Colonel Cole Digges

Cole Digges (1691-1744) was a Virginia merchant, planter and politician who helped establish Yorktown, Virginia, and served more than two decades on the Virginia Governor's Council after representing Warwick County in the House of Burgesses. Complicating matters, his three sons each named one of their sons after this man (their grandfather), and genealogists disagree as to their respective parentage. One of the three cousins died young circa 1769, the other in 1777 and the last, Cole Digges (patriot) became not only a significant politician like his grandfather and a Revolutionary War officer, but also built the other of the two historic houses in Virginia colloquially named the "Cole Digges House." Early life and education The eldest son of prominent planter and politician Dudley Digges(1665-1710) and his wife, the former Susanna Cole (1674-1708). She was the daughter of Captain William Cole, who had a plantation in Warwick County called Denbigh. His name presumably honors that maternal grandfather, whose plantations this man inherited. His birth family included two younger brothers, Edward (who died in England in 1711) and Dudley Digges Jr. (who moved several times as well as married Mary Hubard who bore two sons and three daughters, all of whom died without issue), and a sister Elizabeth. He received a private education appropriate to his class. Career