William Harwood (d. Sept. 1780) was a militia colonel, landowner and politician in the Colony of Virginia. He represented Warwick County in the House of Burgesses for more than three decades (mostly with his neighbor William Digges) beginning in 1752), as well as during all five Virginia Revolutionary Conventions (although no record actually exists of his presence during the 2nd and 3rd conventions) and in the first session of the Virginia House of Delegates.Lyon Gardiner Tyler, Cyclopedia of Virginia Biography (1915) vol. 1 p. 254John Frederick Dorman, Adventurers of Purse and Person, Virginia 1607-1624/5 (Genealogical Publishing Co. Inc. (4th Ed. 2004) vol. 2, p. 304Cynthia Miller Leonard, The Virginia General Assembly 1619=1978 (Richmond: Virginia State Library 1978) pp. 80, 82, 85, 87, 90, 93, 96, 98, 101, 104, 107, 111, 113, 116, 118, 120, 123 Harwood also established Endview Plantation, which became his home and later that of his second son Edward Harwood and grandson (through his eldest son William who moved to Kentucky) Big Humphrey Harwood. Acquired by the City of Newport News in 1995, it is now operated as a house museum focusing on the American Civil War, as well as a park.
Complicating matters, although Harwood had died before Virginia's tax census of 1787, at least three men of the same name but unclear relationship paid taxes in that census. The man living in Warwick County was almost certainly his son who soon moved to Kentucky. William Harwood then owned nine enslaved adults, as well as a dozen enslaved teenagers, five horses and 50 cattle, as well as land (or at least livestock) in Lincoln County (which became Kentucky) and relatively nearby Charles City County, Virginia.Netti Schreiner-Yantis and Florene Speakman Love, The 1787 Census of Virginia (Springfield: Genealogical Books in Print) pp. 310, 951, 1047 William B. Harwood also owned an adult slave and three enslaved teenagers (as well as 2 horses and 2 cattle) in Charles City County, and probably another William Harwood owned two adult slaves adults and four teenagers (as well as 5 horses) in Henrico County, Virginia.Schreiner-Yantis and Speakman Love p. 1075 Other men of the Harwood family (but distant relations) had owned land near Weyanoke in Charles City County since 1665;; Joseph Harwood, Samuel Harwood and Samuel Harwood, Jr. had represented Charles City County in the House of Burgesses at various times in the 18th century, and Major Samuel Harwood represented Charles City County in one of the revolutionary conventions before his death in 1778.
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