Augusta County Circuit Court

Thornburg and Shafer was a livery and exchange stable located on New Street in Staunton, Virginia. The partnership originated between Thomas A. Shafer and Samuel T. Thornburg, the managing partner. On 15 July 1878, Levi Shafer purchased Thomas A. Shafer's share in the partnership. At the height of their business, the livery stable owned twenty horses, five carriages, ten buggies, and a number of wagons. The partnership was officially dissolved in 1883 by a decree rendered in the Augusta County chancery court.

The Augusta County Law Library Association was formed after an act of the General Assembly, passed 29 March 1853, authorized the establishment of law libraries. The act stated that members of the bar practicing in a given locality should procure by voluntary contribution a law library of the value of at least one hundred dollars for the use of the courts held in the particular locality. The Augusta County Law Library Association first met on 7 June 1853 under the supervision of Judge Lucas P. Thompson to establish the rules for the formation and management of the law library. Any member of the bar would be eligible for membership after paying the required admission fees and dues. Books were either donated or purchased with library funds. Users of the library were limited to judges of federal and state courts, lawyers, and law students. The clerk of court would serve as librarian, and a three-member library committee was formed to biannually report the condition of the library and to make any suggestions for the enlargement and management of the library. John B. Baldwin, Alexander H. H. Stuart, and John N. Hendren served on the first library committee. The Augusta County Law Library Association started with twenty members and a fund of approximately two hundred dollars. During its first year of existence, the library association purchased upwards of a hundred volumes, and when combined with donations the library contained nearly five hundred volumes. Throughout the thirty years documented by the Library Record, the library continued to grow although membership remained steady, with approximately twenty members reported at each term.

John B. Christian was a merchant in Augusta County, Virginia, in the early nineteenth century. Christian dealt primarily in the grocery and grain trades selling items such as wheat, corn, sugar, and coffee.