Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Near Commonwealth Free Union, VA

Free Union is a tiny unincorporated census-designated place (CDP) in Albemarle County, Virginia, about ten miles north-northwest of Charlottesville in the foothills of the Blue Ridge.

Free Union had a population of just 187 at the 2020 census, down slightly from 193 in 2010, the first census in which it was listed as a CDP.

The hamlet takes its name from the Free Union Baptist Church, built in 1837: it was called "free" because all races were welcome to worship there, and a "union" because four Christian denominations that could not each afford their own church shared it.

Before it was Free Union, the village was known as Nicksville, after a free Black man named Nick who opened a blacksmith shop there in the early 19th century; the name changed when a post office was established in 1847 to avoid confusion with Nixville elsewhere in the county.

Church records from 1859 show the Free Union congregation had 110 members — 69 white and 41 Black — at a time when mixed-race congregations were customary in the area before the Civil War.

The village center today consists of little more than the private Free Union Country School, a doctor's office, a post office, a homebuilder, and several dozen homes, and the surrounding area is entirely rural in character.

The Ballard-Maupin House in Free Union was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1999.

Free Union has a humid subtropical climate, with about 46.8 inches of precipitation a year spread fairly evenly through the seasons, cold winters, and hot summers, according to NOAA climate normals.