1770 a majority (seven) of the vestry survived the election challenge, but in
Augusta Parish (Augusta County) in the previous year the outcome was far
different, with ten of the vestrymen swept out of office.47 At best the story of
vestry dissolutions remains clouded, confused, and incomplete.48
A mid-eighteenth-century scrutiny of vestries affirms the institution s on-
going importance for Virginians. While there is no evidence of any break with
planter gentry dominance in membership, the petitions demonstrated greater
parishioner assertiveness and, to some extent, heightened responsiveness to
parishioners concerns. Nonetheless, of the colony s seventy-six parishes in
1760, twenty-two (29 percent) whose origins antedated 1690 had totally self-
perpetuating vestries. For another nineteen parishes (25 percent), formed after
1690, the only election was the initial selection of vestrymen. Thus, for slightly
more than half of Virginia s parishes (54 percent), self-perpetuation was opera-
tive throughout the period. On the other hand, recurring new parish for-
mation and vestry dissolutions provided thirty-five parishes with additional
though irregular opportunities to make choice of vestrymen. All told, divi-
sions occurred in twenty-five parishes between 1690 and 1760, four parishes
went through the experience twice, and three parishes yielded territory three
times each. One of the latter was Brunswick County s St. Andrew s Parish,
which, in addition to being divided three times between1720 and1760, also had
its vestry dissolved once.49 These events offered freeholders a renewed say in
the choice of vestrymen. Vestry selection in eighteenth-century Virginia thus
might be more precisely described as limited self-perpetuation.
Whoever the vestrymen were and however they secured and retained their mem-
bership in those august bodies, the more important question is what they did in
their capacity as vestrymen. As was true of the Christ Church Parish (Middle-
sex) vestry on 7 October 1725, they had collective responsibilities that could
only be discharged by formal gatherings.What is initially puzzling is the infre-
quency of vestry meetings. Extant parish minutes record an overall average of
only two meetings a year. This, of course, disguises variations from parish to
parish, but no vestry for which records have survived averaged more than four
meetings a year; some got by for years with a single, annual meeting.50
If relative importance were measured by the frequency of meetings, then
the inescapable conclusion would be that eighteenth-century Virginia vestries
counted for little in the scheme of things. But attention has already been di-
rected to the weighty responsibilities assigned to the parish vestry. Discharge
of these duties the subject of the following four chapters provides over-
.
40 parishes