Yorktown

Our Ancestral Home

Site of the Home of
Nicolas Martiau
The Adventurous Huguenot
Who was born in France 1591
Came to Virginia 1620
And Died at Yorktown 1657
He was a Captain in the Indian Uprising
A Member of the House of Burgesses
Justice of the County of York
In 1635 a Leader
In the Thrusting out of Governor Harvey
Which was the First Opposition
To the British Colonial Policy
The Patentee for Yorktown
And Through the Marriage
of his Daughter Elizabeth
To Col. George Reade he became
The Earliest American Ancestor of both
General George Washington
and Governor Thomas Nelson

Marked by The Huguenot Society of Pennsylvania in cooperation with the National Federation of Huguenot Societies and the Yorktown Sesqui-Centennial Commission.  1931

York History Series #A-5, April 1997;  Written by the late Dick Ivy, Honorary NMDA Members:  When Nicolas Martiau lived on the bluff overlooking the York River, Yorke Village was located on Wormeley Creek.  The new Town of Yorke was built on his property in 1691, sold by his heirs Benjamin & Lucy Reed for 10,000 lbs. of tobacco w/cask, 34 years after Martiau died.  The remains of this maternal ancestor of George Washington and immediate family are in the Grace Episcopal Church graveyard, York.

The Huguenot Society marker commemorating the location of Nicolas Martiau's house sits in the front yard of a Yorktown Historic District antique store.  The location is at the top of a hill overlooking the picturesque York River.  Across the street is a parking lot whose opposite side faces Grace Church.

Martiau's fort in Yorktown

York History Series #A-5, April 1997
by (the late) Dick Ivy, Honorary NMDA Member

Fort Yorke had been in service for 40 years having fallen into disuse by the 1670's, according to eminent historian Leon Tyler in his Tyler's Quarterly. That would put it in the 1630's and before the new Town of Yorke, and the Revolution. But where was it? It might have been at Yorke Village or on the bluffs where today's Victory Monument is. But... Under Chiskiack Watch homes on the bluff overlooking the York River between Ballard and Buckner Streets, on Martiau property (prior to 1681) was found the south part of a palisade shaped like a French fortification, an M-shaped section (see Architectural drawing) of a standard six pointed star in French military architecture. It was uncovered by principal archaeologist Nick Luccketti of the Yorktown Archaeological trust in 1989, well covered in local news media and open for public inspection. Built on the "pitch of the bluff" of split rails and small posts in a ditch filled with clay, some of the wood was still decaying in the holes. There was a 3' deep ditch on the inside and even on the outside. There was an architect's 17th c. compass extension piece, perhaps Martiau's, was found in one of the ditches, indicating a carefully angled design. Good place for a fort. Martiau built it.

The History and Burial of
Nicolas Martiau

The Huguenot Publication No. 12, 1943-45
Huguenot Society of the Founders of Manakin in the Colony of Virginia

The skeletal remains of 18 persons were discovered by the National Park Service in 1936 in a forgotten cemetery, which was enclosed at one time by a brick wall. Buckner Street ran through part of the cemetery. It was Lot 5 and one half of Lot 11. Checking records, it was the graveyard kept through the years by the Nelsons on Martiau property. Tombstones of George and Elizabeth Reade were uncovered about 1923 while Buckner St. was being graded, and were later polished, re-cut and mounted on a brick foundation in Grace Church graveyard by Mrs. Arthur Kelly Evans of Hot Springs, a descendant of Martiau. The skeletons were found in May 1936 when the NPS was laying a water main along Buckner St. Near where the stones had been found, according to church curate Lt. Col. (Ret.) A. A. Pruden, a retired Army chaplain. The NPS suggested that the graveyard be restored where it was found. Five years after having been found, on May 30, 1941, however, the remains were reinterred in the Grace Episcopal graveyard with ceremony presided over by Pruden who had been zealous in the transfer of the remains. A firing squad and bugler from Fort Monroe participated, and members of the Thomas Nelson Jr. Chapter, Sons of the American Revolution, placed the containers. The memorial oration was given by Rev. John Baer Stoudt, D. D., of Allentown, Pa. There were no stone marking the community grave until newly organized descendants did it in 1994, adhering to the current standards of the NPS. During the years before burial, careful study of the bones was made and the Martiau gravesite was mapped. Bennett T. Gale, NPS park engineer reported to B. Floyd Flickinger, park supt., that grave 1 was Elizabeth, 2 was George, 4 was Jane's daughter Jane or his 2nd wife Isabella, 6 was Martiau, 7 his wife Jane, 9 a small casket possibly of Nicolas' son Nicolas who died young.

Grace Church Martiau & Descendants Graves

Shown below are the graves which were removed from the original Buckner Family Plot to the grounds of Grace Episcopal Church.  In the picture below left the marker to the left is that of the flat Nicolas Martiau marker shown directly above.  It marks the spot of the community grave below.  The raised stones immediately to its right are those of George Reade and  his wife Elizabeth Martiau, where their remains are interred.  The large grave to the right of the Reade markers is that of Thomas "Scotch Tom" Nelson.  Beyond that tombstone are those of Thomas Nelson Jr., Signer of the Declaration of Independence, and William Nelson.  The photo below right is taken from the opposite angle near the south face of Grace Church.

York History Series #A-5, April 1997; by (the late) Dick Ivy, Honorary NMDA Member: On the 50 acres bought from the heirs of Martiau, on Surveyor Lawrence Smith's map (a part of the map shown), Lot 11 was recorded as bought by Ralph Walker and shown as owned by Phillip Lightfoot. Lot 5 was shown as part of the William Buckner purchase. It was higher land across the street, but records indicate it was bought by Benjamin Read, Martiau descendant, "gentleman of Gloucester" (because it was the grave site, realized perhaps after the sale of the 50 acres as the Town of Yorke?). Buckner Street was known as Tobacco Warehouse Hill. Top road is Main Street, bottom, Water Street.

In Memory of Dick Ivy

The words of Dick Ivy are used in fond remembrance of the man who did so much to promote the history of Yorktown and Nicolas Martiau.  Mr. Ivy, an Honorary Member of NMDA and the person responsible for this Webmaster having joined the organization, died on June 11, 2004.  A memorial service in honor of the Boston, MA native was held June 18, 2004 at the Fort Eustis Chapel.  NMDA Founder Marty Dale remembers him as follows:  "Yes, indeed...Dick Ivy would've been pleased to be asked for his words to be included in the web site.  Dick had an interest in Martiau before I contacted him and we had that fateful meeting 1991 in Yorktown.  Dick's participation in all things Martiau" was such fun.  He entered into the spirit...."

08/16/2004 10:54:38 PM