Mathews County’s VA250 Committee, like other localities across the U.S., has been busy making plans for the 250th anniversary celebration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
But Mathews has two things other cities and counties can’t lay claim to, said VA250 Committee Chair Fred Lyon: the Battle of Cricket Hill and an original musical that tells its story.
The battle, fought on July 9, 1776, was the final stand for Lord Dunmore, the last royal governor of Virginia. After making an encampment on Gwynn’s Island, Dunmore was vanquished by General Andrew Lewis, members of the 7th Virginia Regiment of the Continental Army, and local colonists, whom he haughtily dubbed “crickets.”
As part of the 250th anniversary celebration in Mathews, said Lyon, the VA250 Committee is teaming up with the Court House Players, a community theater group, to stage a production of “Crickets on a Hill,” the beloved musical written by the late Judy Ward, a Mathews native and regionally renowned sing...