[10] Decades earlier, Pittsylvania voters elected Perkins and fellow militia captain Benjamin Lankford their representatives to what proved to be the final session of the House of Burgesses, which began in 1775.

[11] After Governor Dunmore prorogued (suspended) that assembly, Pittsylvania voters elected Perkins and Lankford and the men they had replaced as burgesses (Hugh Innes who lived in the county's western section and would help found new Patrick Henry County in 1777, and John Donelson who was Pittsylvania's county lieutenant but planned to move to Tennessee) their representatives to the first Virginia Revolutionary Conventions, and Perkins and Lankford to most of the others.

Voters also elected Perkins as one of Pittsylvania County's two representatives in the newly established Virginia House of Delegates; this time he served in the part-time position alongside Abraham Shelton.

Perkins led the local militia during the French and Indian War (decades earlier) and at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse in March 1781, modern historians have not found corroborative documentation.

[18] After the Battle of Guilford Courthouse in March 1781, Perkins' home, Berry Hill, along with nearby plantation houses of his brothers, and of William Harrison (who had emigrated from Goochland County circa 1770), served as hospitals (and cemeteries) for those wounded during the battle.

The land has now been acquired by the City of Danville, which plans to construct an industrial park on that and adjacent acreage.