FRY.
Joshua Fry was born in England, and educated at the
University of Oxford. Coming to this country, he was
made Professor of Mathematics in William and Mary College.
He was present at the organization of Albemarle
County, and was appointed one of its first magistrates, its
Lieutenant, and its Surveyor. For some years he was
actively engaged in surveying lands in this and adjacent
counties, and entered a considerable number of tracts in his
own name. When the French and Indian War broke out in
1754, and a regiment was raised in Virginia on that occasion,
Fry was appointed its Colonel, and Washington its
Lieutenant Colonel. Fry repaired to Fort Wills, now Cumberland,
Md., the rendezvous, to assume the command, but
shortly after died, and was there buried. The home of
Colonel Fry was the plantation just south of Carter's Bridge,
which he patented in 1750, and which is now known by the
name of Viewmont. There his widow lived till her death in
1773, and in 1786 the place was sold to Governor Edmund
Randolph.
The wife of Colonel Fry was Mrs. Mary Micou Hill, and
his children were John, Henry, Martha, the wife of John
Nicholas, Clerk of the county, William, and Margaret, the
wife of John Scott. John married Sarah, sister of Thomas
Adams, who was once the owner of Blair Park, and had
three children, Joshua, William and Tabitha. He died in
1778. Joshua married Peachy, youngest daughter of Dr.
Thomas Walker. He was appointed a magistrate of the
county, and represented it in the House of Delegates. Towards
the end of the last century he removed to Kentucky,
where he taught for a time a classical academy, and was the
ancestor of a numerous posterity, the Frys, Greens, Bullitts
and Speeds, who have acted a prominent part in the affairs
of that State. Henry served as deputy Clerk of the county,
married Susan, daughter of Dr. Thomas Walker, and removed
to Madison County near Rapidan Station, where he died in
1823 in his eighty-fifth year. He had nine children, one of
whom, Reuben, was the father of Joseph L. Fry, for twenty
years the Judge of the Wheeling Circuit; another, Henry,
married Mildred, daughter of Rev. Matthew Maury, and was
the father of J. Frank Fry, long a Commissioner of the
Revenue of the county; and another, Wesley, was the father
of Captain W. O. Fry. William, the Colonel's son, died
unmarried about 1760.
