The Lloyd T. Smith, Jr. & Ashlin W. Smith Research Library at Historic Christ Church & Museum is open year-round by appointment. Please contact the Foundation office at info@christchurch1735.org or (804) 438-6855 to schedule an appointment. Researchers who show up without an appointment may not be able to access the archives or meet with volunteers and staff who can assist them, so please contact us in advance.
The museum does not undertake genealogical research for the public, but it does share its research materials and library with researchers by appointment.
Our skilled volunteers, many of whom are distinguished academics with doctoral degrees, have completed research projects that include the Parish Profile, the Carter Descendants' Database, the Corotoman Slave Histories, and a photographic and documentary history of Christ Church. The ongoing Parish Profile Project uses a range of local records to reconstruct the parish community during the period 1720–1750. Profiles of landholders and their households, along with other parishioners, are underway. A searchable Parish Profile Database will collate this information on the eighteenth-century residents of Christ Church Parish. The database is an ambitious project that will shape our understanding of the parish for years to come.
Research into Robert Carter's family and Thomas Carter's family and their descendants is also ongoing. More than 39,000 Carter family members have been recorded.
Our historians collaborate with other historical organizations in the region and support mutual projects for education and museum programs.
Recent projects include an archaeological investigation of the Thomas Carter home site in Lancaster County, undertaken in partnership with the Carter Society, Mary Ball Washington Museum and Library, Northern Neck of Virginia Historical Society, and the George Washington Birthplace National Monument.
