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.ÿþsentments felt it entirely appropriate to admonish churchwardens for failingto supply bread and wine for Holy Communion.Princess Anne County jus-tices on one occasion even ordered the churchwardens of Lynnhaven Parishnot to allow an unauthorized person to read Divine Service in one of the parishchurches.7 The court also heard objections of disgruntled parishioners to theintroduction of newfangled hymns in the place of time-honored psalmody.8Those found guilty as charged in Virginia paid fines that were turned over tothe parishes to be used in assisting the poor.Nowhere is there evidence that parish vestrymen or county court justicesviewed themselves respectively to be primarily religious or civil officials.Nor is there evidence that they made such distinctions among the array of re-sponsibilities they bore separately or jointly.Deciding to build a church, hiringa parson, appointing tobacco inspectors, or binding out an orphan were allunderstood as normal or natural functions of the parish vestry, reflecting asense of community united in its beliefs, values, and needs.Justices approachedtheir diverse tasks with a similar understanding.Vestryman and justice, in fact,were often one and the same person. Processioning offers another and singular example of parish-county juris-dictional overlay.9 Vestries every four years divided their parishes into precinctsand appointed for each precinct at least two honest, intelligent freeholderswho, with whatever assistance they required, walked the boundary lines of theproperties owned by precinct residents.In the presence of the landowners, theinspectors confirmed existing tree blazes and other boundary marks and estab-lished new ones if the old had been destroyed or moved.10 This quadrennialreaffirming of boundaries afforded occasions to resolve disputed lines to themutual accommodation of the interested parties.The inspectors reports thatwere duly entered in the parish not the county court records representedthe acknowledgment by all landowners that the boundaries were accuratelymarked.Recourse by suit through the county court was available to those un-willing to accept the determination of the boundaries by the processioners.Processioning derived from the medieval English practice of parish peram-bulations and the jurisdiction that church courts held over matters of propertyand probate.11 The church courts never got transmitted to Virginia, but the as-sociation of parish and property did.Origins aside, however, convenience wasthe compelling reason for Virginia to assign responsibility for processioningto its parishes.Over time, English parish perambulations took on a ritual character; theybecame the occasion or excuse for elaborate feasts, for eating, drinking, and.Local Governance 15
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