Virginia

For the ship, see Virginia (Ironclad) The Commonwealth of Virginia is a Southeastern state on the Atlantic Coast in the United States of America. It is named in honor of Elizabeth I of England, who was known as the Virgin Queen because she never married. The Virginia Colony was the first part of the Americas to be continuously inhabited by colonists from its founding as a European colony up to the American Revolution.

Virginia was one of the epicenters of the Revolution; many of the country's early political and military leaders called Virginia home. It maintained its prominence for much of the country's early history after independence. Virginia joined the Confederate States during the American Civil War; Richmond became the CSA's capital. Part of the state counter-seceded in 1863, forming the Union state of West Virginia.

Virginia has had more US Presidents born in it than any other state. Eight presidents were born here. They are George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, and Woodrow Wilson.

Virginia in A Different Flesh
Virginia was the site of Jamestown, the first permanent English colony in North America. The site of the colony was not conducive to agriculture, and the presence of sims made life very difficult for the colonists.

Nevertheless, the colony survived, and eventually, even thrived. In 1738, Virginia joined other English colonies in breaking away from the mother country and forming the Federated Commonwealths of America.

Virginia in The Disunited States of America
In the alternate where the United States failed because it didn't have a constitution, Virginia was one of several independent countries located in North America. It was a constitutional republic. The House of Burgesses was its legislative body. The Consul was the head of state. Like many of the former slave-holding states, Virginia was sharply divided along racial lines, with blacks kept as second-class citizens. Negroes had nonetheless launched rebellions several times in the country's past.

This racial hierarchy created a substantial paranoia in white Virginia. Consequently, while Virginia was a republic, many liberties and freedoms were not as sacred as in the home timeline's United States.

In this alternate, Virginia's borders included both the home timeline's Virginia and West Virginia, as there was no American Civil War to cause the partition.

Virginia's currency was the pound, which was divided into 20 shillings and a shilling was further subdivided into 12 pence. This subdivision was still used in Great Britain and some eastern North American states who were using the pound in this alternate timeline.

Like some other states, Virginia still used the imperial system of measurement.

In 2097, after a period of escalating tensions with its neighbour Ohio, Ohio and Virginia declared war. A few weeks into the war, Ohio disseminated a virus among the Virginians and followed through with a ground invasion. Virginia took the brunt of the fighting; Ohio forces took Virginia towns near their shared border and Negroes (armed by Ohio) in Virginia launched a rebellion. The virus and the rebellion stymied Virginia's efforts to meet the Ohio advance. However, after a few weeks of fighting, the war was ended by a truce.

A very small number of Virginia whites saw the war as a wake-up call for the country to re-evaluate its racial hierarchy. Covertly, Crosstime Traffic helped to finance these moderates, who gained seats in the House of Burgesses.

Virginia in The Guns of the South
Virginia was the scene of the astonishing turnaround in the fortunes of the Confederacy in the late winter of 1864. General Robert E. Lee in command of the Army of Northern Virginia was determined to fight on as long as he could, but faced the near-certainty of eventual defeat - with overwhelming US forces pushing into Virginia from the north.

The appearance of the time-traveling Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging members from 2014, led by Andries Rhoodie, changed the situation by providing the Confederates with a large number of AK-47s. With this new advantage, Lee managed to win the Battle of the Wilderness, push the US forces back out of Virginia and eventually reach Washington, D.C. and win the war.

In the aftermath of Abraham Lincoln reluctantly recognizing the Confederacy, the Confederate leaders agreed to the US retaining West Virginia, whose inhabitants plainly did not want to be part of the Confederacy. The rest of Virginia, with Richmond as its capital, remained the hub of the now recognized Confederacy.

In the first post-war Confederate elections, Virginia solidly supported Lee against the rival candidate, Nathan Bedford Forrest. Following the elections, Richmond was the scene of the attempted coup and assassination by the Confederates' erstwhile allies from the future. In the aftermath, Virginia was at the center of the Lee Administration's efforts to use the captured future technology to establish the Confederacy as a major world power.

Virginians overwhelmingly supported Lee's project of gradually emancipating the slaves.

Virginia in "Lee at the Alamo"
Virginia seceded from the United States in April, 1861, in response to President Abraham Lincoln's call for volunteers to halt southern secession. This was despite the fact that two of her citizens, Lt. Colonel Robert E. Lee and Major George Thomas, had defended a pro-Confederate siege on U.S. property at the Alamo in Texas from February to March, 1861.

For their part, Thomas saw himself as an American first, and continued to serve the Union cause. Lee required more direct persuasion from President Lincoln himself. Lee agreed to continue fighting in the west, but refused any position in the United States Army that might bring him into conflict with his fellow Virginians on the battlefield.

Virginia in Southern Victory
Virginia joined the Confederacy during the War of Secession. Its state capital, Richmond, became the national capital.

Virginia was a critical front during the Great War. Some of the fiercest fighting was on the Roanoke Front. When the Confederacy lost, most of northern Virginia (north of the Rappahannock) was annexed to the U.S. state of West Virginia. This placed the CSA's capital of Richmond less than 50 miles from the new international boundary.

In the late 1930s, the annexed parts of North Virginia were the scene of guerrilla fighting and civil disobedience campaigns waged by local Freedom Party militants, who hoped to get the US to cede this territory as it agreed with regard to Kentucky and the State of Houston, carved out of Texas after the Great War. This hope proved false, however, as US President Al Smith considered retention of North Virginia as vital for defence of Washington DC, still the de jure capital of the US even if the the de facto capital continued on in Philadelphia. Instead of giving up the territory, Smith authorised severe repression against North Virginia's recalcitrant population. Smith's refusal to give up North Virginia was one of the pretexts used by CS President Jake Featherston to launch his 1941 invasion of the US.

Early in the Second Great War, Virginia was again a strategic target of the US, as Jake Featherston steadfastly refused to leave Richmond. Also during the war, the pro-Confederate population of Northern Virginia hoped in vain for an invasion of their area, with Featherston and his generals preferring to direct their forces elsewhere.

In the wake of Operation Blackbeard, the U.S. military turned to a counterattack in northern Virginia in 1941. The attack, led by General Daniel MacArthur, was a failure in the short-term.

The black population of Richmond had an advance warning of Featherston's intention to ship them all to extermination camps and make the city "free of Blacks". They staged a major uprising and fought valiantly and persistently, but were eventually overwhelmed. Though the US planes coming over the city give the rebels some support, the US failed to make of the Richmond uprising a strategic asset, and the eventual US victory came too late to do any good to the Richmond blacks.

After the Confederate advance was stopped and destroyed at the Battle of Pittsburgh in 1943, and Irving Morrell invaded the Confederacy, MacArthur was given another opportunity to invade Virginia in 1944. This time, Virginia fell in short order.

The Confederate superbomb project was located at Washington University, at Lexington, Virginia. The project was able to complete North America's first bomb, which was used against Philadelphia. In response, the U.S. destroyed the Virginia town of Newport News with its own superbomb.

Virginia in The Two Georges
In the aftermath of the Seven Year' War, Virginia was one of a number of colonies that chafed under unrepresentative direct British rule. However, a new arrangement was peacefully negotiated forming the North American Union. Thus, Virginia was one of the oldest Provinces of the NAU.

Virginia was the home of Roland Oliver who was a Crown Prosecutor for the province.

Victoria, the capital of the NAU, was located in northern Virginia.

Literary Comment
In this timeline, the American Civil War never occurred and so West Virginia remained part of Virginia.