James Edmondson (1737 or 1738–by 16 April 1792), member of the Convention of 1776, was born probably in Essex County and was the son of Thomas Edmondson and his first wife, Dorothy Todd Edmondson. After the death of his father late in 1759, Edmondson inherited the bulk of his father's estate, including several enslaved workers and the main dwelling house and land at the mouth of Piscataway Creek in Essex County. In 1761 he continued the lease of a nearby mill that his father had rented. Edmondson had married Elizabeth Webb by 1767. They may not have had any children before she died on 19 November 1773. Edmondson married a second time, but the maiden name of Elizabeth Edmondson and the date of their marriage are not known. They, too, may have had no children; none was living at the time of his death.

In February 1766, after an Essex County merchant had announced that he would abide by the terms of the Stamp Act of 1765, Edmondson joined 114 other men in signing the Westmoreland Association, a regional compact of citizens who condemned the Stamp Act and pledged to prevent its enforcement in Virginia. In 1769 he won election to the House of Burgesses from Essex County and attended the three sessions of the assembly that met between November 1770 and July 1771. Edmondson served on the Committees for Propositions and Grievances and for Courts of Justice. That he was appointed to the latter committee before becoming a member of the county court suggests that he may have had some training in the law or had engaged in commercial transactions consequential enough to have given him the necessary grounding in the law. On 22 June 1770 Edmondson, other burgesses, and some of the colony's principal merchants signed an association protesting Parliament's taxation of the colonies and promised to refuse to import British goods until the taxes were repealed. In January of the following year he served on the Essex County Committee that oversaw local compliance with the association.

Edmondson won reelection to the House of Burgesses in 1771 and again in 1774 and continued to sit on the Committee for Courts of Justice. By 1771 he was also a member of the South Farnham Parish vestry, which met at his place at Piscataway Ferry in October of that year. Edmondson remained on the vestry for at least eight more years. He was appointed to the Essex County Court in June 1774 and named a member of the quorum. At least one member of that select group of justices of the peace had to be present in order for the court to proceed to business, another indication that Edmondson had more than a passing knowledge of the law. He remained a justice of the peace until his death.

In May 1774, after the royal governor had dissolved the General Assembly, Edmondson and other burgesses met in Raleigh Tavern in Williamsburg and issued the first call for a Continental Congress. The following July his Essex County neighbors elected him to the first of the five Revolutionary Conventions that met between August of that year and July 1776, and in December 1775 he won election to the new county committee that enforced the associations that the first Continental Congress and the first Virginia Convention had adopted. Edmondson attended the first, second, and fourth conventions but missed the third convention during the summer of 1775. Reelected in April 1776, he served on the Committee of Propositions and Grievances at the fifth convention, which met in Williamsburg from 6 May through 5 July 1776. Edmondson was almost certainly present on 15 May when the delegates unanimously instructed the colony's delegation to the Continental Congress to introduce a resolution of independence, on 12 June when they unanimously adopted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, and on 29 June when they unanimously adopted the first constitution for the new independent Commonwealth of Virginia.

By virtue of his election in the spring of 1776, Edmondson was eligible for a seat in the House of Delegates in the autumn of that year. He resumed his service on the Committee of Propositions and Grievances. Edmondson either did not stand for reelection or did not win reelection in the spring of 1777. In November of that year the governor and the Council of State designated him a commissioner to clothe the Virginia troops in continental service. In 1778 Edmondson became the county sheriff, but his health may have failed by 1788, when the Council noted that although he was then second in seniority on the county court, he seldom attended. Edmondson did not mention his health on 4 July 1791 when he wrote his will at his home, Charleton Hill, in Essex County. He identified nine enslaved workers by name and left his property to his wife and to his nieces and nephews. James Edmondson died on an unrecorded date before 16 April 1792, when his will was proved in the Essex County Court. The place of his burial is not recorded.

Sources Consulted:
Family history and first wife's gravestone inscription in Tyler's Quarterly Historical and Genealogical Magazine 7 (1926): 188–189; estimation of birth year from provisions of father's will in Essex Co. Will Book, 11:228–232; William J. Van Schreeven, Robert L. Scribner, and Brent Tarter, eds., Revolutionary Virginia, the Road to Independence: A Documentary Record (1973–1983); Henry R. McIlwaine, Wilmer L. Hall, and Benjamin J. Hillman, eds., Executive Journals of the Council of Colonial Virginia (1925–1966), 6:564; Henry R. McIlwaine et al., eds., Journals of the Council of the State of Virginia, 1776–1791 (1931–1982), 2:37, 4:361–362; Essex Co. Will Book, 14:292–294.

Written for the Dictionary of Virginia Biography by Maria Kimberly.

How to cite this page:
Maria Kimberly, "James Edmondson (1737 or 1738–by 1792)," Dictionary of Virginia Biography, Library of Virginia (1998– ), published 2025 (http://www.lva.virginia.gov/public/dvb/bio.asp?b=Edmondson_James, accessed [today's date]).

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