Stranica 503 [503]
PRESTWOULD
to make our glorious country “safe for Democracy"
| and our leisure in studying the annals of the Court
áz of St. James, it may be of interest to trace the
JAM lineage of the Skipwith family in Virginia, from
i} Sir Grey, who emigrated to America during the
usurpation of Cromwell, to Sir Peyton, founder of the Virginia
Prestwould, which he named for the ancestral home in Leicester¬
shire County, England. And, in passing, it may not be amiss to
call attention to this oft misspelled and mispronounced name,
‘‘Prest-w-o-u-l-d,” not ‘‘wold’”’ nor “wood,” though with the sound
of the latter.
Sir Grey Skipwith was succeeded by his only son, Sir William,
who married Sarah, daughter of John Peyton. His first-born dying,
he was succeeded by his second son, Sir William, from whom the
title passed eventually to Sir Peyton. Sir Peyton Skipwith was
married twice; first to Anne, daughter of Hugh Miller; and second
to her sister, Jean—which brings us to the designer and presiding
genius of the Prestwould Garden.
But, first, a few words in regard to Prestwould itself. A little¬
known bit of history, which might have been lost to us but for the
watchful eye of the Honorable H. F. Hutcheson, Clerk of the
Court of Mecklenburg County, Virginia, follows: | j
A part of the Prestwould estate (including the three islands,
“Saponi,”’ “‘Occaneeche” and ‘‘Totero’’), was originally the Blue¬
stone Castle plantation owned by Colonel William Byrd II, founder
of the cities of Richmond and Petersburg, Virginia. Indeed, it
was probably while visiting this plantation that he conceived the
idea of those cities, as he writes in his famous diary, on September
19, 1733: “After returning to ‘Bluestone Castle’ from a trip to the
1308]