Virginia Department of Historic Resources Virginia Department of Historic Resources
For additional information, read the Nomination Form PDF
VLR Listing Date 09/15/1981
NRHP Listing Date 09/16/1982
NRHP Reference Number 82004573
Now a modern residential development, Boldrup Plantation is associated with several of Virginia’s most august 17th-century names. The property was patented by William Claiborne in 1626, and was later the home of Elizabeth Piercy Stephens, who in 1638 married Governor Sir John Harvey. It then reverted to Samuel Stephens, second governor of Albemarle (North Carolina). At Stephens’s death in 1669, Boldrup passed to his widow, Frances Culpeper Stephens, who in 1670 married Governor Sir William Berkeley. The Berkeleys sold Boldrup in 1671 to Lt. Col. William Cole, a colonial secretary of state. Cole’s 1691 armorial grave slab and those of his second and third wives are the only visible objects remaining on site. They lie in the front yard of a house on Patrick Lane. Other sites, including that of a pit house, were salvaged by Virginia Department of Historic Resources archaeologists in the 1980s.
Many properties listed in the registers are private dwellings and are not open to the public, however many are visible from the public right-of-way. Please be respectful of owner privacy.
Abbreviations:
VLR: Virginia Landmarks Register
NPS: National Park Service
NRHP: National Register of Historic Places
NHL: National Historic Landmark
Updated: June 30, 2020
