Five westward expansions now occur in quick succession. In 1787, from Harrison was formed Randolph County named for Edmund Randolph, first Attorney General of the Commonwealth and a member of the Continental Congress. Both Harrison and Randolph are in West Virginia. Pendleton, also now in West Virginia, was formed in 1788 from portions of Hardy, Augusta, and Rockingham counties. It is named for Edmund Pendleton, President of the Virginia Convention of 1775.
The next year two new Kentucky counties were formed; Mason from Bourbon and Woodford from Fayette. The former took its name from George Mason of "Gunston Hall," author of the Bill of Rights and the latter from General William Woodford, a native of Caroline County, Virginia who rendered distinguished service in the Revolution and later moved to Kentucky.
At the same time, a new county destined to be in West Virginia was formed from Greenbrier and part of Montgomery counties and given the name of Kanawha from the river.
The only one of the counties formed in 1789 that is now in Virginia is Nottoway. This was comprised of that part of Amelia County "lying south of a line to begin at a place called Wells bridge on Namozene creek which divides the said county from the county of Dinwiddie, thence running through the said county of Amelia so as to strike the line of Prince Edward county five miles west of a place called Ward's ford on Appomattox river." Nottoway is an Indian word meaning "a snake, that is, an enemy." Nottoway River derives its name from the Indian tribe and the county honors both.
1790-1800 EXPANSION IN THE FIRST DECADE AFTER THE REVOLUTION
The next year a county was cut from Montgomery and named Wythe. It lies to the "south-west of a line beginning on the Henry line at the head of Big Reedy Island, from thence to the waggon ford on Peck creek, thence to the clover bottom on Blue Stone, thence to the Kanawha county line." The name is for George Wythe, eminent jurist and a Signer of the Declaration of Independence. Elected in 1779 to the Chair of Law and Police, recently established at the College of William and Mary, he "became the first occupant of a chair of law in America, and the second in the English speaking world." The first chair of law established in England was at Oxford University, and Sir William Blackstone was the first professor.