clashed in the battles of Aldie, Middleburg, and Upperville. Confederate partisan John S. Mosby based his operations in Loudoun and adjoining Fauquier County (for a more in-depth account of the history of Loudoun County during the Civil War, see Loudoun County in the American Civil War). Notable people from Loudoun CountyJames Monroe constructed and resided at Oak Hill near Aldie after his presidency. American Civil War Brigadier General Robert H. Chilton (Chief of Staff under Robert E. Lee) was a native of Loudoun County. World War II general George C. Marshall resided at Dodona Manor in Leesburg. Entertainer Arthur Godfrey lived near historic Waterford, Virginia. Loudoun County is also notable for being the birthplace of Julia Neale Jackson, mother of Stonewall Jackson, and Susan Catherine Koerner, mother of the Wright Brothers. Timeline
Population History
Research Tips"Genealogical Abstracts from the Mirror, 1880-1890, Loudoun county, Virginia" by Patricia B. Duncan
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