Annual Fall Craft & Heritage Festival

We are excited to announce that the Fort Valley Museum Fall Craft & Heritage Festival will be on Saturday, October 31st from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm.

The Old Brick Church will be open, along with the Trinity Church where will have 20+ vendors, live demonstrations, games for kids, and a basket raffle. Food and drinks from Fort Valley Smokers and the Fort Valley Museum will be available for purchase. The main festival action will take place on the museum grounds in and around the Pavillion. The event is held rain or shine (within reason, of course)! 

Captain George Mercer's Company · Living History in Fort Valley

Join us on October 31st as Captain George Mercer's Company of the Virginia Regiment steps out of the 1750s and onto the grounds of the Fort Valley Museum. This Winchester-based living history unit recreates the soldiers who once garrisoned Fort Loudoun under a young Colonel George Washington — muskets, uniforms, drill, and all.

Formed in 1755 and reformed in 1756, Colonel George Washington's Virginia Regiment — nicknamed the "Virginia Blues" — was Virginia's first full-time provincial fighting force, raised to defend the colony's frontier during the French & Indian War. The regiment manned forts and outposts across Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and North Carolina. Mercer's Company takes its name from Lt. Col. George Mercer, who served as Washington's aide-de-camp at Fort Loudoun in Winchester VA— Washington's right-hand man while the fort was built and garrisoned, sometimes housing 500 soldiers at once.

Mercer's own story is a dramatic one: wounded at the Battle of Fort Necessity in 1754, he went on to serve in the House of Burgesses, then accepted an appointment as stamp collector for Virginia and Maryland — a job that made him so unpopular under the Stamp Act that he resigned and returned to England for good.

Today's Company portrays the regiment as it appeared in 1756, right after new uniforms arrived by ship from England — considered some of the sharpest kit in the regiment's ten companies. Members regularly muster, drill, and march.

At the Craft & Heritage Festival, you can experience it all!

-Period-correct -1756 Virginia Regiment uniforms and equipment
-Musket drill and marching demonstrations
-A living-history encampment open for questions
-Firsthand storytelling about frontier life
-Photos with reenactors

Mercer Company website — virginiaregiment.com

Festival Hours: 10AM - 4PM
8631 Fort Valley Road; the intersection of Fort Valley Road with Dry Run Road.

Fort Valley Book Still Available

Welcome To Fort Valley is available, and can be shipped.  

The book cost is $80.00. get one now before the next printing, when the cost will go up due to increased production costs.
If you prefer to have it shipped, the shipping cost by USPS costs an additional $8.00 ($88.00 total for the book, plus shipping). Cash (at the museum), check, or credit card payments are available.
Checks should be mailed to: Fort Valley Museum, PO Box 32, Fort Valley, VA  22652. Checks should be made out to "Fort Valley Museum."  If you wish to pay via credit card, please email us for an online invoice: fortvalleymuseum1830@gmail.com

Oral Histories Available on YouTube Channel

A video channel has been created to provide online access to a collection of recorded oral histories.
 Check it out!