Chesterfield County (Va.) Judgments, 1749-1955

Access and use

Location of collection:
Library of Virginia
The Library of Virginia
800 East Broad Street
Richmond, VA 23219
Contact for questions and access:
POC: Archives Reference Services
Phone: (804) 692-3888
Restrictions:

There are no restrictions.

Terms of access:

There are no restrictions.

Preferred citation:

Chesterfield County (Va.) Judgments, 1749-1955. [insert series or volume title]. Local government records collection, Chesterfield County Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Va. 23219.

Summary

Extent:
113.2 cubic feet (250 boxes); 20 volumes
Creator:
Chesterfield County (Va.) Circuit Court.
Language:
English
Preferred citation:

Chesterfield County (Va.) Judgments, 1749-1955. [insert series or volume title]. Local government records collection, Chesterfield County Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Va. 23219.

Background

Scope and content:

Chesterfield County (Va.) Judgments, 1749-1955 contains civil cases in which justice was administered on the strictly formulated rules of common law. The majority of cases in this record series relate to matters of debt. These records consist of both processed and unprocessed loose records and several volumes.

Biographical / historical:

Context for Record Type: Judgments are identified as civil suits, often involving debt, heard by a jury on the "law" side of the court as opposed to the "chancery" (or equity) side. Should the defendant not have funds to repay the debt, the court ordered their property (including enslaved people) to be seized and sold to repay the debt owed to the plaintiff. Judgments also contain suits brought by enslaved people seeking to gain their freedom.

In Judgments, an assumpsit or declaration (sometimes referred to as a narratio) lays out the plaintiff's grievance as a petition acted as a formal application to the court requesting judicial action. Judgment suits also generally included record types like subpoenas, summons, and exhibit. Judgments may also include additional documentations such as executions, bonds, and various kinds of writs.

Judgment suits make up a large quantity of a locality's records; consequently, they provide a great deal of information concerning the activities and interests of the people who lived in the locality. Since the vast majority of judgment suits relate to financial matters, they are a valuable resource in studying the economic and social history of Virginia localities and are the impotence for many chancery suits.

Locality History: Chesterfield County was named for Philip Dormer Stanhope, fourth earl of Chesterfield, British statesman and diplomat, and was formed from Henrico County in 1749. The county seat is Chesterfield Court House. Part of Henrico County was added to Chesterfield in 1922.

Additional Judgment Types

Ejectments are a formal court order that declares the property owner to be the rightful owner of a piece of land or building and legally removes the unauthorized occupant. The court might also declare financial damages for the lost use of the property.

Office judgments are ruled on outside of a traditional court hearing by a court clerk, rather than a judge and usually occurs when a defendant failed to file a timely response.

Acquisition information:
These items came to the Library of Virginia in shipments of court papers from Chesterfield County in an undated accession. One record came to the Library of Virginia in accession number 33513.
Processing information:

Prior to 2026, the judgement descriptive records were not standardized in their inclusion of contextual information or content lists. Local Records staff reviewed this record and have updated to current standards as of 2026.

The Chesterfield County Judgment of the College of William and Mary vs. John W. Tomlin, 1813 was previously described separately. This judgment is included in this record, but are still described separately in the Library catalog.

Encoded by G. Crawford: 2010; updated by J. Taylor: August 2026.

Arrangement:

This collection is arranged into three series:

  • Series I: Judgments, 1749-1914
  • Series II: Unprocessed Judgments, 1769-1927
  • Series III: Judgment Volumes, 1809-1955

Physical location:
Library of Virginia