Archives & Collections
The Library at NCHS is one of the best in the Northern Neck for the historian or the genealogist. It boasts an amazing collection of information that is not limited to Northumberland County, the Northern Neck, or even the state of Virginia.
Northumberland County is fortunate to have one of the most complete sets of county records in the Commonwealth of Virginia, including Court Record Books, Court Order books, Will Books, Chancery Records, birth, death, and marriage records, etc. NCHS has the original courthouse records and an extensive selection of abstracts of these records. Many court records and abstracts are also available for the other Northern Neck Counties and many other Counties of Virginia and Maryland, as well as published genealogical histories of many surnames.
Additionally, there are military records for the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, and the Civil War, as well as volumes regarding all aspects of Virginia’s history. There is much historical information about the history of the Northern Neck and all its unique facets such as the steamboat era, menhaden fishing, and boat history and design.
The card catalog can be downloaded and/or printed for your convenience. The file is 49 pages long and lists over 1000 publications alphabetically by author. There is a microfilm viewer available in our library for viewing more than 90 microfilm titles.
Valuable sources that are not listed in the card catalog include family histories by local researchers; histories of locations such as homes, old homesites, stores, post offices, etc.; family Bibles; local school yearbooks; maps; photos; old newspapers; maps and plats; and scrapbooks. These are, for the most part, not available elsewhere.
Following is a list of some of the hard-to-find periodicals on our shelves that are invaluable to the historian or genealogist and are not listed in the card catalog:
Virginia Magazine, 1894 – 1983
Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, 1991 – 2018
Northern Neck of Virginia Historical Magazine, 1951 – 2022 (and indexes)
William and Mary Quarterly, 1902 – 1958
The Bulletin of the Northumberland County Historical Society, 1964 to present.
Virginia Genealogist, 1957 – 2003
National Genealogical Society, 1993 – 2019
Magazine of Virginia Genealogy, 1963 – 2019
Virginia Cavalcade, 1951 – 1987
Southern Historical Society Papers
