Remembering the Crossing of the Dan

Pictured at the conclusion of the commemoration and mock battle of the Crossing of the Dan and with the Virginia Society of the Founders & Patriots of America’s wreath are (left to right) Saul Montes-Bradley, Past Governor of the Florida Society OFPA and current resident of Halifax County, Virginia; J. Shane Newcombe, Governor of the Virginia Society OFPA and resident of Charlotte County, Virginia; and Dr. Hugh E. Fraser, III, Associate of the Virginia Society and resident of Reidsville, North Carolina.

The Virginia Society of the Founders & Patriots of America (VAOFPA) recently participated in the wreath laying ceremony to commemorate the 233rd Anniversary of the Crossing of the

Dan held at The Prizery and Boyd’s Ferry in South Boston, Virginia on Saturday, February 22, 2013.  More than twenty hereditary organizations throughout the Commonwealth, and several from as far away as Georgia and Kentucky, were present to pay tribute to the patriotic event that took place on February 14, 1781.  The Crossing of the Dan has been described as a “masterful military maneuver” that would mark the beginning of the defeat of the British by the American Patriots.

The VAOFPA is a hereditary society dating back to 1896.  Membership in the society is open to any man 18 years or older who is of good moral character and reputation, a citizen of the United States, and lineally descended in the male line of either parent from an ancestor who settled prior to May 13, 1657 in any of the colonies now included in the United States of America, and one or all of whose intermediate ancestors in the same line lived in the period of the American Revolution from 1775 to 1783 and adhered as patriots to the cause of the colonies. Members are called Associates.  More information can be obtained by visiting founderspatriots.org.