On Feb. 1, 1775, just prior to the revolution, Chesterfield representatives to the House of Burgesses in Williamsburg, Archibald Cary, whose impressive home was located at Ampthill, and Benjamin Watkins received a letter of acknowledgement from none other than Boston’s Samuel Adams. It seems Chesterfield, along with Cumberland County, had sent a schooner load of grain to the beleaguered citizens of Boston after the British fleet had boycotted Boston harbor.

According to a passage from Francis Lutz’ book Chesterfield: An Old Virginia County, Adams’ noted receipt of 1426 ½ bushels of grain.   Cary and Watkins, along with many of the other colonists, had been wrestling with problems created by the Stamp Act and other detested British laws. Cary was active in the resistance movement and was a leader in the adoption of the “Resolves,” which led up to the Declaration of Independence. The grain shipment was an offering of solidarity with the Massachusetts colony. It wasn’t really an ingredient for Sam Adams to make beer.