The long anticipated start of the Augusta County Chancery scanning project has begun! The first 50 boxes of chancery cases were transferred to LVA’s digital vendor (Backstage Library Works) in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, on February 4th. Scanning of the papers began last week on the portion of the collection dated from 1867 to 1912. Case files dated from 1745 to 1866 will be scanned at a later date after archivists complete additional arrangement, indexing, and conservation of these fragile papers.
The Augusta County chancery causes are the most voluminous of any locality in Virginia and are one of the longest and most complete continuous collections of chancery records of any locality in the country. They document an unusually large geographic area. For the period 1745 to 1770, the boundaries of Augusta County encompassed most of western Virginia and what became the states of West Virginia, Kentucky, Illinois, and Ohio, and parts of present-day Pennsylvania as far north as Pittsburgh. In fact, the Augusta County court held sessions at Fort Pitt in Pittsburgh when claim to that area, known as the West Augusta District, was in dispute. Even after the county was reduced to roughly its present size in 1778, the Augusta County Court continued to be the repository for chancery causes from 28 localities, which were heard by the Staunton Superior Court of Chancery from 1801 to 1831.
Images will be posted to the Chancery Records Index (CRI) in 20-30 year increments after review has ensured the images meet strict preservation and quality control standards. We will be updating our progress on the blog so stay tuned for further updates.
-Carl Childs, Local Records Services Director
I had never heard of Backstage Library Works before. The work they do looks amazing!