Solitude

Montgomery County · dedicated 1992 · Rte. 314 (West Campus Drive), VPI, Blacksburg.

The earliest portion of Solitude was constructed about 1801 on land owned by Philip Barger, who sold the property in 1803 to James Patton Preston, governor of Virginia (1816-1819). Governor John Floyd (1830-1834), Preston's brother-in-law, lived at Solitude about 1814-1815. Preston's son, Col. Robert Preston, enlarged the house from a simple log dwelling to a central-passage-plan, Greek Revival-style house about 1851. Col. Preston sold Solitude in 1872 to secure the location of Virginia's first land-grant university, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

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under a mile from where William Gabby lived in the 1760s

what this marker records spans 1777 to 1789, overlapping William Gabby's years here

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