The Carters were one of the earliest families to settle in the area. It was with the death of Dale Carter in 1774 that we pick up the first record, and the first Carter to settle on Big Stony Creek. It was in 1774 that Dale Carter was killed, he was tomahawked to death by the Indians when they caught him before he could gain the safety of Fort Blackmore.

Dale Carter left four orphan children, John Ray Carter, who was born in 1769, the oldest child. Little is known of his early childhood, but we do know he was perhaps the first of the Carters to build a home on Stony Creek.

It was John Ray Carter, Jr. who was born in 1796 who opened the first Carter Store on Big Stony Creek. This small country store, opened some time before the Civil War, wasn’t an elaborate affair, it didn’t have a big stock of merchandise. Pioneer settlers could afford only the barest necessities and those were what the first store offered. Gun powder, lead for bullets, lead shot, a few steel traps. Salt, pepper, needles and thread, and a few simple hand tools made up most of the stock.

It was in 1832 that John Ray Carter Jr.’s son Pinkney was born. Pinkney was to become one of the best remembered of all the Carters. Thirty years after his birth Pinkney was a Confederate soldier, fighting along with his company in several of the battles that were fought in Eastern Virginia.

Hello Troy, I found the father of John Rhea Carter, Sr. To be Dale Carter and my research goes back several more generations. Thanks, Elizabeth