County of Northampton

Location: Courthouse Road near Savage Neck Eastville, VA

WY 8 Home of the First Settler

Thomas Savage, a lad of thirteen, arrived at Jamestown on 2 Jan. 1608 with Capt. Christopher Newport on the ship John and Francis. John Smith later wrote, "The next day Newport came a shore .... A boy named Thomas Savage (whom Newport called son) was then given unto Powhatan." Savage resided several years with the Indians, growing up in association with Pocahontas.
He became proficient in the Indian languages and later served as an interpreter. Savage settled on the Eastern Shore by 1619. There Debedeavon, the "Laughing King," gave him a large tract of land, perhaps 9,000 acres for increasing trade with the Indians.

DEPARTMENT OF HISTORIC RESOURCES, 1995

The Encyclopedia Virginia has a detailed history and timeline for Thomas Savage. His story is a fascinating tale of the early colonial days in Virginia. Thomas Savage played a role in the founding of Northampton County and is considered to be the first white permanent settler of the Eastern Shore of Virginia.
"In or around 1621, Savage had received from Esmy Shichans a large tract of land on the Eastern Shore containing an estimated 9,000 acres. (This tract of land would become known as Savage’s Neck.) About two years later, he married a woman named Hannah (sometimes Ann), who had come to Virginia at her own expense in 1621 on the Seaflower. The two had a son, John, around 1624. Savage’s prosperity in the fur trade is reflected in the records of the day: by early 1625, Savage was recorded as possessing a house, a barn, a boat, and two servants; two years later, he was the owner of a 150-acre plantation, Savages Choice." 

Part of Thomas Savage's land can still be visited to this day if you travel down Savage Neck in Eastville and visit Savage Neck Dunes. 

Savage Neck Dunes Natural Area Preserve

Savage Neck Dunes beach Photo credit: William Dyas

The preserve is open daily to the public, but has no restroom facilities, trash receptacles, access to drinking water or on-site staff. Be aware that the Savage Neck Dunes parking lot is small, with space for only eight (8) vehicles. 

If you arrive and the lot is full, please return later. Do not park illegally on adjacent private property, along the access road, within a public road right-of-way or in any other non-designated location.

There are three (3) marked hiking trails with interpretive signage. Please practice "leave no trace" by packing out all trash. Take only photographs and leave only footprints.

Part or all of the preserve may be periodically closed for resource protection or resource management activities. Please call before visiting, especially during deer season when managed hunts may be underway.
For more information visit the DCR webpage for Savage Neck.


Photo credit: Jean E. Flynn
Visitors can see some of the highest and best developed sand dunes in Virginia. 

 
"Look for post oaks, water oaks, sassafras, blueberries and pink lady’s-slipper orchids. Listen for spring peepers, green tree frogs and cricket frogs. Notice painted turtles sunning on logs and dragonflies feeding around the ponds. Follow the 0.75-mile Beach Trail through the forest and dunes to the Chesapeake Bay. "
-From the Natural Area Preserve Visitation Guide 

Thomas Savage - American Dreamer
YouTube Channel: DelmarvaAlmanac

Throwback Thursday w/ Jim Duffy - Thomas Savage
YouTube Channel: Delmarva Life 

JOURNEYS: The British Teenager Left Behind to Live with the Indians in 1608 Jim Duffy Secrets of the Eastern Shore

Cherry Grove

South front. March 1960. Photo by Jack E. Boucher. - Cherry Grove, State Route 634 vicinity, Eastville, Northampton County, VA
Library of Congress Historic American Buildings Survey 
Survey number: HABS VA-592

The photographs and following excerpt is from the Historic American Buildings Survey from 1960:

"Local historians believe that the point created by Chesapeake Bay and Cherrystone Inlet may have been the site of the home of first settler Ensign Thomas Savage. Savage was probably the earliest permanent settler in any of the original colonies whose descendants are definitely known. Captain John Smith recorded his arrival in 1608 and his adoption by Powhatan. He lived a number of years with the Indians and grew up with Pocahontas. He became proficient in the Indian languages and his services as interpreter were invaluable both to the Shore and the Jamestown settlement.

"Cherry Grove" is an old house and could go back to Thomas Savage III who died in 1737 or to the early tenure of Nathaniel Littleton Savage his son. Nathaniel Littleton Savage was a prominent citizen of the county in the latter half of the eighteenth century,

"Cherry Grove" is a substantial farm house, one and a half stories with gambrel roof and well-scaled modillion cornice. The West Indian mode of using louvered shutters on dormers is worth noting. The roof now covered with slate, originally had wood shingles. There is a center hall plan with entrance doors of rare type, paneled on the outside and diagonally battened within.

Detail of door with St. Andrew's cross and aquia steps (relocated). - Cherry Grove, State Route 634 vicinity, Eastville, Northampton County, VA March 1960. Photo by Jack E. Boucher


Inside brick chimneys rise from either end. Extensions to the left and the front porch would seem to date from the late nineteenth century.

The interior of the main block preserves much of its original appearance. The hall has paneled wainscoting and an enclosed stairway. The parlor and bedroom above have fully paneled ends. In the former there are also horizontal panels over each window. Paint evidence around the fireplace opening as well as mantel facings in the Parlor tell the story of at least two differing treatments there.
Considerable wrought-iron hardware remains throughout the house. "Cherry Grove" is reported to have been abandoned following a severe hurricane in the 1930's. The late Ralph T. Whitelaw's authoritative work on the Eastern Shore (Vol. I, p. 22k) reproduces a photograph when it was still inhabited and showing a close-up of landscape treatment in the vicinity. The present prospect is one of open fields and water courses, a magnificent Tidewater setting, but devoid of old trees and shrubbery."

Reference: Ralph T. Whitelaw, Virginia's Eastern Shore, Richmond,
Virginia, Virginia Historical Society, 1951? Volume One, pp. 214-15,
222-25.

Cherry Grove has since disappeared but fortunately the historical survey and the description found in the research by Ralph Whitelaw inspired the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts in Winston-Salem, North Carolina to reconstruct some of the interiors of the home. 

Below are photos and descriptions provided by the Museum of Early Decorative Arts: 

Center Hall 

"This center hall is from a house called “Cherry Grove” built in Northampton County, Virginia, for Nathaniel Littleton Savage (1726-1793), between 1759 and 1760. Cherry Grove was a five-bay, story-and-a-half tall, gambrel roofed house. It was one-room deep with a center hall providing access to a hall and parlor on the first floor and to a staircase leading to two chambers above. The center hall’s surviving exterior doors with diagonal stiles and raised panels and are important architectural survivals.

The architectural historian Mark Wenger has observed that the proliferation of center-hall plan houses in the Chesapeake during the middle of the 18th century reflected social and racial developments in society. The center hall provided an additional place for sorting by class and race as well as an additional barrier to entry into the more private and refined spaces of the house.

Nathaniel Littleton Savage was the fifth-generation of the Savage Family to inhabit the land on which Cherry Grove was built. Called “Savage’s Neck”, the house stood along Cherrystone Creek on the Chesapeake Bay side of the Eastern Shore of Virginia. In about 1767 Savage sold the land to William Burton and moved to York County, Virginia. A cousin, Littleton Savage, married William Burton’s daughter, and the land returned to the Savage family on Burton’s death in 1770. The house was the center of a plantation of more than 1000 acres. William Burton’s 1770 probate inventory lists seventy-one slaves; his son-in-law Littleton Savage’s 1805 probate inventory lists seventy-nine.

The house was illustrated in-situ by Ralph T. Whitelaw in his 1951 “Virginia’s Eastern Shore” (vol. 1, pp.214-215) and surveyed by the Historic American Buildings Survey in 1960:
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/hh/item/va0794/

Abandoned following a hurricane in the 1930s, the architectural woodwork from its center hall, parlor, and an upstairs chambe,r were salvaged by MESDA in 1970. Archeological investigation of the site was also carried out at that time by Brad Rauschenberg."

Credit Line:
Original installation: Agnew Hunter Bahnson III, Frank King Bahnson, Karen Bahnson, Mr. and Mrs. Albert L. Butler, Jr., Mr. and Mrs. William T. Wilson, Jr. Rennovations: MARPAT Foundation of Washington, D.C.

Bed Chamber 

Reconstructed Cherry Grove bed chamber exhibited at the Museum of Southern Early Decorative Arts. Photo via MESDA. 

"This chamber is from the second floor of a house called “Cherry Grove” built in Northampton County, Virginia, for Nathaniel Littleton Savage (1726-1793), between 1759 and 1760. Cherry Grove was a five-bay, story-and-a-half tall, gambrel roofed house. It was one-room deep with a center hall providing access to a hall and parlor on the first floor and to a staircase leading to two chambers above. The center hall’s surviving exterior doors with diagonal stiles and raised panels and are important architectural survivals.

The architectural historian Mark Wenger has observed that the proliferation of center-hall plan houses in the Chesapeake during the middle of the 18th century reflected social and racial developments in society. The center hall provided an additional place for sorting by class and race as well as an additional barrier to entry into the more private and refined spaces of the house." 
-excerpt from MESDA item collections

Parlor

Fireplace end of parlor. - Cherry Grove March 1960. Photo by Jack E. Boucher. Library of Congress collection. Survey number: HABS VA-592 
This is how the parlor looked in 1960 for the Historic American Buildings Survey. The home had been abandoned in the 1930's due to damage from a hurricane. 

 
Reconstructed parlor of Cherry Grove exhibited at MESDA. 

 "This parlor is from a house called “Cherry Grove” built in Northampton County, Virginia, for Nathaniel Littleton Savage (1726-1793), between 1759 and 1760. Cherry Grove was a five-bay, story-and-a-half tall, gambrel roofed house. It was one-room deep with a center hall providing access to a hall and parlor on the first floor and to a staircase leading to two chambers above. The center hall’s surviving exterior doors with diagonal stiles and raised panels and are important architectural survivals." 

Credit Line
Original installation: Agnew Hunter Bahnson III, Frank King Bahnson, Karen Bahnson, Mr. and Mrs. Albert L. Butler, Jr., Mr. and Mrs. William T. Wilson, Jr. Rennovations: MARPAT Foundation of Washington, D.C.

Please visit the Museum of Southern Decorative Arts for more photos and descriptions of Cherry Grove on Savage Neck home to the Savage family, the first settler in Northampton County, Virginia.