Peter Beverley (1663 – 1728) was an English-born planter and lawyer who served as the speaker of the House of Burgesses and treasurer of Virginia. Born in England, he emigrated to the Colony of Virginia. Early and family life Beverley was the first of three sons born to Major Robert Beverley, and the only one borne by his first wife, Elizabeth, probably in Kingston upon Hull in Yorkshire, England, since he was christened in the parish of St. Mary Lowgate on May 7, 1663. His father emigrated to the Virginia colony after his first wife's death, and remarried. Thus, Peter may have been raised in England with relatives before emigrating to Virginia around the time of his father's second marriage, in March 1666. He also may have been sent back to England for his education. In 1687, after his father's death, Beverley married Elizabeth Peyton, the daughter of Major Robert Peyton. They had three daughters: Susanna, Elizabeth and Anne. Their daughter Elizabeth married William Randolph II around 1705 and had five children that lived to adulthood. Their daughter Susanna, married Sir John Randolph. Their daughter Anne married Henry Whiting, probably the son of the burgess of that name, who last served in 1684. Career By March 1681, Beverley was living in Middlesex County with his father, step-mother and soon his half-siblings. As the firstborn son, Peter Beverley acted as this father's agent in numerous land transactions which built a substantial estate in four counties. Around 1686, Peter Beverley became a licensed lawyer in the colony. Furthermore, although the crown had suspended his father from his public offices, Peter Beverley was appointed Middlesex County's surveyor, which Governor Effingham would later characterized as the county's most lucrative post. After his father's death, in March 1687 Peter Beverley moved to Gloucester County, where he took possession of the large estate he had inherited on the bank of the Piankatank River in Ware Parish. Beverley began wielding power in the colony as a whole in 1691, when both Lt. Governor Francis Nicholson and the House of Burgesses elected him as its clerk, the position his father had held for a decade. That became the first of several joint appointments, including as clerk of the General Court and the colony's Secretary (a position he transferred to his half-brother Robert Beverley in October 1693. In 1694, Peter Beverley became Clerk of Gloucester County, a position he