Dettingen Parish Vestry Records

In the right column you can see a link to a folder containing nearly every page of the records now extant for 1749-1782 for the Dettingen Parish, which roughly covers the same area as Prince William County, Virginia.  "Nearly every page" because I decided to photograph every page that had a Reno on it, and nearly every page did.  Our Reno colonists were prominent people in their community, and it's heart-warming to see how they were trusted with positions of responsibility.  Like on page 23, where in 1756 it was "Order'd that Mr. Lewis Reno and James Nisbitt be Church Wardens the Ensuing Yeare and that they take Care of the poor as Usuall."  He was given responsibility to be the collector of tithes (taxes really, paid in pounds of tobacco).   He continued in this position of responsibility until his death, only taking a brief break from 1771 until another church warden died in 1774, upon which he entered service again until his death in 1775 at the age of 64.

The Reno-Walters land patent - 1712

 This is the 1712 land patent given to Lewis Reno.  Interesting that they would mark out the boundaries of the land taking their bearings from (for example) a red oak or a maple tree.  No wonder there were lots of land disputes!

Fun to see the handwritten text of this document

This document is called a Crown Bounty, which shows an intent to emigrate to a colony, along with money granted to do so, from a fund collected to aid distressed Frenchmen.  It is dated September 8, 1687.  The fabulous thing here is that it lists the names of the females - so hard to find at this time in history!  The confusing thing is that it lists "Lewis Reynaud of Angemois, his wife and 8 children" then below appears to list only four children.  Several theories have been floated for this, but the current one in popularity is that Benjamin is their son, and his wife Mary and daughters Marianne and Mary are also being counted in the first total of "children."  (Sorry I cut off the total on the right column, but the math is easy to do.)

Solid Evidence Wanted!

Reneau family history has been researched and scrutinized for over a century, and much good information has been gathered.  This blog is an attempt to pull together all of the primary source records that exist for the early generations who came to America, and perhaps eventually reaching back beyond that.

Who am I and why do I care?  I have a lot of Reneau DNA in my make-up: my great-grandmother was a Reneau, and in her lines there is an inordinate amount of Reneau DNA as there were a lot of cousin marriages keeping the DNA strong (there were 13 Reneaus in the 7 generations that preceded her).  This is not really about DNA though, but about finding out more of who they were and how they lived and loved.

For the past twenty-one years I have lived near the area that was originally settled by Lewis Reynaud, and I know it well.  I have made half-hearted attempts in the past to find out more about these events in the history of colonial America.  But with small push--being asked by my church to become a family history consultant for our local members--I have taken this on in a more serious fashion.

I hope to post the things I have found on a regular basis and have this be a repository for Reneau records.