Quarterpath Road

Quarterpath Road is one of the oldest roads in James City County and the independent city of Williamsburg, Virginia.

Established in the 17th century, Quarterpath Road extended from Middle Plantation (renamed Williamsburg in 1699) through what later became Kingsmill Plantation to Burwell's Landing on the James River, a few miles east of Jamestown. The Burwells were among the First Families of Virginia in the Colony of Virginia, and built the plantation's manor house beginning in the 1730s. A few years later, Carter Burwell built Carter's Grove immediately to the east in what became the modern day Grove Community.

For many years, the Quarterpath Road was the most direct route between Williamsburg and the landing on the James River at Burwell's which was east of Jamestown and more convenient to the Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. In 1775, as the hostilities which became the American Revolutionary War escalated, British troops loyal to the final Royal Governor, Lord Dunmore, walked along the road to steal gunpowder and munitions from the colony's stores at the Powder Magazine in Williamsburg.

During the American Civil War (1861-1865), although he had personally hoped to avoid secession and a war for Virginia, James City County resident Benjamin S. Ewell, the president of the College of William and Mary, joined the local Virginia militia as the Board of Visitors closed the College during the War.

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