Most of the county records that Swem Library has are in published form, although there is a small collection of original county records in the Special Collections Division. Through natural or other disasters, some county records have been destroyed and therefore are not available for research. An excellent explanation of what has survived and why has been done at the Library of Virginia as one of its Va-Notes publications.
The Library of Virginia is the best place to examine local records. Whereas some local records are still housed in an individual county's courthouse, many original records have been transferred to the Library of Virginia. In addition, the Library of Virginia has actively microfilmed local records throughout the state, and users can read these local records on microfilm there or check them out personally or through interlibrary loan to view in their local libraries. For a description of their holdings, go to http://www.lva.lib.va.us/whatwehave/local/index.htm.
For a list of Swem Library's holdings of county records for a particular county, search the online catalog using the subject headings court records virginia, [county name] va genealogy,[county name] va history.
At Swem, two multi-volume works bring together a variety of records:
