• General Notes

  [316552.ftw]
  
  John Turberville d. 1728, Lancaster Co., VA, m. Elizabeth Lee b. 1654, d.
  1714/15, Lancaster Co., VA, (daughter of Col. Richard and Ann (Constable) Lee).
  John was described by Miss Lucy Brown Beale, a prominent Northern Neck
  historian, in 1929, as follows:, As unto the bow the cord is so unto a
  Turberville was a Lee. John was in Northumberland County by 18 Mar 1685, when
  he proved the will of Thomas Brewer [Order Bk 4:255]. On 20 May 1685, we find
  him appointed deputy sheriff to Capt. William Lee. He became an extensive land
  owner in Northumberland and Lancaster Counties and after the death of William
  Lee he became sheriff. On 15 Jun 1692, he took the oath as Justice of the
  Peace [4:592]. On 15 Apr 1696, he was sworn as high sheriff [4:723]. He was
  still a justice in 1699 and a member of the House of Burgesses in 1702-1704.
  He also served Lancaster County as Clerk. He was a man of education and
  culture, his manuscript copy of the Acts of the Assembly still exists, when
  the law read: - Whereas many Babling and Slanderous Women Slander and
  scandalize their Neighbors, for which the poor Husbands are often
  involved....be it enacted that Babling and Slanderous Women be punished by
  Ducking - then again we find in this primitive volume: Whereas the dispatch
  of Business in this Country is made obstructed for want of Bridle Wayes to the
  several houses and Plantations; it is enacted that every Person having a
  Plantation make a passage for Man and Horse to his house. John Turberville
  loved his God and the laws of his country and these virtues he passed on to
  his only son. The long and close association of Johns family with the Lee
  family, beginning with his marriage to Elizabeth (Lee) Howson, suggests a
  possible common origin with that family in the counties of Gloucester and
  Worcester, England. (The Parents of Colonel Richard Lee of Virginia, by
  William Thorndale, National Genealogical Society Quarterly, Dec 1988, Vol. 76,
  No.4, pp. 253-260). The arms used by John Turberville, (Ermine, a lion rampant
  gules, ducally crowned or), corresponds with those used by those Turbervilles
  of Bere Regis, Dorset, and thus, the Virginia Turbervilles are said to be
  descended from the English family of Bere Regis, Dorset. ( On the
  "Battle-Abbey Roll" appears the name of a Sir Payne Turberville, who was a
  companion of the conqueror, and is supposed to have been the progenitor of
  this family in England. The manor of Bere Regis was sold to Robert Turberville
  in 38 Henry VIII, and was for years the seat and sepulcher of generations of
  this family). The earliest recorded use of the arms of Dorset line in Virginia
  was on the 1720 gravestone of Frances Ashton, first wife of Johns son,
  George, at Booth Plantation. (Lee of Virginia, by Edmund Jenings Lee, MD,
  1895; p.65). The inventory of the Lancaster County estate of John Turberville
  can be found in Will Book 12: 85-98. This is included in the Appendix of this
  book as well as a copy of  the 1725/26 deed from John Turberville of Christ
  Church Parish, Lancaster County, to George Turberville, of Cople Parish,
  Westmoreland County. (Deed Bk 11: 285-286). John was taxed in Lancaster County
  from 8 Oct 1697 (Orders 4, 1696-1702: 33) to 12 Jan 1720 (Orders 7:336). In
  1697 he paid two tithes; in 1720, six (Lancaster County, Virginia, Individual
  Tithables, manuscript, NBWM & L).

Details of John's family with Elizabeth LEE