Robert Burwell (1720–1777) – Encyclopedia Virginia encyclopediavirginia.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from encyclopediavirginia.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Print Made from Bodleian CopperplateBlair was the only recorded son of Archibald Blair and his first wife, whose name is not known. He was born in Scotland around 1687 and before his father immigrated to Virginia in the 1690s. He was educated at the College of William and Mary and lived virtually all of his life in Williamsburg.
Blair was a manager of the mercantile house in Williamsburg known as Dr. Blair’s Store, of which his father was the largest shareholder, until Archibald Blair died in 1733. For about fourteen years during the 1740s and 1750s Blair was a partner of John Blair Jr., the son of a cousin, in another Williamsburg store. The names of John Blair and John Blair Jr. often appear together in the records of York County. Blair also owned several valuable properties in Williamsburg, including the Raleigh Tavern, which he rented to a succession of tavern keepers and sold in 1742, and the Chowning Tavern, which he owned from 1726 to sometime before 1739. In 1745 Blair and