Near the south-eastern border of Virginia, in Southampton County, thereis a neighborhood known as "The Cross Keys." It lies fifteen miles fromJerusalem, the county-town, or "court-house," seventy miles from Norfolk,and about as far from Richmond. It is some ten or fifteen miles fromMurfreesborough in North Carolina, and about twenty-five from the GreatDismal Swamp. Up to Sunday, the 21st of August, 1831, there was nothingto distinguish it from any other rural, lethargic, slipshod Virginianeighborhood, with the due allotment of mansion-houses and log huts,tobacco-fields and "old-fields," mules, dogs, negroes, "poor blackfolks," so called, and other black folks, poor without being called so.0ne of these last was Joseph Travis, who had recently married the widowof one Putnam Moore, and had unfortunately wedded to himself her negroesalso.