John Page (Virginia politician)

Broadside, order by John Page, president of the council, ordering state militia to be trained and prepared for battle, August 20, 1776

After he graduated from William and Mary, he then served under George Washington in an expedition during the French and Indian War. He also served during the American Revolutionary War as an officer in the Virginia state militia, raising a regiment from Gloucester County and supplementing it with personal funds. During that war, he attained the rank of colonel.

Page inherited wealth, including Rosewell plantation, but lacked business success as a planter, so after his death, when his debts became due, his family was forced to sell the plantation [1]

Page was a Fifth Virginia Convention delegate in 1776. Page was also instrumental in getting his wife Frances' brother, Nathaniel Burwell, appointed to the Governor's council, and together, Page and Burwell opposed Lord Dunmore's proclamation against Patrick Henry. Page and Burwell built the council whose membership read like a list of Patriots, shaping the American Revolution against Britain.

The revolutionary Virginia legislature elected Page as the Lieutenant Governor of Virginia and served 1776–1779. Gloucester County voters elected him and Thomas Smith as their representatives in the new Virginia House of Delegates 1781–1783 and re=elected the pair three times to the one-year, part-time position until electing James Hubard to replace Page in 1784, only to reelect Page with Smith's namesake son, who served 1785 – 1788.[2] However, when voters were asked to select delegates to the Virginia Ratifying Convention of 1788, they chose Warner Lewis alongside Thomas Smith, rather than this man. Nonetheless, the Page family remained politically powerful in Gloucester County, as voters elected Mann Page to succeed him for a term. However, they selected Mordecai Cooke and James Baytop, who became their repeatedly reelected delegates in Richmond.

Following ratification of the federal constitution, Page successfully ran for a seat in the First United States Congress and was reelected to the Second and Third, and to the Fourth as a member of the Democratic-Republican Party after that party had been created by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. He was a Congressman from March 4, 1789, to March 3, 1797. He was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1792.[3]

After his terms in Congress, Page again won election as one of Gloucester County's representatives to the Virginia House of Delegates in 1797, alongside William Hall. However, only Hall won re-election in 1798, as Mordecai Cooke and several other men won the second seat.[4] In 1800, Gloucester County voters again selected Page to sit alongside Hall and reelected neither, presumably in part because fellow legislators elected Page as Governor of Virginia.[5]

Page became the Governor of Virginia in 1802 and served until 1805. After his term ended (since the state constitution forbade re-election), Page accepted a federal appointment as United States commissioner of loans for Virginia and held office until his death.

The Page family is one of the First Families of Virginia. Its members include Colonel John Page, Governor John Page, his brother Mann Page, Thomas Nelson Page a leading proponent of the Lost Cause myth, and Virginian Railway builder William Nelson Page.

Page County, Virginia, located in the Shenandoah Valley, was formed in 1831 and named for Governor John Page. Also bearing his name is a residence hall at the College of William and Mary.[9]

Governor Page was quoted by George W. Bush in his inaugural address in 2001. Writing to his friend Jefferson shortly after the Declaration of Independence was published, Page said of the Declaration and the Revolution: "We know the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong. Do you not think an angel rides in the whirlwind and directs this storm".[10]