William Letcher, the maternal great-grandfather of James Ewell Brown Stuart, was born about 1750 near Petersburg, Virginia, the second son of Giles Letcher of Goochland County, an Irish-born merchant and later landowner, and Hannah Hughes, who was of Welsh descent. By the late 1770's, William had set out on his own, and on November 20, 1778, he married Elizabeth Perkins, daughter of Nicholas and Bethenia Harden Perkins of Perkins Ferry near Danville, Virginia. After marrying, they started west toward Kentucky but stopped in the far southwestern part of what was then Henry County, Virginia, later Patrick County, at a place called The Hollow, encircled by the Blue Ridge Mountains, Slate Mountain, and Little Mountain, with the Ararat River running through the valley. There, on a slight rise above the Ararat, he built a home, probably of logs, though no known documentation survives showing that he held title to the land, and his connection to it may have come through the Perkins family. While living there, he held as many as nine slaves, grew corn and tobacco in the bottomland, kept cattle, hogs, and horses, and owned household and farm goods recorded in an inventory at the Henry County Courthouse. On March 21, 1780, William and Elizabeth had a daughter, Bethenia. During the American Revolutionary War, Letcher was regarded as a natural leader and ardent Patriot supporter, active and prominent in the local militia; in 1779 he appeared on the payroll of Captain David Carlin's Henry County Militia, was appointed a justice of the peace for Henry County by the governor of Virginia, and according to a letter by his granddaughter, volunteered at the Battle of Shallow Ford on the Yadkin near Huntsville. The border region around The Hollow, along Virginia, North Carolina, and western North Carolina, was a stronghold of Tories and others loyal to the British Crown, who threatened and harassed local supporters of the Revolution, and Letcher's outspoken loyalty to the Patriot cause placed him in danger. Despite warnings, he reportedly hunted Tories from mountain hiding places and underestimated the threat against him until August 2, 1780, when, according to the most accepted account, a local Tory known as Nichols came to his home, demanded him in His Majesty's name, and shot him in the presence of his wife and daughter. Nichols was later captured, evidence linked him to the murder, and he was executed; another man involved tried to flee to Kentucky with his family but was killed by Native Americans along the Holston River. In the aftermath, patriots and Whigs in the area rounded up numerous Tories around The Hollow, and several were hanged. After Letcher's death, Elizabeth and Bethenia returned to Pittsylvania County, and Elizabeth later married George Hairston and lived at Beavercreek Plantation in Henry County. William Letcher was buried near his home site along the Ararat River, close to the place where he was killed, and before her death in 1845 Bethenia placed a white marble slab over his grave. The inscription identifies him as having been assassinated in his own house by a Tory of the Revolution on August 2, 1780, at about thirty years of age, and his grave is regarded as the oldest known inscribed grave in Patrick County.