In the early morning, before the mist that settles overnight on the Chantilly National Golf and Country Club burns away, the area where Braddock Road crosses Flatlick Branch is quite serene. You would be unlikely to suspect that the area used to boast a bustling mercantile store.

 

Its proprietor, Samuel Love, Jr., described the establishment in 1798 as a store for sundry articles of merchandise. Local 18^th century consumers could browse the store for cooking staples; such as butter, sugar, salt, pepper, molasses, and allspice. After working in the fields, some farmers may have enjoyed the benefits of the soap and a comb purchased at Love’s store. Even their clean change of clothes may have appeared whiter due to the effects of Love’s indigo. Should the farmer leave his home on a cool misty morning, he may have donned a cloak and hat bought from the store. Mr. Abraham Riley, who may have been feeling the cold weather, purchased a cloak from Love’s store on December 30, 1785. [1]

 

A significant amount of commerce enjoyed by Love was in the sale of fabrics and sewing supplies. Love carried a wide variety of cloth, including silk, sacking cloth, coating, buckram, Ticklinburg cloth, Thicksett cloth, Russia sheeting, G ozna [oznaburg/osnaburg], linen, and cotton. Sewing notions, such as needles, thread, pins, and buttons, were purchased to facilitate the sewing of garments and perhaps household linens and bed curtains, though coverlets and blankets were sold ready-made.[2]

 

A variety of other miscellaneous goods necessary to life in the region were sold; for example, a penknife, nails, powder and shott [sic], and bed cord. Though we don’t know if the Riley children thought learning was necessary, on January 10, 1787, Abraham Riley purchased four spelling books for 6 shillings 8 pence. And while some may consider rum unnecessary, it was frequently sold. Perhaps Abraham Riley’s purchase of 2 ½ gallons of rum on December 23, 1786 and Samuel Byrn’s purchase of 1 gallon west Indies Rum on December 24, 1792 foretold upcoming holiday cheer. [3]

 

Chancery cases filed with the Loudoun County courts provide a record of sales to Samuel Byrn and Abraham Riley, and offer a glimpse into the collection efforts required to obtain satisfaction of store debts. In Riley’s case, Love was seeking collection of Riley’s account balance of 25 pounds 17 shillings 1 pence. A deposition given by James Lewin Gibbs describes a conversation he heard between Samuel Love and Abraham Riley. Apparently, Mr. Riley felt that debt had already been paid by a hogshead of tobacco that Riley gave Love by Order on the Inspector at Colchester. In other words, Riley deposited a barrel of tobacco at a warehouse at the port of Colchester, Virginia in the name of Samuel Love.

I heard Mr. Riley ask Mr. Love if they could settle to day, Mr. Love answered that he was always ready to settle, have you any money Riley, he answered he had not, but says Riley, I want to know what you intend to allow me for a Hogshead of Tobacco that I give you on Order on the Inspector at Colchester for. Mr. Love said that he never received from said Riley, or the Inspector such a Hogshead of Tob^o. Riley declar’d that he did receive it, and that he had a Certificate to show from said Inspector that he did receive it. Mr. Love said he would be damn’d if ever he received the Tobacco, says Mr. Love, if I ever receiv’d that Hogshead Tobacco from you Riley - I placed it to your Credit on the rent roll…and this deponent further saith that by this deponent, asked Mr Love to send down to his house for the rent roll in order to satisfy Mr. Riley weather he had credit on the rent roll or not. Mr. Love said he would be damned if he would satisfy him so far…

The jury found in favor of Mr. Riley. Love appealed the verdict; however, the case was tied up in court for two years until Love died. Riley was a tenant farmer on the land of John Monroe, who contracted with Love to act as a rent collection agent.[4]

 

Love’s store was operating on his estate of Salisbury in partnership with Hugh Stuart, at least by November of 1785. Stuart and Love may have acquired goods and wares by a variety of means. An Alexandria newspaper advertisement submitted from Salisbury on June 10, 1786 suggests the possibility that Love imported some of his merchandise. The advertisement touts the sale:

 

Just imported from London and Glasgow, A general assortment of goods suitable for the present and approaching season, to the amount of about ₤2,000 sterling; one half or the whole may be had on very low terms…[5]

 

Stuart and Love also purchased goods, farm animals, and slaves from local men. On August 3, 1791, Stuart and Love purchased two slaves and one bay gelding from Benjamin Cockrill for 130 pounds. The purpose of this bill of sale was to secure payment for money Cockrill owed Stuart and Love. It is unknown if the transfer of goods and slaves was actually completed, or if the debt was otherwise paid. On August 22, 1791, Stuart and Love purchased six slaves, one wagon & gears, and two horses from James Aurrell for 200 pounds. Later that year, on November 5^th, they purchased 4 horses, 18 head of sheep, 2 featherbeds and furniture, 20 head of hogs, and 12 head of cattle from George French for 60 pounds. From James French, that same day, they purchased four featherbeds and furniture, 4 horses, 3 cows, 2 calves, 10 head of sheep, all the wheat now sowed on the place where James Finch now lives and about 70 barrels of corn.

 

On at least one occasion, Love hired a local cobbler, Griffith Roberts, to manufacture shoe heals for sale at the store. Roberts delivered the shoe heals to Love’s son, who by that time had become a partner with his father. (Sometime between the end of 1791 and the end of 1792, the store ownership changed from Stuart and Love to Samuel Love and Son. Throughout various documents, Love’s new partner is only referred to as his son. This son predeceased his father.) Roberts was paid 4 or 5 pounds for his work, although Love’s son held back a few shillings until he knew whether there might not be something due to his Father.

 

It is also possible, though not documented, that Love’s enslaved blacksmith worked at his anvil and bellows to produce the nails sold at the store.

 

Love’s store was of such renown that advertisements in an Alexandria newspaper made note of it. Jacob Remey mentions the store in two advertisements for leases of land to be sold.

TO BE SOLD in Loudoun County TWO HUNDRED and SEVENTY acres of leased LAND, near Mr. Samuel Love’s store.[6]

Application to be made to the subscriber living near Mr. Samuel Love’s Store, Salisbury, Loudoun County, Virginia. [7]

[Note:  Western Fairfax County was part of Loudoun County at that time.]

 

Nearby Sully resident Richard Bland Lee advertised for an Irish indentured servant who ran away from Love’s store.

 

In addition to being a farmer and merchant, Love was a trustee of the towns of Matildaville and Centreville, a justice/judge for the Fairfax Circuit District Court, sheriff, commissioner for the Fairfax and Loudoun Turnpike Company, and land agent for John Monroe, George Carter, and Philip Ludwell Grymes. Love also owned at least five mills. His Cub Run mill was located in present day Richard C. Jones Park. Love also owned what is now referred to as Cabell’s mill, and grist mills on the Little River and Tuskarora in Loudoun County, and on Broad Run in Prince William County.

 

On January 5, 1791, Samuel Love became a widower. His wife, Jane, had died in her 45^th year leaving her husband and 12 children. Transporting this large family may have been a challenge for a less wealthy man. Love advertised for sale an elegant chariot in 1780, but by the time of his death in 1800, he owned a stage wagon.[8] [Was Love the first family man to suffer the ignominy of driving a “station wagon?”]

 

In the falloff 1791, James Nisbett was living at the store of Stuart and Love, located at Salisbury, Love’s estate at Braddock Road and Flatlick Branch.[9]

 

Love and his family were described in a letter from Richard Bland Lee’s father-in-law, Stephen Collins, to Collins’s son Zaccheus after Collins’s visit with Lee.

…I have had much pleasure during my stay here, have several times been riding about the plantation & to visit many of the neighbors. have dined out with them sundry times & they have been to dine here. Indeed they are very friendly sociable easy & hospitable people in this part of the country & appear to me very different from the people in lower parts of Virginia. they seeme to me here very generally to be an industrious set of Farmers, with a goodeal of economy & frugality. I have been several times to Samuel Love all three miles from here the friend & Intimate acquaintance of this family. I dined there twice and they have some of them dined here. they are a charming family indeed & live in a beautiful elegant & easy state. he is a most deserving & sociable man (is a widower) but he has three truly delightful Daughters of fine chearful open countinances & chattey girls and are wonderfully enamourd with Eliza. and Indeed they are equaly & very justley so admired & estimated by her. they have a Brother a very amiable young gentleman whoe keeps a store in this neighborhood. all the neighbors around here have been here to see me and they all exhibit a very decent & pritty behavour, very free of foolish pomp or show except one old Lady & her daughter whoe came to visit this family not much more than a mile with a chariot & six horses. they are very rich & the old Lady cant forget the former custome here of show of horses & servants on all occasions. she is a pleasant & sociable old Lady but the daughter very dressy, stiff & formal & much unlike the generality of her six she seemed to have nothing to say –[10]

Though Samuel Love lived in a beautiful, elegant and easy state, three years after Love’s death, his son, Charles Jones Love, advertised an estate sale stating that

…having made every exertion within his power for two years past to procure the means of discharging the debts due from the estate devised to him by his father, without being able to effect it, and now finding the estate under considerable embarrassment, hath come to a determination to offer the whole personal property for sale.[11]

N.B.

 

The Salisbury land was sold off in future years, but there was no mention of the store. No records evidencing the existence of the store beyond the date of Love’s death in 1800 have as yet been discovered.

 

Store account records were discovered in chancery case files in Loudoun County. In 1792, the Virginia General Assembly enacted legislation requiring merchants to enter into suits to collect store accounts within one year of the delivery of goods.[12] 

 

The approximate location of the store, at Flatlick Branch and Braddock Road, was noted in the metes and bounds of a survey for a land sale.