University of Virginia Library

The Coles Purchase

As the years passed away, the great Lewis Tract was
divided and most of the original boundary passed out of
the hands of the first owner or his immediate descendants.
A man named Clark became the owner of most
of the mountain land and of a large boundary of the
plateau land on top of the mountain. This he afterwards
sold to John M. Price of Fincastle, who in turn
sold to John Coles, a boundary of twelve thousand
acres, more or less, which proved to be nearer fourteen
thousand acres, for the sum of $12,000.00. Some six

or eight thousand acres of the original Lewis Tract,
near the Floyd County line, was purchased many years
ago by Tazewell and Warfield Price. In the years to
come as this section became more thickly populated,
these vast boundaries were subdivided into smaller
farms, with the exception of one large tract of nearly
five thousand acres which was purchased by the late
Captain Joseph Motley Terry, and which at his death
reverted to J. Coles Terry, his son, all of which the
latter still owns. On this beautiful plateau are now
some of the best homes in Roanoke County, and some
of the most productive, as well as the largest apple
orchards of this section of Virginia.