EARLY VIRGINIA BRANCHES Introduction: "The annals of Virginia record the name of a "Dodson Plantation" in 1632. And the traditional story in a large and now widely scattered line of descendants is that their ancestor lived along the James River and was one of the early Jamestown Colony. There is also mention of one John Dodson, who was a "mighty hunter"and "fur trader", and who in his dealings with the Indians became the possessor of large bodies of land. Another John very early found his way to the western side of Virginia to what is now Patrick County, and where his memory is preserved in the name of "Dodson Postoffice", but from which locality he long since pased away, leaving none behind him there of the Dodson name at this day. Descendants of the early Jamestown settler, from the various Virginia families of which traces are known, must have in the latter part of the century of their first settlement moved slowly to the western portions of the State. Among the earliest names positively known by descendants of a widely scattered family, as of the James River of Jamestown ancestors, are William and Jesse, and these most probably of the first or second generation from the original settler, as the following genealogical tables will show. Quite a number settled first in the valleys of the Blue Ridge Mountain region -Shenandoah Valley and others. During the latter part, or about the close of the War of the Revolution a large emigration left this region and settled in Kentucky and Tennessee, and later thence to Ohio, Indiana and Missouri." This is the article copied from the book. I dont thank any one has came up with documentation to prove this. The passenger list list a John Dods. age 36 years, in the Susan Constant, April, 1607. Jane, his wife, aged 40 years. How so many people got from Dods to Dodson I dont know But would like to see proof if their is any.m Russell Dodson