Developed for tobacco culture by slaves, the Weyanoke Plantation includes a formal Georgian style mansion built in the 1790s.

Weyanoke Plantation was passed through marriage to the Douthat family, whose descendants kept ownership through the American Civil War.

In June 1864 the Union Army under General Grant crossed from Weyanoke Point to Flowerdew Hundred on the south bank of the James River on a hastily constructed pontoon bridge.

Lewis, a businessman, philanthropist, benefactor of generations of conservative politicians, and founder of Flagler College in St. Augustine, Florida, was an heir to a fortune amassed in oil and railroad investments by Henry Morrison Flagler, who in 1870 founded Standard Oil Co. with John D. Rockefeller.

[4] Ref: Hereward Records & the JJaily Press, New Dominion, Net'apers, pg, 407; Tyler's Quarterly, Vol.