Poll Book; the Right of Suffrage, March 13,14,15, 1862

Southhampton County, Virginia, 1862. Quarto. 10 pages with 3 pages of voter's names and officials. A detailed record of a local election 11 months after the beginning of the Civil War. It would seem that this is the election held on March 13, 1862 on the new constitution which was to remove references to the United States. Since so many men over the age of 21 were at war, only 13 showed up to vote on this list. It was only in 1864 that they had a new Virginia constitution that deleted the term "United States". Page 10 signed by the following Commissioners: Robert Ricks, R.H. Blythe; James W. Parker, Atop page 2, L.R. Edwards, Clerk of Southhampton County has written his name, along with Robert Ricks and Richard H Blythe. Form notes; James W. Parker is Commissioner appointed to open and superintend, Conductor appointed to conduct is B (?) F Vick. Oath closes signed by L.R. Edwards, Clerk. Follows: We (signed Robert Ricks and Richard H. Blythe) note details and again sign at bottom. Page 3 is the Poll Books which is in two columns: Poll Book/The Constitution as amended and Schedule and Poll Book, the Right of Suffrage. The names in both columns are the same: Jas W. Parker, Ben Devanny, Geo. W Lawrence, Richard H. Blythe, Robert Ricks, James Agan, Jonathan Darden, Ben F. Vick [Ancestry shows another B F Vick at the Jerusalem Post Office address in Southhampton which is also the name written on the front of the folder containing the documents] , The remaining items are not as clear to read as the ink has made them somewhat blurred. The surnames appear to be Irway, Williford, Mayer, Boykin, Sipe, Myback (?), Powell, and C.L. Bountty (?). Without further access to county records the last names are educated guesses (see images). There is a Benjamin Vick noted in but though it shows his location at Jerusalem Post Office in Northhampton, he would have been too old to serve in the Confederate Army since originally age 35 was the limit, he was born in 1824 so in the 3rd Conscription Act when the age was extended to 50 he might well have been drafted. The only Benjamin Vick we could find served with the 4th Regiment, South Carolina. These poll books in Virginia are very rare since the major wars were there and either through the aftermath of battles, the unsetttled situation or else carelessness, items were maintained in a more careless matter than the attempt to preserve the official Confederate Records. In stitched plain wrappers.